History of Lovia

Lovia

The Lovia Archipelago, undiscovered for many years

This article describes the full and rich history of Lovia, starting from the colonization and the monarchy, ending in the present time.

First mentioned

Andreas van Velthoven

There is no evidence of prehistoric human life, nor of pre-modern human activity in the Lovia Archipelago. This is questioned by a number of academics and amateur researchers in Lovia and the United States, most notably Pierlot McCrooke.

The archipelago is first mentioned in the 1580s, when Francis Drake explored the Pacific shore of Latin America and California. After having visited the San Francisco Bay Area, Drake went westward. In his diary a small and green-looking archipelago is mentioned: "the islands [...] are greene & some of them are remarkably hilly. [The islands] are not on any of my maps though." It is generally believed Drake was referring to the Lovia Archipelago. Although Drake did not mention whether he or his crew went on land, some historians believe they did. If so, Kings Island's east coast is believed to be the most plausible location.

Miguel Castillo y Espada is another early explorer who is purported to have arrived in Lovia in the 18th century, during the era of Spanish exploratiion in the Pacific Northwest. And Andreas van Velthoven is another (mytohlogical) figure featuring in this period, who is sometimes claimed to have discovered Lovia.

In 1849 gold was found in California and thousands of Asians came over. Some of these transports passed the Lovia archipelago, although neither the crew nor the passengers were conscious. In 1852 a Chinese ship was shipwrecked near the Lovia Archipelago. Some of the passengers reached the most northern island of the archipelago, now called Asian Island. They were picked up four months later and seemed well fed. After years, one of them went working for a Californian newspaper and published a story of the Pacific Islands, as he called them.

"Imagine Paradise. Image a green island, with hills, fruit and clear blue water. Imagine all you've read in the Bible, imagine what Thomas More has written. Imagine perfection, it's out there. Miles off the Californian coast, past the Channel Islands, the Pacific Islands wait for you to be discovered."

In 2012, documents were released from the LDS archives, which showed that Brigham Young during the late 1860s had investigated the possibility of relocating the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints from Utah to somewhere in the Pacific where they could be safe from anti-polygamy persecutions. He sent a small group of explorers to search for the Pacific Islands mentioned in the Californian newspaper and investigate their suitability for settlement. The Mormon explorers landed and spent five days on American Island, which they named Bountiful after the location in the Book of Mormon. Following their arrival back in Salt Lake City, Brigham Young made provisional plans to relocate the Mormons from Utah to Lovia in the event of further persecutions, but the plans eventually came to nothing.

Kingdom of Lovia

Main article: Kingdom of Lovia.

Arthur Noble

Arthur I

Arthur Nobel, a young Belgian man, moved to San Francisco in 1872. He was a journalist and going through the archives of all the papers in order to find some writing material. That same year he found the article on the Pacific Islands. He found an investor and chartered a ship, Francis II, to go to the mysterious archipelago. It didn't take long and after a few days they reached Lovia. Arthur Nobel founded the first settlement and went back to San Francisco in 1875. He published hundreds of advertisements in American and European newspapers and returned in 1876 with more than 1500 people. That year, the settlers voted to establish a monarchy, with Arthur as its first king, and the settlement Noble City was named after him.

The next years King Arthur I reigned over Lovia very well and the population kept growing. In the year 1876 there were about 4000 citizens.

Arthur I's original plan was for Lovia to be a strongly centralized state, with an official language (either English or Dutch) and a homogenized population, which might perhaps eventually be able to apply to become a US state. Because of the wide variation in nationality and language of the first immigrants, however, this was not succesful, due to the fact that people of different nationalities tended to settle together and retain their own culture. Over time, obviously, almost all of Lovia became Anglophone, some areas (such as Kings) faster than others (such as Oceana).

Population growth

In 1887 Arthur I died from natural causes and his son Arthur II inherited the throne. In the meantime the population had increased even more and had reached 10,000 inhabitants. By 1900 there were about 20,000 inhabitants and by 1912 30,000.

By the time of Arthur I's death, however the monarchy had failed in maintaining its authority except in a small region around Noble City. Some local leaders, for example, were able to muster their own police forces which were much larger and more loyal than the king's. Arthur II pursued a much more pragmatic policy, giving away legal power to several local leaders in exchange for their allegiance, for example to the Springhorses and to the early Chinese settlers of Clymene (notably not to Nikolai Sharapov who refused to deal with the Lovians). Most of Kings and Sylvania remained, at least nominally, under the personal control of the King. This approach too failed after about ten years, for a number of reasons; conflict between the mainly Dutch-speaking population of Kings who wanted self-rule from the mainly English-speakers of Sylvania, conflict between the Americans and Eastern Europeans in Collinia, as well as disputes over territorial boundaries all over the country.

20th Century

Lovia's States

The unstable political situation caused was not resolved until, after some unrest, almost a hundred local leaders met with the King in 1904 to sign a document giving away further legal powers. Following fierce discussion and debate, five federal states were formed, each with a dominant language and culture. These were as follows:

• Sylvania - inhabited by a variety of people whom where either part of the original Pale of those loyal to the King, Bostaat and Stephen's Land or small independent territories that where on Peace Island or Discovery Isle. The largest population group was of American descent and so most institutions were Anglicised although due to the large amount of non-English speakers no pro-Anglophone policies where enacted as was the case in America.
• Kings - inhabited by Europeans. The state was divided into zones with no real borders: the East was inhabited primarily by French settlers (hailing from France and Walloon), the North by German settlers (usually Prussian), the South by Dutch settlers (hailing from the Netherlands and Flanders), and the West by British settlers. The few American settlers usually settled in the Western zone. Due to the more common language with the rest of Lovia, Newhaven became the capital of the state.
• Oceana - originally controlled by a conglomerate of companies owned exclusively by American entrepreneurs, it was agreed that this American domination would be eliminated and power would be almost exclusively owned by the Slovaks and Poles. In exchange for favouring the Slovaks and Poles over the Americans, Oceana retracted its Collinian claims to the territories of Bostaat although was granted rights to its predecessors claim to all land south of the Beaver River.
• Clymene - inhabited by four major groups: Chinese, Bredish (including Germans, Dutch, and British), Slavs, and Americans. In general, the four groups seemed to have no significant divisions between them. The largest city of the region, Sofasi, became the capital of the state due to its mixed cultural nature.
• Seven - where the main parties (the people of Kinley (mostly Americans) and Novosevensk (mostly Russians)) refused to compromise. In the end the declaration simply stated, rather vaguely, 'all groups shall share in the responsibility of governing.' In practice, virtually all governors were from Kinley, and Novosevensk shortly after retreated back into isolation and autarky.

In 1905, the Declaration of the Founding of Lovian States was officially signed by the king and thus made into law. The document is still law in the nation, although as it only relates to the land boundaries of the States and due to this it has not been changed since it was signed into law.

Over the next fifty years or so, the new states ruled themselves, fairly democratically. Little action took place on the federal level, because the governors were fairly competent and people had little in common with those in other states. Most people identified themselves as by their state e.g. as Sylvanians rather than Lovians. Though the king was an important figure as representative of the whole nation and a unifying symbol, he continued to have little political power. There was no defined mechanism for making federal laws - on a couple of issues, however, the first nationwide laws were created: first, an agreement that no state would raise an army or go to war without agreement from all, and secondly a document in which each state pledged to democratically elect councils to assist them in running their states. These documents were signed by all governors as well as the king.

Arthur II was rather socialist and leftist in his viewpoints, which was unique for his era. Unlike the United States, under his reign Lovia did not join the First World War, as the Lovian population was too low and the King refused to send troops, although he supported the allies financially. The late 1920s saw the rise of prohibition and subsequently organized crime.

In the 1930s, the situation began to change. Depression caused large-scale migration between states as people searched for work, and with the clash of cultures and economic pressure over limited resources came conflict. Lovia was forced to develop a way of resolving interstate conflict, and at first it was left up to the king as a neutral arbiter. This proved inadequate after a dispute arose between Sylvania and the other states. Sylvania's economy had recovered rapidly after the depression, due to heavy government spending, but also because of the presence of a large immigrant workforce from the other states. However, by 1935 it was feeling the impact of the large budget deficit it had accumulated and the new governor, Princess Lucy, attempted to deal with this problem by raising taxes on resident non-Sylvanians (who did not have voting rights). This was deeply unpopular with the other poorer states, the economies of which relied to some extent on remittances from migrant workers in Sylvania. They appealed to the king, who ruled in favour of Sylvania, but the states refused to accept his arbitration because they claimed he was biased towards his daughter. In 1936, the tension reached a climax when Oceana, Clymene and Kings threatened to secede from the confederation unless a democratic body was created on the federal level. Arthur backed down and created the Royal Legislative Council, which essentially took over the role of the king with regard to arbitration.

The king was murdered in 1938, perhaps due to the controversy (though there is a theory he was killed by a German spy), and his daughter Queen Lucy I, the first and only Lovian ruling queen, took over the throne after a long period of arguments about who would inherit the throne, even though Arthur had always made it very clear the eldest child would inherit the throne regardless of its sex.

Initially unpopular (for reasons stated above), she quickly moved to conciliate the people of Lovia, by increasing representation of the smaller states in the RLC and helping to restrict the states' power to legislate against each other. Once again, the states' autonomy began to increase. However, with the immigration between states of the 1930s, and the creation of a shared Lovian culture, isolationism was no longer an option. States began to form bodies in order to work together, for instance the North Lovian Union, which imposed economic union on the north of Lovia, including the same tax system, and interstate trade tariffs were banned. This additional layer of government made politics very complex and inefficient, with overlapping competencies. Irregularities compounded the problem, such as the fact that Cape Donald District in Kings was a member of the NLU but the rest of Kings wasn't.

Despite the perceived threat of Japanese domination of the Pacific, Queen Lucy I kept to Arthur's policy and didn't enter World War II. Despite this, some Lovian men went to California to join the American troops in World War II, with the permission of the US Army and the Lovian queen.

In 1942, the queen, who already had been playing a far smaller role than her father, retired altogether, appointing Gilbert T. Brand as the first prime minister to replace her. Brand was a keen exponent of centralisation and efficient government, and attempted to break the states' power. Although he wasn't completely successful, for the first time the laws began to be made systematically on the federal level, and states did lose a significant amount of their legislative authority. The Council began to include some democratically elected people, and this period is generally considered a high point of Lovian democracy. As a whole, the country boomed - not only the population grew, but also trade and wealth. Noble City had become an important port between California and the Far East. The Lovian culture bloomed, and literature became a true trademark. Queen Lucy is seen as one of Lovia's best monarchs and as one of the best female leaders in the world. She was succeeded by her eldest son, King Lucas I, in 1953.

The new king retained his mother's policies of non-involvement in politics and did not attempt to revert to any of the features of the former period. Nevertheless, the period coincided with the collapse of the Lovian economy, and around 1955 the Lovian population growth started stagnating. The situation was seriously worsened by natural disaster, when Lovia suffered from famine in 1956 and poverty increased. The famines drastically altered the political situation. Chaos ensued and neither the states nor the federal government was able to enforce their authority. It was particularly difficult for the states as hard times once again caused a huge number of Lovians to uproot and move elsewhere. Lovia became what could be described today as a 'failed state.' When the famines subsided, people called for a strong figure and a centralised government. King Lucas I, who was seen as weak and the person responsible for the famines, was deposed, after three years of reigning Lovia. Lucas' brother, King Arthur III took over the throne and fortunately the harvests became better in 1957 and the problems seemed to be over, more as a result of the climate than of the reign of the new king.

Reign of King Arthur

Arthur immediately set about cutting the states, heavily weakened by the famines, down to size. Lovia became a much more authoritarian place - few members of the RLC were elected, and the King played a strong role, with a veto right which he exercised rather too often for an unelected monarch. The governors had little responsibility except appointing members of the RLC.

With food supply coming back to normal in 1961 and the centralized control of state activities, Lovia began to stabilize although the economy remained very fragile. The RLC of the 60s continued to practice the authoritarian management of the 50s. One member of the RLC called Bairn Sawyer, who was a Keynesian thinker and self-proclaimed socialist, gained influence from 1962 onwards, particularly in economic policy. This was done with the support of socialist Governors and approval from the King. His economic policy outlined high spending while maintaining low taxes and began the subsidy of weak industries to try and turn the focus in Lovia away from agriculture (the primary industry in Seven, Clymene, Kings and Sylvania) and towards manufacturing and services. The economy of Lovia grew dramatically bringing the economic turbulence of the 50s to an end. Sawyer's investment in technology also bore fruit - the industry took off in Sylvania and was a driving force in keeping Lovia up to speed with other first world nations.

By 1965, Sawyer's economic management had ensured most Lovians saw their pay increase dramatically. Most middle class families could afford to buy and keep a car (most of which were imported from the U.S.) and crime went down along with poverty. However, with the economic crisis seemingly over, many youths adopted ideas from American popular culture and multiple protest groups appeared. While the largest groups were the feminist movements and gay rights movements, most groups failed to make any concrete achievements (possibly due to the fact that Lovian society was already rather liberal) although they caused a number of tensions in conservative areas such as Oceana and parts of Seven.

By 1969, Sawyer's administration had accumulated a relatively large budget deficit and the King expressed his concern. Further pressure was put on the administration by growing opposition from liberal governors (such as Davis Miller and Edward M. Roscoe) and conservative governors (such as Mitch Cromwood), who demanded action be taken to shrink the deficit. Sawyer in response was forced to reverse much of his economic plan, cutting subsidies to many industries, and many people lost their jobs as a result. This effectively brought the boom of the late '60s to an end and Sawyer, while remaining in the RLC, had lost favour with his key supporters, and more importantly, the King.

In 1971 the economic growth of the states stalled and in 1972 growth was so low that inflation began to affect the economy dramatically, and Bairn Sawyer, having been blamed for the crisis, was expelled from the RLC. Another serious blow was dealt to the economy by the 1973 oil crisis which hugely increased the cost of oil. Car use dropped dramatically and remained low until the 1980s. A nationwide recession began, with the states whose industries were primarily based on agriculture and manufacturing being hit the hardest. Unemployment rose dramatically and many Lovians were terrified by the possibility of returning to a 1950s style depression. Support for extremist groups who promised to solve the problems grew and threatened to destabilize the nation.

Major social problems during the 70s came from the unemployed and the middle class. After many coal mines (originally an alternative energy source) had been shut and the Lovian motor industry collapsed, workers from these industries began serious protests in Noble City demanding the government find a solution. The middle class demanded that alternative fuel sources be found, but although oil and gas fields were found all across Lovia's exclusive economic zone in 1974, lobbying by environmentalists and sympathy within the RLC ensured that little exploitation actually took place.

In 1977 the feminist movement attempted to return to Lovia as it had across the US. The movement operated out of California and paid members to go and protest, but the movement appeared out of touch to ordinary Lovians who felt economic problems were a priority. Nonetheless, little was done about the economy, which was blamed on the lack of leadership in the RLC and the state governments.

Recession spread into the 1980s, but in 1981 the Governors of the states came together to organize a plan for recovery and they formed a liberal faction in the RLC, led by Rita D. Frances together with her brother Rick throughout the 1980s and '90s. The faction gained influence and brought around a change of policies, largely based around liberalization of the economy and deficit reduction, although this met with opposition from the weakening socialist and Sawyerite factions. The effects of these policies was a stabilization of the economy, a decrease in private debts and an increase in foreign trade. More negatively, inequality increased, social tensions grew, and unemployment remained high. From the perspective of many ordinary Lovians, the improvement in the country's economic health seemed to do little to boost their standard of living, and as a result, opposition to the liberal plans grew in the early 1980s.

In 1984 opposition reached a peak, and riots broke out in Noble City, as well as a few other smaller towns. Homes of supporters of the liberals were attacked, as was the property of the corporate sponsors. Due to this, by 1986 the liberals were at their weakest, particularly when Frances lost her position as Governor of Sylvania. By now, however, most states had begun to recover and economic growth accelerated. By the late 1980s, the Lovian economy was growing at a phenomenal rate equal to that of the '60s boom. The energy crisis was ended, as increased wealth enabled increases in fuel imports. Exploitation of local deposits also increased, though still restricted by environmentalist who had strong support among both the RLC and the general population.

By the early '90s recovery was complete. The Lovian economy was enjoying its first period of sustained growth for decades, particularly in the service industry. Lovia had also become much more self-sufficient with regard to fuel. In an attempt to liberalize the economy, the slow process of centralization, which had been accepted for 40 years, was reversed, and the states enjoyed their greatest amount of freedom for 40 years.

During Dimitri I

The Congress: the main federal institution according to the new Constitution

In 2007, King Arthur III died, and there wasn't an obvious heir to the throne since Arthur left no legitimate children. For months, the economy was in recession. In November King Dimitri I, a nephew of the former king was chosen and crowned. After this point, the economy began to recover.

Politics changed significantly under the reign of King Dimitri I. He drafted a new Constitution, which was signed in December. Under the new Constitution, the government was made more democratic. Federal (Congress) and State (Governor) Elections were held and federal and state institutions were founded. Yuri Medvedev became the Prime Minister, taking control of a large portion of the king's power. The Medvedev I Government ruled the country starting on February 1, 2008.

The Hurbanovans started protesting against the Lovian government and monarch after some provocations in March and April. They claimed independency, but after a short period, the Lovian government regained power. As a result of this, Lovia quit the United Wiki Nations (who had been sympathetic to the rebels) in 2008 after a Congressional decision.

In May 2008, Mid-term Elections were held and Congress gained five new members. King Dimitri decided to step down on August 11, citing personal reasons.

Republican period

Yuri Medvedev, Prime Minister, continued his work as chief of state and introduced the "Lovian state democracy". The system looked very similar to the previous one, with one major difference: there was no king anymore. After a short while, Medvedev fell into inactivity and Lovia became a silent place once more. The population decreased and a new economic crisis would hit the archipelago. Many attempts were done to bring back democracy and government to Lovia, but all failed. The democratically elected Congress ended on February 1, 2009, and since that day Lovia had been totally ungoverned.

Lovian Civil War

On October 3, 2011, the Lovian Civil War broke out.

Under Sebastian I

King Sebastian I of Lovia

On August 26, 2013, Dimitri abdicated from the throne following a sharp decline popularity starting during and after the Civil War. He gave up his right to the throne because of said impopularity, largely caused by the King's inactivity, his refusal to perform his royal duties and, according to an interview with Hugo Mendes in September 2013 "because of his wife's ill health".

During the two years following the war, Dimitri's respect and standing among the Lovian people dropped dramatically. At the same time his cousin Sebastian rose to promince. On the 26th of August, Sebastian ascended to the throne as King Sebastian I of Lovia. Prince Alexander also gave up on his right to the throne, thus the throne passed on to Sebastian and his descendents. Sebastian became a much more active monarch, frequently giving speeches and intereacting often with the people. Under him the popularity of the Royal Family of Lovia began to grow once again, amidst much criticism it received from the Republican side of Lovia's citizens in earlier years. One of the main reasons for Dimitri's impopularity was his inability to act when Civil War swept the nation. Sebastian, however, valiantly took up arms to fight against the enemies of Lovia, and is said to have personally taken out one of Lovia's most dangerous men; IGP leader Hessel Doorian. He openly called his cousin a coward and called for him to step down repeatedly. Following the Donia Coup, when Ygo August Donia and his personal militia attacked the Royal Palace, Dimitri fled. This was once again widely regarded as a cowardly action and cost Dimitri even more popularity. Not wanting to lose goodwill with the Lovian people even more, and with his family's best interest in mind, Dimitri finally stepped down. During Sebastian's rule, republic sentiments largely died down. Calls for the abolishment of the monarchy greatly lessened.

Burenian invasion

On May 22nd, 2014, Burenia invaded Lovia. They took control over Plains and Hurbanova fairly soon, but did not have too much success in their attempts to take control over other settlements as well.

See also

• Lovia
• Lovian art history