Ethelred the Pious |
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In 1130, the 21st year of the long reign of King Woldemar III, England is undergoing considerable turmoil. This has disturbed almost a century of largely peaceful rule by the House of Kent. Two religious issues lie behind the unrest: the connection of the English church to Rome and the suppression of England's pagans.
Geographic overview[]
England has been a single kingdom for about 130 years, mostly under the current dynasty following a few decades of Danish rule. By the Twelfth Century, stable government has fostered unity and something like a national consciousness, though the regions of the country retain their distinct cultures.
Kent[]
The prosperous region of Kent is an autonomous jarldom ruled by the king's uncle Sidroc. It is one of just a small handful of jarldoms to still exist in the kingdom, and Sidroc guards it jealously. Now elderly, he has secured his son Olaf's succession, which he hopes will maintain Kent as the hereditary possession of his descendants.
As England's link to the western continent, Kent has long been a center of trade, and in the twelfth century that trade is growing. The small port towns around the jarldom's coastline are growing in size and wealth, fueled by the wool trade with the growing towns of the Angleanian duchy across the Channel.
Besides the jarl, the City of Lundun is a major landowner within Kent. Some of the most productive estates are actually City-owned, and a few ports are governed as subsidiaries to the City. This has naturally led to conflicting authority that plays out in numerous ways.
Lundun[]
England's largest city but not its royal capital, Lundun resembles a commercial city-state more than ever. The king seems quite distant. Lundun's wealth is now no longer based on commerce alone. The City has also become a significant landowner with estates in many parts of southeastern England.
The South[]
Like Lundun, the rest of southern England has closer ties to the western Continent than to Scandinavia. This different orientation, together with persistent cultural distinctions like the maintenance of old English legal customs, set the region apart. A class of very powerful landowners continues to define southern society, in contrast to the more egalitarian social structures that prevail further north.
Some in the south resent the political control of Jorwik. This is reflected in a flowering of literature celebrating the old Anglo-Saxon customs, above all the Alfredssaga. This book, in which a renegade King Alfred outfoxes a series of Danish villains, betrays some of the political anxieties of the southern ruling classes. It also reflects to some extent the influence of the budding literary tradition of chivalric romance coming out of Provence, though overall it is a Nordic saga.
Ostangeln[]
The eastern lobe of England is one of the two strongholds of paganism, together with the far north. Thus is it is the location of much unrest and fighting as the king attempts to eradicate the pagan institutions once and for all. A few expeditions, led by members of prominent families, have already sailed to Widland.
Westmark[]
The Westmark, England's southwestern peninsula east of Kernow, exhibits many of the same patterns as the rest of the South. Society is driven by magnates in possession of large areas of land. As in most of England, this is an untitled aristocracy; the early Viking jarldoms are long gone. The Westmark's relative remoteness and rugged landscape give it a distinct identity from parts further east. It speaks its own dialect of Englesk, with some pockets still speaking forms of Welsh.
Midland[]
The fertile region of Midland acts as a transition between the regions of the north and the south. It descends from the Five Danish Burgs of the Ninth Century, and the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia before that. Each of the five towns is still the administrative center of a skir or district. One or two still serves as the seat of a jarl descended from the old conquerors, though most of that class has disappeared, replaced by a class of untitled aristocratic landowners who control most of the arable land.
Like the South, Midland is now largely Christian. Some pagan customs persist, but few people actually pray to the old gods. Small churches dot the landscape and bishops sit in the main towns.
Jorwikland[]
Jorwik is both the royal capital and the ancient seat of an archbishop. These two leaders work closer together than ever these days, a reflection and to some extent an imitation of the caesaropapism gaining ever more strength on the Continent. The capital itself is the site of constant intriguing between partisans of the archbishop and the Pope, the latter of whom is making increasingly desperate moves to prevent the English church from following those of the Frankish kingdoms and pursuing autocephaly.
Bernik and the far north[]
This region is England's other stronghold of paganism, and persecution is even more intense here due to its proximity to the capital. Many of its great families have already fled, if not across the ocean, then to Ostangeln or the Orkney islands.
Normanland[]
This region, facing the Irish Sea, has been distinct from the rest of England since the Viking conquests, owing to its settlement by Norwegians rather than Danes. It is a land remarkable among most of the kingdoms of Europe. There are hardly any nobles. The land is worked by a proud class of smallholding farmers. Except in a few remote areas, the Normen converted to Christianity long ago. This was largely the work of Irish, not English, priests, and to this day Normanish religious practices have an Irish cast.
Wyneþ[]
This conquered kingdom of northwest Wales has been fully incorporated into the kingdom of England. Its people still largely speak Welsh.
The Welsh kingdoms[]
South of Wyneþ, Wales is divided into small kingdoms in vassalage to England, a state of affairs that now goes back centuries.
Kernow[]
Thanks to intermarriage with the ruling families of Wales proper, the dynasty of Hrolfr the Northman is long gone, but the Cornish king continues to rule, the political status of the kingdom little changed since the days of the Viking wars. Kernow is considered a Welsh kingdom, its language and habits not that distinct from those of the other kingdoms across the Severn Sea. Like the other rulers, the king of Kernow is a mostly loyal vassal of England.
The Channel Islands remain Cornish territory, another legacy of the Viking conquests of the Tenth Century. They speak a Celtic dialect that combines features of Cornish and Breton. The king of Kernow also still owns estates in and around Carbourg in the Constantine Peninsula, though these lands are in feudal vassalage to the king of Neustria. The king bears the Neustrian title Lord of Carbourg.
Dublin and Ongellsey[]
Across the sea is England's long-term vassal kingdom, Dublin. Its size had peaked a century earlier in the wake of the Welsh Rebellion; now it does not extend very far inland. The island of Ongellsey off the Welsh coast also forms part of the kingdom's territory. The ruling dynasty is of Irish rather than Norse ancestry, but the long political connection to England has ensured that some Scandinavian elements have entered the culture.
The Irish kingdoms[]
The rest of Ireland is divided into several small kingdoms. By now, there is little to distinguish the kingdoms founded by Norsemen (Wexford and Waterford) from those founded by Gaels (Munster, Connacht, and the smaller chiefdoms in the far north). As an example of this blending, the Norse city-states of Limerick and Cork are now considered part of the loosely-governed Gaelic kingdom of Munster. All the Irish port towns still have a Nordic element, by now largely English in character. But Gaelic is the main language all across the island, including among the ruling classes.
Wexford and Waterford do have a closer relationship with England than the kingdoms further west. Both kings acknowledge Woldemar III as their overlord, though in practice they operate independently. Munster also has a historic vassalage relationship that is not entirely forgotten. Connacht and the north are under the influence of Alba rather than England; the kingdom of Ulster in the far northeast has now been part of Alba's realm for a hundred years.