4 October 2026

Zendrolion’s Rakasta 150,000 to 78,000 BC

This was Map 1 of an eight map series covering the history of the rakasta in Mystara. Simone based the first five maps, including this one, on his Precataclysmic map — itself derived from Michele Carpita’s Precataclysmic Mystara (Evergrun).

What struck me most about this map on first viewing was the date, as it was vastly further into the past than most Mystara history ever dealt with before. Simone explained this very neatly in his post at The Piazza, so I will quote the relevant paragraph in full here:

A Note About Rakasta’s Creation Date
As you can see from the following timeline, the Rakastas’ origin has been withdrawn by many thousands years in regards of the existing timelines, in order to have allow time for the individual breeds to develop naturally different characteristics.
I would have liked to withdraw the Rakastas’ origin even further, but that wasn’t possible because the Rakasta legend tell us about Kum-rah, a shaman of Immortal Ka; as I wanted to have Kum-rah as one of the primitive humans (not Brute-Men, but proper humans), I thought that before BC 200 000 the humans could not even have become aware of the Immortals, so I set BC 150 000 for the Rakastas’ origin. As 150 000 years are still few for so many new species to develop (real-world felines have developed into modern species within about 10 million years), we’ve still to suppose that the evolution of Rakastas has been somewhat accelerated by their magical blood – they descend from a normal cat which has been polymorphed into a maiden and then into a cat-woman by Immortal magic, after all.

The map shows that Simone conceived of the rakasta as originating in Skothar, with this super-ancient period seeing them mostly spread out through that continent, with some wandering to Brun via the land bridges of that era. The significance of these migrations seems to have been to provide reason for the many different evolutional variations among the rakasta.

Fan-made Map by Simone Neri (August 2008)

*Rakasta of Mystara 150,000 to 78,000 BC, by Simone Neri, August 2008*

This is an original map created by one of Mystara’s excellent fan cartographers. For more information on the cartographer, including a gallery of all their maps, see also Appendix M: Mappers of Mystara.

Sources

Fan Sources

LoZompatore’s Precataclysmic Mystara (Evergrun) (August 2005)
History and Evolution of Rakastas discussion thread at The Piazza (August 2008)
History and Evolution of Rakastas at the Vaults of Pandius (August 2008)
Zendrolion’s Mystara Precataclysmic (August 2008)

References

All of Simone’s maps at the Atlas of Mystara
Simone’s entry in Appendix M: Mappers of Mystara (upcoming)
Simone’s author page at the Vaults of Pandius

Chronological Analysis

This is a fan-made map. It was published in August 2008. The updated Atlas version of this map is not yet available. See also Appendix C for annual chronological snapshots of the area. For the full context of this map in Mystara’s publication history, see the upcoming Let’s Map Mystara 2008.

The following lists are from the Let’s Map Mystara project. Additions are new features, introduced in this map. Revisions are changes to previously-introduced features. Hex Art & Fonts track design elements. Finally, Textual Additions are potential features found in the related text. In most cases, the Atlas adopts these textual additions into updated and chronological maps.

Under Construction! Please check back again soon for updates.