Crusader Kings II AAR - The Crimson Dragon of Britain - Hiatus

[Latin Knight]

wow just wow. That was epic!! Must have taken a long time to work that up! Your originality and attention to detail as well as ambiance is second to none. Keep up the good work. How much has the world map changed since you last showed it? What a great battle that must have been right at the end of the king's rule.

Thanks for the praise, friend, i appreciate it very much! To be fair, about the last war, i'm still trying to figure out why i took so long to take upon Swaefraed of Lancaster - he alone was the Duke of Lancaster, York, Northumberland, Cumberland, Hereford and Gloucester, i wasn't joking when i said he ruled a third of the island of Britain. It was surprisingly an easy war, my pockets were full at the time, just needed to hire some mercenaries and quickly finished him, but that would be too anticlimatic, so i put a lot more drama .

About the map, on the next character i'll show some pics, because there are historically-based events that are scripted in CK2. Can you guess what it is? 13th century, the reason that made players in Medieval 2 TW hate playing as the Turks or Egypt?

[ccllnply]

Thanks for the praise, friend, i appreciate it very much! To be fair, about the last war, i'm still trying to figure out why i took so long to take upon Swaefraed of Lancaster - he alone was the Duke of Lancaster, York, Northumberland, Cumberland, Hereford and Gloucester, i wasn't joking when i said he ruled a third of the island of Britain. It was surprisingly an easy war, my pockets were full at the time, just needed to hire some mercenaries and quickly finished him, but that would be too anticlimatic, so i put a lot more drama .

About the map, on the next character i'll show some pics, because there are historically-based events that are scripted in CK2. Can you guess what it is? 13th century, the reason that made players in Medieval 2 TW hate playing as the Turks or Egypt?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Mongols!

[Latin Knight]

I didn't intend to write a new update until next weeked, but started this before dinner and absolutely got carried away, only stopping when i finished it. So, there you have it . This is another update which follows a narrative i myself created, with barely any advance in the actual campaign game, but in this AAR i'm really striving to paint a convincing portrait of the Medieval Era - with a Harry Turtledove-style alternate history featuring Anglo-Saxon England, of course.

You might have realized i love to touch in subjects such as religion, societal structures and even folklore. In fact, for historical fiction, i use to say that, the less convinced the reader is that he's reading something actually written by a modern author, the more convincing the story itself will be .

Now, let's get going.

Sælræd Godwinson Mathrafal

Chapter 12: The Two Crusades

King Sælræd I - 1194 A.D.

The King’s death during the campaign plummeted the morale of his troops, and not a few thought it was an ill-omen. Nevertheless, the campaign was well advanced, and, even if the notice of their enemy’s death could have raised their hopes of victory, the truth was that the Nordanhymbrian family was finished, and the northern warriors exhausted from war.

Ceaster had been captured, its garrison starved almost to death. Loncestre was the last great stronghold to be captured, and its walls were sapped, and the garrison butchered to the last man. Then, Sælræd the Conqueror ordered the walls razed as punishment, and left his men free to plunder the region.

The first snows of winter were already falling when Swæfræd finally surrended before the new liege in the palace of Eoferwic. The troubadours of the era likened this episode to the famous one in which Vercingetorix, King of the Gauls, laid down his arms, defeated, at the feet of Iulius Caesar.

Sælræd I returned to Eoferwic, the metropolis of the north, built by the Romans, and paraded as a triumphator. In Christmas 1194 A.D., he was crowned King of the Anglecynn in Eoferwicmynster by the Archbishop of the north himself.

Swæfræd would soon be forgotten in some dungeon, and never would see the sun again, but he was old, and his sons were young and carried the grudge of defeat. The independence ushered since the Norwegians left effectively ended, and they hated it. However, King Sælræd I would not follow his predecessors’ policy of solemnly ignoring the north.

Sælræd, unmarried, decided a matrimony would be the ideal arrangement to bind the Nordanhymbrian family – or, indeed, all of the north – to the Crown. The Witanagemot, which now functioned as a mere advisory council, since the aristocracy’s influence had been curbed by King Godwin I, showed itself reluctant, arguing that the power of this ancient Anglisc dynasty had all but vanished after his glorious father’s last war. Indeed, it would be better if Sælræd instead procured a princess among a foreign power, perhaps a relative of the King of the Franks or of the Römisches Kaiser. But the resolute King dismissed their council and betrothed himself to Swæfræd’s child granddaughter, sired by his eldest son, Eanhere. This princess, named Godgifu, was brought to the royal court – temporarily reallocated to Leidecestre, and would marry as soon as she came of age.

He spent the first years of his reign tidying up the mess in the north. Great care was taken in fragmenting the domain of the Nordanhymbrians, it was better to have various weaker vassals than a few strong ones, and he redistributed fiefs and titles, and created new vassals from his father's loyal men.

Sælræd’s reign, since its beginning, saw a massive castle-building project, like a previous effort undertaken by King Harold III. Godwin’s son was enthusiastic with the architectural and engineering innovations of the continent, and brought many Frankish and German stonemasons and architects to erect stone castles, which were to last for centuries, like those built by the Romans. Those new stone and brick forts were usually polygonal in shape, featuring various towers and bastions, with novel circular keeps and donjons.

Timber and earthwork fortifications were still ubiquitous in the British isles, many of them simply refortified or re-strengthened versions of the ancestral oppida erected by the elder peoples. Now, those so-called Frankish castles would dot the landscape, from the southern shores of Britain to the border marches, and also in Cymru and in the gubernatorial seats in Éire such as Duhblinn or Corcaigh. Yet, those wouldn’t be the only monuments to posterity Sælræd would leave.

Just like his grandfather Llywelyn did in Cymru, he inaugurated a religious building program, and from his reign the chroniclers point a series of cathedral buildings and reforms in Britain, especially in the north. Both the common folk and high-born of the north, which for generations had knelt and prayed in timber churches or simple grey brick constructions, now delighted themselves as the voice of the priest echoed through the expansive nave, inside those tall-arched and colossally towered basilicas, whence the sunlight that crossed the stained glasses designed exquisite and dreamlike refractions in the marbled floor. Now, King Sælræd I boasted, those were indeed sanctuaries worthy being called “the house of God”.

*****

In the year of 1198 A.D., the Fourth Crusade, which had been called to re-conquer the lands of Aragó and Catalunya from the Moslems, had a clear winner, and the Pope called for celebrations and proclaimed the victors the true defenders of the Faith.

During the first seasons of the Crusade the hosts led by the paramount Occitan lords, the Dukes of Tolosa and Aquitània seemed they’d win the war for Christendom, but, despite significant battlefield victories, they failed to capture holdings and were eventually expelled by the Saracens. The great civil war that transformed Francia in a patchwork of warring fiefs made improbable that the Crusade would ever be successful.

Fortunately for the miserable Christian peoples of eastern Iberia, however, the exhausted infidel curs that oppressed them were dismayed at the sight of an even larger Crusading army that crossed the Pyrenees and arrived in Empúries in late 1195 A.D.

This host, numbered at eleven thousand men-at-arms and fifteen hundred knights, hailing from the farthest eastern lands where people profess the True Faith, that is, mainly from Polska (Poland), led by their own King, but also noblemen and free-men from Magyarország (Hungary) and even knights from the realm of Halych, which followed the Greek creed (Orthodox), but who were enticed by the prospect of acquiring fabulous of riches and lands.

The brave descendants of the ancient Sarmatians proved their worth, proudly holding the standards with the imagery of the Cross, of the Holy Virgin and the greatest saints of the Baltic and Carpathian kingdoms as they retook Barcelona and other great cities, and painted the coast of the Mediterranean red with the blood of the damned camel-lovers.

After peace had been concluded with the Mahometan amirs, a difficult arrangement was conceived between the conquerors to rule this distance realm. The Polish monarch would retain (nominal) suzerainty over the newly-settled vassals, even if those who were not Poles. He’d be crowned “Rey d’Aragó” and a Polish duke would retain the control the capital of Barcelona.

The Hungarian and Galician noblemen had proved their valor, and were rewarded with great estates and titles over sparse areas in Tarragona and Saragossa. While under official vassalage to the Polish-Aragonese King, they were too fond of their political freedom and quickly the new Crusader State broke into a series of quasi-independent principalities.

If this somehow impaired the Polish regime, the Moslems certainly didn’t knew it, for before the century ended, in 1199 A.D., the Polish prince-heir – who had remained in Iberia after his father’s return home – launched an invasion to bring the Cross again to the former kingdom of Nafarroa (Navarre), which was now ruled by some Andalusian amir.

As much as he applauded the Christian victory, King Sælræd had his own preoccupations to care about distant Iberia. In 1198 he saw himself forced to do the hardest decision since he was crowned. He had to choose between maintaining his father’s policy concerning the Church or healing the schism that separated the British church from the Papacy, just like the island of Britain by divine design remained separated from the continent by a stretch of sea.

Antipope Coelestinus had passed away in the previous year, and various months passed without the subject being touched upon again, so the relieved bishops of Britain thought King Sælræd had tacitly ended the schism. To their dismay, however, in that year he announced that his sibling, Eadulf Llywelynson, would succeed Coelestinus as Pope Clemens III.

This new Antipope was his half-brother, resulting from the dynastic confusion made by King Godwin I that greatly vexed genealogists. For Queen Inge, Sælræd’s mother by King Godwin, had been previously King Llywelyn’s wife, with whom she had Eadulf. So, Inge was impregnated with Eadulf by one King and with Sælræd by the other, thus making those two half-brothers on the maternal side.

Due to the age difference, however, as Eadulf was old enough to be Sælræd’s progenitor, the later imagined the former more as an uncle, and there was great love and friendship among them. Eadulf since early age showed vocation to the service of God, and his step-father Godwin cumulated him with bishoprics so he would not threaten Sælræd’s succession.

And now King Sælræd I saw that this pious and zealous man should be the head of the Catholic Church in Britain. Not only had the antipope become the King’s most trusted advisor, but his true friend in an environment of despicable court intrigues and conspiracies.

A grave matter concerned these two powerful men who’d joined forces to rule the realm of Britain. The Aldmundian heresy, which even Sælræd was not sure if had really begun as an ingenious political device of his father to support his distancement from the Church, now had spread out of control. Like a wildfire in dry plains, the schismatic sect expanded through the Midlands and some adept groups surged in the great metropolises such as Lunden and Eoferwic, their preachers screaming loudly, like madmen in the streets, that the end of the world was nigh, and that the sinners must repent and seek forgiveness, lest they'd be damned for the eternity. The lowborn rabble seemed willing to believe every nonsense they spoke and, impressed by the dedication of the sectarians - as they practiced flagellation as a means of purifying the flesh from sin - adhered in masse to the schismatic movement.

Perhaps they wouldn’t have been such a grave concern to King Sælræd if they behaved like when they first appeared. But, for two motives, the King decided it was best to eradicate this heretical cult. The first was a purely political stance: distancing from his father’s stern opposition to the Church, Sælræd favored a more amiable approach to the clergy, and, while maintaining the policy of strong secular interference in spiritual matters, restored some of the ecclesiastic privileges. Thus, the extinction of the heresy was result of a compromise between the Crown and the Church.

The second was a more pragmatic consideration: the cult, originally preaching peace and the return to the classic Christian virtues, had grown extremely violent and fanatical beyond any reason. The apocalyptic preaching at first was directed against the Church - which furthered King Godwin's policies - but now had become too inconvenient to Sælræd, because the cultists ignored all kinds of laws, even the royal mandments, and did what they deemed righteous, which included torching chapels whose priests were accused of being impious sinners; lynching prostitutes, sodomites and usurers; and even burning so-called witches.

A terrible pestilence ravaged Englaland in the last years of Godwin’s reign, which caused people’s intestines to fester and liquefy, with death coming in less than a week. Ealdmund the prophet, or better, the heresiarch, was dead, and his desperate disciples couldn’t perform miracles as he allegedly did, nor heal the sick. Fearing the loss of their faithful as hundreds died of the disease and these so-called true followers of God could do nothing, they resorted to a desperate measure: finding a scapegoat that would be victimized by their mad exhortations. Naturally, they directed the fearful hatred of the populace against the Jews.

Anti-Semitic violence wasn’t a novelty in the era – during the First Crusade, various Jewish communities throughout Europe had been forcibly converted, were lynched or suffered wanton destruction of their homes and belongings. In some places, most infamously cities of the Rheinland, such as Köln and Worms, the mob violence escalated to genuine massacre of those who professed Judaism.

Englaland had significant Jewish populations in Lunden, Wintancestre and Oxanforda, rarely episodes of remarkable violence occurred, but generally the royal laws – which the bishops accused of being too favorable to the murderers of Christ – were effective in protecting them, albeit while enforcing a second-class citizen status and discrimination.

As the heretics used the Jews as scapegoats, a surge of mob violence resulted in the almost whole annihilation of those segregated communities in Lunden and other towns. Everyone knew that these filthy Christ-killers desecrated the host and the temples; that they acquired dark powers of sorcery through liaisons with the demons; that they used blood of Christian children in their rituals. The so-called ghettos (walled boroughs inside the cities) were invaded by the enraged gangs, who lynched and burned people alive, torched the synagogues and destroyed their homes, but not before looting everything valuable.

The royal troops had to be summoned to contain the violence and King Sælræd decreed protective measured to protect the panicked and hapless Jewish populations (indeed, this time the massacre was so brutal that even the bishops of more Anti-Semitic inclination supported the King's measures). At the same time, he also made an edict outlawing the Ældmundian cult and proclaiming it a heresy – with pleased approval of the clergy, who desired nothing more to see the blasphemous misbelief be extinguished.

In the main towns of the kingdom, it was fairly easy to root out the sectarian cells, but in the Midlands, specifically in Lincolnscīr, it remained strong and cohesive, and mounted armed opposition to the King. The royal troops, led by the monarch himself, advanced in the region and found out, to their astonishment, that the remaining thousands of cultists – aroused to a suicidal fanatism by the heretic preachers – retreated to the castle of Lincoln, a formidable bastion erected on the site of an ancient fort by King Harold III, a century before.

Determined to resist martyrdom, they actually refortified the stockades and dug deep ditches, filling them with spikes. With pitchforks, knifes, and improvised spears and slingshots, and inspired by the intense words of the “shepherds” – as the priests of this cult called themselves – they shouted insults at the royal army, proclaiming God the Almighty would appear as soon as the next century dawned, and all the impious would burn in Hell, while they'd ascend to Heaven.

Unfortunately for them, they’d not live to see the Second Coming. Their resolve was hard as iron, the place was well defended, and Sælræd was too intelligent to try to storm it, so he decided for a more slower and effective approach: starving the garrison into surrender. It wouldn’t be too difficult, he believed, the settlement was absolutely crowded with tens upon thousands of refugees, in a few weeks they'd give up.

As soon as the water supply to the city was cut and any kind of access to resources was blocked, it was just a matter of time. A lot of time, indeed. King Sælræd had seen a lot of sieges, and won all of them, but this was one… this one was different, it lasted much longer than it should.

When the emaciated citizens finally capitulated, the victorious royal troops were appalled when they realized that the famine led many to resort to cannibalism, after animals such as dogs and rats had been eaten. The corpses of those who passed away were devoured, for supposedly the preachers had proclaimed there was no sin in consuming the flesh of another "pure" human being. The royal soldiers soon came to ghastly conclusions: parents who ate their children, or men and women who ate their parents and siblings, all because of this insane fanatism.

Unnerved, the King expelled the surrendered populace and forced a full-scale re-conversion before banishing them from the realm. The “shepherds of men” and the most fanatical elements, which staunchly refused to abandon their heretical beliefs, were burned alive, which meant there would be no bodies to be reawakened in the Judgment Day, such was their punishment.

Contemporary writers described Sælræd’s facial features as if they were marks chiseled on a statue, so austere and adamantine was his expression. If we surrender ourselves to the imagination, probably we’ll conclude that it was with such an expression that he ordered the entire settlement, including the castle to be razed to the ground.

The fires of destruction blazed high for days, and the smoldering ruins and ashes he commanded that they be scattered in all directions, as if seeking to leave absolutely no trace of the existence of the city of Lincoln – or, perhaps, as if the flames could erase that horrifying episode from History, a dark stain on his reign.

A thriving new cathedral was built upon the foundations of the demolished castle, and if a new settlement was to be constructed, it would have the church, symbolically representing the True Faith, as its center.

Literary sources that relate in details the “Lincoln Crusade” (as there some call it) are almost non-existent, the most detailed one being that an obviously biased description written by Antipope Clemens III himself, which served as propaganda in favor of King Sælræd I.

Then, there is no more to be said about these years. The dawning of the 13th century, with another successful Crusade, shimmered with promises of exaltation and splendor to the Mathrafal, of prestige to Brytain and, indeed, to all of Europe. However, as they’d soon realize, that was but the calm before the storm.

For a storm was coming from the Far East, from the border of the Frozen Ocean, a race savage beyond all parallel that would set ablaze the entire civilized world.

[Chirurgeon]

Dudes on horses with deadly bows? lol

[Chirurgeon]

you got me waiting for more! Was that Poland that I saw in Spain? How much of Spain is muslim? Is there a reconquista going on?

[Latin Knight]

you got me waiting for more! Was that Poland that I saw in Spain? How much of Spain is muslim? Is there a reconquista going on?

Yes, that's Polish Spain for those who thought that only TW games featured weird scenarios. Most of Spain is muslim, actually, they usually vanquish all the Christian powers of the peninsula (Léon, Castille, Galicia) early on. In the map you can notice Galicia was conquered, Navarra was broken, Léon and Castille are shadows of their former selves. The "Reconquista" you'll see is the BBB (big blue blob as people call France in PI games), they've advanced all the way down to Cordoba, and France can really pack a punch against all the Muslim sultanates.

Now, let's get to the next update.

[Latin Knight]

Sælræd Godwinson Mathrafal

Chapter 13: A thousand funerals and a wedding

King Sælræd I - 1196 A.D.

King Sælræd I still felt threatened by the mere existence of some of Swæfræd’s familiars. They held wealthy estates in the north and, just like the Godwine dynasty was influential in Westseaxna, the Nordanhymbrians were predominant in the septentrional fiefs.

Swæfræd’s had four brothers, and two sons. One brother, Sigebeorht, had been slain in a battle during the war, and his young son had died not a couple years earlier. The second brother, Rædwulf, was the father of three sons, but, they had all died in the third year of Sælræd’s reign in a freak accident, whence the family travelled during a stormy night, and a lightning bolt collapsed the bridge which they were crossing. The third brother was fatherless, and retired to the monastery of Lindisfarena (Lindisfarne). The youngest brother, Coenwulf, was very much alive and actively conspired with his nephews, Swæfræd’s successors, to reclaim their birthright.

Sælræd decided that they were to die for the benefit of the realm, and moved his pieces to do the checkmate.

The first to pass away in suspicious circumstances was Swæfræd’s second son, Ælfwine. Sælræd’s operatives contacted bishop Eanhere of Haltune, the court chaplain, who held a murderous grudge against Ælfwine, and readily agreed to assassinate him, with the King’s blessing. Swæfræd’s son was poisoned in dinner and died anguishing a few hours later.

Coenwulf was the next to die. Apparently, he was a filthy and sinful sodomite who had his ruffians supply him with young and miserable boys from the streets to warm his bed during the night. His pederastic inclinations were mostly unknown by those who surrounded him, and, to maintain this state of things, he had a special secluded place where the boys would be brought to – an abandoned watermill near some woods – where he could enjoy his most depraved pleasures.

King Sælræd’s thugs paid a neat sum of money to buy the services of these ruffians, and put on Coenwulf’s bed a more… interesting child to serve him. This kid – some street urchin to whom life meant only misery – was completely devoid of emotions, and readily agreed to get rid of the perverted nobleman after being given a handful of gold. Swæfræd’s youngest son fondled his new lover when, to his shock, the disgusted boy ripped his throat with a serrated knife. The very bed where he had such indescribable pleasures was now the place where he died, babbling in agony.

Finally, it was the time for the eldest son to meet the Lord. Like Ælfwine, he was poisoned. Unfortunately for Sælræd, this assassin was less competent and was captured when he suspiciously tried to leave the palace in the same moment the prince was screaming in pain, his entrails corroded by the acids that flavored his last drink.

The murderer was a mere youth, a cupbearer, paid some cash to administer the toxins. His torture revealed that he had been remunerated by one knight who had connections with the royal court. Suspicions quickly befall upon the King, who readily denied them, but it was obvious he had all the motives in the world to perpetrate the dishonorable crime.

Guilty or not, Sælræd shed no tears for the Nordanhymbrians - no, now he felt secure: all those who might have rallied the people of the north in rebellion were buried. Those who hated King Sælræd among the native nobility were too few and insignificant, while the more powerful lords were his most loyal vassals. Godgifu, Eanhere’s daughter, to whom he was betrothed, was now the heiress of Swæfræd’s remaining titles and fiefs.

As the first year of the new century dawned, his bethroted Godgifu came of age and married King Sælræd I of Englaland, becoming the Queen Consort.

In 1202 A.D., the nubile woman was already pregnant with the monarch’s first child. Divine will determined the firstborn would be of the female sex. King Sælræd, despite being a Saxon at heart, professed a genuine love for the Cymry culture, and, honoring his lineage, which had roots in the very heart of Cymru, gave his daughter a Celtic name: Esyllt (Isolde) recalling the tragic legend of Trystan.

Before that year’s Christmas, to the felicity of the King, his fecund Queen was pregnant again. Nine months later, in August 1204 A.D., as King Sælræd campaigned in Gallobha to submit the rebellious Earl of the Isles and to restore his suzerainty over the former kingdom, the Englisc realm’s ætheling was born. This time, a Saxon name was chosen.

*****

During peacetime, Sælræd established the royal court in Lunden, the great metropolis of Britain, ancient capital of the island when it was a Roman province. Whereas the West Saxon monarchy was always centered in Wintancestre, the Englisc Mathrafal sovereigns established no definitive royal seat, but hold courts in various places, such as Wiogoracestre, Coffentreo or Bedanforda.

Nevertheless, even Ælfred the Great recognized the importance of Lunden, and so did his descendants. Now, Sælræd, established the definitive royal court in the township upon the Temes, and went to great lengths to restore it to its former glory.

The ancient Roman wall circuit and the Saxon palisades were reinforced, the roads and bridges were restored, and a colossal stone cathedral dedicated to the Holy Virgin was erected. As the saying goes: “trade is the blood of a city” so the dockyards and wharfs were greatly expanded, merchant guilds and contracts were established, and the markets bloomed. Even the antique Roman palaces and the ruined remnants that survived from the amphitheatre were partly restored by experts he called all the way from Græcia with the purpose of hosting fairs, festivals and tournaments. Most importantly, his most ambitious project was the transformation of the derelict Saxon defensive structures into an impregnable Frankish-style citadel complex.

Since the reign of his father Godwin, the Saxon monarchy had strengthened ties with Francia. For centuries, the Anglo-Saxon world was much more connected with Scandinavia. The Englisc and Iutæ (Jutes) tribal confederations were originally from Jylland and invaded Britain in a joint effort with the Seaxna (Saxons) from the forested heartlands of Deutisciulanda (Germany) in the twilight era of the Imperium Romanorum.

After that, hundreds of years later, the Anglo-Saxons had naturally distanced from the pagan Norse by affiliating themselves with Christianity, but the isolation would come to a dramatic end after the sack of Lindisfarena in 793 A.D. by Danish vikingr. The Scandinavians would for the next three hundred years intervene in Britain, sometimes even de facto ruling over it, like it happened during the reign of Knut, and Englaland integrated a geopolitical structure entirely focused on the North Sea.

The Danes would eventually lose their hold in the island, and Harald Hardrada’s failed invasion signaled the last true vikingr invasion. The bond was broken, Norse influence waned and the Englisc excluded themselves from the Septentrional socio-cultural grouping, returning to their traditional isolationism.

Now, as the 13th century began, it became evident it were the Frankish, Flemish and Celtic ones that grew inside Englaland, in a promiscuous mingling that formed a unique compound – the proud Cymry and Irish, with their ancestral heritages, now absorbed not only the Saxon culture but also continental influences and customs, while the Saxons and Franks themselves would receive and react to the stimuli coming from far Éire and Cymru. Languages, cultures, arts, socio-economic structures and even customs of war suffered transformations by this novel exchange.

One historian remarked the spirit of the times by noticing that the fairgrounds in St. Dewis (St. Davids), the main Cymry city in Deheubarth – itself a city which had evolved to become strikingly similar to a Saxon or Frankish town – one could now find Irish free-men, Flemish traders, Frankish knights, Breton sailors and Saxon bureaucrats, all speaking with a mind-boggling mishmash of dialects, whereas, in the times of Earl Bleddyn, only Cymry citizens would be found and only their language would be spoken in the same markets.

As a political stance, the Englisc monarchs started actively intervening in the intestine wars that routinely plagued the Kingdom of the Franks, usually at the request of a powerful princedom that sought help against the Parisian Crown, like the Flemish or the Aquitanians.

Now, the realm-wide strife resulted from a recent dynastic crisis: Prince Alain, the Duke of Cordoba, rallied powerful elements of the Frankish and Occitan aristocracies against his relative, the hated King Orson. King Sælræd I led his armies across the Channel and did war against the Frankish King to support Duke Alain’s claim. He won great victories and conquered various castles, plundering the lands of the royal demesne and bringing Saxon standards as far as Reims.

King Orson I was deposed as exiled to Lombardia, and grateful King Alain I gave many gifts to King Sælræd I and they made vows of eternal friendship.

*****

In 1220 A.D., Thoræd ætheling came of age and his father hurried to arrange a fruitful marriage, as his son had never been bethroted to no one.

The King at first wanted him to marry a Frankish princess, probably the sister of King Alain I, to cement alliance with the continental powers, but, to his chagrin, he discovered that his son had fallen hopelessly in love with a Scottish noblewoman, sister of the King of Alba, named Bethoc a Muirebe – youngest daughter of late King Raibeart I the Crusader.

She had spent years in the Saxon court, together with many sons of the Caledonian aristocracy, just as there were Englisc noblemen in the Scottish court, part of a friendship pact made between the two neighboring Crowns some years before. Thoræd was not inclined to fiery passions, but, when he caught sight of the Scottish princess, the angelic auburn hair gleaming in the silver moonlight, his heart was enraptured by her – indeed, the jealous female pretenders to the royal bachelor angrily mocked that the Pictish witch had probably hexed Thoræd with some love spell.

King Sælræd I seemed to be of a similar opinion, and imagined this was just a puerile passion, destined to fade with time. He was wrong, however, for the months passed and his son would dismiss every prospective princess, each time claiming that his beloved Bethoc was his soul-mate, and that God determine they’d be together. The King’s patience exhausted and, absolutely vexed, he ordered his son to stop the nonsense, marry one princess of his own liking and to impregnate her with a son.

To his perplexity, the ætheling took his defiance beyond the boundaries of reason, and, in the darkness of night, escaped Lunden with his Scottish lover, and they contracted matrimony, the ceremony made by a friend of the prince who was also a priest.

When the King found out, he barely contained his surge of fury – unlike his father Godwin, he was of a very serene disposition. In the end, King Sælræd I loved his son too much, and his long absence – for the ætheling feared his father would set them apart and exact revenge by marrying him to some patrician hag – started missing him.

For various weeks he thought about the matter, and talked with learned men and concluded that perhaps that marriage could be taken advantage of. He gave up and summoned back his son to the court, reconciling with him and formalizing the daring act of marriage. To the King’s simultaneous delight and distress, Thoræd whispered that he’d in some months be grandfather, for Bethoc was already pregnant.

In June 1225 A.D., Earl Thoræd now ruling the fief Sumorsæte, King Sælræd’s grandson was born, and the heir of Englaland made the earnest homage to his beloved and majestic parent by naming his firstborn and future King of Englaland, of Cymru and Éire like his grandfather, Sælræd.

Notes:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Well, that was another slow-paced chapter, i intended to put the Mongols appearance here, but it got too big and the story too fragmented, so i decided to advance more in King Saelraed's arc (which is almost finishing) and next chapter will be almost solely dedicated to the Mongol Invasions. Brace yourselves, for the world's most famous Asian horse-lords are coming!

[Chirurgeon]

so much murder and mayhem! I love it

[Gandalfus]

hurrah.

[ccllnply]

Just read the last two updates in one go there and again loved it! Especially your description of the Polish crusade in Aragon and the purge of Lincoln. God damn cannabals, Sælræd was right to burn them with the castle.

There's just one part I didn't really understand:

Swæfræd’s had three brothers, and two sons. One brother, Sigebeorht, had been slain in a battle during the war, and his young son had died not a couple years earlier. The second brother, Rædwulf, was the father of three sons, but, they had all died in the third year of Sælræd’s reign in a freak accident, whence the family travelled during a stormy night, and a lightning bolt collapsed the bridge which they were crossing. The third brother was fatherless, and retired to the monastery of Lindisfarena (Lindisfarne). The youngest brother, Coenwulf, was very much alive and actively conspired with his nephews, Swæfræd’s successors, to reclaim their birthright.

You say here that Swæfræd had three brothers, yet I count four. Is that a mistake or am I reading it wrong?

[Latin Knight]

Just read the last two updates in one go there and again loved it! Especially your description of the Polish crusade in Aragon and the purge of Lincoln. God damn cannabals, Sælræd was right to burn them with the castle.

There's just one part I didn't really understand:



You say here that Swæfræd had three brothers, yet I count four. Is that a mistake or am I reading it wrong?

Well, good find. Actually, in-game he only had two siblings, but i invented another two for storyline and it got kinda botched in the numbering. It's supposed to be four in total, i'll edit the previous post to make it legit.

[ccllnply]

Well, good find. Actually, in-game he only had two siblings, but i invented another two for storyline and it got kinda botched in the numbering. It's supposed to be four in total, i'll edit the previous post to make it legit.

Sorry about that man. I just wasn't sure if I was reading it wrong. I thought the third brother might be a bastard and that's why you weren't counting him

[Latin Knight]

Sorry about that man. I just wasn't sure if I was reading it wrong. I thought the third brother might be a bastard and that's why you weren't counting him

That's ok, mate, as soon as those inconsistencies are detected and rooted out, the better. Thanks for the input. Nevertheless, the Northumbrian arc is finished, now i'll post the next update before going to work .

[Chirurgeon]

Do you put the names of the kingdoms on the map or does the game do that for you?

[Latin Knight]

Do you put the names of the kingdoms on the map or does the game do that for you?

The game has different "mapmodes", the political one just shows the exact names you see in the screenshots, when you have a bird eye view, macroscoped, it shows the names of the independent nations: England, the HRE, France, etc. When you get close to the ground, it shows the names of every county, such as York, Lancaster, etc.

So far all screenshots are entirely authentic, that means, i didn't change or wrote anything on it, just cropped a "detail" from the screenshot captured with Fraps, and resized to standard sizes to be more feasible to read. Of course, when i call England "Englaland", Byzantine Empire "Basileia ton Rhomaion", it's only for the narrative, the game features modern English country names for the respective countries.

[Chirurgeon]

The game has different "mapmodes", the political one just shows the exact names you see in the screenshots, when you have a bird eye view, macroscoped, it shows the names of the independent nations: England, the HRE, France, etc. When you get close to the ground, it shows the names of every county, such as York, Lancaster, etc.

So far all screenshots are entirely authentic, that means, i didn't change or wrote anything on it, just cropped a "detail" from the screenshot captured with Fraps, and resized to standard sizes to be more feasible to read. Of course, when i call England "Englaland", Byzantine Empire "Basileia ton Rhomaion", it's only for the narrative, the game features modern English country names for the respective countries.

Wow it looks amazing. That is an amazing feature. Maybe RTW2 should look into that!

[Latin Knight]

Wow it looks amazing. That is an amazing feature. Maybe RTW2 should look into that!

Yes, there are many interesting features Creative Assembly could learn from Paradox. Only time will tell us about RTW2

For the readers, this week has been hectic, probably only will get to post the next update by the weekend.

[Gandalfus]

Deus Vult.

[Latin Knight]

Finally got some time for an update!

Sælræd Thorædson Mathrafal

Chapter 16 - King Sælræd the Red

King Sælræd II - 1238 A.D.

King Sælræd II was crowned with 14 years of age, and, unlike his father, succeeded peacefully. What we today call the Witenagemōt, as political institution, originally was nothing more than an ad hoc assembly of aristocrats, both secular and ecclesiastical, and while it became a permanent council under Harold III, it had all its political power curbed by King Godwin I himself, and by this time membership signified a merely honorific position in the royal affairs. Originally they, as an assembly of the ancestral aristocracy, elected the monarchs – as per the traditional Germanic customs – but, by the 13th century, succession in the Three Kingdoms had transformed into de facto hereditary primogeniture, and this political body served only to formally ratify and coronate the successor.

Thus, King Sælræd II was made King of the Anglecynn in Cyningestun (Kingston-upon-Thames), Brenin y Brythoniad in the ancestral palace of Mathrafal and, unlike his father and grandfather, actually sailed to Éire and had the senior bishops of the island crown him Ard Rí na hÉireann in the sacred Cnoc na Teamhrach (Hill of Tara).

As he travelled, guarded by his the élite royal knights of Flemish-lineage, he mustered armies, proclaiming that he’d lead them to the Crusade, to finish his father’s campaign. He sent emissaries to the Pope and to his own brethren and subjects, stranded in Italia, having retreated to the recently established British domain in Sicilia, assuring that he was on his way to continue his father’s quest.

He might not be considered a legal adult, but, even before completing 15 summers, the teenage King was of high-stature, strong-armed, red hairs covering the jaw that would soon grown into a remarkable vermillion beard, but, most importantly, he had enrapturing emerald eyes that gleamed with igneous zeal and unquenchable yearning for glory. His roaring voice called forth his vassals and they willingly pledged their swords to the charismatic young sovereign.

King Sælræd II led his men dressed in a black gambeson decorated with red wyrms, at the head of forty hundred footmen and cavalry that carried the banners of the Cross. His first act as a monarch, and the last before he departed his kingdom, was arranging for his father to be canonized a saint. St. Thoræd the Crusader. He then left the realm in the able administration of his mother, Queen Bethoc, and the regents and councilors. From the port of Exanceastre, the army sailed to Iberia.

As they reached the coast of northern España, the King, counseled by his experienced military commanders, opted to send his fleet home and cross on foot the northeastern part of the Iberian Peninsula all the way to Barcelona, whence they’d again take ships to Italia.

The old Christian States of Castilla, Llión (León), Galiza (Galicia), as well as the Basque polity of Nafarroa (Navarre) were now but mere footnotes in History books and geographical regions denoting former realms that failed to resist the voracious and unstoppable Moorish warlords. Whereas before these miserable Spaniards were ruled by Christian kings, now they bowed to Moslem emirs.

The part that remained Christian wasn’t even ruled by Spaniards. The Frankish Crown controlled the southeastern quarter of the peninsula and the Balearic Islands, ruling major cities such as València, Almariyya (Almería), Córdoba and even Granada. Aragó was only nominally under the suzerainty of the Polish King in Kraków, but, after the Tartar invasions, this entire kingdom simply ceased to be, and, later its territory was incorporated in the Römisches Reich. Now, this region of Catalunya became effectively a protectorate of Francia, and the recently established Slavic aristocracy intermingled with the Frankish and Occitan ones.

King Sælræd II didn’t want to risk the long sail through the Moslem-controlled littoral. His father’s men had already raised the alarms through all the coastal provinces, and the wary Moorish emirs would assault any other Christian fleets raiding their domains. Besides, although Sælræd wouldn’t admit it he was extremely superstitious, fearing the sea monsters and the omens that failed to forebode peaceful travels. Soldiers get exasperated with boredom and tiredness from long sea voyages, for it slowly shrinks the spirit. So, few were the dissenting voices when they landed definitely in Santemter (Santander), due Barcelona.

In the northern fringes of Cantábria and at the foothills of the Pyrenees in former Nafarroa, some rump Christian domains survived, with fierce warlords resisting the relentless Moorish advance in the forested hills and deep valleys, like the folk hero Pelayo had done, hundreds of years ago. Despite the recent annexation by the Andalusians, Moslem presence in the region was minimal, and their march was uneventful.

The British host coursed by the foothills of the Cantabrian range, and then along the extensive Ebro valley. The earldom of Nájera was situated right in the frontier between the Moslem dominion and the Franco-Polish country. There, the secular border conflicts had escalated to a full war, as the invading ethnic Slavic governors had been greatly reinforced by the surge of refugees Castillian and Navarrese, thirsty for revenge.

King Sælræd II arrived in time to assist the battered Christian forces. His legion hammered an immense Moorish camel-riding army in the Battle of Fuenmayor and renewed the vigor of the Hispano-Slavic host.

Sælræd agreed to help in their campaign, in exchange the Catalans would provide a fleet of ships to cross the Mediterranean. As they besieged Nájera, Calahorra and Logroño, the King sent forth his swiftest heralds to travel in cog and bring to his armies stranded in Sicilia the news that their Lord King was coming to their rescue.

In 1239 A.D., King Sælræd II, about to come of age, married in Barcelona. His wife was an exiled Castillan princess, Eslonza of the prestigious Jimena dynasty. The royalty and nobility of Castilla and Nafarroa had escaped to Aragó after their last holdings were besieged, and the castle of Manresa was given as a temporary expedient to Ermesinda Jimena, who still claimed to be the rightful Queen of Castilla, albeit without any land to call hers. Just like Thoræd had fallen in love with Bethoc, Sælræd desired Eslonza as his wife on the very moment he saw the young damsel, despite their matrimony being politically insignificant, as the Jimena were all but ruined.

Queen Ermesinda eagerly gave her daughter in marriage to the fearless northern Crusader, hoping that he’d expel the Moors from Castilla and reclaim her birthright. The desperate hopes, however, vanished as soon as the Spanish princess was deflowered and the young Saxon King hurriedly sailed to Sicilia, never looking back.

***

In November in 1239 A.D., King Sælræd II, the second Saxon monarch to take part on a Crusade, disembarked during a quiet night in Palermu, where his expecting soldiers dearly commemorated his arrival.

Shamelessly shedding joyous tears, they sang hymns and songs of valor about the Mathrafal kings, and about his good lord Thoræd. Due to his fire-colored beard and his indomitable presence in the battlefield, the men used to call him Sælræd the Red.

Notwithstanding the reinforcement and the morale boost, the truth was that the war was already lost.

As much as half the original host his father had brought from the north had deserted. There were the men who married to local women and had children; there were those who joined the households of Italian noblemen, abandoning their vows of loyalty to the British monarchy; there were the British high-born who abandoned the cause, returning home by the way of the Alps, and took their men with them. The remaining ones, despite their unflinching loyalty and the renewed morale, were utterly tired and desired nothing more than to return home. Not even the prospect of spoils or of the noble task of eradicating the Moslem filth would burn their bellicose spirit anymore.

In mainland Italia, the other Crusader army, composed of Lombards, Venetians, Swiss and Germans, failed to capitalize upon Thoræd’s victory and the vast legion fragmented in a multitude of national armies after the petty squabbles between the various lords came to boiling point. The Saracen warlord, the son of the Khalifah, retreated to the forested hills and rugged mountains of the region the locals to this day call “Lucania”, and successfully waged guerrilla warfare, repealing the advances of the divided Crusaders. His position was unsustainable, indeed, but he didn’t have to wait much, for about a couple months before Sælræd disembarked in Palermu, an unfathomable horde of Saracens, savage and tough men conscripted from the far lands of al-ʻArabīya (Arabia), al-Muqurra (Makuria) and Sūriyya (Syria) arrived, scaring away the Venetian fleets that policed the coast of Italia, and met the prince in Valsinni.

With such a giant army, he easily crushed the Crusaders in mainland Italia, expelling their battered regiments back to the safety of Lazio and Benevento. He then advanced further north, bringing fire and steel as far as Rieti; their banners with the symbols of the moon and Arabic phrases were seen by the panicked garrison of Roma itself. Just like Hannibal a millenium earlier, however, the invader did not besieged the capital of the world, but simply devastated the land, then, as his supply lines has stretched too much, he retreated.

When he returned, and crossed the Strait of Messina, determined to destroy the last remaining Christian threat to Moslem domination in southern Italia, King Sælræd was ready to meet him, and was decisively defeated in the turfy hills of Spillinga (Sperlinga).

An anecdote says that Sælræd was almost slain in battle by the violence of the Moslem prince himself, but was saved by divine providence when a thunder broke the heavens apart and startled the Saracen general (who was superstitiously terrified of lightning), the moment of distraction allowing Sælræd to kill his aggressor’s horse under him.

Despite the bravery of the British soldiers, which would be recounted in homeric songs for the centuries to come, King Sælræd was subjugated, and forced to sign a peace treaty, in which he agreed to surrender the rich booty his father had taken and forsake Sicilia to the infidel.

Humiliated and defeated, Sælræd the Red was willing to continue the war, but his men were not. As he could not wage wars by himself, after countless times he tried to convince them to follow him to the battlefield yet another time, he eventually gave up. There were no reinforcements coming from Italia, they were alone against a powerful and refreshed enemy. Considering all this, the Red Lion of Britain swallowed his pride and, frustratingly remembering the sweet flavor of victory in Hispania, now felt the bitter taste of hopelessness and failure. Where his great father had been victorious, he now met only ruin. Under the watchful eye of the Arab scouts, they marched back across the peninsula, and returned to Albion by following the same path of his ancestor King Cadwgan I.

They were staying in Dijon, enjoying the courtesy of the Frankish duke of Bourgogne, when the news came that the Pope, after it became evident that no Christian prince would come to rescue Italia from the infidel, formally proclaimed an end to the Fifth Crusade and made a desperate truce with the Egyptian overlord.

[Chirurgeon]

Holy crap the muslims in Italy? Wow that is pretty insane. And even worse the crusade failed! Is Rome under threat?