Cappadocian

Cappadocians
Pseudonyms	Graverobbers
Sect	Camarilla Independents
Disciplines	Auspex Fortitude Mortis
Bloodlines	Giovanni Harbingers of Skulls Lamiae Samedi
Rarity	Legendary

The Cappadocians are often called the clan of death in whispers, and it's a name they work hard to live up to. A group of monastic scholars and researchers who have dedicated eternity to understanding death, how it works, and how they can manipulate it, they are now a scant handful of survivors after the devastating betrayal of Clan Giovanni. Disturbing, secretive, and seldom-seen, they are one of the founding clans of the Camarilla and yet in modern nights barely survive as remnants of a bygone age.

History

Antiquity

The Cappadocians trace their ancestry to their eponymous Antediluvian, Cappadocius, an ancient mystic who saw visions of the future and of the tantalizing secrets underlying the universe. Recognizing death as the key to understanding not just the living and the dead but also the unique condition of vampires themselves, the Antediluvian threw himself and his clan into the study of death, stalking the mausoleums and graves of mortals and meticulously investigating every advance in the science of embalming, burial, or the prolonging of a lifespan. Notably, the clan very seldom participated in the squabbles between the other Antediluvians, and few of its members ever bothered with similar attempts at empire-building or society-shaping.

Instead, the clan created the Erciyes and settled down to their studies, largely ignoring the passing of the centuries outside.

The Middle Ages

By the Middle Ages, Cappadocius had become convinced that religious mysteries were the best conduit to learn more about the condition of death, making him the only one of his peers to adopt the new human religion known as Christianity.

As the clan grew more restless and began to seek to involve themselves in more worldly affairs, their ancient leader responded by ruthlessly weeding the ranks in what would come to be known as the Feast of Folly: he gathered all his clan members in the deep tunnels beneath Erciyes and asked them a series of questions, and those who failed to answer correctly (according to his philosophies) were sealed there forever, presumably falling into Frenzy and eventually true death.

Modern Nights

Unfortunately, it was only a few more centuries that the Cappadocians remained a powerful clan before the Embrace of Augustus Giovanni led to his betrayal of and eventual diablerie of the torpid Cappadocius, who he sought to supplant as the new preeminent necromancer among the undead. The Cappadocians were devastated by their leader's death, as well as by the ensuing campaign of ruthless extermination and harassment by the rest of the Giovanni, and by modern nights there are very few of them remaining, mostly in hiding or in positions in Camarilla cities where they are too well protected for the Giovanni to think pursuing them is worth it.

According to the Cappadocians, two things are certain. The first is that the clan is not nearly as dead as everyone would like to believe; they were never big political movers and shakers, and they claim that the clan's heart has simply moved underground, scattered and decentralized but still very much alive and pursuing their studies. The second is that no one, even a would-be Antediluvian, should be so foolish as to assume that they can actually kill a being that has been studying the secrets of death for uncountable millennia, and that just because no one has seen Cappadocius doesn't necessarily mean that he has entered true death.

Strongholds

The traditional Cappadocian stronghold is Erciyes, an ancient mountain in central Turkey (in the region known as Cappadocia, in fact) that has served as their home base and center of scholarship since the first century B.C.E. Erciyes may boast a temple above-ground, but it's only a fraction of the actual complex: the entire mountain is honeycombed with secret passages, unknown vaults, hidden libraries, and any other nook or cranny a clan of scholarly death-studiers could possibly ever have wanted. While only a few of its secret texts (for example, the Erciyes Fragments) have ever been found or studied by outsiders, it is assumed by most elders that the treasures of arcane and occult knowledge hidden within would drive most scholars of other clans into a frenzy of envy if they had any idea of their true contents.

The lowest levels of Erciyes have been sealed for centuries, thanks to serving as the prison (and presumed mass grave) of those members of the clan found wanting by their Antediluvian. Apocryphal tales of strange occurrences, noises, and sights abound, but even the most elder and powerful of the clan are less than excited about braving whatever is left down there, even if it is only the evidence that in spite of all their studies into death, the Cappadocians themselves remain less than immune to it.

Advantages and Weaknesses

Advantages

Thanks to their clan-wide dedication to their one and only topic of scholarship, Cappadocians have (or have access to) a wealth of obscure information about death and its role in various cultures, powers, and spheres of vampiric life. If a topic is related to death in some way, a Cappadocian can always behave as if they have a dot of Lore in it, by virtue of having studied adjacent ideas or at least understanding how the topic works basically so that they can further appreciate how it affects the process of dying. Many Cappadocians are prone to shocking other vampires by seeming to "know everything," even though their actual knowledge may be more narrow than it appears.

Weaknesses

The Cappadocian obsession with death is immediately visible to all: they look like the living corpses they are. This doesn't necessarily mean that they look monstrous, like their unfortunate cousins the Nosferatu; rather, they simply do not look alive and cannot successfully pass as such without enormous effort that most of them aren't willing to put forth. The marks of death vary slightly from Cappadocian to Cappadocian, but they often have waxy or incredibly pale skin, delicate and breakable bones and joints, very little flesh to cloak their bones, and a tendency to creak and moan when moving like the animated skeletons they are. (Understandably, this can cause them more than a little trouble in social situations, even when they should otherwise be respected for their power or expertise.)

Clan Cappadocian in DC

There is only one Cappadocian in DC: the Gaunt Man, an elder who has made Washington DC his home since fleeing Europe some time in the sixteenth century. Extremely reclusive and uninterested in anything but his studies, the Gaunt Man flies under the radar, and few other than the city's Prince know he even exists.

Cappadocian Characters

Il Cappuccino	The Gaunt Man	Masticatore di Sudari

See Also

Giovanni
Harbingers of Skulls
Lamia
Samedi

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