Ice Skating in Scarterra

Ice skates are not particularly complicated to make, but almost all things are hand made in Scarterra, and it takes a lot of time and skill to make a functioning pair of ice skates which translates into cost.   A good pair of ice skates probably costs between three and four silver pieces which is more than a week's pay for a day laborer.   Because of the cost ice skating is mostly a pastime of the upper classes, especially outside of Fumaya.

To have an ice skating culture you need to have frozen bodies of water that people want to traverse and access to quality steel that can be shaped into skate blades.   In Earth history, ice skating using bone skates to glide across frozen bodies of water dates back well before the civilization being occasionally used by nomads in what is now Scandanavia and Russia as far back as 4000 BCE.   The earliest known metal skates were created in the late medieval/early Renaissance starting in Denmark, but skating culture as we know it today mostly emerged in the 19th century where you had industrial production of high quality steel and a leisure class with time to enjoy skating.   In Scarterra, elves might have gone ice skating on fancy metal skates during the the Second Age, but if they did go skating, that lore was lost during the Second Unmaking. Most of the elf survivors of the Second Unmaking migrated to areas without a lot of frozen water and even if they did have access to frozen water, they had bigger concerns than skating.   In Scarterra, Fumayan humans are the pioneers of skating technology and skating culture.   Fumaya has lots of lakes, relatively flat predominant terrain, and fairly long winters. Fumayans have good relations with the Dwarf Kingdom of Meckelorn , so they have access to lots of dwarf blacksmiths or humans trained by dwarfs that are capable of making the quality steel necessary for metal skates.   Ice skating is not exclusive to Fumaya as plenty of places in Scarterra have access to frozen water and steel, but Fumaya has more skate crafters and more skate enthusiasts than anyone else and skates found elsewhere are all based on Fumayan designs.