Crusader Kings: Prisoners of War

Faced with this kind of explicit joke, Orville simply rolled his eyes: "You also know that I have no interest in this kind of thing. If you really want to satisfy my desires, go and handle your political affairs. Don't let me Worry more, it’s better to give me some surprises, and find me something delicious to eat and drink occasionally, which I’m a little bit interested in.”

Cleopatra smiled sweetly: "Of course, I will try my best to meet your requirements. As long as I can find whatever you want in the world, I will help you find it. In return, you can also meet some of my requirements. I I heard that you have created a new kind of paper that is as smooth and smooth to write on as parchment, and the price is still a fraction of that of parchment. Is this true? "

"Has this matter reached your ears?" Orville was surprised. He didn't expect his stuff to be so widely spread.

"I heard Claudius (Ptolemy) talk about this. He thought highly of the paper you made. What do you think? I want to buy some of this paper to rebuild the Library of Alexandria."

The Ptolemaic royal family was indeed very wealthy. They were so wealthy that the Roman emperors were not necessarily richer than the Egyptian kings at certain times. They owned a large amount of land and monopolized important industries such as trade, finance, food, etc., making them the richest people in the Mediterranean world. people.

But even so, if the Ptolemaic royal family had to spend money to buy the books in the Library of Alexandria, it would be either a pain in the ass for them or they simply couldn't afford it.

Through the generosity of successive kings and the fact that the productivity level of this world was higher than that of the previous world, the Library of Alexandria in the previous world had a larger collection of books than the previous world. The original world is estimated to have a collection of 500,000 volumes, while this world has approximately 650,000 volumes.

Books in this era were extremely expensive. The most basic unit of measurement was not As (a copper coin), but a dinar (silver coin) that civilians rarely encountered in their daily lives, even for those tomes or books. Very valuable books, the unit of measurement will be talents used in the treasury.

The Ptolemaic kings of the past dynasties occasionally had such stories about spending a lot of money to seek knowledge. They spent twenty or thirty talents to buy a book by someone. You must know that the Egyptian treasury income is only several thousand talents. Ordinary people may not be able to see this amount of money at once in their lifetime. The knowledge of this era can be literally priceless.

Hundreds of thousands of books, even if many of them are not that valuable, let's count one hundred dinars per book, 400,000 volumes is 40 million dinars, not counting the cost of rebuilding the library itself, plus some Including incidental expenses, it would cost at least 50 million dinars.

Even the Ptolemaic royal family didn't know if they could afford this money, let alone that they couldn't throw all the money away. So now that Cleopatra wanted to rebuild the library, she had to think of some options. Use the door to find tricks.

After thinking about it, Orville explained to the other party: "The cost is actually lower than you think. What restricts your idea is the production of paper. But this is not a big problem. The manufacturing method is not very complicated, but I Production is not very high now.”

Orville's paper factory is located in the British Province and has about four to five hundred people. After Orville established the market for paper, the supply of paper exceeded the demand, so the factory was always operating at high capacity. Orville left a message to Belisari saying: He is expanding the paper mill. It is not yet clear what the specific situation will be, but it is conceivable that the scale will not be particularly large.

That's why he is preparing to build a new paper mill in Egypt. He is now shipping materials and tools, and it will take some time.

"It seems that your new factory has already found an order in advance. Remember to give me an internal price." Cleopatra winked at him.

"Maybe." Orville said noncommittally.

Now it seems that the order from the Library of Alexandria alone is enough to keep Orville busy for several years. It is not a bad thing. It is a win-win situation for both parties - one party can make money and the other party can save some money.

——

A month and a half later, something big happened in Egypt.

Orville followed the plan and recruited many native Egyptians to join the army as soldiers, and he also launched a very attractive banner - liberating Egypt's tenant farmers and ensuring fairness and justice.

This was not just empty talk, Orwell also ignored the opposition of everyone. After he persuaded Cleopatra to nod, he took the initiative and announced a series of relevant policies.

Similar to the treatment of Roman legionnaires, after the poor Egyptians have served the country for a certain period of time, the country will distribute them a piece of land. The size of the land is determined based on the fertility of the land and the specific location, but it is guaranteed to be enough for the family to live. , no less than the land occupied by Greek immigrants and soldiers.

This is actually an almost intact copy of the Roman legionnaire recruitment policy. At the same time, he also announced the disbandment of some of the redundant colonization soldiers, and asked Cleopatra to issue a decree in the name of the Queen of Egypt, depriving the temple priests of their rights. The large tracts of land under their control were restored to state ownership.

This kind of sharecropping system is obviously not very desirable. Orville is not opposed to state ownership of land, but this method, which is so rough that it is close to slavery, really damages the enthusiasm of producers to work. In his opinion, at least leasing will be more effective. Okay, and he is really prepared to change it like this.

This slogan and policy caused waves in Egypt. Many poor people actively joined the army. It also aroused dissatisfaction and fear among many Greek immigrants.

After secretly communicating, a massive protest movement broke out almost simultaneously in all parts of Egypt, and the intensity of the protest was increasing at an alarming rate, and soon reached the point where the army had to be sent out to control it.

Orwell responded calmly to this, ordering the legionnaires to prepare for war while starting to arm the tenants in Egypt who had been exploited for hundreds of years. Orwell promised them freedom and land as a reward, which was a fatal attraction for the tenants in Egypt.

Without much effort, Orwell recruited an army of more than 20,000 "liberated serfs" in Egypt. They helped the Romans and began to engage in high-intensity small-scale confrontations with landlords and temples in various places.

The situation was inclined to the Romans from the beginning. After all, the military levels of the two sides were not on the same line, but the Romans were also overwhelmed by the protests that came one after another, and various violent incidents that were almost out of control occurred from time to time.