Oh Fernando…. Cómo es orgulloso usted sería….

I know you must have been so very concerned when news of the sublevación reached you! But you must not worry mi amor . . . Los Secularistas did nothing more than rumble in their filthy godless poverty and then they did the most peculiar thing . . . They started a fire! They gathered around and started a fire like the heathens we have saved them from! Yelling about this being a lie and that being a fairy tale . . . it was all very pathetic and ungrateful. But while I watched from our palace, it occurred to me that these people had not yet realized the true nobility that comes from being the service of our lord. So later, just before dawn, after the fools had returned to their piles of hay and mud, I had my spearmen go and round them up. I explained to them that as I had watched their fire burn I had been sent a vision from Buddha . . . a vision of a great Templo built to honor our savior and that they were to build it.

At first there was a bit of belligerent mumbles from the masses. They had not yet seen the brilliance and splendor that comes from devoted service. But they soon came to understand as all the able bodied men were immediately loaded into wagons to begin the Templo de Madrid.

Oh how silent the streets were after that! The people were struck dumb by the power of Spain and the beauty of our golden Templo. To thank me for bringing peace and salvation back to Madrid, the soldiers had some of the smaller or weaker esclavos - who were not able to contribute in any meaningful way to the great Templo - build a monument in my honor right in the center of the market where the fire had burned! To remind the people of how fortunate they are to have my vision and the grace of Buddha in their lives. I hear rumors these monuments have been built in every city as far as Barcelona!

Perhaps you have seen one or heard that my prophecy has lead to a progressive revolution in the labor structures of Spain. All over the kingdom, those who our lord has seen fit to lead have discouraged dissidents and unrest by enlisting those in their debt or who are unwilling to devote their lives to Buddha into holy service.

Unprecedented progress has come to Spain as roads, mines, farms, libraries and temples have bloomed in even the most remote cities. I hear rumors that Seville’s population has even grown to rival Madrid. I must pray that Buddha will give me the wisdom to understand why anyone would leave our paradise.

Te amo siempre . . . Isabella

Cygnus Inter Anates

1040 BC. As knowledge of our world expands, so too does its level of intrigue.



Roman hands have begun to tame the natural chaos surrounding us, imposing order on the savage wild. The cattle grazing to the west of the city have been confined to pastures, and our farmers have tamed the fields of rice to northeast. Food abounds in Rome; our people are well-fed and happy.






The Chinese to the south are now not the only rivals with whom Rome must contend. Our scouts have encountered emissaries from peoples living far to the west, in lands so remote our cartographers have no knowledge of their location. The English are one such people; they speak, like the Chinese, a language foreign to ours ears, yet whose customs and behaviors seem more closely advanced to the Roman level of development. Also met are a people who, laughably, lay claim to the title of the Holy Roman Empire. Like the son of a warrior playing with wooden soldiers, this adolescent culture has witnessed the might and glory of Rome, and aspires to it. Once the locations of their cities become apparent, we shall just how loosely the robes hang from their shoulders.






While our rivals flood the world with their insipid messengers, carrying tidings of peace and friendship like so many candies that please the tongue but leave the stomach longing for substance, Rome instead troubles itself with the solid stone foundations of a new day. South of Antium and southwest of Rome, at the foot of the mighty Mont Blanc, Caesar has ordered the founding of the settlement of Cumae. Our warriors have begged for swift steeds to ride into battle against our enemies, and for copper axes and spears as sturdy as their stout hearts, and Caesar has granted their wishes. The people of Cumae shall now provide these services to our fighting men, and serve the glory of Rome well in this pursuit.






The most recent discoveries of our scouts further broaden the horizons of our world. Rounding the southern tip of China, they press westward along the Mediterranean coast. They have sent back tales of wild boars so fat and succulent that they feast for a week on their flesh, and of Mediterranean clams with a unique flavor unknown to the Roman palate. But despite these wonders, their most recent dispatch gives me the most pause—more strange peoples and cultures wearing the dress of civilized men. Scouts calling themselves Egyptian have been met along the coast, hailing from the same mysterious western country as the English and false Romans, and a culture of horsemen known as the Aztecs have been discovered living in cities along the Mediterranean coast.






Like a new batch of spoils returned to Rome by our warriors, the discovery of these new peoples ignites the imagination—but, as with tribal trinkets, Caesar quickly grows weary of such diversions. To speculate upon the distant stars is amusement for complacent elders; I am more concerned with the thickness of our walls. Unlike these new foreign tribes, the Chinese to our south are within arm’s reach of Rome; they command Caesar’s attention.

Oh cómo mi corazón se rompe….

Oh how I have wept since I lost sight of your horses! I weep for the tragedy that is our empty bed and our lack of heirs. I often wonder why your heart draws you out to wander our wilderness while mine is content to explore and bear witness to the scripture that we are - through divine right - prophesying here in our palace. But I can not deny that your adventurist nature has brought great wealth to Spain both in the vast gold and copper mines to the South but also the fields of wild grapes that have been discovered in the gilded hills of Cordoba.

It does bring me great joy to share with you that open borders have been established with our neighbors the Khmer and the Vikings - Though do not fret I have ordered walls blessed by Buddha to be built around every city to ensure the safety of our people and treasures. My diplomacy has not only led to an exchange of goods along the Tajo but the exchange of ideas and truths. Through their desire to taste the bounty that is Spain, they have also come to recognize that there is only one way to salvation and that is through Buddhism. I have heard news from merchants and sailors that the words of our lord have begun to flow through our rivers like those grey bony fish the peasants feed their thin children or more importantly the boats weighed down with gold from Barcelona that come to pay tribute to Madrid and Buddha.

I know that my faith has kept you safe these many years and I pray hourly that you will return with more riches and tales of distant lands before the high holidays in the spring. I also hope that in your travels you may find a solution to a growing problem in our cities. . . Los Secularistas . . . I believe that if their evil and contemptuous ways continue – always with the speeches and the marches - I maybe forced to find a way to reform their vile and blasphemous movement that will show the real power of Spain. I pray everyday that Buddha shows me a way to crush their evil radical spirits. . . So they will no longer suffer the indignity that is their godless existence.

Te amo siempre . . . Isabella

Cave Canem

1680 BC. The Roman people are not alone.



What is civilization? Where are its limits? Do the mere trappings of the civilized life define it? Or is there something more fundamental about the Roman separating him from the savage? If a dog shall learn to eat with a knife and spoon, shall it cease to be a dog and become a man? Or is there a deeper quality which defines us?



West of the banks of the Po, in a small oasis amidst a gap in the mighty Alps, our Roman scouts encountered representatives of a strange and alien people who call themselves “Chinese”. They appear to live in cities and work the land like Romans, but speak an indecipherable tongue, and follow strange and barbaric customs which bear no resemblance to the true Roman way of life.






Caesar is vexed by their presence. To intermingle with Italian tribesmen who share a common ancestry with our forbearers, however far removed, is one thing. To share our world with those who do not even share our common roots is quite another. Further complicating matters are the cold but fertile lands our scouts have discovered south of the Chinese holdings. The forests and tundra of southern China teem with fur-bearing animals, and the icy waters off the coast are inhabited by massive beasts, the flesh of a single one of which could feed a division of Roman warriors for months.






Our scouts have now mapped the extent of the Chinese territory; in the coming decades Caesar must find a way to apply the talents, such as they are, of the Chinese people to the glory of Roman development—or seek an alternative course of action.

Ferdinand . . . Mi Amor. . . .

A pequeño pescador’s raft arrived today with your letters. A storm of emotion swept through our palace upon reading of your journeys and the adventures you have had. We were all amazed to hear of the desert wastelands full of sand bears and the hills of gold you have discovered along the mighty and mysterious Tajo river.

We were intrigued to learn about the strange gold-faced Khmer people, and the men who have horns growing from their skulls that you call Vikings. We were saddened to learn these men had not yet heard of the joy Buddhism can bring to their lives, and were overcome with pride upon learning you had shared the saving grace of our religion with them. One can only hope they will bring these ideals back with them and save their doomed people from an entire life lived in darkness and ignorance. Our hearts sank when your letters notified us that the legends of great swine in the Spanish forests have been nothing but folly and superstition. Hearing of the great ocean and the tall mountains to the North have lead to some in the kitchens and stales to daydream of lives lived outside of Beloved Madrid. Can you imagine? My heart aches for their feeble minded ways.

I hear rumors that families and young men looking to make their fortunes have volunteered to travel down the river to settle in the golden hills and fertile river valleys you have written about. I have publicly commended their sacrifice in the name of Spain but worry they may not take our devotion to spirituality with them to these hovels that you have so nobly named Barcelona and Seville.

But knowing that you are somewhere down the same river I gaze upon every morning as I enjoy my pudín de arroz, gives me hope that you will return home to rule Spain by my side.

Todo mi amor - Isabella

E Pluribus Unum

2040 BC. Rome’s ascendance has not gone unnoticed.



History is little more than the sum result of a series of individual decisions made by individual men. The foundation of the Great City of Rome has been but one such case. It was a decision which could have been made by any one of the warlords of any one of the scattered, savage tribes of our Italian environs. One knows there are certainly enough of them, huddled around the weak glow of the campfire, posting the nightly watch in a vain attempt to save their children from being devoured by lions, like the prey animals they have willing chosen to remain. As it occurred, the decision was made by Caesar; and so, Caesar now commands not only the will of the great Roman public, but the plying attention of the bleating tribes as well.






Over the past centuries, Roman scouts have embarked on missions to explore our surrounding environs, finding that our Italy extends far beyond the ancient forest homelands of our people. Ancient mariners spoke of the wide Aegean coast to the east of Rome; expeditions have now brought word to our cartographers that the wide Aegean envelops Italy both to our north and our south. Two vast deserts scar the landscape to the south of our homeland; between them lies a fertile valley, and to the east, remote Sicily and the verdant banks of the Salso. To the west—the land has yet to reveal her secrets.






In their travels, our brave scouts have discovered many collections of the savage type of people. All have been enthralled by the glory of Rome, and all have given of themselves—willingly or unwillingly—to advance the great cause of the Roman people. Ask? One may as well ask the corn if it wishes to be planted. Gold has flowed to our coffers from the southern deserts to the northern jungles to the Aegean coast; the savages of the Po River valley and the northern forests have taught our scouts to better endure these harsh environments; a tribe near Lake Albano even shared with our people their remarkable art of using hammers and fire to work copper ore into useful tools and blades. Rome has benefited greatly from the contributions of the Italian tribes to our way of life, and has in turn shared this way of life with those in desperate need of respite from their miserable existence.






With the great influx of these tribal villagers to Rome, and thanks to the great fecundity of our Roman women, our people have begun to outgrow the confines of our lakeside cradle. As such, I have commanded the founding of a new settlement atop a great hill to the northwest of Rome, to further expand Roman influence into the great wilds, and allow our people to continue to grow and prosper. It is my hope that the cornfields to the north will help feed this new settlement, and the great stone outcroppings of the nearby plains may one day be put to use. Behold: Antium.






Roman sandals have now tread indelibly across the Italian landscape.

Mi Encantado Ferdinand . . . .

I am writing this letter to bring you comfort on your journey through the wilderness with our most faithful warriors. After so many long years of wandering through the dense forests and avoiding certain death at the hands of heathens or monstros, it has been such a luxury to finally have a place to call home. My only wish is that you were here to enjoy the bountiful fertile river valley we now call Madrid.

As your ships disappeared down the river I sought a will to continue through prayer and asked a power greater than myself to keep you safe. Through that mediation and reflection I have come to develop a theory - a philosophy really - the people are beginning to refer to as Buddhism. A great peaceful breeze has passed over our people, mi amor, and I believe you will want to share the realization of this higher power and the contentment that comes from knowing your place in the chaos we now call reality with any heathens destiny has seen fit to set in your path . . . if for no other reason than to ease the agony of their burning souls and give their meaningless lives purpose.

I pray daily for your safe return and that I have the wisdom and patience to rule Spain in your absence.

Te amo siempre . . . Isabella