H. Beam Piper

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The Great Piper Mailing List (PIPER-L) Landgrab

Developer Report
Sarpanitum
Mike Robertson, July 2007
CANON: There is no mention of Sarpanitum in Beam Piper's stories, so everything is non-canon.

HISTORY: Sarpanitum was originally discovered in the 8th Century of the Atomic Era. The expedition was financed by a combination of private investors and the Federation Colonial Office. Sarpanitum was not officially settled for several decades after its discovery because the investors sued each other and the Colonial Office over who would have control of Sarpanitum and the other worlds discovered on the voyage. The lawsuit was finally settled by the bankruptcy of all of the private investors. During the lawsuit there was unofficial (non-sanctioned by the Federation) settlement on the planet of several thousand people. Official settlement began in the last quarter of the 8th century.

Sarpanitum experienced an initial wave of immigration in the first few decades after it was officially opened for settlement. In the 830's a large gem discovery caused a rush of people seeking to get rich from emerald mining. For a time, Emerald City surpassed the port city of New Napier as the largest city on Sarpanitum.

The gem mines were petering out just about the time that the Systems States War started. Using part of the cash they made off the gem rush, some of the businessmen of Sarpanitum were able to lobby the Federation Congress into constructing a major spaceport on the planet, selling it as a backup base in case the forward bases fell to the System States Alliance. The spaceport was finished just as the war was ending. The planet had a population of about fifty to sixty million at the end of the war.

For centuries after the war Sarpanitum slowly de-civilized. It was not involved in any of the Interstellar Wars because it was not a powerful world and not a threat to anyone. Though it experienced a few minor raids from pirates, it really didn't have much to loot so it never was a major target. It sank down to a fifteenth century a.d. (fifth century pre-atomic) level of technology until the 16th century AE when a store of Old Federation information was discovered on the planet. This started the natives on an upward climb. They had reached a technological level similar to the early to mid 20th century a.d. in the 19th century AE when a Space Viking ship landed on the planet.

POPULATION: Sarpanitum had approximately 800 million people when the Space Viking ship landed in the 19th Century AE.

CLIMATE: The second planet of a G5 sun, Sarpanitum has slightly less of a tilt to the ecliptic than Terra. It also has less land mass and more ocean area. This means its climate is milder with less extreme temperatures than Terra.

ECONOMY: Before the System States War and the gem rush the economy was mainly agricultural with almost no exports. The gem rush brought hoards of people seeking their fortune and created an export economy. Many of the existing businesspeople were able to grow wealthy off the gem rush. A gadolinium mine was opened at this time and by the end of the war became the largest source of planetary income. After the war trade dropped off tremendously and the planet began a long slow slide downward.

GEOGRAPHY: There are four continents on Sarpanitum. The expedition that discovered the planet named them East, South, West and North, based on their orientation to an island in the major ocean. The East continent is by far the largest, being over twice the size of the West continent. It lies entirely north of the northern tropic line, and runs up into the artic circle. The predominant landform is steppe, shading to tundra in the north. There is a mountainous peninsula on the east end of the continent.

The South continent lies to the south of the East continent across a narrow sea. Fully contained with the tropics, it is the warmest of the four continents. The western edge is rain forest, backed by mountains. The south central part of the continent is high desert, and contains the major space port. The northern part of the continent is fertile and well watered.

The West continent lies west of Greenwich Island. The southern part of the continent falls below the northern tropic line but does not reach the equator. There are high mountains all along the western edge of the continent and small mountains in the north central part of the continent. Rivers flowing out of these mountains meet in the center of the continent. This area is the largest stretch of fertile land on the planet and was the first settled. The Federation era capital city of New Napier is located here.

The North continent lies just north of the West continent. They are separated by a small ocean known as the Northern Sea. The north continent is primarily steppe, shading to tundra in the north. There are rocky, forested hills along the west coast. The continent was uninhabited during the Old Federation era.