* RESOURCE BLOG

GUIDELINES. DOSSIER. MAINS & EXCLUSIVES.

CHARACTER STUDY.

PATERNAL LINEAGE. SEX, GENDER, AND SOCIETY. PRINCE OF POACHERS.

JOHANNES "HANS" CAPON OF PIRKSTEIN IS THE SECOND CHILD OF LORD JESCHKE CAPON OF PIRKSTEIN AND DAUGHTER OF A ČESKÁ LÍPA KNIGHT HEDVIKA OF DUBÁ, WITH A SISTER SEVEN YEARS HIS SENIOR BY THE NAME OF ČEŇEKA. A DAUGHTER AT BIRTH, HANS WOULD BE RAISED A SON TO SECURE THE CAPON LEGACY, AN IDENTITY HANS WOULD PERSONALLY AGREE AND CONTINUE TO ALIGN WITH AFTER LEARNING THE TRUTH IN EARLY CHILDHOOD. HANS' MOTHER DIED OF AFTERBIRTH COMPLICATIONS AND SICKNESS A MERE MONTH AFTER HANS' BIRTH IN THE LATE AUGUST OF 1383. FOR FIVE YEARS, THEN, HANS WAS RAISED BY JESCHKE AND ALONGSIDE ČEŇEKA, BEFORE TRAGEDY ONCE MORE BEFELL THE CAPON FAMILY IN THE AUTUMN OF 1388, WHERE A ROUTINE JOURNEY FROM RATTAY TO POLNÁ ENDED IN BLOODSHED: JESCHKE DIED TO SAVE HANS' AND ČEŇEKA'S LIVES, AND ČEŇEKA DIED SOON AFTER TO SAVE HANS'S, WHO WAS DISCOVERED AT DAWN IN A NARROW CAVERN BY GUARDSMEN. IN THE DAYS FOLLOWING, HANS RETURNED TO RATTAY WITH GRANDFATHER AND NOW ACTING LORD OF RATTAY ČENĚK AND UNCLE HANUSH OF LEIPA.  FOLLOWING ČENĚK'S DEATH IN 1395, HOWEVER, IT WAS HANUSH WHO THEN BECAME THE REGENT LORD OF RATTAY IN YOUNG HANS' STEAD.

SURROUNDED BY DEATH, HANS'S CHILDHOOD AND ADOLESCENCE WAS WROUGHT WITH AN ANXIOUS ATTACHMENT TO HIS CARERS, NAMELY ANYA  — HIS NANNY — AND OATS, ANYA'S HUSBAND AND HANS'S HORSEBACK RIDING INSTRUCTOR. BY LATE CHILDHOOD AND EARLY TEENHOOD, HOWEVER, HANS HAD LEARN TO HIDE BEHIND AN ARROGANT ATTITUDE AND A SUPERIORITY COMPLEX — AN EASY FEAT, HAVING LED A CODDLED, PRIVILEGED LIFE REGARDING LUXURY AND MATERIALITY. OFTEN AT ODDS WITH HANUSH, HE TOOK TO FOCUSING HEAVILY ON ARCHERY,  HUNTING, AND STRENGTH TRAINING IN HIS MID TO LATE TEENS TO BOTH ESCAPE HANUSH'S HOUNDING AND TO FORGE HIMSELF INTO A "BETTER MAN."  AND TO ESCAPE RESPONSIBILITY TOO.

BY HAN'S EIGHTEENTH BIRTHDAY IN 1401, HANUSH HAD REFUSED TO CONTACT THE KING NOR JESCHKE'S COUNCIL TO CONFIRM HANS'S COMING OF AGE, CITING HANS'S IMMATURITY AS THE REASON FOR WITHHOLDING RATTAY.  "NO ONE IN THEIR RIGHT MIND WOULD CONSIDER YOU FIT TO RULE!"  HANS, ENRAGED BY HANUSH'S REFUSAL AND, MOST OF ALL, HANUSH'S STRINGENCY THAT HANS HAD STRUGGLED WITH SINCE CHILDHOOD, REBELLED FURTHER WITH WOMEN AND WINE,  THOUGH TRUTHFULLY STRUGGLED WITH THE FORMER.

it's also evident that he is struggling without henry. while it's fun to say that hans is a damsel in distress — and sometimes he is — hans is more than capable of taking care of himself. but Hans is right: the situation he and henry have found themselves in is dire. and while henry is unfortunately familiar with fighting to survive, hans isn't. and hans flounders. hans tried to hunt hares, but his hands shook too much from the cold, from hunger, from fear, to hit his mark. he tried to hunt wolves, but his first attempt went horribly awry, and he was too afraid to try again. he tried to offer his service as a bellator, but the select few who believed that perhaps he could wield a sword didn't need his sword. perhaps he thought of deigning to menial, peasant work, but he couldn't relinquish what little pride he was left clinging to, nor could he risk shaming the capon family by being seen hauling sacks and digging latrines, because a lord seen doing such work would shame his family, regardless of how dire the circumstances may be, and hanush certainly drilled that into his head  — and how much shame had hans already brought upon his family with his womanizing ways and his childish, devil may care attitude? so hans struggled. hans floundered. hans slept in haybeds in lofts and in abandoned camps and hoped that no one would find him. he wore raggedy clothes that he found or were given to him by goodwives, along with half stale loaves of bread, who felt sorry for him. it's the most difficult time of his life and the most humbling. it's difficult. it's grueling. it's frustrating. but he remembers that taste of freedom almost fondly. as damaging as it was to his pride as a lord and as a noble, it bolstered his pride as a man:

that's the 20th century, of course, but gender roles and heteronormativity have been staunch for centuries; it isn't far fetched to say that a trans man, in the case of hans, was expected to conform entirely to masculinity. and it isn't necessarily hans' attraction to men that would put his masculinity into question. to penetrate is to be masculine. to be penetrated is to be feminine. although a man who was caught in the act of penetrating another man would be accused of sodomy, his masculinity would not be in question. the man who was receiving penetration, however, would most definitely have his masculinity put into question, and he would be labeled a sodomite and worse. that is the world hans lives in. hans would have the belief burnt into him, then, that his enjoying being penetrated is an inherently feminine trait, even if he were a cis man. but hans is not a cis man. and to hans, enjoying being penetrated as a trans man is an even greater betrayal. a man "shouldn't" enjoy being penetrated, and a man already "shouldn't" have, as it was called even in medical documents, a cunt. and to enjoy being penetrated there? the thought alone that he may like that was humiliating enough, made all the more humiliating upon a drunken night of self exploration. the study of physiology is in its infancy in the 15th century. they believe in humourism, for god's sake. hans wouldn't know that what he's experiencing is entirely normal, and that someone's preferred position isn't at all indicative of their masculinity nor their femininity — it's indicative of their enjoyment of internal stimulation. that's it. it isn't only that, however, that troubles hans: it's hans' desire for a family, and what that means for someone like him. hans couldn't produce an heir by impregnating jitka. were hans to have an heir of his blood, he would have to carry the child — and hans isn't against that. he wants a child. he's said so in canon. but carrying a child, even in the 2025th year of our lord, is considered "inherently feminine." in the 21st century, people are still laughing at "mpreg," many who say they're allies, and are still saying that it's weird and that it's gross, not at all taking into consideration that many, many trans men have carried children, pre and post transition, and want to carry children. and those people laugh and say that it's "weird" for a reason they often refuse to disclose or acknowledge: they believe that it "defies gender roles" to an "unacceptable" degree for a man to carry a child. to this day, there are those who claim to be allies that believe in and perpetuate such harmful rhetoric such as gender essentialism. it happens now. naturally, then, a trans man in the 15th century will likely struggle immensely with the thought that he wants to have biological children. hans certainly does. being with child is, again, "inherently feminine." and coupled with the fact that he thinks himself "feminine" for enjoying penetration, required for conception at the time, it's difficult. and all of that along with being a nobleman? it's a nightmare.

but hans comes to terms with it all. throughout the series, he becomes more and more comfortable with who he is, and he becomes more and more comfortable with his masculinity. he realizes that nothing will take being a man away from him, because he is a man, and manhood isn't defined by one's behaviors and actions. he's a man because he's a man. janosh enjoys cooking and collects flowers in the fields behind the devil's den. henry can treat a wound as well as any bathmaid and can identify herbs and flowers simply by appearance alone. zizka can sew, and hans has caught zizka many, many, many times singing hallelujah domine to himself. adder is terrified of spiders and can't hunt worth a damn. kubyenka bathes with lavender soaps, and the dry devil is very fastidious with his hair. captain bernard cooks and cleans for his wife, and even hanush wears floral, "feminine" perfumes. hell, hans probably even meets someone while in trosky or kuttenberg who's transmasc and has carried a child, because representation is so important. hans' son, then, is hans' biological son, and by default with henry, and though the pregnancy was posed as jitka's, having had a child is something hans is immensely proud of himself for. hans struggled with dysphoria during that time, and hans still, from time to time, struggles with it, but hans comes to be a very proud, very self assured man who allows nothing and no one but himself to define who he is.