• The Days of Thunder

  • -35000 DR to -30000 DR

    This earliest days of recorded history begins at the end of a great Ice Age, some 37,000 years ago, when the last glaciations largely ended and the great ocean receded to reveal dry land. In this ancient time before The Sundering, the lands which would one day be identified as Faerun, Kara-Tur, Maztica, and Zakhara were each but one part of a much larger super-continent named Merrouroboros. None of the dozen or so common races which populate the world today existed in this distant era. Merrouroboros knew none of the civilized folk - elves, dwarves, halflings, or gnomes. Nor did the savage peoples - goblins, orcs, ogres and their kin - inhabit the land. Though humans did exist during this time, they were primitive and apelike, using only simple tools and living in caves. These were the Days of Thunder, the time fo the Iqua-Tel'Quessir, the fabled creator races. »

  • c. -35000 DR

  • Rise of the Sarrukh Empires (sauroid creator race)
    The sarrukh establish the realm of Okoth, south of modern-day Mulhorand.  Within a hundred years, most of Faerûn is theirs. »

  • c. -34800 DR

  • The sarrukh establish the realm of Mhairshaulk, on the Chultan Peninsula westward from the Lhairghal to the Jungles of Chult.  The Mhairshaulkans are believed to have created nagas, pterafolk, troglodytes, and yuan-ti, as well as numerous other races long since lost. »

  • c. -34500 DR

  • The sarrukh establish the realm of Isstosseffifil, based in present-day Anauroch. »

  • c. -34100 DR

  • Fall of Okoth
    After a century of civil strife that drove many sarrukh of Okoth to the planes, the Okoth Empire collapses.

    The clans of Sarrukh wandered the planes for millennia but never found a plane where they wished to remain for more than a generation. This nomadic existence hardens them, turning them inexorably toward evil.

    As the sarrukh of Okoth increasingly embraced their darker natures, a few dissenters, despairing of their kindred's push toward evil, broke off from the main group. They entreated Jazirian, a fragment of the World Serpent, for succor, and it responded by transforming them into couatls. A bitter war ensued, but the couatls held their own against the more numerous Okothian sarrukh until Merrshaulk, a darker fragment of the World Serpent, finally slew Jazirian. At that point, the couatls were forced to flee to Abeir-Toril, where they eventually settled in Maztica. The god Qotal embraced them as his divine minions, and they acknowledged him as Jazirian reborn.

    After the war with the couatls, the sarrukh begin to explore the Barrens of Doom and Despair, where they happened upon the khaastas. Believing these creatures to be inferior and weak reptilians, the sarrukh attempt to enslave them. Much to the invaders surprise, not only were the khaastas extremely resistant to serving, but they also had powerful demonic allies willing to aid them. Thus begins a centuries long war between the sarrukh and the khaastas, which the sarrukh eventually lose. To escape the wrath of the victorious khaastas, the sarrukh secretly return to Faerun and begin skulking around the ruins of Okoth, on the shores of the Azulduth. »

  • c. -34000 DR

  • The otherworldly realm of Faerie is ruled by the fey (creators of korreds, sprites, and pixies).  The fey continue to rule to the present day. »

  • c. -33800 DR

  • Fall of Isstosseffifil:
    In an effort to drown the phaerimm of Phaerlin (known today as the Buried Realms in the Underdark) and dispatch their enemies in one masterful stroke, Isstossef wizards rerouted the Narrow Sea so that it ran from east to west, inundating the land around the chain of hills known today as the Tagorlar with water.  Although the Isstossef succeeded in driving the phaerimms deep into the Underdark, the massive ecological change resulting from their weavings of Art caused the Isstosseffifil empire to collapse.

    Although most of the sarrukh of Isstosseffifil died with the city's decline, many survived. The survivors retreated into lichdom in the depths of Oreme where they are protected by the asabis they had created. »

  • c. -33500 DR

  • Fall of Mhairshaulk
    Sarrukh-ruled Mhairshaulk, faced with starvation, declines gradually, sinking slowly into somnolence. The sarrukhs begin a cycle in which thousand-year hibernations alternate with brief periods of activity, during which food gathering and procreation could take place. The empire becomes the domain of the yuan-ti. »

  • Fall of the Sarrukh Empire »

  • Rise of the Batrachi Empire. The batrachi (creator race) are also known as amphibioids or creators of the bullywugs, doppelgangers, kopru, kuo-toa, locathah, sivs, tako, and other shapeshifters, amphibious or piscine races. »

  • c. -31500 DR

  • Under the wise leadership of Zhoukoudien, batrachi power reaches its zenith. The High One's reign ends when he is slain in battle with the titan thane Omo. »

  • c. -31000 DR

  • Rise of the Aearee Empires (avian creator races). In the west, the Aearee-Krocaa establish the grand aerie of Viakoo on Mount Havraquoar, which becomes the capital of their great nation. In the north, the Aearee-Syran establish their capital at the aerie of Phwiukree, in the peaks of the Star Mounts. In the southeast, the Aearee-Quor carve out the domain of Shara from their rookery in the Orsraun Mountains. »

  • An unimaginable catastrophe strikes Abeir-Toril. Whole continents vanish in earthquakes, fires, and windstorms, and the seas are rearranged. Ancient sarrukh accounts remark on the "changing of the stars", but no one now knows what this might mean.

    Most scholars now speculate that at about this date a comet or ice moon fell from the sky, devastating much of Abeir-Toril, and refer to this event as the Tearfall. The four Inner Seas merge together to form the body of water known today as the Sea of Fallen Stars. Tens of thousands of dragon eggs soon hatch across Toril. The dramatic climate change that followed quickly brought an end to the batrachi civilization. »

  • c. -30700 DR

  • Lammasu Massacre
    One thousand Aearee-Krocaa lose their lives to a much smaller force of lammasu. Later experiments with domesticated landwyrms produce the first winged wyrms, which the aearee name wyverns. Thanks to its new wyvern armies, the Aearee-Krocaa empire expands rapidly. »

  • -30400 DR

  • The Wasting Plague
    In a conflict between the gnolls of Urgnarash and rookery of Kookrui-Shara, shamans of Yeenoghu summons marrashi - spirits of pestilence from the Barrens of Doom and Despair - to blight aearee crops and spread a wasting plague among the avians. Decimated, many Aearee-Quor turn to the demon lord Pazrael for salvation. »

  • The Dawn Ages / The Time of Dragons

  • -30000 DR to -24000 DR
    The empires of the creator races fade into memory, ushering in the Time of Dragons and the Time of Giants. Individual dragons and dragon clans rule large swaths of territory and battle with their rivals for control of the lands, seas, and skies. During this period of devastating warfare among the dragons of Faerun, isolated pockets of formerly dragon-ruled territory fall under giant control. Over time, such giant-ruled kingdoms come to threaten the hegemony of dragonkind, leading to great battles between giant kingdoms such as Darchar, Grunfesting, Helligheim, Nedeheim, Ostoria, and Rangfjell, and dragon-ruled realms such as Argissthilliax, Caesinmalsvir, Darastriverthicha, and Tharkrixghontix. »

  • -30000 DR

  • The Ba'etith create the Golden Skins of the World Serpent, known today as the Nether Scrolls »

  • For his betrayal during the War of the Seldarine, the solar Malkizid is branded and thrown down into the Nine Hells. »

  • The great giant god Annam All-Father marries Othea, a lesser demigoddes of Toril. Their union produces eight terrestrial children. Ostoria, the Colossal Kingdom, is founded by Annam in honor of his sons. »

  • Fall of the Aearee Empires
    The Time of Dragons is ushered in as dragons across Faerun swarm together in the first Flight of Dragons. They assail the avians in the air, on the land, and beneath the ground. They fall upon the home nest of Viakoo and burn the city from the sky. In the caverns beneath the Orsraun Mountains, the wyrm-general Nagamat rampages through the ancestral hatcheries of Shara and claims the kingdom as his own. »

  • War of the Seldarine
    Araushnee is cast down into the Demonweb Pits, where she becomes the demon-goddess Lolth. »