Royal Goodwill Tour of 1760
 King Sinchi Roca II and Empress Clara, whose joint tour of twelve cities was announced on 9.V.1760 AN | |
| Country/Countries |
 Nouvelle Alexandrie Natopia |
|---|---|
| Monarch(s) |
Sinchi Roca II (Nouvelle Alexandrie) Clara (Natopia) |
| Accompanying royals | Queen Mother Abigail (Huyenkula leg) |
| Date(s) | 12.VII.1760 AN to 3.IX.1760 AN |
| Duration | 39 days |
| Cities visited | 12 |
| Locations | Hurmu, Aerla, Vegno, Anglien, Natopia, the Benacian Union, Constancia, Zeed, Western Corum, and East Zimia and the Wallis Islands |
| Purpose | Renewal of the Federation's friendships and partnerships |
| Theme | "Faith Kept, Friends Renewed - Fe Guardada, Amistad Renovada" |
| Outcome |
|
| Transportation | Condor One |
| Security | Federal Guards Service |
| Previous tour | Royal Tour of Oportia, 1758 |
The Royal Goodwill Tour of 1760 was a joint royal tour by King Sinchi Roca II of Nouvelle Alexandrie and his wife, Empress Clara of Natopia, to twelve cities in ten states from 12.VII to 3.IX.1760 AN. Planning began under the Montero government, and the Gonçalves government carried it out under the theme the Royal Household set for it, "Faith Kept, Friends Renewed". The route opened at Huyenkula in neutral Hurmu and took in every state that had joined the Concord Alliance since its founding, two Raspur Pact partners outside the alliance, Anglien, the duchy of the Empress's father, and three cities in Natopia.[1][2][3]
Several stops were family visits. Queen Mother Abigail came home to Hurmu on the opening leg, and Sovereign Duke Edgard III received his daughter in Johannsessbuurg. At Petropolis the King dedicated a statue of his grandfather, Manco Cápac I, beside the shrine of the Constancian Basileus who was killed with him in 1718 AN. During the wreath-laying in Johannsessbuurg on 24.VII, a grenade was thrown toward the King and Empress. It did not explode and was found only after the ceremony. A Johannsessbuurg man was later charged with trying to kill them, and the tour kept to its published route.[4][5][6][7]
No treaty was signed on the journey, as the Royal Household had said beforehand, but three stops ended in commitments. At Huyenkula the King said the Federation would seek to accede to the Convention of Huyenkula. A Constancian decree gave Nouvelle Alexandrie the ground beneath the Petropolis statue in perpetuity. At Rusjar the King offered Zeed an equal share of the net revenue of the port of Avey, which the Federation's Council of State had approved before the tour left, and promised talks on the port's future. The Empress pledged ₦60 billion from Natopia over ten years for Zeed's development. When the tour ended, the accession and the land transfer were still to go before the Cortes, and the Natopian pledge before the Frenzy.[8][9]
Background
In the Speech from the Throne delivered on 12.I.1760 AN, King Sinchi Roca II named as the last of five priorities the pledge to keep the Federation "secure and true to its friends." Secretary of State Gabrielle Fitzgerald, who advised the tour, tied the journey to that pledge: "A nation that keeps faith at home does not want for friends abroad."[1] The Royal Household described the tour as a renewal of the Federation's friendships rather than the opening of any new commitment, and said that no treaty or accession would be signed on the journey.[8]
Planning began in the final year of the Montero government, and the Gonçalves government took the project up when it came to office in Novarum (I) 1760 AN. Montero, by then Leader of the Opposition, welcomed it: "This was my Government's undertaking, and I am glad to see it carried through."[1] Fitzgerald saw the royal party off at the palace on 12.VII. "Their Majesties carry the goodwill of the whole Federation with them," she said. "They go to keep faith with friends who have kept it with us, and they will be very welcome wherever they call."[8]
Royal participants
The King and the Empress made the whole journey together. Empress Clara, the King's wife, has reigned in Natopia in her own right since 1752 AN. She had toured the Federation as queen consort, then styled Queen Adelaide, on the Grand Federal Tour of 1746, during which she founded the Adelaide Institute for New Alexandrian Studies at the Royal University of Parap.[10] The Treaty of Dynastic Separation of 1721 AN keeps the two successions permanently apart while leaving the marriage intact.[1]
The King's mother, Queen Mother Abigail, traveled with the party on the opening leg to Huyenkula. The New Alexandrian royal house holds its membership of the Order of the Holy Lakes by descent from her, and her late mother, Li Naomiai, had been the Order's Chancellor. At Huyenkula she was reunited with Princess Mariette, Prince Utas's mother and the widow of her brother, Prince David. Before returning to the Federation she went with Mariette to the Chapel of the Ancient Lakes in Kaupang, where Prince David and his mother are buried, and the two widows kept a private hour at the grave.[4]
Crown Princess Sayari, the heir apparent, saw her parents off at the palace. She was expecting twins and, on medical advice, kept to the Federation from Estivis (VIII).[8][1] Her husband, Prince Janus, hosted the royal party at Redquill.[11]
Itinerary
The royal party called at the twelve cities in the order announced, then flew home to Cárdenas.[1][3] Three of the stops, Tirlar, Redquill and Lindström, were in Natopia.
| # | City | Host | Date | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Huyenkula |  Hurmu |
13.VII.1760 AN | Seat of the Order of the Holy Lakes |
| 2 | Noursala |  Aerla |
18.VII.1760 AN | Concord Alliance partner |
| 3 | Cossa |  Vegno |
21.VII.1760 AN | Concord Alliance partner |
| 4 | Johannsessbuurg |  Free Duchy of Anglien |
24.VII.1760 AN | Reconstructed duchy |
| 5 | Tirlar | Natopia |
3.VIII.1760 AN | Empress Clara reigns |
| 6 | Chryse |  Benacian Union |
6.VIII.1760 AN | Raspur Pact partner |
| 7 | Redquill | Natopia |
11.VIII.1760 AN | Guests of Prince Janus, Neridia |
| 8 | Lindström | Natopia |
14.VIII.1760 AN | Natopian imperial capital |
| 9 | Petropolis |  Constancia |
16.VIII.1760 AN | Concord Alliance partner |
| 10 | Rusjar |  Zeed |
20.VIII.1760 AN | Raspur Pact partner; wreath at Avey on 19.VIII |
| 11 | Corum Electric |  Western Corum |
22.VIII.1760 AN | Concord Alliance partner |
| 12 | Southman |  East Zimia and the Wallis Islands |
1.IX.1760 AN | Concord Alliance partner |
Huyenkula (Hurmu)
The royal party spent four days at Huyenkula, the capital of Hurmu, and lodged at the Palace of the Elenaran. Prince Utas, Hurmu's First Secretary of State and the King's first cousin, met them. The Order of the Holy Lakes welcomed the King and Empress at the palace, and Chancellor Marcus Avon-El Myksos gave a banquet in their honor. Bishop Andres Villarreal Argento led a service. The Royal Household cast the visit as one of faith and kinship, not of alliance.[4]
Secretary-General Túpac Mendoza gave a luncheon at the headquarters of the Micras Treaty Organization, where the King said the Federation would seek to accede to the Convention of Huyenkula, which it had never signed, and asked his government to bring the matter forward: "The ideals set down in this city are already our own, and it is time we put our name to them." Secretary of State Fitzgerald was to carry the matter to the Cortes on the party's return.[4]
Noursala (Aerla)
Alexander Kim, who had taken office as President of Aerla on 20.V, received the King and Empress at Noursala on 18.VII. It was the first stop at a partner in the Concord Alliance, which Aerla had joined in 1752 AN. The King said Aerla had come into the alliance as a friend. The invitation for a reciprocal visit by the Aerlan president had been outstanding since 1752 AN.[2]
Cossa (Vegno)
The King returned on 21.VII to Cossa, the city of his 1738 AN state visit, during which Vegno acceded to the Concord Alliance as its first member beyond the founders. President Antonio Visciglia received the royal party. Empress Clara had come in 1738 AN as Queen Adelaide. "When I first came to this city, the alliance was three names on a page," the King said. "I have come back to see how far those three names have carried."[12]
Johannsessbuurg (Anglien)
Empress Clara was received at Johannsessbuurg on 24.VII by her father, Sovereign Duke Edgard III of Anglien. The King and Empress laid a wreath at Plein fonn Versoening, and the Duke gave a reception in the Throne Hall and a state dinner. "My daughter signed the rescript that brought me here," the Duke said, referring to the Empress's 1753 AN rescript authorizing the Natopian-led intervention. "It is a better thing to receive her at my own door." The Empress answered: "I signed it as Empress. I have come as your daughter." In 1758 AN, by letters patent issued as titular Emperor of the Alexandrians, the Duke had named Clara his successor to that dignity; after her it passes to Crown Princess Sayari, and from Sayari onward it is held with the Crown of Nouvelle Alexandrie. Neither the King nor the Duke raised the Bliven Fund in public; the Royal Household said the matter rested with the Federal and Anglian governments.[5] A grenade thrown at the wreath-laying failed to explode and was found only after the ceremony (see Security).[13]
Tirlar (Natopia)
On 3.VIII the royal party reached Tirlar, the capital of Arboria, where for the first time on the tour the King arrived as his wife's guest. Chancellor Marco Lungo III came from Lindström to meet the party with Princess Rosamund of Arboria, who is also Autokráteira of Constancia and the sister of Basileus Giakoumis II. She gave a state reception for the King and Empress that evening. "We have been guests together in four capitals," the Empress said at the reception. "In Tirlar it is my turn to be the host."[14]
Chryse (Benacian Union)
The Benacian Union, a partner of the Federation in the Raspur Pact, hosted the King and Empress for four days from 6.VIII. First Consul Lors Bakker-Kalirion received them at the New Residency in Chryse, and that evening they attended a gala at the Chrysean Opera House. The next day they toured the Khaz Modan Hall of the Benacian Museum of Antiquities and a fresco studio at the Chrysean Academy of Fine Arts; that evening they saw the Chrysean Ballet Company. The King's sister, Princess Sofia, Duchess of Hualla, came from Ketsire with her twin sons for a family day on 8.VIII, and the party crossed to the island of Botha to visit the Bothan Institute, where Princess Darya, the wife of the King and Empress's son Prince Nathan, had been a pupil. On the last day they took the high-speed train to Goldfield for an audience with King Cosgrach I. The King recalled that in 1706 AN Ransenar's Congress had sounded out both his grandfather, who turned the crown down, and the Empress's mother, who came close to taking it.[15]
Redquill (Natopia)
The royal party arrived on 11.VIII at Redquill, a deep-water port in Neridia and the ceremonial capital of Dos Gardenias, as guests of Prince Janus. Princess Nayaraq, the King's aunt, received them with her husband, Prince Elian, three days before the couple's 75th wedding anniversary. The King brought the Crown Princess's greetings and said she had promised to bring the children to Redquill herself.[11]
Lindström (Natopia)
The Natopian stops ended at Lindström on 14.VIII, where Prince Nathan, heir to Natopia, and Princess Darya gave a private dinner at Vista de Nada Palace, and the King and Empress visited the tomb of Vadoma I. The King called at Concord House, and Chancellor Lungo met him at the Chancellery Building as the order window of the Lindström Recovery Protocol entered its final month.[16]
Petropolis (Constancia)
The royal party reached Petropolis on 16.VIII, and on 17.VIII the King dedicated a statue of his grandfather, Manco Cápac I, beside the shrine of Basileus Giakoumis. The two men were killed together in 1718 AN when Condor One was brought down over Passas. At the dedication the King said: "My grandfather came to Constancia as an exile and left it as a friend. He and the Basileus made their last journey together. It is right that they should keep each other company here." Basileus Giakoumis II and his sister, the Autokráteira Rosamund, who had received the party at Tirlar, welcomed the King and Empress together. A decree from Giakoumis II, read at the ceremony, gave the ground on which the statue stands to Nouvelle Alexandrie in perpetuity, calling the statue a mark of solidarity between two good neighbors and a sign that those who brought down Condor One did not prevail. Ambassador Mateo Alarcón accepted the deed. The Department of State said the transfer would go before the Cortes for approval.[6]
Rusjar (Zeed)
On 19.VIII the King and Empress laid a wreath at the Monument to the Fallen in Avey, the port Nouvelle Alexandrie has administered in Zeed since 1701 AN. The next day in Rusjar the King addressed the National Assembly, speaking for the Gonçalves government, whose Council of State had approved the measures before the tour left. Zeed's share of the port's net revenue, 35 percent, would rise to half from the following year, and part of the Federation's own share would go toward a railway between Avey and Rusjar. The two governments would open talks on the port's future through the Joint Oversight Commission before the hundred-year term runs out in 1801 AN, and any change to the enclave's terms would go to the Federal Assembly for ratification. "For sixty years we have held Avey under the terms of a war. It is time we held it together, under the terms of a friendship," the King said.[9]
While the King was at the Assembly, the Empress toured the Rusjar Mechanical Machine-Building Plant, the main target in Zeed of Operation Lightning Dawn. At a luncheon given by President Vivek Jarkhanda, Empress Clara, speaking for the government of Chancellor Lungo, pledged ₦60 billion over ten years for Zeed's development. About half was to seed a national wealth fund owned by Zeed, and the rest was to go to the Rusjar international airport, irrigation and water works, staff training and the Avey-Rusjar railway. The Empress said: "Zeed's future should be built in Zeed and owned by Zeed. That is how the fund in Anglien works, and it is how this one will work." The Frenzy had still to approve the spending.[9]
Corum Electric City (Western Corum)
Queen Electra of Western Corum received the King and Empress at Corum Electric City on 22.VIII. At a state dinner that day the King thanked the Corum Electric Corporation for the generators it sent after the 1757 Cajamarca micrasquake and invited the Queen to Cárdenas and Cajamarca. On 23.VIII at Concord Hall, Empress Clara presented an Anglian citation, conferred by her father, to the battalion of the Royal West Corumian Regiment that fought in Anglien, and a "Bahira 1756 AN" streamer was fixed to its colors. Electra, the regiment's colonel, took the salute.[17]
At the presentation the Empress said: "Two soldiers of Western Corum died in my father's country. Anglien is in their debt, and it will not forget them." She also asked for a minute of silence for the eleven soldiers of the Anglian Ducal Guard killed in the 1756 AN ambush on the Bahira-Shelsa road. The King gave the Queen a restored print of Last Night on Botha and production papers from the Hans Backovic Archive and Film Institute; Electra has named the director Hans Backovic as a major influence on her own films. Before the royal party left, she recorded an episode of Science With Sparks, the children's science program she has presented on Mondovision since 1751 AN, with the King as her guest.[17]
Southman (East Zimia and the Wallis Islands)
Southman, the capital of East Zimia and the Wallis Islands, was the final stop. The kingdom had signed the Concord Alliance Treaty there nearly nine years earlier. Queen Mina II, Queen Electra's mother, received the royal party at Southman Palace on 1.IX, with Crown Companion Hans von Heida-Weisse beside her, and Supreme Arbiter Erlo Wallis attended one of his last major functions before retirement. The King recalled the gravnought Zimia, which Southman had diverted to the airlift after the Cajamarca micrasquake: "A ship that was going somewhere else came to us instead." On 2.IX the party visited Corum Command, where Hans von Heida-Weisse, as Grand Admiral of the East Zimian and Wallisian War League, escorted the King and Empress as senior officers briefed them on the alliance's watch around Corum. On 3.IX the party flew home to Cárdenas.[3]
Security
The Federal Guards Service provided the royal party's escort, and the party flew aboard Condor One.[8] At the wreath-laying at Plein fonn Versoening on 24.VII, a grenade wrapped in cloth was thrown toward the King and Empress. It landed short of the ceremonial area and did not explode, and officers of the Anglian Ducal Guard found it while clearing the square after the ceremony; the King and Empress were told that evening. The Special Operations Bureau of the Ducal Police Service detained a Johannsessbuurg man on 1.VIII, in an inquiry that drew on the protective intelligence staff of the Federal Royal Guards, the New Alexandrian unit that protects the King. Police said the man had belonged to a Nü Krantisk Rapskaff study group before the liberation and had kept in contact with former members, but had found no sign of an organized network; Director-General Jan-Hendrik Velsink of the Ducal Police Service said: "We believe he acted alone." The tour kept its published itinerary.[13] On 10.XIV.1760 AN prosecutors charged the man, Wouter Dekkersz, before the Court for Crimes Against the Constitutional Order with two counts of attempted murder and one count of an attack on the constitutional order; no trial date had been set.[7]
Outcomes
When the tour ended, its commitments stood as follows:
- The Secretary of State was to bring the Federation's accession to the Convention of Huyenkula before the Cortes.[4]
- The ground beneath the statue of Manco Cápac I at Petropolis, given to the Federation by decree, was to go before the Cortes for approval.[6]
- Zeed's equal share of Avey's net port revenue, already approved by the Council of State, was to apply from the following year. Talks on the port's future were to open through the Joint Oversight Commission, and any change to the enclave's terms would go to the Federal Assembly for ratification.[9]
- Natopia's ₦60 billion for Zeed's development awaited the approval of the Frenzy.[9]
The standing invitation for a reciprocal visit by Aerla's president, and the King's invitation to Queen Electra of Western Corum, were left without dates.[2][17]
Diplomatic context
The tour opened abroad at Huyenkula, the capital of Hurmu and seat of the Order of the Holy Lakes. Hurmu holds to a settled neutrality and belongs to none of the alliance blocs.[4] Huyenkula had given its name to the Convention of Huyenkula, the humanitarian convention on the conduct of war that Secretary-General Túpac Mendoza introduced at the Micras Treaty Organization in 1755 AN. No state had yet ratified it.[18]
Beyond Huyenkula, the route included partners of both the Raspur Pact and the Concord Alliance. Its Concord Alliance stops included every state that has acceded to the alliance: Vegno in 1738 AN, East Zimia and the Wallis Islands in 1751 AN, Aerla in 1752 AN, and Western Corum and Constancia in 1753 AN, together with the founding member Natopia.[19]
The two governments had treated Anglien's reconstruction endowment differently. Nouvelle Alexandrie declined in 1759 AN to subscribe to the Bliven Fund, the duchy's sovereign endowment, while Natopia provided some 84 percent of its capital.[20] The future of Zeed had earlier been the subject of the Cárdenas Summit, held at the Palace of Carranza from which the tour departed.[21]
Reactions
Domestic
Democratic Socialist Party: Premier Marcos Ferreira Gonçalves said the government would put the Convention of Huyenkula accession and the Petropolis deed to a vote in the Cortes: "The King gave the Federation's word in Huyenkula, and our ambassador accepted the deed in Petropolis, both on the government's advice. Now the Cortes decides, and I expect it to say yes."[22]
Federal Humanist Party: Leader of the Opposition José Manuel Montero, whose government began planning the tour, said his party would vote for both, but objected that the Avey revenue share had been decided without the Cortes: "We want a better partnership with Zeed as much as anyone. But half of Avey's revenue is a decision for the Cortes, and deputies heard about it from Rusjar."[22]
- Fred Strong, a former Vice-Premier and Secretary of Defense, asked for an account of the grenade at Johannsessbuurg: "Someone got close enough to throw a grenade at the King and the Empress, and we only learned of it once the police had made an arrest. I want the Federal Guards Service to tell the Cortes how that happened and what it has changed."[22]
Civic Governance Alliance: Treasury Secretary Tomás Iñiguez, the party's floor leader, said the Civic Governance Alliance would back the Petropolis transfer once the full deed was before deputies: "We'll support it. But the Federation would hold that ground forever, and deputies ought to read the whole deed before they vote."[22]
Wakara People's Party: Yuiza Bohi'o, the party's leader and Secretary for Administrative Coordination and Efficiency, noting that the convention had been introduced in 1755 AN while Montero was Premier, said: "This has been sitting on the table since 1755 AN. Of course we'll vote for it."[22]
International
- Zeed: The government of Prime Minister Hypatia Damarion said it welcomed both the revenue share and the Natopian pledge, and would name its delegation to the talks on Avey's future.[9]
- Western Corum: Queen Electra, who had said after the micrasquake that she would visit once she would not get underfoot, answered the King's assurance at Corum Electric City that she would never be underfoot in his country: "Like a coqui, I'm quite small; so while I can make a bit of noise, at least I won't take up a lot of space! No promises about the rain, though..."[17]
See also
- Royal Tour of Oportia, 1758
- Monarchy of Nouvelle Alexandrie
- Foreign affairs of Nouvelle Alexandrie
- State visit of Manco Cápac to Constancia
- Nouvelle Alexandrie–Order of the Holy Lakes relations
References
- ^ a b c d e f "The Royal Household announces a joint goodwill tour of twelve cities for the King and Empress", NBC Newsfeed, 9.V.1760 AN.
- ^ a b c "The King and Empress renew the Federation's friendship with Aerla at Noursala, received by its new president", NBC Newsfeed, 18.VII.1760 AN.
- ^ a b c "The gravnought Zimia is remembered at Southman, last of the twelve stops on the Royal Goodwill Tour", NBC Newsfeed, 2.IX.1760 AN.
- ^ a b c d e f "The King and Empress keep faith at Huyenkula as the Queen Mother comes home to Hurmu", NBC Newsfeed, 16.VII.1760 AN.
- ^ a b "Empress Clara is received by her father, the Sovereign Duke, as the royal tour reaches Anglien", NBC Newsfeed, 24.VII.1760 AN.
- ^ a b c "The King dedicates a statue of Manco Cápac I in Petropolis, beside the shrine of the Basileus who died with him", NBC Newsfeed, 17.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ a b "Anglian prosecutors charge Wouter Dekkersz with trying to kill the King and Empress at the wreath-laying", NBC Newsfeed, 10.XIV.1760 AN.
- ^ a b c d e "The King and Empress leave Cárdenas on the Royal Goodwill Tour, bound first for Huyenkula", NBC Newsfeed, 12.VII.1760 AN.
- ^ a b c d e f "Zeed is promised an equal share of Avey's port revenue and ₦60 billion from Natopia in Rusjar", NBC Newsfeed, 20.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ Grand Federal Tour of 1746.
- ^ a b "The King and Empress visit their son-in-law's family at Redquill, where the King's aunt receives them", NBC Newsfeed, 11.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ "The King returns to Cossa, where Vegno joined the Concord Alliance after his first state visit", NBC Newsfeed, 21.VII.1760 AN.
- ^ a b "Anglian police arrest man over grenade that failed to explode at the royal wreath-laying", NBC Newsfeed, 2.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ "Empress Clara welcomes the King to her own country at Tirlar", NBC Newsfeed, 3.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ "The Benacian Union hosts the King and Empress for four days in Chryse and Goldfield", NBC Newsfeed, 9.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ "The King and Empress end their Natopian stops at Lindström as guests of Prince Nathan, heir to Natopia", NBC Newsfeed, 14.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ a b c d "Empress Clara honors the West Corumian battalion that fought in Anglien", NBC Newsfeed, 23.VIII.1760 AN.
- ^ Convention of Huyenkula.
- ^ Concord Alliance Treaty Organization.
- ^ Bliven Fund.
- ^ Cárdenas Summit.
- ^ a b c d e "The royal tour's promises head for the Cortes, and the parties split over Avey and the grenade", NBC Newsfeed, 4.IX.1760 AN.
