Atto II
Part 25, So It Begins
Mid June: Elector states of the Holy Roman Empire convene in Frankfurt to finally make their decision in regards to who will wear the great crown. Many of the Prince-Electors have been promised exorbitant sums of money in return for their vote, as well as glorious and powerful titles by the kings of France and Spain. What is clear among the Electoral states is the general distaste in their populations at the thought of a French Emperor, causing for great deliberation on the subject.
The decision of who to elect is graciously aided by Charles of Spain, who stations an army in a field near the Electoral meeting in Frankfurt.
June 28: The Electors, in response to the army assembled nearby, obligingly cast their vote unanimously in favour of Charles, who becomes the newest August Emperor of the Romans. This adds to his collection of lands, already including both the Spanish crown and the hereditary Burgundian lands in the Low Countries.
The election of Charles leaves Francis I infuriated. He had invested enormous sums in bribing the Electorate, and threatens to use the Treaty of London as a justification for Habsburg-Valois conflict.
July 4: Martin Luther joins the debate regarding Papal authority against John Eck at Leipzing.
Late July: Pouring in from the Ptolmeic, Venetian carracks have been successfully collecting at the new Red Sea forts, most of which are completed other than for final touchups. The Ottomans, currently rebuilding much of their southern navy thanks to hard losses sustained from skirmishing with the Portuguese, disburse an army of craftsmen across theirs and Venetian forts. This will give the alliance the edge in being able to rebound quickly from damage after battle. This is reassuring to the Venetians, who witnessed the effectiveness of the Ottoman craftsman army in the war of the late 1490s.
Maranazzo meets with other Venetian and Ottoman generals at Massaua, the base of operations for the campaign against the Portuguese. The men are aware that the situation in the region is not totally ideal for them yet, since some forts are still being completed and a sizeable portion of the Ottoman fleet intended for the assault is being rebuilt. Nevertheless, in keeping with the initial objective to disrupt Portuguese shipping in the crucial month of August, it is deemed senseless to keep all the logistics piled up in the region dormant for yet another year until next August, or blowing the element of surprise at a month where the Portuguese will be in a better position to call reinforcements. The decision is made that the first strikes against the Portuguese will be made in August of this year.
August: The mysterious black drink brought back by the Massaua merchants has quickly established itself as the most popular item at the Scola Orientai. All but the very most pious believers indulge in sipping the drink, echoing the initial reactions had towards it by the merchants themselves. Through incessant rambling on the subject my Scola members, word about the drink quickly spreads around the Veneto area; the interest amplified by the populace’s intrigue toward the Scola itself.
Some of the lagoon’s wealthiest citizens turn their intense curiosity into demand for the drink, paying extraordinary prices to merchants that are willing to sell the seeds required for it to them. This behavior towards what is still thought to be a morally illicit substance thanks to its popularity among Muslims is enough to draw the attention of prominent religious figures in the community.
Late August: Far off the coast of Goa, a Veneto-Ottoman force confronts a large Portuguese India Armada heading from India back to Portugal. The Portuguese ships are heavy with valuable booty from the Indian subcontinent. The Portuguese are taken by surprise; until now the Veneto-Ottoman forces had been content to stay protected inside the Red Sea. While eventual action was obvious and planned for, the Portuguese expected such attacks against them to take place in the Gulf of Aden, where they would then repulse the unholy alliance back into the Sea.
The attack is successful thanks to the excess weight of the treasure onboard the Portuguese ships, matched against that same room being used for artillery on the Venetian ships. One Portuguese nau is captured, three are sunk, and the remaining 5 retreat back to India. The battle is the first time many of the men have used the new Venetian ships in actual battle, and, while they were victorious, the battle makes the novelty of the men onboard glaringly obvious. The captains of the ships knew this would be the case, and stress to the men to learn from the ship’s handling and features during the battle.
September: Months after the completion of the Ptolmeic Channel, the mostly Slavic slave population that toiled to build the waterway has been a complicated subject in Egypt. Much of their futures depend on the conditions in which the slaves were purchased from Crimea. After the canal’s completion, this population was approximately divided equally between those still bound to slavery, and those freed after the Ptolmeic’s opening.
To those still belonging to slavery a large portion was resold by both their Venetian (i) and Ottoman owners to recover some further investment. The remaining slaves will serve the important function of keeping the Ptolmeic clean, since it is integrated into the Nile and will require constant care to ensure that silt and sand don’t build up.
Those who were freed from slavery have been left to their own devices in Egypt. With fear of recapture by Arabs and being forced back into slavery again, some follow the free zone of the canal to the shared Ptolmeic cities of Suez and Damietta, where they hope that the strange laws of the cities will offer them safety. Others decide to continue a bolder trip further west through Egypt to arrive at Alexandria, where they know the Venetian rulers will be far more hospitable to the Christians than will be the Ottomans.
Early October: To appease the Council of Ten, the Contarini announce that the Church of Alexandria will be built using white marble from Venetian controlled Istria.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
(i): Recall that the building of the Ptolmeic was financed both privately and publicly in Venice. After complicated discussion it is decided that this first group of slaves still under Venetian control would be given to the ownership of private financiers of the Channel. Their sale will help recover funds for this group, bringing some money back into the homeland. The remaining slaves under the control of the government will be the ones who continue the upkeep of the Channel.