Palace the Lethings

The Court of Settlement:

Lethuc sat seated on a throne, dressed in a Roman military cloak and wearing a helial crown. He was flanked on either side by his own pagan nobles, and also a Roman cleric, and a few civil servants. He had spent all morning listening to appeals and requests of land, and was looking forward to his bath. He had already exhausted his supply of public lands and tax exemptions, which itself would cause some diplomatic difficulties with the Romans, but his immediate concern was an accord between Romans and Lombards. At first, he was eager to strip the land for all it was worth, taken by right of conquest, and divide it up between his followers. His chief Roman adviser, however, the Numerius named Ampius Optatus, had convinced him of the merits of just and equitable rule, and that there was plenty of land to go around.

Of course, many peasants had to be forced off their lands to accommodate new settlers, but mainly in the north, in the Kingdom of Pannonia. Lethuc had managed to keep the number of freemen settled in Illyria to a minimum. By the end of the wrangling, Ampius informed Lethuc that all Rugi and Lombards had been granted the land promised to them, and the local nobility were pleased with their compensation, being granted either tax exemption or public land. However, five hundred nobles could not be accommodated and are now landless. Lethuc is informed that the majority of these have made their way to Ravenna, to petition the Emperor Honorius, since it was in his province of Pannonia that their lands were located.