Difference between revisions of "Imperium (city)"

Revision as of 23:01, 28 September 2005

The city of Imperium rests upon the New Thames River on the island of New Britain and serves as the capital for both the Republic of New Britain as well as the whole of the United Kingdom of Azazia. The large urban metropolis boasts a population of over 47 million people in its immediate environs with a further 23 living outside the city along the banks of the New Thames, primarily in the southern direction as routes to the north and west are blocked by mountains.

Imperium holds the honour of being the seat of Parliament for the whole of the United Kingdom, and as such is the centre of national Azazian politics. Additionally, the monarchy maintains a palace and several mansions within the city limits, although the primary residence has been shifting to a mountain retreat on the northern fringes of the Imperium metropolis.

History

The site of modern day Imperium once boasted a small inlet for a tributary that afforded English explorers a safe location in which they could spend the night – and consequently beginning sending out expeditions from their troop ships. At the sight of the confluence the English settlers founded a village called Georgetown. From Georgetown the rapid influx of English immigrants moved northwards founding the then-independent towns of Bradbury, North Chester, Fordsbury, and Franklin.

As English expansion continued at the expense of the native Azazian Empire, the native Azazians took to sailing up the New Thames River at night and raiding Georgetown with its lack of permanent defences. The raids became so devastating that a royal governor was kidnapped and held hostage before his ransom was paid. This act precipitated the shift of development to the more defensible east bank, where upon a small hill the settlers erected mansions for the royal governor, the mayor, and the military office in charge of defence. These structures were then contained within a heavily fortified brick structure that became known as the Citadel. Although changes have been made over the centuries, the Citadel remains the seat of power for the island of New Britain, and now the whole United Kingdom.

With the discovery of small deposits of iron and silver in the mountains to the west, the city began to ship its iron westward towards the newly founded port of St. Brendans, where deposits of coal made the establishment of iron and later steel industries not only feasible, but economically profitable. From this point onwards, in part due to the burgeoning economic success of St. Brendans and later towns such as Philadelphia, Portsmouth, and Artega, the city of Georgetown declined in economic importance.

Throughout the nineteenth century, the city of Georgetown grew in direct competition as a banking centre. While St. Brendans featured national and regional banks, Georgetown’s financial importance grew as England dispatched capital to be invested in her colony and while the newer foreign colonies of Amsterdam, Paris, and Moscow sought trade with the profitable English colony, a colony in which they could only gain access through Georgetown.

The state of affairs continued as such with development progressing rapidly in addition to the continuing influx of immigrants. The elaborate rail system of the United Kingdom also found its foundations in these earlier days as the first rail route was established between Georgetown and Clifton Heights, from which the ores mined to the west of Georgetown and in the silver-mining town appropriately named Silverton were dispatched by cargo ship to St. Brendans only two days distant by steam-powered ship. Roads grew in importance as did the maritime transit network that allowed for rapid communication and transit between Georgetown and the cities further south along the New Thames and along the coastline of New Britain and New Australia.

In the twentieth century, however, Georgetown would change forever. Shortly after receiving independence from Great Britain prior to World War I, the new capital of Brittany, the original name of the newly formed country arising out of the English colonies, found itself home to delegates of the other colonies that took independence during the First World War. These states all banded together to form the Commonwealth of Azazia, a loose affiliation of republics and monarchies that held their meetings in Georgetown. However, as the islands increasingly found themselves unifying, the Russian peoples, by far the most repressed and economically depressed, set off a brutal revolution that swept through the whole of the Azazian Archipelago. With lightening speed they managed to raid, and burn most of Georgetown while the Royal Navy was off the coast of Philadelphia engaging a diversionary force. After three years of bitter, bloody fighting, the Russians managed to impose Russification upon the Commonwealth.

Russification meant the abandonment of many Anglo names throughout the country. Among them the name of the English monarchy that had become de facto head of state. From the Barent family they became the Barins, John became Ivan and Michael became Mikhail. The city of St. Brendans – captured in an early raid – was forced to change its name to Breningrad while Georgetown suffered humiliation in the initial discussions as its new proposed name would be New Moscow. However, while negotiations were in session, the city of Regal was recaptured and the tide appeared to be slowly shifting away from the initial Russian victories and towards the English conquest of all Russian territories. The Russians admitted defeat and met the English with the compromise name of Imperium, the city named for the centre of the empire that was the Commonwealth.

Although the city has since also suffered lightly from the revolt by the native Azazians, Imperium found itself stuck with the name and the legacy as the seat of power throughout the Commonwealth. During the intervening years, the burned rubble of the city allowed for massive improvements to be made to the city’s infrastructure. The city granted wide swaths of land for new railroad, subways, and monorails in addition to massive superhighways and heliports. The rebirth of Georgetown in the guise of Imperium allowed for the restructuring of the country’s capital. The population rapidly grew until the 21st century where the rate of increase has slowed leaving the current population of some 47 million.