The Concord is an ancient agreement made by the Garou Nation to remain hidden from humanity nearly 9,000 years ago, after which the Impergium ended. Its traditions are still obeyed today.
Overview
No modern werewolf knows how it was that humanity learned the secret of silver, but they know the result all too well. Some time ago, toward the end of the War of Rage, humanity decided it had lived in fear of the night long enough. Somehow, humanity gained not only the courage to fight the Garou but the means to do it. Still damaged from the War of Rage and fractious in any event, the Garou fell back, and a great and momentous argument began.
Some werewolves felt that humanity was, if not justified, then at least understandable in its anger. After all, the Garou had been killing them with impunity for centuries. Perhaps the Garou should approach humanity with more respect, and teach them, in turn, to respect Gaia. Other werewolves snarled that humanity had grievously overstepped its bounds and deserved to be slaughtered wholesale. Many werewolves howled for some kind of retribution, just to show humanity its place. The ethos of many of the modern tribes can be found in each tribe’s attitudes toward the end of the Impergium.
The werewolves fought for months, but eventually reached an agreement called the Concord. They would leave humanity to its own devices, retreat from an overt presence in the world of men, and try to guide and check them from the shadows. They would not kill with impunity, but instead maintain their own society separate from that of humanity.
Since the Concord, the werewolves have kept their existence secret, maintaining the Veil, the illusion that the primitive supernatural world no longer exists. They would continue to take mates from the strongest, brightest and best humans, but never again attempt to guide the course of human destiny. The civilization of werewolves thus formed is known as the Western Concordiat, and as it came into focus, the Impergium ended. Werewolves faded into the collective unconscious of mankind.
They never faded entirely, though. Humanity remembers the Garou, even if it doesn’t really believe in them. No person is born without an instinctive fear of the night and the monsters that lurk in it. The human mind is programmed to see shapes in shadows and to hear howling in the wind... and this isn’t just a trick of genetics. Werewolves pounded that fear into humankind through centuries of predation. Only now, as the wolf population dwindles and the last remaining areas of virgin land in the world are found, exploited and plundered, do the garou realize the enormity of their errors.
References
- W20: Werewolf: The Apocalypse 20th Anniversary Edition, p. 38-39
- WTA: Ratkin (book), p. 14, 17, 24, 25