Marley (Anime)

"Though once repressed more greatly than any, Marley has used the devils to oppress other nations and repeat the tragedy."

- Willy Tybur points out Marley's hypocrisy

Marley (マーレ) is a nation located beyond the Walls and across the sea from Paradis Island. Marley was once conquered by Eldia in ancient times, but during the Great Titan War, the Marleyans rose up and subjugated Eldia's territory, except for Paradis Island. In recent years, Marley sustains its global power using the power of the Titans, while attempting to seize Paradis Island to capture the Founding Titan and the island's natural resources.

Marley serves as the main antagonist to the Eldians inside the Walls and were the ones that filled Paradis Island with Titans. In the year 854, Marley officially declared war on Paradis Island.

History
Marley was once a powerful nation in ancient times; however, this changed over 2,000 years ago a slave of the Eldians named Ymir Fritz gained the power of the Titans. King Fritz used her abilities to defeat Marley and force their surrender. One of the Marleyans attempted to assassinate Fritz several years after their defeat, but Ymir intervened and was killed instead.

After Ymir's death, her power was split and passed down to her descendants in the form of the Nine Titans, who subsequently built the Eldian Empire. Using the Titans, the Eldians waged war against Marley and many other nations, utterly destroying them and obtaining complete rule over the continental mainland. This is considered to be the start of the Dark Ages.

About 1,200 years ago, the large Marleyan city of Lago was destroyed by Titans of the Eldian Empire over the course of a single day. The Titans would continue their advance and went on to commit "The Devastation of Monte" and "The Ravaging of Valle" which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Marleyans. Grisha Jaeger claimed these are all lies; however, he was in denial of Eldia's brutal history of war and slavery.

Eventually the Eldian Empire began to run out of enemies and the nine aristocratic families who possessed the power of the Titans grew resentful of each other, creating a state of constant bloodshed. This eventually led to the Great Titan War. According to Marleyan legend, a legendary Marleyan hero named Helos turned the tides of war to his people's favor by manipulating the Eldians against each other, which allowed Marley to claim victory in the war and even succeed in obtaining seven of the Nine Titans that were in Eldia's possession. The first of these Titans was the War Hammer Titan, held by the Tybur family, who had turned against their king and sided with the Marleyan uprising.

Over an unspecified amount of time, Marley gradually gained control of the continental mainland that once was ruled by Eldia until only Paradis Island remained as King Fritz's undisputed territory. In the year 743, King Fritz moved as many Eldians as he could to Paradis Island, and used the Founding Titan to guide a massive number of Wall Titans in the raising of three concentric Walls around Eldia's remaining territory. In order to force peace between Eldia and Marley, King Fritz gave the ultimatum that any further act of war against Eldia would be met with the releasing of the countless Titans within the Walls. With this, the Great Titan War ended.

However, the truth of the matter is that Eldia's defeat during the Great Titan War was actually orchestrated by Karl Fritz himself, who took pity on the oppressed people of Marley. Believing that the sins of the Eldians were too heavy to justify his rule, he joined forces with the Tybur family and manipulated the other families against each other to destroy his own empire and reinstitute Marley. To that end, both the Tybur family and the King himself fabricated Helos to facilitate the myth that it was the Marleyan people themselves who won the war.

At that time, the king also took a vow renouncing war, forbidding the Eldian people from hurting the world again, as well as renouncing the right to defend themselves if Marley or other external powers grew strong enough to invade Paradis Island. The ultimatum was never meant to be enforced. Instead, its purpose was to allow him to spend the remainder of his reign in peace. To enforce this, he used the powers of the Founding Titan to wipe the memories of the outside world from most of the Eldians on Paradis Island. Karl Fritz wanted to ensure his vow would be followed by the future generation, so he made it so that his descendants—the only people who can use the Founding Titan's absolute power—will also inherit his ideology alongside his memories. Although it had surrendered sovereignty over the continental mainland to the Marleyans, the Tybur family remained the real seat of power behind the Marleyan state, but the house chose to withdraw from active politics, being content to observe events and allowing the Marleyans complete freedom of governance.

Following the collapse of the Eldian Empire, the remaining Eldians of the mainland would then be forced into internment zones, where they would be treated as second class citizens. The nation of Marley would then utilize the Titan powers to become the world's major superpower.

Marley would later recognize the Power of the Titans would not be enough to maintain its position as leader of the world in an age where military power is backed by fuel and began to turn its attention to Paradis Island which is said to have massive amounts of fossil fuels. However, the island is also home to the remnants of the former empire of Eldia, ruled by the Fritz family who possessed the Founding Titan.

In 832, Marley Public Security managed to capture and dissolve the Restorationists with the assistance of a young Zeke Jaeger, who informed on his parents.

In the year 845, Marley launched the Paradis Island Operation. Four of its Titans were sent to the island in order to infiltrate the Eldian kingdom and retrieve the Founding Titan from the king of the Walls. The operation resulted in a failure: the Colossal and Female Titans were lost, Marcel Galliard was killed on the first day of the operation, and the Founding Titan still remained in the hands of the enemy. Only Reiner Braun returned alive from this operation, nearly having had his Titan transferred to another Warrior due to his defeat in Paradis Island.

Marley arc
After Marley's failed operation, the Mid-East Union, a coalition of various nations, took advantage of the defeat and declared war on the nation, starting a four-year long war. A significant portion of the war took place on the sea, with Marley gaining the upper hand over the course of the four years, at the cost of half of its navy. During the last battle of the war, the Marleyan forces, with the help of its infamous Warrior Unit, was able to conquer Fort Slava and destroy the Mid-Eastern fleet. With the annihilation of their fleet, the Mid-East Allied forces signed a peace treaty which ended the war with Marley victorious. Despite their victory, the conflict made the Marleyans realize their global military dominance was greatly in danger because of their military's outdated capabilities which increased the urgency to apprehend the Founding Titan.

During the war, the Marleyan military sent 32 ships and destroyers to Paradis Island. However, none of them managed to return.

Following the war, Willy Tybur met with Theo Magath to reveal the nation of Marley is under the authority of the Tybur family. However, Marley was given its own freedom as an act of atonement and followed the path of militarism on its own. Willy Tybur invited various ambassadors, noble families, and journalists from around the world to a festival. During the festival, Willy made a stage production in which he would tell the world what truly happened during the Great Titan War before proceeding to officially declare war on Paradis Island. Willy is then brutally crushed by the Attack Titan sparking a battle within Liberio.

The battle was a calamity for Marley because of numerous casualties including multiple Marleyan military executives alongside the destruction of its primary ports and fleets. In addition, Marley's War Hammer Titan was taken by Eren Jaeger.

War for Paradis arc
In the aftermath of the battle, Marley and the major nations come together to form a global military alliance to conduct a scorched-earth operation on Paradis. However, Reiner Braun suggests that Marley should launch a surprise attack immediately.

Marley indeed launches a major attack against Shiganshina District on Paradis in a desperate but determined bid to recapture the Founding Titan from Eren Jaeger, but this course of action only leads to the awakening of the Wall Titans. In the following days, these Titans are able to reach the mainland, slaughtering the Global Coalition's fleet gathered in the port city of Karifa, leading to the destruction of most of the Marleyan continent, with tens of millions of people dying crushed by the Titans.

Technology
While technological development on Paradis Island had been relatively stagnant for a century due to King Reiss's isolation policies, the other nations of the world have already progressed far beyond it. By Grisha's early adulthood, Marley had reached the modern age and possessed technologies such as airships, early cars and planes, electricity, and photographs. Technological progress was not developed evenly across the world, however, with Marley lagging behind most of its adversaries in at least the area of military technologies as a result of them relying on the Power of the Titans for many wars, and not worrying about their technology.

Titan Biology Research Society

 * Main article: Titan Biology Research Society
 * The Marley government has a vast knowledge of the Titans to the extent that they are able to make use of Titan-related technology, as they possess insight into the origin of the Titans. For example, the Marley government are known to create Titan serums to transform the Warriors and Eldian criminals into Titans. An academic discipline known as "Titan biology," headed by Marley's Titan Biology Research Society, was founded in dedication to the research of Titans. It is the Society that put forth the theory that all Subjects of Ymir are connected by unseen paths from which the flesh and bones of Titan are sent to them, and that all the paths cross at a single "coordinate," the Founding Titan.

Culture
Marley is notorious for its adherence to militarism and colonial expansion. However, the general populace has since lost touch with the reality of war, both due to the abolition of the conscription system in the past and the extensive use of Eldians as rank-and-file troopers. As its only knowledge of war comes from newspaper stories, Marleyan citizens have little concern about the true cost of war. Out of patriotic sentiments, the Marleyans and the Eldians loyal to Marley refer to their country as the "Motherland." The Marleyans built statues to honor Helos, a folk hero who was renowned for slaying the Devil of All Earth during the Great Titan War. He is described in legend as a brave and beautiful man who was unwounded in the struggle against the greatest Titan on earth. A Helos statue is erected in front of the Warrior unit headquarters in Liberio, and in other major cities in the country. Helos' figure is also engraved in Marleyan currencies.

Marleyan cuisine is varied, consisting of pasta dishes, pizza, as well as seafood such as lobster and clams. The Eldians of Paradis also compliment them for being able to make good wine.

Language
Eldian is the national language of Marley and various nations across the world, due to Eldia's expansionism in the past for many centuries. Various accents and dialects exist in Marley; such as the accent found in southern Marley, which is surprisingly also present in an isolated village deep within Paradis Island.

Demographics
Marley is an empire comprised of an enormous continent as well as various oversea territories. Its entire population is unknown, but the main ethnic group are the Marleyans, leading the nation politics, economy, diplomacy and military. There are a considerable number of Eldians, contained in several ghettos around the mainland, and numerous other ethnic groups and nationalities, added into Marley over the past 100 years through military conquest and expansion.

Geography
Marley is a gigantic empire, stretching over one large continent to the west of Paradis Island, a smaller continent to the south, an entire peninsula to the south east. It also has territories in a western continent, as well as various small islands. This large territory enables Marley to have access to various oceans and various seas, and that may have influenced the nation's culture, since Marleyan cuisine consists of seafood and since the national emblem appears to be a seashell.

The internment zones
After the Great Titan War, most Eldians who were stranded on the continental mainland were left at the mercy of an unforgiving Marleyan nation, which was nevertheless aware of the military potential of their genetic trait. To exploit it, the Eldians were segregated from the rest of the population into designated areas such as the Liberio internment zone under the watch of Marley's Public Security.These ghettos act as a reserve pool for Pure Titans. In wartime, internees were brought out to be turned into Titans and released onto battlefields as living weapons.

To justify its exploitation, Marley indoctrinated both its citizens and Eldians with a revised history that demonized the latter group. As a result, the Marleyan populace saw the Subjects of Ymir as evil due to their ancestor Ymir Fritz's deal with the "Devil of All Earth". On the other hand, average continental Eldians, such as Jaeger and Gabi Braun, became convinced that they were genuinely indebted to their "merciful" Marleyan overlords, and that the only ways to redeem themselves would be through loyal service to the Marley Motherland and the extermination of "bad" Eldians on Paradis Island.

Compared to the Marleyan society beyond the fence, life inside the internment zones is lackluster but not poverty-ridden. For example, the Jaeger family was able to make a living working as doctors, a reputable profession. Nevertheless, they do have to endure abuse from the Marleyan authorities from time to time, which are occasionally lethal, as evidenced by the murder of Fay Jaeger. Movement in and out of the ghettos is also restricted, with the camp's main gate only open at a specified time of the day. One has to produce a permit in order to gain passage.

Not all Eldians suffered that fate, however. A few Eldians were awarded "honorary Marleyan" titles for services to the Marley Motherland, such as the Warrior Unit and their families. With this status, Reiner Braun claimed he could live outside of the internment zones if he wanted to and asked for permission.

By the year 832, the military value of Eldians was put into question. It was known that Pure Titans are inherently uncontrollable and pose as much a risk to the enemy as to itself. There were opinions for the extermination of all Eldians in Marley. At the time, Eren Kruger noted that once Marley secures the Founding Titan, the debate would end in favor of those opinions and seal the doom of all Eldians.

By the year 854, however, the attitude changed again. The Marley Mid-East War laid bare the fact that Titans are losing to the advancing military technology deployed by Marley's many enemies, but since the nation needs time to close the gap in arms development with the rest of the world, the Eldians are still needed as a stop-gap measure. It not only prompted the Marleyan leadership to renew the operation to seize the Founding Titan, but also started a "symbiosis" relationship between the two ethnic groups where the Marleyans need the Eldians to sustain its military might and the Eldians need Marley to keep a hostile world at bay. After the war, Eldians are not only hated in Marley but also all around the world, due to the usage of Titans by Marley in wars of expansion, much like during the age of the Eldian Empire. The universal hatred escalates to the point that most of the world nations now demand the extermination of all Eldians but the Tybur family.The Marleyan government determines the ethnicity of its citizens with blood tests, and the result of which affects their eligibility to get into privileged professions. To join the Public Security Authorities, for example, one has to prove that they are not of Eldian ancestry by passing the test. Despite that, agents of the Eldian Restorationists were able to get around it by using falsified medical records and having their tests done by doctors sympathetic to their cause.

Although harsh, it is noted by Udo, who used to live in a different country, that Marley is, in fact, more tolerant of Eldians than many other countries, wherein Eldians face much severer hostilities that make the Marleyan discrimination pale in comparison. There are some Marleyans, such as Theo Magath or the guards that Gabi Braun befriended, that genuinely care about the well-being of the Eldians under their care. Additionally, the Marleyans in the Panzer Unit have a friendly relationship with Pieck. There exist several organizations in Marley who fight for the Eldian people's human rights, but they face hostile critics from the general population for taking defense of the Eldians.

The Tybur family
Due to its dominant power within the Marleyan state, the Tybur family was not only excepted from the persecution against its ethnic brethren, but also enjoyed privileges such as the retaining of aristocratic status, where they were given honorary citizenship and were allowed to live on regal estates, as well as owning a detail of personal guards. They were led by Willy Tybur until his death.

Government
Despite being supposedly independent, Marley is in fact secretly controlled by the Tybur family. That made Willy Tybur, the past head of the family, the de-facto ruler of the nation during his life. Before the year 854, the family did not actively exercise its power and was content to observe events in the shadows, allowing the Marleyan persecution of Eldians and the nation's drive to militarism to go unchecked, a stance that Willy regretted. But as worrisome news surfaced from Paradis Island, he decided to step in and make public his true nature in a festival in Liberio.

Foreign relations
After gaining the power of seven Titans, Marley implemented a colonization policy in all conflicts with enemy nations. While the nation's territory before or immediately following the Great Titan War is unknown, by the year 854 the nation of Marley had conquered territory across at least three continents, including overseas.

Marley has a historically poor relationship with the Mid-East Allied Forces. By the year 850, after it had become known that Marley lost two Titans in its operation against Paradis Island, the Allies finally declared war against Marley.

Willy Tybur mentioned that Marley currently has many enemies, some of which could be allying with Paradis Island from the shadows against them.

Military
After the Great Titan War, Marley uses Titans as their main military force along with their army, navy and airborne to become a dominant military force. However, their reliance on Titan has made their military obsolete as their enemies develop technology that could easily defeat Marley's Titans.

Trivia

 * The original Japanese name for Marley (マーレ Māre) bears a strong resemblance in pronunciation to the Latin word "mare," meaning "sea."
 * Marley's policy of segregating Eldians into ghetto parallels the Nazi anti-Jewish policy. Similarly, many named Marleyans and Eldians have Germanic names.
 * The history of Marleyans and Eldians is also comparable with that of the Rwandan populations of Hutu and Tutsi. By 1700, the Rwandan populace coalesced into around eight kingdoms, of which the Tutsi Kingdom of Rwanda became dominant and oppressed the Hutu, fueling a hard relationship between the two races that lasted for centuries. In 1994, during the Rwandan Civil War, the then Hutu majority government perpetrated a genocide against the Tutsi which resulted in the extermination of around 70% of the Tutsi population over the course of a hundred days.
 * Since Isayama is Japanese, the Marleyan government's exploitation of ancient grudges for expansionist purposes might or might not have been inspired by the Japanese controversies in Asia, most notably in China and Korea, where the memory of the Second Sino-Japanese War between 1937 and 1945 and the period under Japanese rule between 1910 and 1945 continues to be a point of contention. The landmass size difference between Marley and Paradis Island is also reminiscent of China and Japan.
 * When flipping the known territory of Marley vertically, the continents roughly match with real world Africa, Madagascar, the Middle East and southern Asia

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