Thaylen City

Thaylen City is the capital of Thaylenah, an island kingdom of Roshar renowned for its merchants, banks, and seafaring trade. Built into a steep coastal slope, the city is a hub of Rosharan commerce and the site of pivotal events in The Stormlight Archive, including a climactic confrontation with the forces of Odium.

Geography

Thaylen City is constructed on terraces descending toward a great harbor, sheltered behind a massive seawall called the Ancient Magnificent Bastion that protects it from the highstorms and storm surges. The city's tiers house markets, banks, and the homes of its famously shrewd merchant families. Its harbor is one of the busiest on Roshar.

Society

The Thaylen people are known for their distinctive long white eyebrows, which they style and tuck behind their ears, and for their dominance of trade and finance across the continent. Thaylenah's merchant houses and banks extend their influence far beyond the island, and the kingdom's wealth rests on shipping and commerce rather than conquest.

History

Thaylen City contains an Oathgate linking it to Urithiru, making it strategically vital in the war against Odium. The city became the stage for a decisive battle in which Dalinar Kholin and the reborn Knights Radiant faced Odium directly, a confrontation that reshaped the course of the conflict and the unity of the human coalition.

Significance

As both a center of trade and the site of one of the war's turning points, Thaylen City holds outsized importance among the cities of Roshar.