Hardakain

The Hardakain clan's records are consistent and stretch back as far as the beginnings of the First Age, for they have often chosen professions since the days of their great ancestor Durin that recognized their strengths in lore and administration. And in this regard they have repeatedly proven their worth, recording ever since those first days the annals of Khazad history, which they have maintained with great pride. Over the centuries, as many of the Hardakain were posted in remote areas beyond Khazad-dum, warder and merchant alike have made use of this clan's services as they have often provided dutiful care in tending their wounds. But misfortune stained them as early as the First Age, when a famed and renowned elder healer named Morin was killed in a cave-in down in the one of the lower deeps while attending those wounded and recording the progress of the excavations in a great book. Following this tragic event, the clan held to superstition and decided to settle in the upper halls closer to the surface. There were some given the non-traditional roles of forester and herder in which the clan members learned once again to excel, a rare practice that continues to this day. In the fairer days of the Second Age when there was much contact through trade with the Eldar in Eregion, a number of the Hardakain were noted for the skill with which they learned the foreign tongues and scripts. This thereby greatly enhanced the volume of lore that was accumulated, learnt and studied deeply by those who could further their crafts. As is common among Durin's folk, the art of song was entrusted to this clan from which many a songsmith sprung, thus filling the great halls with the echo of their bardic voices. In the time that marked the end of Khazad rule in Moria, when Durin's Bane crawled forth from the foul depths, much of the accumulated lore of this clan was lost when the surviving hosts of our folk fled for safety in 1980 T.A. The Hardakain did not tarry for long in the new Kingdom of Erebor, but rather struck north to the Ered Mithrin where they were among the first clans to resettle those harsh lands and mine the rich silver veins found there.

For more than five hundred years Durin's folk enjoyed a renewal of fortune within their fine halls in the Mithrin, but sometime around 2560 foul dragons emerged in growing numbers and began brutally seizing one Dwarven hall after another, plundering their wealth and slaughtering many. The Hardakain persevered though and remained with their King until the end, when in 2589 Dain I was slain before the doors of his Kingdom by a nameless cold-drake, thus bringing a tragic end to Dwarven rule in the north. Those that survived fled south, many resettling back in Erebor while the Hardakain in an effort to rebuild their fortunes continued on to Barazahar under the new rule of Dain's youngest son, Prince Gror.