Chapter 387 Gazette System and National Identity
The clatter of horse hooves brought up bursts of dust, and the villagers wearing sleeveless burqas and carrying hoes raised their heads.
Several afterimages rushed past the eyes, and the small bucket containing the paste hit the saddle and spilled a lot to the ground.
They were two gendarmes wearing blue folded hats and short cloaks. They were riding on two fast horses, galloping past on the dirt road.
“The communiqué has been posted, hurry up, hurry up, go faster.”
Upon seeing this scene, the villagers who were still walking slowly quickly quickened their pace and chased the dust raised by the horses.
Since the Salvation Army stationed in Kushland, the communique has become a daily necessity for the villagers.
In order to prevent the bulletin from getting wet by rain, most of the 100-household districts will build a small pavilion or wooden shed on the bulletin board to keep out the rain.
Generally speaking, this kind of communiqué contains three contents.
The first is news from the Kush territory, such as battles won, what policies or laws were promulgated, and who was awarded.
The second type is Horn's article allegory or church joke. The former is to construct the rationality and legitimacy of the Salvation Army regime, and the latter is to deconstruct the rationality and legitimacy of the imperial church.
The third type is the current price and labor recruitment information, such as briquette, mortar and furniture prices, for example, a certain workshop is recruiting labor, etc.
Many times, these villagers do not dare to travel far away, especially since the cost of traveling this way is not cheap, and there is a risk of getting lost.
So most of them agree with the head of the household on what they want every month, and then find the head of the household based on the price list in the communique and pay for the goods in advance.
Then the heads of hundreds of households take the skitarii to the city for collective purchase every month and transport them back together by horse-drawn carriage, which can save a lot of transportation and transportation costs.
Of course, due to the relatively large volume, many heads of households in the same area banded together to lower the wholesale prices with wholesalers, and raised prices with the villagers, reaping rebates from both ends.
However, because the number is not large, and most of it is used to subsidize the fodder money and the skitarii.
So Madeleine and others who stayed at Fort Joan of Arc turned a blind eye and basically ignored it.
When the situation improves, roads are built, and manpower is sufficient, this part of the function will be separated from the hands of the heads of households.
When the villagers rushed to the public list one after another, the captain of the Skitarii asked the Skitarii to maintain order.
The Skitarii formed a semicircle with spears and spears in hand to prevent the villagers from getting too close.
From time to time, they would take out sticks to beat those rural scoundrels who committed petty theft.
You must know that these skitarii have some power of law enforcement, and they have implicitly given them the power of violent law enforcement.
It means that the Skitarii lynched gangsters and scoundrels, and the military police and night watchmen acquiesced.
In the past six months, those gangsters in the countryside were either stabbed to death with spears or transported to Daze Township to dig peat or dredge rivers.
The belatedly arrived head of a hundred households smiled and stood in front of the official list, cleared his throat, and read aloud: "...our army won a great victory, defeating tens of thousands of troops in Jinhe Township, and the devil leader Niedersall died. , Mosanke Redis (Archbishop of Jinhe Township) and Zelaken will arrive at Castle Joan in the near future and will be tried by all the people..."
Before the head of the hundred households finished speaking, the villagers started With bursts of cheers, they pulled off the collar cords and loudly asked if their children were on the list of awards.
At the edge of the village, Halkin smiled as he passed by on a pony. He had seen this scene countless times when he set off from Castle Joan of Arc.
But Halkin was not as excited as them, because he had already heard the news two days ago. News of the great victory reached Fort Joan of Arc by waterway within a day and a half, and then spread to the eight surrounding towns with Fort Joan of Arc as the center.
Finally, by the time the low-level monks copied the communique and the military police issued it, it was already three or four days later.
With the increase in the number of hundreds of households in the Kush Territory, it is naturally impossible for the military police to be sent to every one of the hundreds of households.
So many times, the military police only post the bulletin in the Baihu District bulletin near the main road.
For the remaining relatively remote Baihu District, the communiqués were passed on in a relay style by nearby skitarii.
The frequency and efficiency of communicating once every ten days and a half were considered by later generations to be ridiculously slow.
But compared to other kingdoms where the top and bottom are unknown, most villagers know who Horn is and what is happening in the Salvation Papal Kingdom today.
It was with these communiqués that the villagers' petty gossip after drinking and dinner gradually turned into political comparisons against the Redeemer Papal State.
It is in these key political debates that the villagers will gradually develop a sense of identification with the imaginary community of the "Savior Papal State".
After all, if you don’t even know what it is, how can you agree with it?
Just like this Battle of Montenegro, if it was still under the rule of Duke Dané of Kush, it is estimated that there would be no news until a month or even half a year later.
For the original villagers, it was more like "What does this have to do with my income of 3,000 pounds?"
But for the current villagers, they have children, relatives and friends serving in the Salvation Army. , purchased jihad bonds, and some even donated food to the Salvation Army.
The victory in this battle is closely related to their lives, so they are honored in this battle. It can even be said that they also have merit in this battle.
Armand's article "Victory belongs to all the monks of the Redeemer Kingdom!" confirms this point.
From this perspective, the nobles of Jinhe Township did not lose unjustly.
They only used themselves and their family's meager power to fight against the entire Salvation Papal Kingdom.
However, in order to publish these communiqués, The Salvation Army paid a lot of price.
This communiqué could not exceed 500 words at most, but it still had to waste a lot of manpower on temporary copying and engraving.
So under Horn's suggestion, the Salvation Military Government tried to tinker with the process technology of movable type printing, freeing up more manpower, and by the way, further broadening the market.
According to the milestones in the "1446 Transportation Construction and Postal Memorandum (Third Edition)" written by Saint Sun a month ago, they will complete the hardening of mortar concrete on the main road within two years.
By that time, mail coaches and stagecoaches will be running.
If circumstances permit, a tramway could even be built between Mayo Mines and Ashheard Town.
When the road is hardened, Halkin will no longer have to spend so long visiting his father in Ashheard Town.
Continuing forward from the dusty dirt road, Halkin and the others didn't walk long before they saw the black and red flags fluttering on the wall of Gray Hearth Town.
(End of this chapter)