The Empire in 2217
A brief guide to the recent and more distant history of Sigmar’s Glorious Empire, in the dark days of civil war and fratricidal hatred
A revised and accurate edition of the original works by Ruprecht Breytenbach of Bechafen and Jacobus van der Tricht of Marienburg, prepared by Alexios Vement for the Averheim University Press in the year of Holy Sigmar 2419
The Empire, our mighty state forged at the dawn of history by Holy Sigmar from the twelve tribes of man, was never destined to last. For while Sigmar himself was able to control the tribal chiefs who would one day be known as Elector Counts, future Emperors were to find the task next to impossible. For centuries, Sigmar's Empire endured as a collection of independent (and often warring) territories, watched over by a mostly impotent Emperor.
But even this situation could not continue forever. Electoral and religious disputes led to war on a scale that had not been seen before, and to the foundation of first two, then three, then finally four, separate and antagonistic Empires. Only with the coming of the Blessed Magnus, at our darkest hour, would The Empire be restored. Yet in the times I write of the people had no knowledge of what was to come, and for many hundreds of lifetimes they saw the false Emperors make war, and so despaired.
On Empires and Emperors
Each of these Emperors claimed to be only legitimate heir to the throne of Sigmar. To each, their rival claimants were variously traitors and heretics. Yet as none of the 'Emperors' had been both elected by free and fair decision of their peers and crowned by the serving High Priest of Ulric or Sigmar, not one of them possessed even the shadow of a true claim. In the eyes of Holy Sigmar and Father Ulric, the Imperial Throne stood vacant.
Thus, in describing them, I could fairly call each claimant 'Emperor,' and the lands they ruled 'The Empire.' I have therefore retained the following naming conventions:
- The Emperor in Talabheim is the Otillia or the Otillian Emperor, and rules the Otillian Empire.
- The Emperor in Middenheim is the Emperor of Middenland or the Wolf-Emperor, and rules the Empire of Middenland or the Empire of Wolves.
- The Emperor in Marienburg is at times the Emperor of Marienburg, and at others the Emperor of Averland and Marienburg, with an empire named likewise.
- The Emperor in Altdorf is called the Sigmarite Emperor, and the empire named likewise.
The False God and the Wolf: The Otillian Empire, Ostermark and the Kislev connection
First to claim the title of Emperor without election was the Countess Otillia of Talabecland. A series of bitter wars had resulted in a feud between the states of Stirland and Talabecland, and Stirland's victory in the Imperial election of 1359 was the final insult. Small wonder that Otillia was so receptive to the Ar-Ulric, when he came to her with his fabricated evidence.
The Ar-Ulric had discovered proof that the Cult of Sigmar had been created by liars and demon-worshippers. The founder of the Cult was a man who later admitted (or so the Ar-Ulric's documents claimed) to have been a demonologist and a heretic. Here, at last, was a weapon for the resentful Ulrican clergy to use against the upstart Cult of the First Emperor. Here also was the excuse Otillia needed. Backed by the Ar-Ulric, she declared herself the rightful Empress, under Ulric the Father of All, and in so doing removed her province of Talabecland from Sigmar's Empire. Talabheim became the new headquarters of the Cult of Ulric.
In Otillia's domain, the Cult of Sigmar was suppressed with a determination that was as stubborn as it was bloody. Otillia's soldiers, under the direction of Ulrican priests, tortured and executed thousands of Sigmar's faithful, at times burning entire villages to the ground. In response, The Grand Theogonist of the Cult of Sigmar called for crusade against Talabecland. War after war followed.
So it continued. Otillia died and was succeeded by her daughter - who assumed the name Otillia as a mark of respect. Over time, passing by hereditary succession with female heirs taking precedence, this became the title carried by the Emperor of Talabecland and Talabheim: the Otillian Empire. In 1547, the Ar-Ulric moved the centre of Ulric’s Cult back to Middenheim, and at the same time the Elector of Middenland declared himself Emperor. The Age of Three Emperors had begun. The Otillian Empire waxed and waned in size over the years, yet it prospered and endured.
In 2146, the Otillian Empire became involved in the brief but bloody struggle over ownership of the province of Ostermark. Under the able command of Marshall Huppert Gernot, the Otillians secured the capital city of Bechafen and much of the surrounding area. With Stirland routed and the Middenlanders withdrawing upon the sudden death of Severin I to elect their new Emperor, only Kniaz Makari's Kislevites remained a serious challenge to Otillian domination.
The Otillia’s Ostermark campaign was more successful than she could have hoped. And yet, despite the pleas of her advisors, she could not tolerate the presence of large numbers of Sigmarites in her new possession. Empress Reinhilde sent Inquisitor-General Treitzsaur to Ostermark, with a mandate to convert every Sigmarite by one means or another. When his efforts were frustrated by Gernot, she recalled the Marshall under the pretext of defending the border with Middenland.
These actions were to cost the Otillia dearly. Treitzaur’s ‘spiritual crusade’ cost thousands of lives: not only those who were executed by the inquisition, but also those who were killed in the violent uprising that followed, and the many more who died from hunger and exposure during that terrible winter after they were forced from their homes. For weeks, Reinhilde refused to concede, spending yet more lives for the sake of her dignity. But at last she was forced to meet with the rebels, and at the so-called Diet of Bechafen in 2148 agreed to crown the Gräfin Helena as Elector Countess of Ostermark. Shortly afterward, Tzarina Tamara of Kislev persuaded the Otillia to allow Makari and Helena to marry, thus creating an understanding between Kislev and the Otillian Empire that remains strong to this day.
The terms of the agreement with the rebels also guaranteed the right of free worship for the Ostermarkers, and it was this concession that cut the Otillia most deeply. Even though Ostermark remained a vassal state of the Otillian Empire, Reinhilde could not view the situation as anything but a failure. When at last she died, in her bed at the age of eighty-three, her last words were to declare the toleration of the Sigmarite cult within her Empire to be the only regret of her long reign.
The Diet of Bechafen was to set in motion the eventual collapse of the Otillian state. Reinhilde's concessions in Ostermark weakened her iron grip on her own people. The demand for workers to aid in the reconstruction of Ostermark caused a manpower shortage in Talabecland, overcome only when a large number of Kislevites were encourage to immigrate. This change in the demographics of the population, together with the improved trading links with Kislev, brought new ideas to the Otillian Empire that overcame centuries of isolation. To begin with, this gradually increasing liberalisation came alongside military successes. Marshal Gernot's assault on the Empire of Middenland in 2152 increased Otillian holdings by nearly ten percent. In 2160, Otillian troops broke the Middenland forces in Nordland and helped to retake Salzenmund.
Yet by 2165 the tide had turned. Middenland, under yet another new Emperor, declared an end to its own toleration of the Cult of Sigmar. Buoyed up by new-found religious fervour, the Middenlanders retook their lost lands, swallowing up Hochland and Ostland in the process. As the power of the Otillian army waned, the Cult of Sigmar began to grow in Talabecland.
In 2190, the new Otillia declared a formal end to the persecution of Sigmarites. The announcement caused spontaneous rioting across the Otillian Empire. and resulted in the desertion of many of the most devoted Ulrican priests, knights and noblemen to the Empire of Middenland.
The Empire of Talabecland had been founded as an absolute monarchy, but the personality cult centred around Otillia herself was already in evidence when the first Empress died. Her crown was passed to her daughter, and thereafter, the Otillian throne was always the birthright of the eldest daughter, a unique example (in Sigmar's Empire at least) of female precedence. When the Ar-Ulricate retired from Talabheim to Middenheim in 1547, the Otillia assumed the title of 'Consort of Ulric,' and with it the primacy of the Cult of Ulric within Otillian lands. Thereafter, the Otillia was to be a focus of religious devotion, a living connection to Ulric, the Father of All.
By 2201, The Otillian Empire was a shadow of its former self. The Otillia ruled with the consent of an assembly of priests, guildmasters and lords that was similar in many ways to Marienburg’s ruling council. Emperor Marius V was both loved and hated by his subjects. Ostermark, ruled by Gabriela Steinhardt, the daughter of the Gräfin Helena, had become comparatively prosperous. Its workshops and foundries produced weapons for the Otillian armies, while its soldiers served alongside them as equals. Kislev, meanwhile, remained a collection of independent principalities under the nominal rule of Tzar Dmitri, a weak man who could do little to calm his squabbling nobles.
Winter's Dominion: The Empire of Middenland, Hochland and Ostland
The Imperial election in 1547 was to prove just as disastrous as that of 1359. The Grand Duke of Middenland had been led to believe that he would be the next Emperor, but instead found his life threatened by Sigmarist thugs when he attempted to cast his vote. Driven back to Middenheim, the enraged Grand Duke declared the holy elections a vile Sigmarite lie, and proclaimed himself the true and rightful Emperor.
Shortly afterward, the new Emperor of Middenland convinced the serving Ar-Ulric to depart from the Otillian Empire and renew Middenheim’s position as the centre of the Cult of Ulric. The Otillia replied by declaring herself the ‘Consort of Ulric,’ and excommunicating the Ar-Ulric and the entire Empire of Middenland.
The Emperor of Middenland was anxious to prove that he was no usurping tyrant, and to do so he instituted a new Electoral Assembly. To fifteen prominent nobles and clergymen of Middenland he granted electoral votes, held as proxies for the treacherous Elector Counts of the other provinces. These ‘Proxy-Electors’ immediately voted to legitimise the rule of the new Emperor.
Later Emperors used their powers to revise the Electoral Assembly, altering the weighting of the various proxy-votes, and even creating new Electors. In each case this was done to cement their own power, and to clear the way for their sons to succeed them on the throne. Yet these rampant displays of favouritism fed into the natural rivalries of the Middenland nobility. Again and again, the Empire of Middenland collapsed into brutal civil war.
In 2086, the young Emperor Severin I took the throne. He was a foolish and headstrong boy, and quite unable to control his new dominion. In 2100, he was almost killed by Otillian assassins during the Battle of Four Armies, and subsequently lay for many months in a deep sleep.
When he emerged from that sleep, Severin was a changed man. He reformed the Electoral system, removing the system of unequal weighting of votes and creating enough new Electors to balance the Electoral Assembly in a way that had never been achieved before. Under his leadership, the Empire of Middenland ceased to tear at its own body, and began at last to prosper.
In his last years, Severin’s mind drifted away from him. In 2146, he was steered into an alliance with the rogue prince Makari of Rahkov, and thence into war in Ostermark. Middenland’s attempt to gain control of Ostermark was ultimately a failure, giving lasting benefit only to their Kislevite allies. By 2148, Severin was dead. The Middenland Electors were unable to agree on a successor, and civil war began.
It was in 2151 that the former commander of the Middenland forces in Ostermark, Herzog Adalbert Richter, finally overcame his rivals and crowned himself Emperor Adalbert IV. The new Emperor was a cruel and petty man. His reign saw the end of Middenland’s long alliance with Nordland, and the commencement of a bitter war that still continues to this day. Middenland invaded Nordland, killing its Elector and seizing its Runefang at the third siege of Salzenmund. Adalbert’s assassination in 2157 brought a brief respite, but the next Emperor was to renew the attack. Salzenmund fell the following year.
In 2160, Nordland’s salvation arrived in the form of Otillian and Kislevite troops. The allied forces retook Salzenmund and drove the Middenlanders back. The defeat caused waves of panic to spread throughout Middenland. The belief in the invincibility of the Empire, forged during the reign of Severin the Great, disappeared: taking its place was a new-found religious fanaticism.
In 2165 the Emperor banned the Cult of Sigmar throughout his lands. That same year, Middenland soldiers ranged deep into Otillian territory, the standard of the White Wolf moving always before them. Hochland was absorbed by 2169, Ostland by 2175. The Empire of Middenland had become great once more.
2190 saw Emperor Marius V of the Otillian Empire proclaim an end to the persecution of the Cult of Sigmar within his lands. The result was an influx of devout Ulricans, especially priests and knights, into Middenland. First to take advantage of the situation was the young Proxy-Elector for Wissenland, Baron Titus of Delberz. Borrowing heavily from Marienburg’s merchant families, Titus assembled a large army of fervent Ulricanists. Swiftly gaining control of Middenheim, largely through bribery, the baron proclaimed himself Ulric’s chosen, appending the name of Middenheim’s legendary founder to his own. Emperor Titus-Artur I lost no time in creating twelve new Electors, all of them leading Ulrican priests. At the vote to confirm his office, thirty-four of the forty Electors gave Titus-Artur their support. Winter that year was fearful indeed: a sure sign of Ulric’s favour.
War with the North: Middenland and Norsca
Titus-Artur began a massive program of construction, regenerating the towns and cities of his empire with fine new public buildings (paying particular attention to Middenheim itself, and to Carroburg, home of his summer court). To fund this, he borrowed more and more money from Marienburg, and pushed for continual expansion of the Empire of Middenland into profitable new territories.
A fresh opportunity came from the north. The Norscans had always been a threat to the costal regions, especially to Marienburg. Now the Empire of Middenland had a substantial coast of its own, made up of land that had once belonged to Nordland. Several years of sporadic raiding led to a huge invasion in 2198 led by Thialfi Swiftaxe, uniter of the southern Norse. The Norse overcame two hastily-assembled armies sent against them, but were themselves defeated by an outnumbered army commanded by the Grandmaster of the Knights of the White Wolf, a brilliant general by the name of Lucius Wolfram. Wolfram himself slew the Norse Chieftan, thus delivering to Titus-Artur the overlordship of the southern Norscan tribes.
But Titus-Artur feared Wolfram's new-found fame and influence, and refused to reward him as was expected. Instead, he sent the Grandmaster to defend the Otillian border, appointing his most loyal courtiers as his liaisons to the Norse (appointments which would inevitably bring with them great riches).
This ungrateful move was a serious blow to the Emperor's popularity. A month later he had been poisoned, seemingly by Werner von Feuchtwangen, one of the new Electors he had himself created. Although Titus-Artur survived, he did so only at the cost of his physical strength. Thereafter, the Emperor trusted no one, commissioning an elite body of Norse Guardsmen to protect him at all times.
