Mália
From Almeopedia
Mália [ˈma li ja], Caď. Malia, was one of the most unusual Caďinorian rulers, rising from a Naviu warrior to found the Dascoro dynasty.
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Youth
Mália was born around 2578 (the exact date is unknown), to a tribe known as the Küret (‘lions’) who had been hired away from the Gelyet and given lands in southern Eärdur province by Fidra, empress of the Cteranei dynasty. (When we hear of the Küret again their home is in the south of the Barbarian Plain; it's not clear if these were the same people or not.)
While women led a despised and highly restricted life among the Caďinorians, they were well respected among the Naviu, and were as familiar with riding and warfare as the men, though their skills were usually used for defense. Mália, described as ambitious from a young age, not only rode with the men but clamored to serve in Caďinorian operations, fighting the Gelyet; she took the opportunity to observe the Caďinorian ways of war as well as to learn Caďinor. She was recognized as an adept of the tałavrazika, the ‘fire ancestor’ or war spirit, and thus exempt from marriage; by the age of 18 she was an experienced fighter and troop leader.
She was later described as a 'princess', but this is misleading. The Küret had no hereditary leaders, though some clans, like hers, were more prestigious. Like the Gelyet, they chose their leaders with competitive games (käpinit). Women could compete in the käpinz, but rarely did, as the men were stronger. But Mália insisted on entering the käpinz of 2599, and won six of nine contests, excelling in archery, swordsmanship, running, riding, stallion busting, and endurance, but failing wrestling, spear throwing, and weightlifting. The latter events were won by two separate men; she offered to marry the man who had won two events, but he refused, saying that he feared she would kill him in order to be uncontested ruler. However, the elders were satisfied and named her anära or leader of the tribe.
The path to the throne
As anära of the Küret serving in the Caďinorian army, she was equivalent to a tiedectescrion, which we may roughly equate to a colonel. She was fortunate to have a Caďinorian commander, one Aerlupeȟ, who recognized her abilities and her knowledge of nomad ways, and helped her to understand Caďinorian society and politics. Aerlupeȟ’s army won a series of battles with the Gelyet, and when Aerlupeȟ was killed in the last of these (2604), she took over as general.
Hers was the only one of the six Caďinorian armies that could boast such a record. The emperor Andona, Fidra’s son, had reconquered the upper Svetla from the barbarians; but her son Erbelaica V lost most of the recovered territory— Aerlupeȟ’s last battle was a last-ditch defense of Aránicer. Erbelaica was widely viewed as incompetent, and in 2605 his own family deposed him in favor of his brother Aertund II. Aertund was no smarter than his brother, but was said to have a great interest in strategy. His great idea was to ally with the Somoyi, old enemies of the Gelyet. Though this resulted in an advance on the upper Eärdur, including the recapture of Ožnëa, the Somoyi objected to the small rewards they were given, and occupied Šerian province in revenge, dividing Ctesifon from the sea. Aertund brought Mália’s army to fight them; this left Aránicer vulnerable and the next year it was lost.
Mália fought the Somoyi to a draw, and was called back south to rescue the situation there. She recaptured Aránicer and was ordered to continue to the east. Instead, she persuaded two of the other generals to join her in marching on Ctesifon.
One army was stationed in the central provinces, and it offered only sporadic resistance, despite the increasing panic of Aertund and other nobles. Mália occupied the city in 2609 and imprisoned both Aertund and Erbelaica. Her soldiers were already calling her atrabeis, but she did not yet assume the title, only maintained order and avoided measures that would alarm the nobility or the people: she was not a conqueror or a revolutionary, she said, but a restorer of Caďinorian glory and tradition, like Irun.
Late in the year one of the other generals, Zulbes, also marched on Ctesifon, not to rescue Aertund but to put himself forward as a candidate. But Mália had the loyalty of four of the six armies now, and she brought all of them to meet Zulbes. Seeing the odds, Zulbes surrendered. The next year Mália allowed a delegation of nobles to approach and beg her to become atrabeis, and she accepted.
Reign
Mália spent much of her reign fighting the Gelyet and the Somoyi. She succeeded in reconquering southern Eärdur province and the upper Svetla, but she was unable to make much headway in Šerian, possibly because the Somoyi ways of fighting were different from the Naviu: less cavalry attacks, more hit-and-run pillaging and terrorizing.
She was already in her thirties when she became empress, and realized that if she wanted to establish a dynasty rather than simply rule as a soldier or usurper, she had to produce an heir. The trick was finding a consort who would add respectability but wouldn’t expect to rule. Her solution was to marry a priest of Enäron, Fantiosu Dascoro, second son of the duke of Tasurcaln. This was just the ticket: he was a solid old Caďinorian of an ancient family, but there was a prejudice against priests wielding political power. She bore a son, Murazón, in 2613.
Soldier-emperors were accepted as a necessity by now— opinion had turned against the Cteranei dynasty precisely because it lost martial vigor. And neither of the previous dynasties, the Banda and the Cteranei, had been Ctesifoni. But Mália was a barbarian, for Enäron’s sake, and a woman, and she faced plenty of opposition. She had learned early, as a teenager, how to eat and dress in the Caďinorian way. But her heritage was visible in more subtle ways: in her skin color, her way of walking (formed by years of horse-riding), her lack of a classical education, her restlessness at aristocratic parties. She got along very well with soldiers and tolerably with noblemen, but Caďinorian women could not relate to her, and northerners (such as those of Verduria city) detested her.
Though she never hid her descent and remained close to the Küret she had commanded, she embraced and tirelessly promoted Caďinorian culture and religion. She patronized the arts and the courts, built public works, and detailed soldiers to accompany merchant caravans to protect trade. She named her husband perař of Ctesifon and encouraged him to revitalize pagan temples and seminaries. In all these areas she outdid the later Cteranei emperors, who tended toward laxness and corruption.
Legacy
Most importantly, perhaps, she raised her son as a Caďinorian. He grew up in a palace in Ctesifon, not a camp in the wild, and had the thorough Caďinorian education she lacked. Taking the long view, her gambit worked: the Dascoro dynasty— her name is her husband’s— was accepted as a Caďinorian dynasty, and its founder as unusual rather than foreign. Patriotic histories, for instance, don’t call her a barbarian, and emphasize that the Küret were legally imperial citizens.
On the other hand, the Dascoroi were the last Caďinorian dynasty. Though Mália can hardly be blamed for events two centuries later, she is sometimes criticized for contributing to the increasing independence of the nobility from the state. She certainly didn’t start this trend, but she also didn’t counteract it— the easiest way to gain acceptance from the nobles, after all, was to leave them alone. If she concentrated on architecture, religion, and art rather than firm central authority, this was Caďinorian tradition: culture was what was held to distinguish the Caďinorians from the barbarians.
In her time the newly reconquered areas were directly ruled by the army. It was her grandson Mëradul 2e who converted military governors into new nobles— reducing the region’s administrative burden on Ctesifon but also its loyalty.
| Preceded by: Aertund II | Mália 2610-37 | Succeeded by: Murazón |
