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Forum:Territory application/AN139 - Girebeland

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Please fill in the information below to make a territory request.
Territory ID and proposed name
The Territory ID (from OpenGeofiction:Territories, e.g. AR123a) and proposed name of the country


AN139∈⊾ƨ - Girebeland. This will be a collaborative territory, starting with Kyunzi, greenstumpymonster, me and Axaeve, with other people being able to join later if they want

Physical geography
An overview of climate, topography and landscape of the country. With the exception of Beginner territories, you should always create a sketch map to illustrate & explain your plans. You can add a link to this (hosted on imgBB, Postimages or similar, but not imgur.com)


Plan: https://ibb.co/wNJX0XzD

It will be a varied country, with a temperate climate in the southeast and southwest, cool in the northern mountains, and semi-arid in the western portion of the territory. There is two main rivers, and mountains in the south and north.

Human geography
A brief description of the territory demographics, economic development, land occupation, infrastructure and mapping style


The population will be concentrated in the east, with one city in the west, near the sea. There is a semi-dense network of highways and motorways, with a large rail network connecting most town and regions. It will be largely multicultural, with multiple languages (see below). There will be large areas of agriculture, with town between major agricultural areas. The towns shall be based on creeks and water sources. The main cities and towns will be concentrated in the east, where there is more precipitation combined with a moderate climate. There will be a major town along the edges of the mountain ranges. The public transport network is highly developed, with buses, trains and ferries.

The power grid is 230v 50hz, with the railways being 1435mm standard gauge. The roads are left hand drive to match with Ingrea, and AN142a∈⊾ƨ. Our population is young, with a HDI of around .780.

History & culture
A brief description of the intended culture and language

The country would have a diverse multitude native tribes. Then, in the 1800s or any time that works well with surrounding nations' histories, Ingrea would colonise the area, naming the colony 'Girebeland' after the name of the bay which they had landed in. Finally, in the late 1900s, Girebeland would gain independece. Only the major cities would speak Ingerish, while regional and rural areas would speak languages derived from the IRL:Sepik language family used in real-life Papua New Guinea. The plan of languages can be seen here: https://imgur.com/a/ZEK7FzS

Past mapping
To support your request provide links to areas of OGF mapping which showcase your mapping skill. Mapping relevant to the requested theme & geography is especially useful.
The {{coord}}, {{node}}, {{relation}} or {{scalehelper}} templates can optionally be used to link to the OGF map - they result in nicely formatted links. Or you can paste in a URL.


Kyunzi:

Axaeve:

Alomico:

GreenStumpyMonster - I'll mainly drop in to help with adding some urban, rural and potentially natural mapping though I will balance this with Esvolksmark which I recently applied for.

Username & date
Sign and date the application by typing four tildes (~~~~) without spaces or "nowiki" tags.


Alomico (talk) 06:47, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

Discussion
Discussion for clarification & decision


Thank you, Kyunzi, greenstumpymonster, Alomico and Axaeve, for your application,

  • Collaborations tend to be "slightly" more complex than one-mapper ownership. Have you thought about how the territory would be administer? Who is in charge of what? How new collaborators are brought in? You can get some inspiration from the existing official collaborations. AN139 spreads over 39,8344.12 km²/153,801.52 sq mi (~California) from 38 to 45°S (~San Francisco-Portland or Messina-Milano)
  • Could you provide some additional information regarding the territory's history and cultures? How does it fit in the broader region? How does it impact the mapping style(s)?
  • Have you sounded whether its feasible for you to map, even partially in Sepik languages? Do you have enough online/book materials to invent toponyms, hydronyms, odonyms even in locations where Ingerish is intended to be the main language? Think about places named Winnipeg, Chicago or Potomac River. All have a meaning in what was once the local language.

Thank you,
--Aiki (talk) 08:37, 14 June 2026 (UTC) acting administrator for AN/TA

Hello Aiki, here's what I think about these questions. To start with,

  • I believe that Alomico is the leader of this collaboration, and that Axaeve, GreenStumpyMonster and I are mappers that have been invited to join this collaboration. If one desires to join, I think the main way to do so would be to message Alomico. We have decided that instead of dividing the nation up into regions in which one maps individually, we will be in charge of different types of mapping - for example, my preferences are mapping suburbs and rural towns, whereas GreenStumpyMonster prefers micromapping more. Of course, preferences can fluctuate, and I think that we'll be able to reorganise and communicate which person is mapping what.
  • I have made a severe lapse in judgment by only using Sepik languages in the nation, and in order to incorporate the nation more into its surroundings, it would be the absolute best decision to instead have a large Taukan influence in the nation, with languages branched from Taukan across the country. However, Sepik languages will still be used in certain areas, which could give way to some interesting language features.
  • After looking at Bromley (colonised in 1730) and Ingrea, I believe that it would be quicker for Ingrea to get to Girebeland than to Ingrea, thus the year of colonisation should be around 1730 or earlier. Another detail of this event would be that the Ingerish would land in a bay called "Giireba" ("riverbank" in the local IRL:Kwoma language), and would steadily expand the colony from there whilst potentially exporting native peoples for slavery, similar to native peoples in Bromley. The colonisation of Girebeland would impact mapping style heavily, with urban areas and suburbs similar to those in Australia and New Zealand.
  • Using several resources, I have found many resources for the Sepik languages, and all of the languages named in the language plan sent have at least one resource that I had found on them (wordlist, grammar, dictionary, etc.) The largest dictionary I had found on a Sepik language was on the Kwoma language, which is why we have used it as the language spoken in the capital, so that we can create a creole of it without much hassle.

Thank you for the feedback, warmly,

Kyunzi (talk) 14:34, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

Thank you, Kyunzi,

  • Territory type:
    • Collaboration with initial coordinator Alomico.
    • Collaborators allowed to map "anything", "anywhere", provided this is collectively agreed.
    • Collaborators may express preference in mapping types.
    • Territory collectively owned. Joining/Leaving the collaboration via OGF private message to coordinator
    • Collaboration page/forum page (e.g. list of collaborators, main themes) is public and up-to-date (coordinator in charge)

Let me whether I understand your reply correctly.

  • Sepik languages & Culture:
    • You can use it if you desire. My question was two-part:
      • Do you feel you have enough resource in Sepik languages to keep mapping with it?
      • How does AN139 and its population(s) connect historically, culturally with its neighbours (apart from the Ingerish colonisation elsewhere in Antarephia)? There is absolutely no obligation to use Taukan cultures/languages (in itself, the Taukan concept is very loose anyway).
    • Apparently, giireba is pronounced /ˈɡiːrɛᵐbɑ/ or /ˈɡiːrəbɑ/. I suppose the long "i" might have been rendered as "ee" in Ingerish
  • History:
    • I had a quick look at Ingerish colonial projects in Antarephia and found Guai (1584-1649), New Austland (1545-1895), Leresso (1764-1851), Kofuku (1745-1815) in addition to Bromley.
    • I suppose slave trade would have made sense for the Ingerish if the indigenous population was important enough and somehow "docile" enough for the benefits to outweigh the costs/risks of such a trade. As OGF world kind of mimic the real world, the British Slave Trade Act outlawed slave trade across the Atlantic Ocean in 1807. That means it would have been short-lived for AN139. Maybe, a local form of indenture servitude could have taken place instead?

Thank you
--Aiki (talk) 11:38, 19 June 2026 (UTC)


Hi Aiki,

After discussing with the group, we can confirm that the information you have listed under territory type is all correct.

I believe that for most Sepik languages, the wordlists I have found should be adequate for town and village names. However, making a new creole language out of most of these languages as well as Ingerish is impossible. Thus, for these languages, I suppose that they would have gone extinct, and that the main languages with their own creoles with Ingerish would be the ones that I find lots of data on.

The main way I can think of AN139 connecting with other neighbours culturally and in a historical contect would be through trading. There could be a possible trade network running through the nation from the northwest to southeast, extending to other cultures. In the northwest, where we envision the land to be semi-arid, tribes in the area would be nomadic or semi-nomadic, possibly meaning they could extend to meet other cultural groups too. Other than that, I can't really get to the specifics as I can't find any information on AN139's only active neighbour in AN142a.

Using /i instead of /ee was an aesthetic decision. For the /a at the end of 'giireba', when -land was tacked on at the end, the name slowly corrupted from Girebaland to Girebeland.

I think Taukan would be a great fit for the nation as there are Taukan languages spoken in countries around the nation. AN139 is quite large and I think that having languages from at least two language families in the country is realistic. Are there any resources on Taukan, such as dictionaries or grammar?

Thank you for the information! I'm all for having a short-lived span of slavery, and then an era of indenture servitude afterwards.

Warmly, Kyunzi (talk) 01:38, 22 June 2026 (UTC)

Hi, Kyunzi,

You can find some Taukan linguistic/cultural aspects (usually, high level to be flexible enough) here:

It seems that "Taukan" is mentioned for other Antarephian countries, but I couldn't find any content.

Regular AN/AT administrators should take over the territory application shortly.

--Aiki (talk) 04:55, 22 June 2026 (UTC), acting administrator for AN/TA

Hi Alomico and Kyunzi,

Thanks for the additional information you've provided. Application looks good overall, and our major concerns and points that were open for a collaborative territory are cleared now. I'm approving the application, good luck with the collaboration and Happy Mapping! For any questions or open points, don't hesitate to send out a message.

—PortCal (talk) 22:44, 26 June 2026 (UTC)

Territory application approved
Collaborative territory approved. —PortCal (talk) 22:44, 26 June 2026 (UTC)
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