Part 18 – Aethelwulf – Consul and King (1116 to 1123)
How can one man be both a King, and yet also Senior Consul and Dictator for Life of a republic? This was a question that Aethelwulf was forced to wrestle with after the Serbs acclaimed him their King. The solution that he found reflected the baroque nature of the new Roman Republic. He would be both a King to the Serbians, and a Consul to the Greeks, and yet bind them together into a single state.
When the Republic declared war on the (Serbian) Prince of Rashka it did so using the justification that the Serbs had long ago accepted land in exchange for a promise to serve Rome against her enemies, but that the Serbs had defaulted on this obligation. This logic states that there is no such country as Serbia, so Aethelwulf could not be King of Serbia. However, the Republic accepted that the Serbs existed as a people, as the Serbs were collectively held responsible for their ancestors’ default.
Aethelwulf accepted the title King of the Serbians (not of Serbia) and pledged that they as a people would once more fulfil their obligation to fight for Rome. This of course meant fighting for the Republic, not the heathen Emperor Ilyas. Meanwhile, in his role as Senior Consul Aethelwulf was busy binding the Serbian nobles into the Republic by appointing them as senators. Senators who were likely to vote with their new King, not any Greek opposition that might develop within the Senate.
Aethelwulf’s position was both elegant and contradictory, and this confusion is shown in the charters and other legal documents of the day. Some describe him as King, some Senior Consul, some Dictator, while others use older titles such as Prince of Epirus, Earl and even Strategos.
At the start of 1116, Aethelwulf was the only Prince in the Republic, and the whole realm was organised into a single Theme (like a Frankish duchy) for defence purposes. Clearly this was too much for him to govern alone, so he set about creating a tier of Princes that would stand between him and the Earls. This was not done in a reckless way, and certainly not so as to create any rivals for the Senior Consul’s power. Many earls still paid homage directly to Aethelwulf. Nevertheless this was an innovation that improved the running of the Rupublic’s outlying territories and gave the earls the dream of greater wealth and prestige.
The princes he created were:
• Prince Hvalimir of Rashka. Aethelwulf’s long-term friend, and also son-and-heir of the Prince of Rashka that Aethelwulf defeated and displaced to become King of the Serbians.
• Prince Eadulf of Wallachia. Aethelwulf’s friend, but also his uncle. As Earl of Pereschen he was well used to the Republic’s Danubian frontier.
• Prince Basileios of Achaia. Basileios had been Prince of Achaia before being vassalised by Aethelwulf following the war of 1111.
• Prince Ulf of Dioclea (on the Adriatic coast). Aethelwulf’s friend, only full-brother and the Earl of Zeta.
As you can see, Aethelwulf elevated men he could trust, and who already knew the lands they would be responsible for as prince.
We can also see that Aethelwulf was not out to eradicate the Greek or Serbian High Nobility. Instead he preserved it wherever possible, for example retaining Theodoulos Palaiologos as Count of Corfu, despite his being the grandson of the hated Prince Nikephoros of Epirus (Cerdic’s enemy). This desire for continuity did not necessarily extend to his new princes. Prince Eadulf of Wallachia stripped his brothers (Oshere and Swithelm) of their earldoms, to give their land to his sons. Prince Hvalimir of Rashka also expelled Eustratios Doukas. None of these decisions aroused much ire from Aethelwulf. After all, Uncle Oshere was not a loyalist (having rebelled only e few years before), and Eustratios still maintained a claim to be Emperor over all the Greeks. They received a promise of future compensation, and had to settle back into life at court.
Aethelwulf’s court in Thessalonike was a cultural melting pot, where Orthodox Christians from all across the east came together. Prominent amongst these were the Georgians. They had seen their homeland crushed by the Seljuks and faced with the choice between apostasy or exile, many chose the latter. Thessalonike was attractive to the Georgians for many reasons. There was a tradition of taking in exiles (like the Helleno-Varangians). There were lands to be won in the Republic’s service. Importantly, there was also the figure of Iya Bagratuni, Aethelwulf’s second wife. Although only from a minor branch of the Georgian royal family, she had caught Aethelwulf’s attention and held it well enough to become his wife and to present him with five children.
Importantly, in 1108 she provided him with a healthy son, something his first wife had not managed. The day of his birth Leofric Uffason was appointed Junior Consul of the Roman Republic, and Master of Horse (the Dictator’s deputy), and soon found himself Crown-Prince of the Serbians as well. Leofric was born into a mighty and cultured court, and was taught to rule all of the people of the Republic. He therefore learnt to be fluent in Greek, Latin and Serbian, and had a reasonable grasp of Arabic. What he lacked was fluency in English. This was very much a reflection of the development of the Helleno-Varangian culture within the nobility. Many English cultural practices had become fashionable (e.g. epic poetry, beer-drinking), but the English language had withered, becoming little more that a collection of loan-words that were integrated into everyday Greek language. Even English-style epic poetms were translated into, and now composed in, Greek.
In 1117, Archbishop Nikanor of Dyracchion seceded from the Empire. He was also known to be an apostate, who retained his rank as bishop, while practising as a Muslim to please Emperor Ilyas. What caused him to secede is unknown, but Aethelwulf instantly declared war and forced the Archbishop to become a vassal of the Republic. Yet even then the wily old Archbishop hung onto his position. The Teflon Priest (Teflon being the name of his palace) had an incredible ability to slide away from the consequences of his despicable actions. Even today those to whom blame cannot be stuck are named after him.
Also in 1117, Saelred Atheling (the Earl of Ragusa) rebelled against Prince Ulf of Dioclea. Saelred felt that as he was the true heir to the English throne he should be a prince himself, and certainly not subject to Aethelwulf’s younger brother. Ulf crushed the rebellion efficiently, and drove the Athelings out of the Republic. They became exiles once more.
1118 saw the virtual destruction of the Norman Kingdom of Sicily by a combined attack from the Turks and Emperor Ilyas as well. The Sultan and the Emperor divided the spoils between them in a rather haphazard way each claiming a portion of Sicily and Southern Italy. What was clear was that Christendom’s southern and eastern frontiers were in tatters. The past 40 years had seen the loss on Anatolia and the eastern Balkans (including Constantinople) to the Turks and Arabs, with Emperor Ilyas (an Arab Muslim) claiming authority as Emperor. In the West, the Arabs and Berbers had crushed the remaining Christian Kings in Iberia, occupied southern France, and gained footholds in northern Italy.
The situation was not a lot better in the east, where the Russian princes were succumbing to the growing power of their pagan neighbours (principally the Republic of Vyatichs).
Aethelwulf’s Roman Republic found itself as a Christian peninsular, surrounded to the west, south and east by Muslims who wished to destroy it. The Uffasons had long been friends of the merchant class, but could do little to alleviate their suffering. Trade collapsed as Muslim rulers controlled the sea lanes into the Adriatic, the western Mediterranean, the Levant and the Black Sea. Trade could still take place, but the cost in bribes paid and vessels lost was high.
How could Aethelwulf respond to this crisis for Christendom? His father (Prince Edward) had done so by launching a David and Goliath war against the Muslim hordes, but Aethelwulf knew that the Arab Goliath had won and his father had lost. A glorious defeat was not what he wanted and Aethelwulf was determined to avoid being drawn into a war on Emperor Ilyas’ terms.
Aethelwulf’s response to the increased Muslim threat did not come until 1120, and was to attack the (Christian) Prince of Athens. He did not even bother with a complex justification this time, just asked the Senate to declare war. The Republic must be strengthened, and any Orthodox rulers who would not join voluntarily would be brought onboard by force. Aethelwulf’s terms were simple from the start. The Prince could do homage and keep all his lands, but if any blood was spilt he would lose his prized capital of Athens. Aethelwulf led the invasion from the north; Prince Basileios of Achaia led the invasion from the south. Aethelwulf had to do all the fighting, but pushed through the Athenian forces to meet up with Basileios in Attica. By this point the Prince of Athens had lost the support of his two main vassals and came crawling to do homage. Aethelwulf allowed him to remain a prince, but took Attica into his personal demesne as promised.
This war did not make Aethelwulf look like a paragon of virtue, but did impress those who valued function over form. He spent the next few years rebuilding the fabric of the Republic and filling the treasury. However all work and no play makes jack a dull boy, so he spent much of his private time alone with his ‘friend’ Agatha (who was also his first cousin). In time this could have caused real trouble, as his wife’s Georgian relatives sought to defend her honour.
None of them had time though, as in the spring of 1123 Emperor Ilyas declared war on Hvalimir Prince of Rashka. Aethelwulf could either desert his friend and vassal, or take on an unwinnable war against the power that had crushed both the Byzantine Empire and the Kingdom of Sicily.