Rhineholt was a village north of Apparate, built near and around the ruins and remnants of a historical Baclavian necropolis. The original Baclavian necropolis was founded in what was the Ruon nation, then taken over by Spira (only a few decades before the fall of Spira), then part of Brannis. When the Gelephian Tragedy occurred, the town and necropolis were very near the edge of the Breakwaters, and persisted as such for well over 500 years. 

Rhineholt's original settlers took up the work of studying and preserving the original graves, mausoleums, and tombs, tending to the dead interred within. Adapting to the wooded swamps and forests of the area, the little community throve amongst the dead.

Over time, one of the core families of the original settlement - the Skein family - took on the mantle of reviving and continuing the burial practices of the necropolis, passing the undertaker's arts down from generation to generation. They expanded the cemeteries into the most viable of the swampland surrounding the original necropolis, offering burial and care not only to the Rhineholt community, but to interested pilgrims and visitors traveling to see the ancient tombs. It was considered ritually significant and honorable to, upon final death, be interred there, and the community welcomed anyone from Brannis (or anywhere else) seeking a burial.

In 1510, disaster struck on a late spring evening - as the sun set, Rhineholt's only warning of a major fluctuation failure was a distant violet glow among the trees, before the the Great Shimmer expanded violently over the land and swallowed the town and necropolis whole. The only known survivor was the eldest child of the Skein family's current leading branch - Cicada Skein, at that time 25.