The Prince of Peace

[Cuāuhtemōc]

I enjoyed the update. I hope for more.

[DrakeRlugia]

A Baptism of Fire, Pt. I
1585 to 1589; Poland, Russia, Venice, Genoa and the Ottoman Empire

The death of Murad ‘the Mad’ and the descent of the Ottoman Empire into chaos was nothing short of a disaster. There was little surprise that some began to see the empire as little better as a corpse whose grave was about to be looted. Like vultures flying overhead, both the King of Poland and Tsar of Russia both plotted, wondering how best to take advantage of the situation. Both had suffered from the Tartar yoke, enduring raids along their steppe frontier, while Ivan IV, still smarting from his defeat in an attempt to gain a port on the Baltic coast had begun to eye the Turkish fort of Azov and it’s port which would finally him the access to the sea he craved.

The eyes of the King of Poland also fell towards the Black Sea, or specifically the region of Yedisan, better known by its Greek name of Dykra, which had been briefly ruled by Lithuania in the fourteenth century. Much like the entrance into the sea of Azov was protected, so too was the estuary of the Dnieper that poured into the Black Sea, known to the Turks as Yedistan, having been briefly ruled by Lithuania in the reign of Hacı Giray. Both of these regions promised prosperity to those with their eyes on them. Even if not particularly fertile lands, they were perfect locations for ports to give both Russia and Poland access to the Black Sea, and at the same time to break the Turkish monopoly on it.

Indeed, if the Poles and Russians had any chance to strike, this was their moment. Although the Crimean Peninsula and the surrounding steppe was primarily under the rule of the Crimean Khanate, the Turks owned several fortresses and cities that cemented their control over the estuaries surrounding the peninsula and that kept the Crimean Khanate under their thumb. Azov and Khadjibey were two of these forts, as was the city of Kaffa, although it had quickly pledged loyalty to Selâmet Giray[1] following the death of Murad.

Selâmet was a highly intelligent man, with intentions to gain the Ottoman crown at all costs. He opened negotiations firstly with the Genoese Benedetto Lemellino and Venetian Porcio for funds to outfit his troops, while secret negotiations were opened with the Republic of Ragusa through the Rector Troian Gozze and the Grand Council, wherein Count Nicolò Sorgo agreed to pledge additional funds to to the Tartar cause as well as to use his ships to ferry Italian monies and Tartar troops, as only Ragusan ships were allowed into the Black Sea. The first shipment of credit, some 70,000 zecchini arrived in the summer of 1585, along with cargos of weaponry manufactured aboad on Rasguan shipss, including some 7,000 arquebus muskets and 3,000 clovet muskets[2], a popular musket created in Prague nearly a decade ago which has become quite popular in Italy, Germany, and in France amongst the Huguenots. In return, Selâmet promised to turn a blind eye to Genoese and Venetian ambitions in the Aegean, explicitly giving them a blanque check to wrong what has been done to them. With Morea presently occupied by the Venetians with plans to advance further, it is a perfectly suitable deal. Selâmet has also been busy recruiting off the steppes of his own domains, raising some 70,000 Tartar troops to serve in his rank.

These infused Italian funds give him the chance to make formal offers to the King of Poland and the Tsar of Russia—in exchange to cease raids along their border lands; he gives them a free hand to pick up the pieces of Turkish territories around the Black Sea littoral, essentially giving them what they need, offering the Tsar the port of Azov and some of the surrounding territories, and Yedistan, better known as Dykra, to the Poles. The Tsar accepts without hesitation, although the King of Poland proves much more a stickler, especially given Selâmet’s desire to recruit from the Cossack hosts amongst his border lands. During the passing years, military reforms by the Jagiellons from the time of Sigismund II Francis have been carried on by his son, and the Polish army is rapidly growing into coherent force, with even hopes that soon even the great sczlachta will be forced to provide troops for the royal army—and curtailing the autonomy of the Zaporozhian Cossacks living south of the Dnieper. If even some Cossacks chose to fight for the Khan, it will certainly deplete them of necessary power to resist Polish encroachment along the black sea. Thus Casimir V agrees to Selâmet’s offer, and soon 30,000 Cossacks join Selâmet’s ranks, along with several adventurous Polish officers and ambitious second sons of the szlachta wishing to prove their worth.

Selâmet’s forces are also soon bolstered by eager Italian Conditteri; having long become idle and without an ability to ply their trade in their native following the decades of peace in Italy. While many sought to fight abroad in France, Germany, and even serving as advisors in England and Spain, others prefer to lend their skills to Selâmet, their highest bidder. Selâmet’s forces also include a variety of irregular levies from the Caucasus fleeing raids from the Safavids and a general deteriorating living situation that has forced many into a live of banditry and soldiery Selâmet’s force, numbered at least 120,000 men, a rather larger force given the constraint of Renaissance logistics, Selâmet plans a two pronged attack, to land in Varna, a city loyal to his cause, while a second force crossed the Dnieper into Silistra to link up with Selâmet’s original force.

It was the Venetians who had taken no time to take the first strike against the Ottomans, even before Murad’s death, Venice scored a major victories that would make the supply of Selâmet’s forces out of the Crimea tremendously easier. Firstly, the port of Patras was successfully occupied in 1583 from Corfu even before Murad the Mad’s death with the aid of Admiral Guistiniani’s fleet. This bold seizure of such an important city in the Morea only served to embolden the native Maniots into revolt. Which gave the Venetians the chance to pull off their second great coup against the Ottomans: establishing a foothold within the Mani Penninsula and Morea as whole, a daring task that ultimately paid off.

The Venetian forces, under the command of Count Alessandro Foscolo composed of 18,000 troops while the Bey of Mani had some 30,000 at his disposal. Yet the Venetians daring capture of Patras by the fleet of Admiral Guistiniani from Corfu had served only to rouse the Maniots of Morea into open revolt against the Ottomans. Despite being outnumbered, Foscolo disembarked near Methoni. Armed with pikes, muskets and artillery, Foscolo’s force was further backed up by Maniot Klephts from the north and Admiral Guistiniani’s fleet from the sea. Capturing the Bey of Mani, Sokullu Mehmed Pas in a pincer attack, it was one most of the brilliant attacks carried out by the Venetian forces against the Turks. Despite Sokullu’s numerical superiority, his troops were mainly levies and irregulars that were soon made short work of by Foscolo’s use of alternation between firepower and shock. The Battle of Methoni marked a new form of warfare that began to dissipate throughout the Mediterranean basin and would soon render the days of levies and irregulars obsolete.

The collapse of Ottoman resistance in Morea served to give Venice an upper hand. With the Bey of Mani’s army shattered, Foscolo spent the spent the winter liberating Mystras, Monemvasia (with the aid of the fleet of the Knights of St. Stephen), Nafplio, and Corinth, where Sokullu found his battered force completely obliterated, thus placing the whole of the Morea into Venetian hands by time the spring of 1586 rolled around, with plans to move into Attica next. It was also during the time of the Morean Campaign that had also seen Venice and Genoa make good on their bargain made with the Crimean Khan in regards to the Aegean, with Venice overrunning the former Duchy of Naxos whilst Genoa had soon reclaimed Chios. The seizures of these islands were no great victory in the large scene of things, but essentially turned the Aegean into an Italian lake by which supplies could be facilitated to willing buyers, which included not only the Khan of the Crimea, but the Poles and Russians as well. Yet for those who also eyed the Ottoman crown, such as Hüseyin Bey the warlord who occupied Constantinople and swaths of Anatolia, it only further complicated matters as they found themselves deprived of willing backers, and the ability to seek support abroad.

As the spring of 1586, Selâmet soon saw fit to place his armies into the field. The main force of some 87,000 began the arduous task of leaving Kaffa for the Rumelian port of Varna, ferried by Ragusan ships who remain ostensibly neutral in the drawn out conflict between the different Ottoman claimants and willing to serve the highest bidder—which proved to be the Crimean Khan with his Italian backers. Meanwhile, Selâmet’s secondary force of 33,000 was placed under the command of one of Selâmet’s most loyal beys, Adil Saadet, better known as Saadet Bey for his charge as head of the fortress of Or Qapi. Saadet was also joined by Dmitri Wiśniowiecki, a Polish Orthodox magnate who also served as Starost of Cherkassy and important in the recruitment of Cossack troops for Selâmet’s cause. Indeed, Dmitri was so valued by the Khan that Saadet Bey placed him second in command.

While Selâmet made his way for Varna, the goal of Saadet and Dmitri were to cross the Dnieper into the Danubian Principalities in order to sway them over to the side of Selâmet’s claim, or at worst, neutralize them. As Saadet began his long trek across the unforgiving steppe, Prince Sigismund, son and heir of King Casimir V of Poland is putting the royal army founded by his grandfather to test. Sigismund wastes no time in putting his some 16,000 troops to the test laying waste to Yedistan, burning down villages and crops and sending the inhabitants, mostly Tartar and Turkish, packing to make room for good, Christian settlers once the war is over. Despite the King of Poland having made a deal with the Crimean Khan, it is clear that the deal does not apply to the Ottoman province, with Sigismund soon earning the sobriquet ‘the terrible’ amongst the local population for his actions. Having wasted Yedistan, Sigismund and his army soon make their way down the Dnieper where they set up camp to begin a protracted siege of the Ottoman fortress of Khadjibey[3], which despite being vastly outnumbered and outgunned, refused to surrender…

The Russians, meanwhile, were dealing with their own war against the Turks at Azov. Although the Tsar kept informed on all the details, he was most definitely on his deathbed where he was nursed valiantly by his loving wife, the Tsarista Anna. It was also this illness that kept the Tsarevich Vladimir away from the field of battle, not wishing to leave the Kremlin and learn that his father had passed. Instead the Tsar called forth one of his finest generals, Prince Mikhail Ivanovitch Obolensky to seize Azov for him. Yet Ivan IV’s poor health, along with squabbling between the Boyar Duma on one side and the Tsarevich and Tsarista on the other meant that Prince Obolensky was left both without men and funds to carry out his campaign. It was not until Ivan IV’s untimely death in 1587 that Vladimir succeeded his father. Purging the Boyar Duma of his most resilient enemies and replacing them with allies, Vladimir I’s first business of action was to convene the Zemsky Sobor to announce his intentions to forego a coronation until his father’s dreams that Azov was in Russian hands. Subsequently, Vladimir gave Prince Obolensky both the men and money that he needed.

Things continued to progress much more smoothly in the Balkans. The Venetians continued their conquests in Greece, moving out of the Morea into Attica and Thessaly, where they were popularly acclaimed by the Greek peasantry who saw the Turkish timariots and other fief holders who had impressed them into serfdom chased out. Alessandro Foscolo easily swept aside the Turkish garrisons at Athens without even firing a shot, with his first act being the holding of a celebratory mass in the Partheon, which once more became a Catholic Church of named after Saint Mary of Athens. With the capture of Thebes a few months later, Venice now occupied the whole of Morea as well as Attica and Thessaly. Yet any sort of long term occupation was untenable; Venice was a sea power, and were the slightest misfortune to befall Venice’s navy, she would be cut off from her Mediterranean Empire. The Grand Council soon had a more feasible idea: to offer these conquests feasible domestic autonomy. Venice would continue to defend them with their navy and offer limited garrisons and represent them abroad, but they would otherwise be left to their own devices. So came a new age of Latin rule in Greece, with the Principality of Achaea in Morea and the Duchy of Athens in Attica and Thessaly. The Maniot notables offered the Principality to a son of the Duke of Montferrat, whilst Giovanni, the Grand Duke of Florence purchased the Duchy of Athens for his son Francesco for 250,000 ducats in 1588, from the Grand Council personally. Even the Duchy of Naxos was sold, with the Doge involved personally in the marriage negotiations between the last Duke Giacomo IV Crispo and his heiress, Nicole, with Henry de Guise, the Duke of Mayenne.

Selâmet’s landing at Varna was just as successful as the Venetians campaigns in Greece. A loyalist city that had opposed any all rebel forces, they supported Selâmet’s claim as Sultan. The landing at the Khan at Varna also allowed him to link up with his supporters in the Balkans, such as the governors of the Eyalets of Rumelia and Bosnia. Even Serbia, which had fallen under the control of a native Serbian Prince supported Selâmet, although on certain conditions that the Khan was willing to accept in order to secure his throne. Once in Varna though, the Khan was in for an even larger surprise, when he is taken north from Varna to the Orthodox Monastery of St. Constantine and Helena. It is to the Khan’s great surprise when he is introduced to Manastir Ali Pasha, Sultan Murad’s last competent Vizier and by someone who is an even bigger surprise—the Princess Bala Hatun, whom Manastir had smuggled out of the capital following her father’s death to prevent something awful happening to her.

Selâmet’s is greatly surprised to meet both Manastir and the princess, believing them dead or worse. It is during their brief meeting that the Khan of the Crimea makes one offer and one proposal: he offers Manastir the seals of office to become his Grand Vizier, and proposes to Princess Bala[4] that she become his Sultana, and that in return he will defend her and ensure she is never harmed. Bala Hatun is initially hesitant to accept Selâmet’s offer; she barely knows him, and like so many others, he aspires to be the next Sultan. Yet Manastir soon explains that while many might seek to use her to boost their own right to become Sultan, the Khan has no need of it and is merely seeking to help her. The Princess is eventually won over by Manastir’s pleas and Bala Hatun agrees to marry him, unbeknownst to her that he has chosen to repudiate his concubines and favorites at Bahçeseray

The Khan’s success was not immediately mirrored in some of his associates. In Yedistan, Prince Sigismund continued to hold his position to no avail. Despite having wrecked havoc amongst the populace, 1586 soon turned to 1587 without a change in the situation. The troops of Khadjibey remained defiant, maintaining themselves through supplies ferried through the Black Sea by Hüseyin Bey. Despite the Italians holding the Aegean, their presence still remained minimal in the Black Sea, allowing the garrison at Khadjibey to hold out. Sigismund also faced problems with his own troops, the marshlands around Khadjibey being a breeding ground for malaria. As the fortress remained defiant and Sigismund’s forces seemed to dwindle with the day, there was some worry amongst the Poles that a withdrawal might be necessary.

But it would not be case—fresh from a raid into Moldavia both Saadet Bey and Dmitri Wiśniowiecki proved to be the saviors, their troops arriving on the southern flank, some 27,000 men (although originally some 32,000 men, Saddet and Dmitri had suffered losses). Saadet also had some thirty heavy guns to add to the hundred or so that Sigismund himself possessed. Having Khadjibey surrounded from the south and the east, the joint Polish-Tartar force subjected the fortress to an endless bombardment, their firepower being enough to prevent the fort from being supplied and thus in the early weeks of 1587 Khadjibey finally surrendered, and Sigismund was good to live up to his name he had earned from his time in Yedistan, by having the leading officers of the fort executed as well as many soldiers, with the remaining population being expelled as the fortress was completely demolished. Privately, Saadet Bey was displeased to have even taken part in such a horrible act; indeed, he and Dmitri had been forced to abandon their campaign across the Danubian Principalities because of Sigismund’s incompetence to seize a simple fort. Saadet was supposed to have written to Khan Selâmet that, ”We can only pray that King Kazimierz reigns for all time and we will never be subjected to the reign of this boar they call Zygmunt.”

The Russians, however, proved much more competent in taking the conquests promised to them. Prince Obolensky, backed with generous funding from Tsar Vladimir allowed him to build up a formidable force in order to take Azov. Taking a page out of the book of Tsar IV that allowed him to seize Kazan, Obolensky built up a large force that totaled some 95,000 men. Aside from Steltsy from Moscow, the force also included feudal levies from the land army and irregular feudal cavalry from the Qasim Khanate. Prince Obolensky reached the city in on March 24, 1588, and within a week was soon bearing into the city’s walls with his cannonry, smothering the fire of the large caliber guns employed by the garrison at Azov. Compared with the Poles attempts to take Khadjibey, Obolensky proved an efficient commander, taking lessons that had been used in the siege of Kazan in 1550s—employing battery towers that mounted siege cannons, as well as employing sappers (including a well known German soldier, Philipp Hohenlohe) to breach the walls of the city. After a siege lasting roughly a month, Azov soon fell in October to Prince Obolensky and his forces and the city was soon occupied, despite light resistance from both the garrison and the populace.

The fall of Yedistan to the Polish army once more allows Saadet Bey to focus on his original goal of crossing the Dnieper into Moldavia for a second time. Saadet’s forces have been depleted from the first raid into the territory and through the lengthy siege against Khadjibey. As such, Saadet decides to avoid crossing into a potentially hostile territory and opting to link up with Selâmet through the Eyalet of Silistra, while sending Wiśniowiecki to parlay with Hospodars of Moldavia and Wallachia who in the midst of the chaos since the death of Murad have more or less acted independently, not to mention have occupied swaths of the Eyalet of Silistra, with little intention of handing it over. All in all, it seems a difficult task.

Wiśniowiecki was the perfect choice to negotiate with the Hospodars of the Danube Principalities. A member of the Ruthenian nobility, he also a member of the Orthodox Church and so seemed much less intimidating than a Turk or someone from Tartary, charming his hosts, Wiśniowiecki was intent to gain passage for his and Saadet’s troops without any notable bloodshed. While quite unable to make any binding promises, he did make it clear that Selâmet was a great and just man, and would certainly be willing to reward those who had aided him in his time in need, making it clear that their newly gained possessions might be legitimated once he was Sultan. Soon enough Wiśniowiecki and Saadet were once more on the march, their dwindled force also joined by 8,000 troops from both Wallachia and and Moldavia, led jointly by their princes—Mircea VI Drăculeşti of Wallachia and Ioan III Bogdan-Muşat of Moldavia, a very rare show of solidarity given that conflict between the two principalities in the past was a very common occurrence.

Saadet’s force, standing at some 28,000 troops soon linked up with Selâmet’s forces at Provadia, where they began to prepare for their final campaign. With some 123,000 men at his disposal and nearly two hundred heavy guns, Selâmet sets out to take on Hüseyin Bey, his most formidable opponent and the last obstacle standing in his way in claiming the crown. Ruling over swaths of Anatolia and Thrace, Hüseyin Bey is a formidable foe, and is even married to one of Murad the Mad’s sisters, the Princess Amina, making his claim just as good as the Khan of the Crimea, which is rooted in a traditional promise as well as the Genghisid blood that runs in his veins.

It all comes down to the two of them, and which one will be crowned the next Sultan and right the disorders of the empire. Hüseyin’s forces drastically outnumber Selâmet with a force of some 150,000 men on his side. Yet despite the numerical advantage, he lacks Selâmet’s financial backing as well as diversity in his forces. While Selâmet’s army includes the traditional levies of Tartar troops, it has been augmented with Cossacks,Conditteri, and even adventurous Polish szlachta, along with an array of heavy guns, muskets, including the Bohemian produced Clovets. Hüseyin must rely on the traditional feudal levies which include the Timariot and Siphais, and while the Janissaries have openly sided with Hüseyin, they seem antiquated in the face of the Khan of the Crimea’s highly organized force.

Preferring to bide his time, it was Selâmet who made the first strike, crossing out of Provadia where he hopes to make a foothold into Hüseyin’s territory by seizing the town of Karabunar in midst of the winter, taking him by surprise. Mustering together a portion of his forces in Feburary of 1589, Selâmetclashes with forces led byRüstem Pasha at Karabunar. Overly confident, the Crimean Khan suffers a great defeat and one of the greatest setbacks of his campaign as he finds himself outmaneuvered by Rüstem Pasha’s highly mobile force, whose timariot’s raid his supply lines while rendering the pike and shot tactics and his Italian conditteri utterly useless in the face of such a mobile enemy. Disgraced, he abandoned his plans to take Karabunar and retreated to Sliven, having suffered heavy losses in his foolish attempt to blindly take Karabunar. Going back to the drawing board, he know prepares of a new technique to take down his rivals and secure the throne...

[1]ATL Khan of the Crimea
[2] An ATL form of snaphance muskets, created in Prague c. 1560. Saw wide spread use during the Austrian succession and were also readil adopted by the Huguenots.
[3]An Ottoman fort built on the mouth of the Dnieper. Site of OTL Odessa.
[4]The only daughter of Murad ‘the mad’ and his Bulgarian consort. Upon his death she was spirited away to Varna to prevent her capture.

[RGB]

A much tougher fight, and Girey will have to do something about the timariots after he wins (if he wins)...they might like the old system, you know.

[Cuāuhtemōc]

Excellent update. I do wonder how things will proceed once the Girays take over though.

[Razgriz 2K9]

What ever happened to the Safavids and the resurgent Mamlukes? Are they still killing our Turks?

[DrakeRlugia]

Originally Posted by Razgriz 2K9

What ever happened to the Safavids and the resurgent Mamlukes? Are they still killing our Turks?

Yep, they're still very much around.

[DrakeRlugia]

Originally Posted by RGB

A much tougher fight, and Girey will have to do something about the timariots after he wins (if he wins)...they might like the old system, you know.

Indeed, it's a very entrenched system, but Giray has his own military plans after the war...

[Saya Aensland]

Eeeee, an update! *excited girly handflap*

Originally Posted by RGB

some 70,000 zecchino

It's zecchini in plural.

Originally Posted by RGB

Turkish timarots

Timariots.

Originally Posted by RGB

a celebratory mass in the Pantheon, which once more became a Catholic Church

Parthenon.

Originally Posted by RGB

one of Murad the Mad’s daughters, the Princess Amina

Where did she come from? A big deal was made of the fact that Murad had only one daughter.

[DrakeRlugia]

Originally Posted by Saya Aensland

Eeeee, an update! *excited girly handflap*


It's zecchini in plural.


Timariots.


Parthenon.


Where did she come from? A big deal was made of the fact that Murad had only one daughter.

Ah, thanks for the typos! I always try and correct them, but I miss them.

Amina, as you are correct isn't his daughter. She is one of his sisters. They share they same mother in the infamous Nurbanu Sultan.

[Gonzaga]

And so it starts! The birth of the "Crimean" Empire.

[DrakeRlugia]

Originally Posted by Gonzaga

And so it starts! The birth of the "Crimean" Empire.

Indeed! The long fight begins!

[DrakeRlugia]

Let's wrap this up, shall we?

A Baptism of Fire, Pt II
1585 to 1590; Poland, Russia, Venice, Genoa and the Ottoman Empire

Indeed, despite lacking modern structures and reliant upon the old feudal levies, it was obvious that Selâmet and his men did not have quite the upper hand they thought. The defeat at Karabunar also had a negative impact on the Khan’s finances with his Italian creditors—they had been willing to front him money in expectation of his victory, but had been subsidizing him for nearly five years without anything to show for it. It was made clear that unless Selâmet delivered them a notable victory, the funds would dry up. This was something the Khan refused to contemplate, given how reliant he was on such funding not only to pay his Cossacks, officers, and mercenary soldiers, but how important they were in the purchase of modern weaponry. It was then that Selâmet decided he needed to take a different route if he wished to Hüseyin into the field, blending the western pike and shot tactics that had proved so effective by the Venetians in Morea with the tactics of the Turks. Indeed, once back at Provadia, rather than sulking, the Crimean chose to innovate his forces further under the suggestions of Saadet Bey and Dmitri Wiśniowiecki, by recruiting timariot cavalry and siphais as well from amongst the local Turkish landowners, with the aid of the Beylerbey of Rumelia, a loyal ally. All in all, Selâmet succeeded in recruiting some 7,000 men to his army.

Bolstered with Turkish timariots, Khan Selâmet now had a new strategy. Knowing a pitch battle off the bat would expose his forces to further attacks, the Khan now had a brilliant plan to use his irregular cavalry, bolstered by Tartar reinforcements to raid Hüseyin’s positions and force his commanders into pitched battle—opening the way to Constantinople. Encamped at Aytos, the Khan puts his strategy to the test as he unleashes 20,000 troops under Saadetas a raiding party from Aytos in the middle of the night, determined to draw Rüstem Pasha into field. The raiding party makes a bold move, raiding Hüseyin’s positions at Ravnets, a small village not far from major port of Burgas. Aroused from his slumber by panicking troops, Rüstem fears this is a ploy by the Khan to take Burgas and hastily calls together his troops to repulse the miniscule force sent against them.

Yet just as Rüstem’s force prepares to engage Saadet’s forces, he finds himself caught in a trap as Selâmet and a force of 70,000 men appear on the scene from north,. Trapped by Saadet’s forces, Rüstem is forced to engage Selâmet in pitched battle, his mobile tactics proving unless in such a constrained space as he faces an onslaught of artillery fire and the pike and shot technique that had proved so useless before. Rüstem finds his force wholly obliterated and even taken prisoner by the Khan personally, who moves on from the hamlet of Ravnets towards Burgas, which falls after a short siege—leaving the road into Thrace and Constantinople wide open.

As Selâmet moved into Thrace, Hüseyin began to see his own support base dwindle. His conscripts tired of the constant warfare, while the people of Constantinople bemoaned the state in which their city has fallen, with food becoming scarce with each passing day and manufactories conscripted into producing supplies for Hüseyin and his troops. Even the Princess Amina, Hüseyin’s wife and essentially his key to the throne has begun to tire of the years of warfare, berating him in a letter sent to he was on campaign that stated, “Things are almost intolerable here; this once beautiful city has been brought to its knees. The people are miserable; the lack of Egyptian grain means there is no bread for the hungry, and there is no work for them either… The streets are no longer beautiful and adorned, but empty and squalid, while here at Topkapı your men are certainly busy emptying the palace of any and everything of value: from taking away the horses from the stables, looting the inner and outer treasuries for anything of value without my permission, including precious heirlooms that are rightfully mine and those of my niece. I may be a woman, but I am still an Ottoman, and the last in this forsaken city! Your men also take what they wish from our arms collection and have even gone as far as to cut down trees in the gardens and courtyards so that your men may have firewood and supplies for bows. I fear to think of what other havoc your troops, if you can even dare call your Bashibazouks that have done to the other Ottoman palaces. You have transformed this once beautiful city into nothing! There are no more celebrations or parties; beautiful dresses of silk are nowhere to be found as no one has the money to purchase them and manufactories are now forced into supplying your men with uniforms. Even Jewelry is no longer seen in the shops and bazaars, long having been melted down on your order to be sent to the mint. Greeks, Jews, and Armenians have fled, leaving behind totally empty quarters. No one is happy here, not even I. All you do is prolong this terrible war and you will soon bring misery upon us all.
—AMINA.”

Amina’s scathing letter outraged Hüseyin. She was certainly an Ottoman Princess, but she was also his wife. It was her duty to support him and to obey him without hesitation, and such support meant allowing him to do what he thought necessary to support his campaign, even if it meant gutting the ancestral palaces of the Ottoman Dynasty. Once the Khan of the Crimea was soundly destroyed and Hüseyin was secure upon his throne, Amina’s use would be through for him. Combined with the fact that she had bore him not a single child, Hüseyin would have no qualms divorcing her and finding a new woman to please him within his invetible harem. A pretty, docile, one, who would give him plenty of sons instead of the nagging spinster he had now. With all these troubles on his hands, Hüseyin soon learned that Dmitri Wiśniowiecki had busy building support among the Bulgarians, recruiting those loyal to the Khan’s cause before departing to Plovdid in hopes to convince them to join the struggle.

While many portions of the empire had rebelled, from Selâmet I Giray of the Crimea, Hüeyin Bey, to many other petty warlords in Anatolia, the Balkans, and Thessaly hoping to make their fortunes. Yet despite the rise of the troubles amongst his men, Hüeyin Bey had bigger fish to fry: as Selâmet began his march, smashing the forces of Omar Pasha at Kavakli, who openly welcomed the Tartar liberators ho had saved them from Hüeymin’s brutal men. Kacakli proved the key into Thrace, quite near Erdine. Yet instead of placing the city under siege, he leased Cossacks and Dabubian levies under the joint control of the Hospaodars of Wallachia and Moldavia, Mircea VI Drăculeşti and Ioan III Bogdan-Muşa, with orders to raid the countryside and bring Hüseyin’s forces into the field.

Armed with some 20,000 troops, the joint-command of Mircea with Ioan proved a terrible idea. Of different personalities and ideals, neither could agree on a course of action with Mircea suggesting wholesale destruction much as the Poles did in Yedistan, while Ioan was keen to reserve the Khan’s orders and only raid important targets. The soldiers, weary and tired of the long war were ready to return. Many saw their pay in arrears, while others, such as the irregular infantry saw looting as a part of their right. Ioan was thus forced to back down in opposition to Mircea’s plan. Resigning his post and making haste back to Selâmet to inform him of Mircea’s plans.

Mircea lived up the epithet given to him by the Wallachians, ‘the impaler’ after his forefather. Fighting alongside his men, Mircea’s first target is the village of Lalapaşa where terror is unleashed upon the people. Rounding up as many people as they could in the central square, all are all accused of being traitors to the true Sultan, Selâmet, Khan of the Crimea. He first accuses the men as serving as soldiers, including an elderly man of nearly seventy. It is then that Mircea shows his true side as well as the blood in his veins. Having several stakes erected, Mircea has all of the men impaled upon them for everyone to see. Afterwords, Mircea let the troops do as they please. Homes were burnt and looted, the Mosque smashed into pieces, with the women and children being shipped to Varna where they will go to Kaffa as slaves for sale. While the village stands barren and empty, Mircea soon gives a rousing speech: “A century ago my forefather Vlad Drăculeşti fought in these very lands; he fought against the domination of the Turk and for freedom from the slavery of Islam! Today I fight this very same war! I will not rest until we have paved a way for the Khan of the Crimea, for although a Moslem, he has proved an honorable one. We will provide him the perfect route to Constantinople, and we will line it with stakes and poles on which to impale our enemies!” The news of this atrocity soon spread out into Europe, with courts as far as Mardrid and Denmark stunned at such grave terror in such a war.

The news of such a massacre stunned Selâmet. Although fighting a war and knowing what it entailed, he never wished to bring the suffering of innocents into it. Yet Selâmet felt a little hopeless in the situation—if he removed Mircea from his post, he risked alienating him and his troops. The best bet would be to allow things to continue—but to give them no official support. Ioan III protested at such a move, even spitting at the Khan for being cowardly, but he pressed on. The Crimean army passed into Thrace, passing through the desolate route of through the north of Thrace. Despicable as Mircea’s actions were stretching across the north of Thrace, it finally prompted Hüseyin Bey into battle. It would be at Luleburgaz that the two forces would meet for what would be the final showdown.

The armies met at Luleburgaz on June 24th of 1590, perhaps one of the hottest days of the year. It was also raining. Mircea’s detachment has rejoined the main forces, and now Selâmet prepares for the fight of his life, his own men against the massive force of Hüseyin. If victorious, he will be the next Sultan. If he fails… he will most certainly find his head on a block and some pliable general placed upon the Crimean throne. It is the Khan who makes the first strike, ordering Mircea to move forward much how he had bewildered his earlier enemies by mixing tactics. Yet Hüseyin’s men have learned from the Khan’s mixed tactics. Mircea finds himself outmaneuvered and soundly thrashed, much to the disappointment of Selâmet, who thought he found a key tactic to defeat the irregular levies of Hüseyin.

He decides he cannot rely on one thing forever. Calling back the Wallachian Prince, he baits the forces of Hüseyin Bey forth. And then he lets the cannons go off. If he cannot win by traditional means, he’ll fight like the Europeans—and that means firepower above all else. Ultimately, it pays off. By the end of the day, the forces of Hüseyin are scattered and Selâmet is the victor. Hüseyin finds himself captured and unceremoniously executed. A few days later the Khan of the Crimea enters Constantinople unopposed.

He is victorious. And he is crowned.

[Razgriz 2K9]

And so ends a tale of total war, Selamet Giray, the first of Girayid Dynasty, Emperors of the Ottoman Empire, Khan of Crimea. Has a nice ring to it. I'd love to see how the Ottomans hold up under his rule.

[Saya Aensland]

The Ottoman Empire is dead! Long live the Giray Empire!

[Cuāuhtemōc]

MAY THE GIRAY EMPIRE LAST A THOUSAND YEARS!

I loved the update!

[Archangel]

Keep it up, DrakeRlugia!

[RGB]

Once it gets more close and stationary close to the city, infantry armies do better. Well, let's see what happens next then

[DrakeRlugia]

I bring you not an update, but a question:

I was looking over my maps regarding the Ottoman Empire following Murad's death and then around 1605, when our Giray has united everything back. Now, we know the Italians took advantage of this situation, especially the Venetians with their Greek adventures, and even the Genoese got back Chios.

My mind came to Bosnia. It's under the control of a local warlord; he's loyal to Giray and thus dissenting against the Khan of the Crimea's enemy, but he's the one in charge. He's possibly minting currency; he dispenses justice, has his own army, and is essentially an independent Bey. He's vulnerable to an outside force.

Hungary has her own issues. It has recently been acquired by the Habsburgs, but the Austrian line dies out. In Hungary a woman succeeds. She marries the Duke of Orléans and while she cannot claim Austria nor Bohemia, she is crowned Queen in Hungary. And her claim is recognized by 1588 with the Treaties finally ending the religious wars in France.

Now, the big question: in this chaos, and so recently after fighting for her throne, can she invade Bosnia? The Girays are certainly crowned by 1590, yet they still have to deal with the Safavids in Iraq and the resurgent Mamluks who threaten to spill over into Anatolia proper. So it does give Hungary some time before they actually would occupy said province.

Now, the question: can they? For thing, Hungary doesn't exactly have a strong population base. She was independent under Zapolya, with them paying an annual tribute. Yet this didn't stop constant wars between the Habsburgs and Ottomans to take place over Hungary, with respective armies living off the land as Renaissance armies do. Hungary is just as depopulated, if not more, than she was at this very same time period. This means they certainly don't have a strong army; it certainly suffered loses in it's fight trying to take Bohemia and Hungary. No doubt it could secure Bosnia, but, another question is, would they even want too? Would Hungary have any interest in Bosnia? I could see an expedition to defeat the warlord's army to neutralize them, but would they want to occupy it and fact the fact that Giray might turn west to regain his lost Eyalets when he finally has cleaned house?

[kasumigenx]

Silesia was heavily Polish before the counter reformation and the 30 years war so it will remain in this TL because they will never be targets of Counter Reformation..


I created a map of Silesia that remains largely Polish speaking in an ATL.


The Polish population in Silesia in OTL
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...i_XVIII-XX.PNG

[Saya Aensland]

Originally Posted by DrakeRlugia

I bring you not an update, but a question:

I was looking over my maps regarding the Ottoman Empire following Murad's death and then around 1605, when our Giray has united everything back. Now, we know the Italians took advantage of this situation, especially the Venetians with their Greek adventures, and even the Genoese got back Chios.

My mind came to Bosnia. It's under the control of a local warlord; he's loyal to Giray and thus dissenting against the Khan of the Crimea's enemy, but he's the one in charge. He's possibly minting currency; he dispenses justice, has his own army, and is essentially an independent Bey. He's vulnerable to an outside force.

Hungary has her own issues. It has recently been acquired by the Habsburgs, but the Austrian line dies out. In Hungary a woman succeeds. She marries the Duke of Orléans and while she cannot claim Austria nor Bohemia, she is crowned Queen in Hungary. And her claim is recognized by 1588 with the Treaties finally ending the religious wars in France.

Now, the big question: in this chaos, and so recently after fighting for her throne, can she invade Bosnia? The Girays are certainly crowned by 1590, yet they still have to deal with the Safavids in Iraq and the resurgent Mamluks who threaten to spill over into Anatolia proper. So it does give Hungary some time before they actually would occupy said province.

Now, the question: can they? For thing, Hungary doesn't exactly have a strong population base. She was independent under Zapolya, with them paying an annual tribute. Yet this didn't stop constant wars between the Habsburgs and Ottomans to take place over Hungary, with respective armies living off the land as Renaissance armies do. Hungary is just as depopulated, if not more, than she was at this very same time period. This means they certainly don't have a strong army; it certainly suffered loses in it's fight trying to take Bohemia and Hungary. No doubt it could secure Bosnia, but, another question is, would they even want too? Would Hungary have any interest in Bosnia? I could see an expedition to defeat the warlord's army to neutralize them, but would they want to occupy it and fact the fact that Giray might turn west to regain his lost Eyalets when he finally has cleaned house?

The possible risks outweigh the possible rewards.