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    PaladinGuy

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    confused Azurite terms of address?

    So in-comic, three individuals of Azure City are referred to with the title of Lord: Shojo, Kubota, and Soon Kim. Okay, four, if you count Hinjo.
    Lord of the City- Shojo and Hinjo. Addressed as Your Lordship here.
    Daimyo Kubota- scheming to be Lord, so it makes sense he'd want to be addressed that way, as here and here.
    Soon Kim- Sapphire Commander, addressed as Lord Soon by Miko here.

    Was Soon a member of the nobility, or is "Lord" just a courtesy title given his legendary status among the Azurites? I've been wondering on this for awhile.
    "Dinnae discount tha victories ye have jus' cause ye dinnae plan fer 'em. […] Ye cannae beat yerself up o'er what ye might've done, V. Tha way lies madness." - Durkon Thundershield, Order of the Stick.

    "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable." - Soon Kim, Order of the Stick.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    He was the original head of the Sapphire Guard, which, for a Sapphire Guard Paladin, I would expect to be enough to net him the title of Lord.

    We know he was on a diplomatic mission to the Elven Lands when his wife was killed, which I'm guessing means he was probably some type of noble.
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    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    First, I'm impressed that this topic went so far off topic that it ended up back at The Order of the Stick.
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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    It just seems a bit confusing, because there's all these Lords but only one Lord of the City.
    Makes me wonder how that's all set up, y'know, titles and rank and everything. Including the mysterious Council of Nobles.
    If my queries don't make sense, it's because I'm low on sleep and overdosed on work XD
    "Dinnae discount tha victories ye have jus' cause ye dinnae plan fer 'em. […] Ye cannae beat yerself up o'er what ye might've done, V. Tha way lies madness." - Durkon Thundershield, Order of the Stick.

    "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable." - Soon Kim, Order of the Stick.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Lord Soon was most likely a noble in his own right. He founded the Sapphire Guard, for certain, and may have even founded Azure City itself. Unless the rift he contained with the Sapphire was over an already existing city. But it's worth considering he may have built that city in his own lifetime. (Impossible? Not with enough magic...)

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by Angelalex242 View Post
    Lord Soon was most likely a noble in his own right. He founded the Sapphire Guard, for certain, and may have even founded Azure City itself. Unless the rift he contained with the Sapphire was over an already existing city. But it's worth considering he may have built that city in his own lifetime. (Impossible? Not with enough magic...)
    It seems like Azure City already existed, but I imagine the tower was built up to the Rift.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dalek Kommander View Post
    Heartless? Those flaming letters spelled ELAN! How many sons can honestly say their father has murdered dozens of human beings just to show how much they care?

    Tarquin's fatherly love is truly unique... or at least I hope it is!
    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    First, I'm impressed that this topic went so far off topic that it ended up back at The Order of the Stick.
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    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by DanaK View Post
    It just seems a bit confusing, because there's all these Lords but only one Lord of the City.
    You said yourself--the Lords are noble Lords, and the Lord of the City is the ruler of the city. As far as we can tell, the Lord of the City does not himself have to be noble (seems unlikely Shojo would have been such a target for assassinations if he had his own noble family backing him up), which is probably where a lot of the friction in the system came from.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    You said yourself--the Lords are noble Lords, and the Lord of the City is the ruler of the city. As far as we can tell, the Lord of the City does not himself have to be noble (seems unlikely Shojo would have been such a target for assassinations if he had his own noble family backing him up), which is probably where a lot of the friction in the system came from.
    It's implied here that Hinjo is all the family Shojo has left, with Shojo citing his father Ronjo as a "great leader". It's stated here that Shojo is the leader of the Guard by inheritance, meaning being the son of the previous Lord of the City. Since Shojo has levels in Aristocrat, it would make sense for the Lord of the City to be nobility.
    "Dinnae discount tha victories ye have jus' cause ye dinnae plan fer 'em. […] Ye cannae beat yerself up o'er what ye might've done, V. Tha way lies madness." - Durkon Thundershield, Order of the Stick.

    "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable." - Soon Kim, Order of the Stick.

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    Quote Originally Posted by DanaK View Post
    If my queries don't make sense, it's because I'm low on sleep and overdosed on work XD
    They make sense as somebody used to a modern English tradition looking at titles, but in fact the regular order of precedence with a limited number of standardized titles, single holders of each title, and fixed forms of address for people at certain ranks in it is a somewhat weird development. Most collections of titles are much less neatly organized. Consider for example the native princes of India, with such a confusing tangle of variant titles and ranks the Raj ended up ignoring it for a ranking scheme based on the number of guns to be fired to salute them.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    I have been told that Daimyo is not a name, but a traditional Japanese title.
    By that moniker, Kubota is already "Lord", some characters simply use the English translation of his title. According to the article the word is a composition of "dai" - meaning "great", and "myōden" - meaning "private land". I would assume that "daimyo" thus means "lord of private land".

    Subordinate only to the shogun, daimyo were the most powerful feudal rulers from the 10th century to the middle 19th century in Japan.
    Shōgun are military commanders slash generals. I think Lord Shojo's position as the ruler of the Sapphire Guard would make him a shōgun. Naturally in English it doesn't quite fit to call Shojo simply "general", "Lord" works much better given the status he has. As such, both Shojo, Hinjo, Kubota and Soon can be called "Lord", but their exact placement in Azure City's hierarchy varies.


    Azure City's actual hierarchy seems rather simple. You have the Lord of the City, followed by his family. Each son in the family is likely called Lord as well, and hold a certain amount of power. Further we have the nobles and their families. The head of each noble family is a Lord too, but they are subordinate to the Lord of the City. Most likely there can be some form on non-noble Lords - such as those owning a large amount of land and employing lots of workers - who would hold even less power in the grand scheme of things.
    Last edited by Katuko; 2014-08-19 at 09:46 AM.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Keep in mind that the Sapphire Guard are a secret organization - they're not the Azure City Military.

    And we know that the Azurites use "General" - General Chang, here:

    http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0413.html
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    PaladinGuy

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    I'm not sure that Daimyo Kubota being addressed as "Lord" is an indication of his standing, as it is. Because the only ones who call him "Lord" are his own servants. Here we see Hinjo address him as simply "Daimyo".
    "Dinnae discount tha victories ye have jus' cause ye dinnae plan fer 'em. […] Ye cannae beat yerself up o'er what ye might've done, V. Tha way lies madness." - Durkon Thundershield, Order of the Stick.

    "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable." - Soon Kim, Order of the Stick.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    It does seem that there's one Lord, and then the next tier of nobility are the daimyos. When his minions are sucking up to him, Kubota is called "Lord" Kubota, but only then.

    The Lord of Azure City has been referred to as "king", too, on occasion. Perhaps most relevantly (since it's Azurites saying it), here (fourth panel).
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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by hamishspence View Post
    Keep in mind that the Sapphire Guard are a secret organization - they're not the Azure City Military.
    I concur with your main point: the Sapphire Guard and the military of Azure City are not the same. But "secret"? I don't recall that -- citation?

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    Quote Originally Posted by Malimar View Post
    I concur with your main point: the Sapphire Guard and the military of Azure City are not the same. But "secret"? I don't recall that -- citation?
    Not necessarily "secret", but not common knowledge, anyway. Here. That seems to have changed in later strips; whether that's a retcon or just that the war meant the paladins became more publicly visible is I guess up to the reader.
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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by Aedilred View Post
    Not necessarily "secret", but not common knowledge, anyway. Here. That seems to have changed in later strips; whether that's a retcon or just that the war meant the paladins became more publicly visible is I guess up to the reader.
    Aha, correct you are!

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    So the Lord of the City is addressed as "Lord (name)" or "Your Lordship", Daimyos are addressed as "Daimyo (name)", but where does Soon's title come into it?
    We can always chalk it up to Miko being half-dead at the time, I guess- when you've been cut in half, you're probably not focusing on the proper terms of address for famous people.
    "Dinnae discount tha victories ye have jus' cause ye dinnae plan fer 'em. […] Ye cannae beat yerself up o'er what ye might've done, V. Tha way lies madness." - Durkon Thundershield, Order of the Stick.

    "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable." - Soon Kim, Order of the Stick.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by Aedilred View Post
    Not necessarily "secret", but not common knowledge, anyway. Here. That seems to have changed in later strips; whether that's a retcon or just that the war meant the paladins became more publicly visible is I guess up to the reader.
    My personal opinion is that the Paladins had a normal function in the government or the army in addition to being members if the Sapphire Guard. Being in the army would be the cover for what they were actually doing. After the fall of Azure City, the secret was probably given up. This is just my personal opinion though.


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    Quote Originally Posted by Jaxzan Proditor View Post
    My personal opinion is that the Paladins had a normal function in the government or the army in addition to being members if the Sapphire Guard. Being in the army would be the cover for what they were actually doing. After the fall of Azure City, the secret was probably given up. This is just my personal opinion though.
    That would make sense. I suppose they all count as hatamoto, being in the direct service of the Lord of the City.
    "Dinnae discount tha victories ye have jus' cause ye dinnae plan fer 'em. […] Ye cannae beat yerself up o'er what ye might've done, V. Tha way lies madness." - Durkon Thundershield, Order of the Stick.

    "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable." - Soon Kim, Order of the Stick.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    We have insufficient data points to construct any kind of coherent answer to the question, IMO.

    However, I would like to note that "Daimyo" is indeed a title, one of the highest below "Supreme Ruler." The European equivalent would be "Duke," "Archduke," or "Prince."
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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by DanaK View Post
    That would make sense. I suppose they all count as hatamoto, being in the direct service of the Lord of the City.
    After reading link, yeah that's probably it. Thanks for posting that link, by the way; I've learned a lot of new things about feudal Japanese titles from this thread.


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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by Katuko View Post
    I have been told that Daimyo is not a name, but a traditional Japanese title.
    And I'm the one who told you about the title. As they say on the Straight Dope MB, "ignorance fought".

    BTW, I remember where I first heard the title: reading Shogun
    Last edited by dtilque; 2014-08-22 at 04:34 AM.
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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Quote Originally Posted by dtilque View Post
    And I'm the one who told you about the title. As they say on the Straight Dope MB, "ignorance fought".

    BTW, I remember where I first heard the title: reading Shogun
    I learned the meaning of shogun from video games, but I'd never encountered daimyo before so I didn't think it would be a title rather than a name. Thanks for enlightening me, I always like learning new stuff. :P

    Speaking of family, is Kubota his given name or his family name? Or perhaps it is both, as he is the current head of family anyways? I must admit I know little about how this works in other cultures.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    Likely Kubota is his family name, as he refers to "House Kubota", just as Kazumi and Daigo's family is "House Kato."
    "Dinnae discount tha victories ye have jus' cause ye dinnae plan fer 'em. […] Ye cannae beat yerself up o'er what ye might've done, V. Tha way lies madness." - Durkon Thundershield, Order of the Stick.

    "Only the honor of a paladin is unbreakable." - Soon Kim, Order of the Stick.

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    Default Re: Azurite terms of address?

    The terms of address used by various people do seem internally consistent and equivalent to real-world forms of address. IIRC, the only people to refer to Kubota as Lord are his underlings - he pays them, he houses and feeds them, so it is expected that they owe fealty to him - and the ones who refer to him as Daimyo - his title - are his social equals/superiors (other nobles/Hinjo) and those who don't consider themselves subject to Azurite customs (OotS). They refer to him by his title rather than his relative status because to do so would effectively be to insult him. Also, the head of a family/house would be the only one to be addressed as "Lord", their heir is an untitled noble - nobody refers to Hinjo as "Lord" until after Shojo's death.

    Going from what The Giant has said elsewhere about V High-level characters hanging around, if Soon Kim wanted to be called "Lord", there's no-one going to be in a position to deny him. Yes, he's a Paladin and therefore LG and unlikely to feed you your own toes if you don't call him "Lord", but you never know, right? Also, if he wanted to take over Azure City to ensure the defence of the Gate, there's not really anything able to stop him, and the existing nobility of Azure City probably know that - and since most of them aren't LG, they'll think if he doesn't get his way he'll turn them all into shark-bait.

    And, as I recently found out from reading War and XPs,
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    The Castle: Built by Soon Kim and the Lord of the City over 50 years ago, the massive castle looms over the entire city. Many citizens questioned why it need [sic] to be so darn big [...] but the Lord was able to convince enough noble houses to go along with it anyway.

    That, along with references to the Lord being an hereditary absolute monarch and an Ancient Empire, suggests quite strongly that a city of nearly half a million population was already there when the rift was detected (and suggested here as well).

    War and XPs also implies that Soon didn't assume rulership of the city, an implication first made here.
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