The Third Era, sometimes called the Time of Hominids, is the third (and current) of the three eras marked by sages and scholars. It begins with the emergence of intelligent hominids like humans, elves, dwarves, orcs, and other hominids that live on the surface world and in the Underdark.
The different races all have competing ideas of how hominids emerged. The elves, for example, believe that the gods created them before other hominids as the Firstborn, the Chosen Ones, intended as shepherds and caretakers of the earth and all its life. They believe that long after, humans were created from the beasts and dwarves were created from the bones of the earth, the very rocks and stones of the mountains. They believe that all of the other hominid races – gnomes, orcs, halflings, and others – were derived from the races of either humans or dwarves, sometimes in combination with other creatures. (Dragonborn and kobolds, for example, are believed to be derived from humans and dragons.)
Of course, other cultures dispute this interpretation and have their own ideas of which race came first (usually their own) and their role in the universe.
This era is divided into three epochs, which continue the numbering from the epochs in the previous eras. The first two of these epochs, the Fifth and Sixth, come before the global catastrophe known as the Great Cataclysm, while the Seventh (and current) Epoch encompasses all hominid life after the Great Cataclysm.
Unlike Ages in previous epochs and eras, the ages in the Third Era are enumerated, with the ages in the second and third epochs continuing the numbering that began in the first.
Pre-Cataclysmic Civilizations
The period of time that has become called the Pre-Cataclysmic Civilizations encompasses the Fifth and Sixth Epochs.
The Fifth Epoch
The Fifth Epoch covers the emergence of hominid life on Adnati.
This Epoch is the only one in the Hominid Era (the Third Era) to not be subdivided into Ages. It marks the beginnings of intelligent hominid life. At this time, most or all hominids were believed to live in small tribes huddled in rudimentary shelters like caves and make-shift tents made of animal hides stretched over poles. During this time, they began using the most rudimentary of tools – clubs, sticks sharpened into spears, and rocks used to pound other objects or thrown as weapons. Spoken languages were developed during this period, though it’s believed that the first written languages didn’t come until the First Age at the beginning of the Sixth Epoch.
During this period, magic was abundant, as Dream Force flowed unimpeded. It is believed that everyone during this period had some form of rudimentary, instinctive magic. For some, this came from tapping into the elemental forces of nature in what sages today would consider to be a form of Druidry. For many, the source of magic was innate, manifesting in wild and often unexpected ways. Even the simplest spells often triggered surges of power disproportionate to the spell being cast.
This epoch’s end is marked by hominids developing forms of agriculture, including both cultivating crops and raising livestock, which allowed them to settle into stable communities instead of their previous “hunter/gatherer” existence that forced them to travel nomadically in search of fresh game to hunt and plant life to forage.
The Sixth Epoch
The Sixth Epoch covers the period of time when hominids began to build civilizations with the advent of agriculture up until the Great Cataclysm.
The First Hominid Age
The First Hominid Age, generally called the First Age, was marked by hominids developing forms of agriculture, including both cultivating crops and raising livestock. This allowed them to settle into stable communities and develop civilizations – towns, villages, and eventually kingdoms and empires.
Although these hominids developed tools, much of that was limited because the abundance of Dream Force allowed for the use of magic to aid in both simple and complex tasks alike. Metalworking, for example, could be done without the use of modern forges, and tools like forges wouldn’t be developed until the Seventh Epoch, when Dream Force was much less plentiful.
The Second Hominid Age
The Second Hominid Age in the Sixth Epoch of the Third Era was marked by the first studying of magic and the codification of spells. The instinctive magic used by early druids and sorcerers began to be recorded and explored through experimentation, allowing for the emergence of wizards and arcane lore.
The Third Hominid Age
The Third Hominid Age, sometimes called the Age of Mages, was marked by the emergence of spellcasters so powerful that their might can scarcely be imagined. The abundance of Dream Force allowed these mages to cast spells that were ten, maybe fifty times more potent than the most powerful modern spells.
Great wizards could create entire cities without the use of modern tools. It is believed that many of the chimeric hybrid creatures like the owlbears, perytons, and griffons – maybe even demi-hominids like centaurs, harengons, and satyrs – were created through arcane experimentation during this time. They built immense Towers that climbed hundreds, thousands of feet into the sky.
These mages grew so powerful that when they went to war, the earth itself trembled. They had the power to cleave mountains, to flatten cities thousands of miles away, to make the very rivers and oceans burn like oil. The last of these battles became known as the Great Cataclysm. As much as ninety percent of all hominid life was destroyed during this last terrible war known as the Mage Wars.
At the end of the Great Cataclysm, most of the powerful mages were destroyed and those who survived were driven from the earth. An invisible barrier of disputed origin encircled Adnati, though whether it was created or emerged through natural forces remains a matter of speculation. It kept most of the Dream Force in the heavens, with modern mages only able to tap into tiny quantities of it to weave their spells.
Less-powerful survivors were forced to hide deep in the forests or beneath the surface of the land. Every civilization on Adnati was destroyed and had to be rebuilt in the Seventh Epoch.
Post-Cataclysm Civilizations
The cities and civilizations built in the Third Age were all destroyed in the Mage Wars. A few things remained, including towers and tunnels crafted of a metal unknown on Adnati, a few statues, and extremely rare magical items more powerful than anything that could be created in the Seventh Epoch.
The Seventh Epoch
The Seventh Epoch, which extends to the present time, began when survivors of the Great Cataclysm regrouped and slowly began to rebuild civilizations. This period is also known as the Post-Cataclysmic Civilizations.
Much had been lost, both in knowledge and ability, for surviving mages only had a fraction of the Dream Force available to the mages of the Fifth Epoch and Sixth Epoch Epochs.
The Fourth Hominid Age
The Fourth Hominid Age is sometimes called the Age of Rebuilding. During this time, survivors of the Great Cataclysm began to come back together and rebuilt towns, cities, and civilizations.
It also marked a period when Dream Force was no longer as abundant as it had been during the Fifth and Sixth Epochs. For the first time, some hominids were born without the instinctive and innate ability to use magic. Some retained that instinctive ability, but they became increasingly rare, and the ability often skipped many generations.
Hominids compensated in two ways: studying lore to learn magic that had once been innate, and developing tools to ease labor that once could be done by magic. Humans had to learn to forge metals and craft weapons rather than conjure them or transmute them from other substances. House that could at one time been created by magic had to be assembled with tools and hard labor.
The Fifth Hominid Age
The Fifth Hominid Age is sometimes called the Age of Modern Magic. It was during this period that scholars began classifying magic into the eight schools of magic known today: Abjuration, Conjuration, Divination, Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion, Necromancy, and Transmutation.
This period lasted for nearly ten thousand years. The age ended with a mysterious event now called the Minor Cataclysm.
No one appears to know what caused the Minor Cataclysm (or if they know, they’ve kept it secret). It appears to have begun with rippling waves of light and energy coursing over Adnati. These ripples came in pulses that filled every hour of the day and night. These pulses slowly decreased day by day, month by month, until they finally disappeared entirely more than a year after they started.
Ultimately, the waves appeared to have been largely benign, though a few things of note occurred. During this year, sorcerers of Wild Magic triggered surges with virtually every spell cast, large or small. And babies who had been gestating during this period were invariably found to have some sort of innate magical abilities, though their abilities were not always strong and were not always passed along to their descendants.
Though scholars understood very little about the Minor Cataclysm, they chose to use it as the mark of the end of the Fifth Age and the start of the Sixth, the present age.
The Sixth Hominid Age
The Sixth Age, which is the present age, began more than three thousand years ago with the mysterious Minor Cataclysm.
It has been called the Age of Standards. During this period, seafaring travelers and traders, along with travelers aided by magical means, began to foster the Common Calendar, a standardized solar/lunar calendar system that drew from the elven religion for the names of the days in the week and the human Almagest faith for the names of the months. A common language among humans in particular emerged known as the Common Tongue, or simply Common, though regional accents and slang persist. And though kingdoms and empires had their own coins, standardized weights and metallurgy were developed for gold, silver, and copper coins.
It is currently the year 3121 in the Sixth Age, which is in the Seventh Epoch in the Third Era of Adnati.