Description
Armada is made up of hundreds of ships, airships and other sea vessels all interconnected, existing as a movable pirate state on the oceans of Bas-Lag. The ships, the oldest having been part of Armada for more than a thousand years, are mostly built-upon, factories and residences built up on their decks (and in some cases, within their gutted hulls). The city's population is at least a hundred thousand, and is made up of humans, cactacae, khepri, ab-dead, Remade, scabmettlers and many other races. People considered criminals (or otherwise being of lower classes) in their former home states of Bas-Lag are recast as equals upon joining Armada, and often go on to hold positions of power.
Armada thrives on piracy, and through this method adds wealth to itself. Piracy of the seas also leads to acquisitions of knowledge in countless languages (all books are stolen for the Grand Gears Library), and the growth of Armada's population, for any ship intercepted by Armada's forces is assimilated into the city and its crew and passengers are press-ganged into citizenship for life. The language of Armada is Salt, a constructed language deliberately made easy to learn, and consisting of vocabulary from the languages of the many races who inhabit the city.
Read more about this topic: Armada (Bas-Lag)
Famous quotes containing the word description:
“A sound mind in a sound body, is a short, but full description of a happy state in this World: he that has these two, has little more to wish for; and he that wants either of them, will be little the better for anything else.”
—John Locke (16321704)
“Do not require a description of the countries towards which you sail. The description does not describe them to you, and to- morrow you arrive there, and know them by inhabiting them.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)
“It is possibleindeed possible even according to the old conception of logicto give in advance a description of all true logical propositions. Hence there can never be surprises in logic.”
—Ludwig Wittgenstein (18891951)