My wild Irish prose

Intro: Murchad mac Diarmata (1026 – 1070) was a King of Dublin and Leinster, and if you haven’t heard of him, no big deal. He didn’t really accomplish that much, and thus his name has been lost in the realms of history. However, last week, I decided, with the aid of Crusader Kings 2, to give the name of Murchad new meaning! Playing out his life in full glory, and doing things differently from the way he did, Murchad (me) achieved crazy things! If you want to discover how this historical figure lived out his lifein my alternate universe, read his diary that was discovered and translated just yesterday!

Anno 1066: To whomever will read this in the future, I am Murchad Mac Diarmata, Earl of Dublin! Hopefully when I finish this document, I will be what I have dreamed of, ever since I was a little boy – to be the King of Ireland! I will unite the Green Isle under one banner, and make it the force that it deserves to be. To accomplish this, I have a devious plan, that hopefully will play out exactly as I want it to. Firstly, my dad is the Earl of Leinster, and therefore I will be the Earl of Leinster when he finally kicks the bucket... GOD why is it taking so long? Patience, Murchad, patience, your time will come, just gotta keep repeating that. Secondly I have to change these goddamn succession laws. I mean, C’MON, who the hell still uses Gavelkind Succession these days? You’re like, “What’s Gavelkind?” Exactly! No one even knows about it. Well basically when I die, my stuff won’t go to my oldest child, but will be split up in even bits for all of them. The fact that I have 3 kids doesn’t really help. So my first plan on the agenda is changing it to seniority succession! Boom Shakalaka, now Donnell (my oldest son) is my heir! Perfetto, now my realm won’t be split up when I meet my maker! Next thing on the agenda is getting rid of my chancellor. Seamus is a such an idiot. He managed to insult the Duke of Connacht’s wife while he was standing next to her... God, I had to send lots of horses and gifts to keep him from going to war with me. I HAVE to get rid of Seamus... hmmm I have to see about that. I mean without a good chancellor how am I supposed to fabricate claims on other counties? Without any claims I cant even legitimately take over places...man this King of Ireland thing is looking harder and harder to achieve.

Anno 1075: Oh God, where to start... Well dad is finally pushing up the daisies! That means I’m the Earl of Leinster! Double trouble! I now have the armies of Leinster and Dublin combined, which makes me one of the most powerful men (behind a few others) in Ireland! So now, this power (and the extra cash) allowed me to hatch a dastardly plot! I murdered Seamus (yep, the chancellor, involving an unfortunate incident including rocks and a river), and installed his son Rhiann! Such a beautiful plan, and Rhiann doesn’t even have a clue!!!! Anyway, so I sent Rhia of to Breifne to bribe my way to claiming it for myself (and to stop him from getting suspicious), and violá, 2 years later, I have the Causus Belli (reason for war) I need to attack Breifne! So in 1068, my troops overran that place, and now you may also call me the Earl of Breifne! So now with the army of three counties, I looked for my next target! Luckily for me Rhiann dug out an old history book where it claimed (rather dubiously) that Ossory was part of the duchy of Leinster! Since I am the Earl of Leinster, I mean it’s not thaaat much of a step to be the duke, right? Well, you might not agree, but it was enough for me! I started calling myself the Duke of Leinster (instead of just an earl!) and now had the reason to take over Ossory! Piece of cake!

Hmmmm what else happened....oh yeah wifey died, can’t really remember her name! She died about the same time my bastard child (who I had with my lover) was born... suspicious... Anyway, I didn’t really want to spend the rest ofmy life alone, so I looked round for a good wife in the bridal catalogue, and then my eyes fell upon her! Szofiá was a Polish princess (plus points!!) and an absolute peach! Married her within a year of wifey dying.

That’s it for now! Till next time!!! I have great things planned, and Rhia has many things in motion!

Anno 1086: Bad day for the house mac Diarmata... Donnell passed away from severe stress (is that even possible?!?!)... anyway gotta live on... at least I have a beautiful grandson, Fáelán...and even though he prefers to play with dolls instead of swords, I think he has a lot of promise. Anyway, “What’s new on the King of Ireland front?” you ask. Remember the Duke of Connacht? Well his son, Ruadri, (whose mother had been insulted) is being a right stroppy little twit. I usurped the title of Duke of Connacht (Breifne kinda is part of it, and I mean, I’m a much better duke anyway) and forced him to become my vassal, all totally acceptable things! So he gets pissed and starts plotting to kill Fáelán, yeah I know, shocking. The NERVE of some people. Really, I had him thrown in to my dungeon... kinda was forced to let him out though, after everyone threatened to declare war on me. Sucks to be not as powerful as all your enemies combined. Oh yeah, I also took over Ulster, after Rhi had fabricated a claim, saying my uncle’s mother’s dog had been the Earl of Ulster, which means it’s mine now. Pretty standard stuff. Also I created the title of Duchy of Meath just because I could. Good times! That means now I am the Duke of Meath, Leinster and Connacht as well as the Earl of Ulster. My plan is coming to fruition, soon when I own more than half of Ireland, I will be able to crown myself King of Ireland, MUAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! (P.S. Gotta do it fast though... I’m 60 now, most people don’t even live to 50 these days... gotta hurry up!)

Anno 1096: Ladies and gentlemen, may we present you: THE KING OF IRELAND!!!!! HAHAHAHAHAAHHAAHAH. Yes, dear reader, we have successfully battled, bribed and fabricated our way to the Irish throne! The looks on the people’s faces when we announced our royal ancestry and therefore claim to the Irish throne was MAGNIFICENT. We are now known as King Murchad I ‘the Great’ of Ireland! Sounds great, we know! Anyway, once we had risen to shoulder this great responsibility, we started to declare war on all the rebel factions that still controlled more than half of Ireland, and free the poor helpless peasants (thinking about it... the peasants weren’t actually that grateful; punishment is in order). So, we decided Thomond would be first. Thomond, in the southwest, was just a random target, seriously, who could withstand us now!! However, for some reason, Brian of Munster came to the aid of the Earl of Thomond. Split my armies in two, crushed him and crushed Thomond too. However, we felt a bit merciful, as Brian had become a cripple in some battle, so we let him go home and keep Munster a while longer. A year later, in our pledge to free Ireland from the tyranny of rebel lords, we took over Ormond and Desmond, then we were feeling generous, and gave the royal Irish army Christmas off! That’s all till now in Ireland.

So what’s up in England!? We have been getting strange messages, that there are now two factions in England, one that styles itself as “Lancaster” and one that calls itself “England”. These two seem to be at war with each other... hmmmm I wonder at the possibilities. If they are still fighting once we have mopped up here, we can perhaps cut ourselves a slice off of England as well....hmmmm! Anno 1106: Yes dear reader, this King is still alive and kicking, even though we have reached the respectable age of 80! So what has happened in the past few years? We managed to free Oriol (1097), Tyrone (1098, whose earl was waging war in Scotland at the time. How considerate, it made it that much more easier) and finally Tyroconnel (1099). Finally, control of all of Ireland! Success. How interesting, that we, as a young child, could have dreamed so big and then achieved it! Anyway Rhi was (and is) still around, now Chancellor of Ireland (he certainly moved up with us), and as we were bored, we sent him to fabricate a claim on the Isle of Man! Since he did find a record of our grandfather’s horse, being ridden by the Earl of the Isle of Man, it followed that the Isle of Man should be Irish property! We ourselves led the armies there, and subsequently crushed any resistance! Anyway, so Ruadri (remember him?) was plotting again, and did manage to convince a few people that HE was the Duke of Connacht... He just doesn’t know when to give up! Anyway, we finally had him executed, as he was getting annoying and nobody ever doubted us being the Duke of Connacht anymore! A year ago, there were revolts in Desmond... We are wondering why. With such a benevolent King, who would ever want to revolt? Anyway, we crushed the peasants and crucified every tenth survivor! That should teach them!

Oh... also Szofiá died. She was our everything. We almost committed suicide in the following months, but we were too important to do that. However, we swore to ourselves, that we would remain celibate... at the age of 80 that is easy anyway, we think! Anyway we are very tired now... more tired than usual. We hope that we our kingdom survives and lives on... Fáelán will have to make an amazing king, to hold all theearls in check. We however do not care anymore, we are giving this kingdom to the next generation.

The following day, the King was found dead! He had peacefully died in his sleep. While this story may be over, the story of Fáelánand the Kingdom of Ireland is not!

Conclusion: Now you may be wondering, if what I wrote here is a pure figment of my imagination. I swear to you, it is not! All that was written by Murchad, actually did really occur in the game! So if you are thinking, “Hey this game sounds way cool!” then get yourselves a copy of Crusader Kings 2, and see who you can make King. Create your own history!