For nearly four thousand years, the "History of the Queendoms" was a matter of much speculation, considerable writing, deep research, and unanswered questions.
Recent events, however, have put all of this into new context...
Records from the various Queendoms all go back just about this far. Early records are extremely rare, often unreliably transcribed over the milennia, and frequently referring to people, places, and creatures that seem fantastical or even absurd. Of the time before those most ancient of parchments, little is known for certain, and there is no consensus among scholars.
Cryptic phrases in archaic tongues refer something ancient vanquished by the Goddess; something chained in the deep places. Some think these are traditional alchemical recipes, misread due to the evolution of tongues. Some think these are spiritual teachings of the Inner Self. Some think these are literal descriptions of an earlier time. Some think these are bedtime stories to scare children. If there was an earlier time, no good evidence has survived.
For neither have arcane investigations confirmed the age of any cities or relics that indicate civilizations prior to the dawn of the Queendoms. Occasionally, some artifact arises that appears to suggest more ancient times, but to date, such artifacts have all been traced outside the plane of the Ten Queendoms.
By all traditions, stories, and records, the Ten Queendoms were always such: Ten Goddesses, Ten Lands, Ten Queens. The borders have shifted somewhat from century to century as fortunes rise and fall, and the dynamics and particulars of each Queendom has evolved. Still the fundamental character of each, as determined by the Goddess, has remained constant.
Scholars in the great universities of Mataga, as well as record keepers and scholars in other lands, tend to view the history of the Ten Queendoms in terms of times of crisis and stretches of stability. That said, some Queendoms thrive on constant upheaval, while others maintain both contancy and apparent tranquility.
The historically interesting crises have been those which bring the Queendoms into conflict with other realms.
The first of these was the Passage of Shiba: the destructive arrival, subsequent chaos, and ongoing conflict brought by the great God Shiba, whom all the Ten Goddesses (except possibly Duumaba) are thought to have as lover. Records and memories from before the Passage of Shiba are scant, and that earliest time is often held up as a kind of golden age of magical beauty, artistic accomplishment, wonder, and spiritual purity. But for ten years destruction rained upon the world, and in the rebuilding the general shape of the Ten Queendoms as we know them today took form.
The second great crisis was the Age of Demons. All the Queendoms were overrun with a demonic plague, possibly brought on by shenanigans of the Gods, or possibly experiments gone horribly horribly wrong. But it took the full might of the Queendom of Bagalī, as well as the personal intervention of Khalrī, to beat back the chaos and restore some semblance of order. It is thought that much magical knowledge was lost during the Age of Demons; although scholars of the arcane tend to agree that much was discovered during the crisis as well.
Each Queendom has had its own turbulent moments of upheaval, conflict, and transition, sometimes almost as dramatic as these pivotal moments for the world as a whole. Buvaresh, for example, tends to experience hundreds of years of peace and tranquility punctuated by catastrophic restructuring on the part of their Goddess.
Those alive today believe that a third great crisis has just opened. Throughout all of history the Queendoms were surrounded by beautiful and seemingly endless ocean... until all of a sudden, as if falling through some vast crack in edge of reality... the oceans themselves were gone. Not dried up, not drained away... gone! Replaced by rough and desolate scrubland.
The implications of this astonishing turn of events are still unfolding!