War of the Marked

War of the Marked
Part of Makedonian Civil Wars
Date 1262-1265 Location Makedonian Empire Result Victory for Eryx and Serikos
Belligerents
Eryx Loyalists Serikos	Makedonian Empire
Commanders and leaders
Eryx Tai Zhihua	Zethos IV
Strength
~1,500,000	~1,000,000
Casualties and losses
Heavy	Heavy

The War of the Marked, also known as the Brothers’ War, or the Makedonian Succession Crisis of 1262, was a civil and international war lasting from 1262 to 1264, and the last Makedonian civil war before the subjugation of the Empire by the Arkoennites in 1305. It was initiated by Eryx I, Prince of Makedon and Viceroy of Serikos, against his identical twin brother Zethos IV, Basileus (King) of Makedon, after the wife of the deceased doctor who had delivered the princes came forward claiming that it had been Eryx, and not Zethos as initially reported, who had been first born. To prosecute the war, Eryx, who had previously served as Viceroy in Serikos and had spent over a decade steeped in Han culture, rallied the Han gentry and peasantry to push his claim. In this way, the war also harnessed deep, anti-Makedon sentiments running through the nation ever since the conclusion of the Discovery Wars.

The hostile Han peasantry proved decisive in the beginning of the war, when the Makedonian capital in Serikos—Sinae—was surrounded by thousands of rudimentarily armed peasants chanting the slogan “Support the Viceroy and exterminate the pretenders.” With the permission of Eryx, Makedonian forces permitted the peasant masses to enter Sinae to petition the Viceroy, a historic right of the Han. The peasant forces overran the government sector and extracted oaths of loyalty from all Makedonian officials there, killing any who refused. The incident, which came to be known in Makedonia as Eryx’s Massacre, brought a premature end to negotiations between the brothers and marked the beginning of armed hostilities.

The conflict eventually earned the support of the Chuan Dynasty, a Han polity situated in the southeast of modern day Serikos with territory extending into modern day Quenmin. The Chuan Dynasty had nominal ambitions to expel the Makedonian invaders from the ancestral homelands of the Han and sought to use the war, after initial ambivalence, as a means to accomplish this reconquest. The Chuan formed a tenuous alliance with the mostly-Han forces of Eryx and thereby marked the first time since the initial Makedonian Invasion that Serikos was united in opposition to the Empire.

The War of the Marked proved to be an extremely bloody chapter in the history of the Makedonian Empire. Zethos IV responded to the massacre at Sinae by quickly organizing a force under the command of Onasander to retake the city. Onasander had earned considerably renown for assisting Eryx in suppressing several Han revolts prior to the war and was familiar with the geography of Serikos. However, Onasander’s army, unaccustomed to facing Makedonian troops, became bogged down in a protracted siege of Sinae which was broken by the arrival of Chuan forces. The battle quickly became a rout for the Makedonians, with Onasander surrendering seven weeks after arriving. Onasander would go on to renounce his support for Zethos IV and endorsed Eryx’s claim, taking command of mixed Makedonian and Han forces, and assisting Serikos for the duration of the war.

The Makedonians were incensed at their defeat outside of Sinae and shocked by Onasander’s betrayal. Using intelligence provided by Alarangov, Eryx assembled a force of 60,000 soldiers—the Army of the West—and launched a devastating raid across the border. During this raid, Eryx succeeded in capturing several border provinces and persuaded many military and civilian officials of the legitimacy of his claim. The Army of the West continued deeper into Makedonian territory until being ambushed near the Arkoennite coast of the Sundering Sea. The Makedonian forces, commanded by Zethos IV personally, outmaneuvered the Army of the West, triggering mass confusion in the Han ranks and dealing Eryx a bloody defeat. This was the first and only time brothers personally commanded clashing armies. Eryx was forced to retreat, leaving almost his entire army behind to be captured or killed, and was chased by the Makedonians back across the border.

The Han managed to stop the bleeding at the Battle of Hexin Pass, a strategic pathway in the Qilan Mountain ranges. The Battle was joined when the Makedonian forces attempted to encircle Eryx’s retrating army by cutting through the narrow Hexin Pass, aiming to come out on the other side and trap the remnants of the Army of the West in the mountains between the two halfs of the Makedonian forces. Numerous intelligence failings, along with Zethos’s eagerness for the end of the conflict, saw the Makedonian forces surrounded in Hexin Pass by Chuan forces under the command of the Fangxin Long, the Emperor of the Chuan Dynasty. The last stand of the Makedonian army at Hexin Pass has since become the source of legends. The Makedonians offered valiant resistance against the Chuan, even killing Emperor Fangxin in the process, before being overrun and annihilated themselves. The defeat triggered a retreat and regrouping for surviving Makedonian forces and allowed Eryx to return to the Sinae where he remained for the duration of the war.

The war continued as a low intensity conflict after the Battle of Hexin Pass, with occasional flair ups causing significant battles for the next twenty months, however, the war never again saw the massive armies commanded by noble princes which have come to define the conflict in the popular imagination. The War of the Marked led directly to the Qilan Disaster, a series of border skirmishes by farmers and local militias on both sides of the border. Some historians have sought to include the Qilan Disaster as part of the broader war, but this is a minority position among scholars who generally agree that the Qilan conflicts were driven mostly by local feuds rather than national ambition.

The consequences of the war were immense. Historians broadly agree that the fighting left the Makedonian Empire vulnerable to the subsequent invasion and conquest by the rising Arkoennites, who conquered the Empire's territory in Ruvelka and Syara 40 years later. In Serikos, the war saw the death of Emperor Fangxin and the incorporation of the Chuan into the Tai Dynasty. This re-established the Tai Dynasty and ushered in the Hellenization of Serikos. The war also had a considerable impact on both brothers’ successor states, as the war was never formally ended and the question of inheritance never ultimately resolved. The conflict has the distinction of being—on paper—the longest lasting war in Tyran history, beginning in 1262 and not formally ending until the collapse of the Kineasan Dynasty in 1987, a period of 725 years. Further, it has captured the imaginations of people on both sides of the conflict for centuries and the general history of the conflict has been used as the plot for countless plays, books, and films in both Syara and Serikos. The conflict also produced the Han epic poem, The Brothers’ War in the Evening of Empire. The Brothers’ War, penned by Tai Zhihua, is considered the greatest literary achievement of the Han and at 1,000,000 words and 137 chapters it is also one of the grandest surviving works from the pre-modern era.