An Aksum AAR (with ET-Mod)

First of all we choose our main god and decide us for Amm. He grants us yearly army tradition +1 and a plus of 10% on discipline, what we consider important.



Our first mission is to get religious and cultural unity and to relocate our capital to Aksum. To have our capital in Beja, mainly inhabited by the non-accepted Nubians is by far too risky.

We decided to place our national focus on administration to get another +2 per month there to compensate the efforts we will have to make in stability and to relocate our capital. Also we choose religious policy to gain a missionary, starting to convert the African religion provinces, beginning with Wollo.

On November 27, 52 we converted the heretics in Wollo without any revolts and continued with Gonder. On January 2, 53 we changed the culture in Tajura, proceeding with our efforts to unity in Dschibuti, Danakil and Angot.

On October 10, 53 we accepted a royal marriage with the Himyar, located on the other side of the Red Sea, holding open a possible door to Arabia.

September 6, 54 brought us the conversion of the heretics in Gonder, our missionary travelled on to Beja, the last province in our realm with African religion. On January 17, 57 we converted the heretics there, giving us the possibility to convert the culture there while the missionary travelled to the provinces with Judaism faith. Cultural conversion was finished two years later and we were on a good way to a stable realm with a strong economy, especially after we relocated our capital to Aksum.

On January 24, 59 the Himyar broke their alliance with us, alerting us to strengthen our borders at the Red Sea, especially in Tajura where it can be crossed by land forces.

On June 2, 61 our nation got an heir, Hezqeyâs Solomonid (5/2/3). Hopefully he would survive as a good administrator is something we could really need.

We completed our mission to reach religious unity on February 21, 62 and lowered the revolt risk by a great number. Our next mission was to build a fleet, a mission that was only a matter of time. About one and a half year later we accomplished this mission. Our next missions were to ally and vassalize Himyar, a difficult task, since Himyar had a vassal himself and so it couldn’t be vassalized by diplomacy. We abandoned this mission and chose to improve our relations to THM.

On July 8, 103 our ruler died after 52 years of regency at the age of 72. His son Hezqeyâs I. Solomonid took over a stable, peaceful and economically strong realm.

On July 16, 103 we finally completed the mission to improve our relations with THM after joining a royal marriage. We still don’t trust the Himyar more than to have royal marriage since they broke our alliance.

On August 5, 111 a new heir to the throne was born. Iyâsû Solomonid (3/6/1) will follow our current ruler after his death.

On July 15, 123 our ruler died leaving our realm in the hands of a regency council since his son was too young to take over the fate of our nation until his enthronement on August 5, 126.

On December 19, 129 we suddenly gained a core on the province of Berber, owned by Meroe in the north. We had to think about it, because the more norther neighbor of Meroe is the Roman Empire, on the other hand they have no allies and declared us to their rivals a few years ago…

While war waged our king had time enough to secure his succession, ‘Amda Seyôn (5/4/1) would be the next ruler.

Aksum-Meroe War of Conquest (129-131)
On December 18, 130 we conquered the province of Berber after 310 days of siege, the really weak forces of Meroe were defeated a few times by small troops of us. We noticed their technological inferiority and made use of it. On August 28, 131 we conquered Sarah an Nübyah, the province north of Berber. We planned to wait a bit until our warscore was higher to get some more than just the province of Berber, as our sieges in Shendy and Dongola were short before success. Shendy fell on December 19, 131. One day later we signed a peace agreement, granting us the provinces of Berber and Shendy. We relinquished further demands as we would like the Meroe be a puffer to the Roman Empire.



On September 23, 139 ‘Amda Seyôn died as a result of illness. We were sad to lose such a promising heir, but as always bad news are followed by good ones. A few weeks later we finished converting the newly won provinces to our true faith and gained cores on them, lowering the revolt risk by a great amount.

VassalState said:

Good luck! Do you plan on becoming a trading power as I think they historically were?

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As I have to wait for Rome to collapse and to keep an eye on other eventually rising powers, I will focus on economy for now. As I said in my first post my goal will be to conquer and rule over Africa, or at least to get control over East Africa, from the Niledelta to the Cape of Good Hope.

On December 28, 141 our king seemed to have mourned long enough and presented Nâ’ôd (3/1/1) as his new planned follower, but only until August 14, 173, when Nâ’ôd died. On September 17, 174 a new heir was born, Taqla Hâymânôt (2/2/4). At least he would be better than Nâ’ôd…

On April 28, 183 our leader Iyâsû died after reigning 57 years, leaving the nation in the hands of a regency council. Four years later, on September 17, 187 Taqla Hâymânôt finally took over the throne. Though he had not the best attributes may be he would prove useful. At least he did when his son, Yônas (2/2/5), was born on December 21, 193.

On July 13, 195 news from Rome reached us. After their emperor was murdered the Roman Empire was divided into a Western Roman Empire and a Byzantine Empire. Let’s see what the future has in store…



On August 4, 199 Libanon declared its independence from the Byzantine Empire, leaving them with merely the half of their former size. To our luck Libanon is shattered in three pieces, but their most southern province is only separated from us by the Blemmyers’ two provinces.

On December 17, 230 we gained a core on Soba, a province owned by Meroe. It was a good opportunity to ensure us some more provinces in Africa, as the Mameluks, Libanon and now also the Greek grew strong in the Mediterranean area…

We decided to start war exactly 100 years after the last capitulation of Meroe, hoping it would be a good sign.

2. Aksum-Meroe War of Conquest (231-233)
On May 25, 232 Soba finally surrendered after having suffered water shortage for a few times. They refused to surrender so we needed to attack the fortress and we did with success. Now it was important to keep the Meroean army away. They chose Anubis as their god so they were superior in discipline what could be a deciding factor in this war.

On June 11, 232 Bayuda surrendered, a bit surprisingly as the siege only endured less more than 200 days. On October 30, 232 the Battle of Sahra an Nübyah was won by our troops, they resisted an ongoing attack from the Meroean forces in a brave and effective manor though being inferior disciplined.



Dongola capitulated on September 22, 233 after over 400 days of siege, so we now controlled three provinces. As they would be a nice addition to our realm (and would make pretty new borders by the way), we wanted to get no less than these three provinces in peace negotiations.

On October 13, 233 Meroe accepted our generous peace offer and gave us the three provines and an additional 9 ducats. We achieved what we wanted and would now be busy enough with the conversion and integration of our new provinces Soba, Bayuda and Dongola.

blklizard said:

Rome is weakening while opportunities are arising for Aksum. Should be interesting to see how the map develops in the next century or so.

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Rome is actually crumbling. I looked at the map after your post and had to see that Galicia, Greece and England declared independence from Western Roman Empire. They gained a handful of provinces in North Africa, but they are a shadow of their former power. Byzantine is collapsed a few times and the most dangerous power in the Middle East are the Parthians. I will upload a map overview the next time I play.

Mr. Slade said:

Subbed! I would suggest (not sure how far into the future you plan on playing) on securing Mecca and Medina before the rise of Islam. If you do you can convert to Islam, become Rashidun and ravage the world for 30 years.

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An interesting, not yet considered idea ... though I prefer to stay on the African continent to reach my goal. But the Parthian aggression on the Arabian peninsula could eventually make it necessary to gain provinces there to stand a chance.

So ... as I promised a long, long time ago here is a map overwiew in 262. This is how the Mediterranean Area looks like, you see how splintered Western Rome (Weströmisches Reich) is, as well as you see the rising powers Gallien (Gauls) and Sarmatien.



In the Middle East Byzantine (Byzantisches Reich) struggled massively, meanwhile the Parthians (Parther) and especially Libanon gained big parts of the pie.




((Sorry for keeping you waiting for so long, but I had a bit of trouble with my car, my job and so on ... ))

jazzroen said:

is that really Wales I see south of Gaul?

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Yes, it really is Wales. They conquered two provinces in Gaul when it was part of the Roman Empire somehow, defended them and declared war against Gaul while being allied with England, so they could get provinces in the south while the Gauls defended the north of their realm. One of many surprises in this game mode.

On June 14, 247 our ruler Taqla Hâymânôt died after unbelievable 60 years of regency, leaving the throne empty for his son Yônas I. Solomonid (2/2/5). He also brings a follower in his son Iyâsû II. (6/3/6).

Twelve years later on July 27, 259 Yônas I. Solomonid died and his more than capable son Iyâsû II. claimed the throne. At his death he will be followed by Yôstôs Solomonid (4/4/3). Sadly Yônas ruled only for thirteen years, so Yôstôs followed him on June 22, 272. Yôstôs’ son Sarsa Dengel (4/2/1) will be the next ruler.

The Solomonid bloodline continued though Yôstôs died on February 2, 283, as his son Sarsa Dengel claimed the throne. His son Sûsenyôs (1/4/2) will follow him after his death.

On February 23, 335 Sarsa Dengel died after a long regency, his son followed him in a time, where on the Arabian peninsula only two powers exist: The Parthians and Israel, who was extremely warmonging in the past fifty years and conquered the Nabataeans, THM and all minor states. Hezqeyas II. (2/3/4), aged already 59, will follow him. And so he did after only one year on December 16, 336. Salomon (2/1/2), aged 20, is his son and will follow him, what leaves us to another – let’s say – decent leader.



Salomon claimed the throne on December 25, 338, hopefully his reign would be as short as the one of his predecessors… On April 21, 340 he did one good thing and gave our nation a heir, Yôhannes (4/0/3).

December seems to be the month for our rulers to die, Salômôn III. died on December 2, 373 and was followed by Yôhannes. On June 10, 374 a new heir was born and named after our greatest king, Iyâsû (1/3/6).

On July 21, 378 we gained a core in Sahra-an-Nübyah, which we used immediately to declare war against Meroe, as we urgently needed some more provinces.

3. Aksum-Meroan War (378-383)
On May 13, 379 we conquered Sahra-an-Nübyah while the Meroan army was doing nothing to defend the province. They move in a really wide bow across the native-inhabited provinces west of their realm, so we kept an army in Berber to defend ourselves while the rest of our troops marched on to conquer as much as possible. Kharga, the northernmost province was conquered at July, 31. Wadi Halfa followed on December 7, so now only their capital, Qasr Ibrim and Aswan were not conquered. Aswan capitulated on June 28, 380 and we could concentrate on the capital, that fell on August 28. On January 7, 383 we finally could afford our peace demands and annexed Meroe.



Of course we now had to deal with a massive revolt risk and a war exhaustion of 12,76, giving us plenty of work for the next years. On January 2, 389 we received surprising news: The Nubian culture was accepted from now on, so we had enough time to think over if we would convert them and – more useful at this time: We had the unaccepted culture malus no longer, so we could start regenerating our treasury.



On November 6, 399 suddenly Christian belief spread in Aswan and we again had religious disunity. On the other hand we had the choice to convert to Chalcedonism. We really had to think over this decision…

The world in the year 400 AD

blklizard said:

That's one large Israel. They might be the closest threat to you right now. Who's your target? India looks almost united while Han is on the brink of collapse. Nations are consolidating in Europe. Let's hope there isn't just three or four superpowers that reside in Europe. Otherwise, you might have a hard time expanding there in the future. How's your tech compared to elsewhere?

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They are a threat indeed as they took me as a rival and seem to expand aggressively. They already annexed Nabatea, the Ghassanides, Minean and are continuously waging war against Byzantine. My next target will be Blemmyer, the small two provinces on the coast. I have to watch Ghana and Timbuktu, too, as they have no rivals nearby and seem to grow steadily. My goal is still to conquer all of Africa, so I don't care much about Europe for now, but in the age of colonization all nations could become a threat to my plans. The danger is, that Israel is allied with Libanon and Greece, what makes them have a strong block with plenty of manpower while I can support a maximum of 13,000 soldiers. My tech is 16, Blemmyer's 15 and as far as I know, all other nations except for Ghana and Timbuktu are 16 or 17.

On June 21, 408 our leader died and Iyâsû III. Solomonid (1/3/6) became king of Aksum at the age of 34, his younger brother Sûsenyôs (5/3/0) will follow him.

On July 8, 411 we declared war upon the Blemmyer. We had enough of their secret service trying to forge cores on Berber and Sahra-an-Nübyah, so we forged a core on Halaib. While war waged we converted Aswan back to the only true faith on May 12, 412.

Aksum-Blemmyer War of Conquest (411-413)
Halaib surrendered to our troops on April 23, 413 after 646 days of siege, while our mercenary army chased the Blemmyer’s only army that was marauding through our realm, looting provinces without making a siege anywhere. Suakin fell after 863 days on December 14, 413 and we could annex the two provinces.

As you can see, a new power rose on the Arab peninsula, Kindah. We now control most of Eastern Africa and it seems as we had to prepare against the Libanon-Israel-Greece triumvirate.



On February 1, 425 Kindah’s rise to power ended as they were crushed in lesser than 2 years by Israel and got annexed, so Israel now is the greatest power in the Arabian world, even more dangerous than the Parthians.

On September 6, 426 we decided to change our government form to a feudalistic monarchy. Hopefully this step will prove useful… Sadly our ruler didn’t live very long to enjoy the changes, on October 26, 426 he died and passed the throne to Sûsenyôs II. Solomonid. His son Salômôn (6/4/4), aged 2, will follow him and hopefully grow old enough to rule for a long time.

On July 2, 438 Sûsenyôs died – a year too soon – so a regency council controlled the fate of Aksum until Salômôn will be old enough. On October 29, 439 the time has come for Salômôn to claim the throne.

Salômôn proved to be anything but lazy, he presented a heir on February 5, 440 named Gîyôrgîs (1/4/5), who seemed only partially have been given the greatness of his father. Salômôn decided on May 2, 476 that the Nubian culture will no longer be accepted and that Tigray will be the one and only culture in our realm.

On September 12, 478 Salômôn died much too soon at the age of 54. His son Gîyôrgîs claimed the throne without having a heir. The heir was born on February 17, 480: Lebna Dengel (3/2/0).

The year 500 has arrived and it is time to have a look on the map:





Slowly but sure there are some great powers showing up, such as Israel, the Huns, Gepides and Gaul.