Reș

The Reș people are an ethnolinguistic group of Nebyetic origin identified by their use of the Risorese language, a South West Sumric language, and ancestry from earlier Misiurina people who did not convert to Lesgveiskism. Those who did would go on to become the Medduri people.

=Ethnonym= The modern name Reș is from the Early Meddió, an originally derogatory term meaning “heathen” used by Misiurina converts to Lesgveiskism to mock those who kept the native belief system (descending from Golden Age Mythology). Going further it traces back to Misiuri which was loaned from South Middle Mangeodge rapadisi (“foreign scum, heathen”), from Old Mangeodge drapadisi which is made up of drapadi (“vermin, pest, rat”) and si (“foreigner”). While it was originally used against the non-converts as an insult it eventually became a term of kinship among them and eventually their ethnonym.

=Origin= Like all speakers of Sumric languages, the Reș descend from the nomadic Old Sumrë speaking Sumnė whose culture flourished during the 20th to 29th centuries AN, a time known as the Sumric Golden Age. Several regional factors in many places marked the end of this age. One in particular was the Khyldau disease which affected many herbivorous game species in the South West of Malomanan. Since the Sumnė relied heavily upon hunting this had a devastating blow to those in that area. The symptoms of Khyldau included hydrophobia, aggregassion and fearlessness towards predators, with death being an eventual result of the hydrophobia. Eating infected meat brought the risk of humans becoming infected which did happen albeit infrequently. This forced the survivors to change diet and for those in the far west the next most available choice of meat was fish. Around the 37th century is when these people became a distinct ethnicity and around the 39th century is when their language diverged from Middle Sumri into Misiuri. These new people called themselves the meaning “Misiuri people” “Misiuri speaking people”. They lived in what is now the east of modern day Meddiorn and eventually they caught the attention of their Mangeodge neighbours to the north when their territories reached the borders of Meilvarestu. The Lesgveiski Church of Meilvarestu reacted by attempting to convert the Misiurina to Lesgveiskism which had limited success. This eventually escalated into crusades against the Misiurina until the church decided it was not worth the effort. However those who had been successfully converted maintained this mindset and they saught to convert the rest if their Misiurini kin. This resulted in a series of crusades and wars which finally ended with The Last Crusade, a bloody and widespread massacre that left thousands of unconverted Misiurina slaughtered. The survivors were chased out of the country altogether and with help from Nusiba they fled to what is now Vitsoresh, at the time a mostly uninhabited pensinsula. The refugees made the peninsula their home and saught to carve out their own Reș indentity to distinguish themselves from their hated Meddiorn kin, embracing the many influences from their neighbouring countries...except Meddiorn.