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On loan from a private collector, this gold hairnet (photograph shown with an artist’s depiction of how it was worn) is around 2,200 years old and is said to have belonged to Sol Koroleva.
The most famous of the Old Ravkan rulers, Sol Koroleva – whose given name has been sadly lost to history – was crowned as a child queen and, although exact dates have been debated, is said to have ruled for around eighty years.
While confirmed as a historical figure, many mythologies have built up around Sol Koroleva – these include stories that she did not age and simply vanished one day rather than dying of old age; claims that she wielded the power of light (which is supposedly the reason for her title); and rumours that, while she never married or had children, she had a single lover for around sixty-five years.
Evidence of Sol Koroleva’s lover is scarce and murky. This almost seems deliberate, as if the historical record was muddled by the queen herself for her own reasons. He was supposedly a court magician and favourite of the queen, called the Darkling or, in less complimentary sources, the Black Heretic. He was said to wield the power of shadows and to command a vast army that helped make Ravka the premier military power in the world at that time.
Three separate palace friezes depict the Darkling – with his distinctive symbol of the sun in eclipse – gifting the gold hairnet to Sol Koroleva. Given that she is shown wearing the piece in many official statues and paintings, it can be concluded that it was a favourite item.
On Sol Koroleva’s disappearance, the Darkling also vanishes from Old Ravkan records, possibly murdered by one of his enemies.
The throne then apparently passed to a distant cousin of Sol Koroleva’s, who had grown up away from court. This was Tsarita Alina I, whose husband Aleksandr was a formidable General.
Rumours continued to persist of light and shadow powers into Tsarita Alina I’s reign, although this may have been because such things had begun to be associated with the crown itself rather than with a specific person.
Alina I’s only child, a daughter who would later be known as Tsarita Alina II, was raised away from court for her safety. She came to the throne following her mother’s abdication (after which Alina I disappears from records) and ruled with her own husband, also called Aleksandr (a popular and common name at the time), who acted as her chief advisor.
The time encompassing the reigns of these three queens is considered to be Ravka’s golden age.
There is a moderately popular conspiracy theory that all three of these queens were one and the same person. However, given the length of their combined reigns and the average life expectancy at the time, this seems quite impossible.
Alina II had no children and her fate is unknown as she vanished mysteriously with her husband with no witnesses to her departure.
The Lantsov dynasty then rose to prominence, the first in a long line of families who attempted – and failed – to recapture the earlier glory of Old Ravka.
Ravka became a republic sixty years ago, a new age heralded by the election of well-respected and beloved President Alina Starkova.
Excerpt from a leaflet for a display at the Ravkan Museum in Os Alta