Created by Claire Cavendish on Sat Dec 10th, 2022 @ 17:46

The Dark Ages

Earliest written Mutant history speaks of Faeblessed individuals, and for the most part they speak of them in positive terms. They were integral part of small communities using their powers for the betterment of whatever settlement they were in. Especially individuals with healing and prophetic powers were highly regarded. This view of them seemed to change in the late 15th century. Fuelled by puritan beliefs the state branded mutants Witchblooded, pushing the understanding that they were in league with Satan. A fragile balance was broken and state sanctioned witch hunters started to seek out mutants, killing hundreds in the process and pushing those that remained underground and in hiding. Both the terms Faeblessed and Witchblooded seemed to disappear from the common vernacular but their derivatives found their way into mythological accounts and local legends, in the form of fairies, hags, witches, and others.

The Renaissance and Enlightenment

The aggressive persecution of mutants seemed to simmer down in light of the renaissance. Scientific thought and the resurgence of humanism made it that individuals with mutant abilities were seen as a potentially good influence on humankind. In the scientific pursuit of cataloguing different species. Many terms were used but the one that stuck until modern day was Homo Superior. A term that has become a bit of a hot topic in the modern age as it implies an inferiority in 'regular' humans. Very few of the scientific scholarly endeavours involving mutants have survived the test of time, with many of the renaissance thinkers attributing some of their abilities to connections with the mythological gods of ancient Greece and Rome, also spawning the term Homo Deus. This is an idea that no longer holds much credence with the rise of Darwinism.

Victorian Era

The most prominent change in the understanding of mutants was the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin. By the time of the Victorian Era the number of publically known mutants was brought back to around zero. Descriptions of the next stage in Human evolution was a purely academic endeavour, and none of the more well known papers were getting anywhere near mentioning humankind developing special abilities through mutation. Within the upper class of the Victorian era there is sporadic mention of superpowered individuals. A single letter by the hand of Charles Darwin is thought to address mutants, while the exact quote is difficult to verify there are scholars that mark it as an indicator that mutants are unnatural. In the letter Darwin mentions that despite the infinite possibilities brought on by external sexual and natural pressures he feels it's 'Such a thing is so unlikely to occur that I'm confident in saying that it will never come to pass in this universe, or the next.' As a result one of the Victorian slangs for mutants became Nevers, though there's little written evidence of this practice. While most of the socio-political reforms in the era focused on individual improvement, and the middle class rose in power, very little was done to the benefit or detriment of mutants, who remained on the fringe. There's some evidence that the first mutant centric societies where introduced during the later half of the 19th century.

The era of the Great Wars

When the world devolved into the chaos of two massive global conflicts mutants were inevitably caught in the crossfire. During the first world wars, with the advent of machine weapons and armoured vehicles the first mutants started to make their way onto the public stage, but were thought to be part of rapid new developments in military technology by the general public. For most of the world governments this was also the start of their efforts to investigate and experiment on mutantkind. Despite their integral role in some of the larger conflicts during the first world war mutants weren't acknowledged as such, merely being indicated a special operatives during some of the engagements. The years immediately following the first world war experimentation and development for military applications of mutant abilities increased on black operations budgets of the world governments. By the time the second world war came around the most prominent field of study that focused on mutantkind was Nazi Germany's eugenics programme. After the war the victorious allied forces did their best to suppress the information, and atrocities, discovered in the severely unethical medical trials. It's the first official record of the hereditary nature of mutations, Abweichend as they were called by German scientists. Some of the war records show an A in the margins indicating the deviating nature of the people involved.

Post-war era / the Cold War

Following two devastating wars the world focused on rebuilding the devastation wrought by the conflict. It allowed the superpowers to bury the evidence surrounding mutantkind. The Cold War that followed between West and East put pressure on the superpowers to develop their own mutant divisions. Within mutant communities stories about these programmes were used as ghost stories to scare people into secrecy. One famous example of such a programme is the CIA's MKULTRA, who after several leaks in the fifties and sixties was officially disbanded, though people would be hard pressed to believe the CIA is no longer dedicating resources to the development of mutants within their ranks. The true horror stories centre around the USSR and the Gulags. As the wall came crumbling and the USSR collapsed in the late 80's, early 90's, a new light was shone on the atrocities conducted by the KGB. With the new technological advances making it faster and easier to spread information outside of official government channels. As mutants become more vocal and in the public debate pro- and anti-mutant voices seem to become increasingly polarised.