Chapter 26: Filling The Holes
931 began with the hope that the French would get the message and go back home. They sort of got the message. They didn't try to break through the wall, but they did try to go around it. The wall would need to move with it, but it would hold. Nonetheless, this was a problem that could not be solved like this forever. Cordova would need to settle the Southern coastline behind it, or risk losing the area. The period of the next few decades came to be known as the Crisis of the Coast.
In better news, the Castilian Spearmen that had been running around up to no good near Seville and Cadiz decided to disband instead of go back home. Rumors of the Castilian Military suffering a budget shortage have yet to be confirmed.
The wall blocking the French Settlers moved west in 933 to continue the block. In 934, they would now move East, trying to find another way around the wall, perhaps. Castilian Settlers and their Spear-wielding escorts also appeared in this year, but no notice was taken and it was expected that they'd settle in the sizable gap between Cordovan and Castilian territory.
Sailing North along the coastline of the Holy Land, the Curragh in the East finally ran into the borders of the Eastern Roman Empire, now going by the name of the Byzantines. They were led by Empress Theodora. They were pretty big- the largest nation that Cordova knew of, in fact. And they were still expanding at a rapid rate.
In 937, people started paying attention to the Castilian Settlers, as they started moving South, into Cordovan land. Their intention was obvious- they wanted the same area that France wanted.
The Cordovan government met in 938 to talk about this.
"Now what?" asked Al-Mundhir, "We can't block both of them!"
"Maybe we can, at least for long enough to settle it ourselves. Any ideas?" said Abd Al-Rahman.
"Well," said Al-Hakam, "We could try building a giant wall of people across the peninsula, out of everything we have available. I'll even help form the wall myself."
It was decided that this was actually a pretty good idea, and if the French and Castilians wished to challenge it, they could find themselves dismembered by Cordovan swords. The wall started forming in 939, and it was almost entirely finished by 942, with one small hole that would soon be plugged. Created from Spearmen, Warriors, Workers, Swordsmen, cities, and even Al-Hakam and Al-Mundhir, it would prevent any attempted crossing.
Predictably enough, the Castilian and French Settlers, being idiots, tried to move West towards the hole in 943, even though it would be plugged up long before they could get there.
The same year, a Danish Longboat, a powerful, fast boat that few people knew how to build, appeared from the North, seeming to be without any actual direction, and Castile finally built a 5th city, Oviedo, to the North of Valencia, making them still the smallest country in Europe, with little hope of getting much bigger soon.
The hole was plugged by a Sword in 945, and the Castilians and French, realizing the futility of their efforts, went back North to find somewhere else to settle.
Around this time, the workers finally finished the road connecting Valencia to the rest of Cordova.
With the Castilians and French gone, there was little for the Cordovans to worry about for a while. They kept the wall up, and the workers in the wall built improvements to the land they were on. Settlers headed towards the unsettled area to prevent it from ever being a problem, by simply taking the land for themselves.
About the only noteworthy events between the Castilians and French leaving and the settling of a city in that area were the finishing of a Curragh in Seville that would go North and explore, and news heard of a Massive Barbarian Uprising "Near Cadiz" in 955. Of course, despite some initial panic, it was quickly realized that they were across the Mediterranean in Africa, and probably were no threat to Cordova at all. They were the Fatimids' problem.
In 957, a city was finally built on the Southeast coast, on a river. Named Granada, it permanently ensured that the area behind Cordova would be Cordovan, with the exception of a few small gaps that could easily be filled and were probably too close to Cordovan cities for anyone else to bother settling there anyway. The Wall broke apart shortly after, and the people in it resumed their jobs of working the land and defending cities.
Most of the holes would soon be filled with border expansions from already existing cities, anyway.
In 962, Cordovan scientists finally learned something that almost everyone else had already learned anyway: How to ride a Horse. They could now start training soldiers on Horseback, although they couldn't yet make any more powerful Ansar Warriors, as they didn't have the technology for that.
In 964, something appeared from the North. A Longboat, specifically, but not a Danish one. This one belonged to Sweden, one of the other Viking civilizations in the North. The Cordovans hear that only one more that they don't know of exists, and want to sail North quickly to meet them.
The Swedes were led by Inge I, and like almost everyone else, were a bit larger than Cordova, and didn't really have anything to trade.
Also at about this time, the Danes built the city of Aarhus in North Africa. Al-Rahman wonders what made them come so far from home. Perhaps they want the Quarry outside the city, seeing as they lack a source of their own, but Al-Rahman finds it odd they couldn't just find a closer source.
There was some worry in 967 that the Swedish Longboat was heading for the Northern part of the Straits of Gibraltar to settle. Such a city could not be allowed to exist by the Cordovans, but there wasn't much they could do if Sweden really wanted that city. They blocked off the coast with several people in 969, making them have to fight for it if that was their intention, but hopefully not. They didn't want to have to deal with the fearsome Viking Berzerkers.
A bit later, to the West of France, in a region known as Brittany, which contained a Danish colony, the Curraghs met someone new. They called themselves the Celts, and were led by Malcolm. They were around the middle in size. Al-Rahman briefly wondered where all of their other cities were, then learned that this city was as much of a colony as the nearby Danish one. The Celts inhabited some islands to the North, which they shared with some other people. Al-Rahman hoped to meet them soon.
The Swedes, thankfully, moved Southwest, probably to Northwest Africa, ensuring that the Southern coast of Iberia would remain Cordovan.
It would be settled in 975, by settlers who named their city Malaga. The southern coast was now completely insured against any who would attempt to challenge Cordovan ownership of the area.
A strange delusion came over the leadership of Castile in 976. It led them to believe that the Cordovans would give them tribute.
"That's a pretty good deal," said Abd Al-Rahman, "but I've got a better one. How about you get the hell out of my palace, and I'll let you return to Castile in one piece. That seem like a good deal?"
The Castilian messenger must have agreed, as he promptly left. The Castilians, though angry, decided not to fight over this rejection.
Having earlier found the island the Celts lived on, the Curraghs in the North moved East, and in 978 met the other people on the island: The English, led by Empress Matilda. They were about the same size as the Celts, a little bigger.
The period after this was a period of not much happening. African Barbarian Keshiks attacked Aarhus and quickly died in 979, stuff was being built, people moved, life went on. The Ansars finally returned home in 993, having been gone from Cordova for 150 years. They had learned much, been harassed for passing through other people's territory on the way, and come home to a completely different Cordova. They were soon sent for a brief trip into South Castile to see the little bit of the country that the Cordovans didn't yet know about.
And speaking of harassing Castile, the Cordovans began doing that a little more by settling the last few gaps between Cordova and Castile. They were a bit surprised the Castilians had never done this themselves, as they had had plenty of time to and several spare settlers, but, if they weren't going to, that was their loss. In 996, the city of Badajoz was built to the North of Lisbon, filling in the area and even taking some of the land Castile had previously claimed, including some Wines. Hehehe.
A rather hilarious occurrence happened next year, when Castilian workers moved to build a road on those wines, apparently not having heard that Cordova now owned the area. They would later leave without finishing it, but it was still funny.
In 998, the Cordovan scientists had finished research on something several other people had already gotten, but they were much faster this time. Specifically, they learned how to use sources of Stone Quarries like the one between Cordoba and Cadiz to build large fortifications, known as Castles, in strategic areas, or just build walls around cities. They also learned how to build large bridges over rivers so that they could be much more easily crossed, and roads could now cross them.
With this massive new advance, changes started taking place, appropriate for the change to a new millennium. It was enough to consider that the Cordovans had entered a new age in advancement, and could now take full advantage of their Arab Learning, to learn more quickly how to do... um... Arabic stuff.
They'd get to work building all of the new things they could build as soon as they could.
By 1002, the Curraghs had discovered a lot. They'd explored the South coast of Great Britain, the North coast of France, and the Northern coasts of Burgundy and Germany which weren't even fully confirmed to actually exist before that point. Finally, in 1002, after passing by the Danish core, they encountered the final Viking civilization, and the final nation to even exist in the known world of Europe. They were called Norway, and their King was named Harald Hardrada. They weren't much different from any of the other Vikings, aside from their size. At 8 cities, they were even smaller than Cordova, and everyone else, for that matter, except the Castilians.
3 years later, the Curraghs discovered a rather amusing result of Norway's small size: The English had managed to build a city in Scandinavia, right between the Norwegians and Swedes. Abd Al-Rahman and the rest of the Cordovans can't help but wonder how the hell that managed to happen. Did the Norwegians really expand so slowly they failed to keep the English out? Were they on the losing side of a war? What?
The Curraghs headed East and South from here, exploring the coasts of Sweden and Denmark. They also found, curiously, the Northern coast of Poland. They were farther Northwest than the Cordovans had expected.
Meanwhile, the Curraghs in the Mediterranean finished mapping out the coastline of Italy and a couple of islands. Most of the Mediterranean was now on Cordovan maps. And that would be all that would happen for the next few decades, as the Cordovans built up in preparation for research to complete and the last few holes in territory to be filled with cities. Not much interesting occurred in this time. The Turks, Abbasids, and Byzantines, always on top of technological breakthroughs by virtue of their massive sizes, continued researching and managed to develop several breakthroughs at around the same time, and trade among themselves to keep themselves on top.
The Swedish built a city on Sicily in 1021. The Cordovans question their decision to build it right next to Mt. Etna, a known active volcano, but guesses they must have a good reason for it.
Speaking of building cities, the Cordovans finally finished their settlers and got the last three cities they would build in Iberia built. In 1023, Mertola was built to the East of Badajoz, taking a bit more from Castille and defining the border there.
In 1029, the last gap in cities on the Southeast coast was filled, if you wanted to even call it a gap, with the building of the city of Santa Maria. It was already all owned by Cordova, but there was a lot of unused land there, so a city really needed to be there to take advantage of it.
Finally, the last gap was filled in 1035 in the Northeast. The new city of Huelva didn't take anything from Castile, like Mertola and Badajoz did, but it did fill in some land. With it, all of Iberia was now filled in by somebody.
With all this happening, Cordova had run out of room to expand. And yet, they wanted more, they needed more, to compete with other, bigger nations.
Castile was now looking like a very appealing target, especially with the new cities giving them faster access to Castilian border cities.
If only they could build more Ansar Warriors...
931 began with the hope that the French would get the message and go back home. They sort of got the message. They didn't try to break through the wall, but they did try to go around it. The wall would need to move with it, but it would hold. Nonetheless, this was a problem that could not be solved like this forever. Cordova would need to settle the Southern coastline behind it, or risk losing the area. The period of the next few decades came to be known as the Crisis of the Coast.
In better news, the Castilian Spearmen that had been running around up to no good near Seville and Cadiz decided to disband instead of go back home. Rumors of the Castilian Military suffering a budget shortage have yet to be confirmed.
The wall blocking the French Settlers moved west in 933 to continue the block. In 934, they would now move East, trying to find another way around the wall, perhaps. Castilian Settlers and their Spear-wielding escorts also appeared in this year, but no notice was taken and it was expected that they'd settle in the sizable gap between Cordovan and Castilian territory.
Sailing North along the coastline of the Holy Land, the Curragh in the East finally ran into the borders of the Eastern Roman Empire, now going by the name of the Byzantines. They were led by Empress Theodora. They were pretty big- the largest nation that Cordova knew of, in fact. And they were still expanding at a rapid rate.
In 937, people started paying attention to the Castilian Settlers, as they started moving South, into Cordovan land. Their intention was obvious- they wanted the same area that France wanted.
The Cordovan government met in 938 to talk about this.
"Now what?" asked Al-Mundhir, "We can't block both of them!"
"Maybe we can, at least for long enough to settle it ourselves. Any ideas?" said Abd Al-Rahman.
"Well," said Al-Hakam, "We could try building a giant wall of people across the peninsula, out of everything we have available. I'll even help form the wall myself."
It was decided that this was actually a pretty good idea, and if the French and Castilians wished to challenge it, they could find themselves dismembered by Cordovan swords. The wall started forming in 939, and it was almost entirely finished by 942, with one small hole that would soon be plugged. Created from Spearmen, Warriors, Workers, Swordsmen, cities, and even Al-Hakam and Al-Mundhir, it would prevent any attempted crossing.
Predictably enough, the Castilian and French Settlers, being idiots, tried to move West towards the hole in 943, even though it would be plugged up long before they could get there.
The same year, a Danish Longboat, a powerful, fast boat that few people knew how to build, appeared from the North, seeming to be without any actual direction, and Castile finally built a 5th city, Oviedo, to the North of Valencia, making them still the smallest country in Europe, with little hope of getting much bigger soon.
The hole was plugged by a Sword in 945, and the Castilians and French, realizing the futility of their efforts, went back North to find somewhere else to settle.
Around this time, the workers finally finished the road connecting Valencia to the rest of Cordova.
With the Castilians and French gone, there was little for the Cordovans to worry about for a while. They kept the wall up, and the workers in the wall built improvements to the land they were on. Settlers headed towards the unsettled area to prevent it from ever being a problem, by simply taking the land for themselves.
About the only noteworthy events between the Castilians and French leaving and the settling of a city in that area were the finishing of a Curragh in Seville that would go North and explore, and news heard of a Massive Barbarian Uprising "Near Cadiz" in 955. Of course, despite some initial panic, it was quickly realized that they were across the Mediterranean in Africa, and probably were no threat to Cordova at all. They were the Fatimids' problem.
In 957, a city was finally built on the Southeast coast, on a river. Named Granada, it permanently ensured that the area behind Cordova would be Cordovan, with the exception of a few small gaps that could easily be filled and were probably too close to Cordovan cities for anyone else to bother settling there anyway. The Wall broke apart shortly after, and the people in it resumed their jobs of working the land and defending cities.
Most of the holes would soon be filled with border expansions from already existing cities, anyway.
In 962, Cordovan scientists finally learned something that almost everyone else had already learned anyway: How to ride a Horse. They could now start training soldiers on Horseback, although they couldn't yet make any more powerful Ansar Warriors, as they didn't have the technology for that.
In 964, something appeared from the North. A Longboat, specifically, but not a Danish one. This one belonged to Sweden, one of the other Viking civilizations in the North. The Cordovans hear that only one more that they don't know of exists, and want to sail North quickly to meet them.
The Swedes were led by Inge I, and like almost everyone else, were a bit larger than Cordova, and didn't really have anything to trade.
Also at about this time, the Danes built the city of Aarhus in North Africa. Al-Rahman wonders what made them come so far from home. Perhaps they want the Quarry outside the city, seeing as they lack a source of their own, but Al-Rahman finds it odd they couldn't just find a closer source.
There was some worry in 967 that the Swedish Longboat was heading for the Northern part of the Straits of Gibraltar to settle. Such a city could not be allowed to exist by the Cordovans, but there wasn't much they could do if Sweden really wanted that city. They blocked off the coast with several people in 969, making them have to fight for it if that was their intention, but hopefully not. They didn't want to have to deal with the fearsome Viking Berzerkers.
A bit later, to the West of France, in a region known as Brittany, which contained a Danish colony, the Curraghs met someone new. They called themselves the Celts, and were led by Malcolm. They were around the middle in size. Al-Rahman briefly wondered where all of their other cities were, then learned that this city was as much of a colony as the nearby Danish one. The Celts inhabited some islands to the North, which they shared with some other people. Al-Rahman hoped to meet them soon.
The Swedes, thankfully, moved Southwest, probably to Northwest Africa, ensuring that the Southern coast of Iberia would remain Cordovan.
It would be settled in 975, by settlers who named their city Malaga. The southern coast was now completely insured against any who would attempt to challenge Cordovan ownership of the area.
A strange delusion came over the leadership of Castile in 976. It led them to believe that the Cordovans would give them tribute.
"That's a pretty good deal," said Abd Al-Rahman, "but I've got a better one. How about you get the hell out of my palace, and I'll let you return to Castile in one piece. That seem like a good deal?"
The Castilian messenger must have agreed, as he promptly left. The Castilians, though angry, decided not to fight over this rejection.
Having earlier found the island the Celts lived on, the Curraghs in the North moved East, and in 978 met the other people on the island: The English, led by Empress Matilda. They were about the same size as the Celts, a little bigger.
The period after this was a period of not much happening. African Barbarian Keshiks attacked Aarhus and quickly died in 979, stuff was being built, people moved, life went on. The Ansars finally returned home in 993, having been gone from Cordova for 150 years. They had learned much, been harassed for passing through other people's territory on the way, and come home to a completely different Cordova. They were soon sent for a brief trip into South Castile to see the little bit of the country that the Cordovans didn't yet know about.
And speaking of harassing Castile, the Cordovans began doing that a little more by settling the last few gaps between Cordova and Castile. They were a bit surprised the Castilians had never done this themselves, as they had had plenty of time to and several spare settlers, but, if they weren't going to, that was their loss. In 996, the city of Badajoz was built to the North of Lisbon, filling in the area and even taking some of the land Castile had previously claimed, including some Wines. Hehehe.
A rather hilarious occurrence happened next year, when Castilian workers moved to build a road on those wines, apparently not having heard that Cordova now owned the area. They would later leave without finishing it, but it was still funny.
In 998, the Cordovan scientists had finished research on something several other people had already gotten, but they were much faster this time. Specifically, they learned how to use sources of Stone Quarries like the one between Cordoba and Cadiz to build large fortifications, known as Castles, in strategic areas, or just build walls around cities. They also learned how to build large bridges over rivers so that they could be much more easily crossed, and roads could now cross them.
With this massive new advance, changes started taking place, appropriate for the change to a new millennium. It was enough to consider that the Cordovans had entered a new age in advancement, and could now take full advantage of their Arab Learning, to learn more quickly how to do... um... Arabic stuff.
They'd get to work building all of the new things they could build as soon as they could.
By 1002, the Curraghs had discovered a lot. They'd explored the South coast of Great Britain, the North coast of France, and the Northern coasts of Burgundy and Germany which weren't even fully confirmed to actually exist before that point. Finally, in 1002, after passing by the Danish core, they encountered the final Viking civilization, and the final nation to even exist in the known world of Europe. They were called Norway, and their King was named Harald Hardrada. They weren't much different from any of the other Vikings, aside from their size. At 8 cities, they were even smaller than Cordova, and everyone else, for that matter, except the Castilians.
3 years later, the Curraghs discovered a rather amusing result of Norway's small size: The English had managed to build a city in Scandinavia, right between the Norwegians and Swedes. Abd Al-Rahman and the rest of the Cordovans can't help but wonder how the hell that managed to happen. Did the Norwegians really expand so slowly they failed to keep the English out? Were they on the losing side of a war? What?
The Curraghs headed East and South from here, exploring the coasts of Sweden and Denmark. They also found, curiously, the Northern coast of Poland. They were farther Northwest than the Cordovans had expected.
Meanwhile, the Curraghs in the Mediterranean finished mapping out the coastline of Italy and a couple of islands. Most of the Mediterranean was now on Cordovan maps. And that would be all that would happen for the next few decades, as the Cordovans built up in preparation for research to complete and the last few holes in territory to be filled with cities. Not much interesting occurred in this time. The Turks, Abbasids, and Byzantines, always on top of technological breakthroughs by virtue of their massive sizes, continued researching and managed to develop several breakthroughs at around the same time, and trade among themselves to keep themselves on top.
The Swedish built a city on Sicily in 1021. The Cordovans question their decision to build it right next to Mt. Etna, a known active volcano, but guesses they must have a good reason for it.
Speaking of building cities, the Cordovans finally finished their settlers and got the last three cities they would build in Iberia built. In 1023, Mertola was built to the East of Badajoz, taking a bit more from Castille and defining the border there.
In 1029, the last gap in cities on the Southeast coast was filled, if you wanted to even call it a gap, with the building of the city of Santa Maria. It was already all owned by Cordova, but there was a lot of unused land there, so a city really needed to be there to take advantage of it.
Finally, the last gap was filled in 1035 in the Northeast. The new city of Huelva didn't take anything from Castile, like Mertola and Badajoz did, but it did fill in some land. With it, all of Iberia was now filled in by somebody.
With all this happening, Cordova had run out of room to expand. And yet, they wanted more, they needed more, to compete with other, bigger nations.
Castile was now looking like a very appealing target, especially with the new cities giving them faster access to Castilian border cities.
If only they could build more Ansar Warriors...
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![[pissed]](/images/smilies/pissed.gif "Pissed [pissed]")
