The Icemark Chronicles is a little-known trilogy of books by equally little-known British writer Stuart Hill. The trilogy takes place in a world so full of counterpart cultures that it may as well be a straight-out parallel world. Most of the action takes place in the Icemark, a 'tiny kingdom' in the north, and the Icesheets even further north. The Icemark is British/Norse in feel. The main antagonists are the Polypontian Empire: basically Romans with better technology. There are also the Desert People, who are Muslim Arabs, the Lusu people who seem to be based on the Zulu, and the Venettians (from Venezzia) and Hellenes(Greeks).