CHAPTER 6
1531-1553
MOSKVA AND FREE ELECTION
Cześć! Recently I've realized that with the incoming “Art of War” release this campaign may find itself in peril of losing Ironman status. And to be honest, I've started it 2-3 months ago and we didn't even get 100 years into the campaign (we ended in year 1531 last time). Therefore I decided to to change something in order to ensure that I'll be able to get the achievement – from now on updates will cover at least c. 20 years each. No more short chapters and (hopefully) no more bloody peasants. So let's not waste time and jump straight to the action.
We start with unlocking Ecumenism from Humanist Ideas in May 1532, which not only gives me much needed +3 tolerance to heretics but also unlocks (glorious) Polish Ideas – in this case its the Compute Army with cheaper regiments. We've already talked about
Wojsko Komputowe but since it was a long time ago allow me to repeat myself:
Wojsko komputowe (The Compute Army)
In Old Polish „komput” was an army budget voted by the Sejm (from Latin computatio – account, calculation). The Compute Army was a new type of unit created in 1652 by merging The Quarter Army with The Supplemental Forces. It numbered c. 12,000 troops for the Crown (Polish part of the PLC) and 6,000 for the Duchy (Lithuanian part of the PLC), increasing during war to 20,000-40,000 men for the Crown and 8,000-20,000 for the Duchy respectively.
For the first time PLC had a decent army. If not for the devastating Deluge (1655-1660), perhaps the Commonwealth would continue slow reforms of its army and would enter 18th century with enough soldiers to protect itself. Alas, when during the Silent Sejm of 1717 Tsardom of Russia enforced on the Parliament permanent reduction of the Compute Army by more or less 50% it was already to late.
Alright than, we're ready to rock!
*clink*
AUTOSAVING...
*clink*
AUTOSAVING...
*clink*
AUTOSAVING...
*clink*
AUTOSAVING...
*clink*
AUTOSAVING...
*clink*
AUTOSAVING...
*clink*
Sigh.
Finally,
five years after the bloody Peasants' War, I regain enough strength to do something. And by something I mean the obvious:
I would have got you earlier Muscowy if not for these pesky peasants! Even despite spending lots of time staring at map I carefully chose the moment of attack: in August 1537 Kazan DOWed Muscowy, so few weeks later in September I joined the party. I wanted to post some screenshots from battles but they are pretty repetitive so I abandoned the idea. Anyways, we're at war and we're winning! After years spent by sitting in the Royal Palace in Warsaw first waiting for rebels to disperse and later for the manpower to recover it was clearly too much excitement for old king Kazimierz.
He dies in June 1539. Oh well. All hail king Stanisław... Lancaster? Huh. I question the priorities of English AI – was keeping one diplomat in Warsaw for years really worth it? Anyways, I'm now stuck with a worthless ruler. Great. And to make things worse, the nasty PLC event fires:
Ah yes,
pacta conventa and
artykuły henrykowskie. Both very important for the understanding of Commonwealth's political system and both require some in-depth analysis. I'll do my best to explain both this issues to you:
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PACTA CONVENTA & ARTYKUŁY HENRYKOWSKIE[/size]
To say something about pacta conventa and Henrician articles we have to start from the beginning, that is from the election.
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Wolna elekcja (Free Election)[/size]
Wolna elekcja in general was a legal institution according to which nobility could elect king of the Commonwealth (to put things simple). We won't delve into details surrounding the origins of the Free Election and instead we shall focus on the procedure itself. Here's how it went (more or less):
1. Death of the king
Kinda obvious, isn't it?
2. Interregnum
Or what we know from EU4 as Regency Council. In case of the Commonwealth it wasn't a council but rather interrex who had the supreme authority until the new king was elected. This honor was bestowed upon (Roman Catholic) Primate of Poland, which was the title of Archbishop of Gniezno – first Polish archbishopric created in year 1000 by Holy Roman Emperor Otto III when he was visiting the city during the Congress of Gniezno.
2a. Konfederacje kapturowe (Hooded Confederations)
Since the supreme authority of the king was, uhm, unavailable due to his death, the power of royal officials nominated by His Majesty was greatly eroded – as you can easily imagine, it was much easier to argue with starosta when the monarch who nominated him left this world and he couldn't be sure of his own position. That's why for the time being the Hooded Confederations were to assume power in local government, substituting government officials – kinda like when in various revolutions (French Revolution, Bolshevik Revolution) ad hoc committees were created to run the state. Although in this case local Hooded Sejmiki were electing both the Hooded Confederation and the Hooded Court (since normal royal courts ceased to function during interregnum). We'll talk more about confederations later, what's important is that they were generally ad hoc created associations of nobles through which they can act in a various ways. Oh, and why Hooded Confederations? Because the nobles who were members of such confederations were wearing hoods, of course.
2b. Local sejmiki elect representants to the Convocation Sejm
Again, pretty self-explanatory.
3. Sejm konwokacyjny (Convocation Sejm)
This Sejm (not the institution as a whole but this particular “session” of the Sejm) was called by the interrex - Primate of Poland – to determine date of the election, prepare
pacta conventa and screen the candidates. It usually took less than a month, which obviously meant that not every noble from every corner of the PLC could arrive there.
4. Sejm elekcyjny (Election Sejm)
The Sejm during which the king was elected by nobility. Since every member of the szlachta could attend to it – sejmiki didn't elect deputies to the Sejm as normally - the number of participants varied greatly from several thousands to even 100,000 nobles. Royal candidates couldn't participate in the Sejm elekcyjny but could send their representatives. Since every noble worth his name used to arrive at the Sejm with his sword and the tensions were high, often discussions ended in a bloodshed but rather limited – few dozens of dead at most, which concerning that numbers of present nobles (tens of thousands sometimes) wasn't that much. It usually took 1,5 month for the szlachta to elect their king.
4a. New king elected by Sejm elekcyjny
Yay!
5. Sejm koronacyjny (Coronation Sejm)
This Sejm was held in Kraków (capital of Kingdom of Poland) and usually took few weeks. During the coronation (which took place in Wawel Cathedral) interrex – Primate of Poland – relinquished his powers to the king. But what's most important for us today, it was during this Sejm that the king had to swear an oath that he will obey the rules of both
pacta conventa and
Henrician articles.
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Artykuły henrykowskie (Henrician Articles aka King Henry's Articles)[/size]
Sometimes called “the first constitution of the Commonwealth”, the Henrician Articles were a set of provisions created by the nobles in 1573, four years after the creation of the PLC in Union of Lublin and one year after the death of king Sigismund II Augustus and the extinction of the House Jagiellon. Why “King's Henry” articles? Well, the first king elected to Commonwealth's throne was Henri III Valois but he didn't reign for long – he was elected on 16th May 1573, arrived in Commonwealth in January 1574 and had his coronation on 21st February 1574. But when the news of his brother's death reached Kraków he decided to leave Commonwealth and go back to France – he was the first in line to the French throne after the king (his brother) died. His infamous escape (he literally escaped from Kraków with few servants and dressed as a peasant) is a very interesting topic but let's focus on the Articles themselves.
King Henri III Valois was forced to sign the articles in order to be allowed to ascend to the throne. That's right, he was
forced to sign them – this was the condition of his election and a formal requirement of his coronation. Why? First of all, with Jagiellons extinction the nobles had complete power in the Commonwealth, at least for a time being. This was the perfect occasion to push for such document, a sort of an ultimate privilege. Second of all, he was a foreigner and his weird (for PLC nobles) customs and basically zero knowledge of a country he was supposed to rule were worrying to many. By forcing him to sign the Articles at least some basic guarantees were expected to be respected. And third of all, in 1572 – year before the election – several dozens of thousands of Protestants were killed in France and many among them were nobles. Indeed St. Bartholomew's Day massacre caused a great uproar in the traditionally tolerant Commonwealth and many nobles wanted to make sure that no king would ever be able to commit such a horrendous deed or become powerful enough to enforce his will in religious matters.
What's very important is that Henrician Articles were
general, permanent and immutable – every elected king had to swore an oath on the same Articles or he wasn't allowed to become a king. In total there were 18 Articles; since there isn't a good source in English and they are quite long I decided to just copy here the summary which you can find on wikipedia:
- Kings of the Commonwealth were all to be chosen by election by the szlachta, and his children had no right of inheritance with regards to the throne;
- The King marriages had to gain the approval of the Senate;
- The King must convene a General Sejm at least once every two years for six weeks;
- The King had no right to create new taxes, tariffs or such without approval of the Sejm;
- Between Sejms, 16 resident senators were to be at the king's side as his advisers and overseers.This Royal Council of 16 senators was elected every two years during the Sejm session. Four of their number (rotating every six months) were obliged to accompany the king and serve as advisers and supervisors to ensure that the king made no decision contrary to the laws of the Commonwealth. All royal decrees had to be counter-stamped by the chancellors or the deputy chancellors;
- The king had no right to call a pospolite ruszenie without approval of the Sejm. Further, the Articles upheld the informal tradition that the king could not send those troops to serve outside the Commonwealth's borders without compensation;
- The King had to provide for the standing, royal army (wojsko kwarciane);
- The King had no right to declare war or peace without approval of the Sejm;
- The King must abide by the Warsaw Confederation's guarantees of religious freedom (more on that in the next chapters);
- Finally, if the monarch were to transgress against the law or the privileges of szlachta, the Articles authorized the szlachta to refuse the king's orders and act against him (in Polish practice it became known as the rokosz). Each king had to swear that "if anything has been done by Us against laws, liberties, privileges or customs, we declare all the inhabitants of the Kingdom are freed from obedience to Us".
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Pacta conventa (Latin: Articles of Agreement)[/size]
Pacta conventa was the second part of the “deal” made between the king and the nobility. Unlike Henrician Articles - which were general, permanent and immutable – pacta conventa were
specific, temporary and changeable. That is, every king had to sing a separate and unique “contract” with the nobility which was prepared during the Sejm konwokacyjny. For instance, king Władysław IV Vasa promised to create a decent Baltic Fleet for the Commonwealth and rebuild the castle in Kamieniec, while king Stefan Batory (Báthory István) promised to liberate lands conquered by Muscowy and so on.
Basically when the Henrician Articles were quasi-constitution, the pacta conventa were a management contract – which only shows how powerful the szlachta was, since the king was basically reduced to a glorified lifetime manager of the Commonwealth. Of course the reality was much more complicated but hey, don't expect much from a Crash Course on a game forum!
But there are also good news:
It seems that – for some reason – the Sejm supports policies enacted by
Lanister Lancaster king. Of course both the
veto and its description in the flavor text of this event aren't really well representing what happened in real life. We'll take a closer look at this later, since the first time
liberum veto was used was in 1669 and we're still in early 16th century.
In November 1539 I unlock another Humanist idea which seems to be created with PLC in mind. Lower accepted culture threshold allows me to accept Byelarussian as well, thus expanding Tolerance(tm) to another culture. But even now in Polish-Prussian-Ruthenian-Russian-Byelarussian Commonwealth there's no place for Lithuanians... The thing is I could get Lithuanian accepted but only if I wait to unlock the PLC decision without conquering Prussia, which IMHO is a bad design – why on earth am I forced to do nothing for decades only to get Lithuanian as accepted culture in Polish-
Lithuanian Commonwealth? It's not like at any time of PLC's history Russians were “more” tolerated than Lithuanians, you know.
Speaking of which:
In October 1541 the war with Muscowy ends in my complete victory. Not only I gained Moskva itself, but apart from two other provinces I forced the Muscovites to release Perm, thus separating a huge chunk of their territory from the capital. And since what lies beyond Perm is in Asia, this means that Muscowy just got nerfed by Distant Overseas penalty which now applies to all these provinces. To make things worse for them, the moment our war ended Uzbek DOWed them. Some of you may say “You're an idiot CzokletMuss, you could've easily release Perm earlier and prevent Muscowy from colonizing Siberia” in the first place, lol l2p n00b.” To this I can only firmly reply with... uhm... hey look, new Polish idea unlocked!
It's year 1544, I just got massive +5% discipline bonus from The Foreign Section, Muscowy is ruined and not even worthy of being my rival and I got core in Moskva. Life can be pretty good, you know? Damned peasants, we could have got here much sooner...
Anyways, in March 1545 I annex Silesia. Which generally isn't a good idea since it's member of HRE and annexing it is going to piss off the emperor but me and Austria are good buddies – at least for now – so I'm not really concerned. Also an event introduced by “Res Publica” for Elective Monarchy fires: since both glorious Commonwealth and England share the same dynasty, I was blessed with... a claim on London. Huh. That's... unimpressive, to say at least.
But it doesn't matter.
While I was busy beating Muscovites into submission, Swedes managed to gain independence from their Danish overlords. Obviously I couldn't let such splendid occasion to be wasted and therefore in August 1546 – after dozens of months spent on improving relations in every way possible – I asked Sweden to become my vassal. And they did which is great for several reasons. First of all, I have one of the tier 1 countries with awesome National Idea set on my side, which combined with Offensive makes them a wonderful march. Second of all, Sweden has cores everywhere in Scandinavia, which allows me to destroy Denmark without spending any ADM and without gaining AE. And finally it means that I made a puppet one of the historical enemies of Commonwealth: Deluge worst day of life, 1655-1670 never forgib, 1/10 won't play again. Seriously, did you know that PLC lost c. 33% of its population during this period? But more about it later.
In November 1537 finally the last two ideas in both Humanist and Aristocratic group are unlocked, both of them giving sweet bonuses: +3 tolerance of heathens is going to help me immensely during wars with Ottomans and -10% military tech cost combined with university and Western Arms Trade means that my MIL tech costs 95% of what Western group pays for it. Awesome! But there's more:
By getting these ideas I unlocked also final Polish Idea AND Polish Ambition, which gives me sweet +3 tolerance of heretics. Which leads to a funny paradox: since my heretic tolerance is so high but my legitimacy is (as usually) pitiful, for the time being I'm more tolerant towards Orthodox, Catholic, Coptic and Reformed than Protestants (I have -1 true faith tolerance due to 17 legitimacy).
Unlike all previous Polish Ideas, in case of the last one (unlocked two years later) there's nothing to be said about it really. Honestly I have no idea what's the connection between PLC history and “Focus on Field Defense” - I guess Paradox just ran out of ideas. Which is weird since there tons of things which could serve as an inspiration for interesting NI for Commonwealth. In any case, I finished three Idea Groups so before I unlock a new one I have excess MPs to spend on something. Oh, I also managed to FINALLY repay the last loan from Peasants' War. In year 1550. Thanks, dirty peasants. Anyways, Commonwealth is in a very good condition and I would like to DOW someone - alas, I still have truce with Muscowy until 1556.
I don't feel like waiting that long.
Solution is easy – Muscowy hates me and is allied to Wallachia, so all it takes is to DOW Wallachia to get Muscowy to join the defensive war and became a war leader, thus avoiding silly truce. Which I promptly did in August 1551. But as you can see my calculations failed me – it seems Muscowy is so weak that Neapol was chosen as a war leader. Nothing to worry, right? Well, not exactly since they also have allies...
...and among them France. With king Charles VIII de Valois, who's still excommunicated and who's still pissed at me for this. Oops. Ferrara and Hungary also join the party and suddenly ordinary Muscowy-bashing transforms into a continental war. Luckily France is already in war with HRE, so by the time BBB gets close to my borders I should be able to get what I want from Muscovites.
Of course
szlachta couldn't waste such splendid occasion.
Goddamit, guys. I can either get “Golden Liberty” modifier until the death of my king (+20% stability cost, -20% advisor cost, lose 10 prestige, gain 10 legitimacy) or try to challenge the nobility and get lots of MPs at the cost of legitimacy. I don't have any legitimacy since before Peasants' War and eventually I want PLC to become a proper absolute monarchy, so I decide to ignore “advice” from
szlachta. We're at war, I have no time for such silliness! By the way, Golden Liberty (
Złota Wolność) is another important institution from PLC about which we shall talk later due to me being still in early 16th century which is rather inappropriate period to talk about it.
Two years and thousands of dead Muscovites later I can finally claim what I started this war for – that is, every piece of clay I can get from Muscowy.
Muscovites are forced to surrender in June 1553 and France – with low war enthusiasm after failed conquest of some HRE province – gladly accepts white peace in September.
As a bonus Perm at last agreed to become my vassal – because we share a border now the distance penalty is gone and they are more than happy to
become my puppet enjoy my “protection” from steppe hordes. The only thing I regret are the terrible, terrible borders of my blob...
All in all, a glorious victory for the Commonwealth.
Muscowy is ashes but it still doesn't have my permission to die. Why? Well, one of you suggested to make a vassal out of the Grand Principality (not so grand now, eh?) and that's exactly what I'm going to do. Next time we will deliver a final blow to the enemy and we will finally free Russians from Muscovite oppression and tyranny.
