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"I had the good fortune to get to revamp and update those areas in LANDS OF INTRIGUE and EMPIRES OF THE SHINING SEA. My major contributions were in finishing the Restoration of Tethyr, making Amn a little more aware of the consequences of its actions (i.e. Maztica, ogre mages, rebel cities, etc.), and making Calimshan less Arabian and more Turkish / Ottoman Empire (since we had AL-QADIM covering the Arabian stuff quite well)."

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Calimshan--Medieval Turkey and Byzantine Empire

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I'll be the first to confess that Turkish history and culture had a lot more play than I expected it would when I was writing up Calimshan in Empires of the Shining Sea. The main reason I layered in more Turkish grace notes was to differentiate Calishites from the Bedine and the Zakharans, both cultures being far more directly Arabic in inspiration.

As for the Amn / Tethyr bits, you guys are on the mark; there is probably more Calishite leftover culture in Amn because they were always a bit removed from the lash, unlike Tethyr. Thus, while both were born from a mix of immigrant conquerors/overlords from Calimshan, Amn and Tethyr have their touches of the south in varying degrees. That's why I always hint at the links to Moorish Spain and southern France for them--the architecture and some of the religion and customs remain, even if they outwardly hate the culture from which it came.

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Originally posted by Cleric Generic

The artist commissioned to do the art, or whoever got them to do it, was probably just not a hard-core realms nerd and went with what they knew. Ed and other realmsian authors/designers/etc in general are (in my experience) pretty clear that real world inspirations and influences in Toril are vague and distant, but you'd really have to be eyeball deep in the lore for that to mean a whole lot.

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Originally posted by Jorkens

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Originally posted by Cleric Generic

The artist commissioned to do the art, or whoever got them to do it, was probably just not a hard-core realms nerd and went with what they knew. Ed and other realmsian authors/designers/etc in general are (in my experience) pretty clear that real world inspirations and influences in Toril are vague and distant, but you'd really have to be eyeball deep in the lore for that to mean a whole lot.

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Well, FR3 was published in '88, so the framework was still loose. I would say that more than one designer was clear in adding Real World elements, especially names, but Haring this book is not one of them (as I said, as far as I remember). But still Calimshan got marked with an "arabic" feel when talked about. Was this from Salvatore or some other novel?

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Originally posted by Jorkens

Ah, I finally have the book in front of me.

Well, the genies are part of a general tie to the plane of Air. The genies are mentioned along with other elemental creatures. The words and terms used are not "Real world". The names used are rather neutral and the cultural references are not tied to any specific earthly culture; there is a Rashid, but also a Duncan and Anders among the Pashas. Viziers has been used all over the place in fantasy history, although the Turkish Pasha seems a bit out of place. There are desert bandits, but no nomads or Bedouin-like tribes are mentioned. To call it Arabic from the information in F3 becomes a bit like calling Cormyr French to me because it has knights, kings and feudal elements. In many ways I think the late 2nd edition version of Calimshan is far more "Middle Eastern" than the old version.

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Originally posted by Jorkens

I agree that there are a few elements included, but I still find it a bit strange that it has been included in the areas that shows strong "Real World" elements. Compared with the Moonshae's, Anauroch, Hordelands (and neighbours) and Ancient Empires there is not that to base it on in the early published material. The reason that I am mentioning this is that I only recently got my hands on F3, and I was surprised, as I always thought the product to be responsible for the image, but if I had bought it fifteen-twenty years ago, before I knew anything about the region, I don't think it would have brought forth an image of a middle eastern culture to me personally.

I am curious; Thauramath, and those here that have used the Realms since its earliest days, was there always an image of the region as a "Thousand-and-One-Nights" region when you read the gaming products or was that an element that came later (if at all)? I don't mean if you ran it that way, but how the books read to you.

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Originally posted by Thauramarth
I don't disagree. It's just that I feel that there are some elements in there that authors could latch on to to depict Calimshan as "Arabic".

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It is really hard, more than twenty years on (I'm getting old) to remember how I read the materials originally. But no, I don't think that at the time I got the impression that it was supposed to be the Realms' equivalent of pulp Arabia, even less so after Arabian Adventures and Al-Qadim were published. I've never really given much thought to how I would have run Calimshan, as I have not really run any games there. I'll admit that the 1001 Nights is an easy trap to fall into. Lack of imagination on my part, I suppose, and watching "Lawrence of Arabia" one times too many: hot, desert, swords, genies - one small step. Nowadays, and still assuming that I am too lazy to work out something for myself, I'd probably go with an adaptation of Dorne from A Song of Ice and Fire.

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