Full transcript
The Creation
Toril is a world shaped across countless ages. This is the timeline of Faerûn and how each age rose from the ruins of the last. Our story begins before time itself. Our first age is the Creation. In a misty realm of timeless nothingness, the over-god Lord Ao forged the crystal sphere that holds Abeir-Toril, igniting the epic struggle between light and darkness to come. From the Silver Sea of Creation rose twin goddesses, radiant Selûne and shadowed Shar, perfect opposites born together.
In their wake rose other gods and Chauntea, the living soul of the world Abeir-Toril itself.
The War of Light and Darkness
Then came the War of Light and Darkness. When Chauntea begged for warmth to nurture life, Selûne kindled the sun, but jealous Shar sought to smother every light. The twin sisters turned upon each other in cosmic war. Losing the fight, Selûne tore raw magic from her essence and hurled it at Shar.
From that spark was born Mystryl, goddess of magic. Shar was driven back and the Weave, the source of all magic, entered Abeir-Toril forever.
The Dawn War
Yet a greater war loomed. Elemental titans called primordials sought to un-make the young worlds. Against them the gods united in the Dawn War, a conflict so vast it raged across two entire ages of Abeir-Toril’s infancy. The Dawn War’s first phase was the Blue Age. Beneath Abeir-Toril’s single ocean, the first life flourished. Gentle sea dwelling races thriving in glowing depths, unaware of the divine war raging across the heavens above them. Then the Blue Age shattered into the Shadow Epoch. A monstrous primordial, Dendar the Night Serpent, ripped the sun from the sky.
The oceans froze, darkness reigned, and nearly all life on Abeir-Toril perished in the cold. The Dawn War turned when the Elder Gods, led by Ouroboros the World Serpent, were joined by the traitor Ubtao, who betrayed his primordial kin. The primordials were slain or imprisoned, the sun rekindled, and the Primordial Age had ended.
The Beginning of Titans and Dragons
Among Abeir-Toril’s first lords were the giants. The god Annam All-Father, wed the Earth Goddess Othea, and their towering children became the first giants and titans. Giantkind would rule for uncounted ages. The dragons too were ancient. At the world’s birth, Io the dragon god forged the first wyrms from astral fire and elemental fury. Slain in the Dawn War, Io split into Bahamut and Tiamat, whose feud sunders dragonkind still.
The Days of Thunder
Now dawned the Days of Thunder, 35,000 years before Dalereckoning. As the frozen seas receded, the supercontinent Merrouroboros emerged. Upon it rose the creator races, the first architects of civilization. Each creator race are ancestors of different races. The yuan-ti and nagas are descended from the sarrukh, the frog-folk of the swamps from the batrachi, the winged bird-races from the aearee, the sprites, pixies, and their kin from the fey. The creator races left one enduring legacy. The serpentfolk sarrukh encoded the secrets of the Weave onto the golden skins of the World Serpent. These Nether Scrolls would one day shape the arcane arts of mortal mages. The batrachi grew proud and rashly made war upon the titans of Annam’s brood. Crushed and desperate, they performed a powerful ritual, releasing several primordials from their ancient prison, hoping to unleash them upon their foes.
The Tearfall & Sundering of Abeir and Toril
But the primordials turned instead upon the gods. Intent on destroying the world, Asgorath the World Shaper hurled an ice moon at Abeir-Toril, merging four inner seas into the Sea of Fallen Stars, an event known as the Tearfall. As the primordials threatened to unmake the world entirely, Ao intervened. The Hidden One split Abeir-Toril in two, banishing the primordials to the new world of Abeir and keeping Toril for the gods. So began eons of separation.
The Dawn Ages
In the Tearfall’s wake, countless dragon eggs hatched across the Toril, and so began the Dawn Ages, the time of dragons. Mighty wyrms carved out sky-spanning empires, ruling land, sea, and air as absolute tyrants over all below. But the dragons were not unopposed. Annam’s mighty children raised the colossal kingdom of Ostoria across the young world. The giants rose to challenge dragon supremacy, and a war of a thousand years began. In the heavens, betrayals split the elven gods.
The traitor goddess Araushnee was cast down by Corellon and became Lolth, the demonic Spider Queen. Her fall planted a seed of darkness that would one day corrupt her own people. The elves were not born of Toril. To undermine the reign of dragons, the fey opened gates to the other world, and the first elves stepped onto Faerûn, newcomers who would soon raise the world’s most glorious civilizations. After a thousand years, the great war ground to a weary truce, and the giant kingdom of Ostoria shrank to the Cold Lands. The elves then unleashed high magic that drove the dragons into a suicidal madness, and their dominion collapsed at last.
The First Flowering
So began the First Flowering, the golden age of the elves. Great realms like Aryvandaar, Illefarn, and Miyeritar rose to their height. In their protective shadow, humans, dwarves, and others slowly climbed toward civilization.
The First Sundering
But elven pride bred catastrophe. Around 17,600 before Dalereckoning, the elves created the elven paradise of Evermeet using high magic. The reckless ritual caused the First Sundering, splitting Merrouroboros into continents of Faerûn, Maztica, and Katashaka.
The Crown Wars
Elven ambition then curdled into the Crown Wars. For 3,000 years, the elf realms slaughtered one another for supremacy. Proud southern kingdoms fell one after another, and the elves’ golden unity was broken forever. The Crown Wars birthed unspeakable horrors. The Dark Disaster obliterated the forest realm of Miyeritar in a killing storm, leaving only the blasted gray wasteland known ever after as the High Moor, a wound Toril never healed. From that darkness came the fall of the dark elves. Corrupted by cruelty and the schemes of the Spider Queen Lolth, they were cast down and banished beneath the world to become the drow, traitors exiled to the Underdark.
The Founding Time
With the elder powers spent, the Founding Time, the Age of Proud Peoples began, dwarven civilization blossomed, raising the great kingdoms of Shanatar and Delzoun, while the first mighty human nations, Calimshan and Jhaamdath, took root. But the dwarves’ golden age curdled. Civil wars, drow raids and mind-flayer slavers ground the shield dwarves down, even splintering the cursed duergar from their kin. As their birthrate withered, kingdom after kingdom fell dark and empty.
The Age of Humanity
Then came humanity’s hour. As elves and dwarves declined, the Age of Humanity dawned, and human empires Netheril, Imaskar, Mulhorand, Unther, Narfell, and Raumathar rose, reshaping the world with startling ambition and speed.
The Empire of Netheril
Greatest was Netheril, whose archwizards mastered Mystryl’s Weave so completely they raised entire cities into the sky. For two thousand years, their floating enclave stood as the pinnacle of arcane achievement in all of history.
Karsus’s Folly & the Fall of Netheril
Then came Karsus’s Folly. In 339 before Dale- reckoning, the arch-wizard Karsus seized the power of Mystryl herself. To save the Weave she sacrificed herself, reborn as the goddess Mystra, and Netheril’s sky cities crashed from the heavens.
The Standing Stone & Dalereckoning
From those ashes rose new realms. In the Year One, elves and human settlers raised the Standing Stone to seal a lasting pact. From that moment the world counts its years. The calendar of Dalereckoning had begun.
The Rise of Myth Drannor
In 261 by Dalereckoning, the elves of Cormanthyr opened their forest capital to all peoples. Renamed Myth Drannor and crowned with a mighty mythal, it became the City of Song, the greatest unity among the races Faerûn had ever known. But its light drew darkness.
The Fall of Myth Drannor / The Weeping War
In 714 the Weeping War erupted as a demonic army of darkness stormed Cormanthor. After years of slaughter, Myth Drannor fell. Barely 200 of 3,000 defenders survived to tell of its passing.
The Elven Retreat
Grief and decline turned the elves inward. Over centuries they abandoned their realms across Faerûn, culminating in the great Retreat of 1344, a mass withdrawal to the island of Evermeet, leaving the continent to the younger races. Even as the elves departed, humankind was inheriting the continent. Across the long age of humanity, proud realms like Cormyr, the great port of Waterdeep and countless others had risen. A Faerûn bound by trade, faith, and bitter rivalry.
The Era of Upheaval: The Time of Troubles
In 1358, the Age of Humanity gave way to the Era of Upheaval. Enraged by the theft of the Tablets of Fate, overgod Ao cast the gods down to walk Toril as mortals. The Time of Troubles had come. For a year, gods bled and died in the streets as mortals, and magic ran wild across the land. When the chaos cleared, a mortal woman named Midnight ascended to become the new Goddess of Magic, taking Mystra’s fallen mantle. The Time of Troubles left a profound legacy. By Ao’s decree, a deity’s power would now flow from the number and fervor of its worshipers. Never again could the gods afford to ignore their faithful.
The Spellplague
But the Goddess of Magic would fall again. In 1385, Mystra was murdered by the mad god Cyric, instigated by ancient Shar. Her death tore the Weave asunder and unleashed the Spellplague, a tide of raging blue fire. The Spellplague reshaped everything. Blue fire warped flesh and magic alike, while whole nations vanished or drowned. In their place appeared alien lands from Abeir, Toril’s long lost twin world. Geography was violently rewritten. For a hundred years, Faerûn endured the Spellplague’s scars. Roads crumbled, ports ran dry, and civilization huddled into scattered points of light amid the dark. It was a bleak age of survival, ruin, and hard-won courage.
The Second Sundering
Then the cycle turned once more. Around 1482, long-dead gods stirred and mortals called the Chosen blazed with divine power. Their rise sparked wars and wonders across Faerûn, heralding a world-changing new era, the Second Sundering. As the Second Sundering unfolded, disaster racked the world. Earthquakes shattered cities, and the Great Rain drowned vast lands around the Sea of Fallen Stars. Even the laws binding gods and reality strained toward breaking. At last the Second Sundering healed the ancient wound. In 1487 and 1488, the worlds of Toril and Abeir gently drifted apart. The borrowed alien lands departed, and Toril slowly reclaimed its true and rightful shape.
As the worlds parted, realms thought lost forever returned. Magic mighty Halruaa, the hidden isles of Lantan and Nimbral, and drowned Luiren rose again from exile. The deep wounds of a shattered century began to close at last.
The Present Age
And so we reached the Present Age, around 1492 by Dalereckoning. Faerûn stands renewed yet wary. Old kingdoms rebuilding, new heroes rising, and ancient evils stirring once more. The world is whole again, but never truly at peace. From the Creation and the Dawn War to this fragile present, Toril has risen and fallen through age after age.
The endless cycle of ruin and rebirth turns onward. And in Faerûn, the next age always waits to begin.
