Elven Court
Humans hailing from the lands known today as Chondath and Impultur, settled on the edges fo the great forest of Cormanthyr.  These migrtions attracted folk from other regions of Faerun: exiles, fugitives from justice, and adventurers saw a land of bright promise.  Scattered human farmsteads and hamlets began to appear at the fringes of Cormanthyr around -200 DR.  Elven defences hampered woodcutting, so human settlements were scattered and isolated instead of sprawling across wide-open farmland, as they did in the lands that would become Cormyr to the west and Sembia to the south.

Forseeing  the eventual doom of his people if they tried to fight off the increasingly numerous human settlers, te elven coronal Eltatgrim arranged the Dales Compact between the elves of the forest empire of Cormanthyr and the humans who would become known as dalesfolk.  Human and elven wizardsa together raised the Standing Stone in the center of Cormanthyr as a symbol of unity between the two raes.  In return for promising not to cut deeper into the Cormanthor forest, the ancestors of the current dalesfolk were allowed to settle around the forest's edges or in places where the great trees did not grow.

While the early dales struggled to survive, the elves of Cormanthor grew strong and confident.  In 220 DR, the elven coronal allowed humans to enter his kingdom.  In 261 DR, he made the fateful decision to welcome them into his very heart, transforming the elven city then known as Cormanthor into the open city of Myth Drannor.  All races were welcome in Myth Drannor, which enjoyed a golden age that lasted nearly five centuries.  Myth Drannor  reached heights of arts, crafting, and culture unsurpassed since, and the city brought human, halfling, dwarven, and gnome trade, travel, and settlement to the Dragon Reach lands.

Myth Drannor's rise allowed the Dales to survive their troubled infancy.  The city's fall in 714 DR gave the Dales the chance to flourish in ways that would have been impossible if elven might had remained intact.  Few survivors of Myth Drannor's collapse escaped the demons, devils, and dragons that flocked to the ruins, but these survivors took the scraps of their wealth, magic, and learning to the nearby dales.

Although the compact stands no more, most of the Dales still abide by its terms.  Tradition has replaced elven might as the principle motivation for adhering to the compact, but for now it is sufficient to preserve Cormanthor's borders as they stand.

Dales Council

Each year at Midwinter, every dale sends a delegate to a selected Dalelands town for the Dales Council.  Delegates debate issues affecting all the dales, such as maintenance of trade routes, defence pacts against Zhent or Sembian aggression, border squabbles between neighboring dales, and matters relating to the great forest of Cormanthor.

Two serious attempts have been made to unify the Dales.  The first was under the legendary Aencar the Mantled King, who sought to forge the Dales into one realm but was slain in 1044 DR.  His dream died with him.  The second would-be unifier rose and fell in 1356 DR.  Lord Lashan of Scardale overran Battledale, Featherdale, and Harrowdale, proclaiming his intention of conquering all the Dales.  Lashan vanished after his defeat in the great battles in Misstledale and Shadowdale, but his legacy initiated a string of bad luck that has plague Scardale to this day.