You have to remember, being a bloodthirsty tyrant was his guys entire career.
And he was damn good at it.
From the absolute get go in this mans life, you get every impression that he was going for gold-in exile, attempted murder plots, attempted coups, successful coups, then head honcho under the admin of relatives-whom he then progressively bumps off in remarkably expedient fashion.
Then gets the top job, and holds it for how long?
You have to admit, thats not a bad effort.
The odds of a guy like that lasting 12 months in those circles is pretty bad, but he did it.
Vanhelsing, re; "not being a coward" in the face of execution, looking at the historical precedents of high profile executions, it's a typical propaganda exercise to in some bizarre way, "honour" the person, by in fact claiming they werent dragged screaming to the chopping block, even if they were.
It's also a peculiar method of aggrandisement of the executioner, reflecting such "nobility" to the psycho's who signed the order that they had the integrity to sentence someone else of nobility-whom naturally, said coherent last words, and with remarkable dignity, accepted the fate handed down by an "equal".
A commoner of course, would simply be dragged out somewhere and have their head roughly bludgeoned with an axe, but thats beside the point.
Medieval/rennasaince europe is filled with such examples, but there is continuous diplomatic tradition of this principle , dating back some ways.
