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Chapter Four, Part Three: The Stag and the Dragon
Chapter Four, Part Three: The Stag and the Dragon, 977-985
When the Filleadhaithe revolt first broke out, Gorfodi Riderch generally ignored it. He didn’t think it too much of a threat to his reign, believing the revolt to be the actions of a few disgruntled poor-folk. He was also getting old, approaching his 60s, and was more willing to allow his subordinate nobles or company heads take action against the Filleadhaite. However, over the course of 977, as the revolters clashed with bands sent to fight them, the threat became suddenly much more real.
Riderch’s idea that this was a poor-driven revolt was incorrect. The Filleadhaite had their base of support in a sort of middling-class that was unique to this period in time. Before the Reconquest under Owain, they would have been the close retainers of a company chief, almost like an Anglo-Saxon Huscarl or Thegn of the same period. However, that rank no longer existed in the new system, though their nominal status remained. These were the men most affected by the evolution of the Bishopric in the 10th Century, and they were the ones most willing to fight to reclaim their “birthright”.
This, however, prevented the Filleadhaite from fielding large numbers of men in the field in the early days of the revolt. While many poorer Fanaithe were sympathetic to their goals, and assisted them by hiding and supplying them, the Filleadhaite were loathe to trust them in the field of battle. They feared that these farmers, fishermen, miners, and timbermen would break down and run in the face of an opposing warband.
Riderch finally decided to take the Revolt more seriously in 978, after a year of disruption to his efforts to collect the man-tax. He encouraged his nobility to take more aggressive action in the fight against the Filleadhaite, destroying their bases of support and capturing Olchobar, who he viewed as the head of the revolt. He still refused to send his own retinue to assist in the campaigning, likely out of worries that the Meascthan population on the Insula had some ties to the Filleadhaite and would strike the moment they departed. [1]
This forced the petty nobility of the Bishopric to try to fight against the Filleadhaite themselves, which would prove to be a difficult endeavor. Without a centralized commander assigned from above, the noblemen pursued their own objectives without establishing proper communication with their fellows. The elusive nature of the Filleadhaite also proved to be a major obstacle to reaffirming control over the populations- the members of the movement were adept at hiding amongst the populace, while others existed in small roving brigand-like bands.
The inability to win decisively against them in 978 helped embolden the Filleadhaite, who felt that victory was shortly to be achieved. Like Riderch, the Filleadhaite had misperceptions of the revolt. The more starkly anti-Briton tendency expressed later in the fighting had yet to develop, and the Filleadhaite were certain that by denying the Gorfodi his victory that a “clerical coup” would soon follow- the monks of Brendan’s would unite to remove the Gorfodi status from the Briton, and restore Olchobar to his rightful position. How exactly this would happen when the vast majority of the clergy in the monastery were loyal to Riderch was unknown, but the Filleadhaite were confident they could accomplish this.
When no coup came in 978, the Filleadhaite began to adopt a more offensive approach. They started targetting the Gorfodi and the nobility where it hurt- the trade expeditions down the Tullaha.
Organized Filleadhaite, for lack of a better word, river piracy was the last straw for Riderch. While the expeditions were hard targets for the Filleadhaite, as they sailed in groups, the rebels became more and more creative at how they attacked them- sometimes they came at night, when the expeditions tended to camp on land, and simply burned vessels; sometimes they attacked while in the river; sometimes they managed to convince a crew to defect. These were annoyances that slwoly added up to lost profits. And if Riderch was concerned about anything in this life, it was profits.
The Gorfodi sent his warband to Talbeah in 980, marking the beginning of a new stage of war. Organizing the various bands of the petty nobility under his son’s command, Riderch gave orders to do whatever was necessary to secure his trading expeditions. And to his son, Andras, this was taken as a carte blanche to engage in a punitive campaign.
Andras was very different from his father. Records at the time indicated that something was off about the princeling, that he was eager for violence at a level even 10th Century men viewed as extreme. Modern psychological attempts to read back conditions into history describe Andras generally as some kind of psychopath. Whatever the case was, Andras began to carry out atrocities against the Fanaithe citizens on the mainland. This was ostensibly to deny the Filleadhaite their bases of support; it had the opposite effect.
More and more Fanaithe, not even part of the social class of the Filleadhaite, began to rise up in support of the revolt. The Filleadhaite were nervous about this rise in support- they feared that their fighting capacity was going to be weakened by the new recruits, and their leadership hierarchy, already strained by the vast geographic distances involved in Talbeah, began to break down. But after some hastily organized militias won some early successes against scattered retinues, the Filleadhaite began to encourage these actions more and more.
To Andras, this was seen as a chance to indulge in his bloodlust and as a self-fulfilling prophecy. He believed strongly that the Fanaithe were barbarous beneath the surface, and that a strong hand was needed to control their natures. That was the natural conclusion of the propaganda and myth-making the Britons had been engaged in since their arrival almost ninety years before. On the other side, the brutality of the Britons reinforced to the Fanaithe their own myths, causing both sides to believe that they were firmly in the right.
Campaigning in 981 and 982 was violent and followed a similar pattern. Loosely associated militias, loyal to the Filleadhaite, would attempt to besiege the forts of noblemen or ambush patrols. Andras would lead his warband in campaigns across vast distances, destroying militias when he ran into them. The “true” Filleadhaite would avoid engagements with Andras, and absorb the more skilled militia men into their ranks; the leadership of the Revolt was generally in favor of gradually increasing their ranks to avoid flinging untrained men against Andras’s armies. [2]
983 was viewed as a year that everything would come to a head. The brutality had devastated the economy of the Bishopric (spilling over into the Confederation, which will be discussed later), and internal trade had ground to a halt. The Filleadhaite began to abandon their idea of a clerical coup, and came to the realization that they would have to defeat Andras’s army in the field if they wanted to have a chance at achieving victory. They began to develop plans to draw Andras into a trap, which would force him to meet them on the field of their choosing.
Andras also prepared to deliver a killing blow to the Filleadhaite. The mobile nature of his war had caused him to realize the importance of what modern military minds would describe as “combined arms” operations. The larger, sea-going currachs that had been developed over the centuries of trans-oceanic trade proved their worth, allowing him to move his army from one coastal outpost to the other rapidly. The usual refusal of the rebels to meet him in open combat required quick movement to pin them down before they slipped into the deep woods; this caused him to develop a fairly strong cavalry contingent, manned almost entirely by Measctha from the Insula.
With his desire to deliver a killing blow, Andras took the bait that the Filleadhaite prepared for him. Claiming that Olchobar was becoming more bold, the rumor spread that he would celebrate Easter in public. This drew the attention of Andras and also various supporters of the Revolt. Large numbers of men gathered to hear Olchobar- fodder for the Filleadhaite to use to wear down the Briton attack that was sure to come. The Filleadhaite’s leadership believed that the battle was to come the Tuesday after Easter- Andras wouldn’t dare attack during the celebration of one of the holiest days of Christianity.
The battle came on Good Friday. Andras, over the objection of his commanders, desired the element of shock.
His initial cavalry attack into the outer camps of the unprepared Filleadhaite was devastating, forcing many erstwhile militia men to flee in chaos or be cut down. The Filleadhaite were able to rally, however, as the central core of their force, developed over two years of fighting, was located in the middle of their camp. They moved forward and blunted the cavalry’s attack, the momentum of which had been slowed by forcing through unorganized mobs of terrified men, women, and children (as many of those wanting to hear Olchobar’s words had brought their families with them, unaware of the true purpose of the gathering).
The battle began in earnest then, as Andras brought up his infantry and shield clashed against shield. Chroniclers at the time described it as a “sea of strife”, comparing the men slamming against each other to the surf crashing into rocks. The exact details of the battle are fuzzy, due to the differing accounts, but the outcome seemed very much in the air for much of the day.
However, the weight of numbers was on the side of the Filleadhaite, and they began to drive Andras’s more skilled men back, despite heavy casualties on their own side. Andras, seeing his force begin to waver, rallied his cavalry to him and led a desperate charge against the right flank of the Filleadhaite. They pierced through, rolling up the flank, and causing mass panic to descend in the ranks of the rebels. His men, rallied, attacked with new vigor, and the Filleadhaite line broke. A tremendous slaughter followed; the day ended with the Britons victorious.
But it was a decidedly Phyrric victory. Andras himself had fallen in the charge, and the retinue he had led was decimated.
However, the Filleadhaite were in no place to take advantage of this. Much of their leadership also lay dead on the field, and Olchobar, who had been watching from the read, fled into the Confederation (as many would later do). Unfortunately for him, the Confederation did not take kindly to his movement’s disruption of trade; he was captured, clubbed to death, and his head was sent to the Gorfodi to show the Confederation’s desire for trade.
The Gorfodi was not Riderch however- the old man, shocked by news of his son’s death, passed, leaving the title in the hands of his grandson, Arthfael. Unlike his father, Arthfael was not violent by nature. He would seek to restore some semblance of order to his realm, trying his best to make concessions- though these would be ignored by his nobility, many of whom were embittered by years of war. The Fanaithe would also look at these reforms with suspicion, and low-level violence became endemic to the Bishopric.
Arthfael’s reign would soon face another threat, when, in 985, an Ostish raiding party arrived and successfully sacked Peace Town. Arthfael holed up in his fortress, giving the raiders a free hand. This was the first time the men of the sea had pulled off a successful raid in the West- a harbinger of things to come…
[1] - This was untrue, as was proven later in the war.
[2] – The Filleadhaite leadership was very decentralized. While Olchobar was the rallying point, he was merely a member of a sort of cabal or council that led the movement. This lack of a central leader may have hindered some aspects of the Revolt, though it did allow the Filleadhaite to react to local threats faster.
When the Filleadhaithe revolt first broke out, Gorfodi Riderch generally ignored it. He didn’t think it too much of a threat to his reign, believing the revolt to be the actions of a few disgruntled poor-folk. He was also getting old, approaching his 60s, and was more willing to allow his subordinate nobles or company heads take action against the Filleadhaite. However, over the course of 977, as the revolters clashed with bands sent to fight them, the threat became suddenly much more real.
Riderch’s idea that this was a poor-driven revolt was incorrect. The Filleadhaite had their base of support in a sort of middling-class that was unique to this period in time. Before the Reconquest under Owain, they would have been the close retainers of a company chief, almost like an Anglo-Saxon Huscarl or Thegn of the same period. However, that rank no longer existed in the new system, though their nominal status remained. These were the men most affected by the evolution of the Bishopric in the 10th Century, and they were the ones most willing to fight to reclaim their “birthright”.
This, however, prevented the Filleadhaite from fielding large numbers of men in the field in the early days of the revolt. While many poorer Fanaithe were sympathetic to their goals, and assisted them by hiding and supplying them, the Filleadhaite were loathe to trust them in the field of battle. They feared that these farmers, fishermen, miners, and timbermen would break down and run in the face of an opposing warband.
Riderch finally decided to take the Revolt more seriously in 978, after a year of disruption to his efforts to collect the man-tax. He encouraged his nobility to take more aggressive action in the fight against the Filleadhaite, destroying their bases of support and capturing Olchobar, who he viewed as the head of the revolt. He still refused to send his own retinue to assist in the campaigning, likely out of worries that the Meascthan population on the Insula had some ties to the Filleadhaite and would strike the moment they departed. [1]
This forced the petty nobility of the Bishopric to try to fight against the Filleadhaite themselves, which would prove to be a difficult endeavor. Without a centralized commander assigned from above, the noblemen pursued their own objectives without establishing proper communication with their fellows. The elusive nature of the Filleadhaite also proved to be a major obstacle to reaffirming control over the populations- the members of the movement were adept at hiding amongst the populace, while others existed in small roving brigand-like bands.
The inability to win decisively against them in 978 helped embolden the Filleadhaite, who felt that victory was shortly to be achieved. Like Riderch, the Filleadhaite had misperceptions of the revolt. The more starkly anti-Briton tendency expressed later in the fighting had yet to develop, and the Filleadhaite were certain that by denying the Gorfodi his victory that a “clerical coup” would soon follow- the monks of Brendan’s would unite to remove the Gorfodi status from the Briton, and restore Olchobar to his rightful position. How exactly this would happen when the vast majority of the clergy in the monastery were loyal to Riderch was unknown, but the Filleadhaite were confident they could accomplish this.
When no coup came in 978, the Filleadhaite began to adopt a more offensive approach. They started targetting the Gorfodi and the nobility where it hurt- the trade expeditions down the Tullaha.
Organized Filleadhaite, for lack of a better word, river piracy was the last straw for Riderch. While the expeditions were hard targets for the Filleadhaite, as they sailed in groups, the rebels became more and more creative at how they attacked them- sometimes they came at night, when the expeditions tended to camp on land, and simply burned vessels; sometimes they attacked while in the river; sometimes they managed to convince a crew to defect. These were annoyances that slwoly added up to lost profits. And if Riderch was concerned about anything in this life, it was profits.
The Gorfodi sent his warband to Talbeah in 980, marking the beginning of a new stage of war. Organizing the various bands of the petty nobility under his son’s command, Riderch gave orders to do whatever was necessary to secure his trading expeditions. And to his son, Andras, this was taken as a carte blanche to engage in a punitive campaign.
Andras was very different from his father. Records at the time indicated that something was off about the princeling, that he was eager for violence at a level even 10th Century men viewed as extreme. Modern psychological attempts to read back conditions into history describe Andras generally as some kind of psychopath. Whatever the case was, Andras began to carry out atrocities against the Fanaithe citizens on the mainland. This was ostensibly to deny the Filleadhaite their bases of support; it had the opposite effect.
More and more Fanaithe, not even part of the social class of the Filleadhaite, began to rise up in support of the revolt. The Filleadhaite were nervous about this rise in support- they feared that their fighting capacity was going to be weakened by the new recruits, and their leadership hierarchy, already strained by the vast geographic distances involved in Talbeah, began to break down. But after some hastily organized militias won some early successes against scattered retinues, the Filleadhaite began to encourage these actions more and more.
To Andras, this was seen as a chance to indulge in his bloodlust and as a self-fulfilling prophecy. He believed strongly that the Fanaithe were barbarous beneath the surface, and that a strong hand was needed to control their natures. That was the natural conclusion of the propaganda and myth-making the Britons had been engaged in since their arrival almost ninety years before. On the other side, the brutality of the Britons reinforced to the Fanaithe their own myths, causing both sides to believe that they were firmly in the right.
Campaigning in 981 and 982 was violent and followed a similar pattern. Loosely associated militias, loyal to the Filleadhaite, would attempt to besiege the forts of noblemen or ambush patrols. Andras would lead his warband in campaigns across vast distances, destroying militias when he ran into them. The “true” Filleadhaite would avoid engagements with Andras, and absorb the more skilled militia men into their ranks; the leadership of the Revolt was generally in favor of gradually increasing their ranks to avoid flinging untrained men against Andras’s armies. [2]
983 was viewed as a year that everything would come to a head. The brutality had devastated the economy of the Bishopric (spilling over into the Confederation, which will be discussed later), and internal trade had ground to a halt. The Filleadhaite began to abandon their idea of a clerical coup, and came to the realization that they would have to defeat Andras’s army in the field if they wanted to have a chance at achieving victory. They began to develop plans to draw Andras into a trap, which would force him to meet them on the field of their choosing.
Andras also prepared to deliver a killing blow to the Filleadhaite. The mobile nature of his war had caused him to realize the importance of what modern military minds would describe as “combined arms” operations. The larger, sea-going currachs that had been developed over the centuries of trans-oceanic trade proved their worth, allowing him to move his army from one coastal outpost to the other rapidly. The usual refusal of the rebels to meet him in open combat required quick movement to pin them down before they slipped into the deep woods; this caused him to develop a fairly strong cavalry contingent, manned almost entirely by Measctha from the Insula.
With his desire to deliver a killing blow, Andras took the bait that the Filleadhaite prepared for him. Claiming that Olchobar was becoming more bold, the rumor spread that he would celebrate Easter in public. This drew the attention of Andras and also various supporters of the Revolt. Large numbers of men gathered to hear Olchobar- fodder for the Filleadhaite to use to wear down the Briton attack that was sure to come. The Filleadhaite’s leadership believed that the battle was to come the Tuesday after Easter- Andras wouldn’t dare attack during the celebration of one of the holiest days of Christianity.
The battle came on Good Friday. Andras, over the objection of his commanders, desired the element of shock.
His initial cavalry attack into the outer camps of the unprepared Filleadhaite was devastating, forcing many erstwhile militia men to flee in chaos or be cut down. The Filleadhaite were able to rally, however, as the central core of their force, developed over two years of fighting, was located in the middle of their camp. They moved forward and blunted the cavalry’s attack, the momentum of which had been slowed by forcing through unorganized mobs of terrified men, women, and children (as many of those wanting to hear Olchobar’s words had brought their families with them, unaware of the true purpose of the gathering).
The battle began in earnest then, as Andras brought up his infantry and shield clashed against shield. Chroniclers at the time described it as a “sea of strife”, comparing the men slamming against each other to the surf crashing into rocks. The exact details of the battle are fuzzy, due to the differing accounts, but the outcome seemed very much in the air for much of the day.
However, the weight of numbers was on the side of the Filleadhaite, and they began to drive Andras’s more skilled men back, despite heavy casualties on their own side. Andras, seeing his force begin to waver, rallied his cavalry to him and led a desperate charge against the right flank of the Filleadhaite. They pierced through, rolling up the flank, and causing mass panic to descend in the ranks of the rebels. His men, rallied, attacked with new vigor, and the Filleadhaite line broke. A tremendous slaughter followed; the day ended with the Britons victorious.
But it was a decidedly Phyrric victory. Andras himself had fallen in the charge, and the retinue he had led was decimated.
However, the Filleadhaite were in no place to take advantage of this. Much of their leadership also lay dead on the field, and Olchobar, who had been watching from the read, fled into the Confederation (as many would later do). Unfortunately for him, the Confederation did not take kindly to his movement’s disruption of trade; he was captured, clubbed to death, and his head was sent to the Gorfodi to show the Confederation’s desire for trade.
The Gorfodi was not Riderch however- the old man, shocked by news of his son’s death, passed, leaving the title in the hands of his grandson, Arthfael. Unlike his father, Arthfael was not violent by nature. He would seek to restore some semblance of order to his realm, trying his best to make concessions- though these would be ignored by his nobility, many of whom were embittered by years of war. The Fanaithe would also look at these reforms with suspicion, and low-level violence became endemic to the Bishopric.
Arthfael’s reign would soon face another threat, when, in 985, an Ostish raiding party arrived and successfully sacked Peace Town. Arthfael holed up in his fortress, giving the raiders a free hand. This was the first time the men of the sea had pulled off a successful raid in the West- a harbinger of things to come…
[1] - This was untrue, as was proven later in the war.
[2] – The Filleadhaite leadership was very decentralized. While Olchobar was the rallying point, he was merely a member of a sort of cabal or council that led the movement. This lack of a central leader may have hindered some aspects of the Revolt, though it did allow the Filleadhaite to react to local threats faster.
- Rognvald
- Word Count: 2k