The previous part is here: https://bartoll.se/2023/12/history-matrix-part44/
All parts of this series can be found here: https://bartoll.se/world-playbook-quickstart/
In 590 AD, the Byzantine–Sassanid War continued as Emperor Maurice pushed back the Persian forces into Armenia. During March, Theodosius, the eldest son of Maurice, was proclaimed as co-emperor, thus he also became his father’s heir to the Byzantine throne.
Around this time, Maurice also established two exarchates, as in ‘divisions’ of the Byzantine Empire ruled by an ‘exarch’ (viceroy) under obligation to Constantinople. One in Italy, with its seat at Ravenna, and one in Africa, based in Carthage, which also included all imperial possessions in the western Mediterranean.
In Europe, after recovering for a year, the Franks invaded Italy once again after being persuaded by Maurice. This time with better success and in two separate waves; first capturing Milan and Verona, and later Modena and Mantua. As people and soldiers where still recovering from the last attacks and suffering from food shortages, many were ill and sickly, fueling the illusion and superstition of a plague. Thus, several Lombard dukes defected and the cities were left mostly unprotected as the Frankish forced approached.
In Persia, King Hormizd IV dismissed his commander Bahrām Chobin. As a response to the insult, Chobin revolted and marched with the support of the Persian army towards its capital of Ctesiphon. In support of Bahrām, the Persian nobles had Hormizd IV assassinated and his young and unexperienced son Khosrau II succeeded him as king of the Persian Empire. As Bahrām reached Ctesiphon, the inferior forces of Khosrau II could not put up a fight and Bahrām seized the throne and proclaimed himself as king Bahrām IV of Persia.
In Rome, in cover of the fake and imaginary plague, Pope Pelagius II was assassinated in a power play by Gregory I, age 50, who then became the 64th pope.
Gregory had earlier instigated the feud between the Arian-supporting Visigothic king Liuvigild and his son Hermenegild, who at the hands of Gregory had converted to Catholicism. The feud ultimately led to both their deaths and the second son, Reccared I, heavy influenced by his brother and by Gregory, taking the throne and banishing Arianism in favor of the Catholic faith — giving the Roman Catholic Church and the Holy See of the Vatican the ultimate influence over the rulership in Spain. During his previous career and the following 16 years as pope, Gregory was instrumental in manipulating Franks, Anglo-Saxons, Lombards, and Visigoths to align with Rome and converting to Catholicism – which also laid the foundation for controlling the noble families and creating new elite families all connected to the same secret order and to keep the old ideals and Saturn worship of the Holy Roman Empire alive as the Holy Roman Catholic Church.
Throughout the Middle Ages (476 AD to 1453 AD,) Pope Gregory I, a.k.a., Saint Gregory the Great, was known as “the Father of Christian Worship” because of his exceptional efforts in revising the Roman worship of his day.
In late 590 and early 591 AD, Pope Gregory I began a vigorous program of rebuilding aqueducts, feeding the citizens with doles of grain, and restoring Rome. Again, this gives us hints to what really happened as people got sick from food shortages and contaminated water, and not an imaginary plague. Of course, feeding citizens with grain, a slave-food void of nutrition, is a clever way of barely keeping them alive and happy for having something to eat, but weak and docile (and thus easier to rule.)
In the east, as King Bahrām VI dethroned Khosrau II in Persia, Emperor Maurice saw an opportunity to end the prolonged war to the advantage of Constantinople by assisting Khosrau II in regaining the throne. He sent a Byzantine army of roughly 35,000 men under Narses into Mesopotamia, through Syria. In the lowlands near Ganzak (Iran,) an army of about 40,000 men under King Bahrām VI was defeated. Bahrām fled to seek refuge with the Turks in Central Asia, but was ultimately assassinated by agents sent by Khosrau II.
As Khosrau II could retake his throne, Maurice received the Persian provinces of Armenia and Georgia. And with a newly found peace with the Sassanid Empire, Maurice could focus on a series of military expeditions to defend the Balkan provinces from the Avars and Slavs.
In Italy, Agilulf, cousin of Authari, became the new king of the Lombards. Agilulf married the widowed queen Theodelinda and was baptized into the Catholic faith to please her.
Also, according to some records, it was said that a locust swarm destroyed the harvest in Northern Italy in 591 AD, again contributing to sickness and the superstition of plagues.
In 592 AD, Emperor Maurice regained the Byzantine stronghold Singidunum (present-day Belgrade) from the Avars.
In Europe, King Guntram, age 59, died after a 31-year reign, and was succeeded by his nephew Childebert II, who became the ruler of Burgundy (present-day parts of France and Switzerland.)
In Britannia, a mass killing took place at Woden’s Burg, near Marlborough. Ceawlin was deposed as king of the West Saxons and his son Cuthwine was taken prisoner. Ceol succeeded his uncle Ceawlin and became the new king of Wessex.
In 594 AD, after being on the retreat for over a year, the Slavs invaded the Byzantine provinces of Moesia and Macedonia once again. During their pillaging, the towns of Aquis, Scupi and Zaldapa in Dobruja were destroyed.
In 595 AD, King Childebert II died and was succeeded by his two young sons, Theudebert II and Theuderic II. His mother Brunhilda attempted to rule Austrasia and Burgundy, as regent for her grandsons.
During the summer, Pope Gregory I sent a group of monks under Augustine of Canterbury on a mission to Britain to Christianize King Æthelberht, and to convert the Kingdom of Kent from native Anglo-Saxon paganism to that of the Catholic faith.
In the east, Muhammad, the Islamic prophet, met and married Khadija. She was a 40-year-old widow and 15 years older than he. Supported by Khadija’s wealth, they formed a successful merchant partnership.
It was about this time that the Saturn Cult in Persia became the Saturn-Moon cult of Islam (meaning ‘submission,’ as in the absolute self-surrender and submission to God’s will.)
While Christianity is a solar religion, Islam is a lunar religion (Lunar calendar.)
In 596 AD, Emperor Maurice decided on the city of Marcianopolis (in present-day Bulgaria) as a military base on the lower Danube River, in the war against the Slavs on the Balkans.
In Britannia, an invading force of Angles landed on the Fife coast near Raith (Kirkcaldy.) During the fifth century, all Germanic tribes who invaded Britain were referred to as either Englisc, Ængle or Engle, and they were all speakers of Old English (which was known as Englisc, Ænglisc, or Anglisc.) Pope Gregory simplified the Latinized name Anglii to Angli and Angles.
The invading Germanic Angles, whose origin were from present-day north Germany and the southern parts of Denmark, defeated an alliance of Scots, Britons and Picts, under King Áedán mac Gabráin of Scotland. The Angles later split up and founded the kingdoms of Northumbria, East Anglia, and Mercia. Their name is also the root of the name England (“land of Ængle”.)
It was also around this time, in late 596 or early 597 AD, that Augustine of Canterbury landed with his group of missionaries sent by Pope Gregory on the Isle of Thanet (South East England.) He was welcomed by King Æthelberht of Kent, who accepted baptism along with the rest of his court at the behest of his Catholic Frankish wife, Bertha. Æthelbert assigned Augustine and his 40 monks a residence at Canterbury (Kent,) where they founded a Benedictine monastery that would make the town a center of Christianity. Keep in mind that the Order of Saint Benedict is a monastic order of the Catholic Church. Among the Benedictines, the male religious are also called Black Monks, just as the superior general of the Jesuit Order later would be called the black pope.
In the Byzantine Empire, by 597 AD, Emperor Maurice wrote his last will, in which he described his ideas for governing the Byzantine (Roman) Empire. His eldest son, Theodosius, would rule the East from Constantinople, and his second son, Tiberius, the West from Rome.
In the autumn, the Avars allied with the Franks and resumed their campaign along the Danube River, where they besieged the Byzantine fortress city of Tomis (present-day Romania.)
In Europe, Queen Fredegund died of natural causes and Chlothar II, age 13, became sole ruler of Neustria. He continued his mother’s feud with Brunhilda of Austrasia.
By December 25 in 597, it was said that ‘Christianity’ spread rapidly in Kent as Augustine and his monks allegedly baptized more than 10,000 Anglo-Saxons, making sure that the Catholic Church could slowly infiltrate and take over Britannia.
Augustine also founded the Catholic King’s School in Canterbury to be used to train their mind-controlled puppets. The school is still operational today and is considered as Britain’s oldest public school and the oldest continuously operating school in the world.
It was also about this time that England got her first written code of laws from Æthelberht. The code was concerned with preserving social order through compensation and punishment for personal injury.
In 598 AD, the Byzantine-Avars War continued, and after many cities were destroyed in the Balkan Peninsula, Emperor Maurice paid tribute to the Avars and concluded a treaty with their leader Bayan I, allowing Byzantine expeditions in Wallachia.
In Europe, Pope Gregory, who had slowly converted the Lombards to Christianity (Catholicism) negotiated a truce, ending 30 years of Lombard terror in southern- and mid-Italy. In addition to this, where Emperor Maurice earlier had ignored the Lombards who had held the greater part of Italy and instead had pitted the Franks against them as he had been busy with Persia, the Avars and Slavs, now made peace with King Agilulf, conceding northern Italy to the Lombards.