a harsh place to live, but New Crobuzon's government will pay the passage of any volunteers. The exact location of Nova Esperium is not given, although it lies a great distance across the Swollen Sea, southeast of New Crobuzon. Armada The pirate city of Armada is a mobile city-state, consisting of numerous ships that have been lashed together to form a large, connected settlement. It is divided into small districts which are ruled by a number of unique rulers, such as a High Cromlech vampir. Armada moves around the Swollen Ocean by means of a small fleet of tug ships and is the central setting of The Scar. Armada's origins are unknown, but it has existed in one form or another for at least a thousand years. At the opening of The Scar, its population is said to number in the hundreds of thousands. The city itself is only about a mile wide, though one character claims that "there are probably as many miles of streets here as in New Crobuzon" owing to all its "layers and layers of decks." In The Scar, Armada is seen and described through the eyes of several recently press-ganged citizens, notably New Crobuzoner Bellis Coldwine and Remade prisoner Tanner Sack. The city's population is at least a hundred thousand, and is made up of humans, cactacae, khepri, ab-dead, Remade, scabmettlers and many other races. People considered criminals (or otherwise being of lower classes) in their former home states of Bas-Lag are recast as equals upon joining Armada, and often go on to hold positions of power. Armada thrives on piracy, and through this method adds wealth to itself. Piracy of the seas also leads to acquisitions of knowledge in countless languages (all books are stolen for the Grand Gears Library), and the growth of Armada's population, for any ship intercepted by Armada's forces is assimilated into the city and its crew and passengers are press-ganged into citizenship for life. The language of Armada is Salt, a constructed language deliberately made easy to learn, and consisting of vocabulary from the languages of the many races who inhabit the city. In the course of the events of The Scar, the Lovers devise of and carry out a plan to raise the legendary avanc to give Armada ultimate power over the seas. This has been tried once before in Armada's history, as evidenced by five enormous chains