An Age of Miracles: The Revival of Rhomanion

[SavoyTruffle]

Originally Posted by Dragos Cel Mare

@SavoyTruffle I'm curious, how much do you know about Pre-Hispanic Philippines?

Not a lot I'm afraid. Culturally sufficient, event-wise not so much.

[Dragos Cel Mare]

I see. My knowledge in that area is also insufficient. That said, I do have some guesses:

-The weaker position of Islam in Indonesia and Malaysia would lead to a weaker Islam in the Philippines, unless there's a rift between them and Majapahit.

- The Byzantines would pursue a smarter policy than the Spanish as regards conversion and conquest, though they would still be hostile towards Paganism and Animism. In fact, Islam may actually advance under Byzantine rule, if the Muslims play their cards right.

- The Native Kingdoms in the isles were of a Thassalocrastic bent, which can easily be taken advantage of by the Byzantines/Byzantine Vassals in the area.

[Vince]

Nice update. How are the Christian Spanish states (not to mention the Avignon Papacy) reacting to the fact that Roman artisans and shipwrights are helping their mortal enemy? At least from a diplomatic standpoint, with maybe the exception of Arles, they are the most friendly Catholic powers with the Romans.

[SavoyTruffle]

Originally Posted by Dragos Cel Mare

I see. My knowledge in that area is also insufficient. That said, I do have some guesses:

-The weaker position of Islam in Indonesia and Malaysia would lead to a weaker Islam in the Philippines, unless there's a rift between them and Majapahit.

- The Byzantines would pursue a smarter policy than the Spanish as regards conversion and conquest, though they would still be hostile towards Paganism and Animism. In fact, Islam may actually advance under Byzantine rule, if the Muslims play their cards right.

- The Native Kingdoms in the isles were of a Thassalocrastic bent, which can easily be taken advantage of by the Byzantines/Byzantine Vassals in the area.

While in the meantime China influences the Philippines more?

Originally Posted by Vince

Nice update. How are the Christian Spanish states (not to mention the Avignon Papacy) reacting to the fact that Roman artisans and shipwrights are helping their mortal enemy? At least from a diplomatic standpoint, with maybe the exception of Arles, they are the most friendly Catholic powers with the Romans.

Both Christian and Muslim Iberia aren't ready for a round 2; both sides are just "business as usual" so far.

The powder keg is but full.

[thekingsguard]

Originally Posted by MerryPrankster

Start posting this on your blog, along with links to the main TL.

On what in particular? Also, I should ask Basileus444 for permission first .

Originally Posted by Basileus444

thekingsguard: Yes, you have. Happy now?

Quite

Also, given Merry's idea, should a post pan out to anything, do I have your permission do one?

[Dragos Cel Mare]

Originally Posted by SavoyTruffle

While in the meantime China influences the Philippines more?

That would be inevitible, if Southern Wu becomes a power in Asian politics.

[Dragos Cel Mare]

Also, don't the Mamluks have the surviving Abbasids under their wing? Back when I was in high school, I remember reading about it from the Encyclopedia Britannica.

[Basileus444]

bolhabela: Yes, and yes. This is my effort to turn al-Andalus into a country that can stand on its own two feet, rather than just being a province that survives by virtue of its powerful overlords.

Mathalamus: So far the Andalusi have survived because of help from North Africa. Without that, they would have lost miserably to the Christians. In their position, imitating the Romans make sense.

Elfwine: The Jund should serve Al-Andalus well. They'll need it, especially as the Portuguese navy is now the number one owner of purxiphoi (their version has much better seamanship capabilities than Romans but less firepower). With that in the way, relying on Africa for protection is a bad idea.

And the Sultan-Lord situation is asking for trouble down the road. Mohammed and Ahmed like it, but I think the issues Mohammed's heirs will have with it are obvious.

SavoyTruffle: That was actually my original purpose for the Laskarid tagma-theme system, to create an intermediary between medieval levy and modern professional army. And this is a setup for the breaking of the Marinid Empire on continental lines.

Dragos Cel Mare: Yeah, the Romans aren't going to accept paganism. They may be pretty tolerant, but there are limits. I like your idea about the Muslims actually expanding under Roman rule. That's a possibility if they play up the 'fellow Abrahamic monotheist' angle to try and get a most-favored middleman status between Roman officials and local rulers.

The sack of Baghdad in 1258 still happened, but I believe there were some Abbasids in Egypt under Mameluke 'protection'. But their political importance is completely spent by this point.

Vince: They do not like it one bit, and it is causing relations to cool (relations with Arles are still undamaged though). They aren't in a position to complain though. Both Christian and Muslim Iberia have come a long way to recovering from the GC, and they're rearming for Round 2, but they're not there yet.

This is actually a way of showing the difference in Demetrios' and Theodoros' diplomacy. Demetrios was concerned with securing the gratitude and goodwill of Catholic countries, hence the interventions in western Europe. Theodoros though considers goodwill to be worth its weight in gold. He's concerned with keeping good relations with the best buyer (in this case the biggest market for Roman goods) and here that is the Andalusi cities.

thekingsguard: You have my permission.


Part 4: In the Shadow of Timur, 1422-1430, has been posted in the finished timeline forum. For reference, we are currently in Part 6: The Lords of Asia (originally A New Generation but I'm changing the title). Part 5 was Twilight of Heroes and will be posted once Part 6 has been finished in this thread. And as of now the title choices for Part 7 are The End of the Middle Ages or The Boy Emperor

[Dragos Cel Mare]

Originally Posted by Basileus444

Here's a non-LOTR question to the floor. I was thinking about the Southern Wu (no, they will not be involved in the War for Asia). In their situation, what would be the best agricultural/livestock package for them, and where would they get it? Currently they're centered around OTL Darwin, but they have ships so they may relocate at least some to the southeast once they discover it. Also once an agricultural economy is established, what kinds of exports could the Wu produce? Would they be able to start exporting silk, chinaware, and tea again like regular China? Also what kinds of Australian products would be valuable as exports to pre-industrial societies? As well, what would be the easiest sources of Wu naval supplies so they can maintain their fleet?

I am aware that Australia is big on ranching, so I'm envisioning the interior aborigines becoming pastoral nomads tending great herds and trading animal products with the Sinicized zone. I'm just having difficulty with the economic base for said zone. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

All I know about Australia's agricultural potential is from Jared Diamond's Collapse, which is a flawed work. Why don't we ask the other Jared (the one who wrote Lands of Red and Gold)?

[Dragos Cel Mare]

Originally Posted by Basileus444

However seven thousand men, no matter how well equipped, would be enough to defend Al-Andalus in a repeat of the Gunpowder Crusade. Again what Mohammed did was very heavily influenced by the tagma-theme system in use by the Romans, which was explained in detail to him by the old drill dekarchoi that he had also brought from Rhomania. In the countryside, he instituted a system of land grants, waiving land taxes in exchange for military services. Unlike in Rhomania, where new estates were created out of conquered or confiscated land, the soldiers’ estates are transformed from existing farming lands.

Shoudn't it be, 'would not be'? Also, you already used 'However' to begin the paragraph before this one.

[Basileus444]

Originally Posted by Dragos Cel Mare

Shoudn't it be, 'would not be'? Also, you already used 'However' to begin the paragraph before this one.

You're right. That's a typo. I've fixed that to say 'would not be' and replaced the first 'However' with 'Nevertheless'.

[Dragos Cel Mare]

So, what about asking the other Jared?

[Basileus444]

Originally Posted by Dragos Cel Mare

So, what about asking the other Jared?

I took a look at his stuff, and it seems likely something he might know. I'm thinking I might create a separate thread just for that issue, to see what suggestions the general board has.



And now for something a bit different. Here is a modernized version of an excerpt from Alexios and the Latins, a popular Roman children's book from the Second Komnenid period.

Alexios glared at the latin knight, his eyes boring into his hairy face. “What gives you the right to steal our cow?!” he yelled.

The knight glanced over, raising a bushy eyebrow. The bellow of a ten year old boy did not intimidate him. “What right?” he said, laughing, spraying spittle all over the ground. “Why, I’m the biggest, bravest knight in all the world. That gives me the right, stupid peasant. Now go away before I kill you.”

“You’re not the biggest, bravest knight in all the world,” Alexios said.

A hideous scowl twisted the man’s face as he dropped the rope with which he had been pulling the cow. He took a step forward, his hand wrapping around the pommel of his sword. His heavy armor gleamed in the sun. “Why you little brat, I ought to-”

“Have you ever beaten the sea?” Alexios asked.

The man stopped. “What?”

“Have you ever beaten the sea? You haven’t. Well, there was a Roman knight who challenged the sea to a duel, and he beat it. But since you haven’t beaten the sea, you’re only the second biggest, bravest knight in all the world.”

“No! I’m the biggest, bravest knight!” he snarled.

“You aren’t. You have to beat the sea to be that. But if a Greek can do it, surely a German can.”

“That’s right!” the knight bellowed, slamming his foot on the ground. He mounted his horse and pointed at the nearby beach. “Come, boy, and see how a German beats the sea!”

A minute later they were on a sandy beach, the knight trotting to the edge of the water and unfurling his lance. “Oh, sea!” He bellowed. “I am the greatest knight in all the world, and I challenge you to a duel!”

A wave lapped onto the shore. “See, the sea is scared of you. It won’t answer back,” Alexios said. The man smiled. “Now go on, show it how brave a knight you are.”

“Alright, sea!” the man yelled. “You won’t answer my challenge. But I will not be denied my duel. Prepare to defend yourself!” The man urged his horse into the water. For several steps the horse obeyed, but whinnied in fear and jerked its neck as the water lapped at the base of its neck.

“Come on!” Alexios yelled. “Are you going to let a horse stop you? You’re supposed to be the greatest knight the world has ever seen.”

“I am!” the knight roared, shoving his mount forward, boxing its ear. The animal obeyed, going deeper, deeper. Now it was craning its head up, keeping its nostrils above the water. The knight beat at the water. “Take that! Take that!” He dropped his lance, pulling out his mace, smashing at the surface. “Forward, you stupid animal!”

The horse took one more step. Too deep. It slipped, the knight flailing as he fell off the saddle, and disappeared from sight. There was a gurgle, several bubbles and then nothing. The horse splashed its way onto the beach, snorting angrily. Alexios walked over, gently stroking its nose. “Sorry about that.” He took the reins, gently tugging the horse forward, and Alexios turned to go and fetch the cow.

[brokenman]

Originally Posted by Basileus444

~snip~

Now that's a clever boy, or should I say, a really stupid man for a knight.

[MerryPrankster]

Originally Posted by brokenman

Now that's a clever boy, or should I say, a really stupid man for a knight.

That's the point.

[Elfwine]

I like it, I really do.

[frozenpredator]

some nice propaganda indeed

[Dragos Cel Mare]

Now that we've seen a Cordoban "Tagma", what about an Arletian one?

[Basileus444]

On Alexios and the Latins excerpt: Glad you enjoyed it. I thought it would be a fun little exercise in looking at the current Byzantine mindset, how they viewed themselves and the world around them, in this case their latin neighbors.

Our Empress: Basileia Helena Komnena

Basileia Helena Komnena, Empress of the Romans, would have been powerful simply because of the men in her life. The granddaughter of Manuel III Doukas, the daughter of the famed archiatros Giorgios Doukas (who according to some rumors had the power to raise the recently dead to life), and wife of Theodoros IV Laskaris Komnenos, family ties alone would have been enough to earn her a place in the history books.

She was born in 1409 in the Coloneian march theme. A somewhat wild place, the theme had few cities, and contained members of all the peoples and faiths that made up the cosmopolitan Empire. It was also the only theme of the Empire without a clear religious majority. The Syrian theme was mostly Muslim, with the Cilician Armenians as a large minority and Antioch as an Orthodox island. The remaining themes were all majority Orthodox Christian, although the Anatolic theme had a small Muslim portion.

Here on the march, with no great cities like Trebizond to the north or Antioch to the south (unless one counted the ruins of Sebastea), there was no opportunity for Helena to grow up as a refined court lady. She grew up in the outdoors, learning to ride and hunt alongside her grandfather (although she was merely mediocre in those skills).

When she became Empress, she was determined to be more than just the wife of the Emperor. Her model was the Empress Anna I, though fortunately not in foreign affairs. Her husband Theodoros was mostly interested in subsidizing construction with direct economic benefits, such as roads and covered marketplaces. She was much more concerned with funding new hospitals, schools, and orphanages.

Both her grandfather and father gave her some land to fund her efforts, in addition to those already provided by the Imperial treasury. After she started, she also received some more land in wills from various individuals who wanted the estates to be used in charity work as well (the increased involvement of government in what would be called social services was a trend begun by Theodoros Megas, started as an effort to lessen the influence of the Church and increase that of the Emperor). What Helena did was divide the lands into small parcels, renting them to individuals willing to farm. It helped landless sons get a start, and the rents enlarged the Empress’ coffers.

She also sent some representatives to the Avignon Papacy, to learn how they conducted their own charity work and see if Helena could use any of their ideas. She opened soup kitchens in almost every city in the Empire, including Italy, the Crimea, and the newly conquered portions of Syria. She also funded the construction and maintenance of eleven hospitals, concentrating on the smaller cities that were not as well provided with good medical care.

Besides her charity efforts, she also worked on bettering the condition of women throughout the Empire. First she convinced her husband to pass new legislation to prevent the harassment of women market vendors, which was becoming a problem as some trade fairs. She also managed to convince the universities to begin allowing female students in the schools of medicine. It had long been Roman practice for women to be treated by women doctors who were as well trained in the medical arts as their male counterparts.

However the rise of the university system that was for males only had resulted in a sizeable gap between male and female doctors. And as a result, the care given to male and female patients, even at the same hospitals, also was substantially different in quality as due to their lack of university training, female doctors had not been able to learn and use the new advances in medicine developed at the schools over the last hundred years. After much pushing, Helena was able to get all of the universities to open schools of medicine for female doctors in 1439. They were separate from the male academies, with female faculty and students. The remaining schools at the universities however remained barred to women.

In the early 1440s, she was also able to convince her husband to pass several pieces of legislation that protected and expanded the rights of women. The first was a lessening in the gap in punishments from anti-adultery laws. Women still suffered more heavily, as they could be executed, but the punishment for men was raised from a steep fine to castration. Admittedly the anti-adultery laws were rarely used in practice, as families were reluctant to so publicly air their dirty laundry. A related statue also read that if a man killed his wife because of adultery (or the lover), he would be charged with murder himself.

Nevertheless the main focus of Helena’s new legislation was on the economic role of women in the Empire, with the rationale that it was stupid to constrain half of the Empire’s population from participating in the economy (and tax production). It was an argument that appealed very strongly to Theodoros’ mercantile mind. First, the right of a bride to bring and maintain property during a marriage that remained hers and hers alone (with the husband having no rights to it unless freely granted by the wife) was affirmed. Women were granted permission to invest in industries and businesses without the permission of their male relatives, and any profits were to be hers alone.

Women had already been involved in the Empire’s economy before, but mostly in the lower classes. There they worked as farmhands in the country, as wet nurses, or as textile workers. There had been some women merchants, mainly army spouses running stalls at the trade fairs around the reviews. The aim of the new legislation was to increase the ability of middle and upper class women to be involved as well, fueling the economy with their knowledge and capital. Incidentally the printing industry was to be the main beneficiary of this policy, as mothers interested in the education of their children subsidized the printing of children’s literature and textbooks.

In 1444 however came her greatest victory. Then she was able, with the support of the patriarch Adem (Adam), to convince her husband to pass a new law regarding the nature of slavery in the Empire. It stated that no child could be born into slavery, even if both parents were slaves. It was common practice on the Cypriot plantations for the owners to use their few female slaves for pleasure and breeding stock, as the offspring they produced, whether with the slaves or with the master himself, grew up to be new slaves. While the law did not stop all sexual harassment of female slaves, it did decrease it substantially as well as bring the number purchased down to almost nothing. However with the removal of any possibility of natural increase of the slave population, there grew more agitation amongst the merchants of the Empire for the conquest of Egypt, this time to secure direct access to the Sudanese slave pool.

However throughout her life Helena focused most of her energy on the plight of orphans. She founded at least thirty orphanages, which together cared for over ten thousand children. She did more than just create the institutions. She also set up systems that provided orphan girls with dowries so they could marry, and also helped arrange apprenticeships for boys so that they could learn a useful trade from local artisans. Many were able to acquire an education through the schools Helena also set up, some, both male and female, eventually going on to university.

It is quite likely that her continued efforts on the behalf of children was a direct result of the difficulties of having them herself. By early 1445, she was thirty six years old, although she looked more like thirty. She had given birth to a daughter Anastasia in 1431, but had eight miscarriages before giving birth to the twins Irene and Zoe in 1440. She became pregnant again in 1442, but again suffered a miscarriage. Even her father Giorgios was stumped, because of the Empress’ great health.

Because of the need to secure the succession with the lack of a male heir, Anastasia was married to Petros Palaiologos, son of Alexios Palaiologos, with Anastasia to succeed Theodoros as Anna I had succeeded her father Manuel II. The Palaiologos family was finally beginning to recover from its reputation of treachery, under which it had hung for over a hundred years after Michael Palaiologos’ death in the Nobles’ Revolt. It had begun to clear in the late 1300s, only to reform after Maria of Barcelona became the lover of Basil Palaiologos. The recovery of Palaiologid honor was entirely due to Petros’ father Alexios, the victor of Ain Sijni and the Lion of Syria, and the marriage was an attempt to weld the powerful and skilled general to the side of the arrangement.

Despite her difficulties in bearing children, the Emperor Theodoros still loved Helena dearly and refused to divorce her. There was only one time when he was not faithful, in 1430, when he slept with one of the kitchen maids, a woman from Sweden whose parents had emigrated to the Empire in the 1420s. At that time, despite being married to Helena for six years, the couple had had no children. The childbirth was fatal to the maid, but the daughter Alexeia survived. Although by this point Helena was pregnant with Anastasia, she decided to raise the girl as her own, but since she was a bastard she was raised on Helena’s estates in Coloneia.

There she grew up much like her adopted mother, learning to ride and hunt in the wild march theme, becoming far better at both than Helena, who had much less opportunity to practice living in Constantinople. She also learned how to wield a blade, largely as a result of having to gut kills during the hunts. Her tutors were the local tagma soldiers who often joined her and her retainers in the excursions. This would in the mid 1400s lead to an intense rivalry between Anastasia and Alexeia. The former was raised in Constantinople as a proper lady of the court. But Helena preferred the company of her like-minded stepdaughter, leading to her natural one getting jealous. The rivalry between the two would poison relations in the Imperial family, as the twins Irene and Zoe were eventually drawn into the conflict, Irene on Anastasia’s side and Zoe on Alexeia’s.

In 1445 the Empress was pregnant, and this time Giorgios had an answer, poison. She had refused to hire a taster so it was a possible solution. When she was about four months along, her chief cook was discovered adding something to her soup. When Giorgios examined the dish, he was able to confirm his theory; it was poison, designed to induce a miscarriage. The chef had served with Helena’s household since just a few months after Anastasia’s birth, and when she was pregnant with Zoe and Irene he was recuperating from an injury after falling off a horse.

The cook was tortured, confessing what he had done, and that he had been paid by the Doge of Venice. Theodoros exploded with rage, and it was only the personal intervention of the Empress herself that prevented an immediate declaration of war on the Serene Republic. Shah Rukh was still out there, and with a threat of that magnitude the Empire could not afford a war in the west.

She was able to calm her husband down with those words, although Theodoros muttered that as soon “the Tatar is gone, there will be a reckoning.” But the anger turned to joy when the Empress gave birth five months later. At long last, after twenty years, Theodoros and Helena had a son, in whom was combined the blood of all three Imperial dynasties and the lineage of both Theodoros and Demetrios Megas. His name, Andreas Doukas Laskaris Komnenos.

Madonna of the Rosary by Fiorenzo Santi, 1446. A painter of the Urbinese court, Fiorenzo spent seven years living in Constantinople as ambassador at the Komnenian court, becoming good friends with the Imperial couple. In his most famous work, painted in honor of the birth of Andreas (and given as a belated gift) the Empress served as the model for the Madonna. Its use of darker, more subdued colors is a sign of Roman painting influence on specifically Fiorenzo's but also Urbinese art in general.

“An Empress is to be a mother to her people. She is to guide and educate them, correct and chastise them when need be. But above all, like any mother, she must care for and love them,”-Basileia Helena Komnena

[Basileus444]

Originally Posted by Dragos Cel Mare

Now that we've seen a Cordoban "Tagma", what about an Arletian one?

There will be one coming up. I'm trying to figure out a way to shoehorn it in without disrupting the flow of events. Starting in the late 1440s, the eastern Mediterranean is going to be extremely busy for the next couple of decades.