Inge av Munsö, King of Sweden 1176-1192
Inge av Munsö was only a child of nine years when he was crowned and thus had no actual power. The real power behind the throne was his mother, Ragnhild av Roden, late spouse of King Håkan. The most preassuring issue was of course the wars in Italy with the Zirid kingdom. The battle of Firenze in the summer of 1177 proved costly for both sides: eleven thousand men loyal to the Munsö king fought fourteen thousand Zirids, and only one and four thousand respectivly survived. This was a major blow to the immideate future of the italian campaign as new troops had to be mobilized from southern Italy.
In 1078 Bagge av Munsö, who controlled a large chunk of Italian territoy, was elected Pope. This ment that most of the Italian lands was now under the direct control of the crown; inefficient but it allowed Ragnhild to mobilize more troops than before, because Bagge had not been the new king's most loyal servant. When peace was concluded with the Zirid king Najib in September 1178 there were almost only Catholic rulers in Italy, save the Cyrenaica lands in the north. The following years would be a period of peace and waiting for Inge to come to age.
In 1184 Inge had reached the age of 17 and married a daughter of the English king, Felicia de Normandie. At the same time an army gathered in Navarra to put an end to the crusade against Burgos. But there was another problem that caught Inge's attention: his excommuicated brother Gustav, the duke of Västergötland, was having troubles keeping togeather his vassals. The king started with the most obvious solution: revoking the five duchy titles that Gustav held. After giving up one he however wouldn't go any further.
The situation in Italy soon took a turn for the worse. Several counts revolted against their liberator, their reasons unkown. Inge in Spain now had the goal to quickly snatch Burgos, make peace with the Sevillan muslims in posession of the province and then head to Italy. The problems with Inge's brother Gustav solved themselves: Gustav was killed in battle with a revolting vassal. Down in Italy the Zirids attacked again, throwing Sweden into another war. Keeping the army paid drove down the kingdom into debt, but after two successfull peace deals with muslims they were suddenly plus 6000 in gold.
It would take untill July 1187 before Sevilla accepted peace. By then both the emir Ruknaddin and Inge had tried to have eachother assassinated.
Inge now turned east towards Italy to deal with the revolters that had had a playing ground so far. Fortunantly the Zirids hadn't done anything yet. While on their way to Palermo a part of Inge's army turned on him; they had been bought by an opposing count. When Inge landed in Palermo five thousand of his orginal twenty thousand men remained, that had been the price to liberate northern Iberia.
While Italy was revolting Scicily was still loyal to Inge and brought up an army of some ten thousand soldiers to support the king. They started to march north through Italy, defeating revolters as they arrived. In 1190 the Zirids were kicked out of Italy (again) and the souther half of the country was once again under the king's command. In Russia a few unimportant counts had revolted; they were soon to be dealt with. But it was when all but one of the Italian revolters had been taken care of that Inge was wounded in battle in northern Italy. He did however finish his campaign and when christmas arrived Sweden was once again united.
Much of Inge's treasury was lost when he was forced to pay the price of his scepticalness in 1191, by giving it as a gift to the pope.
From then on Inge became a defender of the catholic faith; Sweden had a large number of muslim courtiers, courtiers who now had the choice to convert or die. Those young enough did not have to worry; all muslim children were placed in Catholic monasteries to give them the right faith. Among the more prominent people to be killed was Abdul-Hamin ibn Zirid, the former man of power in the Zirid southern Italy. All these events put a large amount of stress on Inge, a stress that became worse and slowly developed into madness. Luckily for him he had many good advisors to keep things running. It was, however, not that that would finally take him.
It was the 20th of November 1192 when Inge passed away. His health had been getting worse and worse throughout the years, and now it finally caught up with him. He left his empire to his only son, Brynjolf. The young child was only two years old when he was crowned king.
