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Help[Games] Edited with story and pictures.
in reply to a message by avalon
Nation: Cussia
DH [71]: His Royal Highness Klaus Benedikt von Shriek IV, King of Cussia, Duke of Barria and Westphalia
DW [48]: Her Royal Highness Anna Luisa Mafalda Benedetta Margarazzi, Queen Regent of Cussia, Duchess of Marvalia
--DS [24]: His Royal Highess Philipp von Shriek, Crown Prince of Cussia, Heir Apparent of Barria
----DW [19]: Her Royal Highness Felicia Verusha Valentina di Renaldi, Crown Princess of Cussia, Princess of Doloria
----DS [2]: His Highness Rudolf Adalbert von Shriek, Lord of Cussia
--DD [deceased]: Her Royal Highness Anna Mafalda Cecilia Katarina von Shriek, Princess of Cussia
--DS [20]: His Royal Highness Heinrich Klaus Cosimo von Shriek, Prince of Cussia, Heir Apparent of Westphalia
----DW [17]: Magali Brigitte Isabel du Comtois, princess of Laileaux
--DD [19]: Her Imperial Highness Maria Amalia Katarina Isabella von Shriek, Heiress Apparent to Nordskovic, Princess of Cussia
----DH [24]: His Imperial Highness Nikolai Benedikt Konstantin Viktor Kozlov, Heir Apparent to Nordskovic
----DS [2]: His Imperial Highness Ivan Nikolai Fyodor Dmitry Alexei Smerdyakov, Beloved of Nordskovic
--DD [17]: Her Royal Highness Christina Benetta Friedrike von Shriek, princess of Cussia
----DH [20]: Konstantin Domonik Marcovic, prince of Sokolov
--DS [deceased]: His Royal Highness Wilhelm Klaus Cosimo von Shriek, Prince of Cussia
--DD [14]: Her Royal Highness Katarina Walburga Anna Luisa von Shriek, Princess of Cussia
--DS [11]: His Royal Highness Franz Ignaz von Shriek, Prince of Cussia
Cussia was settled by tribal people known as the Kosshans for hundreds of years, but was conquered and civilized during the Vivarian invasions of the 900's. Once the Vivarians withdrew their occupation in 1121, the Cussians (Vivarian-influenced spelling) were left with a vacuum of power. Gradually, a feudal system emerged, along with an elaborate system of civil customs and constructs that give Cussia a distinct blend of tribal and Vivarian traditions. The King is the highest lord in the land. Under him are Lords, Dukes, Marquesses, Counts, Earls, and Barons. Serfs work the land and Knights fight for it. The religion, while it has many of the pagan characteristics of old Kosshan religions such as celebrating major feasts at the solstices, is nominally the same church of the Vivarians, and the clergy are part of the network of that church. Consequently, clergy are exempt from fiefdom and therefore from taxation.
The von Shriek family has been in power for about 350 years at this point. They got there by dynastic strategy: a von Shriek daughter married the only son of the Kasselmark heir. They make their residency in the capital city of Frienne, a walled city with a lovely lovely river in it.
Klaus's marriage with Anna Luisa was the result of a happy coincidence. The King's spiritual advisor Father Luigi had had a dream in which the Holy Spirit spoke to him of a beautiful maiden in Westphalia, a Cussian duchy. Also in which Malcolm's dad was elected homecoming queen and wore this gorgeous blue dress similar to the one Lily wore last year. Klaus, whose seven previous fiancees had all died in completely blameless accidents or sicknesses before he could marry them, had been convinced that his marriage prospects were cursed by God, so this vision intrigued him and he went to Westphalia immediately. His other advisors were skeptical because there were no marriage-age women among the Westphalian nobility at that point, but upon the royal party's arrival they found that Anna Luisa was attending the wedding of the Marquess of North Westphalia, Sir Philipp, to her elder sister Maria. Anna Luisa was by far the more beautiful and well-mannered of the sisters, and Klaus knew immediately that this must be the maiden of Father Luigi's dream. (Father Luigi was the skeptical one at this point; the girl in his vision had had red hair and a portly physique, but he agreed eventually that these features may have been symbolic for her passion and prosperity.) Klaus quickly cancelled the wedding of Philipp and Maria, as their marriage would have made the King too closely related to Anna Luisa for church-sanctioned marriage, and married the befuddled Anna Luisa the same day, using the same preparations that had been arranged for Philipp and Maria. She didn't speak a word of Cussian, but eventually grasped the general concept that she was married to a King, and this idea pleased her. Klaus adored Anna Luisa and pampered her to the best of his struggling country's ability.
Ten years later, the royal couple had produced five healthy children. King Klaus was quite convinced that his marriage had indeed been blessed by God, as very few couples had such a high survival rate, and raised his children to be heavily pious. Queen Anna Luisa turned out to be somewhat flighty and unintelligent, but she was a very adoring mother and utilized her full resources as queen to provide the very best lifestyle for her brood. Klaus's cousins in Westphalia had grown more and more bitter with the birth of each child out of jealousy, but the rest of Cussia turned in their taxes on time and prayed at mass for the royal children without complaint. Both Crown Prince Philipp and Princess Anna Mafalda were highly intelligent children, where Prince Heinrich and Princess Maria Amalia were energetic and excitable, and very close to each other.
Fifteen years following the last ten-year update, very many things happened. Three more children were born to Klaus and Anna Luisa, Westphalia had an uprising, and a bunch of the kids got married off.
-Anna Mafalda died at age 11. All of the royal family were greatly affected by this loss, but none more so than Anna Luisa. Anna Mafalda was, after all, her primary namesake, firstborn daughter, and overall favorite child. She did not leave her room for six months, giving rise to many rumors about her health, sanity, and fidelity. Anyway, this is what Anna Mafalda looked like:
-Crown Prince Philipp's grief was comparable to his mother's, as he had always shared a very close bond with Anna Mafalda. After her death, he grew even more quiet, introspective, and pious. He wore Anna Mafalda's baptismal cross around his neck constantly, and slept with a lock of her hair beside his bed. This was viewed as slightly strange, but Philipp had an intent, focused nature that lent itself to obsessions. Nevertheless, he remained intelligent and articulate, and Klaus was quite confident in his ruling capabilities. When he was 21 years old, he suggested to his father that he should be married. He vaguely expressed the desireto marry a foreign woman, and so Klaus gave him leave to travel where he desired. At first, Philipp went directly to Doma, the capital of Vivaria and Vivaria's religion. (It's time to give it a name now. Hm. Hm hm hm. Mantism.) However, for reasons unclear to historians (Philipp was very secretive), the Crown Prince suddenly left Vivaria and travelled to Doloria, a former Vivarian province known for its devotion to Mantism that had recently gained its independence through revolution. Doloria's ruling family, the di Renaldi's, were quite impressed with Philipp and offered to him their second-born daughter Felicia, who was sixteen at the time. Felicia was a highly intelligent and stunningly beautiful girl of 16, and she and Philipp quickly consented to be married. She was well-received by the von Shrieks, and she soon gave birth to a son called Rudolf Adalbert.
Want to see Philipp? Here he is:
And here is his wife Felicia:
-Heinrich was a much more reckless and adventurous youth than his brother. While Philipp was in his room meditating and praying, Heinrich had taken up sailing with his Barrian cousins. When he was eighteen, his ship became hopelessly lost at sea, and crashed on a foreign shore several weeks later. He and his bedraggled crew were greeted by a lovely young woman who politely inquired their names in broken Cussian. When Heinrich told her he was the Prince of Cussia, her eyes lit up. She explained that they had landed in a country called Laileux (none of them had ever heard of it) and that she was the princess. Her father was planning to marry her to a fat and highly unpleasant duke. But Heinrich's rank was much higher than the Duke's, and she found Heinrich much more appealing physically, so would he please alert her father of his intentions to marry her? Encouraged by his buddies, Heinrich gave his consent. The King of Laileaux also gave his consent, and the princess Magali was welcomed into Frienne, where they were all relieved at Heinrich's aliveness.
Heinrich:
-When Westphalia revolted, Maria Amalia requested permission to get out of the country for a while, as she had a taste for exploring that matched Heinrich's. Klaus gave her (and her female Barrian cousins) an armed escort service to take them to Nordskovic, where Klaus's father had once happened to be passing through and crushed a peasant uprising. When they arrived in Nordskovic, they found that King Benedikt III was holding an urgent conference with several foreign higher-ups regarding a great attack from a neighboring country. Maria Amalia, who was amused that her father had sent her from one war zone to another, but not so amused that her bravery was overridden, boldly stepped into the conference room and announced that Nordskovic could count upon Cussia's unwavering support in their efforts, and she would be glad to contribute personally in any way she could. "Will you marry my son?" asked King Benedikt. "Of course," answered Maria Amalia, without pausing to think. Oh well. Maria Amalia found Crown Prince Nikolai a pleasant fellow, and she was very interested in Nordskovic's culture. Her Barrian cousins returned home without her, bringing news of the alliance. In the meantime, the Westphalians had been pacified, and Klaus eagerly sent the Westphalian prisoners to fight for the Nordskovician army. Maria Amalia had a child called Max.
Here she is!
-With Anna Mafalda dead and Maria Amalia always tomboyish and independent, the status of Favored Daughter fell onto Christina. Christina had very high expectations of life; she was the most princessy of the four sisters. She was beautiful and cold-hearted; she demanded finery and high art. Her mother desperately wanted her to marry a local gentleman to keep her in town, but Christina refused to marry anyone below the ranks of her sister's husband. When an offer of marriage came from the handsome and dignified Prince Konstantin of Sokolov, she was elated, but Klaus and Anna Luisa refused to give permission for the marriage unless Prince Konstantin agreed to live in Cussia.
Here she is:
-A baby was born to Anna Luisa and Klaus, a son named Wilhelm Klaus Cosimo -- Wilhelm for Klaus's father and Cosimo for Anna Luisa's -- but en route to Doma for Wilhelm's baptism, the babe fell ill and died.
-Another daughter, Katarina Walburga Anna Luisa, was born a year after our last update. She spent a lot of her childhood alone, reading, as Christina found her irritating and her parents were too old to be interesting. She demanded more and more books. Philipp liked her.
-A son, Franz Ignaz, was a fat brat.
All right. Sometime in the midst of all this, Westphalia got angry and revolted. Blah blah blah. Lots of fighting occured. The end result was mainly that while Westphalia's nobility was almost destroyed, the power of the nobility in general was weakened, and Cussia became much more centralized. What with the marriages of four of their children to foreign princes, Cussia became well-known internationally and people began to know who King Klaus was. Um. Also the people in Cussia began to become more aware of other things happening in the world, and hunger for more than farms. Also the printing press was invented, which was quickly followed by immediate church confiscation of bibles from the commoners, which is causing some confusion and resentment among the common people. Umm Father Luigi died, which was very sad but he was also very old. He was replaced by Father Cristiano, who is much less warm of a figure. Damn my tense tension! I hope that was coherent! I wish I was still lucid enough after writing all that to be coherent.
DH [71]: His Royal Highness Klaus Benedikt von Shriek IV, King of Cussia, Duke of Barria and Westphalia
DW [48]: Her Royal Highness Anna Luisa Mafalda Benedetta Margarazzi, Queen Regent of Cussia, Duchess of Marvalia
--DS [24]: His Royal Highess Philipp von Shriek, Crown Prince of Cussia, Heir Apparent of Barria
----DW [19]: Her Royal Highness Felicia Verusha Valentina di Renaldi, Crown Princess of Cussia, Princess of Doloria
----DS [2]: His Highness Rudolf Adalbert von Shriek, Lord of Cussia
--DD [deceased]: Her Royal Highness Anna Mafalda Cecilia Katarina von Shriek, Princess of Cussia
--DS [20]: His Royal Highness Heinrich Klaus Cosimo von Shriek, Prince of Cussia, Heir Apparent of Westphalia
----DW [17]: Magali Brigitte Isabel du Comtois, princess of Laileaux
--DD [19]: Her Imperial Highness Maria Amalia Katarina Isabella von Shriek, Heiress Apparent to Nordskovic, Princess of Cussia
----DH [24]: His Imperial Highness Nikolai Benedikt Konstantin Viktor Kozlov, Heir Apparent to Nordskovic
----DS [2]: His Imperial Highness Ivan Nikolai Fyodor Dmitry Alexei Smerdyakov, Beloved of Nordskovic
--DD [17]: Her Royal Highness Christina Benetta Friedrike von Shriek, princess of Cussia
----DH [20]: Konstantin Domonik Marcovic, prince of Sokolov
--DS [deceased]: His Royal Highness Wilhelm Klaus Cosimo von Shriek, Prince of Cussia
--DD [14]: Her Royal Highness Katarina Walburga Anna Luisa von Shriek, Princess of Cussia
--DS [11]: His Royal Highness Franz Ignaz von Shriek, Prince of Cussia
Cussia was settled by tribal people known as the Kosshans for hundreds of years, but was conquered and civilized during the Vivarian invasions of the 900's. Once the Vivarians withdrew their occupation in 1121, the Cussians (Vivarian-influenced spelling) were left with a vacuum of power. Gradually, a feudal system emerged, along with an elaborate system of civil customs and constructs that give Cussia a distinct blend of tribal and Vivarian traditions. The King is the highest lord in the land. Under him are Lords, Dukes, Marquesses, Counts, Earls, and Barons. Serfs work the land and Knights fight for it. The religion, while it has many of the pagan characteristics of old Kosshan religions such as celebrating major feasts at the solstices, is nominally the same church of the Vivarians, and the clergy are part of the network of that church. Consequently, clergy are exempt from fiefdom and therefore from taxation.
The von Shriek family has been in power for about 350 years at this point. They got there by dynastic strategy: a von Shriek daughter married the only son of the Kasselmark heir. They make their residency in the capital city of Frienne, a walled city with a lovely lovely river in it.
Klaus's marriage with Anna Luisa was the result of a happy coincidence. The King's spiritual advisor Father Luigi had had a dream in which the Holy Spirit spoke to him of a beautiful maiden in Westphalia, a Cussian duchy. Also in which Malcolm's dad was elected homecoming queen and wore this gorgeous blue dress similar to the one Lily wore last year. Klaus, whose seven previous fiancees had all died in completely blameless accidents or sicknesses before he could marry them, had been convinced that his marriage prospects were cursed by God, so this vision intrigued him and he went to Westphalia immediately. His other advisors were skeptical because there were no marriage-age women among the Westphalian nobility at that point, but upon the royal party's arrival they found that Anna Luisa was attending the wedding of the Marquess of North Westphalia, Sir Philipp, to her elder sister Maria. Anna Luisa was by far the more beautiful and well-mannered of the sisters, and Klaus knew immediately that this must be the maiden of Father Luigi's dream. (Father Luigi was the skeptical one at this point; the girl in his vision had had red hair and a portly physique, but he agreed eventually that these features may have been symbolic for her passion and prosperity.) Klaus quickly cancelled the wedding of Philipp and Maria, as their marriage would have made the King too closely related to Anna Luisa for church-sanctioned marriage, and married the befuddled Anna Luisa the same day, using the same preparations that had been arranged for Philipp and Maria. She didn't speak a word of Cussian, but eventually grasped the general concept that she was married to a King, and this idea pleased her. Klaus adored Anna Luisa and pampered her to the best of his struggling country's ability.
Ten years later, the royal couple had produced five healthy children. King Klaus was quite convinced that his marriage had indeed been blessed by God, as very few couples had such a high survival rate, and raised his children to be heavily pious. Queen Anna Luisa turned out to be somewhat flighty and unintelligent, but she was a very adoring mother and utilized her full resources as queen to provide the very best lifestyle for her brood. Klaus's cousins in Westphalia had grown more and more bitter with the birth of each child out of jealousy, but the rest of Cussia turned in their taxes on time and prayed at mass for the royal children without complaint. Both Crown Prince Philipp and Princess Anna Mafalda were highly intelligent children, where Prince Heinrich and Princess Maria Amalia were energetic and excitable, and very close to each other.
Fifteen years following the last ten-year update, very many things happened. Three more children were born to Klaus and Anna Luisa, Westphalia had an uprising, and a bunch of the kids got married off.
-Anna Mafalda died at age 11. All of the royal family were greatly affected by this loss, but none more so than Anna Luisa. Anna Mafalda was, after all, her primary namesake, firstborn daughter, and overall favorite child. She did not leave her room for six months, giving rise to many rumors about her health, sanity, and fidelity. Anyway, this is what Anna Mafalda looked like:
-Crown Prince Philipp's grief was comparable to his mother's, as he had always shared a very close bond with Anna Mafalda. After her death, he grew even more quiet, introspective, and pious. He wore Anna Mafalda's baptismal cross around his neck constantly, and slept with a lock of her hair beside his bed. This was viewed as slightly strange, but Philipp had an intent, focused nature that lent itself to obsessions. Nevertheless, he remained intelligent and articulate, and Klaus was quite confident in his ruling capabilities. When he was 21 years old, he suggested to his father that he should be married. He vaguely expressed the desireto marry a foreign woman, and so Klaus gave him leave to travel where he desired. At first, Philipp went directly to Doma, the capital of Vivaria and Vivaria's religion. (It's time to give it a name now. Hm. Hm hm hm. Mantism.) However, for reasons unclear to historians (Philipp was very secretive), the Crown Prince suddenly left Vivaria and travelled to Doloria, a former Vivarian province known for its devotion to Mantism that had recently gained its independence through revolution. Doloria's ruling family, the di Renaldi's, were quite impressed with Philipp and offered to him their second-born daughter Felicia, who was sixteen at the time. Felicia was a highly intelligent and stunningly beautiful girl of 16, and she and Philipp quickly consented to be married. She was well-received by the von Shrieks, and she soon gave birth to a son called Rudolf Adalbert.
Want to see Philipp? Here he is:
And here is his wife Felicia:
-Heinrich was a much more reckless and adventurous youth than his brother. While Philipp was in his room meditating and praying, Heinrich had taken up sailing with his Barrian cousins. When he was eighteen, his ship became hopelessly lost at sea, and crashed on a foreign shore several weeks later. He and his bedraggled crew were greeted by a lovely young woman who politely inquired their names in broken Cussian. When Heinrich told her he was the Prince of Cussia, her eyes lit up. She explained that they had landed in a country called Laileux (none of them had ever heard of it) and that she was the princess. Her father was planning to marry her to a fat and highly unpleasant duke. But Heinrich's rank was much higher than the Duke's, and she found Heinrich much more appealing physically, so would he please alert her father of his intentions to marry her? Encouraged by his buddies, Heinrich gave his consent. The King of Laileaux also gave his consent, and the princess Magali was welcomed into Frienne, where they were all relieved at Heinrich's aliveness.
Heinrich:
-When Westphalia revolted, Maria Amalia requested permission to get out of the country for a while, as she had a taste for exploring that matched Heinrich's. Klaus gave her (and her female Barrian cousins) an armed escort service to take them to Nordskovic, where Klaus's father had once happened to be passing through and crushed a peasant uprising. When they arrived in Nordskovic, they found that King Benedikt III was holding an urgent conference with several foreign higher-ups regarding a great attack from a neighboring country. Maria Amalia, who was amused that her father had sent her from one war zone to another, but not so amused that her bravery was overridden, boldly stepped into the conference room and announced that Nordskovic could count upon Cussia's unwavering support in their efforts, and she would be glad to contribute personally in any way she could. "Will you marry my son?" asked King Benedikt. "Of course," answered Maria Amalia, without pausing to think. Oh well. Maria Amalia found Crown Prince Nikolai a pleasant fellow, and she was very interested in Nordskovic's culture. Her Barrian cousins returned home without her, bringing news of the alliance. In the meantime, the Westphalians had been pacified, and Klaus eagerly sent the Westphalian prisoners to fight for the Nordskovician army. Maria Amalia had a child called Max.
Here she is!
-With Anna Mafalda dead and Maria Amalia always tomboyish and independent, the status of Favored Daughter fell onto Christina. Christina had very high expectations of life; she was the most princessy of the four sisters. She was beautiful and cold-hearted; she demanded finery and high art. Her mother desperately wanted her to marry a local gentleman to keep her in town, but Christina refused to marry anyone below the ranks of her sister's husband. When an offer of marriage came from the handsome and dignified Prince Konstantin of Sokolov, she was elated, but Klaus and Anna Luisa refused to give permission for the marriage unless Prince Konstantin agreed to live in Cussia.
Here she is:
-A baby was born to Anna Luisa and Klaus, a son named Wilhelm Klaus Cosimo -- Wilhelm for Klaus's father and Cosimo for Anna Luisa's -- but en route to Doma for Wilhelm's baptism, the babe fell ill and died.
-Another daughter, Katarina Walburga Anna Luisa, was born a year after our last update. She spent a lot of her childhood alone, reading, as Christina found her irritating and her parents were too old to be interesting. She demanded more and more books. Philipp liked her.
-A son, Franz Ignaz, was a fat brat.
All right. Sometime in the midst of all this, Westphalia got angry and revolted. Blah blah blah. Lots of fighting occured. The end result was mainly that while Westphalia's nobility was almost destroyed, the power of the nobility in general was weakened, and Cussia became much more centralized. What with the marriages of four of their children to foreign princes, Cussia became well-known internationally and people began to know who King Klaus was. Um. Also the people in Cussia began to become more aware of other things happening in the world, and hunger for more than farms. Also the printing press was invented, which was quickly followed by immediate church confiscation of bibles from the commoners, which is causing some confusion and resentment among the common people. Umm Father Luigi died, which was very sad but he was also very old. He was replaced by Father Cristiano, who is much less warm of a figure. Damn my tense tension! I hope that was coherent! I wish I was still lucid enough after writing all that to be coherent.
This message was edited 10/10/2007, 6:15 PM
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