King Eawer III ("þee Bowsume")
Ruler Profile
King of the Sutherlands
4 March, 1256 - 27 June, 1294
Crowned: Hwithampstow Clauster (14 July, 1256)
Predecessor: Ryckard I "Ironskin"
Successor: Edwin IV "the Young King" or Þeobald II "the Unyielding" (contested)
Born: 30 May, 1226; Baldwin, Helsing
Died: 27 June, 1294 (age 68); Æverreþ, Westmorland
King Eawer III (Middle Atlish:
Æawere), colloquially
"the Bowsome", was the King of Sutherland between 1256 and 1294. Succeeding his father Ryckard I following his death at the rout at Battle of Leashaw to the Cumbrish, Eawer rose to the throne at the age of 29 and became the first monarch to be crowned at Hwithampstow Clauster.
Excerpt from "Tides of the Crown" (Charlsen, 2022)
Eawer was a unique monarch for his time in that in his youth, folks did not have to pretend in order to like him. He was affable, and unlike his deeply proud father Ryckard Ironskin - who had spent the vast majority of Eawer's youth driving hammers through various Southerners' skulls for the glory of his kingdom, or whatever else it was that medieval Kings used to justify bludgeoning uncountable people with - he was known for not being particularly full of himself. The young boy grew up deeply pious, unlike most kings who viewed the Church as a major obstacle to their "fuck you, I'll do what I wish" attitudes, and viewed himself as a servant of God very sincerely.
It is also known that Eawer was sparkling company in his early years. He was an avid sportsman, and for all his piety, he drank like a whale. That is, until the night he received a message from God in 1252 demanding that he prepare himself for kingship. We can only imagine this sounded as weird to those around him at the time as it does to you reading this now even without Messiandom being as much of a starting point as it was then, but nevertheless Eawer's weirdness was far more of the goodhearted, slightly quirky kind than the far more common "blood and rage, and bloodrage" that monarchs of this time period are far more known for, so nobody minded much.
Eawer's relationship with his father was however not so bright. Ryckard viewed the boy as a disappointment, and is known to have favoured Eawer's younger, far more typical for a royal (yes, that means both incredibly full of himself and extremely temperamental, but crucially for his father it entailed an assertive streak) brother, Alfred. Ryckard went so far as to crown young Alfred in front of a crowd at Eamont, however Alfred's reputation in Eamont of being a cruel bruiser meant that the cheering only resumed the moment Ryckard's Chancellor lifted the crown back off Alfred's head. I can only assume that was an incredible embarrassment, although neither King nor second son would ever take the very, very obvious hint of how little anyone wanted a King Alfred.
Ryckard's reputation for having skin of iron ended rather abruptly in 1256 when someone stuck an arrow through it, and the wound festered rapidly. Alfred rushed into Eamont to claim what he believed would be his throne, however the death of Ryckard had given an opportunity for the very loyal Chancellor Lumbert to loyally follow his King into the dirt at the hands of the not very loyal Carl Edwardson. Edwardson's first act was to proclaim the coronation of Alfred invalid, but not before warmly welcoming him into Eamont and promptly sending him to his 22-year stint at the Blackkeep.
Eawer's arrival into Eamont from his earldom at Franklin to the southeast two weeks later was far more sincere. Eawer quickly saw a friend in Edwardson, and Edwardson was very open to pretending this was the case for the time being. His coronation was a grand affair, and his first act – to defy expectations that he would do what his father and grandfather had done, and appoint loyalists to the High Table – facilitated what would be the first of many easy partnerships between existing powerful figures and their new King.
How the Good King was... not very good
Eawer's key strengths were as follows: he wasn't a King educated in the typical "King tells his son how to both make people be very polite around you, pretend to like them, and then reduce the height of those who you disapprove of by about one head" manner, but instead by the courts at Baldwin and Hemel Leastead, and that he wasn't yet another warrior king. His mentor, the Lord of Thurrush, instead targeted Eawer's ability to understand and profess mercy, charm, compromise and mutual respect. The issue was fairly apparent early on; neither of these are actually strengths. Whoops.
Ryckard, and most of the vaguely successful Kings before him, had been totally incapable of nuance and uncompromising. There were issues with this, yes, but it helped stabilise the realm when the certainty of your head being missing if you raised arms was assured. The role of the King being invariably bruiser-in-chief, dating back as far as the first Viking stepping foot off his longship in the Sound and learning how to complain about the weather, had been a vital part of the Crown's system. Eawer's style was not this – and the worst thing was that Ryckard's relentless bashing of Westmorlander heads had finally given them a reason to splinter off from the kingdom.
Eawer's first test was therefore a certain failure. The King at Westmorland, Oswald the First, rose to power for one reason; he was an accidental brilliancy, possessing a rare mix of cunning and military prowess. This had allowed him to weaponise Ryckard's offence at somewhere not doing what it was bloody well told to his own end, and the stars aligning to shoot an arrow through Ironskin's armour was the cherry on top. Eawer came down, and naturally, began to negotiate. When he came back north with a shining South Charter, declaring that he had secured Oswald's fealty as King of Westmorland, his entire court's heads exploded; the stupid man had just recognised a new, materially independent kingdom without even realising it.
Nevertheless, Eawer spent his first decade otherwise improving the realm. He granted assent to the opening of three great universities on top of his grandfather's Brunswyk; Tywardon in 1258, Hawkshaw in 1260 and Dæmstead in 1261. His resistance of demands from Brunswyk to shutter down Tywardon for fear of threatening their superiority in the university system was ignored, which likely had some effect on the 757 years of petty rivalries between the two universities that followed. The fifth of the five well-known Sutherlander universities at Roseburn would follow, but that would take 68 years and a lot of history to appear. Naturally, Oswald set up his own at Leashaw, because what's better for a pretend kingdom than pretending to be Eawer? Similarly, church and land reforms, as well as greater focus on the burgeoning mercantile class in the wool industry, was rapidly opening up Sutherland's economy into what would be called the Little Golden Age in a hundredyear or two, after the copious quantity of death and disease that followed had not yet taken hold.
Eawer's second turn to blunder came when the Earls of Barrowland and Franklin, irate that their own advances in power had not only been rebuffed, but that taxes had been levied on them for the great projects of roads, universities and general conquering. In a normal situation, this would not really earn even a foothold in history - medieval earls and lords have grumbled about this sort of thing since virtually forever - but the fact that Westmorland had managed to get round the "what on earth replaces a King" query that troubled revolutions of the time (the answer being "just crown yourself and hope you're a godsent perfect choice like Oswald", apparently) meant that the "or else" threat actually stung Eamont and King Eawer. Eawer's attempts to charm them went so far that they actually pissed off his own court, and Edwardson finally spotted an opening to stop having to pretend he liked Eawer, beginning to cleave off grumbling figures to support Ryckard's little known third son, Þeobald.
The least enthusiastic Pretender King
Þeobald is not particularly notable in many ways. He lacked the ruthless violence of his father, the deep-rooted inadequacy and opportunism of Alfred, and the pious diplomatic focus of King Eawer. What he did have was simple - a stable life.
Þeobald was married, and unusually for the time's arranged marriages, it is known that the two courted beforehand so closely that Ryckard must have considered it insanely lucky to have a Queen consort from Aikshaw. He and Freyja of Aikshaw had five children, of whom four survived into adulthood. He was significantly younger than Eawer, and as of the revolution's start in 1277, the 42-year-old Þeobald was positively spritely compared to the King he was nine years junior of. With Eawer's children still not close to the age of majority – Eawer married late to a woman twenty-four years his junior, which apparently isn't seen as incredibly creepy in this time period – his wife unfailingly loyal to his cause, his brother firmly stuck in the Blackkeep and his disapproving father in the dirt, Þeobald was apparently the closest thing to a replacement for angry rebels.
The more astute reader may at this point mention that Ryckard's younger brother, Asmund, was very much still alive and even more disapproving of not-so-young Eawer as his father proved to be. He was also in formidable health, which unusually for the time and his age of 76 years did not merely give him faint praise for not being in the ground. Asmund, however, had been sidelined by Chancellor Edwardson for one key reason – he had a very obvious backbone. Asmund was long known for his fierce voice and fiercer mind, and – as I'm sure you'll gather from his propensity to fall upwards on the back of weaker men – the Chancellor did not want to replace a pliable King with a strong-minded one.
The main issue Edwardson faced with picking Þeobald instead was pretty obvious - the man had absolutely zero intention on becoming King. He had a good, if distanced, relationship with his elder brother, and most of all, distanced himself from kingly politics as early as possible. His solution for this was equally simple – kill one of his kids.
That might take a moment to sink in, so let me explain further. While Þeobald was close to his brother the King, his eldest son, also called Þeobald, was very much not a fan. Þeobald the Younger, as I will call him, was a belligerent little twerp who got so angry that Uncle Eawer did not grant him his wished for place as Earl of Westmorland, not that the position was at all meaningful with Oswald the Great – or more accurately, Oswald the Grey at this stage, since the man was 70 – as the actual ruler there that he defected to Oswald's court. As I've said before, royals at this time really did never get a chance to get a bloody grip of themselves. It makes the few who do appear to have less delusions than the rest like Eawer appear in a brighter light. Guess who talks him up to this? That's right, Edwardson. I imagine you get the idea I don't like him, and that's right, because he's a twat.
Never mind – Oswald receives Þeobald the Walking Temper Tantrum gladly, and immediately throws him into a prison for the crime of being an idiot-shaped bargaining chip. Þeobald the Elder calls out to brother Eawer to intervene, and in the time the King tries to stall for time – almost certainly considering whether it was even worth the bother to get this twerp back north, which honestly, fair enough – Oswald presumably gets bored of his prisoner and chops his head off.
A democracy to defeat democracy
Þeobald the Not Dead was suddenly pissed off enough to visit Edwardson at Burrasey and offer his help in taking down his brother, who he now held responsible for his moron of a son walking himself into a deeply stupid death. Asmund, sensing the tension, organised an army and was promptly crushed by an army led by Eawer himself, hung and his remains left atop the city gates into Østerdal. Oh well. It's the thought that counts.
Þeobald was prudent enough not to immediately die, and therefore became the natural choice for even people who weren't Chancellor Edwardson. A group of earls at Montgomery and Knightsmere, the furthest northwest provinces at the time, organised an army in the tens of thousands to support his claim. I personally imagine this has something to do with the fact that his other two sons were the earls of Montgomery and Knightsmere.
By now, the year was 1280. Eawer was an old man at 54, although still fit enough to lead armies and do essentially everything he did – except not getting up without making a noise of anguish, that one hits us all by his age – and his brother was growing restless in his increasingly radicalised demand for vengeance. Þeobald and much of the King's court, including Edwardson, had fled to the northwest where they sat around and pretended to matter, while Eawer enjoyed a few years having decently loyal earls and lords at his side. With the Conspiracy still too weak militarily to launch more than counterattacks against Eawer's now most senior marcher earl, the Earl of Charlton, Eawer set about building up the mercantile class he had fostered by bringing "almoots" – that's parliaments to the international reader, hello there – which increasingly included these groups. Apparently, including the very posh with the extremely posh in the proceedings of rule worked wonders, likely as it ensured the loyalty of an entirely separate class from the aristocracy and monarchy to the Crown.
