So the world- it was only in the religious context

the inhabitants ever called it Merovin- managed for itself, these hundred cities descended from humans too stubborn to quit the world when the human-sharrh treaty demanded the removal of the colony; descended from colonists clever enough to have hidden out from the search teams; and tough enough to have survived the Scouring which took out the tech.  The sharrh ignored Merovin's inhabitants thereafter.  (Though there were rumors that there were sharrh onworld who had not kept their side of the treaty.)  The uproar and the commotion died down; the human fugitives came out of the hills, rebuilt their ruins and begat offspring.  And twenty generations of descendants cursed them for absolute fools.
Second paragraph, Chapter one of Angel With The Sword.  Good book, as are the collaborations following.  Well worth finding.