The Northern Adantri are quite tall, with an average height for men at about six feet and for women a few inches shorter. They tend to be rather stocky or sturdy in build but are very unlikely to run to fat. Their hair is mostly brown and their eyes gray or blue. Occasionally blondes appear among the Northern Adantri, but that is usually a sign that some foreign blood, probably Siniar, has crept into the family at some point (not that anyone holds it against them). They tend to have high cheekbones and rather square faces, often with aquiline noses. The Northern Adantri seldom make use of cosmetics as such, although a member of either sex may paint a clan or lineage emblem on his/her face if the occasion should seem to warrant it; when they wear jewelry, they favor heavy, elaborately-worked metal pieces, usually copper or gold, with the patterns picked out in colored enamels.

Traditionally, the Northern Adantri are said to be `violent and harsh with themselves and others, unfriendly or solitary by temperament, unsubtle, independent to the point of rudeness and unpracticality, scornful of comfort, disrespectful, and insular.' (This is the southerners speaking, of course.) They tend to make great use of strong, frequently clashing colors in their clothing, and employ all the colors they can get in the embroidery with which they decorate it; they may use striped, checked, or plaid cloth, but seldom printed fabrics for clothing. They generally refer to their southern kinsmen as `decadent' and `effete' (even though they will acknowledge that there are many exceptions...). Though it is unsafe to generalize about large populations, the Northern Adantri tend toward a black-and-white view of morality; once they have meted out whatever harsh punishment they have deemed fit, however, the lapse is not only forgiven but forgotten.

Tradition says that the purest of pure Northern Adantri will be found in Angsin and Shiansin provinces, that those of Imperial Heart, Linshar, and Pelang provinces are nearly as pure, and that the people of Liho, though not absolutely pure, come close to it. (The people of Liho consider themselves to be of a MORE and not a LESS pure and distinguished lineage, naturally.) Angsin is snobbish, Shangsin and Liho in their different ways very insular, and Linshar and Pelang largely uninterested in outsiders, so they will likely retain their "purity"; Imperial Heart Province is too cosmopolitan to remain so "pure" for long.