Yes, that's exactly what it was. They had originally planned to have a group of 60 judges, 12 from each dofft of Dithmarschen, but Strandmannsdofft was initially uninterested in joining, so they wound up with 48.
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
Yes, that's exactly what it was. They had originally planned to have a group of 60 judges, 12 from each dofft of Dithmarschen, but Strandmannsdofft was initially uninterested in joining, so they wound up with 48.
Yes. The hiatus got extended a month because I accidentally left behind my notes for the next few updates. There ought to be a new update within the next two weeks.
“Aufsteigende Macht”
1583-1598
___________________________________________
1583-1598
___________________________________________
One of Bernhard Boie’s first acts as Chief Judge of the Achtundvierzig was the reorganization of East Frisian society. The region has been occupied by Dithmarschers for three years by that point, and the area increasingly came under the political authority of Dithmarchen’s administrative officials. The trouble, however, was the question of sovereignty for those provinces. It was a common accusation at the time that the Dithmarschen Landrecht had been acting unlawfully in its acquisition of the Holy Roman Empire’s northern territories, and Boie had hoped to deflect this criticism. The method he determined most effective for ensuring that East Frisia would not become problematic was to place it under a government friendly towards the Dithmarschers.
The Coats of Arms of the Kingdom of Norway and the County of Oldenburg, c. 1580
This action was not without immediate repercussions, however, for while Bremen had come under Dithmarscher control and the independent states of the Low Countries had been defeated, some of the most prominent opponents of Dithmarschen’s expansionism relished the opportunity to interfere with its activities. The County of Oldenburg, once an ally of the Dithmarschers, soon became an enemy, while the newly-independent Norwegians quickly moved to prevent the strengthening of one of Sweden’s allies. Because of the geographic distance between the Oldenburgers and Norwegians, however, this effort was short-lived. After only three months of fighting, a peace agreement was drawn up which granted the Dithmarschers reparations and indemnities. The substantial amount of money making its way into Dithmarschen was not without consequences, however.
A Portrait of Bernhard Boie, c. 1584
The greatest struggle of Dithmarschen had always been the matter of revenue. Over the prior century, the Dithmarschen Landrecht had become increasingly reliant upon the treasuries of the Imperial states which it conquered or subjugated. The natural consequence was a long history of overwhelmingly high amounts of money repeatedly making their way into the state. Dithmarscher coinage was especially disadvantaged by this, and by 1584, only a very small proportion of the circulated coinage in the region was Dithmarscher-minted. In order to address this, Boie called upon the assistance of his ally, Ernst Horwege, who proposed a variety of economic reforms. According to the Achtundvierzig’s records, these managed to slightly reduce inflation, although the problem continued to largely go unaddressed for many years after that initial set of reforms.
At the same time that economic policy became focused on increasing internal revenues and reducing inflation, foreign policy also underwent a shift. Boie had been disappointed in the actions of the Frankfurters and felt that they had reneged on the conditions of their alliance. He made it clear that the Dithmarschen Landrecht would not aid in future Frankfurter conflicts, which ended the alliance. This exacerbated the issue of Dithmarschen’s constantly-shifting web of alliances and led to a lack of sympathy (or, for that matter, support) from the more significant states of Northern Europe. For the time, it seemed, there was not a sufficient ability for any state to oppose the expansionistic Kingdom of Bohemia.
Katerina Vladimirovna, Electress Regent of Bohemia
The Kings of Bohemia had expanded westward and, in the process, had elevated themselves to the de facto leading state of the Empire. This was not to say that they had assumed the Imperial title (or for that matter a true military dominance in the region). Indeed, the Austrian Habsburgs continued to reign. Bohemia, however, possessed a far stronger network of allies than its rivals within the Empire. The French, specifically, had enabled their growth by outright supporting them. To risk war with the Bohemians was to risk war with the French – a dangerous prospect. Because of that, while Bohemia had become something of a pariah within the Empire, it remained untouchable. To Boie and the other leaders of Imperial States it was clear: the end of Bohemian supremacy would likely have to wait for the withdrawal of French support.
The Battle of Grindsted, 1586
Instead of being able to bolster itself against its rivals to the south, the attention of the Achtundvierzig was increasingly drawn northward. In 1585, another war erupted between the Danes and Swedes. The Dithmarscher Guard very quickly intervened in the crisis and secured several victories in Jutland. Denmark lacked the support it possessed in the Swedish War of Independence (a war which it had lost), so its loss was all but guaranteed. Despite this, they posted a fierce defense, and the conflict had lasted three years before Boie negotiated for peace against the insistence of the Swedes. The Dithmarschers had not been particularly eager to participate in the conflict, so they looked for a material gain which would sustain future expansion. Ultimately, the island of Bornholm was taken and organized into a new parish. This gave Dithmarschen an important position in the matter of Baltic trade.
The Island of Bornholm became a Dithmarscher possession in 1588.
While conflict had defined much of the 1580s for Dithmarschen, religion also developed in several ways. When Boie was elected Chief Judge, he had almost immediately received the ire of the Church. This essentially gave two options to the Achtundvierzig: first, the rejection of the Roman Church and the formation of a unique Dithmarscher Church; and second, a policy of appeasement regarding the Church. Because Dithmarschen (which remained the administrative and cultural center of the Imperial State even as its boundaries expanded) itself was mainly Catholic, Boie’s decision was clear. He denounced the Anabaptist presence in the provinces and supported efforts of the Society of Jesus to return Stade to Catholicism. The efforts were immediately successful, and under the pressure of the government, all the parishes of Stade had rejected Anabaptism by 1584. This ushered in a new era for Catholic dominance in religious affairs. These efforts were so successful that the nominally-independent (but Dithmarscher-aligned) Archbishop of Bremen was rewarded with a cardinalship in 1591.
Boie’s concessions to the Church, however, did not go far enough in appeasing his detractors. He was soundly defeated in 1589 and replaced with Hermann Roth. Roth had made his name as part of the Dithmarscher bureaucracy, where he became well-known for his judgments in a number of minor cases. He was seen as fair, even-handed, and free from corruption. This made him immensely popular, which had facilitated his rise to power. In fact, when he was elected as Chief Judge, he nearly refused to accept the role, as he had felt it stolen from Boie. Only once Boie endorsed him did Roth finally agree to serve in the role. While Roth would have liked a peaceful tenure, the circumstances of the Empire did not grant that possibility. Although one might find difficulty seeing it in his earliest efforts, Roth would ultimately rule as Chief Judge during a period of aggressive expansion.
A map of Baltic and Northern European trade in the approximate era of Roth's reforms.
His first effort was mundane. He had hoped to capitalize on Dithmarschen’s ever-increasing control of Baltic trade, so he proposed one law granting special exemptions to merchants, another encouraging the movement of goods between Viridia and Europe, and several others related to the strengthening of trade. For Roth, peaceful trade would provide the means by which the perpetual deficits of the Dithmarschen Landrecht might be escaped. Further, as its trade rivals in the northern Empire were repeatedly defeated, Dithmarschen had also eliminated its primary obstacles to trade domination. Roth hoped that his efforts would provide the impetus necessary for trade to expand dramatically.
Whether it did or not is a matter of some debate amongst scholars of Dithmarscher history, as it was immediately cut short by one of the fastest and most damaging wars in the history of the northern Empire. Lasting only a little more than one year, Dithmarschen was provoked into war with the Brunswickers and Oldenburgers over the matter of a territorial dispute. As Dithmarschen had expanded, it increasingly bore the burden of its predecessor states’ own territorial issues. These were both a liability and a boon, for they made enemies of Dithmarschen’s neighbors. In this case, the Brunswickers and Oldenburgers, who had been weakened in wars with Bohemia and Dithmarschen, respectively, found themselves targets of an aggressive campaign. It concluded with the seizure of the County of Hoya and the City of Osnabrück from Brunswick, as well as the total annexation of the County of Oldenburg. Naturally, this was not approved of by either the Bohemians or the Danes, who both found the action unjustified. Indeed, it likely was unjustified, just as nearly every Dithmarscher conquest had been since the formation of the Dithmarschen Landrecht. The war was over in 1593.
The Coat of Arms of the Duchy of Cleves
Peace did not come to Dithmarschen long, however. Four years later, the Dukes of Brabant attacked the Duchy of Cleves. The Dithmarschers, obligated to join, participated in the efforts and secured several victories, although it was not decided with efficiency of previous wars. The year of that war’s beginning, 1597, was a momentous one for the Empire. It coincided perfectly with the utter demolition of the Anabaptist Margraviate of Brandenburg by the Bohemians and the Prussians. This marked the end of the northern Empire’s third most powerful state and left the political situation of the region sharply divided between the externally-supported Bohemians and the generally-disliked Dithmarschers. This became especially clear following the incorporation of the East Frisians and the retirement of Roth. It was decided Dithmarschen was next going to be led by a more diplomatic figure – one who, it was hoped, would be able to help attain domination in the region.
A French Map of the Viridian Interior.
After all, it had already been the luck of the Dithmarschers to find successes in Viridia. Under Boie and Roth, several colonies were established and Wekhofen completely reorganized. While the new parishes of Dithmarscher Viridia were originally treated as true parishes, it had become increasingly evident that they were too distant to be administered in the old fashion. Instead, a new government was formed within Dithmarschen for the first time. The Kolonialrat of Wekhofen used the political organization of Dithmarschen as a model, establishing the first German-speaking government of the New World. This period was one of changing dynamics in the New World, with some new colonizers entering into the competition for domination. Among these were the Ottoman Turks, who quickly found themselves in competition with the Atleantean colonies. Dithmarschen, however, was given an important privilege – the Papally-given right to colonize the basin of the Wekhof River. Despite incursions by other potential colonizers, Dithmarschen had secured its position as a preeminent colonial power. Beyond that, it was simply a question of whether those advances could be sustained.
One of the beast EUIV AARs is back! If it isn't much of a hassle could you share with us a map of Dithmarch's current colonial possessions?
Great to see this make a return
Thanks for the kind words! I'm definitely going to do my best to keep updating this from here on out, so stay tuned!
Sure I can. The map below covers all of our Viridian (North American) possessions as of 1598. I'll try to include some maps of both Europe and the New World in the next update.
Can I ask why Wekhofen's named as it is? Does it have a specific meaning in the Dithmarschen dialect of german?
It's a Germanic bastardization of the Muskogee (Creek) word for "muddy water" (referencing the Mississippi River), which is ue-okofke. I twisted that into Wekhof, then added the -en suffix. This ended up giving it an additional meaning, since "-hofen" is a German toponym suffix related to the term for farmhouses. In hindsight I could just left it as Wekhof, but I felt it could be worthwhile to separate the name of the region from the name of the river.
So, it's basically the same as if the colony was called Mississippi -- only the river in this timeline is the Wekhof River, so the colony is called Wekhofen.