Convulsions of the Silver Flame
914-930
The Church's Detractors are quick to point to the Lycanthropic Purge as a sign that the Church of the Silver Flame is hopelessly militant but are noticeably hesitate to point to the Convulsions of the Silver Flame. The fourteen year period under King Thalin when certain historians would have you believe that the streets overflowed red with blood. Strangely, this period is rarely brought up by anyone who has the slightest knowledge of Thranish history or any real understanding of the events of that time.
Instead, the Convulsions are useful as propaganda and then only for people who might as well be told anything that the speaker intends to claim about Thrane as true (one particularly fun Anti-Flamite story has the Silver flame powered by natural gas...). Augusta Wainwocket has already had her history protested as anti-Thranish propaganda and the work known as the Forge of War is likely to fail as a work of truly unbiased history. She is quick to point out the events are true, just that her depiction might have been overly lurid.
In truth, the Convulsion is not used for Anti-Silver Flame propaganda very often because it often detracts from the purposes of it. The mass uprising and civil strife that followed was what put the Silver Flame in power but scholars of the time have dissected the period too thoroughly to hide the truth. The Silver Flame is a church devoted to militancy and the stamping out of supernatural evil but not interested in conversion by sword point. The spontaneous insurgency certainly took a religious cast but was not nearly the holy crusade that its own descriptors claimed it to be. As shocking as it may seem, what propelled the theocracy into power was a primarily secular revolt.
To understand the confusion, the first thing to note was that the situation in Thrane was already a powder keg by the period of King Thalin's vision being legitimized. The war had already been dragging for twenty years now and the populous had grown utterly disgusted with what they perceived to be the incompetence of its handling. Karrn's adoption of the undead was still new enough at this time to be in the lifetime of most Thranes. Many also poorly understood their military might enough to fear an apocalyptic doom might fall upon them. The other nations hostility towards Thrane even in the face of Karrn's horrors resulted in a sense of siege mentality by the populous.
Really, a lot of historians place a good deal of unnecessary blame on Prince Daslin Ir'Wynarn. King Thalin was a monarch that was much beloved by the people, even if quite a few of them hadn't yet fully embraced the Silver Flame as deeply as he had. The Prince was much more akin to his descendant in that he was a primarily secular individual with a love of Cyrean art and lavish parties. His excesses weren't particularly terrible but a great number of agitators disliked him terribly. It didn't help that he was a man whom didn't look like either a warrior or a holy man and the nation of Thrane wanted both from their visible leader.
Honestly, even this wouldn't have triggered the tremendous civil strife were not the people already tremendously divided. An unusually high presence of foreign born families from Galifar that had a significant concentration of wealth, the fears of regicide that had assailed Cyre leading to baseless accusations that Thalin had been murdered by Thranish traitors, and a vampire infestation being rooted out in the heart of the capital by Flame paladins just caused events to spiral out of control. Bluntly, the Convulsions were about making "Thrane fit for Thranes." An attempt to purify a culture that they felt had been insufficiently committed to victory in the war.
The primary targets of the Convulsions were the usual collection of individuals you find in a witch hunt. Those of non-Thranish descent, particularly the wealthy, were the most victimized. However, they were far from the only. Anyone who was hesitant in the war against the other Four Nations from pacifists to Galifar unionists were targeted. A sizable number of Sovereign Host churches were looted during this period and its priests killed. The Flame, ironically, escaped persecution primarily because its members were most often considered too humble to inspire much outrage. Their history of good works in the area was also a point in their favor when the mass riots began.
It was, honestly, civil war in Thrane for the next year. Dol Arrah and Dol Dorn worshipers retaliated for their holy places being looted by killing in the streets. Of course, this violence created an instant slew of martyrs for the insurrection. Rabble rousers seeking to overthrow the monarchy were quick to point the most popular religion in the land and that their cause was just. The civil strife took an oddly religious cast as depictions of their enemies painted them as Lycanthropes, demons, undead, or foreign agents. This was lumped under 'impiety' since nationalism didn't evoke quite as much fury on its own as these outrageous accusations.
The Church of the Silver Flame won even more support during this period as they sheltered as many victims as possible while healing others. Strangely, despite the religion being adopted by the looters as justification, countless converted to the Flame due to the deep sincerity they saw in the resistance amongst the faithful. The Church has beatified several Paladins, Clerics, and simple peasants who gave their lives to save the innocent from militant revolutionaries.
Ultimately, the Church managed to channel most of the tensions into other works as they focused the rage outwards onto other nations. Many trials for heresy, a charge that Silver Flame worshipers are only accused of when they deliberately use name of the church for evil practices, were convened. Many more rabble rousers were excommunicated and found their support dwindling after the tide of the violence died down. The result was a sense of national shame that reinforced the Church's popularity as they had kept the coolest head during the crisis. Nevertheless, attempts to take advantage by foreign aggressors during this period solidified their burning hatred for the other four nations.
Please email it to Wolfgang Bauer. :D
I can just imagine poor Napoleon serving in Thrane's armies abroad while the situation at home goes to Hell.
and although I still like the FoW(even the section on Thrane) this does seem to be a more likely series of events then presented in the book.That its just so obviously wrong that its easier to just flat out ignore it than it is to try and fix it.