This incident had a great impact on many young junior officers who farmed and fought all year round and did not care much about other things.
Some people felt deeply guilty about this, thinking that the Queen Mother had deceived them, and were very angry. Some people think that even the Great Khan cannot rebel and hangs out with those noble slaves. They don’t know what they are doing, but it is definitely not good. In the end, no one came to a conclusion after discussing it.
However, not long after more than a year, John VIII died suddenly. At this time, the officers were furious, thinking that the Queen Mother had broken the rules. Some felt regretful and even began to secretly contact the exiled Li Yinglin.
On the subsequent inheritance issue, the Queen Mother had conflicts with the Guo family, Shi family and others. John VIII had no sons, and the ministers hoped to support Basil, the second son of the pre-Khan, while the Queen Mother hoped to support her younger son Alexios.
This time, the Queen Mother finally failed to do so.
At that time, a war broke out between Hungary and Venice over Dalmatia. The Venetian army could not defeat the Hungarians, and after successive defeats, the governor sent envoys to the capital many times to request support, and he did not hesitate to offer high rewards for this. The Purple Horde Khanate then gathered a group of soldiers and prepared to board the ship in Dadu.
In the winter of that year, the Hungarians weakened their offensive due to the influence of the climate, and the main army began winter camping. The Venetian navy also followed the habit in the Mediterranean and stopped at the port of Dadu without sailing. It planned to wait until the sea conditions improved in the spring before sending reinforcements there.
At this time, there were rumors that the Queen Mother was preparing to expel Basil and coerce the Patriarch Yin to support Alexios on her own. The idle legionnaires quickly organized themselves under the leadership of someone unknown.
Later, Anna, the Queen Mother's distant niece and close maid, wrote a memoir-like note called "The Life of Helena".
She said she still remembered that in early 1379, on the day before Christmas, there was a sudden commotion outside the Queen Mother's palace. The Queen Mother thought it was the citizens celebrating, so she didn't ask anything until the sound gradually became clearer.
They walked out to the terrace and found the streets filled with excited legionnaires. A large group of hundreds of households in red robes, holding canes, opened the road ahead and drove away the curious citizens from the road. In the middle of the team, there were at least one or twenty people wearing phoenix-winged helmets with conspicuous three-color horsehair tassels on the top of their helmets - this meant that they were at least senior officers at the level of Chapter Master.
These people were holding up a huge purple felt, which was used by the Boerjinnus Dynasty when the Khans sat on the felt and were crowned. And now, sitting on the purple carpet is Basil, the second son of the Queen Mother.
Anna said, and as the procession drew closer, the Queen Mother's face grew paler. And the team's slogan gradually became clear.
——They shouted "The Khan of Khans, the Great Khan of Grace".
The huge procession passed by the palace gate and continued walking towards Hagia Sophia without stopping. Beside the Queen Mother, until this moment, a maid hurriedly ran upstairs, but stopped talking.
Even the guards in the palace ran to attend the ceremony. No one even reported to her in advance.
Anna said that after that day, the shrewd and capable Queen Mother suddenly looked much older. But she still persisted, often intervening in various matters she had arranged before, such as the alliance between the Georgians and Tokhtamysh, and the arrangements for the princes in the Morea region.
She also sent Alexios away with the Venetians. He also asked him to come back when Basil and those Serbian "Andans" completely broke off and went to war.
Two years later, a palace coup that was not a mutiny occurred in the city. With the help of the Serbs and Nanya Shihou, Basil arrested the Queen Mother without much effort.
Anna recalled that in the face of the menacing Imperial Guard soldiers, almost everyone around the Queen Mother ran away. The guards guarding the palace seemed to have gotten the message and withdrew early. In the palace, even the eunuchs have all fled, leaving only a few.
Facing Marshals Guo Shuai and Zong Zheng Saiin Batur, who were ordered to lead the army to arrest people, the Queen Mother pointed at them and laughed at Anna, saying that her tongue and hands are actually not as good as those of a hundred households, but now she actually allows these two people to come. Look up to her.
As a result, Guo Shuai and Sain Batur did not understand what this meant.
Later, Anna followed them to see Basil and repeated this sentence to him. Basil complained that even if the Queen Mother wanted to compare herself to Cicero, there was no need to say that he was Antony.
In the end, the Queen Mother managed to keep her tongue. According to the Purple Tent tradition, she, like Queen Mary before her, was exiled to Crimea.
Anna also insisted in the book that John VIII was drunk and tried to escape from house arrest by climbing over the wall, but fell into the moat and drowned. She believed that the Queen Mother had nothing to do with this matter, because the Queen Mother herself could not benefit from it, and instead fell into great passivity.
But you can't believe everything she said. After all, in this situation, people would definitely give priority to saying good things to their elders. Moreover, she made some deductions and came to the conclusion that the main messenger should be the big bad guy Li Yinglin. In Guo Kang's view, this conclusion is magical - if Li Yinglin had this ability, why would he run away? He would have killed the Queen Mother long ago.
When his adoptive mother read this book to him when he was a child, he warned him that the person who writes the book has his own position and perspective. Even if she thinks she is objective and fair, her understanding of objectivity and fairness may not be the same. Just like you. Just like Li Xuanying and his son, they would definitely not agree that the Queen Mother made a fair decision.
It is a pity that the Guo family themselves do not know what the situation was at that time.
The adoptive father said that he did not know whether Anna had made up even the famous dialogue when the Queen Mother was arrested, and he could not verify it - his grandfather Guo Shuai told him that the Queen Mother actually said a lot of words at that time and was still using them there. Read the opera in Greek. Who knows exactly what she wanted to express.
What's more troublesome is that he can't say for sure that this is fake, because Guo Shuai really doesn't know this allusion. He himself only found out that there was such an allusion after reading the books written by others later...
But what is certain is that the Queen Mother believed that Basil would inevitably fall out with the Serbian nobles, which was quite true.
Anna believes that Basil is actually a violent person, but his will is too tenacious and he uses reason to forcibly restrain his emotions.
Seniors such as Guo Shuai and Guo Di described that he was actually introverted and liked to think. He was indeed strict but also very fair.
They felt that Basil was more like the ancient Roman and Greek heroes in dramas who kept a straight face all day long. On the contrary, his brother Alexios was much happier than he was.
Alexios likes BMWs and wine, but doesn't like reading. The greatest pleasure is traveling around and happily bragging and farting with others every day. Guo Di even believed that the country needed an older monarch at that time, and the Queen Mother had inspired everyone's rebellious psychology, otherwise everyone might support him. In fact, Basil III may be a special case. Even the subsequent Great Khan John IX was more like his uncle than his father.
Soon, Basil fell out with the Serbian nobles of the time.
The trigger of the matter is the issue of rewards.
In order to win over these people, Queen Mother Helena gave high rewards to both those who came to Dadu and those who were local. But Basil took the lead in advocating frugality, saying that now that there is war in all directions, it is not the time to pay attention to luxury. The allowances of the nobles were greatly cut off by him.
This made the nobles very dissatisfied. They soon stopped taking this "An Da" seriously and began routine rebellion planning.
Serbian local nobles, who had long been dissatisfied, also took the opportunity to join in.
Previously, Queen Mother Helena had intervened in the management of the port of Constantinople, and with the help of conflicts between the Venetians and the Genoese, she had squeezed out the Genoese Chamber of Commerce that was entrenched in the commercial port. A large part of the large amount of extra income she received from here was invested in Serbia to bribe the nobles. This is why she repeatedly deliberately weakened the local nobles, but many people still tolerated it.
(End of chapter)
