Description
Mature Content
The Rivierie was a popular revolt in early Middle Human Age in North-western Aels by peasants that took place in eastern Huncle in the summer of 2.258 after the Aparition of the Human (a.a.H), after the First War of the Power (2.203-2.223 a.a.H).
The revolt, which was violently suppressed after two years of violence, was centered in the Ostergate valley, east of Huncle.
Why this rebellion became known as the Rivierie isn't clear: some say it was because the nobles derided peasants as "Rivier" as a generic name, or for their revolutionary leader referred to by the aristocratic chronicler Jacques Crossant as Disette Rivier .
The word Rivierie became synonymous with peasant uprisings in general in the Sargonic, Degolendish and Hunclech.
Background
After the capture of the fortess of Oster Gate by the King of Huncle and his warriors inspired by a Prophet, they didn't fullfiled his vission and where cursed by that Prophet.
Individually, this woulnd't have been causant for such a peasant rebellion, but after the First war of the Power the kingdom of Huncle was still in a weakened state, and being unnable the nobles and armies of the king to protect their peoples from the demons and the dark legion before had put their legitimacy in question:
And with the curse of the Prophet, even when he didn't represented the opinion of the official church, was seemed as a desligitimation of the king and the nobles to the peasants of Huncle.
Consequently the prestige of the Huncle nobility – which had begun the century at the defeats against the Dark Legion fleeing the field and leaving their infantry to be hacked to pieces, and had given up their king at La Cruz – had sunk to a new low. To secure their rights, the Huncle privileged classes, the nobility, the merchant elite, and the clergy, forced the peasantry to pay ever-increasing taxes and to repair their war-damaged properties under forgotten ancient taxes without compensation, aside of being conscripted the peasants to defend the castles of their lords.
The inmediate cause of the spontaneous uprising would be however when was decided to tax the rights to cut wood from the forests -legally property of the king-. With that tax being announced, the villagers decided that they had enough of that. Sedition spread like a forest fire inside the villages and soon the whole region was rioting.
The chronicle of Jacques Crossant articulates the perceived problems between the nobility and the peasants, yet some historians, Aq'ven Kaseem being one of them, see the Rivierie revolts as a reaction to a combination of short and long-term effects dating as early as the grain crisis and famine of 1995 and the Sargos-Huncle War of 1998 a.a.H. In addition, bands of grey elves, Kanov montangards, Sargonic and Degolandic routiers— unemployed mercenaries and bandits employed by the Huncle during outbreaks of the war against the orcs in the mountains range of Olga's Wall — were left uncontrolled, to loot, rape and plunder the lands of eastern Huncle almost at will, the King of Huncle powerless to stop them. Many peasants questioned why they should work for a government that clearly could not protect its citizens.
The uprising
This combination of problems set the stage for a brief series of bloody rebellions in eastern Huncle in 2.258 a.a.H. The uprisings began in a village of Bois de l'eau (Waterwood in Sargonic) near the Trèfle river, where a group of peasants met in a burned church under the command of a young widow who lost her wife during the assault to the orc fortifications in Ostergate.
There, they discussed their perception that the nobles had abandoned the people, and that the tax on the wood was unfair. "They shamed and despoiled the realm, and it would be a good thing to destroy them all."
The account of the rising by the contemporary chronicler Menteur de l'Eglise includes a description of horrifying violence. According to him, peasants
"killed a knight, put him on a spit, and roasted him with his wife and children looking on. After ten or twelve of them raped the lady, they wished to force feed them the roasted flesh of their father and husband and made them then die by a miserable death."
Examples of violence on this scale by the hands of Huncle peasants are offered throughout all of the western-Aelian sources, including Nombre Dix-Sept, in general sympathetic to the peasants' plight, and the particularly unsympathetic aristocrat Jean Pompeux.
The peasants involved in the rebellion seem to have lacked any real organization, instead rising up locally as an unstructured mass. It is speculated by Jean le Boiteux that evil governors and tax collectors spread the word of rebellion from village to village to inspire the peasants to rebel against the nobility. When asked as to the cause of their discontent they apparently replied that they were just doing what they had witnessed others doing. Additionally it seems that the rebellion contained some idea that it was possible to rid the world of nobles.
Pompeux's account portrays the rebels as mindless thugs bent on destruction, which they wreaked on over 150 noble houses and castles, murdering the families in horrendous ways.
Outbreaks occurred in all eastern Huncle, while some northern Degolendic cities were sacked by the peasant army. Meanwhile, The bourgeoisie of many cities of Western Huncle, sorely pressed by the court party, accepted the Rivierie, and the urban underclass were sympathetic. It is notable that churches were not the targets of peasant fury.
Suppression
At first, the armies of Huncle -still weakened since the end of the end of the First War of the Power- were wagging war at the south: As well, due the curse of the Prophet, many of his troops had deserted him upon supersition, so when he finally was able to march back to eastern Huncle, his army arrived in the advanced winter, and facing a large peasant army and lacking a foothold in his own country, he wasn't able to organize an efficient repression: and so, they did the Pacts of Christmas of 2.258.
After the weeks of violence, with this pact between the king, nobles and the peasants of the Valley of Oster Gate, it was instituted not only an amnesty to all the rebels and their leaders, but as well many of the taxes where outlawed and the feudal system of Huncle was renovated, claiming many that the Pacts of Christmas can be seen as the first constitution of western Aels -while others claims is instead the Gran Carta de Sargos-.
The Pacts of Christmas where a great victory to the rebels and an humilliation to the King of Huncle. While many of the rebel leaders as important political figures of the region, conforming a self government in eastern Huncle, the king retreated to his western possetions.
In the following year, during 2.559 the violence will continue, but in a sporadic way: riots and protests, divisions among the same peasants, and as well uprisings in near provinces, which worried not only now the king of Huncle and his nobles, but as well the neighboring kingdoms of Degoland, Sargos and La Cruz, specially after the death of the King of Huncle Charles IV due a hunting accident: the sucession was unclear, becoming Charles le Gros the Regent, and claiming the Throne prince Phillipe II Vautur and king of Sargos.
With rebelion once again expressiong in violent assaults to castles and noble mannors, the prince (and aspiring to the throne) Phillipe II Vautur, with his possition too weakened to solve the situation in his own, contacted in secret with the King of Sargos, Martin the Conqueror.
Sargos, in that moment rising as one of the more powerful human kingdoms of Northwestern Aels, seeing this as an oportunity not only to restore peace of the distirbed society (To their standards), but as well as an oportunity for territorial expansion.
They began with an offensive of the church, who claimed all these peasant uprisings as hereticals and sinful, while the Sargonic army slowly prepared for war.
In the 2.260, it was the end of the Commune of the Valley of Ostergate and their independent rule.
The revolt was suppressed by Huncle and Sargonic nobles led by Martin the Conqueror of Sargos, cousin, brother-in-law and mortal enemy of the Regent Charles le Gross, whose throne he was attempting to usurp.
When knowing of the Sargonic invasion of Eastern Huncle, the Commune and their leaders claimed Prince Phillipe II Vautur to be a traitor to Huncle and rallied their forces in a hurry:
Finally, Martin the Conqueror and the peasant army opposed each other near Dix-Sept on 10 June 2.260 a.a.H.
There, the large but untrained, unequiped and without discipline peasant army was ridden down by divisions of knights' cavalry in the ensuing Battle of Dix-Sept, which was followed by a campaign of terror throughout the Oster Gate region, where soldiers roamed door to door in the countryside lynching countless peasants and killing thousands and thousands in the fury that followed.
The nobles and the sargonic soldiers plundered the cities and churches and set fire to all eastern Huncle, which burned for two weeks, overrunning the countryside, burning cottages and barns and slaughtering all the peasants they could find.
The reprisals continued through July and August. There was a massacre after other as Martin The Conqueror and his Sargonic army slowly advanced now to western Huncle, where the regent Charles le Gross, who feared both the rebels and the Sargonic, didn't do nothing to stop the invasion of their southrn neighbors until the Rebelion was smashed...
Then, instead of fighting the invader, Charles le Gross gave the crown of Huncle to Phillipe II vautur, becoming Huncle an allied state of Sargos.
A declaration of Amnesty was issued then by Phillipe II as the Sargonic army returned to their own country -leaving an important garrison to ensure the "loyalty" of the now king Phillipe II-
The leader of the revolt, Disette Rivier, disapeared after the battle of Dix-Sept. Some say, she died on that battle. Others, that she was captured and interned as nun on a monastery... and others said, she left, to become a spirit of rebelion of Aels.
For the entry of Number-Seventeen for my contest of the World of Aiers
Edit 30.10.2015: As come the signaled date of birthday, I was remembering the Folc Fyrd comic he once began in the good old times, and as a memento of his -at least in dA- birthday, even if he is almost 96% inactive, I wanted to update the pic.
I do wonder, where the story of Folc Fyrd was going : U
As well, seeing back, the technology they use in this pic isn't the one I now give to the northwestern realms around the post first-war of the power, but more like the one used by the Sargonic Wars and Second War of the Power!
Comments: 66
Pootisman90 [2018-11-10 13:48:06 +0000 UTC]
If only they had war wagons...
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to Pootisman90 [2018-11-11 12:21:11 +0000 UTC]
Very useful for the peasants -if they know how to use them, of course!-
👍: 1 ⏩: 1
animal-delos [2015-11-08 00:36:42 +0000 UTC]
Too many pony-tailed women!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to larqven [2015-11-03 10:12:24 +0000 UTC]
Very unfortunate indeed v-v
Yeah, was fun a comic in that day and age!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
larqven In reply to Shabazik [2015-11-03 17:52:35 +0000 UTC]
I also recall Goeliath's multi-pic ozcura story. The 'free for all' between orcs, bandits, mercenaries of obvious nonhuman bloodlines, and yet human peasantry made the setting to likely be one of the Polforian colonies at this time, one to two generations after the First War of the Power.
It's an interesting time and colonial set up. A 'Great Settling of the Wild East' where the natives remained in place, and remained an ongoing factor for good and ill. Eventually overcoming the colonial effort.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
crimsongrain [2015-10-31 02:08:31 +0000 UTC]
Hell yeah
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
koushiro1180 [2015-10-31 01:10:18 +0000 UTC]
something much needed in the USA
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to koushiro1180 [2015-10-31 02:12:33 +0000 UTC]
I take, you mean some noble cavalry riding over the rebel plebs, right? : D ?
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
koushiro1180 In reply to Shabazik [2015-10-31 02:16:48 +0000 UTC]
no i mean the working class rebels kicking down the rotten establishment that is taking their lands to ruin.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
warhammer2546 [2015-10-31 00:57:40 +0000 UTC]
You can push sheep oh so far but sooner or later they'll kick back the Shepherd.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Galedor37 [2013-04-06 03:46:32 +0000 UTC]
Love it! Very interesting chronology too. I love timelines.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Savachika [2013-03-18 16:49:40 +0000 UTC]
Vive la révolution!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to AngelicAdonis [2012-07-28 14:48:01 +0000 UTC]
thanks! X3
I doubt the guy clutching is face can apreciate you compliment how he looks for now, thought! XD
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
DarkCloak [2012-07-26 00:17:02 +0000 UTC]
She doesn't look like the type that runs away from a fight. I'm going to guess that the soldiers facing her were so brutal that there just wasn't enough of her left to give her a positive I.D.
Her spirit lives on though! Viva Rivier! Viva la Revolution!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to DarkCloak [2012-07-28 14:47:04 +0000 UTC]
yeah... but no one knows for sure...
And once people become legends, is truly difficult to kill a legend!
And such, for centuries Disette Rivier will become incarnated in each leader of each peasant uprising in northwestern Aels. :3
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
single-leg [2012-07-25 02:10:57 +0000 UTC]
Winner is king, loser the thief..
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
larqven [2012-07-25 00:15:21 +0000 UTC]
Wow! I'm rather speechless! This is certainly one of your serious pics, and emerging from a contestant as well! Well, do a serous deviation, get a serious response! The cold look in her eyes from the original pic stays in place here. She does not care that the odds are clearly against her! Her battle rage might be a form of insanity, but from the text, we know that similar to the Syrian uprising, there is no safety in running away and being "good". The army will hunt everyone down, whether they had anything to do with the rebellion or not!
Very, very nicely done text! It left me wondering a bit that "I'm helping you!" what with the compilations. I loved how you included a reference to the "Aq'ven Kaseem" scholar character! The text was very "reference material" like! Not at all surprising, given your field of study, but I do feel rather like KO-Corral, at least in his protestations that you are too good!
You wrote a great text like this--after drawing all those pictures--and you are now half blind!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to larqven [2012-07-31 02:29:53 +0000 UTC]
I'm glad you liked it!
I must say, I used as template a wikipedia entry, to make it sound more serious! X3
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
kanyiko [2012-07-24 21:22:32 +0000 UTC]
The last moments of a fighter, and the birth of a legend, so it seems to me... T_T
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
kanyiko In reply to Shabazik [2012-07-28 20:25:58 +0000 UTC]
Not every story can have a happy ending, but not every sad ending is a 'bad' one. Some become inspirational stories, legends of their own with a legacy for future generations. Think of how Americans were inspired by the Alamo; or how the story of the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae has withstood the time, even though the actual battles were suicidal defeats (Alamo: 2 survivers out of 260 defenders; Thermopylae: no survivors among the Spartans). Perhaps the most dangerous enemy is not a live or a dead one, but one who died heroically or even in a legendary way while defending "the way of the righteous", as a "champion of the suppressed".
Even if she died - if, Disette Rivier is likely to live on in the stories of many, as one who stood up for her rights and died free, eventually becoming a much more dangerous enemy than if she actually survived to fight another day. In that way she will be immortal, a hero to many and an example to follow, much to the chagrin of those who thought death was the best way to vanquish her...
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to kanyiko [2012-08-02 00:30:13 +0000 UTC]
We have our own, the Battle of Concepción. :3
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to kanyiko [2012-08-02 20:21:30 +0000 UTC]
...
-for first time looking at you deviantArt "About Me" and noticing that say Male/belgium.
...
I allways assumed you where from USA!
XO!!-
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
kanyiko In reply to Shabazik [2012-08-02 20:26:24 +0000 UTC]
Meh, I'm half-Japanese as well! ^_^
Anyway, I guess it's natural to assume that, it's happened a lot to me that I commented on someone in English, only to discover that they were actually French, Belgian, Dutch or German rather than American (or British) like I previously assumed.
But, heh, it could e worse. Occasionally, some people miss out on the "male" bit, for some reason, with funny results... XD
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Shabazik In reply to kanyiko [2012-08-02 20:31:39 +0000 UTC]
In internet, I allways asume as default male/USA, and from them one get to change information.
At least if you act like that, you have less chances to mess it up. Even more if you see carefully before saying stupid comments. XD
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
kanyiko In reply to Shabazik [2012-08-02 20:44:04 +0000 UTC]
True, true.
At least I have a bit of knowledge of the world, so I can place most of the countries, and know a thing or two - so I know what to say and what not to say.
The other way round... I actually have had it happen a couple of times that people started assuming completely incorrect things because I'm from Belgium... or more often, who have no idea that it is a) a country, and b) where in the world it is...
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
| Next =>