Perendur

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Perendur the Hapless
King of Trellin and Emperor of Hysera
Reign17 June 1471 – 20 August 1502
Coronation1 and 8 July, respectively
PredecessorMinrir
SuccessorTor'qim
Born29 June 1447
Mar'theqa, Trellin
Died5 October 1502(1502-10-05) (aged 55)
SpouseArtxa, Countess of Betria
IssueTor'qim
HouseHouse Kazdorir
FatherMinrir
ReligionLadath Thaerinë

Perendur (29 June 1447 - 5 October 1502), sometimes called Perendur the Hapless, was the son of Minrir. He was King of Trellin and Emperor of Hysera from 1471 until his abdication in 1502, two months before he died of typhoid fever. He was succeeded by his son Tor'qim. His rule is remembered as turbulent, marked by repeated uprisings of both the nobility and the commoners, and saw Trellin twice in open war against the Kingdom of the Isles of Velar.

Reign

Perendur succeeded to the thrones of Trellin and Hysera immediately upon the death of his father, King Minrir, who was killed in an ambush in Lekhmir. His reign was plagued by domestic unrest, a consequence of his father's continual warfare against neighbouring states which had nearly emptied the state's coffers and pushed several of his more powerful vassals into open revolt. In 1474 he made peace with Lekhmir, and by 1478 he had subdued or placated most of his rebels. He took this opportunity to enact minor military reforms, but lacked the financial strength to make any more sweeping changes.

In 1481, after successfully destroying a Txekri and Ja'ekhan fleet gathered to oppose it, an armada of the Kingdom of the Isles of Velar sailed on the Trellinese port of Mintra and sacked it in revenge for Mintran merchants having sponsored the Velarans' rivals. Perendur was slow to react, an illness having left him incapacitated at the time, and his lords stubbornly refused to provide troops. Instead he slowly built up an army under his own banner and turned his attention to the Trellinese navy, long neglected in favour of conquests inland. Finally, in 1487, while the Velaran fleets were engaged in a campaign against Txekrikar, Perendur assembled his entire navy and a large army and sent it against the Velaran capital, Parthenope. Taken by surprise, the undefended port was burned and the city's hinterland looted. What ships the Velarans could muster were quickly turned to flight and, while the Trellinese had no further major victories, the King of Velar recognised he had lost the brief war and conceded many of his now indefensible territories in Retikh and Pelna.

Peasant rebellions had persisted in the more remote provinces of the empire, and in 1490 they suddenly spread rapidly from east to west and south to north, sparked by rising bread prices and the crown's inability to pay the military full wages. As even his army rose in revolt, Perendur was unable to cope with the rebellion, and when another illness left him bedridden that summer he was forced to rely exclusively on his vassals to subdue the rebels. It was a long, slow process, as some lords joined the revolt themselves and others refused to work outside their own borders. One rebel army would be put down only for another to rise up elsewhere in the empire. As the revolts continued into 1493, the nobility of eastern Retikh took the opportunity to secede from the empire. Perendur, however, retained control of the navy, and sent a fleet to restore his recent conquests to the crown.

His vassals closer to home took the hint, many of them abandoning the rebellion and retaking their oaths of fealty. This was not the case in Jajich and Idisamo, however which fielded their own navies still and successfully held out against an attempted blockade. Jajich briefly received assistance from the King of Velar, but in 1495 the queen, Artxa of Betria, landed at the head of a royal army and marched on Durats. The earl of Jajich surrendered immediately and Idisamo followed suit. No more of the empire's nobility would enter revolt, but the peasant rebellions continued for several more years, Perendur having been forced to disband much of his army because they could not afford the expense. In 1499 a plague struck the empire, arriving on merchant ships, and the king, always a man of weak constitution, barely survived it. In mid-1502 a case of typhoid fever forced him to realise he could no longer lead his empire, and in August he resigned in favour of his eldest son, Tor'qim. Shortly thereafter he suffered a relapse and was dead within another month.