Dwarf

Dwarves, sometimes called the Stout Folk, are a natural humanoid race common throughout parts of Toril. Dwarves are a tough, tradition-abiding folk known for their strong martial traditions and beautiful craftsmanship.

Physical Characteristics
Dwarves a short race, as their name implies, standing between 4'3" and 4'9" on average, with gold dwarves a bit shorter. What they lack in height they make up for in bulk as dwarves are, on average, about as heavy as humans, and weighing from about 160 to 220 lbs. Dwarven men are a little bit taller and heavier than their female counterparts. Like humans dwarves have a wide variety of skin, eye, and hair colors, typically pale among shield dwarves and deeply tanned or brown amongst gold dwarves. Hazel eyes are common throughout the race, with blue eyes more common amongst shield dwarves and brown or green eyes found amongst the gold dwarves.

Male dwarves are often bald and grow thick facial hair sometimes used to display social status. It is a common misconception that female dwarves (with the exception of some gold dwarves) also do this, who instead braid their long hair. This hair is often dark in hue, though among shield dwarves blond or red hair is just as common. Gold dwarves take the care of beards to an extreme, carefully oiling and grooming it, and in some cases even gold dwarven females grow beards.

Dwarves are a long-lived race, though not so much as the Tel'Quessir, and reach physical maturity somewhat later than humans, traditionall considered adults once they reach age 50, and live far longer. Dwarves age much like humans but over a longer period of time, remaining vigorous well past 150 years. Most dwarves live to see their bicentennial and a few live to be over 400.

Psychology
Whether or not the dwarven claim that they were carved from the world's stone is true the dwarves share many qualities considered similar to the stone they live with. Strong, hardy, and dependable dwarves are polite, particularly elders, and possess a wisdom beyond that of many other races. Dwarves value their traditions, regardless of the subrace they come from, and look for inspiration from ancestral heroes. Dwarves are also known for their stubborn nature and cynicism, traits widespread amongst the dwarves but which contribute to and are commonly offset by their bravery and tenacity.

Dwarves are friends that are hard to earn but who are strong once won. Naturally dour and suspicious, the stout folk are slow to trust, specifically towards those outside their family, suspecting the worst of an individual until the outsider proves many times their good will. Once this trust is gained dwarves hold their friends to it and view betrayals, even minor ones, with a vicious propensity for vengeance. A common gnomish oath, remarking on this dwarven sense of justice, is "if I'm lying, may I cross a dwarf."

For dwarves, loyalty is more than a word and that it should be both valued and rewarded. Dwarves believe it a gift and mark of respect to stand beside a friend in combat, and an even deeper one to protect that ally from harm. Many dwarven tales subsequently revolve around the sacrifice of dwarves for their friends and family. Just as dwarves are known for their dependability as friends and allies, dwarves also harbor grudges far longer than many other races. This may be on an individual basis between a dwarf and one who has wronged him or against entire races, even if warfare with the enemy has long since ceased.

Culture
Dwarves highly value the ties between family members and friends, weaving tightly nit clans. Dwarves particularly respect elders, from whom they expect sound leadership and the wisdom of experience, as well as ancestral heroes or clan founders. This idea carries on to relations with other races and dwarves are deferential even to the elders of another, non-dwarven race.

Likewise, dwarves, perhaps moreso than most other races, turn to their gods for guidance and protection. Non-evil dwarves look to the divine for comfort and inspiration, while the wicked look to their divine overlords for methods through which to obtain power over others. Individual dwarves might be faithless, but the race has a whole, regardless of subrace, has a strong inclination for religion and almost every community maintains at least one temple or ancestral shrine.

Clans
Most dwarven societies are divided into clans built along family ties and political allegiances. These clans are usually led by hereditary rulers, often monarchs of a sort and descended from the founder of the clan. Dwarves strong value loyalty to these rulers and to the clan as a whole and even objective dwarves tend to side primarily with their kin over other races or communities.

Most dwarven clans focus on one or two kinds of crafting, such as blacksmithing, jewelry, engineering, or masonry. Dwarves strive to avoid overspecialization by sending some of their youth as apprentices to other clans, which also helps to foster racial unity. Because of the long age dwarves exhibit these apprenticeships may last decades.

Relations with Other Races
Dwarves do not forgive past wrongs easily and the entire race has more or less declared war on goblins and orcs as a whole, wiping them out where they find them. Many dwarves view these races as a foul infestation of their mountain homes and their duty to purge them. Likewise, many dwarves view drow and grimlocks with a similar hatred and few dwarves have forgotten their ancestral hatred of the giants who once enslaved them. Because of this dwarves generally view related races, such as half-orcs, with distrust.

In regards to their distant cousins the azers, duergar, and galeb duhr dwarven opinions vary. Many view their distant relations with sympathy for their prior enslavement. On the other hand, duergar and dwarves have long been enemies and many dwarves view them with any more love than they do the drow who share the Underdark with the duergar.

Dwarves get along pretty well with gnomes, with whom they share a love of fine crafting, and passably with humans, half-elves, half-eladrin, and halflings. However, most dwarves commonly believe that true friendships can only be forged over long periods of time and a common saying is that "the differnece between an acquaintance and a friend is about a hundred years," meaning that few members of the shorter-lived races ever forge strong bonds with dwarves. There are exceptions, however, and some of the strongest friendships are those between a dwarf and a human whose grandparents and parents were also on good terms with the dwarf.

History
While some scholars believe that dwarves are not native to Abeir-Toril, most dwarves believe that their ancestors came from the planet itself, given life by Moradin and being made by the All-Father's hammer in the Soulforge.

The first dwarves to settle in Faerûn originated from the mountains of Yehimal. They settled underneath what is now Semphar and migrated to the west, spreading to all areas. This migration as well as wars with orcs and goblinoids caused the race to splinter into several subraces, as well as an entirely seprate race known as the duergar who fell under the sway of the illithids for a time. The arctic dwarves settled around the peaks of Novularond, the shield dwarves in the southwest and eventually northwest (from whom the urdunnir dwarves separated to move into the Underdark), the wild dwarves in Chult and the gold dwarves the area surrounding the Great Rift.

Over the centuries dwarves have entered into a long decline and most of the ancient kingdoms that once stood are now fallen. The shield dwarves have seen parts of the north overrun and conquered by the orcs of Many Arrows while to the south the gold dwarves have been primarily driven from their underground kingdom in the Great Rift towards the surface world. In spite of this, the dwarves remain a proud and hardy people, unshaken by the pitalls that have befallen them.

Homelands
Most dwarves prefer living in underground cities near the surface and above the Underdark, built around mines that provide much of their livelihood. Carved into stone these cities may take centuries to complete but are practically ageless once finished. Though dwarves are typically a martial race by nature these cities have civilian populations that compose about one fourth of the total population and which are made up primarily of the young, the elderly, or a few regular adults. Females typically compose as large a portion of the military as male dwarves do.

At present, dwarves can be found all across Faerûn although the greatest numbers are in the Underdark, the North, the East Rift and the Cold Lands.

Subraces
There exist several dwarven subraces:


 * Arctic dwarves: Squat and hardy dwarves from the isolated northern reaches of Faerûn.
 * Gold dwarves: Strong and muscular dwarves with tanned skin from the south, largely in the Great Rift area.
 * Shield dwarves: Tall dwarves, by comparison, who populate the northern reaches of west and central Faerûn.
 * Urdunnir dwarves: Stocky and muscular dwarves living in the Underdark.
 * Wild dwarves: Primitive dark-skinned dwarves primarily from the jungles of Chult.

Duergar are also a closely related race of humanoids, but separated from generations of divergence, slavery under the illithids, and the infusion of diabolic blood.