Tomao
From Almeopedia
Tomao [to ˈma o] was King of Verduria from 3241 to 3264, the first king of the Eleďe dynasty, best known for ending the rule of the wizard king Utu-On.
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The fall of the wizard king
Tomao was born in 3207 in his father’s barony of Arostrana, on the seacoast opposite Verduria city. The family (named Ihtüec) was old and respectable, but two centuries back had converted to Eleďát. Tomao was warned early on that he would be scrutinized closely in public life as an Eleďe, and in Eleďe life as a noble, and must be unassailable in both realms. He very nearly was; as a noble and (briefly) an officer in the army, he had an air of command and expected obedience; but this was combined with an unusual tact.
When his father Savel died in 3225 he became baron, and also took on his father’s position as kešoro (steward) of the kešana of Arcaln. He immersed himself into the affairs of the Mažtan-Kal, the City Forum, where he achieved a reputation for outspoken criticism of the city and royal government. Utu-On, though he kept a tight reign on all sources of power, tolerated the Kal— “The sparrows chatter interminably, but never overthrow the cat,” he is said to have remarked.
Tomao was named lord of the Kal in 3238, and increasingly tested the limits of Utu-On’s patience. Under his lordship, the Kal became a continuous debate on the inadequacy of the government. He was careful not to critize the wizard directly; but behind closed doors, especially among fellow Eleďi, he maintained that Eleď wished the overthrow of the king. His speeches coincided with (and partially inspired) a rash of civil disobedience across the kingdom, from insulting graffiti to nobles throwing agents of Utu-On off their estates, to rioting mobs.
In cuéndimar of 3241, Tomao called for the courts to reject laws not approved by the Esčambra. This was an unusual legal claim (and forgotten later), but effective propaganda, highlighting the fact that the Esčambra had not been allowed to convene for twenty years. Nonetheless, Utu-On had had enough. He had Tomao arrested as he spoke in the Kal, imposed a curfew, and declared that he would put an end to this epidemic of treason.
The revolution
Though Utu-On had executed many a rebel in secret, he now decided on a full show trial to make an example of this upstart. For three days his prosecutors raged against Tomao, bound and gagged; the court was full, as indeed was the Lagana Rafát outside. On the third day Tomao was given the chance to “recant and repent”; he took the opportunity instead to deliver a passionate oration, the finest incitement to riot ever heard in the High Court.
“You are no agent of the King,” he told the judge. “There is no King, only a dank usurper and sorceror who has placed himself on a throne still wet with the blood of the lawful monarch. Bring me here a true King, chosen of the Electors and father to his people, and you will find me the loyallest of subjects. But under God, I owe nothing but defiance to a tyrant.”
He was not shut up for nearly twenty minutes before he was forcibly silenced— enough to send the courtroom into a furor, and the crowd outside into a near-riot. The Wizard King decided that only an immediate execution could save the day. But when the people saw the gibbet erected in the Lagana Rafát, the army could no longer restrain them. When Tomao appeared, they overwhelmed his guards, tore down the gibbet, and stormed the High Court itself. Tomao led the crowd to besiege the wizard’s palace (now the Mažtansäte).
There he was approached by belgosanno Anglavo, commander of Arcaln, who pledged his support. With the defection of Anglavo, Utu-On’s troubles became serious. The army was untrustworthy or actually against him; the city was in riot. His magic was useless against Arcaln, protected by powers older and stronger than his own. He sulked, blustered, and sent out his secret police and his sorcerors, but left Arcaln undisturbed for ten days.
Tomao was busy during this time; using both noble and Eleďe contacts, as well as Anglavo’s military resources, he summoned the Esčambra to Arcaln. When a quorum had arrived and deliberated, on 5 vlerëi 3241, they proclaimed Tomao King.
In soberer times this action generated some controversy; Mëranac 1e maintained that it was illegal: the Esčambra could not possibly have assembled quickly enough, and meeting in an unaccustomed place it was unable to consult its records or follow its own rules. At the time there were no complaints; and Tomao’s accession was later ratified by the whole Esčambra in its own chambers.
Tomao rode out of Arcaln with Anglavo’s garrison, intending to meet the garrison at Pelym. He never made it; the crowds slowed him so much that it took him four hours to reach the Prosia Daluë. The next day the Pelym garrison arrived and joined him; the whole force, perhaps five thousand men, accompanied by tens of thousands of citizens, marched on the wizard king’s palace to besiege it.
There, they were discomfited by a giant image of Utu-On which stood on the Mažtan-Lagana. Tomao didn’t waver, but charged into the palace, followed by the army. The image broke as the wizard lost his concentration. Within ten minutes he had lost his life as well. Stories conflict as to his exact end: murdered by an aide, or by his own hand, or cut down by an arrow fired from the Lagana, or destroyed in an alchemical explosion as he followed dark arts to save his rule.
Approximately three hundred of the wizard’s retainers and sorcerors were killed during the assault on the palace, to about a hundred of the attackers. Another hundred of the wizard’s most corrupt or oppressive officials were later tried and executed. It was a remarkably bloodless end to the Gray Years.
Early actions
The ending of a tyranny is a troubling time; long-repressed groups and passions rise up, and some seems to find new freedom only an excuse for seeking power; sometimes the stability of the fallen despotism seems preferable to the current chaos. The first two years of Tomao’s reign were tumultous, but wisely managed.
Tomao’s method was to seek consensus before a decision, but then to make it quickly, and allow no reconsiderations. His first act, then, was to establish the health and position of Verduria's consultative bodies, the Esčambra, the Kal, and the Konselora (his personal council). The Esčambra, indeed, sat for two years almost without interruption, considering Tomao’s reforms and some of its own. (One of the latter was a bill that required the Esčambra to meet at least once every four years.)
“I have heard many men oppose the policies of the King, but only the devil could oppose the man,” commented Šm Ihano Debere. Even hostile visitors often came away from his presence charmed, if not won over. Mëranac 1e put it as harshly as he could, but can hardly avoid praising with faint damns: “A black spell difficult to dissever hung about him. Men did his will, whatever course they had set themselves beforehand; not only the masses but the most refined peers fell under his persuasion, finding themselves opposing their own policy, without cavil.”
Tomao removed curbs on free travel and free speech, appointed judges to get the court system working again, and rooted out supporters of Utu from the government and army.
He also disestablished Caďinorian paganism as the state religion— the action which has earned the contempt of so many conservative pagans, and indeed dissipated some of the goodwill created by the rebellion. He kept pagan priests out of his government, ended royal participation in temple rites, ended some (but not all) subsidies of temples and monasteries, and above all guaranteed religious freedom, not only for his own Eleďi brethren, but for foreign beliefs such as Irreanism and Endajué. Even atheism was a protected option. He took the title Reďreo Iáinei “Minister of Iáinos” and appointed many Eleďi to key posts, but (despite many pagan accusations) made no other moves to show government favor to Eleďát. In any case Eleďi were still too small a minority to form a ruling class, at least in a parliamentary monarchy.
He did make two major reforms dictated by his faith. First, in 3243, he abolished slavery, and indeed decreed that any slave touching Verdurian soil would be freed. Slavery had always been permitted under Caďinorian law, but was not widespread; the chief uses of slaves were as servants in noble houses, and as cheap labor for mining and manufacturing. (It was conventional wisdom that slaves made bad peasants.) Some nobles grumbled, but public opinion had been drifting away from the approval of slavery anyway. The manufacturers were angrier, protesting that they would be driven out of business. Perhaps some did, but the rest adapted, finding other ways to economize. The savviest operators began to seek methods to use machines to do simple repetitive tasks.
Tomao’s other major reform was to prohibit all forms of interest (nogačia), which was a great evil in Eleďe eyes. This decree was more controversial; extortionate usury was common in the Dark Years, but was seen as a thing of the past. A rate of 10% or so was considered fair.
However, the Verdurian monetary system was young yet, and adapted. The usual expedient was to give a kela, a stake or partnership in an enterprise. A brokerage would take a stake in a new business (or in an estate) as the condition for giving a loan. Someone with a large savings account would similarly become a partner in the brokerage, and receive a share of its profits. The system worked well enough that Verdurian brokerages remained competitive with Kebreni banks, which continued to offer loans and mortgages with interest.
Suns and Acorns
In addition to reviving the court system, Tomao appointed governors (sažuroi) for each province, and prefects (esarî) for each district. Under both Caďinorian and Verdurian law, nobles derived their authority from the king. The nobles, however, were used to the feudal practice, in which they owed certain services to the king, but so long as they fulfilled those could rule their estates absolutely. They were glad to be rid of Utu-On, whose demands were exorbitant, but they did not really want royal interference in their affairs instead.
A galvanizing issue was the case of Yanil Cunr, count of Isyae in Zeir, in 3251. Isyae put his physician to death, on the grounds that he was responsible for the death of all three of his sons. Somewhat to his surprise, he was arrested by the local esar— a mere viscount— and tried for murder. There was no doubt of his guilt, and under the law his title and estate was forfeit. He was sentenced to a year in prison, and his estate was given to a relative.
The Zeiri bloc in the Esčambra voted to impeach the esar (which it did not have the right to do) and summoned the King’s High Justice for a formal inquiry (which it did). The King’s opponents professed to despise Isyae’s action, but were offended that a royal court should interfere in his affairs— was it not outrageous enough that the doctor had failed to cure all three sons’ illness, if he had not actually killed them with his treatments? The royalists, of course, responded that Isyae had the right to sue his physician, but not to murder him.
The royal party— which was larger— became known as the Suns (Ënomaî); the name comes from a speech by the marquis of Nof, who declared that “to oppose the lawful authority of our King is as to challenge the Sun, embracing instead darkness, error, and misery.” The opposing party was known as the Acorns (Čunidoi), perhaps from a royalist taunt about “acorns rejecting the oak”, perhaps from the coat of arms of Belnear Culán, the marquis of Irvesi, who however was only an indifferent Acorn.
When the Isyae case lost its interest, the Acorns gathered instead around Ořeon Badbec, duke of Pelym. Pelymei made the interesting claim that the kingship of Verduria belonged to the duchy of Pelym; there were various grounds for this (it was even called so Donul aďië, the Divine Gift), but it mostly rested on the fact that the Soley monarchs were dukes of Pelym. There was, as even Mëranac 1e would conclude, absolutely no case for this— this was not how the Verdurian succession worked; the Badbecî were not even the descendents of the Soleî; Pelymei’s father had cast his biyeta for Tomao. Nonetheless, it was good enough for the Acorns, and the coffeehouses of Verduria echoed with constitutional debates.
Tomao refused to even address the matter, and the Suns kept the Esčambra from even inquiring into it. In 3257 Pelymei decided on the direct approach: he hired assassins to kill the baron of Bilmán, the leader of the Suns, and to kidnap Tomao. The assassins sent after Bilmán succeeded but were apprehended by Bilmán’s guards; the kidnappers were caught in the Palace, and told all. Tomao had the Esčambra itself conduct Pelymei’s trial for murder and treason. (Pelymei was in fact helped to escape; but he fled to Ismahi, whose ruler handed him back to Tomao. Pelymei was convicted by the Esčambra and executed; his estate was forfeit to the King, but Tomao simply gave it to Ořeon’s cousin— a royalist.)
The incident effectively demolished the Acorn movement. “The Esčambra suspects, and the public believes, that we are simply apologists for murderers,” complained Culán. In any case, even the slowest Acorns could see that there was no future in a return to the Dark Years. The real action was elsewhere: Verduria was becoming rich.
The Eleďe renaissance
Held back under the Wizard Kings, commerce, sea trade, and manufacturing boomed under Tomao and his successors. Verdurian ships reached Uytai and Téllinor for the first time; one even crossed the Zone of Fire and returned. An embassy was established in Moreo Ašcai in 3263, and in Xurno ten years later.
Merchants began combining their resources to undertake enterprises beyond the means of an individual. The Menla-Vesi Canal was begun by a consortium under royal charter in 3245. Northern Kingdoms Trading Company launched its first ships in 3250, leading to the Cumbutát and Saran Celdonin, the Eastern Trade Company, which for decades enjoyed a monopoly on trade with Uytai. And a host of less glamorous enterprises sprang up: brokerages, house builders, brewers, shipwrights.
Printing had been invented in Érenat nearly a century before, by Adriano Boďmorey, but the Wizard Kings had outlawed it. In 3242 Tomao granted a royal charter to Ikobo Mirtíy, an Avélan immigrant, to open the first printing press in Verduria. It was a great success, and spawned imitators: by the end of the century the kingdom boasted more than a hundred printing shops.
The Eleďe church grew enormously from Tomao’s reign onward; if Eleďi numbered perhaps 1 in 20 Verdurians at the beginning of his reign, the ratio was perhaps 1 in 6 by the accession of Mëranac 1e. Tomao treated the pagans and Eleďi with scrupulous fairness, but this in itself was a great advance for the Eleďi; and it seemed to many that the explosion of prosperity and inquiry under his rule must be due to the doctrines of Eleďát.
The Almean scientific method, the žuysë onteca, flourished under the dynasty. Ironically, the Eleďi themselves were thoroughgoing spiritualists who distrusted the rationalism of the savants; the new scientists descend from the tradition of natural philosophy (kestora) of Caďinorian paganism. But the pagans’ loss of political power removed restraints on free expression, and printing allowed new ideas to disseminate with unprecedented rapidity.
Seeds of trouble
These developments were not universally welcomed. The nobles and landed gentry especially in the south did not share in the new prosperity— if anything they declined, as peace in southern Eretald made nations like the Confederacy of Svetla exporters rather than importers of grain, and thus rivals rather than customers. To them the new enterprises were impudent upstarts whose steadily growing power could only alarm. Gold from Arcél and the Little Kingdoms caused inflation, which reduced the value of their stored gold. As well, a more efficient state must eventually conflict with the nobles’ desire for absolute control over their own estates.
Verduria’s growing trade also, it became clear, set it on a collision course with Kebri. Kebri had a head start on the sea trade; its response to Verdurian competition was to make its trading agreements exclusive where possible, close its own ports to Verdurians, and subsidize privateers to disrupt Verdurian shipping. The Verdurians paid for their own pirates, and started building up a navy, but they could not match the Kebreni in number of ships, in naval experience, and in shipbuilding. Ismahi as well felt threatened by Verdurian power; Flora and Érenat by contrast were inclined to cooperate.
Tomao’s end
Tomao’s one mistake, according to a friendly historian, was to die. He died of sudden stroke in 3264, at the age of 57. His two children were teenagers, the eldest was a girl, and neither was popular. The Esčambra faced a difficult decision; and no possible choice seemed to be of the scale of Tomao.
See also
(Example 2) Debere discusses the ‘Divine Gift’
| Preceded by: Utu-On | Tomao 3241-64 | Succeeded by: Ihano |
