1453: Revival of Byzantium

Chapter 254: Orderrr!!!

"Trabajadores de mi patria:

Quiero agradecerles la lealtad que siempre tuvieron,

la confianza que depositaron en un hombre,

que slo fue intrprete de grandes anhelos de justicia,'

que empe su palabra en que respetara la Constitucin y la ley, y as lo hizo."

-        Salvador Allende, 11 Sept 1973

The street of Thessaloniki reminds Antonius so much of his old hole the city of Genoa, the endless view of dull white marble stone buildings that might have an even longer history than Antonius himself. On the corners of the streets and valleys there are carts after carts of fruits, vegetables, live stocks and other products on display causing one after another traffic jam that Antonius has to send his men out to maintain order. The city, just like its other counterparts in Europia, is scented with the smells of live stock defecations, burning charcoals, smell of scorched wood and buildings, decomposition of rotting plants and meat, together along with ordour created by human sweat getting mixed together making the street filled with the nasty polluted air, of course, people of this age still has no idea what does pollution means.

Though at least there is a good perspective to this, at least the commerce and merchant activities in Thessaloniki are slowly getting back its former glory, actually even better as Antonius' men are at least not like those Ottoman guards last time who are like a moral vacuum going around threatening people asking them for bribes and protection fees, the soldiers of Antonius, on the other hand, at least are not that obvious when doing things, as their admiral Antonius is right here patrolling the premise. 

A few days after the end of the siege, under the hard work of Antonius's crew and fellow sailors maintaining law and order, bringing in trade back in to the city, expelling the bandits and robbers scattered around inside and outside of the city. And today Antonius is having a stroll around his new city with his helper on economics and trade Alexios, studying the local market listening to the later giving him a lecture on laws and business. 

"Admiral, with no means to disrespect, I have always been against the idea of making laws that are too blunt and straight forward, indeed it can be useful when the situation is dire and immediate actions are to be taken, but it should be changed once the situation has been stabalised." 

"Alexios, I don't have that ability to think for you to look in to the future, but for now, this entire thing is working just as perfect, no more civil distress, no more disorders, no more murders, every thing coming back in to place." 

"My admiral." Alexios took a deep breathe. "Let me ask you, what is the punishment for murder?" 

"Death by public execution with hanging, of course." 

"Spreading of rumors and fake news in the demesne?" 

"Immediate execution by chopping down their head with their tongue, of course." 

"Then what about the other cardinal sins like robbery, kidnapping, theft?" 

"Immediate execution by arrows through their heart." 

"Now, what about the possession of undeclared dangerous tools or weapons blades, bows and spears that might cause harm to the stability of the society?" 

"Hmmm. Immediate imprisonment?" 

"Now, admiral What is the punishment for adultery?" 

"This is not up to me, it is up to the patricians, but I guess it is immediate imprisonment and public humiliation, as decided by the church." 

"Now admiral." Alexios grinned as he pointed towards two passers by, one man one woman, holding hands together and chit chatting as they walk down the street shopping for groceries. Judging by their looks they look like brothers and sisters. "Look at this two people, I suspect that they are a potential threat to our social stability." 

"Why?" Antonius took a closer inspection at this teenage man and woman. "I don't see any potential threat hey might carry towards social disorders." 

"They might do things like adultery." 

"Huh? How do you know?" 

"Because that is what you said yourself, admiral!" Alexios giggled holding his hands on his wrist. "They carry the 'tools' necessary to committing the crime of adultery, you know, the dings and the dongs, which might make them a potential hazard to the society. I suggest you to put them under arrest immediately." 

Antonius is bewildered for a moment hearing this weird piece of 'advice' from Alexios, then broke in to laughter as he gave Alexios a pat on the back. Alexios too, seeing that the admiral has understood what he means, also broke in to laughter facing Antonius. The two big men just stood there right in the center of the shopping street connecting the Forum of Romania to the Port of Constantine laughing and chortling, attracting the attention of the every single shopper and merchants. Most of them definitely did not recognize the admiral, especially the sibling passing by. The lady walked past Antonius rolling her eyes and mumbled. "Weirdo." 

"I see what you mean, Alexios, there is a need to set a more specific list of law and regulations along with each law's punishment."

"My admiral, may I remind you again that all capital punishments, including death penalty and imprisonment, are a form of tool that is used to serve the laws set by the jurisdiction system, a system we don't really have yet, forcing people to abide by the laws if they do not want these punishments. However, we must also be careful about this tool we are holding in our hands adjusting its power and authority with flexibility. If every single crime is punished by a death or imprisonment sentence, then the punishment quickly lose their power and warning effect to those hard witted rogues out there who are the true and main cause for social distress, and on the other hand it might cause a lot of wrong sentences where by the lesser criminals or the innocent people who can still be pardoned be sentences to a pointless death by the inflexibility of the law system." 

"I see." Antonius nodded as the scribe following closely behind quickly dribbled down the words of Alexios. "But isn't it a little to early to start on this kind of things? I mean, I know it is a mega project as I have studied the Corpus Juris Civilis which indeed gave me a super head ache. Our state now is still small consisting of a bunch of islands, a city, with a total population of no more than fifty thousand people, will this project be consuming too much social resources that it might cause other more important stuff to lag behind?" 

Alexios stopped grinning and turned in to a serious face for the very first time since he joined Antonius' force. "My lord, there are three things about law that I studied from the works of the past geniuses and believes are, first is that no matter whether it is effective or not, a system of law needs to be there in the first place for things to get started. Secondly, the people and mass public needs to know about this new law and its punishment before it is being implemented Just like in this case." 

Alexios walked up to an old man who is busy placing down his merchandise of charcoal on a cloth placed right in the middle of the street, patted him on the back and gently reminded him with a warm smile. "Hey kind sir, do you know that putting your merchandise here is considered illegal?" 

The old charcoal burner turned around and stared at Alexios with his coal tainted face and replied. "Don't try to bluff me, young man, I don't know who you are, but we charcoal burners have our own way of survival, and we do have our own ways of information. No one ever told me that I cannot lay my stuff over here There is no fun in fooling us poor humble charcoal burners, young man. I can judge from your clothing that you came from a wealthy back ground, but that does not give you the privilege of trying to make fun of us" 

Alexios walked away shaking his head. "You see my admiral, that is what happens, this old man does not know that a new law was made yesterday about the regulations of the market, and that not only brings disorders but also brings troubles to our law enforcers, as the offender can just say that he don't know about this new law Now to the third point." 

"The law, is just like a complex machinery that requires many parts to work together, and in order to make it work fluently you need to make it to be as flawless as possible, a most important part is that you cannot make it contradict with each other, and that scenario if you just rely on your mouth making the laws instead of making it in to a book, a codex for law to let all the people follow." 

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