Imperium AARlandium Sacrum - Succession Game (AAR thread)

[Cornelius Rex]

XVIII - “They're out to get you ” “
You close your eyes
And hope that this is just imagination
But all the while
You hear a creature creepin' up behind
You're outta time”
Michael Jackson / Rod Temperton (1982)

(1110-1115)​

The alliance with the neighbouring empire of Byzantium was the source of many developments which historians have long debated about. Thankfully, in these days it’s not necessary to establish if they were “positive” or “negative”: they are simply facts.

The Imperial Court, now controlled by two technocratic minds, was absolutely centered in maintaining stability until a new Emperor was enthroned: every ounce of gold was dedicated to buying off rebellious-minded dukes, while Nicholas’s health dribbled away in seclusion and his succession was still undecided. This left the military angle in the hands of aggressive, ambitious frontier lords, and every candidate to the Throne took advantage of the lack of leadership to enlarge his opportunities by enlarging his glory and his lands.

In short, while in internal affairs of the Empire were almost peacefully sordid, the following years saw a new wave of foreign aggression, parts of it completely out of Imperial control.

Of course, this view has not always been prevalent. Different schools have tried to blame a crazed Nicholas with a frenzy of pagan destruction (or praise him for it), but it seems clearly established that from 1110 onwards he lived on opium tincture and only rarely took active part in the management of the state.

A hunger for land

In March 1111, the latest uprising in Iberia, led by the Duke of Cuenca, was finished with the complete annexation of his lands into the Imperial real, from which they were eventually redistributed to loyal counts. On the Eastern Front, the Imperials fought the Cuman with mixed success, subjugating chiefdoms almost one by one and dictating terms.

Those terms were harsh. The Cuman vassals were forced to kneel before the Germanic and West Slavic conquerors, switching allegiances and bringing into the Empire a vast slice of land that went around the Black Sea and into the territories that once were the Kingdom of Georgia. By 1113, and despite frequent trouble with his levies, the Imperial regiments had turned the northern Black Sea into a loyal realm. In June, the Cuman armies were dismembered and their royal domain finally occupied. In June 25th, the King of Cuman formally surrendered in a ceremony that was later painted in Neoclassical, romanised idealization Franscisco Vázquez.

It goes without saying that the imperial figure was not at the time fit to receive any surrenders in the middle of the steppe. The actual surrender was done to Juan de El Even, the Duke of Bohemia, who was in turn rewarded by Nicholas (or his warders) with the four counties of Tmutakaran, Crimea, Teresbovl and Korsen.

But the Emperor kept such lands as Kiev and its surrounding, and when the Imperials subdued the rebellious Prince of Cherson in late June 1113, his titles and land were torn from him too.

The Crusade

While up to that time the Empire had taken very little heed of the Crusades, in the Summer of 1113 the Emir of Jerusalem tried to seal a formal peace. This seems to have been about the largest blunder in recorded history.

As the Imperial copyists have recorded it, Nicholas was awake and actually sat on the throne for the Muslim emissary. Something either in the diplomat’s words or in the translation incensed him (what it was, we can only guess, for he was unintelligible in his anger) and the result was a sweeping change of policy. There would be Crusades.

The Court (and that meant the de Lusignans and their new ally, the spymaster Raolf von Wurtemberg) supported them too, as a cheap means of ridding the Empire of the most enthusiastic warmongers. By November 1113, the whole Catholic part of the Empire was in arms, with every nobleman recruiting and most able-bodied men under arms.

1114 was almost uneventful on the mainland (barring some Iberian turmoil and the continuous drop of ducal extortions), as even the most disloyal Dukes (such as Sigfried Muffin of Saxony) had their regiments under sail, or trekking overland, to Outremer. The biggest landfall didn’t happen until October 1114, when a landslide of armored crusaders (over thirty regiments raised and led by their own lords) crushed the Emirate of Jerusalem and its vassals, but by year end vast armies were still half-way en route.

By January 1115 only Jerusalem proper remained in Emirate hands, and no Muslim country attempted to help them. By January 1116, the Pope called off the Crusades with their goal accomplished.

It is plain that nobody was sorrier of this swift conclusion than the De Lusignans.

 

[Cornelius Rex]

XIX – “The Earth opened to receive him, and he went back Home”. “
“Our breathing falters.
Our eyes dim.
Our bones creak.
And those frigging students next door just won’t stop playing loud music.
Drat! Bring me the gasoline, Eve!”
Old Father Christmas, 2011

(1115-1118) ​

The final years of Nicholas were a game of musical chairs for preferment and succession, in which many dukes rattled sabres to shake money from the feeble Imperial government, and many more jockeyed for titles and position. Still, not much real change ensued.

Some of the most notorious personages of the time were not Dukes at all. For instance, Stephen Murmurandus, count of Besancon and Angouleme, vassal of the Duke of Meissen… and one of the most troublesome heretics of the time.

Probably the worst headache for the Court in those final years was Zygmunt D’Oraz, Duke of Lower Lorraine (and three other places). His domain was powerful enough, and his “character” led him to a continuous rebellious attitude that was unquenchable with money, even when Nicholas’ prestige and reputation were at their height. His permanent grumblings are documented to have cost the Emperor above of a thousand ducats in five years.

The fact is that the end of Nicholas’ administration was simply an effort to prevent an explosion. His management abilities were absolutely dissolved. An English ambassador wrote in January 1117: “If I were to rate the Emperor’s gifts, I could not be kind. On the field of war, his banner may still rally troops, but he is completely futile. Diplomatically he is worse than useless, being unable to show himself and even to make himself understood without an interpreter. His gift for intrigue is almost as gone, as he can’t take anybody in his confidence. Only his stewardship abilities survive, conveyed in writing from beyond the white veil of his private chambers. He is said to be trusting and generous, he long had the fame of being just and friendly, but age and leprosy have eaten him up. His estrangement from his wife has not hurt his prestige, but it is notorious that his attempts to assassinate her have always failed”.

By 1117 it was also clear that he had decided on Juan de El Even as the best successor. He therefore conferred on him honours such as the Duchies of Ferrara and Castilla, or the county of Burgos, advancing him to preeminence among the electors. The rest of the Dukes were appeased with generous funds, coming directly from the Estates General when the Imperial coffers were no longer enough.

Indeed, in early 1117 it seemed as if the Empire still had a bit of life in it: a heavy contingent was shipped to Outremer with the explicit aim of sacking the rich Muslim emirates to finance the stability in the mainland (in June 1117 Tiberias was taken from the Emirate of Damascus, and Damascus itself under siege). The Emperor apparently managed to sire a bastard in August (at least he recognized the child, who became Duke of Córdoba while a suckling baby; the mother’s subsequent health is unknown). By January 1118, the Archbishop of Galloway asked to become a vassal. But disorganisation at the center was rife. The spy master showed increased signs of schizophrenia.

And just after the siege of Damascus was finally over, in March 3rd 1118, Emperor Nicholas Kendall died.

He left a sprawling, newly forged realm, with better stability than he had a right to expect, and rather empty coffers. He had preferred internal stability and external conquest to the development of his domain, and he had only two infants (a son and a grandson) to carry his name. The name of the Kendalls would not soon be forgotten, but it wouldn’t sit on the Imperial Throne soon either.

 

[Cornelius Rex]

XX-"Life beats fiction, every time" “
"I watched as the years fell away,
from a face I've never shown,
a stranger living in my skin,
whom I myself have never known."
Semper Fi, 9/9/02

(1118-1122)​

What followed is one of the most mysterious spells in European history. It has been called the Hidden Regency. A better description may be a hidden, and temporarily successful, coup d'etat by the Morrell family.

While Nicholas' death is traditionally established on March 1118, this date was first used seven years later. It is still impossible, nowadays, to know the exact date of his demise.

Indeed, to the inhabitants of the Holy Roman Empire, 1118 was a year of happiness and wonder. On the death of his aged wife the Duchess of Valencia, their saintly Emperor was recovered enough to marry again (after publicly acknowledging a bastard a year earlier). No less than Busilla Morell, at that: the gifted chancellor of the Duchy of Bavaria. The wedding did not only bring wonder to the subjects, but also an extremely welcome deluge of cash to the parched Imperial coffers, and a new Chancellor displacing one of the De Lusignan brothers.

The wedding also marked a radical shift of strategy in the Imperial court. Foreign wars were suspended, including the victorious Damascus campaign. Ducal appeasement ceased: while previously Lower Lorraine and Saxony had bled the Empire dry, now the Duke Sygmund D'Oraz was actually pushed toward secession... and then had his subjects torn from him and his lands dismembered. Of note, too, was that the lands and titles torn from Sygmund were given to his very wife: a Guilheumina Kendall, whose heirs were not D'Oraz. This exemplary punishment cured both Sygmund and the Duke of Saxony of all rebellious tendencies.

The following years saw a general improvement in the imperial provinces, and even some accessions: the Duke of Sardinia (September 1118) and Martachus Duke of Leinster (December 1118) joined the Empire.

Even though the prestige of the Emperor was impressive, and general rebelliousness dropped radically, the Empire was still racked by periodic small wars, and stability continued to deteriorate. Still, the "hidden regency" only started one war of aggression. Most secessions were either bought back or, in case of war, dealt with through diplomatic channels rather than armies and sieges. This was indeed the case of one of the most dangerous, led by the Duke of Genoa himself. The Imperial Court was able to bring that war to an end, and the young Duke to the fold, without bloodshed.

It is at the time of this secession that the first rumors concerning Emperor Nicholas’ true state began; indeed it is adduced that the rumors caused the uprising. Some sources consign speculation that the Emperor was already dead, and the Court led by the new Empress. Some contended that the Empress herself was another pawn of the De Lusignans.

The myth pervived for years that Nicholas had been abducted in 1118 by an impatient successor, and the Court led by the De Lusignan brothers staged a gigantic hoax to prevent the succession. They would have faked the wedding to ensure the support of the Morrells, only to find that they had put a viper in their midst and be eventually turfed out of power by the puppet-Empress. Indeed the De Lusignans and their longtime partners were eliminated from the Court starting in 1118. Their long-serving Marshall died insane. Eventually, infighting between the two sides would have led to the abandonment of the hoax. Another version has it that the abducers were the Morrells themselves, and the price for the Emperor's life was that Busilla be enthroned as Empress. In this version, the end of the hoax would have been caused by the actual death of Nicholas.

It is impossible to be sure if any of these hypotheses are true, since from years earlier Nicholas was practically a secluded prisoner in his own chambers, protected by layers of linen shrouds, privy counselors and secretaries: there are no outside witnesses of his life. He could have died earlier, or later, and very few people would have been in the know. Indeed there is no documented evidence of anybody ever seeing the corpse.

The story of the abducted Emperor is still cherished in Germany. There is even a notorious dungeon in Bavaria that is, to this day, shown to tourists as the place where “the man in the iron mask” was kept. If true, such an iron mask would have been a fitting means of keeping the illness, and thus the identity, of the prisoner away from any prying eyes.

This “man in the iron mask” legend, as collected in children’s tales and novels in later centuries, includes a rescue by one of the Kendall younger family members. The ailing deposed monarch would have been taken to a secret mountain retreat to die with dignity, cared over by an ex mistress, and dispensing wisdom to a future vengeful emperor. The site of his retreat is claimed by several villages all over Europe. But again, there is no evidence that any of this ever happened.

The only established facts are that in November 23th, 1122, the death of Emperor Nicholas was publicly announced, but the Imperial bier was found to be empty. The lack of a body, the mystery, and the startling changes in policy, caught the fancy of the scholars, and thus it was popularly decreed, if never proven, that the true death had happened four years earlier.

Several novels and films have taken these stories as a source of inspiration. The most recent, 1987 film by Oliver Stone is completely a-historical. The only proven part is that there was indeed a leper bishop in the Court in 1122.

 

[Johan11]

XXI - ”Go on, nobody wants to be cooped up here forever”
Quasimodo, The hunchback of Notre Dame


November 1126

Not much is known about the past of Emperor Juan I. de El Even. It is known that he was born somewhere near the town of Burgos in the year 1058. It is also known that he had been Duke of Bohemia for more than 40 years upon his ascension to the throne. He was, at that time, 64 years old. An old, crippled man, with a brilliant mind, a man who may not have inspired great awe by his looks, but nevertheless inspired many people, and a man who, at last, brought peace to the empire.

It is said that he, upon receiving the crown of the, by now, many kingdoms that the empire consisted of, uttered the words: “I now must do a difficult deed. A deed that will have me remembered, but not sung of. It is time for peace.”

This quote, real or not, gives us a picture of the mind of the man who would be known as Juan ‘el Tranquilo’, or Juan the Peaceful. It goes to show, that by the time of his crowning, there were only two counties which were rebelling, though many was harboring rebellious tendencies. The two counties were both in the low countries, one of them being the county of Brabant, seceded from the direct control of the empire, and the county of Ostfriesland, which had rebelled against the Duchy of Gelre.

Though many enjoyed widespread autonomy from the crown due to the massive span the empire was in, and therefore hoped for more independence and less control , the Emperors diplomatic skill was well known, and even the most rebellious of the duchies could nothing but like the new emperors policy, telling everyone that the time of war was over, as he said it in his inauguration speech. The words reached many, and many hoped that he spoke the truth, though vile tongues said that it was only the policy because Juan didn’t want anyone else to get honor from battle, something he was unable to with his handicap.

Whatever his reasons, and even though he was right in saying that he was never sung of, he is still looked upon today as one of the great rulers of the empire. A new era was dawning.​

 

[Johan11]

Chapter XXII: ”Oh, James will be turning in his grave with envy!”
Emperor Juan I (Allegedly)



November 1122 – August 1123​

It was a peaceful time, though one wayward count was proving difficult. The count of Ostfriesland and Münster had successfully rebelled against his lord, the Duke of Gelre, and had peaced out with him for the cost of Frisia a few days before Münster fell to the emperor’s personal guard. A few months later the wayward count was forced to surrender, reentering the empire. The province of Frisia was returned to the Duke of Gelre, though Juan found it safer to place the count under his direct jurisdiction.

In January, the aging emperor remarried after having been without a wife for several years. The choice fell upon a young woman named Edith, who was the daughter of Duke Laurence of Franconia, the oldest son of the late James I. The choice was criticized by a number of dukes, claiming that the power of the emperor was centralized around a few families. Juan never answered to these allegations.

In the meantime, the emperor’s policies were paying off. The choice of returning the county of Frisia to the duke of Gelre instead of keeping it had also had an impact. In any case, even the man most infamous for being disloyal, the duke of Flanders, was talking warmly about the gift of loyalty to a man of honor, “for a man of honor will not throw the empire into disarray.”

The emperor was, by all accounts happy about this, as he had never found better joy in peace. This was, by more warmongering critics, especially some of the clergy, voiced to be because he, as a hunchback, feared war above everything else.

Also contributing to the happiness of the emperor was the fact that the law of feudal contract was of great pleasure to his immediate vassals, enjoying the autonomy they got as a result. None voiced this more than Bouchard d’Anjou, who is known to have voiced his happiness about this at least 8 times during the first 6 months of Juan’s reign.

(On another note: Seriously. I got this event all the time, and it was always THIS dude who made me get it. What’s up with that?)

The clergy of the empire, especially those on the eastern outskirts, strongly opposed to Juan peaceful stance, as the past warmongering had caused major setbacks to the heathens of Europe, pushed almost out to the end of the known world. The bigger the shock was it, when news reached them that the pope had offered Juan an emperor’s crown, the first one to be given since the days of Charlemagne. Juan was especially surprised about this, but at a private audience with the pope in July, he accepted the great honor it was. The ceremony was held a week later in the cathedral of Cologne, the current capital of the empire.

During all this, a single count still held on to his independence. MaelSechlainn, the count of Brabant, had been independent and at war with the emperor since his crowning, but hadn’t made any move with his armies, just as Juan had completely ignored him.

There is evidence that suggests that emperor Juan only decided to act because the repeated comments about the wayward count was hurting his pride. Nevertheless, Juan wasn’t clever enough martially, so his own regiments was out of the question. Another argument against them was the fact that only the regiment of Cologne was actually within 200 kilometers of Brabant. Another option was needed, and Juan was about to show just how good a diplomat he was.