After Heligif left, Vig became bored again and picked up some rocks to skip in the river.
Half a minute later, Mitchum came up behind him with a stack of bills and found the lord in a strange mood: "Master, are you interested in her?"
"What nonsense are you talking about?"
Mitchum
continued: "For a nobleman, marriage is a very serious matter. If approached correctly, it will bring great benefits to your reign. The best choice is to marry the royal princess, but unfortunately, Your Majesty does not have a daughter or sister, so this option is excluded. The second is relatives of other powerful nobles. I do not fully understand the situation of each family, so I will not discuss it for now. Finally, as an outsider, marrying the daughter of a local landowner can reduce the resistance of the people. Heligif is a good choice. They say her great-grandmother was of royal lineage and hardly worthy of you." "
This is too sudden, let me slow down." Vig gestured for the people around him to step back, staring in amazement at a flock of wild ducks on the other side of the river.
Meachum was right. As a nobleman, it was time for him to think about marriage.
He thought deeply.
Speaking of marriage, King Eric had an unmarried little daughter named Eva. During the two years he had been away in Eastern Europe, Nils had often mentioned the name, as if he were obsessed with it.
"Eva is Eric's daughter. Her aunt Sora married Ragnar. She is of high position and beautiful. The only drawback is that she is open and even wanton. Forget about it, let others worry about it."
Then several names flashed through his mind again. They were all the sisters or daughters of nobles. It was a pity that their cultural level was generally low. Vig weighed them repeatedly and finally gave in one by one.
As for the Geligians, there were three advantages to marrying her.
First, she was an Anglo-Saxon, which could greatly reduce the hostility of the locals towards her. Second, her family was sparsely populated and could only rely on themselves, which was enough to guarantee her loyalty. Third, being able to read and write Latin was a highly prized talent in the Middle Ages, when illiterates were everywhere. After marriage, she could also do household chores.
After more than two hours of struggling, Vig came to a small compartment next to the lord's hall and found Miham doing accounts.
"Pick a day to go to her house and propose. Try to be kind and don't make me look like a bully. It doesn't matter if we can't come to an agreement. This gentleman has plenty of choice."
Vig was not exaggerating. Thanks to his legendary adventures in Eastern Europe and his services at the Battle of Northumbria, he is now a legendary figure in Scandinavian society. During his stay in York earlier in the year, warrior maidens had taken the initiative and came to the door almost every few days, but it was a pity that their family background, talents, etc. were too mediocre to be suitable as marriage partners.
"Yes, sir."
The next day, Miham went to Geligiv's house with gifts and two shield bearers. The latter's mother, Iris, was overjoyed and immediately agreed to the marriage. With the support of the lord, the young son can grow up in a safe environment, and the worries that have been troubling him for over half a year are finally resolved.
...
The lord has married, and the nobles and village chiefs in the area rush to congratulate him. When the wedding is over, Vig counts the gifts from each family and finds that after deducting expenses, he has a net profit of three pounds of silver.
"Not bad, they are reasonable."
After making an entry in the ledger, Vig looks at the tax situation for the year.
There are 19 large estates and 23 scattered villages in Tyneburg.
The total population of the estate has reached 2,500. The villagers are mostly self-taught and poor farmers, with a small number of smallholders, for a total of 5,000 villagers. Add them all up, and you have 7,500 Angles.
Including over 200 Angle farmers and over 500 Viking farmers around Tyneburg (who migrated from Northern Europe and grew slowly), Vig has around 8,300 people under his rule.
"The land is vast and the population sparse, much worse than Leonard's Manchuni."
Manchuni has 2,000 citizens, and including the various villages in the area, the total population is over 20,000, second only to the York area, which is ruled directly by Ragnar. Furthermore, the wealth generated by a citizen is several times that of a farmer. Wig estimated that Leonard's income ranged from 250 to 300 pounds of silver.
"After all, the southern region is still rich." Wig sighed and began to crunch the numbers.
First of all, wheat, which yielded the most, brought in a total revenue of 28,000 bushels (about 780 tons) at a tax rate of 15%. In currency terms, one bushel of wheat was equal to two silver pennies, a total of 60 pounds of silver.
In addition to grain, each estate also contributed two sheep, five pairs of chickens and ducks, and a small amount of beer and honey. Wig yawned and turned the page.
Finally, his three workshops had a combined profit of about 1.6 pounds of silver per month. Excluding a quarter of the service fee, the estimated annual profit was 15 pounds.
...
In terms of expenses, the annual salary of a shield bearer is 70 silver pennies, which is about 0.3 pounds of silver. If you add in the daily losses of food and equipment, each of these uncles consumes 0.6 pounds of silver per year.
"Twenty shield bearers, twelve pounds of silver. If you expand to fifty men, the costs reach a horrific thirty pounds!"
In addition, Tyneburg has tax collectors, blacksmiths, tailors, cooks, grooms, shepherds, ratters, laborers and other professions. After marrying Heligif, you will have to hire six maids, and food and wages will consume a total of eight pounds of silver.
After calculating, Vig was momentarily taken aback and realized that he had missed the tribute to Ragnar.
"Oh no, how could I forget about this trouble."
He was long confused. It was obvious that too much tribute would be a disadvantage, and too little would reduce the king's favor.
"My dear, what are you talking about?" Finding that her husband had not slept for a long time, Heligif came to watch him for a few minutes and mentioned the situation in West Francia.
"The Carolingian royal family appointed many counts. My father once saw a scroll in the monastery that mentioned the expenses of the counts. They need to spend 5%-20% of their total income to fulfill their obligations to the king (including military expenses, royal reception, and special fees). I think that since there was no war this year, you should give at least 15% of your income."
At his wife's suggestion, Vig made a list that included 20 pieces of woollen cloth, more than ten cartloads of grain, and several head of cattle.
"The total cost is ten pounds of silver, which should be enough to pay."
After dragging his tired body to bed to rest, Vig could not fall asleep for a long time. After the calculations he had just made, he realized that film and television work had greatly enriched the lives of medieval nobles. It was not easy to maintain daily expenses, let alone host lavish events such as banquets, dances, and martial arts competitions.
Unless you borrowed money from the church or trade groups.
Speaking of loans, Vig recalled the negative experience of the former Lord Tyneburg. They say his father was a spendthrift, so he owed the church a huge debt, so he spent decades and couldn't pay it off, and couldn't build a stone wall.
"Guess I need to come up with some new ways to make money."