The Social Ranks of Niro and Panula

Below is an overview of the different social ranks a citizen of Niro or Panula can belong in, sortest from lowest to highest:

Outlaw: A person defined as an outlaw is someone who does not own any property, and is not enslaved. Outlaws have no rights at all, and harming an outlaw is not illegal, no matter your own rank. Outlaws themselves however, have to follow the laws of the country they are in, or they are sure to be punished, often just killed on the spot, because putting them in jail just isn’t worth the extra resources spent.

Slave: Slaves are the same as commoners in the sense that they own no property and thus have no rights of their own, the difference however, is that slaves are owned by people of higher ranks. Committing crimes such as murdering or kidnapping a slave would be illegal, not because you would be violating the rights of the slave, but because you would be damaging or stealing private property of the owner. Although slaves technically have higher social status than outlaws, they most of the time live under the worst conditions due to poor treatment by their owners.

Commoner: Commoners are the everyday people of Niro and Panula, and make up the majority of the population, with slaves being the 2nd most populous group. Outside of the bigger cities pretty much all commoners are farmers, but in areas of higher population density they will often be found working as merchants, guards and soldiers, carpenters or sailors, among many other things.

The nobility: Noblemen belong in the highest of the social ranks of Niro and Panula. In a lot of cases, nobles don’t really have any jobs themselves, but rather earn their livelyhood from taxating and renting property to commoners. Many noble families do however, own different shops or shipping companies, for example, which they themselves man and/or do the accounting for, but most of these will offer more luxurious or high-end services, and will thus in theory be reserved to the wealthy. Everyone in the nobility is part of a table, or assembly (which is what makes them nobles in the first place), which is a cooperation of several noble houses, giving them benefits in everyday life, such as lower taxes, higher priority in healing houses, evading the law in some cases, and more, depending on the table you’re a member of. Tables are owned by the wealthiest and most influential people of the nobility, and are means for them to gain even more wealth and influence. In Panula (Niro is a monarchy) only people of the Nobility are allowed to vote during elections, which happen every 10 years.