Dornish Civil War

The Dornish Civil War was a conflict between the Katoor dynasty in Dorn and a coalition between some of the noble houses and Dornish republicans, eventually led by Inez Clevenger. The war ended in 1338 with the end of the Katoor dynasty and the instatement of a republican system of governance with a republican monarchy under Queen Inez Clevenger.

History

In the 1320s, Mruk Katoor II began to increasingly centralize power under the monarchy, breaking the balance of power between the noble houses of Dorn and the Katoor dynasty that had existed since the Bronze Isle Treaty. This culminated in 1328, following the Succession Wars, when he struck one of the seats from the Signatory Council and restricted the houses from maintaining armies. At the same time, the Red Week had caused an economic depression in Dorn, shining a light on economic and political disparities within the nation. Republican and communist ideas were spreading across Duurn, and in Dorn, a growing republican movement decried a lack of political representation.   On the 19th of the Month of Growth, 1335, soldiers loyal to Mruk Katoor II moved to arrest eight members of the Signatory Council, alleging a conspiracy to unseat Katoor. Five were successfully captured, but three managed to escape. The fugitives Inez Clevenger, Wigbehrt Heikkinen, and Oliver Sercombe published a demand for Mruk Katoor II to release the imprisoned councilmembers and resign his crown. Nine of the Signatory Houses declared their support for the revolutionaries, alongside many minor houses. The revolutionaries drafted a proposal for a new political structure for Dorn, including the creation of a dual parliamentary system with a popularly elected parliament formed alongside a Council of Houses. This bought them support from the Dornish republican movement. The war began when loyalist aerostats advanced on Staffick, where the revolutionaries had gathered and declared themselves the Army of the Dornish Republic.   Broadly, the Army of the Dornish Republic found the most support in the cities and urban centers, where republicanism was most popular, while the loyalists had the most support in rural areas. Most houses still supported Katoor, who ensured their loyalty through generous promises of rewards to come once the civil war was over. In 1337, Jakob Stonewall and the rest of House Stonewall joined the revolutionaries, which some argue was the death-knell of the loyalists. The war lasted a little longer than three years, ending when an assault on Mruk Katoor II's mountain fortress ended in the death of Mruk II and the discovery of the cthonic cult that had been using him as a puppet.

Revolutionary Power Struggle

While many of the revolutionaries were fighting for a truly representative system, the noble houses each wished to see themselves on top of a new republican monarchy. A struggle for leadership of the republican army and the new political system continued throughout the war. While there were many important leaders in the war, Inez Clevenger, Wigbehrt Heikkinen, and Oliver Sercombe were perceived as the natural options. On the 11th of the Month of Storm, 1337, Oliver Sercombe was killed on the field of battle, leaving Clevenger and Heikkinen as the contenders. Finally, at an assembly of the leaders of the Army of the Dornish Republic in the Month of Hope of 1338, Inez Clevenger was declared the supreme commander of the revolutionaries. When Katoor was dethroned, she was installed as the new queen of Dorn.