Give 'Em the Ol' Basel Razzle-Dazzle - A Habsburg AAR
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That’s awesome!
I’m worried about Egypt...
Gilbert is as cruel as ever, it seems. That’s excellent news!
I’m worried about Egypt...
Gilbert is as cruel as ever, it seems. That’s excellent news!
Chapter 18: Kaiserschaft
Chapter 18: Kaiserschaft
It was the summer of 1159. The Holy Roman Emperor Gilbert Scarponnois was in the 13th year of his reign and the 63rd of his life. His empire stretched from Lorraine and Holland in the west to Poland and Carpathia in the east, from Holstein in the bitter north to the blistering deserts of Tunisia and Libya in the south, the latter territory having just been successfully defended from a Shia Jihad. Now the realm was gearing up to defend the Crusader Kingdom of Egypt from a separate Jihad declared by the Sunnis. Against the massive Muslim armies the Christians had a snowball’s chance in hell, but Gilbert had been involved in the Crusade to win Egypt, and he would be damned if he didn’t defend it.
But the man who was truly regarded as the most powerful in the empire was the 35-year-old King Simon II von Habsburg. His family controlled about three-quarters of the empire’s military strength, and had been responsible for much of its eastward expansion. Simon himself held authority over the vast majority of the Habsburg lands and had enough manpower at his command as the rest of the empire combined, but there was one Habsburg who was not directly beholden to the patriarch.
Burchard von Habsburg was the Duke of Austria-Steiermark, commonly called Styria. He was only 28 years old, but the past ten of those had not been kind to him. He suffered from the great pox, which would have been the worst thing to happen to his face had he not lost a good chunk to the torturer’s knife for supporting a pretender to the imperial throne. Despite his disfigurement that required him to hide his face behind a mask in other’s company, he was still reasonably respected and referred to as “the Strong” among supporters, not only as a remark on his physique but as a commentary on his extraordinary resilience to the horrors life had burdened him with. But even the strongest cannot hold out indefinitely. Burchard’s syphilis had progressed to its final stage, and together with the trauma of his torture at the hands of the Emperor, had turned him into a stressed-out lunatic. The disease was also attacking his heart, which was already feeling the strain from the high blood pressure caused from his severe anxiety. On the 22nd of July, 1159, Duke Burchard finally rested and went to his forefathers in Heaven: his father, Alois Otakeren, slain in a duel with a bishop when Burchard was thirteen; his grandfather, for whom he had been named, who had also died young, only 22 when dysentery took him. Not present to welcome Burchard at the Pearly Gates, one could imagine, was his great-grandfather Adalbero, the reviled former Kaiser who had burnt his own brother at the stake and been deposed by Burchard’s maternal grandmother, Queen Amalie von Habsburg.
Simon was grieved to learn of his younger cousin’s passing, but mildly relieved to know that his suffering was at an end. He attended the funeral in modest black attire. Presiding over the ceremony was the court chaplain and newly-appointed regent, Bishop Dietmar of Radkersburg. He gave a stirring sermon about how Burchard had endured thanks to his faith in God and remained brave and humble in the face of adversity, but that sometimes the bravest and humblest act was to accept when the fight was no longer worth the pain. Afterwards Simon went up to the new Duke, little 4-year-old Alois, holding his mother Ermengarde’s hand tight. The Dowager Duchess curtsied and compelled Alois to bow to the king, but Simon waved her off.
“I’m not coming to talk as a king but as a cousin,” he said as he knelt to be on eye-level with the Duke, who was extremely tall for his age but still not yet past Simon’s hip. “I’m sure you’re tired by now of hearing people praise your father,” he told him. “I remember that feeling well. I was much older than you are now when my father passed, but believe me, that did not help dull the pain. If ever you need someone new to talk to, when your mother or Bishop Dieter just won’t do, you are welcome at my home any time.” He gave the little boy a hug. “Now learn well from your mother and Bishop Dieter. When you are sixteen you’ll not only have your own lands to rule but my daughter, my firstborn, to look after. And one day, when I am gone to see your father again, you will be the new King. I’m sorry to have to entrust you with so much, but you are strong like your father, and I hear you’re smart, too. I know you will be great if you try your best.” He gave Alois one more hug, received a brief word of thanks from him and Ermengarde, and walked back to his carriage for the long journey back.
When he returned home on 21 August, he was immediately faced with more somber news, though thankfully not as severe as the loss of a friend and ally. It was his trusted siege commander for the past three years. Roman, who had long since embraced the Roman Catholic Church, now had a desire to leave Simon’s service and join the Knights Templar. Simon was loathe to loose such a faithful and competent general, but Roman seemed genuinely eager, and so he reluctantly accepted Roman’s resignation. In his place, he invited a Frenchman named Gervas de Vassy to take his place.
Now there was the question of what to pursue now that the internal and external threats to the empire were over and done with. His eye turned to Christine von Nordheim, who was Duchess to many, many duchies. Her primary title was Bavaria, but she also reigned over Tuscany, Jerid, Abruzzo, Modena, Corsica, and Spoleto. The latter was claimed by the Pope as part of the Papal States, and so for many years now she had been excommunicated from the Catholic Church. In addition, she was the wife of Gottfried of Brabant, adding yet another duchy to the list of titles her son Otto was set to inherit. And therein lied opportunity, for Otto was a mere boy of five, and his elder sister, Kunigunde, was betrothed to Konrad von Habsburg, Simon’s second cousin once removed. Simon was seized with sudden ambition. After securing the promise of an alliance with young Alois, he declared an excommunication war on Christine of Bavaria on 25 Sept 1159.
The early months of the war consisted mostly of merely collecting the militias raised from around the kingdoms into two armies of roughly 6,500 men each and marching them over to Bavaria. Time was of the essence. Gottfried would be marshaling his own troops, and once he reinforced his wife they would have 14,000 men between them, putting them on equal footing with Simon. With Alois providing an additional 7,300 the Habsburgs would still have the upper hand, but Simon had to think long-term. This would be just like Franche-Comté, the very first war he had fought. His father had fought to overthrow an excommunicated monarch, and he had had to fight a separate war to steal it for the Habsburg candidate. If they wasted all their manpower in the first phase, then there was not point in going to war at all. So despite the Bavarians laying siege to Basel, Simon knuckled down and led his troops to the castle of Landshut in Innsbruck, and the Bishopric of Friesing just south of it. Meanwhile the Austrians and Styrians were directed to capture the county of Passau.
The triple-siege strategy worked well. Friesing and Landshut surrendered within weeks of each other in the early spring. On April 6th, Gilbert felt compelled to intervene and attempt to stop the fighting, but Simon reminded Gilbert of the I.O.U. he had given Simon for attempting to help pass his revocation law, and so the kaiser stepped back and let the war continue after all.
On 25 April, Duke Gottfried laid siege to Furstenberg with over 7,000 men, and it was finally time to do battle. Simon combined his two armies to one in Schwaben and marched them south to Thurgau, from where they could more easily get around the Brabantians and attack. While these maneuvers were being made, the first of May brought the not-unexpected news that King Martin had been deposed by the Sunnis and Egypt returned to Muslim control.
The Battle of Zollern began on the 14th of May and lasted into June. Simon quickly chipped away at the enemy’s left flank, and they were even beginning to retreat when the Bavarians showed up to reinforce their allies. The attackers seemed to be losing the upper hand, but Gottschalk continued to hammer the enemy center until it collapsed. Seizing his chance, Simon launched a final assault on the left, and with only one wing of their army remaining, Duchess Christine and Duke Gottfried ordered a full retreat.
The allied forces split up, with the Brabantians heading south into the Alps and the Bavarians, ironically, turning north towards Brabant. Simon pursued the Bavarians and caught up with them on 18 July outside Sponheim, near Trier. The battle was brief and was not a crushing victory for the Habsburgs, but a victory nonetheless. However, during the battle Geraud de Vassy caught a crippling case of dysentery that left him an invalid. Simon wrote to Roman Romanov, asking if he could return from the Templars long enough to be a siege master once more. While he waited he learned that his poor uncle Martin had died of cancer on August the 7th. Apparently losing his kingdom had broken his will to fight. His spirits were slightly alleviated when he received an epiphany from a Divine Being five days later.
On the sixth of September, a familiar face arrived at the Habsburg camp. Simon embraced Roman and they got straight to work laying siege to Brabant. But it turned out that the entire war would be rendered moot not two months later, when Christine of Bavaria died of a heart attack on November 3rd, presumably when she remembered that her daughter Kunigunde’s wedding to Konrad von Habsburg was the next day.
Simon took the rest of November to reassess the situation. While he had arguably wasted hundreds of lives on the excommunication war, the losses were not enough to discourage him from continuing on with the second phase of his plan. His uncle’s loss of Egypt also provided an opportunity, as the county of Ulm was de facto a province of Egypt owing to Karl Otakeren being the Duke of Faiyum but inheriting Ulm when his father Kaiser Otakar had died. Simon had very much desired to return Ulm to the Holy Roman Empire, but not by waging war with his extremely powerful uncle. But now Egypt was ruled by a Sultan named Arsenios Fatimid, who paradoxically had converted to the Sunni faith, and his grip on power was near non-existant. He had only 733 troops ready at the time.
So Simon declared two wars simultaneously: a de jure war on Egypt to return Ulm to Swabia, and a claim war on behalf of Kunigunde Wigeriche to the Duchy of Tuscany against her brother Otto. He got a good omen three days later, Zsanett was pregnant for the third time! Austria-Steiermark joined in against Bavaria once again, and thanks to Simon’s quick action, this time Brabant would not be joining at least immediately, because there hadn’t been enough time for Otto to officially get an alliance with his father.
The combined campaign against Bavaria and Egypt goes smoothly. The Bavarians blunder into a quagmire at Klatovy in Plzen in late January. Attacking a Habsburg regiment of fewer than 500 men with 3,300 of their own, they are slowly pushed back as more and more levy troops reinforce. By the end of the battle a total of 4,400 troops loyal to Simon have descended upon Klatovy, and the Bavarians are sent packing. Now that his troops are more or less regrouped, Simon orders them to prioritize Ulm before moving on to Bavaria. Meanwhile, he discovers the joy of charity while buying Zsanett something to lift her mood when she begins to feel blue with pregnancy hormones.
By the end of May, Ulm is firmly in Simon’s control. Even better news comes on 13 June, when the man who had deposed (and, as Simon was inclined to believe despite lack of evidence, murdered) Simon’s brother Martin as King of Poland, Siemomysl Piast, was excommunicated on charges of apostasy and burned at the stake by the Kaiser.
On July the 4th, Simon and Zsanett welcomed their first son. As parents, they were thrilled, but as a king and queen, they were a bit disheartened. Their beloved Sofie was no longer first in line to the throne, and her new little brother didn’t quite seem to have the same spark in his eyes as she did. As for a name, Sofie suggested Baldewin, but Simon had a better idea:
July also saw Simon triumph once more on the battlefield, this time at Dachau, where all 12,500 of his troops nearly halved the 4,800 Bavarian defenders. In the interest of time, Simon marched the entire army to Regensburg and stormed the castle of Landshut. By October the 5th he had also taken the city of Regensburg and the bishopric of Ingolstadt. He left the last city in the county to the Austrians, who had just recaptured Passau, while he met the Bavarians for a second time at Klatovy. This time he did halve the enemy force, and more. 1,800 of the 3,000 Bavarians who began the Second Battle of Klatovy did not leave the field.
While the battle at Klatovy had raged, on the first of November a revolt began in Hamburg County, led by a man named Dieter von Altona, who claimed that as a Frenchman, Gilbert Scarpponois had no right to be crowned King of the Germans. Gilbert personally assembled an army and led it north to face the separatists.
Meanwhile, the Brabantians were moving dangerously close to Basel. Simon cornered them at Montbeliard in January. It was a rough and brutal winter battle, but despite taking heavier losses than usual (more than 1,000), Simon won the day once again. The final battle of the war was at Fürstenburg between March 4th and 27th, with 11,000 Habsburg troops slaughtering 1,700 Bavarians until there were only about 600 left. Simon felt the time was right to send terms of surrender to Duke Otto, and he was proven correct. Although for the time being Tuscany was still a domain of the House of Wigeriche, it would only take one child to bring it into the growing list of Habsburg titles.
Almost immediately after Bavaria’s surrender, a peasant revolt broke out in Geneva, and with Gilbert off fighting the German separatists in the north, Simon was tasked with cleaning up the rabble. He took his army, its morale high after such an easy and short campaign, and met the peasant army at Aubonne in May and made an exemplary display of the superiority of properly-armed troops versus farmers with pitchforks. 1,100 revolting peasants paid the ultimate price for their insubordination, while managing to only slay 34 of Simon’s soldiers.
When Simon returned to Habsburg Castle, there was a tenseness in the atmosphere. His entire family and council were assembled to meet him, looking rather serious given the cause for celebration.
“What has happened? What is wrong?” Simon asked the room.
“Nothing for you, cousin,” answered Chancellor Berthold von Pommern, Simon’s relative from his mother’s side. “We have just received word that the emperor was wounded fighting the separatists. The physician amputated the leg, but, at Kaiser Gilbert’s age, it is not looking likely that he will make a recovery. We are expecting the summons from Prince-Bishop Michael of Mainz calling the Electoral College any day.”
Simon exhaled heavily. So the Butcher had been butchered himself. The King of Bohemia regretted not having any skill for poetry, for this was clearly a moment for a poet to shine. The long-awaited day would be soon upon them.
But not as soon as they thought. The first two months of summer felt like one long, held breath, and then on 6 August, 1162, Kaiser Gilbert Scarponnois breathed his last. The summons for the Electors came shortly afterword.
“With the passing of Gilbert Scarponnois, the time has come to elect a new King of Germany and of Rome,” Prince-Bishop Michael opened the ceremony. “In his last will and testament, Kaiser Gilbert expresses his wish that the Lords Temporal and Ecclesiastical consider his son Onfroy, the Duke of Nordgau, as his successor. Are there any here who wish to cast a vote for Onfroy Scarponnois?”
The silence surprised no one.
“If there are no votes for Duke Onfroy, then I invite my fellow lords to submit a nominee of their choosing.”
Young Duke Borel of Saxony spoke up quickly. “I nominate Duke Karl Otakeren of Faiyum, son of Kaiser Otakar Otakeren, may God rest his soul.” There was a collective groan around the room.
“We’ve had Otakeren emperors before,” scoffed Heinrich. “The first was so tyrannical that many of our fathers and grandfathers, including the one for whom you’re named, had to remove him from the throne. And the second spent the first half of his reign under house arrest and was never properly crowned. Now you suggest a third, one that currently serves a Muslim liege and has barely spent any time in this land? Cast a vote for Karl Otakeren if you truly wish, Duke Borel, but do not expect to be in the majority.” Borel sat back down, unwilling to get into an argument with the elder statesman but equally unwilling to change his vote, as Heinrich continued.
“I nominate Simon von Habsburg, King of Bohemia and Pannonia. Through his late mother he claims descent from Kaiser Wenzel von Pommern, may God rest his soul. And he not only has the blood to claim the throne but the strength of arms and character as well. I can personally vouch for his growth as a man since he took his father’s throne, and we are all aware of how he defended the empire from two false kings. My lords, although we have not been so unfortunate, we have heard too many stories of Kaiser Gilbert’s cruelty. I promise you this day, we will have no such need to worry under King Simon’s leadership! Thank you!”
“Are there any other nominations?” Prince-Bishop Michael asked, but when none were offered he announced that the time had come to vote. Duke Borel remained steadfast in voting for Karl Otakeren, but one-by-one the votes came in for someone else:
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg,” said Prince-Bishop Michael, looking at the man himself, who was the only one left to vote.
“Well, it would seem a betrayal of your confidence in me to not show any in myself,” Simon conceded humbly, rising from his bench. “I cast my vote for myself, not for want of glory or power but as a promise to you, that I shall carry out my duties with the same conviction that led you to cast your votes.” He retook his seat to a round of applause and Michael spoke one last time.
“Prince-Electors of the Roman Empire, we have a new King, and with the blessing of the Bishop of Rome, a new Emperor. Simon of the House von Habsburg, on behalf of the College of Electors I name you King of Germany and King of Rome. Long live the Kaiser!”
It was the summer of 1159. The Holy Roman Emperor Gilbert Scarponnois was in the 13th year of his reign and the 63rd of his life. His empire stretched from Lorraine and Holland in the west to Poland and Carpathia in the east, from Holstein in the bitter north to the blistering deserts of Tunisia and Libya in the south, the latter territory having just been successfully defended from a Shia Jihad. Now the realm was gearing up to defend the Crusader Kingdom of Egypt from a separate Jihad declared by the Sunnis. Against the massive Muslim armies the Christians had a snowball’s chance in hell, but Gilbert had been involved in the Crusade to win Egypt, and he would be damned if he didn’t defend it.
But the man who was truly regarded as the most powerful in the empire was the 35-year-old King Simon II von Habsburg. His family controlled about three-quarters of the empire’s military strength, and had been responsible for much of its eastward expansion. Simon himself held authority over the vast majority of the Habsburg lands and had enough manpower at his command as the rest of the empire combined, but there was one Habsburg who was not directly beholden to the patriarch.
Burchard von Habsburg was the Duke of Austria-Steiermark, commonly called Styria. He was only 28 years old, but the past ten of those had not been kind to him. He suffered from the great pox, which would have been the worst thing to happen to his face had he not lost a good chunk to the torturer’s knife for supporting a pretender to the imperial throne. Despite his disfigurement that required him to hide his face behind a mask in other’s company, he was still reasonably respected and referred to as “the Strong” among supporters, not only as a remark on his physique but as a commentary on his extraordinary resilience to the horrors life had burdened him with. But even the strongest cannot hold out indefinitely. Burchard’s syphilis had progressed to its final stage, and together with the trauma of his torture at the hands of the Emperor, had turned him into a stressed-out lunatic. The disease was also attacking his heart, which was already feeling the strain from the high blood pressure caused from his severe anxiety. On the 22nd of July, 1159, Duke Burchard finally rested and went to his forefathers in Heaven: his father, Alois Otakeren, slain in a duel with a bishop when Burchard was thirteen; his grandfather, for whom he had been named, who had also died young, only 22 when dysentery took him. Not present to welcome Burchard at the Pearly Gates, one could imagine, was his great-grandfather Adalbero, the reviled former Kaiser who had burnt his own brother at the stake and been deposed by Burchard’s maternal grandmother, Queen Amalie von Habsburg.
Simon was grieved to learn of his younger cousin’s passing, but mildly relieved to know that his suffering was at an end. He attended the funeral in modest black attire. Presiding over the ceremony was the court chaplain and newly-appointed regent, Bishop Dietmar of Radkersburg. He gave a stirring sermon about how Burchard had endured thanks to his faith in God and remained brave and humble in the face of adversity, but that sometimes the bravest and humblest act was to accept when the fight was no longer worth the pain. Afterwards Simon went up to the new Duke, little 4-year-old Alois, holding his mother Ermengarde’s hand tight. The Dowager Duchess curtsied and compelled Alois to bow to the king, but Simon waved her off.
“I’m not coming to talk as a king but as a cousin,” he said as he knelt to be on eye-level with the Duke, who was extremely tall for his age but still not yet past Simon’s hip. “I’m sure you’re tired by now of hearing people praise your father,” he told him. “I remember that feeling well. I was much older than you are now when my father passed, but believe me, that did not help dull the pain. If ever you need someone new to talk to, when your mother or Bishop Dieter just won’t do, you are welcome at my home any time.” He gave the little boy a hug. “Now learn well from your mother and Bishop Dieter. When you are sixteen you’ll not only have your own lands to rule but my daughter, my firstborn, to look after. And one day, when I am gone to see your father again, you will be the new King. I’m sorry to have to entrust you with so much, but you are strong like your father, and I hear you’re smart, too. I know you will be great if you try your best.” He gave Alois one more hug, received a brief word of thanks from him and Ermengarde, and walked back to his carriage for the long journey back.
When he returned home on 21 August, he was immediately faced with more somber news, though thankfully not as severe as the loss of a friend and ally. It was his trusted siege commander for the past three years. Roman, who had long since embraced the Roman Catholic Church, now had a desire to leave Simon’s service and join the Knights Templar. Simon was loathe to loose such a faithful and competent general, but Roman seemed genuinely eager, and so he reluctantly accepted Roman’s resignation. In his place, he invited a Frenchman named Gervas de Vassy to take his place.
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Now there was the question of what to pursue now that the internal and external threats to the empire were over and done with. His eye turned to Christine von Nordheim, who was Duchess to many, many duchies. Her primary title was Bavaria, but she also reigned over Tuscany, Jerid, Abruzzo, Modena, Corsica, and Spoleto. The latter was claimed by the Pope as part of the Papal States, and so for many years now she had been excommunicated from the Catholic Church. In addition, she was the wife of Gottfried of Brabant, adding yet another duchy to the list of titles her son Otto was set to inherit. And therein lied opportunity, for Otto was a mere boy of five, and his elder sister, Kunigunde, was betrothed to Konrad von Habsburg, Simon’s second cousin once removed. Simon was seized with sudden ambition. After securing the promise of an alliance with young Alois, he declared an excommunication war on Christine of Bavaria on 25 Sept 1159.
The early months of the war consisted mostly of merely collecting the militias raised from around the kingdoms into two armies of roughly 6,500 men each and marching them over to Bavaria. Time was of the essence. Gottfried would be marshaling his own troops, and once he reinforced his wife they would have 14,000 men between them, putting them on equal footing with Simon. With Alois providing an additional 7,300 the Habsburgs would still have the upper hand, but Simon had to think long-term. This would be just like Franche-Comté, the very first war he had fought. His father had fought to overthrow an excommunicated monarch, and he had had to fight a separate war to steal it for the Habsburg candidate. If they wasted all their manpower in the first phase, then there was not point in going to war at all. So despite the Bavarians laying siege to Basel, Simon knuckled down and led his troops to the castle of Landshut in Innsbruck, and the Bishopric of Friesing just south of it. Meanwhile the Austrians and Styrians were directed to capture the county of Passau.
The triple-siege strategy worked well. Friesing and Landshut surrendered within weeks of each other in the early spring. On April 6th, Gilbert felt compelled to intervene and attempt to stop the fighting, but Simon reminded Gilbert of the I.O.U. he had given Simon for attempting to help pass his revocation law, and so the kaiser stepped back and let the war continue after all.
On 25 April, Duke Gottfried laid siege to Furstenberg with over 7,000 men, and it was finally time to do battle. Simon combined his two armies to one in Schwaben and marched them south to Thurgau, from where they could more easily get around the Brabantians and attack. While these maneuvers were being made, the first of May brought the not-unexpected news that King Martin had been deposed by the Sunnis and Egypt returned to Muslim control.
The Battle of Zollern began on the 14th of May and lasted into June. Simon quickly chipped away at the enemy’s left flank, and they were even beginning to retreat when the Bavarians showed up to reinforce their allies. The attackers seemed to be losing the upper hand, but Gottschalk continued to hammer the enemy center until it collapsed. Seizing his chance, Simon launched a final assault on the left, and with only one wing of their army remaining, Duchess Christine and Duke Gottfried ordered a full retreat.
The allied forces split up, with the Brabantians heading south into the Alps and the Bavarians, ironically, turning north towards Brabant. Simon pursued the Bavarians and caught up with them on 18 July outside Sponheim, near Trier. The battle was brief and was not a crushing victory for the Habsburgs, but a victory nonetheless. However, during the battle Geraud de Vassy caught a crippling case of dysentery that left him an invalid. Simon wrote to Roman Romanov, asking if he could return from the Templars long enough to be a siege master once more. While he waited he learned that his poor uncle Martin had died of cancer on August the 7th. Apparently losing his kingdom had broken his will to fight. His spirits were slightly alleviated when he received an epiphany from a Divine Being five days later.
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On the sixth of September, a familiar face arrived at the Habsburg camp. Simon embraced Roman and they got straight to work laying siege to Brabant. But it turned out that the entire war would be rendered moot not two months later, when Christine of Bavaria died of a heart attack on November 3rd, presumably when she remembered that her daughter Kunigunde’s wedding to Konrad von Habsburg was the next day.
Simon took the rest of November to reassess the situation. While he had arguably wasted hundreds of lives on the excommunication war, the losses were not enough to discourage him from continuing on with the second phase of his plan. His uncle’s loss of Egypt also provided an opportunity, as the county of Ulm was de facto a province of Egypt owing to Karl Otakeren being the Duke of Faiyum but inheriting Ulm when his father Kaiser Otakar had died. Simon had very much desired to return Ulm to the Holy Roman Empire, but not by waging war with his extremely powerful uncle. But now Egypt was ruled by a Sultan named Arsenios Fatimid, who paradoxically had converted to the Sunni faith, and his grip on power was near non-existant. He had only 733 troops ready at the time.
So Simon declared two wars simultaneously: a de jure war on Egypt to return Ulm to Swabia, and a claim war on behalf of Kunigunde Wigeriche to the Duchy of Tuscany against her brother Otto. He got a good omen three days later, Zsanett was pregnant for the third time! Austria-Steiermark joined in against Bavaria once again, and thanks to Simon’s quick action, this time Brabant would not be joining at least immediately, because there hadn’t been enough time for Otto to officially get an alliance with his father.
The combined campaign against Bavaria and Egypt goes smoothly. The Bavarians blunder into a quagmire at Klatovy in Plzen in late January. Attacking a Habsburg regiment of fewer than 500 men with 3,300 of their own, they are slowly pushed back as more and more levy troops reinforce. By the end of the battle a total of 4,400 troops loyal to Simon have descended upon Klatovy, and the Bavarians are sent packing. Now that his troops are more or less regrouped, Simon orders them to prioritize Ulm before moving on to Bavaria. Meanwhile, he discovers the joy of charity while buying Zsanett something to lift her mood when she begins to feel blue with pregnancy hormones.
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By the end of May, Ulm is firmly in Simon’s control. Even better news comes on 13 June, when the man who had deposed (and, as Simon was inclined to believe despite lack of evidence, murdered) Simon’s brother Martin as King of Poland, Siemomysl Piast, was excommunicated on charges of apostasy and burned at the stake by the Kaiser.
On July the 4th, Simon and Zsanett welcomed their first son. As parents, they were thrilled, but as a king and queen, they were a bit disheartened. Their beloved Sofie was no longer first in line to the throne, and her new little brother didn’t quite seem to have the same spark in his eyes as she did. As for a name, Sofie suggested Baldewin, but Simon had a better idea:
July also saw Simon triumph once more on the battlefield, this time at Dachau, where all 12,500 of his troops nearly halved the 4,800 Bavarian defenders. In the interest of time, Simon marched the entire army to Regensburg and stormed the castle of Landshut. By October the 5th he had also taken the city of Regensburg and the bishopric of Ingolstadt. He left the last city in the county to the Austrians, who had just recaptured Passau, while he met the Bavarians for a second time at Klatovy. This time he did halve the enemy force, and more. 1,800 of the 3,000 Bavarians who began the Second Battle of Klatovy did not leave the field.
While the battle at Klatovy had raged, on the first of November a revolt began in Hamburg County, led by a man named Dieter von Altona, who claimed that as a Frenchman, Gilbert Scarpponois had no right to be crowned King of the Germans. Gilbert personally assembled an army and led it north to face the separatists.
Meanwhile, the Brabantians were moving dangerously close to Basel. Simon cornered them at Montbeliard in January. It was a rough and brutal winter battle, but despite taking heavier losses than usual (more than 1,000), Simon won the day once again. The final battle of the war was at Fürstenburg between March 4th and 27th, with 11,000 Habsburg troops slaughtering 1,700 Bavarians until there were only about 600 left. Simon felt the time was right to send terms of surrender to Duke Otto, and he was proven correct. Although for the time being Tuscany was still a domain of the House of Wigeriche, it would only take one child to bring it into the growing list of Habsburg titles.
Almost immediately after Bavaria’s surrender, a peasant revolt broke out in Geneva, and with Gilbert off fighting the German separatists in the north, Simon was tasked with cleaning up the rabble. He took his army, its morale high after such an easy and short campaign, and met the peasant army at Aubonne in May and made an exemplary display of the superiority of properly-armed troops versus farmers with pitchforks. 1,100 revolting peasants paid the ultimate price for their insubordination, while managing to only slay 34 of Simon’s soldiers.
When Simon returned to Habsburg Castle, there was a tenseness in the atmosphere. His entire family and council were assembled to meet him, looking rather serious given the cause for celebration.
“What has happened? What is wrong?” Simon asked the room.
“Nothing for you, cousin,” answered Chancellor Berthold von Pommern, Simon’s relative from his mother’s side. “We have just received word that the emperor was wounded fighting the separatists. The physician amputated the leg, but, at Kaiser Gilbert’s age, it is not looking likely that he will make a recovery. We are expecting the summons from Prince-Bishop Michael of Mainz calling the Electoral College any day.”
Simon exhaled heavily. So the Butcher had been butchered himself. The King of Bohemia regretted not having any skill for poetry, for this was clearly a moment for a poet to shine. The long-awaited day would be soon upon them.
But not as soon as they thought. The first two months of summer felt like one long, held breath, and then on 6 August, 1162, Kaiser Gilbert Scarponnois breathed his last. The summons for the Electors came shortly afterword.
“With the passing of Gilbert Scarponnois, the time has come to elect a new King of Germany and of Rome,” Prince-Bishop Michael opened the ceremony. “In his last will and testament, Kaiser Gilbert expresses his wish that the Lords Temporal and Ecclesiastical consider his son Onfroy, the Duke of Nordgau, as his successor. Are there any here who wish to cast a vote for Onfroy Scarponnois?”
The silence surprised no one.
“If there are no votes for Duke Onfroy, then I invite my fellow lords to submit a nominee of their choosing.”
Young Duke Borel of Saxony spoke up quickly. “I nominate Duke Karl Otakeren of Faiyum, son of Kaiser Otakar Otakeren, may God rest his soul.” There was a collective groan around the room.
“We’ve had Otakeren emperors before,” scoffed Heinrich. “The first was so tyrannical that many of our fathers and grandfathers, including the one for whom you’re named, had to remove him from the throne. And the second spent the first half of his reign under house arrest and was never properly crowned. Now you suggest a third, one that currently serves a Muslim liege and has barely spent any time in this land? Cast a vote for Karl Otakeren if you truly wish, Duke Borel, but do not expect to be in the majority.” Borel sat back down, unwilling to get into an argument with the elder statesman but equally unwilling to change his vote, as Heinrich continued.
“I nominate Simon von Habsburg, King of Bohemia and Pannonia. Through his late mother he claims descent from Kaiser Wenzel von Pommern, may God rest his soul. And he not only has the blood to claim the throne but the strength of arms and character as well. I can personally vouch for his growth as a man since he took his father’s throne, and we are all aware of how he defended the empire from two false kings. My lords, although we have not been so unfortunate, we have heard too many stories of Kaiser Gilbert’s cruelty. I promise you this day, we will have no such need to worry under King Simon’s leadership! Thank you!”
“Are there any other nominations?” Prince-Bishop Michael asked, but when none were offered he announced that the time had come to vote. Duke Borel remained steadfast in voting for Karl Otakeren, but one-by-one the votes came in for someone else:
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg.”
“Simon von Habsburg,” said Prince-Bishop Michael, looking at the man himself, who was the only one left to vote.
“Well, it would seem a betrayal of your confidence in me to not show any in myself,” Simon conceded humbly, rising from his bench. “I cast my vote for myself, not for want of glory or power but as a promise to you, that I shall carry out my duties with the same conviction that led you to cast your votes.” He retook his seat to a round of applause and Michael spoke one last time.
“Prince-Electors of the Roman Empire, we have a new King, and with the blessing of the Bishop of Rome, a new Emperor. Simon of the House von Habsburg, on behalf of the College of Electors I name you King of Germany and King of Rome. Long live the Kaiser!”
- 2
Stream Announcement Update!
Ladies and gents, I have just discovered the exact release time for CK3, and it is significantly later in the day from what I had anticipated. In fact, it will ironically be releasing at the time I initially planned to end my stream, which is 4pm UTC!
*cue nervous laughter that devolves into sobs*
So that leaves me with a bit of a time zone dilemma, because I know we have regular readers from various corners of the planet, and I'd like as many people who want to join in to have the opportunity. With that in mind, here are the options I'm currently considering:
Option A: Reschedule the stream for 4pm UTC (Default)
Option B: Push the stream back all the way to 1pm UTC on Wednesday
So I need all your help in the form of some RSVPs! Let me know if you plan to attend the stream and which of those two time(s) you're available, 4pm Tuesday, 1pm Wednesday, or BOTH! Post below in the thread or PM me, either way works! If we go with Option B or C I'll make another announcement here on the thread! Hope to see you all in the Twitch chat soon!
Best Wishes,
Green Rice
Ladies and gents, I have just discovered the exact release time for CK3, and it is significantly later in the day from what I had anticipated. In fact, it will ironically be releasing at the time I initially planned to end my stream, which is 4pm UTC!
*cue nervous laughter that devolves into sobs*
So that leaves me with a bit of a time zone dilemma, because I know we have regular readers from various corners of the planet, and I'd like as many people who want to join in to have the opportunity. With that in mind, here are the options I'm currently considering:
Option A: Reschedule the stream for 4pm UTC (Default)
+ Still a good time slot for U.S./E.U. viewers.
+ Get my first, unfiltered reactions
- Bad time slot for AU viewers *cough* @Bullfilter *cough*
Option B: Push the stream back all the way to 1pm UTC on Wednesday
+ Decent time slot for all viewers
- Longer wait
- I can guarantee I will have played a little the day before, so it won't be as much of a shared discovery of the game
Option C: Stream at both times+ More time to explore the game together
- More time commitment
- May split the viewers between the two times and not have as many people in chat at a given moment.
So I need all your help in the form of some RSVPs! Let me know if you plan to attend the stream and which of those two time(s) you're available, 4pm Tuesday, 1pm Wednesday, or BOTH! Post below in the thread or PM me, either way works! If we go with Option B or C I'll make another announcement here on the thread! Hope to see you all in the Twitch chat soon!
Best Wishes,
Green Rice
- 1
I’m a Boomer so I don’t know what a Twitch is - other than something one’s upper lip does when confronted with young-folks’ World Wide Interweb hip language of the streets. Seriously, thanks for thinking of me and my time-zone buddies. You probably need to go for your biggest demographic (US/EU) first, plus what you want to do yourself. Will it all be on Twitch?
Out of curiosity, because I’ve never watched one, can a stream be viewed later, even if you’re not virtually present for chat at the time of broadcast? I’ve only been on any social media for a year or two, because ... security clearances with my old job (since safely retired from).
Seriously, thanks for thinking of me and my time-zone buddies. You probably need to go for your biggest demographic (US/EU) first, plus what you want to do yourself. Will it all be on Twitch?Out of curiosity, because I’ve never watched one, can a stream be viewed later, even if you’re not virtually present for chat at the time of broadcast? I’ve only been on any social media for a year or two, because ... security clearances with my old job (since safely retired from).
Stream ending with ckiii launching and crashing the forums sounds like a good idea?
@Bullfilter Twitch.tv only lets you view videos for 14 days after the fact on their platform. Beyond that the onus is on the streamer to upload to YouTube or another platform for posterity.
- 1
*confused face* Not following your train of thought, here. Mind clarifying?
Just joking that everything is going to break on the first of September.
Okay, that sets me at ease, I thought I’d written something misleading about the stream time.
By the way it’s amusing how both you and @Bullfilter replied but I guess aren’t planning to tune in since you didn’t give any mention of availability?
I...don't know actually. I am morbidly curious to see ckiii upon launch and would certainly prefer someone else take the bullet for me if possible. Depending on what I'm working on (and where), I imagine I can put the stream on. If UTC is the same as GMT minus daylight saving then either afternoon time works for me. Bullfilter though presumbaly isn't tuning in the middle of the night just to see seduction in next-gen graphics...
UTC and GMT is the same time, at least currently. Dunno how the UK does daylight savings but my understanding is that they’re always in sync. UTC is just time as measured by an atomic clock and GMT is the physical time zone. Glad you’re thinking of joining in, it’ll be nice to have at least one person to talk to!
This made me chuckle! But yeah, that’s why I was hoping originally to stream at 1pm UTC/GMT, since it’s early morning here in the 13 colonies but it’s late evening in Oz, so I figured Bull could watch a little and hang out in chat before bed.
UTC and GMT is the same time, at least currently. Dunno how the UK does daylight savings but my understanding is that they’re always in sync. UTC is just time as measured by an atomic clock and GMT is the physical time zone. Glad you’re thinking of joining in, it’ll be nice to have at least one person to talk to!
It's 1 hour ahead at the moment, for British summertime.
- 1
Epilogue
Epilogue
Kaiser Simon von Habsburg reigned as Holy Roman Emperor for 32 years. He successfully retook Ulm for his new empire on 29 December 1162. He revoked the county of Schwaben from Thomas of Schwaben, giving the land and the title Duke of Swabia to his cousin Aldrich, younger brother of Burchard of Austria-Steiermark. He had a new top-quality suit of armor made for him, dubbed the Angelic Guardian, by the master smith Michael, although the extreme expense temporarily put the empire into debt. To help alleviate it, he sold the County of Genfergau back to the Duke of Savoy, finally making good on his great-grandfather Werner’s promise. In exchange he revoked the Barony of Bochnia from Kojata Premyslid, a descendant of Queen Justina.
In August of 1165 Simon declared war on the Pechenegs and would reclaim Szekelyföld almost exactly two years later. While he campaigned, Pope Ioannes XX excommunicated Simon for possessing the duchies of Ferrara and Spoleto as vassal states. Simon took a break from personally leading his troops to perform a public act of contrition in front of the Papal Palace, only for the Pope to re-excommunicate him four days later. Simon is infuriated but is too preoccupied to make a retaliation.
The third Simon von Habsburg, the Kaiser’s second son, was born on 4 October 1166. The adult Simon was glad to see his namesake shared his genius.
The Third Crusade was called to reclaim Egypt in July of 1167, right before the end of Simon’s war with the Pechenegs. The Pope re-lifted Simon’s excommunication upon receiving his pledge to fight in the crusade, this time for good.
Egyptian Crusade 2: Habsburg Boogaloo officially began a year later, Simon had preemptively moved his army to the county of Rasheed, which one of his vassals possessed, allowing him to easily take the lead in the campaign. Parallel to this, using his newfound influence as a reinstated Catholic, he successfully persuaded Pope Ioannes to excommunicate Rutger Salian, who then raised a rebellion when Simon tried to use that as justification for imprisoning him. Ultimately it was a futile effort, of course, as Simon won the crusade for the Pope in November 1169, got his cousin Martin, son of the former King of Egypt, restored to his rightful throne, and quickly returned to Germany to defeat Rutger in 1171. Somehow in all of that, Simon found time to produce a third daughter, Margarete, on 12 March 1169, write a Magnum Opus on a Universal Panacea from start to finish, and revoke the Kingdom of Poland from its infant King Géraud Piast, whose father had been killed in a battlefield duel with (who else?) a bishop in November 1170. Rutger spent the final 174 days of his life in Simon’s prison before passing away. Ironically (or perhaps just confusingly), Rutger was beatified after his death by the very same pope who’d excommunicated him. His daughter and heir Konstanze had been betrothed to Giselbert von Habsburg, the lone son of Sambor Sieradzki and Engeltraud of the Franche-Comté line of Habsburgs. When she passed in 1194 her son Berengar von Habsburg inherited her titles and the Iron Crown of Lombardy.
In April of 1175, Simon undertook a quest to prove his descent from the legendary Macedonian warrior-king Alexander the Great. The journey took almost two whole years, but proved ultimately successful. Towards the end of the adventure, in late 1176, Simon took some time off to go on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
Very shortly afterwards, Simon was elected Magus of the Hermetic Society. That same day he declared the first of what would eventually become three Genoese Wars. This first one, from 1177 to 1178, added the province of Nice to the HRE. The Second and Third would add Logudoro and Arboréa, lasting between 1184-1185 and 1191-1192, respectively.
During the First Genoese War, Franz Ferdinand came of age and, as difficult as it was for Simon, was sent to a monastery to live out the rest of his days, disinherited from his father’s kingdoms. When the war ended, Simon summoned his fellow Hermetics to a Grand Debate (which he later won) and began work on a family history book.
In June of 1178 he received a message from Queen Aziza of Kanem, requested the Empire’s aid in converting her subjects to Christianity. Simon accepted and traveled to Kanem in 1181 to see the progress that the Queen had made, and was highly impressed, striking up a strong friendship with her.
A year after the end of Simon’s trip to Africa, in 1182 he again convened the Hermetics, this time to create the Radius Astronomicus, which was completed that September. Almost three years to the day later, in the midst of the Second Genoese War, Simon completed his book on his family history.
During the first half of the 1180s, Simon also finally made use of the land in Basel that had been cleared over 35 years prior and built the cities of Aarau and Pruntrut.
Simon followed up the end of the Second Genoese War with the Invasion of Prussia, which began in February of 1186 and would last a surprisingly long time, not finishing until almost July of 1189. Although Simon should have been overjoyed, his reaction to the surrender of the Prussians was muted. Zsanett had passed away peacefully but suddenly on 4 June 1188, only 54 years old. As if that wasn’t enough Prince Simon, a still-boyish 22, also died unexpectedly, of severe stress, in January 1189.
Simon remarried to Thana Nubaid, the daughter of Musa Nubaid, the previous Sultan of Jerusalem, who’d been murdered by the Hashshashin in 1162. They had two children together: Frida, born 11 April 1190, and Leopold, born 11 December 1191.
On 30 January 1193, just six months after ending the Third Genoese War, Simon went to war for the final time. This time, it was actually not a war of his own making, but one of his vassals’. Count Obizzino of Westfriesland had found the audacity to declare war on the King of Castille, Pelayo de León, whose family had inherited the county of Holland almost exactly 60 years prior from the House of Luxemburg. It turned out to be the perfect bookend to his military career, which had started by fighting a papal war to depose Pelayo’s mother Queen Sancha.
Simon began by driving away the Castilian army from the Netherlands and liberating Obizzino’s occupied counties of Westfriesland and Zeeland before fully occupying Holland. When the Castilians returned to attempt to retake Zeeland, Simon pounced on them with 10,000 troops to their 7,400. The battle was going well, but on the morning of 26 March, 1194, Simon did not emerge from his tent. When an aide-de-camp went to fetch the Emperor, he found him lying in bed as if asleep. The aide tried to rouse Simon, but quickly discovered that his body was cold and without a pulse. Simon von Habsburg had departed the mortal plane at the age of 69.
In the end, he managed to secure the succession for Sofie just as he’d wanted. He was so well-beloved that he actually managed to change the Imperial Succession Law to Agnatic-Cognatic in August of 1175, and similarly changed the succession laws in the Three Kingdoms to elective monarchy, even going so far as to temporarily destroy and recreate the Kingdom of Bohemia (he had already changed it once to be Agnatic-Cognatic before Franz Ferdinand was born). All it took after that was a lot of bribes (truly a lot) and Sofie became the first-ever Empress Regnant of the Holy Roman Empire. She was crowned by Pope Silvester V almost a year to the day after her father’s death, on 21 March, 1195.
Roman Romanov stayed at King Simon’s court until his death from cancer in 1181 at the age of 60. He died not long after his third daughter, Praxida, was murdered by a Prussian minor noble. He was survived by his three other daughters, Tatyiana, Feodosia, and Pribislava. Pribislava, the youngest, was the only one to marry, becoming the Russian Queen-Consort of the Norwegian king of Sweden Eystein Gautur. They had one son, Prince Harald.
Kyros Macrodoukas was granted the Themes of Cilicia and Paphlagonia in 1159 by the Byzantine Emperor Konstantinos II. He married a countess matrilineally and had two sons and a daughter, all born into the Palaiologos dynasty. His eldest son, Tryphon, was given the same titles by the Emperor when Kyros died of Great Pox in 1174. He was barely 49 years old.
Simon was beatified on 10 August 1195 and canonized by Pope Silvester’s successor Marinus III as Saint Simon of Basel on 11 January 1197. He was given the epithet ‘the Apostle,’ to add to his list alongside ‘the Affable’ and ‘the Crusader.’ Although his passing marked the end of an era for the Holy Roman Empire, one marked by relative internal peace coupled with external expansion, many among the nobility saw it as a beginning as well as an end. For if the last 130 years had taught them anything, it was that the rise of the Habsburgs would never truly end.
A.E.I.O.U.
Finis
Kaiser Simon von Habsburg reigned as Holy Roman Emperor for 32 years. He successfully retook Ulm for his new empire on 29 December 1162. He revoked the county of Schwaben from Thomas of Schwaben, giving the land and the title Duke of Swabia to his cousin Aldrich, younger brother of Burchard of Austria-Steiermark. He had a new top-quality suit of armor made for him, dubbed the Angelic Guardian, by the master smith Michael, although the extreme expense temporarily put the empire into debt. To help alleviate it, he sold the County of Genfergau back to the Duke of Savoy, finally making good on his great-grandfather Werner’s promise. In exchange he revoked the Barony of Bochnia from Kojata Premyslid, a descendant of Queen Justina.
In August of 1165 Simon declared war on the Pechenegs and would reclaim Szekelyföld almost exactly two years later. While he campaigned, Pope Ioannes XX excommunicated Simon for possessing the duchies of Ferrara and Spoleto as vassal states. Simon took a break from personally leading his troops to perform a public act of contrition in front of the Papal Palace, only for the Pope to re-excommunicate him four days later. Simon is infuriated but is too preoccupied to make a retaliation.
| 
|
The third Simon von Habsburg, the Kaiser’s second son, was born on 4 October 1166. The adult Simon was glad to see his namesake shared his genius.
The Third Crusade was called to reclaim Egypt in July of 1167, right before the end of Simon’s war with the Pechenegs. The Pope re-lifted Simon’s excommunication upon receiving his pledge to fight in the crusade, this time for good.
| 
|
Egyptian Crusade 2: Habsburg Boogaloo officially began a year later, Simon had preemptively moved his army to the county of Rasheed, which one of his vassals possessed, allowing him to easily take the lead in the campaign. Parallel to this, using his newfound influence as a reinstated Catholic, he successfully persuaded Pope Ioannes to excommunicate Rutger Salian, who then raised a rebellion when Simon tried to use that as justification for imprisoning him. Ultimately it was a futile effort, of course, as Simon won the crusade for the Pope in November 1169, got his cousin Martin, son of the former King of Egypt, restored to his rightful throne, and quickly returned to Germany to defeat Rutger in 1171. Somehow in all of that, Simon found time to produce a third daughter, Margarete, on 12 March 1169, write a Magnum Opus on a Universal Panacea from start to finish, and revoke the Kingdom of Poland from its infant King Géraud Piast, whose father had been killed in a battlefield duel with (who else?) a bishop in November 1170. Rutger spent the final 174 days of his life in Simon’s prison before passing away. Ironically (or perhaps just confusingly), Rutger was beatified after his death by the very same pope who’d excommunicated him. His daughter and heir Konstanze had been betrothed to Giselbert von Habsburg, the lone son of Sambor Sieradzki and Engeltraud of the Franche-Comté line of Habsburgs. When she passed in 1194 her son Berengar von Habsburg inherited her titles and the Iron Crown of Lombardy.
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In April of 1175, Simon undertook a quest to prove his descent from the legendary Macedonian warrior-king Alexander the Great. The journey took almost two whole years, but proved ultimately successful. Towards the end of the adventure, in late 1176, Simon took some time off to go on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
| 
|
Very shortly afterwards, Simon was elected Magus of the Hermetic Society. That same day he declared the first of what would eventually become three Genoese Wars. This first one, from 1177 to 1178, added the province of Nice to the HRE. The Second and Third would add Logudoro and Arboréa, lasting between 1184-1185 and 1191-1192, respectively.
During the First Genoese War, Franz Ferdinand came of age and, as difficult as it was for Simon, was sent to a monastery to live out the rest of his days, disinherited from his father’s kingdoms. When the war ended, Simon summoned his fellow Hermetics to a Grand Debate (which he later won) and began work on a family history book.
In June of 1178 he received a message from Queen Aziza of Kanem, requested the Empire’s aid in converting her subjects to Christianity. Simon accepted and traveled to Kanem in 1181 to see the progress that the Queen had made, and was highly impressed, striking up a strong friendship with her.
A year after the end of Simon’s trip to Africa, in 1182 he again convened the Hermetics, this time to create the Radius Astronomicus, which was completed that September. Almost three years to the day later, in the midst of the Second Genoese War, Simon completed his book on his family history.
| 
|
During the first half of the 1180s, Simon also finally made use of the land in Basel that had been cleared over 35 years prior and built the cities of Aarau and Pruntrut.
Simon followed up the end of the Second Genoese War with the Invasion of Prussia, which began in February of 1186 and would last a surprisingly long time, not finishing until almost July of 1189. Although Simon should have been overjoyed, his reaction to the surrender of the Prussians was muted. Zsanett had passed away peacefully but suddenly on 4 June 1188, only 54 years old. As if that wasn’t enough Prince Simon, a still-boyish 22, also died unexpectedly, of severe stress, in January 1189.
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Simon remarried to Thana Nubaid, the daughter of Musa Nubaid, the previous Sultan of Jerusalem, who’d been murdered by the Hashshashin in 1162. They had two children together: Frida, born 11 April 1190, and Leopold, born 11 December 1191.
On 30 January 1193, just six months after ending the Third Genoese War, Simon went to war for the final time. This time, it was actually not a war of his own making, but one of his vassals’. Count Obizzino of Westfriesland had found the audacity to declare war on the King of Castille, Pelayo de León, whose family had inherited the county of Holland almost exactly 60 years prior from the House of Luxemburg. It turned out to be the perfect bookend to his military career, which had started by fighting a papal war to depose Pelayo’s mother Queen Sancha.
Simon began by driving away the Castilian army from the Netherlands and liberating Obizzino’s occupied counties of Westfriesland and Zeeland before fully occupying Holland. When the Castilians returned to attempt to retake Zeeland, Simon pounced on them with 10,000 troops to their 7,400. The battle was going well, but on the morning of 26 March, 1194, Simon did not emerge from his tent. When an aide-de-camp went to fetch the Emperor, he found him lying in bed as if asleep. The aide tried to rouse Simon, but quickly discovered that his body was cold and without a pulse. Simon von Habsburg had departed the mortal plane at the age of 69.
In the end, he managed to secure the succession for Sofie just as he’d wanted. He was so well-beloved that he actually managed to change the Imperial Succession Law to Agnatic-Cognatic in August of 1175, and similarly changed the succession laws in the Three Kingdoms to elective monarchy, even going so far as to temporarily destroy and recreate the Kingdom of Bohemia (he had already changed it once to be Agnatic-Cognatic before Franz Ferdinand was born). All it took after that was a lot of bribes (truly a lot) and Sofie became the first-ever Empress Regnant of the Holy Roman Empire. She was crowned by Pope Silvester V almost a year to the day after her father’s death, on 21 March, 1195.
Roman Romanov stayed at King Simon’s court until his death from cancer in 1181 at the age of 60. He died not long after his third daughter, Praxida, was murdered by a Prussian minor noble. He was survived by his three other daughters, Tatyiana, Feodosia, and Pribislava. Pribislava, the youngest, was the only one to marry, becoming the Russian Queen-Consort of the Norwegian king of Sweden Eystein Gautur. They had one son, Prince Harald.
Kyros Macrodoukas was granted the Themes of Cilicia and Paphlagonia in 1159 by the Byzantine Emperor Konstantinos II. He married a countess matrilineally and had two sons and a daughter, all born into the Palaiologos dynasty. His eldest son, Tryphon, was given the same titles by the Emperor when Kyros died of Great Pox in 1174. He was barely 49 years old.
Simon was beatified on 10 August 1195 and canonized by Pope Silvester’s successor Marinus III as Saint Simon of Basel on 11 January 1197. He was given the epithet ‘the Apostle,’ to add to his list alongside ‘the Affable’ and ‘the Crusader.’ Although his passing marked the end of an era for the Holy Roman Empire, one marked by relative internal peace coupled with external expansion, many among the nobility saw it as a beginning as well as an end. For if the last 130 years had taught them anything, it was that the rise of the Habsburgs would never truly end.
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A.E.I.O.U.
Finis
- 1
- 1
Afterword
Well, folks, a big thank-you for sticking with me through all this! It was a very fun first-time AAR and a great way to send off CK2 for me! I hope you all enjoyed reading this story as much as I enjoyed playing it!
One last reminder that I will be streaming my first experience with CK3 over on twitch.tv/GreenRiceGaming at (tentatively, see previous stream-related post for more information) about launch time tomorrow at 4pm UTC. That's 5pm in the UK, 6pm CEST, and noon EST. I know it won't be the biggest event but I hope to see a few of you there! If you show up towards the beginning you'll get to vote on my first CK3 character, so it may be a compare-and-contrast Habsburg playthrough or something completely different! Either way, I'm sure it'll be loads of fun!
Best Wishes,
Green Rice
One last reminder that I will be streaming my first experience with CK3 over on twitch.tv/GreenRiceGaming at (tentatively, see previous stream-related post for more information) about launch time tomorrow at 4pm UTC. That's 5pm in the UK, 6pm CEST, and noon EST. I know it won't be the biggest event but I hope to see a few of you there! If you show up towards the beginning you'll get to vote on my first CK3 character, so it may be a compare-and-contrast Habsburg playthrough or something completely different! Either way, I'm sure it'll be loads of fun!
Best Wishes,
Green Rice
- 1
Never really done a serious hre game but always like to see people make it work. The hapsburgs have certainly already passed into legend, and it seems that they are in no danger of stopping anytime soon.