Roshar Reader

Chapter 38 · reading

Peoples

Cultures

Visual tells first: eyebrows, eyes, nails, carapace, clothing. Only peoples you have encountered or seen named on the map.

Alethi lighteyes and darkeyes: tan skin, black hair, havah and uniform

Alethi

Ten wage the War of Reckoning against while competing with one another.

Ten princedoms, one war, colored banners on the Plains.

Veden Vorin lighteyes: fairer skin, red hair more common, havah and safehand

Veden

House politics, country , the same gendered arts.

Davar country, Veden houses, the same .

Thaylen ships

Thaylen

A trading people whose houses send masters and apprentices across Roshar.

Eyebrows, a babsk, and a bargain.

Shin farmers in Shinovar grass country, large round eyes, pale skin

Shin

A pastoral people who revere those who add (farmers) and look down on those who take away (soldiers). Traders come to them for .

Grass, , round eyes; soldiers at the bottom, farmers at the top.

Unkalaki Horneaters of the Peaks: huge frame, copper-red hair, mountain dress

Unkalaki

Craft and peak-clan ranks matter. A third son cooks. They are not Alethi soldiers who happen to be large.

Red hair, extra jaw for shells, a third son who cooks.

Herdazians with tan skin and sparkling crystalline fingernails

Herdazian

Northern neighbor of Alethkar.

Herdaz, north of Alethkar.

Azish of Azir: dark brown skin, formal robes, a bureaucratic court people

Azish

A bureaucratic empire-culture. Sigzil is an educated Azish man among Sadeas's .

Dark brown skin, Azir, and Sigzil who wants things done in order.

Makabaki peoples of western Roshar: dark brown skin

Makabaki

A racial and regional grouping in eastern talk: dark brown skin, the west.

Dark brown skin; Azir is the name they actually use in camp.

Purelakers wading the shallow Purelake, little clothing, fishing spears

Purelaker

Lake-dwellers and fishers. Ishikk is one, hired to ask after a foreigner named Hoid.

Waist-deep in the lake, praying to the god they will not name.

Parshendi warriors with marbled skin and living carapace armor

Parshendi

Rival army on the plateaus — , , a war with no end in sight.

Carapace and Plate, fighting for .

Parshmen slaves with dull marbled skin and worker wraps, no warrior carapace

Parshmen

Menial : porters, servants, labor. Present, silent, overlooked.

Quiet marbled who look too much like .

Reshi islanders of the northern archipelago, warm seas and light clothing

Reshi

A remote people of the northern islands; an exotic label in eastern conversation.

Warm northern isles, far from the Plains.

Iriali of Iri: golden metallic skin and hair

Iriali

Golden-skinned westerners; Kasitor is one of their cities.

Hair and skin like hammered gold.

Aimian scholar: blue fingernails and a blue shadow that points toward him

Aimian

Nearly vanished as a public people. Axies is a scholar of , and a curiosity wherever he goes.

Blue nails; a shadow that points the wrong way.

Natan remnant people: faint bluish skin, ruins of a fallen eastern kingdom

Natan

A fallen Silver-Kingdom people. The war on the Plains is fought on what was once theirs.

Bluish skin; a kingdom that is now hills and chasms.

Rirans of the west: golden hair, not full Iriali metallic skin

Riran

Iri's neighbor; a source of western coloring in Alethi great houses.

Western gold, next door to Iri, not the metallic Iriali cast.