Sabbans and Drudachs

 

There are 17 wards about the city, as per the syl-pasha's command that all of the sabbans save the Pasha's Sabban be organized within wards; whether a ward contained two, three, or four sabbans was determined by the status of the sabbans. (In other words, the richer the sabbans, the fewer of them within that ward.)

The Sabbans

The next major division of Calimport is by sabban, an enclosed district or neighborhood. The 53 sabbans of Calimport each act as a miniature city of their own, with their own peacekeepers, water supply, businesses, and more. They do not, however, have autonomous powers and must answer to the syl-pasha who rules both the capital and the nation of Calimshan. While many details and features make each sabban unique, they all share some basic traits. 

The Sabban Archetype- In terms of general physical details, here is what can be expected in every sabban:

• Walls: The entire sabban is surrounded by a wall of mud brick either topped or covered in stonework . In many sabbans, the sabban's mark is set high into all of the walls facing into the sabban, which act similarly to street signs. This mark also is set into the keystone of the arch leading out of the sabban while the other side of the keystone is stamped with the new sabban's mark. 

• Arches & Gates: All sabbans have arched gates within their walls (and beneath the byways atop them) that are shut and locked at night. The gates usually are a double set of hinged metal gates locked by padlock and guarded by the soldiers assigned to the sabbans on either side of the gate arch.

• Drudachs: Each sabban contains three or more drudachs, which subdivide the sabban with more mud-brick or masonry walls. These help to define areas and their people by social class. 

• Villa: At least one major villa exists within the walls of the sabban, and this is the traditional house of the sabbalad, the ruler of the sabban. Often enclosed behind its own defensive walls, the sabbalad's villa usually consists of at least three buildings (or one large building with distinct wings) and one khamarkha (a family mausoleum). Forces loyal only to the sabbalad and his house guard each villa (sometimes resulting in clashes with the local amlakkar). It is often one of the largest landmarks in the whole sabban, as its walls rise higher than the drudach-wall byways.

• Water: Every sabban provides at least one public source of water for its residents. This is most often a communal well from which everyone draws water for all manner of things, including watering one's animals. Many villas have separate wells, allowing the rich to be less dependent on sabban resources. Long lines of commoners waiting to draw water from the well often form, especially during the hottest days.

• Minaret: Each sabban has a defensive minaret rising from one of its outer walls, and the minaret exits both onto the byways and the ground. The minarets average 20 feet wide and 40 feet tall, and contain at least a score of defenders. Often the only way to tell which sabban is under its protection is by noting the location of the minaret's ground-level exit. If the sabban is wealthy, the minaret may be glazed (at least on the minaret's dome) a color corresponding to the sabban mark. These minarets are often connected to other buildings resting on the wall- the amlakkhan or the sadidah (garrison) most commonly, but sometimes to the walls and garrisons of the sabbalad's villa so the sabban's defenders can instantly gain higher ground for missile fire and other advantages.

• Sadidah: The sadidah holds sadimmin (soldiers) or Nallojal (sailors or marines, if in a port ward) or Farisan (elite troops). These troops are all sworn to watch over and defend their garrison and sabban when commanded by their sultan commanders (who oftimes also command the sabbalad of the sabban). Where the minaret is attached to it, the sadidah has four or more stories, and the amlakkhan average two or three floors for garrisons, armories, and immediate access to the byways from the second-floor exits.

• Guildhalls: These buildings are often combined businesses, meeting halls, and living quarters for many of their members. Their primary function is to serve as a central headquarters for their respective guilds. These are often clustered in close proximity to khanduqs (see below) and bazaars where their skills or goods are sold.

• Ward Message Board: Arch or public square- usually on a 5' diameter, 10' tall stone column, shaded from the sun with arches and tapestries is the ward's message board. From public announcements, apartments for rent, vizir decrees, contract jobs, lost persons and general information message board. To prevent vandalism, there is one amlakkar posted at all times. 

• Khanduq: These permanent market and warehouse areas are the points around which the city grew. While markets surround the khanduq from outside its walls, the rarest goods or items of greater value are bought and sold within the khanduqs (despite a tradition of selling all foods in proximity with one another). Common clothes and textiles are found in all bazaars, but furs and rare silks and precious fabrics would be sold within the safer (and more expensive and exclusive) khanduq's courtyard markets. For moderate fees, these places also provide the secure storage of precious items and sums of money for those who have expensive assets but no safe holds in which to put them.
• Public water source.
• Grocer
• Business- apothecary, armor smith, weapon, profession services 
• Souk- haberdashery, household items, male or female personal outfitter and clothier
• Magic Shop, alchemist or scribe, magic trader. 
• Food Vendor- food cart, baker, butcher. 
• Craftsmen- fine smith, blacksmith. 
• Coffee Shop
• Launderer- laundry services for the working class residents of the Sabban. 
• Street Cart Vendors- pipe weed, melon vendor

• Market/Bazaar: Calimshan birthed the market form of the bazaar, where particular streets (even the impromptu streets of tent markets and the like) formed exclusive markets where goods of a type were sold in proximity to each other (thus, leather bazaars, metalwork bazaars, sages' bazaars, etc.).The open-air tent and cart markets collect at the fringes of the professional and permanent khanduqs. Bazaars always splay out into web-works of streets that grew in set patterns around former temporary tent-and-cart markets. Set in patterns millennia old, there are 'proper' patterns to bazaars, whether temporary or permanent. Closest to the permanent khanduq markets, bazaars spread out concentrically around the khanduq or laterally along street and block patterns. Grouped by types of goods are carts and shops for foods, spices, wines and ales; next are hardier items like clothes, leather-goods, wooden goods; the outermost bazaars are the heavy items like metal goods and weapons (which are always farthest from the gates of the khanduqs). Surrounding the bazaars (either above them in second story shop fronts or among the other services and goods) are supplementary services, businesses, and people seeking work, from mercenaries and sages seeking employment to scribes looking for books to copy for fees.

The Drudachs

Every native of the city has her own nicknames or the drudachs they frequents. While the palace views one neighborhood as Twelvetors Drudach, many of its neighbors call it the Blades Drudach or the Mameluk's Drudach (in reference to its large military forces garrisoned there or their commander and his alleged origins among the slave class). There are 166 drudachs contained within Calimport. 

Just like the sabbans that contain them, there are details that make each drudach unique, but they all share basic structural traits. Below is a generic drudach for DMs to se as a template for their own Calimport campaign. There is no standard size to a drudach and only a minimum of services and sites that each must contain. In general terms, though, most drudachs have from 10 to 30 buildings, many of which only remain standing as they are tightly clustered against one another and are all supported by the byways/walls of the sabban/drudach. The minimum amenities of a drudach are: 

• Archways/Walls: Like the sabbans they are part of, drudachs each have their individual walls, topped by the byways for the affluent. However, very few drudachs have gates or guards at the points where one drudach intersects one or more other drudachs. Instead, simple archways link alleys or tunnels under or through other buildings (limiting a building to second-floor and above businesses or lodgings, since the first floor is a throughway).

• Religious Sites: All drudachs have at least one temple or shrine, and some have other random holy sites. Not all are officially recognized temples, but they can be pilgrimage sites where occurred events important only to those involved or to the religions and faithful of the gods or prophets involved.

• Entertainment: While the public wells provide the basics of refreshment, there is never less than one each of a tavern, inn, or festhall in a drudach.

• Stables: Usually a 1-story hovel with no cellar or lower level. A common sight in all drucachs, these are reasonable beast accommodations for camel, riding lizards, ostrich, baluchitherium, or sometimes bison or oxen. 

• Business/Place of Trade: While one drudach from each sabban contains a khanduq and permanent marketplace, the others each hold a less formal bazaar formed of carts around a central court or along a wide street. Richer drudachs substitute businesses within permanent buildings, like many cities to the north.

• Government Buildings: All drudachs contain at least two administrative buildings for the drudach and greater sabban. These include the houses and villas of the druzir and sabbalad, city-owned warehouses and granaries, public registrars (for ownership of land and goods), public stables, and so on. The sadidah or the amlakkhan do not count against these minimums, as they are necessary regardless.

• Amlakkhan: This is a garrison of amlakkar (the watch) or soldiers, all sworn to watch over and defend their sabban. Where the minaret attached to it has four or more stories, the amlakkhan average two or three floors for garrisons, armories, and immediate access to the byways from the second floor exits.

• Row House/Living Quarters: Of course, there are numerous other buildings for use as living quarters for those working in the drudach. There are other uses for the general buildings, and many of them overlap with other sites noted above or among the sabban's features (one person's apartments in a row house acting as an impromptu shrine to a god, rooms or buildings owned by the syl-pasha for places to secret spies and goods, etc.).

Drudachs from the Sabban's Perspective: Often, individual drudachs having competing businesses within one sabban often leads to strife and street wars among those working to embrace the Calishite dream of opulence. Thus, many sabbalads have stratified their drudachs toward providing particular services for the greater sabban. In other words, like bazaars which only sell food or weapons or sage advice, some drudachs are limited to being a trade drudach, entertainment drudach, residential drudach, or government drudach. While more efficient and organized for the sabbalad, only those drudachs destroyed by fire or other disasters and rebuilt (and reorganized into this scheme) have been able to stratify their people and sites in this manner. Thus, many more of the city's eastern sabbans are structured this way, as that area of the city seems more prone to fires and destruction and to newer ways of life.