The Great Doldrum

The Great Doldrum was a period of total civilization collapse lasting nearly half a millennia across the known universe occurring around 12,000 BCP. This dark period was marked by confusion, strife, and madness.

Before The Doldrum, Ape-kind, the Monkeys, was the most powerful race in the known universe, and neither the Rumps nor the Chickens counted for much. The collapse itself lasted nearly half a millennium; Ape-kind's recovery took millennia. When it came, they did not return to conquest. They turned instead to scholarship, and above all to Monkey Mechanics.

While the event itself is well-documented to have occurred. Very little information exists documenting the origins or happenings of the period. This is also corroborated by the fact that the period is documented in multiple cultures, for example it is also known as “Chicken-squalor” in Chicken histories.

It is believed that Rektoplese Simponius Fallagrade angered the god, Mandobar by stealing his scepter, which was used to lay waste to The Nine Realms of Bellakarth. The Great Doldrum occurred some time after the fall of The Realms and is believed to have occurred as a direct result of Fallagrade’s transgressions against Mandobar.

Other mentions§

Ape-kind persevered and eventually devised scientific methods to lead them out of the darkness, such as early forms of loosening (see Rektoplese Simponius Fallagrade). The histories of the Nine Realms of Bellakarth were lost in The Great Doldrum. The IGRSE was initially established near the end of The Great Doldrum.

In Chicken histories The Doldrum is the Chicken-squalor. It is believed to take that name from the extinction of the precursor birds, forebears of the Chickens, whom Chæmbo, The Barbarian, hunted to the last in that age.