Voivode is the title given to an official leader of Clan Tzimisce.
History[]
Originally, the title denoted any Tzimisce with a claim of domain, with all Voivodes nominally answering to the Voivode among Voivodes.
The Council of Voivodes dealt with events, contemplated about actions of individual Voivodes and the consequences to Clan Tzimisce. The events, actions and development of situations discussed in the Council of Voivodes were often (deemed to be) of grave importance to Clan Tzimisce and/or had a certain amount of urgency. It was an institution commissioned for matters that required more than the attention and resolve of one Voivode or when it concerned the domains of more than one Voivode.
Sometime around the 12th century A.D. the Voivode of Voivodes was Urdo and he, was ascribed many a fear-instilling title, also proclaimed himself the Revenger of Wayward Voivodes. Voivode Vukodlak had endeavored to attain the power to devour Antediluvians and in doing so disobeyed the collective will of the Council of Voivodes and subsequently Urdo proclaimed he was the Revenger of Wayward Voivodes like Vukodlak. This implies that a Voivode among Voivodes or Voivode of Voivodes was granted the role of persecutor or could assume such a role in order to reprimand a Voivode and eventually take disciplinary actions against the Voivode. In this particular case, Vukodlak's demesne and holdings were divided amongst the Voivodes, Vukodlak's servitors/servants were decimated and Vukodlak himself put into deep Torpor.¹
Each Voivode had to present himself according to the ancestral tenets of the Clan. The domains of the individual Voivodes were put together in a loose confederation called the Voivodate.
The modern Tzimisce of the Sabbat give very little actual power to the Voivode, the current Voivode of Voivodes being ignorant of most traditions that would have nominated her before.
References[]
- VTM: Clanbook: Tzimisce, p. 27
- VTM: Vampire: The Masquerade - Redemption
- VTM: Clanbook: Tzimisce Revised
