Aliskémon Tharstros
b 2517, Astira; d 2583, Urnanc, Magdala. Aliskémon Tharstros' mother was Incarnandist but his father was of the Old Religion. His father, a low-ranking civil servant, wanted him to become a lawyer against his will. Despite his commendable progress in grammar school, he left home at around age fifteen to study magic in Pytharnia. He became a neophyte under a mediocre wizard in Dúrandwor for about two years where he learned the Durandworese language.
When he discovered that his sponsor had no intentions to teach him further, he fled to the High Pytharnia, learned Pytharnian, and taught reading to children in farm villages in exchange for food and housing. During this time, he learned the stories the children and their grandparents had been told and wrote down as many as he could. He later compiled many of these into a written collection called Tales of Old Pytharny in 2555 which includes numerous accounts of children in the palace of the Chaos Ruler, Lord Kualotha of the Groaning Earth. He also learned the power of Demotic Magic from the village elders.
Aliskémon married the youngest daughter of a prosperous farmer in the small town of Urnanc and moved to Trevirs where he continued to teach reading to working-class children and Ithatian to middle-class students. He saved money despite five children of his own and paid for his first year of instruction in magic in Trevirs. He made friends and acquaintances, but his money ran out after only a year. Disillusioned with the first year of formal spellcraft training compared to the folk magic he learned in the farms and villages, Aliskémon took his family back to the country and taught practical magic to the villagers in exchange for low wages while his children worked on his father-in-law's farm, then owned by his brother-in-law.
His youngest daughter showed great talent for magic. With generous donations of the locals and what little savings he had, he sent her to live with friends in Trevirs to take up the first year of formal education in spellcraft. She excelled brilliantly and was sponsored by the Imperial Court much to her family's surprise and astonishment
Aliskémon's other children lived not far from his home in Urnanc. He died in at the age of 66 in his adopted hometown, surrounded by many grateful students. Tharstros is most well-known for Tales of Old Pytharny which was one of the sources for Amric Ethuve's magnum opus, Five Lives of the Princes of Chaos.
See Also
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