1276-1277

The following is the turn report covering the years of **1276 and 1277**. It was the first turn of *The Banners Start to Tatter*, the sixth installment of the Arthurverse, and lasted from 6 March 2017 to 18 March 2017.

## The Great Imperial Interregnum

The great banner of the Holy Roman Empire is much like the current state of the empire as a whole, more remnant to greater and smaller pieces stitched together, than a great united whole. Torn in the many battles of the Great Interregnum for a short time it seemed like it would be restored under Wettin leadership, but with the great interdict coming down on the head of Otto Wettin these pieces of the banner were once again turn to the seven winds and the second phase of the Great Imperial Interregnum started.

### The Polish incursion

At the centre of the Imperial Interregnum's second phase stood the Polish incursion lead by their king Wladyslaw IV from the House Piast. For the Germans this was seen as a barbaric attack from an upstart Duke from the Slavic east, for the Polish it was in some ways the first forebearers of ideas of unity that may in centuries grow into much more.

The first year of the war started with a bang. As soon as the first winter snow melted king Wladyslaw dashed westwards at the head of his army. Having prepared to start his expedition at just this moment he managed to move far faster than anyone anticipated, reaching the Oder while it was still filled wich much ice. In a death defying move he had his forces built small brides of wood, putting those over the edges of the giant ice floes that swam in the river to cross it. Within weeks he was before Görlitz, which Prince Vladislav had to reluctantly abandon. During his retreat he also had to hurry his family out of the castle, as nobody had expected the castle to be threatened so fast. During a neckbrecking tale of flight from the castle Lady Elisabeth Ludowinger and her three children found themselves face to face with Prince Henry of Poland and his half brother Boleslaw, Duke of Sandomierz, who had spent the previous night in a nearby village with some peasant girls and were now sneeking back to the camp. Elisabeth's two Thuringian guards fought valiantly, but finally were saved when Elisabeth took control of the situation, ordering them to stay down before cordially greeting Prince Henry as cousin of her husband and asked to be brought before his father to be treated as his guest. So started her and her family's imprisonment at the court of King Wladyslaw.

From there on the war continued as Wladyslaw marched his army westwards seeking the decisive battle with Otto Wettin to loosen his hold on his vassals. Meanwhile Otto retreated again and again at the advise of his cousin Hermann of Thuringia, letting Wladyslaw exhaust his forces. The Poles soon reached Meissen capital of king Otto, but soon gave up on besieging it, seeing how easy it would be for the Wettins to gather further troops on the other side of the Elbe. Thus Wladyslaw turned southwards towards the Bohemian border. This had two purposes: Firstly Wladyslaw, still keen on his objective to quickly break the power of the Emperor wanted to raid the Imperial silver mines and secondly through a control of those mine and the presence of Polish forces so close tohis border persuade his brother-in-law in Bohemia to join his war. What he found however greatly distressed him: The mines lay abandoned, many shafts having been collapsed. At about the same time news reached his court that Polish mints were quickly running out bullion. The Wettins meanwhile were unhappy with the great loan they had to take out with various jews and their great reliance on the city of Goslar that they now had.

The next year the war fell into a certain lull as forces lead by Rudolf of Habsburg and other western Imperial supporters of the Wettins, like Adolf, heir of Saxony showed up to bolster the imperial forces. The Poles meanwhile plundered lands east of Elbe and Havel, burning down Berlin and Cölln a second time, forever breaking those towns. They would never again have any great political significance.

The gridlock finally ended when in late 1277 Bernhard of Wittenberg was the first German noble to throw his hat in with king Wladyslaw of Poland. Having stood up in rebellion against Heinrich Wettin years ago, he had never been able to be dislodged from his castle. As nobody in the entire Empire took serious this insignificant branch of the Askanian family's claim to Saxony Otto saw little harm than letting them rot behind their walls as their neighbours grew rich and influential. Now however it was time for him to once more try to stir the tide against the "Vile practice of neutrality". Indeed Bernhard of Wittenberg published his legal complaints against the Emperor in a confused letter to the realm listing 95 ideas against the "Vile sin that is neutrality in the face of evil". Quote: "The Imperial Justice stands in great disrepair. If one were to strike down the crown from the Wettin's head with a price arrow, the rest of the noble building blocks will fall like a house of rubble. Checkmate."

What at first may seem like questionable new ally may still yet prove decisive for the Poles. For the Count of Wittenberg controls the one thing that may yet change this war: A bridge across the Elbe.

### The Burgundian war

The second great new theater of this new phase of the Imperial interregnum was the French invasion of Burgundy. Having been previously left mostly untouched by the imperial infighting, despite different lords nominally acknowledging different kings, the lords of Burgundy were are close knit and rich region, in many parts eager to find some more freedoms for themselves and acting on them. Into this world now came Louis of France , to many offering a welcome escape from Papal interdict and imperial infighting with a promise for greater advanteges and prizes. There were however those who thought differently.

First among those men was Guiges VII, Dauphine of Viennois . He rose against the king of France with support by his cousin Hugh of Montagu . While their forces were far from the size of the French army, they however proved far more troublesome than king Louis expected, however much of that also had to do with the murky and inopportune geographical and alliance position Guiges found himself in. Surrounded by lands friendly to both him and the king, Louis had to navigate carefully on his march southwards, losing precious weeks in avoiding this land and this castle that belonged to a neutral party. Further Louis had left behind a sizeable force in Paris to secure against imperial attacks, which only after a few months started their own march south, when no such attack came.

The king of France thus spent nearly a year in Viennois, trying to prepare for a march to strike into Savoy. It was only during the next year that he could dare to attempt a climb into the higher alps seeking to dislodge the fellow Capetian with the aid of an old claimant to Savoy. This slow advance only really ended the next year when at the end of 1277 a path towards Savoy finally seemed within French reach and preparations were made for the finaly stretch of the march and end this war. However as such victories are had, news arrive of letters from the Counts of Geneva and various Swiss monasteries sent to Heidelberg to ask Rudolf of Habsburg if not Switzerland is also part of Burgundy and if they should prepare to fight French invaders.​

### The Sicilio-Papal conflict

The final and most dramatic shift in the Imperial Interregnum however was the Hohenstaufen's radical change of sides. Having previously been a champion of papal power for the past thirty years it now returned to the kingdom's proud tradition of antagonism towards the Holy See. At the head of an army 20,000 strong Henry of Hohenstaufen marched northwards to seize Rome from a pope mad on power, trying to undermine the lawful order of the Empire. What he found was a city in jubilation. Rome had ever been quite Ghibbline in opposition of greater papal power and now it had seized the opportunity to gain greater independence from their father. However, this had been known to Nicholas, who had already taken to leaving the city of Rome often to hold court in Orvieto had indeed just been about to leave the holy city when news of Henry's approach reached him. He only barely escaped with his life from the city, indeed it is said that at one point one man saw him clutching a redding robe during his flight. Henry Hohenstaufen was soon joined in his war on Nicholas by his allies in Egypt and Saluzzo. He however found that he had badly misjudged the overall italian situation when he sought that such a move against the pope would be popular. Mantua, Florence, Ferrarra, San Marino, Milan and many other middle Italian city states declared openly for the holy father, while Pisa only agreed to neutrality after Henry threatingly marched his army up to her borders in spring 1277. The Prince of Sardinia used this opportunity to provide an open harbour for those raiding shipping to Palermo and Genoa. To make matters worse for Henry, the pope had gone with near 2/3 of the cardinal college, who saw little reason to support Henry if he was to threaten the papacy's power in Latium. The pope disappeared for a short while before resurfacing in Mantua, directing from there the resistance against Henry. However Henry still had the edge in numbers, organization and quality of troops. This latest tussle was far from over.

## The Second Scottish War

The latest phase of the Second Scottish war waged by Henry III of England started with fast fleet maneuvers as both side tried to gain superiority in the waters. This began with a fast fleet action by the English royal fleet, sailing fast for the Dutch coast to strike down the European forces of House Holland before they could move against them. However they underestimated the great storms this early in the season as well as the advantage the Dutch had for fighting close to their coast. While the Dutch were surprised and unprepared in the end the two forces left in a draw, preventing William of Artois from sailing to Scotland, thus being stuck for two years on the far side of the channel as his fleet was repaired, as well as taking the English royal fleet out of the war as it retreated to London for repairs. Thus it was clear that the battle would be fought in Scotland as it had for the past years.

Something similar happened also on the east coast, but instead of making it more stagnant it only complicated the fighting. As the fleet in Edinburgh waited and waited for their Dutch allies they eventually could wait no longer and started their circumnavigation of Alba, only to arrive with the Hebrides swarming with Irish invading forces. As the Irish and Scottish fleet met near Ayr both suffered horrible casualties, eventually emerging both as shattered individual ships, whose captains soon found employ for this Irish noble or that Scottish chief, who spent the next two years fightin small scale petty battles over the various Hebride islands raiding with ships and men, dividing often one village from the other, so small scale was the fighting.

The fighting on the Scottish mainland moved towards greater and greater English stagnation. Henry III marched his army once more into southern Scotland, but this time instead of going for a great march to crush this or that war objective he had his army split into smaller units, trying to lure Alexander into giving chase as he plundered the lands of Scotland. Alexander however did not let himself provoked keeping his forces from their positions at Stirling and Glasgow. This however exposed many of the Lowlands to the English raiders, but even they could not do as much damage as they would have wished. While they had the control of much of the open lands, where the professional English longbow men proved ruthless raiders, due to their smaller size these different smaller forces could not lay siege to the great castles of families such as the Lord of Brus or indeed penetrate the highly concentrated lands of the Balliols, who repelled any attempts of these warbands to take their territory. In the second year of the invasion the steam started to go out of the English, as rumours spread that Henry III had offered his cousin Edward the crown of Ireland, something that many saw as a far too great and fast promotion from the mere Lord he had been but a few years before. Further with crown Prince William having fallen in love with the festive nature of London as the soldiers of the fleet idly spent their days away in the streets of the surrounding villages, many heard tales of songs laughter and tourneys, something that they would much rather return to than senseless slaughter. One however, who disliked this was Prince Arthur of England, who had quite a taste for this rawer sort of fighting he had never known in his life. Thus he convinced his father to make him one of the leaders of one great endeavour to force peace: Marching southwards to take the Balliol lands. Slowly over the years of 1277 the English forces reunited as Henry marched towards Galloway, laying siege eventually to the Balliol house castle. Arthur meanwhile was left behind with a smaller force to guard his father's back. This was the situation when the winter fell. Since then the sides have not moved, as king Alexander III weighs letting his Balliol rivals lands getting raided against losing legitimacy as his land keeps being occupied. Meanwhile Henry III must find a way to finish this war before it becomes a problem for him to keep the enthusiasm of his vassals going.​

## The Third Martinian Revolt

The Third Martinian revolt has ended in a most ignoble peace between king and subjects. It has done little to end the animosity between the two sides as banditry and lawlessness now continue to rage as no clear agreement on the exact interpretation of the terms of "status quo ante" means. Meanwhile some Portuguese vassals now ask freedom from their king to leave for Santiago and demand payment from king Martin II for his march over their lands during the wars.​

## The Swedish War of Succession

The Swedish civil war has so far not proceeded much as both sides raid the others' territories without making any inroads for further conquests.​

## The Causa of Outremer

The war of Jerusalemite succession has proven so far quite succesful for king Bohemond of Syria as in the first year he managed to take control of key royal castles along the spine of Palestine, before in 1277 taking a great corridor down to the Dead Sea. King Hugh and his wife have retreated to Acre, with much of the coast still in their control. King Bohemond now also has to face the problem of many Jerusalemite nobles staying in their various castles, keeping their gates closed to him as they wait to see what happens next. Meanwhile in Cyprus a force lead by lord Aimery of Brienne has landed to aid his cousin Eschiva of Ibelin in her war for the crowns.​

## The Rurikid Brothers' War

The war between the brothers Andrey and Alexei have so far been on the side of the elder boy Andrey, who has managed to turn some of the Novgorod chieftain vassals from the far north and east against their Russian overlords. Further he has motivated the city of Pskov to withhold support to their mother Novgorod, no doubt eager for a greater independent position. However, apart from great raids into Novgorod no clear march towards the capital has taken place, as Andrey is hesitant on how this will be seen by Mengu-Timur his overlord.

## Serbian Rebuilding

In Serbia hemp production is flourishing. Following the devastating civil wars the king of Serbia had to look for new ways to finance his rule. He turned towards giving greater freedom to Italian traders within his realm, leading to the creation of great plantations where precious crops are grown, first among them hemp, both for materials as well as consumable pipe filler. While this move has brought more silver in the Serbian coffers it has also slowly begun to reduce to Serbia to a dependent state on the Italian market and greater European economic demands. It is uncertain how this development will play out.

## Other Official Events

### Lower Bavaria

Heinrich of Bavaria wasted little time to try and improve the development of his lands, while his neighbours made war on each other. For such purposes he started the building of a great library at Straubing and indeed soon it had grown to a great size. The collection of books that is. The building had barely started as material had to be gathered and foundations made. The monks of "Bei den Mönchen" (Munich) offered themselves as supervisors of such an institution.

Meanwhile a great measuring of his lands took place searching for mineral resources, no doubt to create a lesser dependence on the Wettin silver mines. Sadly, nothing that was not already known was found, if for lack of their existence or time spent searching was not known.

### Jochid Khanate

The efforts to establish a bureaucracy are coming along quite fine, as the various men luckily all can communicate in Arabic and thus work together to provide a very rough framework for administration of the realm. However, there remain many glaring issues, such as the need to actually *pay* all these officials, educating new hires and making the various local nobles and officials accept such previously completely unknown modes of government.

The various border lords of the Jochids are quite taken with the establishment of Gaza, improving their opinion of this young lord. Many now speculate that this may be preparation for a new great raid, maybe against the Templars or Poland or, dare they dream Constantinople?

The search for the right grand vizier has proven an arduous task as the many different advisors of Sultan Mengu-Timur all favour different abilities in a great leader, depending on their education, culture and religion. Then of course there is also the trouble of many resenting the fact that not a Chinese/Turk/Mongol shall fill that role and thus covertly sabotage the process. Nevertheless by the end of the year the Sultan will be presented with a shortlist of twenty Russian men deemed worthy of such position, many from lower nobility or local city administration.

The borderlords have filed formal protest at the unprecedentedly large tax on their slave raids from the Sultan. While they have no problem paying the Sultan his fair share, the demand to *only* accept payment in slaves is quite unpopular. So far many work around this imposition by offering the Sultan subpar slaves as payment.

### England

William of Essex, inspired by the boring reading his father has forced him to pick up, has started a liking for poetry and songs to distract himself, while pretending to be reading more serious works.

His brother Prince Arthur meanwhile has started to surround himself with a gang of other young nobles, spending their days in the taverns of York getting drunk and into brawls. He has been given a handler to make sure that he does not misbehave too much during the coming invasion of Scotland.

King Henry meanwhile has pushed forward an expansion of the harbour of York to give his fleets more potential harbours to sail to, given the abundance of Hollandish and Scottish raiders plaguing the North Sea. While this has proven a money sink for now, it may come in handy in more peaceful days.

Castille

Prince Enrico of Castille is coming along quite well. Or troubingly, depending on who you ask. While by no means the .....friendly and pious man that his father is, he has proven to have a bit of a lack when it comes to understanding the vast complexities of state. He seems to like to learn coats of arms and the histories of families, but when it comes to laws and contracts he gets bored fast and numbers lead to a quick slumber. On the other hand he more and more proves himself to be truly the grandson of king Enrico "The Tough" and Gaucher De Châtillon, greatest tourney knight of France, as he not only shows great promise with sword and lance, but also has experienced a great growth spurt, now standing already a good head taller than other boys his age.

The great survey of the city of Toledo has found some minor damages that were still left from the times of king Henry and fixed them fast. However, it has also shown that the city is a bit overcrowded and thus fitting a new great church within her walls may prove difficult.

Makeshift forts have been erected out of wood along the Leonese border. While it is not sure how useful they will prove, they have proven already expensive as usable wood so far south is hard to come by.

### Lithuania

The Great Reikalas (gathering of all people important to the Pagan Faith in Lithuania (Druids, Priests, Preachers, Local Cult Leaders and what have you) has proven to be.... not so Great, as the many priests gathered have burst apart in disagreement, some even going so far as to magically curse each other. In the end only a handful of men remain, quite sheepishly presenting the king with the "successes". The Templars meanwhile take note of these actions.

A dirt road has been built connecting the royal capital to the sea in Prussia. For the first time trade goods can now flow...well drip out of the country and into the Baltic system. Soon the Germans of Poland and Denmark are taking note and have started sending ships to establish trade agreement.

The royal audience goes a bit better than the Great Reikalas in that it never even takes place, as the various chieftains for the most part stay at home, seeing no reason to submit their privileged grudges and feuds to royal arbitration. Who after all is the king to tell them what to do in their lands?

### Bohemia

King Vladislaus and his brother Ottokar made the round among the vassals of their great realms, renewing ties, holding court and passing justice. Most of all they built castles. As they were on the edges of the realm it was clear that they were not targeted at their vassals and many appreciate the aid in defense and the passing out of border castles to younger sons was also welcome, but some were a bit disturbed by the indiscriminate building of castles on all borders, not sure who is friend or foe of their overlord now and how to align themselves politically. A small minority may even hold the king to be a war monger but those people have always existed and are more a nuisance often judged to keep alive to show openness to dissent. Ottokar also discovered what mighty debts his father-in-law had accumulated with some of his vassals. Thus he was quite happy t have done the great tour as it gave him an opportunity to enter into talks with his nobles, preventing this from festering and pushing them into debt feuds.

This also made the two shelf their respective ideas of a grand survey of their lands. Not for lack of capability to do so, but simply because, despite their flaws as men were quite capable leaders and saw that such a project would take a long time and would not serve them well in time of tumultuous changes. They did however gain a much better understanding of their current situation and their scribes also took note of many facts that will greatly aid the two once they undergo such a large project.

Finally as a great symbol of the Bohemians flexing their muscles must be taken the embryo of the Bohemian royal guards the "Red Lions" as they would be called and would survive in one form or the other until the 20th century. So far they were but a collection of capable soldiers surrounding the king, but slowly he has now started to truly recruit a central core to his forces, an elite troop to call on it battle.​

## References

https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/before-the-fall.36591/page-5#post-8096740

https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/before-the-fall.36591/page-2#post-8032334

https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/before-the-fall.36591/page-5#post-8097084