Decenarians

First Appearance and Context

The Decenarians are described as the narrator’s cohort within a mathic community, living in their own math within the broader concent. Their math lies a short walk from the Mynster, connected by a roofed gallery known locally as the Seven Stairs, though some prefer a back way through the Cloister and workshops. During a day of Provener, the Tenners assemble in the crowded southwest corner of the Mynster, filing through their screen into the chancel as part of the rite.

A meadow separates the Tenners’ side from the math of the Centenarians (also called the Hundreders), divided by a sixteen‑foot wall. After a past grass fire on their side, the Tenners converted the meadow to clover and other flowering plants and began keeping bees, selling honey at the market before the Day Gate when trade is possible, or keeping it as provision when conditions outside are harsh.

Description and Role

The Decenarians are one of the cohorts within a Decenarian math, and references to the Decenarian Gate and preparations for Apert suggest a decennial rhythm to their observances. In and around the Mynster, roughly three hundred Tenners share the southwest corner; additional side‑towers bulge from that corner to make space for them, giving the building a noticeable asymmetry. During Provener, Tenners join the wider assembly of avout in the chancel and take part in the winding of the great clock; some are seen robed in scarlet for the rite.

Apert and External Interactions

The Decenarians celebrate Apert alongside other maths; under the ancient rules, their gates open for ten days, during which members may go out and visitors may enter. Around this opening, some Tenners interview people from outside the walls using very old questionnaires to record change in the world extramuros. This is described as both a service to those outside and, by some, a routine check for theoretical concerns such as “Causal Domain Shear.”

Relationships and Functions

• Neighbor relations: The south nave is reserved for the Centenarians, whose numbers do not fill it; by contrast the Tenners’ corner is cramped, a disparity that has long been a point of mild resentment. The Centenarians—known informally as the Hundreders—keep livestock on their side of the dividing meadow wall.
• Community role: Within the concent, the Tenners maintain gardens (“tangles”) and a bee meadow on their side of the wall, contributing food and stores. They participate in public rites within the Mynster.
• Consultation with Hundreders: In the lead‑up to the Centenarian opening, a Tenner may be summoned to the upper labyrinth that divides the maths for a question‑and‑answer exchange—through a grate—with a Hundreder preparing for their rarer Apert.

Current Status

As of the latest events, many Tenners are occupied with preparations for Apert, while others continue daily duties and attend Provener in the Mynster’s southwest corner.

Intake and Progression

• Size and targets: The Tenners aim to maintain a nominal strength of around three hundred, taking in roughly forty new avout at Apert.
• Sources of entrants: Some come up from the Unarian math after at least a year under its Discipline; the balance arrive by Collection from extramuros, including the seeking of abandoned newborns in hospitals and shelters.
• Exceptional cases: Rare "One‑off" candidates may graduate early by passing through the labyrinth that connects the Unarian and Decenarian maths; this has been observed only a few times.
• Vows and orders: Following Apert, the bells signal the aut of Eliger, when Tenners gather to witness vows that bind an avout to an order.