I have some idea for a TL, but I need some help....

Ridwan Asher

Here's the rough explanation about the whole thing.

Basically, this is an Islamic-wank TL, where Constantinople eventually got subdued by the Umayyad Arabs after years of besieging the city in the mid 670s. However, this success ITTL is possible because beforehand, the Eastern Romans were wrecked internally by a dramatic horrible epic disaster which IOTL didn't happen. The PoD to cause all these, I want it to be in the period between the Siege of Marash and 670, so I got 32 years to screw the (Orthodox) Byzantines to the point of no rebound. In order to that though, because I'm an absolute sucker on East Romans' history I will may going to need extensive help from the Byzantine experts around so that I can make this disaster to be magnificent enough that the already muslim Rhomanians and even the world of TTL will always remember those moments as probably the most influential on the human history after the death of the Prophet. Between 638 - 670, please, help me to pave the way for the legendary muslim Rhomanian nation to emerge ! :eek:
 
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Basileus Giorgios

Analytical Engine said:
An earthquake that strikes the city?

Turkey is on a fairly large faultline, to that wouldn't be out of the question.
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An earthquake strikes Constantinople, bringing down the walls. The city is sacked by a group of Slavs and Avars. The Emperor attempts to flee to Rome, but is captured by the Lombards, and executed. The Empire falls into disarray- the Muslims occupy Anatolia, and a "Western Empire" is proclaimed around the Exarchates. In Greece, a heroic general rolls back the Arabs and Slavs, and retakes Constantinople as capital of a much shrunken dominion, encompassing essentially the Aegean. He wins a crushing victory over an Arab army, but suffers a minor injury in this battle, which kills him. Without him, the Empire is unable to recover, Constantinople lacks an organised defence, Greek Fire is butterflied away, and the Eastern Roman Empire falls to the armies of Islam.

God. What an awful scenario :eek:
 

jkay

A: A Really, Really Bad Emperor

How about a really, really bad Emperor? He orders ALL the troops in the Empire to concentrate to face the Islamic threat. Then he sends them out in battle to whomever and loses. Then he loses the entire army, as Pompey did to Caesar in the Roman Civil War despite having more troops. Caesar isolated Pompey's army while it was runnning from water. You can mix and match to suit your scenario best.

There was no shortage of appallingly bad Emperors OTL, so that's not so unlikely. That, IMHO, was the Empire's biggest weakness.
 

Geekhis Khan

Another, really freakin' bad plague outbreak that wipes out the Imperial family and devastates the city population? After the plague clears the Umayyads waltz in and clean up?
 

Ridwan Asher

Analytical Engine said:
An earthquake that strikes the city?

Turkey is on a fairly large faultline, to that wouldn't be out of the question.
Click to expand...

But if the PoD is geological one, I can't post it outside of the ASB section.

Basileus Giorgios said:
An earthquake strikes Constantinople, bringing down the walls. The city is sacked by a group of Slavs and Avars. The Emperor attempts to flee to Rome, but is captured by the Lombards, and executed. The Empire falls into disarray- the Muslims occupy Anatolia, and a "Western Empire" is proclaimed around the Exarchates. In Greece, a heroic general rolls back the Arabs and Slavs, and retakes Constantinople as capital of a much shrunken dominion, encompassing essentially the Aegean. He wins a crushing victory over an Arab army, but suffers a minor injury in this battle, which kills him. Without him, the Empire is unable to recover, Constantinople lacks an organised defence, Greek Fire is butterflied away, and the Eastern Roman Empire falls to the armies of Islam.

God. What an awful scenario :eek:
Click to expand...

Indeed though, a firm enough occupation of the whole Anatolia by the Arabs seems to be the only best required precondition in order to make the conquest of Constantinople successful. How, though ? Though I think in this time of utter-mess for the Rhomanian Empire that would be just far from impossible, but I don't think it is so probable without a helluva mistake done by a certain or some Rhomanians inside in order to melt down the invulnerability of Anatolia, enough so the Arabs can be just cookie-eating on the land. Who could be the most suitable candidate for this, between 638-670 ? Preferably, he can also degrade the Rhomanian naval capability into half of the its capability during the OTL's first Arab invasion of Constantinople.

And don't worry, it's not like the Rhomanians will never bounce back again ITTL. It's just not as Christians. And the Arabs will receive their loans back ;)

jkay said:
There was no shortage of appallingly bad Emperors OTL, so that's not so unlikely. That, IMHO, was the Empire's biggest weakness.
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Hmm.... sounds interesting....

The theme of my preference though (just to clear myself), is that the Rhomanians will lose their backbone not to the Arabs but instead to themselves. In awareness of this sad reality, the later Greeks will be still thinking they could've prevailed over the Arabs back then. It won't be just that, though, because overwhelming majority of them will be accepting Islam anyway (actually I want to make the "backbone" to be able to be translated as "Christianity" as well), but apparently they can become slightly more nationalistic than the Persians.
 

Basileus Giorgios

Ridwan Asher said:
Indeed though, a firm enough occupation of the whole Anatolia by the Arabs seems to be the only best required precondition in order to make the conquest of Constantinople successful. How, though ? Though I think in this time of utter-mess for the Rhomanian Empire that would be just far from impossible, but I don't think it is so probable without a helluva mistake done by a certain or some Rhomanians inside in order to melt down the invulnerability of Anatolia, enough so the Arabs can be just cookie-eating on the land. Who could be the most suitable candidate for this, between 638-670 ? Preferably, he can also degrade the Rhomanian naval capability into half of the its capability during the OTL's first Arab invasion of Constantinople.

And don't worry, it's not like the Rhomanians will never bounce back again ITTL. It's just not as Christians. And the Arabs will receive their loans back ;)
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The trouble is, the Emperors of the period, Constans II and Constantine IV, were both relatively competent individuals, overwhelmed by wars on multiple fronts and religious chaos. Barring a case of insanity, I can't really see either of them majorly screwing things up to the degree you wish, so I think you're going to have to attempt to overthrow one of them. Perhaps have Constans II killed at the Battle of the Masts and then have the Empire dissolve into chaos.

And I'm not especially bothered about the fall of the ERE, it's more, as a Christian, this TL will see my own faith wiped out, which upsets me slightly. I'm sure I'll get over it. Will Rhomanian Islam have several links back to Christianity? Since this is very early Islam, and much is able to be changed... perhaps Jesus could be a prophet equal in stature to Mohammed, and Muslims would celebrate the birth of the Prophet Jesus Christ every year? Up to you. Hope this helps :D
 

Wednesday

Basileus Giorgios said:
The trouble is, the Emperors of the period, Constans II and Constantine IV, were both relatively competent individuals, overwhelmed by wars on multiple fronts and religious chaos. Barring a case of insanity, I can't really see either of them majorly screwing things up to the degree you wish, so I think you're going to have to attempt to overthrow one of them. Perhaps have Constans II killed at the Battle of the Masts and then have the Empire dissolve into chaos.
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Sadly, the Battle of Phoenix-as-PoD kind of ruins an interesting rebellion waiting to happen, that of Theodoros Rshtuni. Get him and Mu'awiyah some more success in the 652 Armenian campaign (preferably by killing off Konstas, who is personally leading the Thraikian army) and there's probably enough momentum in there to get a revolt of somewhat equivalent caliber to that of Thomas Slavos. Something like that would allow the Arabs to irrupt through the Taurus/Antitaurus frontier, which will be a nice launching pad to Konstantinoupolis a decade later.

And that means Yennadios can have his independent African Exarchate (have Nikephoros Patrikios rescue a portion of the field army after the fall of the capital and join him for even longer-lived North African hijinks; this is before Qayrawan has been founded, so the fall of the Exarchate isn't yet preordained), possibly with extra Italy and Sicily. Yeah, it's got way too many butterflies, but it'd be kind of cool.
 

DuQuense

But if the PoD is geological one, I can't post it outside of the ASB section.
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Don't see why not.

Problem with a 600 Earthquake [Not unlikely as OTL the east Med suffered a earthquake storm in the 600's ] That knocks down the walls, is that they probably wouldn't be rebuilt.
This leaves Constantinople open for taking by the Rus in the 900's. [OTL their seige was defeated by the walls.]
 

Basileus Giorgios

DuQuense said:
Don't see why not.

Problem with a 600 Earthquake [Not unlikely as OTL the east Med suffered a earthquake storm in the 600's ] That knocks down the walls, is that they probably wouldn't be rebuilt.
This leaves Constantinople open for taking by the Rus in the 900's. [OTL their seige was defeated by the walls.]
Click to expand...

Why wouldn't they be rebuilt? In 447, when brought down by an earthquake, they were rebuilt in under two months, due to the Hunnish threat. In the 600s, with Arabs, Slavs, and Lombards rapidly overunning the Roman frontiers in all directions, the threat would be if possible even greater.
 

Ridwan Asher

Basileus Giorgios said:
1) The trouble is, the Emperors of the period, Constans II and Constantine IV, were both relatively competent individuals, overwhelmed by wars on multiple fronts and religious chaos. Barring a case of insanity, I can't really see either of them majorly screwing things up to the degree you wish, so I think you're going to have to attempt to overthrow one of them. Perhaps have Constans II killed at the Battle of the Masts and then have the Empire dissolve into chaos.

2) And I'm not especially bothered about the fall of the ERE, it's more, as a Christian, this TL will see my own faith wiped out, which upsets me slightly. I'm sure I'll get over it. Will Rhomanian Islam have several links back to Christianity? Since this is very early Islam, and much is able to be changed... perhaps Jesus could be a prophet equal in stature to Mohammed, and Muslims would celebrate the birth of the Prophet Jesus Christ every year? Up to you. Hope this helps
Click to expand...

1) Well, if that could eventually result in soldification of Arab control over Anatolia, the precondition I'm looking for before the Constantinople assault. Also, I need to find a way to exploit existing schisms so things will be easier for the Arabs in Anatolia. Was Constans II in some problem reconciling a doctrine with another ?

2) Very early Islam wasn't really that vague of an Islam, actually. If anything the Islamified Greeks will be as Christian as Islamified Persians are Zoroastrian, or at best as the post-Ridda war Bedouins are Pagans. Since Jesus possesses a pretty positive image among muslims, he will remain be respected, but only up to the limit of Islamic ethics. In fact I want this muslim greeks to be as Islamic as the OTL Greeks have been as Orthodox Christians. Not to mention that I want to throw schism between Christian doctrins into the mix of the potion to catalyze the Greeks eventual decisive mass conversion to Islam. In fact, ITTL dummies in history will know them best about their history with the Arabs as people who got involved into conflicts with the Arabs about whose Islam is the purest !

The Greeks will be fairly Arabized of course, but will maybe lesser then the OTL Persians, depends on how much of an Arabization they will really need ITTL. They will be holding firmly to anything that is "Islam and Rhomanian" to the point that they will be quite used to regard both things as basically equal to each other, and will be critical about heterodox movements that will emerge ITTL surface of the uncivilized Arabian deserts.

Those being said, doesn't mean the Christian Greeks will be wiped out but of course they will be politically impotent. But that is mostly why they will survive ITTL.

And also, doesn't mean I reject your proposal of a version of Islam as utterly impossible. It's just that I don't really consider the Greeks as really that isolated and hard-headed for that. Ultimately, while this TL will be quite great of a Christian anti-wank, doesn't mean TTL Christians won't be having their interesting moments of glory and grace and some entirely new breeding grounds for the faith, that most people just won't expect it will be them ;)

Wednesday said:
1) Sadly, the Battle of Phoenix-as-PoD kind of ruins an interesting rebellion waiting to happen, that of Theodoros Rshtuni. Get him and Mu'awiyah some more success in the 652 Armenian campaign (preferably by killing off Konstas, who is personally leading the Thraikian army) and there's probably enough momentum in there to get a revolt of somewhat equivalent caliber to that of Thomas Slavos. Something like that would allow the Arabs to irrupt through the Taurus/Antitaurus frontier, which will be a nice launching pad to Konstantinoupolis a decade later.

2) And that means Yennadios can have his independent African Exarchate (have Nikephoros Patrikios rescue a portion of the field army after the fall of the capital and join him for even longer-lived North African hijinks; this is before Qayrawan has been founded, so the fall of the Exarchate isn't yet preordained), possibly with extra Italy and Sicily. Yeah, it's got way too many butterflies, but it'd be kind of cool.
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1) Hmm....

Sounds like nice idea. Can you explain further about this ? :cool:

2) Hmmmm......

Will this be a potential thorn for the later muslims when they set up their eyes for Italy ? Because I have some plans for Italy.... ;)

DuQuense said:
Don't see why not.
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Hasn't it already agreed upon that any nature-based PoD belongs only to ASB section ? If no, than Peshawar Lancers can't be an ASBTL for its "The Fall"....
 
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rcduggan

Basileus Giorgios said:
And I'm not especially bothered about the fall of the ERE, it's more, as a Christian, this TL will see my own faith wiped out, which upsets me slightly. I'm sure I'll get over it. Will Rhomanian Islam have several links back to Christianity? Since this is very early Islam, and much is able to be changed... perhaps Jesus could be a prophet equal in stature to Mohammed, and Muslims would celebrate the birth of the Prophet Jesus Christ every year? Up to you. Hope this helps :D
Click to expand...

First of all, this does not mean the death of Christianity. Even Orthodoxy Christianity will survive. By your logic the Copts should be gone, and yet they comprise almost 10% of the population of Egypt today. So there of course still would be Greek Christians surviving.
And I haven't even mentioned the Catholics. Many seem to think that in any situation where Islam does even slightly better than OTL, Catholic Christianity is utterly screwed. This is ignoring the fact that even Al-Andalus was still mostly Christian for two hundred years after the Muslim conquest. Iran was majorly non-Muslim for centuries as well, and there were Zoroastrian revolts up to the ninth century. Parts of Egypt were largely Coptic until the 1200s.
My point is that Muslim conquest does not equal the end of Christianity. In this TL most of Christianity will pay homage to the Pope rather than the OTL split, but there will still be a large amount of Christians in the Empire of Rum.
 

Ridwan Asher

rcduggan said:
First of all, this does not mean the death of Christianity. Even Orthodoxy Christianity will survive. By your logic the Copts should be gone, and yet they comprise almost 10% of the population of Egypt today. So there of course still would be Greek Christians surviving.
And I haven't even mentioned the Catholics. Many seem to think that in any situation where Islam does even slightly better than OTL, Catholic Christianity is utterly screwed. This is ignoring the fact that even Al-Andalus was still mostly Christian for two hundred years after the Muslim conquest. Iran was majorly non-Muslim for centuries as well, and there were Zoroastrian revolts up to the ninth century. Parts of Egypt were largely Coptic until the 1200s.
My point is that Muslim conquest does not equal the end of Christianity. In this TL most of Christianity will pay homage to the Pope rather than the OTL split, but there will still be a large amount of Christians in the Empire of Rum.
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Yes Christianity will not perish ITTL. However, Islam won't be just slightly successful ITTL, and Muslim world will also include quite a chunk of Europe, though Neustria will never going to be Islamic ITTL ;)

As to compensate that, your going to see Christian faith to flourish on a few exotic countries that it didn't IOTL ;):D

Also, due to effect of butterflies, Central Asia will see an interesting development. Certainly it will be better developed compared to OTL, and it also be a bastion of a bigger problem for Islam in the east than the already largley-reduced western Christianity, for a while at least...
But the eastern problem won't be Christian ;)

And I have a question. As the fact you've brought above, that even today the number of Christians in Egypt isn't really that small after 14 centuries of Islamic era. Will such be even more of a case in Anatolia and Greece in the same effort for Islamization ? Because if so, I need to put an extra work on Islamizing the Greeks. My target is for at most 10 % by TTL's 1600, without any particular (relatively effective) attempt of persecution, ethnic cleansing and/or forced conversion by the sword on the Christians.
 
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Ridwan Asher

Analytical Engine said:
Sorry, but nothing less than that is going to get past the fact that Constantinople has

HUGE WALLS

The Arabs couldn't get past them; the Venetians cheated; the Turks had to use the mother of all cannons to bring them down...
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No worries, as I don't have any intention to tear the walls down. Basically ITTL the great city will be cut off of any supplies and starvation will force them to open the gates for the Arabs ITTL. That's basically how they will get her. The climax of the first chapter of TTL won't be about the capture of Constantinople but the huge epic internal political chaos that preceded it. THAT, is what I'm trying to make here ;)
 

Analytical Engine

Ridwan Asher said:
No worries, as I don't have any intention to tear the walls down. Basically ITTL the great city will be cut off of any supplies and starvation will force them to open the gates for the Arabs ITTL. That's basically how they will get her. The climax of the first chapter of TTL won't be about the capture of Constantinople but the huge epic internal political chaos that preceded it. THAT, is what I'm trying to make here ;)
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Good luck with that...

Didn't Constantinople have some farming area inside its outer walls or something? And you still have to deal with the Byzantine navy...
 
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