Emperor Guntherm

Called: The Bold or The Bloodthirsty

Early Life and Election

Guntherm Hefthammer was a Steinr warrior who rose to prominence in wars against the Jotun.

Reign

Guntherm was committed to expanding the reach of the Empire, and chafed under the economic restrictions placed by his predecessor, Empress Mariika. He proposed and received support for numerous campaigns to the east and west, as well as several probing attacks against the Thule to the north.

The early part of his reign is mostly concerned with the defence of Imperial territories; the treasury was dedicated to a program of castle and fortress building that helped reinforce key borderlands areas against the barbarians. With these fortifications in place, Guntherm launched an all-out attack on the barbarians, claiming a great deal of land. However, his troops were largely unable to hold the territories they took and a massive betrayal by the Druj in 245 YE saw Guntherm trapped fighting a war on three fronts. The final straw came with the complete destruction of the Navarr Dance of Blood army during a disastrous attempt to ambush an invading Jotun force in Bregasland.

In response, Guntherm arranged a peace treaty with the Jotun for the next two years, and turned the full attention of the Imperial armies on the Druj. With brutal efficiency, the Imperial war-machine drove the Druj eastward, delivering a series of crushing attacks from which they would take decades to recover. At the completion of the two-year peace-treaty, the Jotun invaded Sermersuaq and Guntherm returned to fighting their armies and reclaiming lost territory.

Dramatists tend to paint Guntherm as a gung-ho warrior, but historians point to his practicality in matters of warfare. As he reportedly said to the Military Council before proposing a treaty with the Jotun: "fighting on one front is barely a war, but trying to fight on three fronts gets everyone killed."

Death and Legacy

Guntherm died fighting the Jotun, suffering a severely fractured skull. He lapsed in and out of consciousness for three days. During this time he repeated his desire to be interred in the Necropolis of Highguard, claiming that while he was a Steinr, he was also an Emperor and it was only fitting he lie alongside his peers.

There was some resistance from his family, but in the end Guntherm was carried to Pharos and interred in a hall of black marble and granite where he lies in state to this day. Persistent rumours arose shortly after his internment that his body had been stolen and re-interred in the swamps of Kallavesa by his daughters Brigid and Jaara.

History tends to paint Guntherm as a thick-headed warrior, but this is not entirely fair. He was a competent and inspiring general, and some scholars argue that he did the best he could in a bad situation. Still, some nations focus on the military defeats they suffered during his reign - the Navarr lost the Dance of Blood, and the Freeborn army of the Burning Falcon were slaughtered during the 247YE invasion of Hahnmark when the kohan fought to the last drop of blood to prevent a force three times its size claiming the academy at Ishal.