"Well, Marbad’s a good man and his people were scratching a living on the edges of the marshes at the mouth of the river. They’d settled there after King Marius of the Jutones drove them from their homeland after the Teutogens had taken their lands. I suppose it’s possible to live there, but why anyone would want to, I don’t know. The marshes are dangerous places, full of sucking bogs, corpse lights and daemons that drink the blood of men."
- —King Bjorn Unbergoen, telling the woes of the Endals and the Jutones[2a]
Map of the tribal territories of Men in what would become the Empire during the reign of Emperor Sigmar Heldenhammer. Faced with assaults by the aggressive Teutogens to their south and the savage Norsii to their north, the Jutones eventually migrated into the Wasteland in the far west, where they founded the city that became Marienburg.[4b]
The Jutones, sometimes called the Was Jutones[1d] or simply the Juton[3a], are an ancient war-like tribe of Human barbarians populating the lands of not just what became Westerland, but also the lands of Nordland and parts of western Ostland, making them the ancestors of the present-day Marienburgers, Nordlanders and close relatives of the Ostlanders.[1d]
History[]
Facing many hardships and enemies to the north and south, the Jutones were a broken people before their king Marius led them in an exodus towards the west.
Like many other tribes, the Jutones came into the lands of the Empire of Man in -1000 IC and settled within the coastlines that border the Sea of Claws. This, unfortunately, spelled much misfortune for the Jutones.[1a]
In time, the early Jutones were slain and subjugated by the Teutogens to their south and due to their proximity to the north, also became the main victims of the Norsii when they invaded the lands of what became the Empire. Faced with the choice of slavery, starvation or suicidal battle against the joint threats of the Norsii and Teutogens, their paramount chief, the semi-mythical King Marius, persuaded a branch of his people to instead flee their homes in the Forest of Shadows and head west with all they could carry, in a great exodus. Those Jutones who stayed behind were known as the "Was Jutones," who would later become the ancestors of the present-day Nordlanders.[1d][3a]
However they got there and for whatever reason they left, it's agreed by most scholars that the Jutones were in the Wasteland by the year -20 IC. There, all the tales state, they drove out the tribe of the Endals who had once made the marshes their home and soon engaged in a fierce war with the Fimir, with neither side giving quarter, each bent on genocide. Around -10 IC, the Jutones and the Fimir met in a climactic battle amidst the ruins of a Sea Elf fortress in the region. The Saga of Dobbe Arend, the oldest known with fragments dating from the sixth century IC, says that Marius met the Fimir queen in single combat and killed her on Slagveldsrots ("Battlefield Rock"), the old name for the island on which the Staadtholder's palace of Marienburg now sits.[3a]
Marius laid claim to the marsh and all the lands between "the forests and the seas" and founded his new city on the ruins of the ancient Sea Elven city, proclaiming himself King of Jutonsryk (meaning "Realm of the Jutones").[3a] Ever since, the Jutones have been fierce rivals with the displaced Endals, resulting in frequent retaliatory raids against one another. Out of respect for King Bjorn Unberogen for his efforts at repelling the hated Norsii, a small band of Jutone warriors were present at his funeral pyre, and were noted for their custom of wearing feathered helmets and bright-coloured jerkins.[2b]
Marius saw fit to name a city after himself which would later become the port-city of Marienburg, and built his tower on Rykseiland ("Realm's Isle"), these days called Rijkers' Isle. The next several centuries are shrouded in obscurity. A column in the crypts of the cathedral of Manaan in Marienburg bears the carved names and accomplishments of the city's leaders, some of which are still readable. Though styled "kings", these leader can have been little better than chiefs in those days, ruling a crude fishing village amongst the splendour of the Elven ruins. Among the carvings, the appearance of a twin-tailed comet during the reign of King Euricius Mariuszoon is mentioned.[3a]
The Jutones tried to settle the wider Wasteland as well, especially the fertile country around the banks of the River Reik. One can still see the artificial hills of old motte-and-bailey forts, some maintained as places of refuge to this day. Small towns and villages were founded on the Tumble Downs, of which Aarnau is the largest and oldest.[3b]
None survived any of the few attempts made to settle the Bitter Moors, Almshoven being the last settlement to die. After the first few centuries, these attempts at colonisation became only half-hearted at best, a bone thrown to disaffected factions or young nobles who "wanted land, not fish!" Even in these early days, Marienburg was not only the chief city of the Wasteland, it essentially was the Wasteland. Unlike the other founding tribes of the Empire, the Jutones, though having respect for Sigmar and his people, refused the call for unification and instead stayed put in their newly conquered homeland.[3b]
The next time the Jutones enter Imperial history with any certainty is in the Chronicles of the Venerable Ottokar, an early Grand Theogonist of the Cult of Sigmar. The unknown scribe records Ottokar's blessings on the efforts of Emperor Sigismund II, better known as Sigismund the Conqueror, who sought to extend the domains of "the unity of Divine Sigmar." While the Chronicle concentrates on wars to the south and east, it makes a brief mention of a campaign against the "barbarians of the Reik's mouth" in the spring and summer of 501 IC.[3b]
Mustering a great army, Sigismund II is said to have swept aside the resistance of the Jutones and received the submission of King Bram, the Jutones' ruler. The chronicler praises the wisdom and generosity of the emperor, for "he neither razed their Citadel nor reduced them to charcoal, but rather loved them as Children, making their King a Baron and Vassal of the Empire, and naming the new province 'Weysterland'." The lands of the Jutonsyrk, which encompassed all the lands west of the Sea of Claws to the forest of Laurelorn, was integrated into the already established province of Westerland by the Endals. From then on, the Jutones and the Was Jutones of Nordland were finally contained within Sigmar's dreams of a united Empire of Man.[3b]
Forces of the Jutones[]
The Jutones were the first pre-Imperial tribe of Men to develop the phalanx. This probably occurred because they were one of the few tribes to live on open plains rather than in forested areas. For a time, the phalanx was highly successful, allowing the Jutones to defend their homeland for many years. But eventually weaknesses in the formation were discovered and exploited, and the use of the formation fell out of favour.[4a]
However, the development of the phalanx was a very important innovation in the military history of the Empire, because it introduced the concept of coordinated fighting. Most of the Jutones' contemporaries fought in loose bands of warriors and emphasized personal heroism over coordinated, cooperative fighting. In this way, the Jutone phalanx presaged the style of war used in the Empire today.[4a]
Canon Conflict[]
The lore concerning the Jutones are conflicted as there are three sources which give different accounts of their history. In the most recent source, the Time of Legends novels about Sigmar, much of the history of the Jutones matches the original lore established by earlier editions of Warhammer until the start of the second book Empire and later God-King which stated that Sigmar conquered the Jutones and forced them into his Empire, which contradicts the established lore that the Jutones never joined Sigmar's Empire and were only finally integrated when Emperor Sigismund the Conqueror invaded the Jutonsryk. It is also stated in the last chapter of God-King that the Jutones' kingdom of Jutonsyrk was lost to the Undead and the rulers of the Endals and Jutones intermarried, which contradicts the established lore that Jutonsyrk still remained independent until the time of Sigismund the Conqueror.
The second source, the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition soucebook Sigmar's Heirs, claimed that the Jutones never integrated themselves into Sigmar's Empire until the time called the "Drive to the Frontiers" when Emperor Sigismund the Conqueror invaded Jutonsyrk and annexed their lands and people into the province of Westerland, which was founded by the Endals of King Marbad. The sourcebook also mentioned that the Endals founded the city of Marburg at the mouth of the River Reik, considered the future site of Marienburg.
The last source, and perhaps the most detailed account of the Jutones, was the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 1st Edition sourcebook Marienburg: Sold down the River which claimed the Jutones were the ones to found a great city in a ruined Elven city that became Marienburg. Unlike the two other sources, this sourcebook never mentioned the Endals and instead stated that Rijkers' Isle, which was the Jutones' original capital, was indeed the foundation from which the city of Marienburg grew, not the Endal capital of Marburg. Most maps which show the layout of Marienburg have shown Rijker's Isle at the mouth of the city harbour, indicating that it was the Jutones who founded Marienburg as this source claims, not the Endals.
Trivia[]
The Jutones are inspired by the real world Germanic tribes of the Jutes, Angles and Saxons who originally made their homes in early medieval Denmark and what is now northern Germany. They were famed as the three major Germanic tribes who came to Britain as raiders and invaders and founded the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of what would eventually become England after the Roman Empire abandoned its province of Britannia in 410 A.D. These tribes, once they were converted to Christianity in the sixth century A.D., would in turn become the victims of a new wave of pagan raiders from their original Scandinavian homelands beginning in the late 8th century at the start of the Viking Age.