It is easy to find the little fooling preachers sent to the eight vassal states, because Bishop Taylor trained his disciples at the Theological College of Orich University every year, but he was not short of talents. After all, the eight vassal states are German states, and it is enough to speak German.
Only in the Ukrainian region, because ordinary people speak Ukrainian language, it is more difficult to handle. Therefore, Marin needs to send people to Kiev and hire several German-speaking Ukrainian missionaries to help train young missionaries sent to Ukraine in the future. However, it is estimated that when the young missionaries learn Ukrainian, it is estimated that they will be at least two or three years. This is still because the people with the highest language talent need to be selected. If the qualifications are average, it will probably take several years to learn Ukrainian. Therefore, things in Ukraine cannot be rushed and can only wait.
But there is one thing that Marin can't wait...
Soon, Johnny, the envoy sent to Lubeck and Hamburg, rushed back. As soon as he came back, Johnny came to Marin to report on his job.
"How is it? What do you say about Lubeck and Hamburg?" Marin asked anxiously.
Johnny nodded and said:
"Lubeck and Hamburg both agreed, but they have the conditions..."
"What conditions?" Marin was not surprised, he would be surprised if he had to be unconditional.
"They asked the Grand Duke, you must not use force against Bremen, but instead blockade and persecute. Then, they will send people to recruit wealthy merchants in Bremen to leave Bremen and settle in Lubeck and Hamburg. Of course, the Grand Duke, you must not stop or rob their property..." Johnny said the result of his mission.
Yes, after the war, Marin sent Johnny to enlist the chief and deputy leader of the Hanseatic League, Lübeck and Hamburg to discuss the issue of dealing with Bremen.
Marin was a revengeful master. Before, when the eight kingdoms invaded the Beihai Kingdom, Bremen stood on the side of the alliance of the eight kingdoms and tried to prevent the Third Legion from crossing the Wissel River, which angered Marin.
Obviously, when the Hanseatic city of Bremen was in the life and death of Beihai, he chose to stand on the side of Beihai's mortal enemy and hoped to see the demise of Beihai... How could Marin not be angry?
So, after the war ended, Marin began to consider liquidating Bremen.
In addition to this hatred, Bremen's geographical location is also very important. Bremen City is located in the southeast of Oldenburg and southwest of Bremen Province. Originally, it was not within the territory of the North Sea Country.
But after Marin annexed the Principality of Lüneburg, Bremen became the "national China" of the Beihai Kingdom. Moreover, it was located in the core part.
No one would like to have an unruly area in their hearts, let alone a Hanseatic commercial city with very developed trade.
How far has Bremen reached? In the Hanseatic League, except for Lubeck and Hamburg, the "one king and one queen" of the Hanseatic League, Bremen is next, and big cities such as Cologne are slightly inferior.
However, the city of Bremen has a fatal flaw - its status is unknown...
What does it mean to have unknown status? It means that Bremen City does not have an independent political status. Although Bremen City is a veteran city of the Hanseatic League, Bremen City is really average in terms of political status.
Unlike Lübeck and Hamburg, which owned its own seats in the Imperial House of Princes, Bremen has no independent legal status yet.
It should be pointed out that Hanseatic city and Imperial Free City are two concepts. Hanseatic Free City only means that the city has joined the Hanseatic League as a commercial alliance and does not have special political rights. The Imperial Free City is a city that can vote in the Imperial Parliament. In other words, Hanseatic Free City only represents the economic status of the city. The Imperial Free City represents the political status.
Among them, the status of the Hanseatic Free City is voted by representatives of the Hanseatic League cities to agree to join. Of course, this city must be an important trading port city along the coast or along the river.
The imperial free city is a free city authorized by the emperor. Of course, the premise is that these cities themselves are independent of their lords and are already "free cities". Then, the emperor authorized them to be "imperial city" and had seats in the Imperial Parliament.
The so-called "free city" refers to those cities that have separated from the original lord and obtained autonomy. Generally speaking, the autonomy of these free cities is the way that the merchants and citizens of the city purchase autonomy from the original lord by spending money, and no longer accept the jurisdiction of the original lord.
"Free City" is the basis for becoming the free city of Hanseatic and the free city of the imperial city. Generally speaking, such "free city" is mostly the church vassal states. Because most church vassals are greedy for money, they are more likely to be bribed and allow urban autonomy.
For example, this is the case in Bremen. Originally, the capital of the Archbishop of Bremen was in Bremen. However, later, the commercially developed city of Bremen spent a lot of money to buy back the autonomy of Bremen from Archbishop of Bremen. Archbishop of Bremen also moved the capital of Archbishop of Bremen from Bremen to Bremen (Bremer Vorde).
The same is true for the Archbishop of Cologne. After collecting money from Cologne, the Archbishop of Cologne also moved the capital from Cologne to Bonn.
But this is not enough. This kind of free city can only be recognized by the relevant vassal states and has no independent political status. The so-called "imperial free city" also requires the authorization of the emperor. Once the emperor authorizes a free city to be an imperial free city, the city will immediately become an independent individual politically, with its status equivalent to a vassal state and has its own seat in the imperial vassal court. This is probably one of the few privileges of the Holy Roman Emperor.
However, the emperor generally does not easily grant the free city the status of "imperial city". Because granting a free city the title of "imperial city" means that the city's sovereignty has been lost from the original vassal states. For those princes, this is a very slap in the face and is particularly offensive.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content later! Although those free cities redeem the right to autonomy from their respective lords, their sovereignty still belongs to the original lords. Sovereignty cannot be easily abandoned. Granting the title of an imperial city to a certain city is equivalent to depriving the sovereignty of the city from the original lords, especially slapping the face.
Therefore, in general, unless the emperor has a bad relationship with this lord, the free city within the lord's jurisdiction will not be easily awarded the title of "Imperial City".
Under normal circumstances, the emergence of the free city of the empire is generally the product of the power struggle between the emperor and the lord to which the free city belongs. For hundreds of years, the emperors and princes of the Holy Roman Empire have fought for power and profit, fighting each other, and then a group of imperial cities have emerged.
But the granting of imperial cities is not free. If you want to get the title of imperial cities, the city usually has to give the emperor money. The steps are like this - a free city borrows a lot of money to the emperor, but the emperor cannot afford it. In addition, the emperor has a bad relationship with the princes to which the free city belongs... Then, he wants to pay the debt while trying to attack the princes to which the free city belongs, so he awarded the free city the title of "imperial city"...
For example, Lübeck, for example, Hamburg, had previously obtained the status of "Imperial Free City" by spending money to redeem. However, Hamburg originally belonged to the Principality of Holstein under Denmark. Although Hamburg had long been authorized by the emperor, Denmark has always denied the status of Hamburg as the "Imperial City" and believed that Hamburg was a city under the Principality of Holstein. In history, it was not until 1768 that Denmark agreed to the identity of Hamburg as the "Imperial Free City".
But in this time and space, because Marin had long taken the Principality of Holstein from Denmark through war. Therefore, the imperial free city of Hamburg was widely recognized after Denmark's defeat.
...
However, Bremen, a big-name city of the Hanseatic League, has never won the title of "Imperial City". Because the Archbishop of Bremen, which was originally owned by Bremen, was one of the two "archbishops" in Germany (the other was the Archbishop of Magdeburg).
From the perspective of the church, Archbishop of Bremen and Archbishop of Margotburg are even higher than Archbishop Mainz, Archbishop of Cologne and Archbishop of Trier. However, the last three archbishops have the title of "Elector" and their secular power is much greater than Archbishop of Bremen and Archbishop of Margotburg.
But no matter what, Archbishop Bremen and Archbishop Margothenburg are the top tyrants in the church. Therefore, even the emperor dare not offend easily. Therefore, even if Bremen and Magdeburg were long the leaders of Hanseatic commercial cities, they have never been granted the status of "imperial city" by the emperor.
Originally, in history, the city of Bremen was awarded the status of "imperial city". It was not until the "Thirty Years' War" period in the 17th century that the then Emperor Ferdinand III issued the "Linz Certificate" to confirm the status of the city of Bremen.
But at that time, the Archbishop of Bremen was already a Lutheran Protestant vassal state. Ferdinand III was a staunch Catholic emperor, so he was naturally not afraid of offending Archbishop of Bremen. Because the Archbishop of Bremen at that time was already a Protestant vassal and belonged to the mortal enemy of the Catholic camp. Recognizing the status of Bremen as the "imperial city" was to attack the Archbishop of Bremen at that time.
Of course, that was a thing of history. In this time and space, after Marin exchanged territory with the Stendal County ceded from the Brandenburg Electoral State and the Archbishop of Bremen, the sovereignty of Bremen was actually still in the hands of the North Sea State Bremen Province.
In other words, although Bremen is a big shot among the Hanseatic cities, the sovereignty of Bremen is actually still in the province of Bremen. To put it more directly - Bremen's sovereignty is actually in the hands of the North Sea Kingdom. Marin can be regarded as the sovereignty of Bremen...
Before, Marin didn't care about this, but the people in Bremen care...
The reason why Bremen stood on the side of the eight kingdoms this time was because the eight kingdoms promised that Bremen would be allowed to gain sovereignty after the war. At that time, Bremen could pay the emperor himself to buy the status of "imperial city", and the eight kingdoms of the Beihai Kingdom would publicly express their support...
In addition, the princes of the eight countries also promised that most of the future commercial orders would be handed over to Hanseatic merchants in Bremen...
As a result, the business oligarchs in Bremen were immediately moved. You should know that Marin did not mean to give Bremen sovereignty (actually, Marin did not notice this matter). At the same time, Marin's orders were basically given to Hamburg and Lübeck, rather than to the closer Bremen, which had long caused dissatisfaction among Bremen merchants. Therefore, this led to Bremen's city finally standing on the side of the princes of the eight countries...
Of course, at that time, Beihai Country had no chance of winning. After all, the people in Bremen did not expect this to be a trap set by Marin and thought Beihai Country would lose. So, they stood in the wrong team...
He stood in the wrong team, but he was going to be liquidated afterwards. So, Marin planned to liquidate with them...
But Bremen is the top big city in the Hanseatic League. If you want to liquidate Bremen, Marin cannot bypass the Hanseatic League. Otherwise, Marin will lose the support of dozens of imperial cities led by Lubeck in the future at the Imperial Conference.
Therefore, Marin sent Johnny to Lübeck and Hamburg to secretly discuss the matter of annexation of Bremen with the two cities. Of course, it is not called annexation. Because the sovereignty of Bremen is already in the hands of Marin. At best, Marin can only be considered to take back the autonomy granted to Bremen by the Archbishop of Bremen.
As for the two Hanseatic alliance leaders and deputy leaders of Hamburg and Lubeck, their attitudes are not very similar. Hamburg agrees with Marinto Reme City with both hands and feet, while Lubeck is very hesitant.
Why? Because Hamburg and Bremen, two Hanseatic cities, are in the northwest of Germany. Although the two cities belong to the Hanseatic League, they secretly compete for the commercial dominance of the northwest of Germany (mainly the North Sea coast). Although Hamburg has a greater location advantage, Bremen is not weak either.
Therefore, Hamburg hoped that Marin would help them remove Bremen, a competitor. They naturally agreed with Marin's desire to attack Bremen.
The city of Lubeck is different. Lubeck is a commercial city in the Baltic region, and the commercial competition along the North Sea coast has nothing to do with them. Therefore, the Lubeck people have an ambiguous attitude towards Marinto Reme.
Finally, Hamburg came up with a killer move - joining Lübeck to recruit Hanseatic merchants from Bremen...
You should know that for a Hanseatic city, the most core group is the Hanseatic merchants. Without those Hanseatic merchants, Bremen is no different from ordinary German cities. Therefore, Hanseatic merchants are the core of Hanseatic cities. Because Hanseatic merchants have mastered the main wealth of Hanseatic cities and - business channels. These two are the most important Hanseatic cities.
In order to eliminate Bremen, Hamburg proposed to two companies to poach the main Hanseatic merchants in Bremen, which eventually impressed Lübeck. Therefore, they made a request to Marin to poach the Hanseatic merchants in Bremen.
Although Marin was also very envious of the wealth of the Hanseatic merchants in Bremen, he also knew that if he stole the Hanseatic merchants in Bremen, he might offend the entire Hanseatic alliance. Therefore, he finally agreed to the request of Lubeck and Hamburg to poach the Hanseatic merchants in Bremen. Anyway, for him, the future Bremen should be the territory of the North Sea Chamber of Commerce under his name. It would be better if the Hanseatic merchants in Bremen were poached, which was considered as a place for Marin's North Sea Chamber of Commerce...
In this way, Marin privately reached an agreement to divide Bremen without the knowledge of the Bremen.
Chapter completed!