TWENTY-EIGHT.
(Ain’t It Funny How the) Type Moves
14 March 1548 – 7 June 1552
‘You did it, Tomík,’ Milomíra told her husband.
‘Did what?’ asked the twenty-one-year-old king.
‘You remember how I’ve been getting really queasy lately? Well…’
Milomíra guided Tomáš’s hand below her belly. There was a small, but noticeable, bulge. She grinned at him. ‘You’re going to be a real
otec now,’ she told him. ‘Treat both of us well, okay,
tatí?’
Tomáš had been good to his word and kept to a single glass of wine on all days when it was permitted, and it had the desired result. He hadn’t gotten drunk and publicly embarrassed Milomíra again. And now that he’d gotten some of his own clerks into positions of responsibility in the Church, he’d even gone to pray on the occasional Sunday Liturgy! Seeing this progress toward responsibility, Milomíra had become her old trusting self with him again.
Tomáš could tell she was being particularly affectionate when she behaved like a needy, spoiled little girl and pouted like that–even though she was slightly the older of the two of them. He slid a warm and grateful hand around her waist. ‘I will. I will.’
As they clasped amiably, the implications struck Tomáš:
a child! Perhaps a boy–an heir!
‘Mother will be pleased,’ Tomáš told Mila.
‘She ought to be,’ Milomíra said, confident in her newly-expectant motherhood.
~~~
Queen Mother Lesana was
not pleased.
‘Do me the favour of reminding me, I beg you,’ she said ominously, ‘to
which position were you recommended?’
The saturnine young Italian, Mahtar Ventimiglia, looked bewildered at this cold reaction from the Queen Mother, whom he thought had been well disposed to him. ‘
Mia signora… I am an engineer. A military engineer–a brilliant one, though I say it myself. So, naturally…’
‘We
already have a military engineer.’
‘
Perdonatemi, signora, but I had heard… not for long… ?’
‘And
from whom did you hear this?’
The hapless Italian engineer could not but speak the truth in this situation. ‘From your steward. Štefánik.’
Lesana’s lip curled as she dismissed the crestfallen engineer, whose hopes of attaining the office so promised had been so jarringly and thoroughly dashed. It was Štefánik.
Again.
True, Queen Mother Lesana had rather resented walking in on Štefánik and his little blonde harlot while they had been swiving on her bed–a bed she’d swived on herself only too rarely. But her dislike of Štefánik had been cemented long before then. The choice of Matej Štefánik for the Regency over her had been a calculated slight. Lesana Rychnovská
rozená Sokolová, the daughter of a most ancient and worthy Velehrad house from the very seat of Moravia the Great in ages past, had been overlooked for a
nobody–a Nitran armiger of little account, of picayune holdings and of obscure pedigree! (At a subconscious level also, perhaps, Lesana had transferred her hatred of Zelezný, her husband’s male lover, to Štefánik on account of the career-military background the two of them shared.)
But the bad blood between Lesana and Matej Štefánik had gradually escalated from occasional friction over things like Tomáš’s upbringing, to a full-blown power struggle between the two. The Queen Mother had been the one to argue for clemency upon Blahoslav Bosniak, not because she had any particular personal liking for him, but because he’d been willing to call Štefánik to task and make him look like a fool in front of the court. And now she was having to defend Bosniak’s appointment from backdoor challenges like this. If it had been Tomáš sitting here today instead of her, Bosniak might well be out, and she would be on the back foot.
Queen Mother Lesana
would find a way to get back at Štefánik for this. It was only a matter of time, of patience, of planning.
~~~
Despite the nastiness of some of the backroom court politics in Olomouc, and the factionalism between the Queen Mother and the former Regent that engendered it, all in all the Moravian state had never been in better shape, or enjoyed a better reputation.
Moravia had been involved in two wars in Bayern in recent memory, and the perennial political and religious tensions with East Francia and with Austria always posed a concern. But Germans themselves, particularly merchants, were made welcome in practically every Moravian city, usually even being given special accommodations to stay in particular quarters of the city: a practice dating back
to the first King Bohodar mladší. This had occasionally posed a problem for internal security, but for the most part it was an arrangement that was beneficial for all parties, and Bohodar 1.’s descendant Tomáš 2. was more than happy to uphold and expound the benefits of this tradition.
Also, Tomáš’s decisions to place the recently-annexed Sorbian lands under local Sorbian rule, and to place a Sámi as Lord Protector over Kola (a territory which now included all but the mouth of the Lule River, from whence Moravia directly operated a small shipping port), though the latter decision had cost the Moravian state a rather significant source of tax revenues, accrued benefits to the state of a different sort. Moravia was broadly seen among reformers and humanists on the continent as a haven of tolerance and a staunch supporter of their ideas. There was more wishful thinking to this than reality: Moravia was still very much so a conservative and devout power, despite having had a string of somewhat unconventional kings, including Tomáš’s father and grandfather.
Even so, Moravia’s reputation for benevolence did spread through Europe. So too did Moravia’s reputation for honesty and fair play: a result of their having backed White Rus’ to the hilt in its regaining of its former towns, without any regard to the costs to itself. The fact that Tomáš was also willing to hold his own officials’ feet to the fire over treatment of Sámi also helped in this particular regard. And the diplomatic corps found to their amazement that their jobs were considerably eased by the reputation that preceded them.
And then, one rather grey and snowbound day in early February of 1550—
‘
Môj Kráľ!’
Tomáš, who had been diligently massaging Milomíra’s swelling ankles up to that point, turned abruptly to the source of the outburst.
‘What?’
Hubert Kozár’s face—normally so grave and dignified, as befit his office—was now alight with exhilaration. So jarring was the difference from his usual
mien that he seemed almost
giddy.
‘
Môj Kráľ—you
must come see this! You too,
moja Kráľovná!’
‘I don’t think he’s taking no for an answer,’ Milomíra offered her husband a knowing smile. ‘Thank you dearly for that massage… but I think we’d better do as he bids.’
Tomáš took her hand and helped her to her feet, and they descended into the main audience hall, where it seemed that most of the inner
Zhromaždenie had already gathered. Kozár wasn’t the only one who was aflutter with whatever had transpired here! Many of the court ladies were tittering behind their fans; and the men were no less craning over each other’s shoulders to get a better look at… whatever it was. Kozár briskly parted the crowd for the royal couple, who were escorted to where a wood frame had been erected in the centre of the hall.
‘It’s a… printing press,’ said the
Kráľ matter-of-factly. It was easy to recognise the screw-press, the plate and the bench; from what he could tell at a glance, it was no different than any other press he’d seen.
‘With respect, your Majesty, you are correct,’ said the typesetter who had erected the thing. ‘And yet you are not. This is not just
any printing press. Look closer.’
Actually, as the king did look closer, he could already begin to see the differences. The type trays were quite a bit neater than those he’d seen elsewhere. And he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a
portable press of any sort!
‘And look at the
pages this fine girl can print!’
The
Kráľ took the leaf which the typesetter offered him, and his ash-blond brows rose in delighted astonishment. The lettering was in the Latin alphabet rather than the Cyrillic, but each of the letters was cut so cleanly and crisply that there was no mistaking what each and every single glyph was. Despite the alien Western script, it was in fact the single most readable page of print that Tomáš had seen in his twenty-one years. Clearly the punches and matrices that had been crafted for setting this page had been cut by a master! He shared the page with his pregnant wife, who traced a hand over the printed paper admiringly.
‘This is… exquisite,’ the
Kráľ marvelled.
‘The trays and the punches were cut by a master from Strasbourg in West Francia, Sylvain Bourguignon. You see, this style of type is simple, elegant, legible, but… square. Easy to set. These punches and type trays are already selling like hotcakes across Western Europe!’
The clergymen and bishops in the hall were already crossing themselves and lifting their eyes heavenward, asking the Merciful Judge’s forgiveness for this clear and manifest devilry. But Tomáš 2. was eyeing both the page and a couple of the curious cast-metal prisms that had produced such fine work.
‘Could such punches be made to show the Moravian alphabet given us by Saints Cyril and Methodius?’
‘I don’t see why not,’ the typesetter said cheerily. ‘It would take a master metalsmith a few years to hammer out, if you’ll pardon the feeble pun. But there’s no reason why Cyrillic couldn’t be made as readable and as distributable as the Bourguignon Latin typeface!’
‘Then I shall order it done,’ Tomáš said at once. ‘Kozár! Send out the proclamation. Štefánik! I want a five-hundred-
denár cash commission, payable in fine gold, to the metalsmith who can deliver me a complete, workable, readable Cyrillic typeset, with all punches and matrices upon inspection, that can be operated on such a press!’
It was indeed far more than a couple of years before that commission was able to be paid.
But on the ides of June of 1550, Queen Milomíra did give birth to a fine, healthy baby boy. The lad clearly had his mother’s sandy-brown colouring and hazel eyes, but possessed most of his father’s other features.
‘By tradition, we ought to name him Bohodar,’ said Tomáš. But Milomíra shook her head.
‘No, there have already been too many Bohodars,’ she opined. ‘How about Otakar instead?’
To this Tomáš agreed. He’d rather have a name for his child that his wife liked, rather than one that was foisted on them both by tradition.
The royal family was happy and flourishing. Otakar was the apple of his parents’ eyes, blessed with all of the natural graces that God could see fit to bestow upon a child: good looks; firm, hale flesh; a keen mind with a remarkable talent for both speech and organisation. (He far preferred to play with charcoal pencils and paper than with toy soldiers or wooden swords, though.) All was well, it seemed.
But the clergy did not agree.
‘Lord
Kráľ,’ Bishop Arsenie boomed loudly across the hall, puffing out his chest. ‘The spiritual shepherds of the Church have besought the Crown for years to come to the assistance of our suffering brothers and sisters in Pest! Yet nothing has been done; not one soldier moved into place, and not so much as one letter written! Do not expect that God has forgotten, He Who sees and marks each and every deed of each and every person! Do not expect that your
inaction shall go unanswered at the Dread Judgement!’
There was little, however, that Tomáš could do to placate the Church in this matter. An aggressive war with Austria at the present moment was unthinkable.
On the other hand, a certain monarch of a certain country to the north was quick to point to Moravia’s infamy, and its failure to uphold its own promises to the faithful.
And she did so in such a manner that a response had to be made.