Template:Kobol Era/doc

Twelve Tribes
It took almost a thousand years for civilization to begin again on Hiigara, now renamed Kobol. During the recovery stage, the Kobolians adopted a theocratic society who worshiped the Twelve Lords of Kobol and began to slowly advance back to an industrial age as Kobol again began to become habitable again.

By the height of their civilization the Kobolians were established into twelve tribes, separated by the patron God they worshiped, dwelled in twelve great cities while the seat of power for all of Kobol resided in the City of the Gods, referred to in scriptures as Edinnu. On Earth, Edinnu is from the Akkadian edinnu, itself derived from a Sumerian word meaning "plain" or "steppe". Located in the northern hemisphere, the city itself was dominated by the Forum, Temple and Opera House, structures which were duplicated on modern Caprica in the city of Delphi.

During this period, many of the most sacred religious texts were written, some of which have survived through time, and are regarded by some as religious artifacts, and by others as the documenting of myths and legends. These texts have been collected into a tome known as the Sacred Scrolls. These are the main source of information about Kobol for the people of the Twelve Colonies, as few hard facts remain, which makes those accounts potentially unreliable.

Some scholars theorize that Human sacrifice was practiced on Kobol, and claim that the Kobolian scriptures are erroneous in their description of life on Kobol, hiding darker truths. However mainstream Kobolian religions refuse these claims.

Exodus
The Book of Pythia, recorded by the oracle Pythia on Kobol 3,600 years before the contemporary times, detailed the exile and rebirth of the Human race, written in the midst of great turmoil on Kobol.

Around 4,000 years prior to present the tribes of Kobol saw a rapid rise in technological advances, along with a corresponding level of atheism among many humans who turned to science as a belief system and forsook the Lords of Kobol. This caused outrage among the twelve tribes, who at first attempted to exterminate these groups and assert their control. However after the atheists began to band together, setting a thirteenth city and establishing their technological power as a visible deterrent from further persecution, the tribes reluctantly accepted the atheist on the condition that they did not threatened the remaining tribe's belief systems.

This relationship remained in place for many years, mostly tolerated for the popular commercial and civilian products the thirteenth tribe produced. However that changed with the rise of Pythia, a radical member of the thirteenth tribe. She was arrested for leading a group of university students to burn down the Library of Hephaestus in Edinnu.

Pythia was arrested by the Quorum and brought before them for judgement. Pythia maintained the people should be united as one tribe, that it is wrong for them to be divided into twelve, let alone thirteen. She called for the people to abolish the Quorum and destroy the capitol and the idols to the Lords of Kobol. She was sentenced to death by immolation at dawn for heresy, and refusal to pay tithes to the temples her riots damaged.

Delegate Herriam Tigh, representative of the thirteenth tribe on the Quorum attempted to sway his fellows for leniency however just minutes after their judgement was declared he was approached by a hooded man in the robes of a Zeus follower on the steps outside the Quorum building, who then knifed him.

With his death long standing tensions exploded and members of the thirteenth tribe were now rioting in the streets, mostly in response to the Quorums ruling there would be no investigation into Delegate Tigh's death. Thirteenth tribe members were met by equal violence from religious rioters who quickly rose to the chance to inflict harm on the Godless heathens. In the heat of the moment the Quorum votes to remove the thirteenth tribe's seat in the government and to seize all their assets.

In fear of possible war the thirteenth tribe quickly pulled all their citizens out of Edinnu and retreated to their city, believing open conflict could erupt at any moment. They were correct as a mere two days after Tigh's death and Pythia's jailing, a man with a briefcase entered the thirteenth tribes embassy and detonated a bomb.

Soldiers approached the ruins and open fire on nearby rioters and rescue workers of the thirteenth alike, while armies of the other twelve tribes began to march towards the thirteenth's city. In desperation, knowing they could no longer co-exist with their sister tribes, the thirteenth departed Kobol in a caravan of ships, carrying their entire population off-world and to a new planet. Until this point no other tribe had gained the ability of space flight and no where to the technology to support the level of travel the thirteenth used to move their population to the stars.

However just as the thirteenth's fleet escaped Kobol's upper atmosphere, the thermonic warheads planted by Emperor Riesstiu over a millennium ago detonated. As the ships left Kobol, millions perished as the energy released decimated the entire surface.

This event became known as the Blaze, a decimating event that left the remainder of Kobol locked in a nuclear winter. While it was not the intention of the thirteenth tribe to cause the Blaze and until modern times they themselves could not determine what had caused it during their escape, the remaining tribes blamed the thirteenth for attempting genocide against them. Ash caused crops failures, gravitational shifts forced oceans to flood their beaches and long dormant mountains suddenly erupted with lava. Most of the twelve tribe's cities were evacuated and abandoned in the face of this wide-spread ecological/geological disaster. The only remaining safe location was Edinnu, where the religious firmly believed the Lords of Kobol had spared the city.

For the next 2,000 years the tribes dwelled within Edinnu, constructing great walls to protect themselves from the environment outside which continued to run wild after the Blaze. But many knew their time on Kobol was limited and research began into ways to both survive the disaster, reverse it or move the population off-world like the thirteenth had. In order to survive in the face of the Blaze, many of the tribe merely focused on survival and in their blind attempt to maintain their way of life pollution, strip mining and clear cutting of the few surviving forests on Kobol became rampant. By the time the radiation and dust clouds from the thirteenth's departure began to clear their world was already dangerously close to collapse, even as their people continued to struggle within Edinnu.

Around this time a single ship appeared in the skies above Kobol, flown by a single pilot called Magnus Baltar. Claiming to be from the new thirteenth colony on a distant world called Earth, he announced that in an act to repay the damage they had done to Kobol the thirteenth offered the other tribes that power of space flight and a map to a new region of space where the other twelve tribes could find habitable worlds much like Kobol, to start a new. Magnus personally said this gift was from Pythia herself, who had disappeared during the original bombing of the thirteenth's embassy.

But instead of taking his gift the twelve tribes captured Baltar, claiming him to be a demon who had been cast to ground by the Lords of Kobol so they could use his secrets to save their people. Using the technology gained from his ship, along with the map the thirteenth had provided, the remaining twelve tribes also left Kobol. According to the Sacred Scrolls, the populace of the tribes were taken in a separate Galleons (a spacecraft) and led across the stars by their respective Lord of Kobol. The Aurora Galleon carried the followers of Aurora, the Hera Galleon the followers of Hera and so forth.

Only the Athena Galleon was without a patron Lord, as Athena threw herself from the Gates of Hera, to her death in sorrow over the tribes departure. However because they departed, it was said Zeus warned the survivors that any return to Kobol "would exact a price in blood."