1254/8/23
Dear Tailiki,
I advise you to visit during one of your long breaks from school, so as not to fall behind on your studies. Whether that exactly matches my own break from teaching is less important, though I think it will mostly do so since most universities and lyceums have similar schedules. We can figure out the details when the time is nearer. In any case I’d be glad to introduce you to my colleagues; I think they’d like to meet you.
As for my students, there are two who stand out so far. One is Rensar, a young man from a village in the domain of Sderamyn, who has ambitions to be a novelist. He wanted to take Seridra’s ancient history course, but couldn’t get into it – her courses are always extremely popular with students who have read her novels and popularizations. He applies himself as though he wanted to be a historian, turning in papers that are extremely well-supported and well-written. He says he’s already written three novels, but none of them are good enough to show anyone yet.
Then there is Pirisar, a girl from Dyram, who I am beginning to suspect might be like I was, a woman who wants to be a man. She goes by a masculine nickname (I won’t mention her official name), wears men’s clothes, and affects masculine patterns of speech. I have thought carefully about whether and how I can advise her, but haven’t come to any conclusions. She is a fair student, working reasonably hard at her courses but putting most of her effort, apparently, into the student organizations she volunteers for – one promoting the rights of women, and one helping out the poor of the city.
I have been looking about me for something else to do in the way of research. I can’t easily continue my research on daily life in your palace, because the artifacts are scattered in other cities’ museums and universities, and the photographs we took of them in situ are at the University of Kosyndar library, as are the interview transcripts. I don’t want to abuse our friendship to pester you with more questions, you get enough of that as it is, and I get the impression you’re tired of being treated as a historical curiosity. So I’m considering a couple of other areas of research, which there are plenty of resources to study here in the university library and archives, or other places a short distance away. I’d like to get back into archaeology, but I suspect I’ll need to teach history for several years until Niskyr in the archaeology department retires and a position opens up.
Your friend,
Ftangu
Fourth day of the ninth month, 1254
Dear Ftangu,
Daodru tells us that his stipend from the Bureau of Antiquities will end after this month. Mother and Father have been looking hard for apartments and houses for rent, and we’re having trouble finding something of acceptable quality that we can afford. We’re thinking of splitting a small house or large apartment with Uncle Kaspan and Aunt Datai, as their host family’s stipend is of course ending as well. We probably won’t be able to get a place in the neighborhood around the university, which means I’d have to take the tram to lyceum from another neighborhood, if I were still allowed to go to the same lyceum – I hope so, but I haven’t heard back from the school administration yet. I hope I can; I don’t want to lose contact with Kenet and Ridra. I suppose we could still visit on our off days if we were going to different lyceums, but we’ll see.
Between his work and apartment-hunting and spending time with his friends, I barely see Father anymore except at breakfast and bedtime. Mother is frequently away too, but not as often. I’ll be glad when we have moved, if it lets us see each other more often. At least in some ways.
Besides seeing Kenet frequently, I think what I’ll miss most is having access to the university library. It’s so much better than the school library. I am reading Sderamyn, City of Contradictions from the university library right now, and have a couple of other books checked out that I hope to have time to read before we move out and I am no longer in walking distance of it. The library card that Daodru got me is good for another four months, but I don’t know how often I’ll be able to use it if we’re living on the other side of the city.
A few days ago we celebrated the winter solstice with Daodru’s family, Uncle Kaspan and Aunt Datai. Daodru and Hetran’s grown-up daughter and son came to visit for the first time since we’ve lived with them – they live a long way off, in southern Huresh near the border with Neshinark – and the house was pretty crowded for a couple of days, but it was fun and cheerful even with our worries about finding another place to live. The solstice customs are a bit different now than they were a thousand years ago; they still light big bonfires and dance around them singing, but the dances and songs are different, and after a couple of hours everyone goes inside and drinks hot chocolate instead of the young men continuing to dance until dawn. What do they do for the solstice in Sderamyn and Kosyndar?
[in Kosyan] I have been practicing my Kosyan with Ridra a lot, and she says I’m getting pretty okay on the grammar and pronunciation, though I still have to look up a lot of words. It took me five minutes to write this paragraph, because I had to look up several words and check my textbook for some of the conjugations.
Your betrothed,
Tailiki
1254/10/9
Dear Tailiki,
I’m sorry to hear that your stipend is running out. I hope you’ve found a good place to live by now. I’m glad I’ve been able to live in student housing or faculty housing my whole adult life, and haven’t had to shop for apartments – it’s apparently pretty difficult in both Kosyndar and Sderamyn, to hear my friends talk, and I suspect it’s like that in Hureshan cities as well.
The winter solstice customs in the League city-states are similar; people light bonfires and dance around them pretty much everywhere on the continent except some parts of the south coast. The dances and songs vary, as does the exact time the bonfire is supposed to be lit, whether at sunset (Sderamyn), or when it gets dark enough to see the stars (Kosyndar), or at midnight (Dyram). There are villages not far from here where those with enough stamina dance all night as you say they used to do in Tupaska, or where several groups of dancers take shifts to cover the entire night.
I spent the solstice with several other young professors who live near me in the faculty housing. We lit the bonfire in the courtyard at sunset and danced until it died down about ten o’clock, a bit longer than it sounds like you did. Then most of us crowded into Ngesar’s apartment (he’s a professor of alchemy, very gregarious, seems to be friends with everyone in the university and half the people in the city) and prolonged the party until one or two in the morning.
My classes are going reasonably well; I feel like I’ve engaged most of the students’ attention and they’re learning at least a few things they won’t forget after the final exam. I still haven’t told Pirisar that I used to be a woman; I haven’t figured out a way to tell her how it happened without seeming like I’m taunting her with something she can never have. Unless perhaps her family is both extremely wealthy and extremely supportive of her desire to be a man; then she might hire Mysen or Gysar to transform her using some of the remaining supply of unicorn horn and black dragon teeth. I hope Mysen and Gysar can figure out how to synthesize those rediscovered spell ingredients so that those old spells can be cast for anyone of modest means, but last I heard from Sgensar, their research hadn’t yet borne fruit.
As for research, my own seems to be narrowing down on a little-known phenomenon in the history of Sderamyn that doesn’t seem to have gotten much academic attention: in the tenth century, there was a period of several decades (I’m not sure how long exactly, yet) when the styles of dress allowed both men and women to wear pretty much whatever they wanted. Or at least when several prominent figures cross-dressed freely; it’s hard to find as much documentation about ordinary people in those days, but anyway. It was followed by a moral panic and crackdown that enforced a new clothing standard, a bit different from what it had been before the freer period. There is a blink and you’ll miss it reference to this in Sderamyn, City of Contradictions, if you’ve finished that by now – the mention in chapter ten of Dedysen wearing women’s clothing. From that paragraph you’d think he was an isolated eccentric, but no, at least eight other well-known people of the period (well-known to historians, anyway) wore clothing that had been customary for the opposite sex just a short time before. You can naturally see why I’m interested.
Your friend,
Ftangu
Fifth day of the eleventh month, 1254
Dear Ftangu,
We are now living in an apartment several miles from the Daodru’s house, in a very different neighborhood. I have to walk about half a mile to get to a tram stop, from which I can get to the museum or the lyceum in twenty minutes. The university is a bit further, but not so far that I won’t be able to use my library card for the next few months.
Most of the buildings in this area have apartments in the upper stories and shops and offices in the lower stories. Ours is ten stories, about the same as many of the others; we’re on the eighth floor.
Our entire apartment – including the kitchen – is not much bigger than Father and Mother’s room in Daodru’s house. And to bathe or relieve ourselves, we must go out and down the hall to one of the shared showers or water closets. Usually at least one of them is occupied by our neighbors, and often both. But the rent is within our means, and judging from our groceries and other expenses so far, it will leave us a little margin to save some money. My trip to Sderamyn seems farther off than ever, alas!
The best feature, our neighbors say, is that our building does have elevators – many of the ones around here do not. And there’s a laundromat on the second storey, so we don’t have to haul our clothes as far as we did at Daodru’s house.
I have asked the curator at the museum for longer hours, but so far he hasn’t given me much. I probably shouldn’t work much longer hours than this while school is in session, anyway.
Father is still spending a lot of time with his friends at the pub, and very little in the apartment with Mother and me, which I suppose helps make this place feel less crowded. His Hureshan is improving a good deal, between conversations with customers at work and friends at the pub, but Mother is concerned about how much he spends on drink, now that we are responsible for all our own expenses.
Your new research sounds intriguing. Who were some of the other men who wore women’s clothing? Were there women who wore men’s clothing too?
Your betrothed,
Tailiki
1254/11/29
Dear Tailiki,
I’m sorry to hear your apartment is so crowded, but from what I hear, most people in the bigger cities are in a similar situation. I’m better off than most, being in faculty housing, but though I have my apartment to myself, it’s still pretty small.
I have had some interesting experiences since I last wrote to you. I finally found a good occasion to speak with Pirisar, telling her about how I used to be a woman, and was changed into a man with ancient magic during an archaeological expedition, etc., and about Gysar and Mysen’s research on synthesizing unicorn horn. In turn, she invited me to come to a meeting of a small, unofficial club.
They met in one of the students’ dorm rooms, and it was pretty crowded with me and five students in a room meant for two. There were three girls like Pirisar, girls who affect boyish clothing or speech patterns or outright want to be boys, and two boys who wear girlish clothing when they can, which isn’t as often as Pirisar wears boy’s clothing, unfortunately. I spoke to them about my experiences, and about my research about tenth-century Sderamyn cross-dressing, and heard from them in turn. I was surprised to learn that there is an alchemical way of changing a person’s body to look mostly like the opposite sex. It’s slow and moderately expensive, and only one of the boys and one of the girls is using it, but nowhere near as expensive (or until recently impossible) as sorcery using unicorn horn and black dragon teeth. I wish I’d known about that years ago, but if there is a community like this in Kosyndar, I never found it, or met anyone quite like me (though there were some who wore opposite-sex clothing when they could get away with it, none of those I spoke to actually wished to become the opposite sex). Anyway, I offered to become their faculty sponsor so they could get a proper meeting room and a listing in the student handbook. We’re still considering what name to use; we want to draw the attention of the students (and maybe faculty?) who would benefit from the community of like minds, but not draw too much attention from moral busybodies. Let me know if you have any ideas.
My research progresses slowly. I’ve turned up a few more less well-known people who wore opposite-sex clothing or went by names typical of the opposite sex in the period I’m looking at. So far I know of nine men and two women; women in general, whether they cross-dressed or not, are much less often mentioned in chronicles of the time, and even less often discussed in much detail. You asked for specifics, so I’ll describe a couple of them.
Sdigrin was a natural philosopher; he made some important discoveries in optics and the mechanics of air pressure. He wore women’s clothing during all the best-documented period of his life, from about 926-952. If he went by a feminine nickname, it hasn’t been recorded, though I haven’t given up hope (I still have a few dozen letters to get through). I did find one interesting document: a near-contemporary Lives of the Natural Philosophers which uses feminine adjectives to refer to Sdigrin.
Kynidra, or Kyndisar as she was sometimes known, was the widow of one of the archons of Sderamyn. A year after her husband’s death, in 924, she began to wear men’s clothing – that, and her masculine nickname, are well-documented in several contemporary or near-contemporary documents. What I’m less sure of, because it’s only documented in a century-later and rather sensationalistic history, is that she apparently married a woman (one who wore traditional women’s clothing) in 929, and lived with her until they both died in the flu epidemic of 948. Other sources say she lived until 957 or 958, and most of the others don’t mention her wife (one mentions her, but only as a “close friend”), so who knows.
Your friend,
Ftangu
