Chapter 443 Changes

Lübeck, the capital of the Hanseatic League, is also the economic center of the northern Baltic Sea. In the castle in the city center, the German King Jobst was lying on the bed waiting for God's call.

Originally, Jobst's body was still OK, but a few days ago, when he was riding a horse, the horse was frightened for some reason and threw him off the horse. He got sick from the fall. He is still alive now, but he is dying.

The priest has prayed for him, but some people still think that he can't die quickly enough, so they smothered the king with a pillow while he was sleeping. The German king who helped Brandenburg a lot just left the stage.

In recent years, in order to obtain more information, various princes have been developing their own intelligence networks. Brandenburg is the closest, so Vlad naturally knew the news of the German king's death first.

"What, Jobst is dead?"

"Yes, sir, the mayor of Lübeck confirmed it personally."

This is troublesome. If he can't choose a neutral person, his future life will be difficult.

"We need a suitable candidate, and one that other electors will not object to."

Although he has the support of Rome, if he wants to continue to have a good life, he naturally has to let the top leaders recognize him. Now he has to continue looking for a suitable person. Anyway, he will not succeed if he comes by himself.

Brandenburg has expanded a little recently. The Teutonic Knights had no money to pay the compensation, so they had to sell part of their land to Brandenburg. Although most of it is bad land, it is also a progress. After all, they will dominate the north in the future.

At this time, the land area of ​​the Teutonic Knights is as large as 170,000 square kilometers, and the population is as high as 1 million. However, after the Battle of Grunwald, the Teutonic Knights lost a lot of territory, and the Livonian Knights demanded autonomy and broke away from the control of the Knights. That's why it has come to this point.

The climate conditions here are between the temperate marine climate and the cold temperate continental climate. The winter here is much colder than Western Europe. At least, Western Europe has the North Atlantic warm current to warm up, and the average winter temperature is not lower than zero degrees. Here, because there is no warming effect like the North Atlantic warm current, and the West Siberia region blows cold air from the East European steppe from time to time. Therefore, the temperature here in winter is generally around minus nine degrees, which is colder than the Western European region at the same latitude.

The climate is not good and the land is barren, so agriculture is a weak point, but the indigenous people and the Knights here have never relied on the weather for food. In this era, the larger European trade is food, salt, fur, wood, spices, etc. The indigenous people along the Baltic Sea sell amber and fur to the south in exchange for daily necessities, which is the origin of the Amber Road.

The Teutonic Knights' place is too suitable for grazing, and there are large areas of unowned grassland here. However, only many areas near the coast and near the big rivers are put on horses, cattle and sheep. And many inland areas have not been developed yet...

If the Teutonic Knights can be obtained, then Brandenburg can extend its influence to Livonia. Of course, the specific division has to be discussed with the second brother. I heard that he recently obtained a large piece of land, but it is a bit cold.

————Dividing line————

"Sir, do you really want to do this?"

"Of course"

The newly appointed senior official of Yerevan Province, Deleanu, said to the people around him: "In the East, people lend money to farmers to help them. Now we can do the same to help farmers through difficult days. They just need to pay back the principal and interest during the harvest season."

Since his good performance in Iasi, Deleanu's official career has been smooth. He also came into contact with some Eastern books, among which there is such a law that the government lends money to farmers to avoid exploitation by landlords. He thought it was good and planned to try it in Yerevan.

"Will doing this make those businessmen angry?"

Several subordinates were still a little worried. After all, loans are a means for landlords and businessmen to generate income, and the target is these farmers and civilians. Now the government directly intercepts their business. Will it cause trouble or block it?

"You are really scared. This is also for the government to generate income, and the interest rate is low. Those farmers can't even borrow it in time, let alone other things."

Deleanu has always aimed to sit in the position of prime minister. Although the path to promotion in the Eastern Roman Empire is simpler than in other countries, it still requires political achievements. Before, his political achievements in Tulcea, Iasi and other places were good, but it was far from enough to enter the Senate. If he could make merit here, he would definitely become a figure like Agrippa who will be remembered for thousands of years.

In fact, he found this method from oriental books when he was in Constantinople. The books of this oriental figure have caused great controversy among scholars. Some people say that this is a good policy to increase income and strengthen national strength, and some people say that this is a move that will bring disaster to the country and the people. But Deleanu thinks that if used properly, it will be a booster for his official career to be smoother.

No matter what the psychology of these local officials is, they know that they must have their own political achievements to avoid being beaten down. The construction of water conservancy facilities became the mainstream, and a wave of water conservancy construction swept from Illyria to Van. If one place could not complete it, multiple places would complete it together. In addition to this, they also used various methods to boost the local economy. To be honest, they really didn't know how Rome had so many means to keep an eye on them.

Not only is there an assessment every two years, there are also countless secret visits, and those who fail to meet the requirements are directly fired. Last year, 15 people failed and were forced to retire. Officials like them can only work diligently to prevent the other party from catching them.

Even so, the people are still very enthusiastic about the exam. In the new official selection exam, 60% of the financial officers and half of the judges are from the citizen class. The influence of the nobles on officials is no longer as great as before. Moreover, their children have to take the exam if they want to become officials, but the government has set up schools specifically for them to study. It can be regarded as extra care for them.

Moreover, after the great translation movement, the oriental books have had a considerable impact on them. The ideal country in the books such as "The Analects", "The Doctrine of the Mean" and "Tao Te Ching" is very similar to the concept of God's heaven, and people who have traveled to the East say that the East is the real heaven on earth. This makes the Eastern route a popular route for the empire.

Of course, the titles of some books have also been translated into other names, otherwise they can't understand. For example, "The World in Dreams", which was thought to be a fairy tale book, turned out to be a popular science book. I can only say that the imagination is really rich.