Peasants and Nomads (Rural Backgrounds for King of Kings)

Many moons ago, in fact only one month after I first began this blog, I wrote a post with 30 character backgrounds for urban characters in King of Kings. Since one of the running themes of my blog output this year has and will continue to be "finally getting around to finishing things that I didn't finish Multiple Years Ago," and since I'm planning on starting the King of Kings campaign up again soon, I figured I would write up the complement to the original post: 30 backgrounds for peasants and other rural folk.

 

Unfortunately, since writing that first paragraph it has now taken me an additional month and a half to actually stop procrastinating and shying away from working on it and post the damn table. If I wasn't like this my blog would be so prolific I swear.

 

Also, for a smaller additional background table, check out this post about the Kingdom of the Straits, KoK's answer to historical Aksum. 

 

Rural Shahanistanis

While perhaps most adventurers would come from the urban underclasses, the overwhelming majority of the Enlightened Empire is rural, whether landless peasants, smallholders, herders, or members of mountain and desert tribes. In parentheses next to each background/failed career (because why would a peasant become an adventurer if their life in the countryside hadn't been disrupted in some way?) is whatever item(s) the background provides the character. Additionally, as noted in the other background post, characters are assumed to be able to just do things that their career would imply they should be able to do, skills-wise.

 

Qajar-era, so it's way later than the period I take more inspiration from, but it's kinda tough to find not-modern rural scenes from Iran

Roll 1d30 or choose:

painting by Edwin Lord Weeks

1. Ashamed cowherd (a switch, an empty yoke, a large waterskin, an overwhelming shame)

2. Burnt orchardist (a basket, a ladder, noticeable burns on the skin)

3. Churner (a yogurt churn, a wooden spoon, a waterskin full of doogh or ayran, a smile wherever you go) 

4. Collapsed coal miner (a pet cricket that chirps around unclean spirits, a pickax, a disabling injury)

5. Defiled shrine custodian (the last icon from your shrine, tattered vestments, hate in your heart)

6. Desert youth (a staff, a knife, loose robes and a head cloth, the knowledge that when you return home your own camel is waiting for you)

7. Dispossessed farmer (a knife, a mattock, a bag of seeds, nothing else to your name)

8. Escaped salt miner (a bag of salt you stole, a pickax, constant anxiety that someone will find you or the sky will fall on your head)

mosaic, Great Palace of Constantinople ca. 500s

9. Foot-washer (a jug of water, a clay dish, a sense of loyalty and purpose, a piece of gossip)

10. Former miller (your last bag of flour, a mule, a millstone somewhere far away)

11. Gleaner (an empty sack, a trowel, a hunched over back, a closely observant pair of eyes)

12. Goatherd (a switch, a goat, a short stool, stubbornness)

13. Hills tribesman (a spear, a sling, a hunting snare, a necklace made of wolf teeth)

14. Hunter (a knife, a hunting snare, a hunting dog OR caracal)

probably also 19th century

15. Inconsistent weaver (a half-finished rug, a simple loom, shaky hands)

16. Inexperienced blacksmith (a hammer, tongs, a cumbersome lump of misshapen metal)

17. Leather worker (animal skins, cow brains, a knife, nobody wants to get near you)

18. Lizard wrangler (a lasso, a bludgeon, sturdy feet and sturdy hands)

19. Mystic follower (a rough and itchy mantle, a map of the night sky drawn on tree bark, a mystic master you revere)

20. Potter (a pottery wheel, a hunk of clay, steady hands, a good impression when you walk into town)

21. Provincial princeling (an old-fashioned cylinder seal, actual literacy, a sword, the knowledge you will never inherit your family's estate)

22. Runaway bride/groom (brightly-colored clothes, a dowry you stole, a worry that you're letting someone down)

23. Runner-up wrestler (meels (training weights), a heavy coat, a rival who's better at wrestling than you)

24. Shepherd (a sheep, a crook, a pair of shears, a calm attitude)

female gusan, from the Armenian Haghpat Gospel, ca. 1211

25. Snake catcher (a burlap bag, a snare, a hammer, a couple dead snakes)

26. Unclean swineherd (a switch, a pig, a sturdy pair of boots, looked down upon by all)

27. Unlucky fisherman (a net, a fishing line, despondency)

28. Unpopular exorcist (a bunch of iron nails, a container of well-used olive oil, a paper talisman)

29. Village drunkard (a half-full wineskin, a wooden bowl, an unsteady stance)

30. Wandering gusan (a duduk OR chahartar, a cone to hold your hair up, memorized poetry and song)

Jean-Francois Millet, The Gleaners
(yeah its 19th century and French but it's a good painting!!!)