Ravenloft: History and Timeline

Ravenloft: The Demiplane of Dread

Quote

"History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors,"
"And issues, deceives with whispering ambitions,"
"Guides us by vanities."
—- T. S. Eliot, "Gerontion"

Introduction

The study of Ravenloft's past can prove a maddening exercise. When a new domain forms in the Mists, its denizens appear with complete memories of full lives, and their culture may record a history that stretches back centuries before the domain's actual creation. Whether these "false histories" are real and drawn from other worlds or entirely fabricated by the Dark Powers is a matter best left to the philosophers.

Through long tradition, most lands of the Realm of Dread have adopted the Barovian calendar (BC) to mark the passing of the years. This book does the same. Isolated domains, such as those found in clusters or Islands of Terror, may still track time through their own reckoning.

Pre-351: The Time Before

The true origins of the Realm of Dread remain a mystery. Through the veil of allegory, the creation myths of numerous traditions, including the legends of the Vistani, hint that the Dark Powers and their sinister realm may be as ancient as dread itself. Sifting a common theme from these often contradictory tales, the Realm of Dread may have crept through innumerable eons, forever ebbing and flowing in an eternal cycle of expansion and decay. If so, then the creation of the domain of Barovia merely marked the birth of a new cycle of torment — and the death of whatever came before.

However, the few sages who delve into Ravenloft's arcane origins note that no reliable record of a domain predating the creation of Barovia has ever been found. In their learned opinion, the creation of the Realm of Dread can be traced back some four hundred years to a single world on the Material Plane. Little is now known about this world beyond the name of one of its kingdoms: Barovia.

According to Barovian records, Strahd von Zarovich was born in the year 299 BC. As the eldest son in an aristocratic line, he obeyed tradition and entered the military as a child, rising steadily in the ranks.

In the same year Strahd became a general, a horde of pillaging barbarians, the Tergs, invaded Barovia and drove Strahd's family from their ancestral lands. Strahd rallied the tattered Barovian forces, driving the Tergs back in a grueling and bloody conflict that would last decades. Strahd's youth had long since been spent by the time his weary army defeated the last of the Terg warlords. As the noble houses of Barovia struggled to rebuild from their losses, Strahd claimed sovereignty over the lands he had liberated from the Tergs as his reward and settled into the mountain fortress of the last Terg, dubbing it Castle Ravenloft.

Count Strahd's new subjects hailed him as a conquering hero, but the decades of war and the endless parade of death had hardened Strahd's heart. His reign, like his war-torn life, held no room for compassion.

Strahd called for his scattered relatives to join him at Castle Ravenloft and reestablish the proud von Zarovich lineage. It was then that Strahd first met his youngest brother, Sergei, a handsome and charming cleric a full quarter-century his junior. In Sergei, Strahd saw himself before the coming of the Tergs, and for the first time, he began to ponder his lost vitality.

While living at Castle Ravenloft, Sergei met a local villager named Tatyana, a young woman as full of life and beauty as himself. Their love was immediate and pure. Sergei brought Tatyana to Strahd, announced their plans to wed, and asked for his eldest brother's blessing.

Sergei's words struck Strahd a more crippling blow than that inflicted by any Terg warrior. Strahd was immediately enraptured with the simple girl, but she loved only Sergei, treating Strahd like a father. Tatyana's grace confronted Strahd with all the pleasures of life that war had denied him, and her love for Sergei tormented Strahd with his squandered youth. A desperate hatred for Sergei flared to life in Strahd's heart.

This was when Strahd made his pact with death, as recorded in The Tome of Strahd. Strahd's account of the doomed wedding is largely accurate, but it neglects a few vital facts. One of the many guests invited to Castle Ravenloft was Leo Dilisnya, patriarch of a mercantile family still struggling to rebuild after the war. His entourage came to the wedding concealing crossbows, plotting to eradicate the rival von Zarovich line.

The moment Strahd murdered Sergei with an assassin's blade, strange mists descended on Castle Ravenloft and flowed across the land, forming the domain of Barovia. When Strahd expressed his love to Tatyana, confessing his crime, she fled from him in horror, throwing herself from the castle walls. As Strahd watched her fall, Leo's assassins launched their attack — but Strahd's bloody pact had forever freed him from the indignity of death. As the poison-tipped bolts pierced his body, his heart ceased to beat and he became a vampire. All his hopes destroyed, Strahd had nothing left but fury. He rampaged through the castle, slaughtering guests and assassins alike. By dawn, not a single soul was left alive within the castle walls. The Realm of Dread was born.

351-469: A Private Hell

The domain of Barovia originally existed as an Island of Terror, alone in the Mists. Few records survive from this time.

Strahd retreated from public life, and many Barovian villagers came to believe that he too had died. The few survivors of the massacre scattered throughout the domain, settling into new lives. Strahd spent the century learning the limits of his Mist-bound prison and adapting to undeath.

Strahd also spent these years hunting down the traitorous Leo Dilisnya, who had excused himself early from the wedding, claiming illness. According to some tales, Strahd finally found the wizened Leo hiding in a remote monastery, nearly five decades after the ill-fated wedding. Most accounts agree that, wherever Leo Dilisnya is now, his torment has never ended. Leo's family survived, however. To this day, the Dilisnya name is renowned for cunning and infamous for duplicity.