Highborne Empire

The Highborne Empire was a massive ancient kingdom that spanned nearly the entirety of the landmass of Kalimdor during its apex. For nearly three thousand years, it prospered as a multicultural empire of scholars, sorcerers, and warriors. The Empire was eponymously ruled by the Highborne Peerage, or elves that had attained nobility through a variety of means. The underclass consisted of common elves, or Kaldorei, who did not possess inherent magical abilities or noble blood. Some Kaldorei achieved powerful honorific titles that afforded them priveleges akin to those of their rulers, but they were exceptional individuals, and by no means did they represent a majority.

Due to increasing disparity between social and economic classes, rising tensions between Highborne and Kaldorei, and the emergence of Druidism and Naturalism as prominent philosophies, the Empire fell into rapid decline, ending in the War of the Ancients which destroyed the Highborne Empire and shattered Kalimdor in an event known today as the Sundering.