The Rise of the White Huns

[Practical Lobster]

The Monsoon Alliance

The 9th and 10th centuries were for Southeast Asian polities a time of demographic and urban expansion. The concentration of state power allowed for the construction of enormous and enduring temple complexes. Nowhere was this phenomenon more evident than at the heart of Khmer civilization, great Indranokura and her rival and ally, Yasodharapurait, often called Angkor Thom or simply Angkor.

While it may be somewhat obvious to say that climate shaped the development of Khmer civilization, the monsoon system which gave its people life and food presented unique challenges. Much of the immense rainfall which blankets the region comes during a very specific wet season, and harnessing this season was the perennial challenge of those who wished to prosper on the banks of the Mekong. Due to their predictable patterns, the monsoon allowed sustainable agriculture and aquaculture to flourish – and the state perfected it. Mass engineering projects, particularly the construction of canals known as baray, allowed the guilds of Angkor and Indranokura to prosper to unprecedented degrees. Large-scale urbanization to remarkable levels became a hallmark of Khmer civilization.

The hydrological system reached its peak in the late tenth century, providing clean water to the sprawling interlinked system of cities which comprised Indranokura. Run by an indigenous version of the Ayat council system, Indranokuran governance was a byzantine and chaotic system at the best of times. Unlike in India, the guilds here had relatively limited authority – many merchants, craftsmen, and other groups were private individuals, and social mobility although limited was unprecedented for the time. However, the Ayat seats were effectively hereditary, and the monarch was more than a ceremonial figure or a glorified prime minister but a vital religious and political leader. Besides the Ayat, the main seat of power was the temple complex. Local cults syncretized their deities, adopting Hindu names and the overarching religious philosophies as necessary and in turn were granted secular power by local elites eager to use religion to validate their reign.

Part of the reason for the stuttering failure of mercantile guilds to gain control was the collapse of Qi China, which had profound effects on the economy of the entire region. While trade would recover within a century or so, its collapse during a time of political consolidation ensured the domination of religious figures and landholders rather than merchants. Yasodharapurait and Indranokura first signed an alliance in 874. Despite a war three years later, the alliance would be restored, and in union with the city of Vyadhapura, the “Triple Alliance” or Khmer Empire was formed. The Indranokuran Maharaja was notionally placed at the head of the entire system, a symbolic and yet vital link which bound the three cities together through regular visits between all three cities.

While the system might have had some flaws, the demographic advantages of the Khmer in general and the economic and political advantages of the Alliance in particular were overwhelming. Victory after victory was commemorated on temples and monuments to the glory of a series of world conquering Great Kings. Only the Champa dynasty of Vijayapura, shielded as they were by terrain and the Dvaravati city states, strong enough to fight back and form their own coalitions, resisted the centralizing power of Indranokura, and it was Indranokura that emerged as paramount member of the Alliance. By 933, when the terms of the treaty were renegotiated in favor of the Indranokuran Ayats, it was clear where true power lay. Henceforth, most temple dedications were in honor of the Maharaja, rather than local government.

Royal power before the 933 treaty was in many senses secular. The monarch had emerged from a local prominent family, and that family had gradually codified their powers within the framework of a Hindu state. However, after that date, the monarch increasingly became referred to as the devaraja, and sought to connect themselves with various Hindu deities as an incarnation of the divine to grant themselves additional legitimacy and prestige. Despite the centralizing tendencies, the Khmer were a loose and somewhat hegemonic empire. Geography and the uneasy nature of their union meant that symbolic dominion was often more important than actual dominion, and these local governors and councils who watched their names be erased from history in favor of the glorious conquests of a distant despot could rest easy knowing that their actual tangible power was far more difficult to wrest away.

The Khmer Empire did however pose a direct threat to the Srivijaya. By 900, Srivijaya was exhausted, having fought the Silendra dynasty and their partisans to a bloody standstill across Java. Interruptions in Chinese trade and the increasing independence of Srivijayas notional protectorates and partners had rocked the mighty city-state to the core. Local rulers sought their own power-bases, as the Silendra had, and the example set by the Silendra was that it was possible to rebel and at least for a while get away with it. Any punitive victory won by the Srivijayan Empire was rendered hollow by the Silendra dynasty’s escape further east. Word reached the Maharaja’s court that the Silendra exiles now lived in splendid luxury far away, and were no worse for their exile.

The Khmer Empire was one of the more obvious threats. More powerful than any other notional partner of the Srivijaya, the Khmer threat prompted the Srivijaya to begin working with the Dvaravati Raja Narapatisimhavarman providing money and great stockpiles of arms to counterbalance the Khmer and keep them preoccupied. With these generous gifts, Narapatisimhavarman encouraged certain Tai tribes to migrate into the Khorat Basin, distracting the Khmer and leading to several campaigns between 945-955. However, the Tai by and large saw better opportunities to their northeast, and in 957, those who remained, known as the Isan, signed a treaty acknowledging the primacy of Indranokura.

In 960, the Maharaja made a pact with the northern Mon city of Haripunjaya and their king, Chakafadiraj, further isolating the Dvaravati and cutting off their northern overland trade. Slowly, cities began to turn away from the Dvaravati and seek Khmer protection, protection which came with generally lenient terms and was closer to alliance than outright subjugation. However, the core of the Dvaravati kingdom, centered on Nakhon Pathon, refused to submit. Bolstered by a large Srivijayan army (said to number a hundred thousand men and ten thousand elephants) and lead by Sangramadhanan, the son of the famous general Dharmasetu and husband of the Imperial princess Devitanajaya. Sangramadhanan had earned his position thanks to his father’s impressive campaigns against the Silendrans, and though he had inherited his father’s tactical genius he lacked sufficient tact to endear himself to Narapatisimhavarman and indeed had a lofty and overbearing manner which alienated the Dvaravati nobility.

The Khmer invasion, when it came, was well-poised to take advantage of this division in the ranks. While what happened is unclear, it seems that the Srivijayan army was broken independently in a massive battle. Trophies from the victory adorned the walls of Indranokura for the next decade, and Sangramadhanan himself was captured and later executed. The Khmer army defeated Dvaravati roughly a month later and the Khmer enjoyed near total hegemony over Southeast Asia. The rag-tag remainder of the Srivijayan army was evacuated by sea and shortly after this period the city of Chaiya on the Malay peninsula underwent a massive fortification project.

News of this defeat caused a spate of rebellions. The Raja of Kadaram on the peninsula aligned himself with Indranokura, subverting the Srivijayan control of the region. One of the dynasts who had replaced the Silendra, Devasimha Dharmaja launched a successful rebellion on Java. Srivijayan power structures had always been lose and now they were utterly broken. The center of political power in the region would shift rapidly. Cities on the straits would acquire direct influence and Java, far more densely populated than Sumatra, would rise to hegemonic status.

A sign of growing Srivijayan weakness can be seen in the 1018 expedition by an Utkaladeshan navy which brought the once mighty city-state to ruin. Despite holding on as at least a notional hegemon, after that date, political power shifted irrevocably north and east. The city of Temasek on the Malay peninsula negotiated a favorable trade treaty with the Utkaladeshan fleet and henceforth would assume Srivijaya’s position and influence in the region in alliance with the city of Kadaram.

The 11th century was the zenith of the Khmer. Despite increasing strain on the hydraulic systems which enabled their supremacy, Khmer culture and hegemony was unquestionably dominant across a vast region. With the decline of Srivijaya and its fracturing into rival city-states, the Khmer, despite being a primarily land-based power could afford to play kingmakers of sorts, funneling funds to their favored allies and conspiring to bring down those who opposed them.

 

[Practical Lobster]

From the Tarim to Sugd - independent states and the rise of the Khardi

As with many areas of the world isolated from regular rainfall and oceanic influence, the fortunes of the Tarim basin states were dependent on water and water supply. Throughout its history, the city-states there have despite sporadic ascents and descents in prosperity controlled by the fickle supply of life-giving water nevertheless always benefitted from their remarkable position at the crossroads of east and west. Chinese travelers to the region as early as the Liang dynasty spoke of a remarkable seat of scholarship, art, and perhaps most remarkably enormous agricultural wealth. Travelers recorded “short haired women dancing in ochre turbans” and “a country of pomegranates and apricots, peaches and wheat.”

The native people were a mixture of Saka and Tocharian natives, and possessed a long and antique history which until the coming of the Kipchak was relatively undisturbed by outside threats. Part of the broader cultural Indosphere, they had absorbed Buddhism and Hindu religion from Gandhara. They had been dominated of course by a succession of foreign dynasties, most notably the Eftal and the Bod Empires, but the hand of both of these powers was exceptionally light, and those who tried to strengthen their dominion over the vast and arid country often met with defeat, as did the Aghatsaghids. The Eftal made little effort to enforce Sogdian Buddhism on them, and the Tibetan peoples who came to the great oasis cities were frequently converted to the Sarvastivadin school which was popular in the region.

Civilization in the Tarim basin exists in a rough horseshoe of sorts around a vast and arid center in which no life is possible. Despite this remarkable aridity, several major kingdoms, based around oasis cities, had survived in varying states since the 3rd century. Perhaps the greatest of these was Khotan or Hvamna, a long-suffering vassal of the Bod Empire whose rule by the Viasha dynasty was never in doubt even as the Viasha bowed to tax collectors and administrators from far Rhasa. Despite being reduced to figurehead vassals and sending their children as hostages to the Imperial court, the Viasha retained the covert allegiance of many notables, and in 931 broke from the Bod Empire permanently.

In 876, the arrival of Kipchak refugees in the Turfan oasis region would upset the delicate balance of steppe life. At the time, certain oases were actually overflowing, a crisis which damaged critical irrigation canals and left many Tocharian cities vulnerable to the carefully mediated threats and intimidation of the Kipchak. However, the Kipchak presence itself was wholly unsustainable – as we have seen, they were incapable of supporting their herds and ultimately continued to move southwards until they met their end in Gandhara.

By 940, there was essentially no sign of the Kipchak people as an independent civilization. Their notional hegemony might have endured beyond their defeats in India, but if it did, it was not for long. The Tarim basin indeed would continue to cultivate a reputation as a place which swallowed up invaders – several Bod dynasty invasions to reconquer the Hvamna kingdom were repulsed between 930 and 950, and indeed the Hvamna kingdom was never assimilated or annexed by the Kipchak, whose westward journey avoided their power. While Kipchak ethnic markers remained a part of the Tarim basin civilization, they were unable to survive the transition from nomadic to sedentary people – the rapid shock proved fatal.

As the Tarim basin recovered from invasions and the water crisis, there was a fresh blossoming of Buddhist philosophy and missionary activity. The writing of the Red-Gold Sutras, and the Book of Received Awareness represent significant literary and cultural achievements of the era. Monks travelled as far East as the Fujiwara Regency in Japan and as far West as the Xasar Shahdom, where their teachings were translated and propagated. Their teachings represented a “purer” philosophy, closer to the historical roots of the religion, and in general were treated with a mix of xenophilic reverence by some and suspicion by traditional priestly elites in particular.

For all their prestige and wealth, Hvamna, Kashgar, and the other powers of the Tarim basin had difficulty asserting hard power beyond their own cities. One of the few exceptions would prove to be the Khardi wars of the 11th century, where they supported the Ferghana kingdom of Khujand against encroachment from the west. Hvamna mercenaries would fight in these wars and bring back from them some of the first handguns, where they became a curiosity which was studied in detail in several manuals published in Khotan.

Just to the west, the Ferghana valley represented another region relatively untouched by the changes happening in the wider world, and spared also significant raids from the steppes by nature of its geographic isolation. However, it remained a trade lane, and a significant source of high-quality horses for foreign rulers wishing to make an impression. Ruled since the fall of the Aghatsaghids by a petty dynasty known as the Mihirkulids or the Khujand Shahdom, the Ferghana valley was dominated by a mixture of Indo-Iranian peoples of which the Eftal were no small percentage, although their dynasty called themselves Saka. In 986, after a Khardi raid, the capital was moved from Khujand into the valley, to Akhsikat. In the reign of Shah Indradata, fortifications were built across the valley, and the Shahs were ultimately able to keep their title and pay a small tribute to the distant Eranshahr.

Ferghana was thus able to preserve its unique culture and material traditions. Selling red lacquerware and horses and maintaining their key position on vital trade routes despite Khardi pressure was not easy, especially as the Khardi began their resettlement projects and resistance to Khardi rule on the steppes began to grow. Alliances between the Ferghanans and petty satraps in Khuttal and Chach were necessary to preserve their independence, and as time wore on it was increasingly a matter of when, not if, the hammer would fall against these satraps and thus by extension Akhsikat. The royal court feared quite reasonably that if the Khardi ever became distracted in their conquests of the west and turned their attention back east, Ferghana and her petty allies, the Mihirkulid kingdom would almost certainly be annexed. Fortunately for Indradata however, rapidly changing circumstances would ensure that scenario would not come to pass.

Meanwhile, to the north of the Khardi Empire lay the great Oghuz Khaganate. With their seat of power in Khorasem, the Oghuz were a force to be reckoned with, if for no other reason than their center of gravity lay far closer to Sugd and many other newly-conquered provinces. To compete with this local threat, the Khardi were forced to cooperate with the remaining Aghatsaghid elites, who had settled and fortified the vast frontier against Oghuz raids. As fellow Turks, these Aghatsaghid grandees had a familiarity with steppe warfare which the Iranian armies lacked, and backed by the generous support of wealthy Khardi provinces along the interior, the balance of power shifted in favor of the Khardi.

This was only a temporary shift. Various officials in Susa[1] recognized that Khardi rule along the vast steppe frontier depended upon settlement. Khardi, especially former soldiers, were offered large landholdings for themselves and their families. However, there were two major problems with this policy which have often been overlooked by those who describe how the land-grant system allowed Khardi dominion to endure across a wide swathe of the east and contributed to the homogenization of culture in a way which was ultimately favorable to the stability of the region. The first is that it alienated the Aghatsaghid elites, meaning that when the Oghuz Turks invaded the Khardi in 1022, it was at the invitation of Aghatsaghid nobles and said nobles defected en masse, fearing the confiscation of their vast estates. The second is that these policies would indirectly lead to the loss of Sogd and the rise of the Mihirkulid dynasty to renewed prominence. It is often forgotten that for a brief moment the Khardi actually held Sugd directly and might, had they been more willing to compromise, have retained it indefinitely. Instead, all they did was alienate and terrify their subjects by committing wholly to a project which would only see long-term results.

The Gandharan Equal-Kingdoms also had every reason to be nervous about the rise of the Khardi. Aghatsaghid rule was a memory but it was not a distant enough one for comfort, and with the fall of Kabul in 984, the Gandharans were once more staring down a titanic Asian power whose borders fell far too close to Purushapura. They too would embark on the construction of a series of fortifications, and send ambassadors to the Oghuz Khaganate seeking an alliance. The Gandharans would make potent allies. They benefitted from a professional military based in the recruitment of hill tribes from the foothills of the Himalayas and the traditional heavily-equipped guild cavalry, and had a brilliant strategist in the form of the Gandharan commander Vallabha Kalasha. If they had been able to coordinate better with the Oghuz Khagan, the Khardi might have been pushed out of Central Asia altogether. But instead the various powers would attack piecemeal and be defeated one by one.

Distracted by the Dauwa to their south, it was not until 1029 that the Gandharan army would attack Kabul, and they would immediately struggle to gain a foothold. The local Afghan tribes were torn between collusion with the Iranians and aiding the Gandharans. Promises of independence and autonomy swayed many Afghan groups to join their side, and vicious intertribal battles in the mountains and valleys around Kabul preoccupied the Gandharans – preventing meaningful advance, especially as the Tokhari “sun-worshipping clans”[2] aligned themselves with the Khardi in exchange for promises of lands in Gandhara. Two years later, the Gandharans made a white peace without having gained any territory. This border clash is mostly notable for the proliferation of firepowder weapons, including some of the first primitive handguns, first used as an anti-elephant weapon but a few years prior against the Dauwa. The Gandharans turned firepowder against the walls of Kabul, using massed volleys of shrapnel fired from siege towers at close range to clear the walls. Despite their ultimate failure to take the city, these weapons made a distinct impression on the defenders, and over time were copied and refined.

By contrast, the Oghuz invasion in 1022, led by the Khagan Tughrul Yavuldar, was a much greater success initially. Tughrul did not have the allegiance of all of the “twelve tribes” that traditionally made up the Oghuz hegemony, but he did have the backing of several of the strongest, including the Kinek, the Imur, and the Afsar, as well as an alliance with Ferghana and her satrapal allies. His ace in the hole, however, was convincing the Salir Turks, who had come under pressure from the East, to migrate into Sugd in great numbers, ensuring they would come under attack by representatives of the Iranshahr. From there it was easy to motivate a large portion of his confederation to follow him into battle.

The Khardi forces were light on the ground and frequently betrayed by their Aghatsaghid auxiliaries. Sugd was lost almost immediately, and Tughrul wasted little time fortifying the Iron Gates and leading raids as far south as Balkh. By the time significant Khardi reinforcements could be deployed, the Shah of Balkh, Mihirevanda, had been slain along with almost an entire army of twenty thousand. This defeat inspired the Padishah’s direct attention, and Artaxser sent as large of an army north under his cousin Surkhab as he could, given the large commitment of men to Palestine and Egypt.

Surkhab, however, proved to be utterly incompetent, and while that might have been remedied by veteran subordinates who knew how to creatively interpret poor orders and salvage his atrocious campaign, most of these veterans were absent. Only one officer in his army distinguished himself notably, and that was Sepandiar, an Iranian who claimed descent from both the Oadhya and the Aspahbadh house from Sassanian times. As Surkhab blundered into a feigned retreat which saw much of his army destroyed, Sepandiar distinguished himself in spite of the debacle, turning a disaster into a stalemate.

Artaxser dispatched a fresh army under Sepandiar in 1023, and the Iranian proved his quality as much on the battlefield as by turning some of the lesser Turkic tribes against Tughrul, causing the Khagan to turn back and ride north to deal with the rebellion. Sensing victory, the Shah encouraged Sepandiar to march north and retake Sogd, but Sepandiar instead entered into negotiations with several of the clans while Tughrul was away – offering them Sogd in exchange for an alliance. Sepandiar felt that he had the loyalty of his troops, and that his successful campaign would inspire them to turn on Artaxser and proclaim him Shah.

The clans turned on Tughrul and ensured his defeat against the rebels, at which point Qutalmish Afsar became Khagan and the Yavuldar were almost entirely annihilated. Once his power was secure, Qutalmish expected to march on Susa with Sepandiar and replace the Mitradharmid dynasty, and he hoped that Sepandiar’s victory would of course mean more concessions to the tribes which had granted him power. But it was not to be. Sepandiar underestimated the degree to which the Khardi revered Artaxser, and overestimated the clout of his own noble background, and was simply arrested by his subordinates after declaring himself Shah.

Qutamish Afsar was the only true victor of the conflict. He arranged the division of Sugd between his vassal tribes and had managed to elevate his clan to the Khaganate. The Khardi, exhausted and seeking to consolidate their position in the east, allowed him to retain Tughrul’s conquests and were more concerned with prosecuting Sepandiar and any potential allies he had within the army. After 1030, the powers who ruled Central Asia were increasingly forced to accommodate the Khardi presence.

[1] Indicative of Khardi attempts to create a civilian bureaucracy. However, they would never wholly be able to shake their clannish origins. The bureaucracy was very much a nepotistic organization at its upper levels, with local talent finding an invisible ceiling arresting any particularly capable individual in his tracks.

[2] It is unclear what group this refers to, but it is worth noting that many of the prominent tribal groups who aligned with the Iranians in Afghanistan were actually Turkic. Unlike along the steppe frontier, here the Khardi settlement was substantially lighter.

 

[Practical Lobster]

The Isle of the Moon and the Cape of Cider Trees

The ruling grandees, or Randryan, of Watya became increasingly entrenched as the tenth century continued. While they had begun as mere local strongmen with land claims and retainers to back up their rights, they transformed themselves into a permanent, entrenched aristocracy. Their diverse agricultural package, a sprawling mixture of European, Asian, and African fruits, grains, and livestock allowed a level of prosperity unknown on the crowded Isle of the Moon. Those who enjoyed Randryan privileges ornamented themselves lavishly with gold and diamonds and enjoyed long, healthy lives. Cape Watya’s bustling port cities accommodated travelers from as far afield as Egypt and Srivijaya. Ankarmena, the greatest of these ports, grew rapidly. Kapudesan engineers were hired by the local nobility to create sewage systems and a series of public bath-houses in 954, hinting at what was becoming a sprawling and filthy metropolis. Ankarmena, unlike many of the Savahila cities, was unwalled and indeed utterly undefended, a mercantile town without any fears. Accordingly, it was not a dense city at all – there was nothing to limit the creation of dozens of successful suburbs such as Sivatanana, which grew up around a nearby harbor and a temple of ecstatic Hindu mendicants.

One of the biggest changes in Watya society, however, was the elite no longer using their newfound wealth to return to Izaoriaka. After the initial burst of these flighty opportunists, it became increasingly difficult to buy privilege in the Sakalava court. The current of gold itself reduced the value of precious metals and diamonds significantly, with widespread economic impacts that would reverberate across the globe. Instead, the Watyan aristocracy formed the Mahasanga, an enormous guild of sorts available to any landholding man who met certain requirements – namely the ability to buy membership and pay annually into the guild.

The Mahasanga quickly garnered more power than the weak Izaoriakan viceroy, negotiating with the local Sakalava Prince Randamasalega from a position of marked strength. Randamasalega, despite his reputation as a weak and ineffective governor, was actually quite astute. He realized that there was no way to maintain strict Izaoriaka dominance over the Watya Cape – by 973, when the Mahasanga began agitating for independence, the Watya were quite simply too numerous and Izaoriaka too far. His main goals instead were to preserve the remaining Izaoriaka colonies and to ensure that the government would always profit from Watya.

The final terms of the Mahasanga’s independence were complex, but boiled down to this: the Randryan would remain forever within the mandala of the Emperor, but in practice the Mahasanga was given authority over all the Cape save where lands had been given to Temples or treaties had been struck with the natives.[1] All Watyan trade would pass through the Izaoriaka-governed entrepot city of Ramamida, situated on the Savahila coast, and no ship sailing a guild flag would pass Ramamida going north. Any ship caught doing so forfeited their cargo.

Thus, war was averted and the Mahasanga grew to dominate political life across the Cape. By the turn of the millennium, the Mahasanga had its own armies of significant size – and used them extensively to expand its influence against the indigenous peoples. The clan, that paramount marker of social standing back home in Izaoriaka, meant little on the Cape. Rather, what mattered was guild affiliation and wealth. A small farmer of no particular status and his extended family might migrate out into the wilderness and carve out their own settlement. That settlement might attract migrants and in doing so expand as these new tenants cultivated the land – allowing the original farmer to gain membership in the guild. As such, the Mahasanga was remarkably egalitarian.

By contrast, Izaoriaka had totally stagnated. Those with the means to do so sought transport to Watya. Those who could not pay their way sold themselves into a sort of debt-slavery which would not extend to their family members. They were assured tenancy on a farm or mining community (the latter being the fate of many unfortunate souls who couldn’t read their own contracts) and after working off a “contract of indenture” they were granted their own plot of land and some money. In this way, Watya continued to grow and prosper, but Izaoriaka declined. The mass emigration of nobles and commoners alike left gaps in the island’s carefully constructed mandala society. Whole clans were uprooted and conflicts began to emerge where once society had seemed impossibly stable. The divine guidance of the Sakalava monarchy ensured peace and harmony. Their kings were golden and splendid, living incarnations of Visnu. To each person was assigned a place, a spot in the celestial harmony of things. Mass exodus led to disharmony because many who had long accepted their place at the bottom or middle of the social system and would have been content for karma to reward them in the next life were now opportunistically seizing vacated lands.

However, Izaoriaka by the eleventh century lacked any sense of martial spirit. The warlike clans of the ancient past were thoroughly declawed by centuries of peace. Riots and rebellions were rare, and the interlocking framework of ritual hostage taking that had survived for centuries had ensured that the nobility could act with unified purpose against unarmed peasants if an uprising did come to pass. The hostage and ward system which had ensured peace had broken down perhaps a century earlier, becoming primarily symbolic. Hostages were frequently allowed extended visits home and the Sakalava monarchy turned a blind eye to the affairs of their nobles, becoming complacent in their power. The rebellion would begin when the members of the Antandroi, a clan of the arid south, began to seize more prosperous lands from their traditional rivals the Antambahoaka, who, as one of the “maritime peoples” had seen their strength sapped by emigration.

Endemic warfare and the collapse of the monarchy followed by 1019. Ironically, the lack of strong military forces exacerbated the violence. Standardized armies with clear loyalties might have prevented much of the brutality and bloodshed. Instead, clan leaders rallied fickle mobs of supporters to attack neighboring strongholds and the pillaging across the island was indiscriminate.

The Iazorana dynasty of the Antemoro clan ultimately emerged on top. Unlike the feudal Sakalava, their power was based in the fanatic devotion of their followers, and they were essentially populist theocrats. Led by a local Raja named Andriaserabe who claimed divinity, the Antemoro conquered the coasts and reasserted control over the city of Ramamida, negotiating a treaty with the Watya “guild” to ensure that the Sakalava privileges still applied to them. Unlike the Izaoriaka, however, their dominion over the interior was light. They might have ruled the old “long valleys” of the Sakalava but the highland clans refused to accept Andriaserabe’s divine inspiration and rallied around a traditional “mandala” king named Andriasampi. Andriasampi ruled most of the island in time, but without the western coast and the overseas links, his realm was comparatively poor and isolated.

Andriaserabe’s religion by all accounts was the monotheistic bhakti faith of the Ishvara worshippers radically modified and adapted into an Izaoriakan context. His sole innovation was placing himself as monarch at the center of the faith. His interpretation of dreams and omens provided divine guidance, and he dismissed the complex Tantric traditions of the island as an inferior way of attaining moksha compared to simply shouting “Hail, hail, the Great God!” He claimed that those who died in battle fighting for him would have their karmic sins wiped away and that they would be granted divinity in a world of pure ecstatic bliss. While widely dismissed by the temples, aristocrats, religious scholars of the island, Andriaserabe’s cult caught on among the illiterate peasant class for whom the legends of the island seemed insufficient in the wake of mass social collapse. The peasants of the highland, however, despite having a veneer of Tantric Hinduism, still clung to their ancestor-worshipping traditions and were accordingly less vulnerable to a faith that actively dismissed the antique rituals of the island.

[1] A rarity – by the end of the tenth century the indigenous peoples had been pushed entirely into the highlands and beyond the OTL Orange River. Large guild communities existed even further inland, as in the early days of the Watya settlement, birthrates were enormous and land was freely available so long as you didn’t mind getting your hands dirty.

The Fair and Noble Ones – The Baltic Littoral at the turn of the millennium

The ancient Baltic peoples, like their Slavic neighbors, were mostly settled agriculturalists, growing wheat, rye, and flax, raising cattle, sheep, and horses. In coming centuries they would become known for their production of honey and sweet fermented beverages made with the same, but for now their apiaries were individual and most trade was intercommunal and local. Unlike the Slavs, however, they eschewed tight-knit, dense communities and the “gord” in favor of a sprawl of individual farms and homesteads belonging to kin-groups. Hill-towns were comparatively rare, although local aristocrats would certainly build fortifications for the protection of the locality in the event of a raid.

They worshipped gods which had evolved little since the earliest Indo-European settlers, and the Lithuanians in particular showed the same sort of conservativism in their linguistics, which were largely untainted by loanwords or significant shifts from the first peoples who had come to the Baltic region centuries ago. Dievas was first among their gods, the “Highest” and the “Eternal” and represented both the pale sky and the core of the universe itself. Other significant gods included an earth mother, Zemesmate, and a zeus-like god of thunder named Perkunas.

The Baltic tribes lacked significant centralization, and instead cast their lot in with strong local rulers who outfitted local freemen with horses and weapons to protect the community. Internecine conflict was frequent, and when raids occurred whole villages would take shelter within nearby fortifications. Battles between competing local warlords ensured that no stable political organization really had developed.

Less populated and less organized than their more potent neighbors, the Balts were occasional victims of Viking raids but never had anything of sufficient value to see their lands colonized. Gardaveldi in the late ninth century pushed into Estonia, and runestones from the region credit the Wheel-Rulers with undoing the menace posed by “the pirates and brigands of this country” which, combined with records from Sweden and Gotland point to a cycle of raid and counter-raid between the Norse and Estonians only broken in the tenth century. Gardaveldi in general pushed against the Baltic periphery, seeking to establish control over the long north-south trade routes which connected the Near East to the Scandinavian world. In this they were successful, but they never made an effort to penetrate the core of the Baltic littoral.

Protected by the swords of the Polonians, the Baltic world was not exposed to Christendom either in its peaceable mercantile form or its warlike Votivist form. While Poles fought and died to reach the Pure Heaven of the Jarylo Bodda, neither their strange local “Buddhism” or the more orthodox Buddhism of the Sahu was known before the eleventh century among the Balts. While the Byalarusian Hans of Svayatapolk were busy building stupas on the sites of ancient holy groves, and in the process erasing much of the culture of their people in favor of the received knowledge of the East, the Balts preserved their own quite unintentionally by their sheer isolation. It would not be until the middle of the eleventh century that the first Buddhist missionaries from the south would visit Lithuanian princes. The religion, however, failed to gain significant traction – it was equated with the conquering armies of the Wheel-Ruler and accordingly treated suspicion, gaining ground mostly with those of low status who had little to lose and much to gain in terms of community by embracing the foreign faith and the Buddha.

The first Buddhist monastery in the Baltic would be built at Ikskile [Riga] in 1084, but the religion would not appeal to more than minority – particularly traders and those who had contact with the outside world.

Gardaveldi

The exceptionally long reign of Arnmundr, the sister-son of Bjarnheidenn, is the defining feature of eleventh century Gardaveldi. Taking the throne at the age of 11, he ruled fifty-three years, from 997 to 1050. Over the course of his reign, the first intellectual flowering of Norse paganism as a distinct faith would begin. The school of Darmahujr would begin its development with the writings of Adalradir of Holmgard and Sialfi Vedersson – some of the first books produced by the Gardaveldi tradition. While Sialfi primarily wrote a chronology of Armnundr’s reign, it is far more useful as an instructional guide for righteous living than as an accurate history of the times. Adalradir on the other hand both compiled traditional Norse myths and explained their relevance to Buddhism, as well as translating many Buddhist texts into Norse.

Arnmundr in his reign as Wheel-Ruler[1] was not a very expansionist ruler. His main campaigns were to remind the Balts that he controlled the trade lanes of the north. In general he ignored the conflicts of the Scandinavian world, welcoming refugees from the Votive Wars of the north but not participating in them. He spent several years of his reign overseeing the construction of Darmagard as a major port city, but it never truly surpassed Mikla Niragard [OTL St. Petersburg] as a trading center due to its isolation from the major riverine arteries of Transuralic Asia.[2]

The Gardaveldi state in the eleventh century continued trends established several centuries prior – the urban population of Norse traders buoyed the traditional culture of the Norse homesteader as opposed to the Slavic peoples of the region. The Slavic-influenced dialect of Gardaveldi Norse was the language of religion, law, and art. Accordingly, the culture of the gords continued to perish against this influx, and assimilation was very much the order of the day. The culture of the Ilmen Slavs was almost entirely eliminated and by the twelfth century the Rus were defined as those people living outside of the Wheel-Realm.

The governance of the Wheel-Realm was not particularly despotic. In the Norse tradition, the greater names within the realm gathered in assembly semi-regularly to debate and drink – a social tradition which brought significant unity to the Gardaveldi aristocracy. The Wheel-Ruler was first among equals in some senses, although the jarls did not often dare to contradict decrees given on the throne, even if they might argue or fight with him in the throes of drunken anger. It was critical to the legitimacy of the monarch that he be personable, strong, and capable – and if he lacked these qualities, a more popular son might be chosen for the royal title and the remaining heirs given lands according to their quality and their service to the state. It was in this way that Arnmundr, despite being a nephew, had gained the throne – Bjarnheidenn, despite being fierce in battle and an excellent king, was rumored to be a cuckhold and accordingly his sons were widely disdained as bastards despite an absence of any definitive proof. Under Arnmundr, they were sent away as hostages to the Hanates, where they lived out their lives without attaining any sort of glory which might have allowed them to threaten the new royal house.

[1] It’s overdue that I have a translated version of this word. Maybe Hvelskati?

[2] I might have mentioned this, but the eastern border of Europe in this timeline is traditionally drawn according to the frontiers of Germanic Christendom and not the Urals.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Kanem – the Holy City on the Lake

Kanem under the Akirid dynasty seemed as if it might even stabilize itself, but that period of calm barely lasted a generation. The Akiri built their dynasty on weak foundations; the declining settled tribes such as the Dabir and Kunkuna were their primary allies. These were the tribes that their successors would denounce as “pagans” and “idolaters” and there is no lack of evidence to corroborate that notion. Despite the messianic reign of Selma, at best a thin veneer of the religion had been plastered over local customs. The divinity of the monarchy had been briefly replaced with the notion of the monarchy as an Apostle of God, but under the Akirids that shifted back once more.

Christianity, travelling from the Coptic Egyptian courts, brought increased literacy and connections with the outer world. Learned men would acquire written Bibles from Egypt and host readings and scholarly debates, and out of this grew a fanatical group who called themselves the Dalai, or Students. At first, the Students were disorganized. They took Christian names in Coptic and formed mobs to tear down icons and “false temples.” But in time, the power of the Students would grow, and they would form something of a paradoxical organization – at once a learned administrative class and a violent force for compelling the mob.

For the Kanem, the new religion came at a time of intense social disruption. For much of its early history, Kanem had existed in a bountiful wet period – but around the middle of the ninth century that began to change. First came political pressures from an outside world which had previously been extremely remote – Berber movements south and Christian missionaries. But by the dawn of the tenth century, these had transformed into environmental pressures. The contraction of farmland gave way to arid and semi-nomadic raiders who had all the fanaticism of new converts to an ancient religion. Two clans in particular, the Kay and the Koukuma, would take up the banner with alacrity, aligning themselves with the growing power of the Students against the ruling dynasty.

The world of the Kay and the Students was one which seemed as if it was ending. In ancient times, the Mai of Kanem had ruled as living Gods. Now that had been proven false, and the great lake and the rivers that fed it were drying up at an unprecedented rate, forcing many to abandon agriculture. The material culture of the whole Lake Chad region, famed for its pottery and elaborate textiles, declined precipitously in this era. Urban centers alternately swelled and shrank depending on the river’s beneficence, forcing whole tribes to migrate. The dread specter of famine loomed over the countryside. Raids and small scale wars were accordingly frequent, and by 920 the Akirid dynasty did not have control outside of their capital city.

In earlier times, this loss of control might have been survivable, but the Akiri lacked the prestige of their greater predecessors. Accordingly, it was inevitable that the rural clans would rise against them. The Kay justified their rebellion by calling Mai Hume Akiri decadent and corrupt. They claimed that he sought to restore the old idols and indeed worshipped them in secret. According to their propaganda, he kept a harem of mistresses and profaned the sacred altars of Kanem’s churches in secret.

The Kay enjoyed immense military successes which, without the benefit of historical context, seem almost miraculous. Their calls for austerity and unity were popular among a world turned upside down by internecine war and societal collapse. Their army was augmented by Berber mercenaries from the oasis of Kawar, who in time largely converted to the strict Christianity of their new masters. The Kay seized Kanem itself sometime between 926 and 930, when records kept by the Akirid dynasty cease and reportedly, the Magomi clan took power in the city. A people whose history was deeply interconnected with the region in any case, the Magomi ruled for a time, but according to most histories (which inevitably were biased towards the Kay) their Queen-Mother sought for her son the title of Mai and wished that he would rule as a God in the traditional manner. Accordingly, the Kay rose up once more and defeated the Magomi. This time, instead of placing another clan on the throne, they took power directly, calling themselves the Holy Kings.

The first Kay ruler, Dunama, was also a reformer. He utilized the literate population for more than just recitations of the Bible – he build a complex tax code and corvee system. His victories had brought him a base population of educated slaves whose talents were turned to administering the country he had conquered. The wealth of Kanem largely came from manufacturing and trading finished goods, salt, and copper north along the Kawar or Djadu roads, and accordingly Dunama required meticulous records of those transactions. He issued small golden coins stamped with the sign of the cross and his name on the reverse, and required that only his new currency could be spent in the city’s marketplaces. Those who did not have it were forced to convert their own money to this local equivalent for a fee.

By 934, the Kay ruled all of old Kanem. By 940, they had turned their conquests into a base from which to launch holy war. Beyond the rhetoric and propaganda which survives, the motivation for the Kay holy wars seems quite clear. Controlling the northeastern rim of Lake Chad, the Kay hoped to expand their dominion over the west and thus gain a firmer hold on the Berber trade routes. Furthermore, any conquest would net them a valuable source of slaves, which could be traded for Berber horses and camels. Logistically, Kanem lacked the capacity to truly control the northern trade routes. Kawar oasis in particular lay beyond the pale of what they could easily conquer, and the caravan paths that tracked across the Libyan desert could reach Air and the Niger river every bit as easily as they reached Kanem. Accordingly, their wars were primarily directed towards the west and south, striking against the poorer, regional rivals who lacked the geographic security of the Kawar oasis.

Dunama’s son, Iakobas lead the wars against Kanem’s southern rivals, and with the help of a learned scribe he compiled a great account of his conquests. His descriptions have a fatalistic quality to them, that of a victorious conqueror who sees his victories as inevitable – and perhaps they were. From the Berbers of Cyrene, the Kanem cavalry adopted new tactics, in particular the use of the long, heavy lance to disrupt massed formations of infantry. On open ground, these brutal charges proved devastating to the Bornu cavalry, who fought with shorter spears and throwing javelins.

First, Iakobas struck against the “great residence of the Bornu of Yao, who hold among their vassals the Tatala and the Ngalma.” He describes the destruction of its temples and thousands of slaves being taken from the city. Further campaigns down the Kamadugu river saw the sack of Diakam and “twelve lesser towns” whose peoples were similarly treated without mercy. His victorious cavalry crushed all in their path until ultimately he ends his chronicle with an afterthought:

“When the waters of Ngadde receeded I made war upon the Kagha who dwelled along the river. For seven years, seven months, and seven days I warred against them, until they were broken and made to accept the Lord who is God of Israel and Egypt. Their idols were destroyed in a great fire, proving their weakness against the Almighty, who cannot be destroyed. Those who refused to set aside their devils were burned or impaled. To the glory of God, few chose that option, and a great number of men and women were baptized and then sold into slavery.”

By the eleventh century, Kanem was once again regional hegemon, but in a very different manner than the mercantile hegemony of earlier centuries. The “great residences” of the south, which had been coming into their own along the fertile rivers which fed Lake Chad, were broken. The Kay and other Christian tribes were moving into the region as well, an inevitable consequence of the desertification of the north. In many respects, their new state was simply a well-regulated army which lived parasitically off the spoils of the still-prosperous south.

Ghana and the Hausa

The 10th century saw the ranks of Ghana’s rivals grow, and her hegemony finally break. It was, in some ways, inevitable. Across the well-watered Sahel cities were growing, necessitating the construction of walled suburbs and allowing increased division of labor. The agriculturalist element of the population was diminishing and a new urban world based in the manufacturing of finished goods was being supported on its back.

However, the growing aridity which pitched Kanem into ruin had its impact on West Africa as well. Even as cities were growing huge along the Senegal and Niger watersheds, elsewhere, particularly further to the north, urban settlements were regressing into more mobile camps as people turned to pastoralism. Those who remained settled were forced to rely on increasingly more elaborate forms of agriculture – deeper wells and more complex works of irrigation. However, they transmitted this knowledge southwards and soon even the peoples privileged by easy water were able to bring in greater yields of crops than previously.

Ghana however, was on the brink of collapse. Roving bands of Taureg bandits caused a shocking contraction in the trade economy, one which was accompanied by the rise of the city-state kingdom of Niani immediately to the south. A dagger pointed at the very heart of Ghana, the ruling elders of Niani refused to submit themselves, and between 930 and 950 won several battles including most notably the Battle of Mahina in 936, where the Ghanan cavalry elite took grievous losses. One in every three noble horsemen were slain and henceforth Ghana was primarily reactive – struggling against the coalition of Gao and Djenne to the east and Niani to the south.

The wars of the great Mande cities were often deeply personal. To maintain their hegemony, the original Ghanan conquerors had utilized intermarriage between notable families, one which ensured that the battles that brought down Ghana were often family affairs, conflicts between nephews and cousins. Unlike Kanem, however, religion was rarely a motivator for bloodshed, apart from the ritual harvest sacrifices of cattle. Tereism, as the Teacher Nakhato’s religion became known, was an important tool for subverting the divine hierarchy of the Ghanan kingdom, but it did not advocate violence and in many ways was a philosophical cousin of the indigenous beliefs of many ethnic groups. Tereism also served as a way for the aristocracy to separate themselves from the common people. As a religion with many mystery elements, it became a mark of pride for the civilized elites of Gao to be inducted high into the society.

As Ghana’s wars in the late tenth century were simply political jockeying for position, the stakes were never as high as they were around Lake Chad. Even the most bloodthirsty wars were primarily a matter for the mounted elites to dispute in pitched battles rather than with outright massacres and genocide. To a degree, the Soninke in particular made war into a ritualistic expression – battles were frequently indecisive and without significant casualties. Sporadic peasant rebellions in the same era, meanwhile, or actions against raiders, were brutal and uncompromising, pointing to an intentional limiting of casualties among the interrelated aristocracies of western Africa.

Along the western coasts, meanwhile, a unique cultural exchange was happening. The spiral patterns beloved by the indigenous people of the Canaries began appearing on Takruri merchandise in the tenth century, and the Niumi and Fulani people took to the seas. At first, they primarily made their way north on Mauri and Norse expeditions, but those who travelled returned and with their shipbuilding knowledge, local villages began to build larger ships in emulation of the oceangoing cargo ships of both civilizations.

Takrur in particular had potential. Over the tenth century the city blossomed with maritime environs – the beginnings of a safe harbor on the Senegal River. As the African coast (above a certain line correlating with diseases to which even the hybridized Norse of the isles had no immunity) became connected to the outside world, commercial enterprises began to circumvent the Tauregs and the Berbers of the interior entirely.

Some of our first records of the Hausa people come from the court of Ghana, where Berber historians wrote that “many are the peoples who have been drawn to their culture and abandoned their own tongues and histories.” According to these historians, the Hausa came from the great desert and moved into their Central African homeland as it became increasingly arid – a plausible hypothesis, although one that has been debated by other modern historians, who asserted that the Hausa migration was a movement of people fleeing the Kanem holy wars.

The Sarkunan, or Kings of the Hausa, were reportedly seven in number, and according to legend and archeological finds were prolific builders of cities. Throughout northern Nigeria their cities sprung up almost spontaneously throughout the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Traditionally, these cities were based on small local communities which in turn were organized into larger and larger blocs of people. At the highest level these communities were ruled by a village chief, who in turn was ruled by the chief of the “country”, who in turn was subordinate to the Sarkin, or King. Kings and chiefs alike were sacred, and their performance in elaborate religious rituals defined their power.

The galadima, or Vizier, was the head of the King’s household and was typically an educated slave – as was most of the bureaucracy of the Hausa states. Building off the example of the Mande kingdoms to the west, the Hausa cities were typically well ordered and governed. Trade was the lifeblood of these kingdoms; the Hausa were well situated between all the great states of Africa. To the south lay the populous cities of the Ukwu Empire, to the West, Gao, and to the north the Taureg traders. The wealth of the West African world filtered through their cities, and as it did so it could be taxed.

On Heathens

From Hermann of Koln’s famous eleventh century treatise On Heathens:

In the East, those who are not of the Christian faith call themselves Brazaic[1] and worship many gods. To them, as to the Romans of old, the greatest of these deities is Jove, who in their tongue is called Tangras. The Chirican make their grandest sacrifices to Jove, and every year their King takes five hundred mounted men and rides on a grand hunt, the purpose of which is to capture all manner of game for this sacrifice.

But the cornerstone of the Barzaic faith is not lofty Jove or any of the other demons who they worship, but a false prophet by the name of Boddo, who is idolized beyond the measure of their gods.[2] Boddo it is said was a prince in his own country, who, after hearing the blessed gospel became enraged and was determined to pervert it to his own ends, lest his subjects be turned to the worship of the Lord. It is said that he bound himself to a tree, and in doing so became possessed by demons who granted him the power to speak in many languages, and he went and preached among the monstrous peoples of the East.

Boddo is the architect of all the woes of the Eastern Christian, whose heresy was insufficient to earn them a reprieve from his servants. Instead the great warlord Mirgul and his sons[3], swayed by the teachings of the false one, made war on Rome and ultimately would bring down Constantinople itself. Oh what woe for the patriarchal sees of our great faith, that so many of them should fall into the hands of vicious idolaters and heathens!

[1] from the Khotanese word for the transcendent Buddha, Barza or Barslya. In this timeline, Brasayasna is a common umbrella term in the Iranian language for all the different schools of Buddhism which are worshiped in the West, and certain Hindu philosophies as well.

[2] While Christians of the Near East were often much more familiar with the religions of their foes, knowledge of Buddhism in Western Europe was spotty at best. Still, he gets some things right.

[3] A reference to Mihirgula, one of the more famous of the Eftal Shahs. A more obscure reference and a sign of the diffusion of information, given that usually the “Chirican” were blamed for most of Christendom’s woes, including the fall of the Roman Empire.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Japan in the Fujiwara Regency

At the turn of the Millennium, the far-flung Fujiawara clan had control over the court in Kyoto. Holding the title of Kampaku, or regent, they monopolized control over the affairs of state, enthroning and dethroning Emperors at will. Mitchitaka kept control both by agglomerating vast estates into his personal control and the control of his vassals and allies, and by ensuring that the Empress was always a daughter or niece of his. Despite a rapid succession of Emperors, the Fujiwara power behind the throne remained a constant. The shoen estates ruled by the Fujiwara and many monasteries acquired legal exemptions from taxes and indeed certain Imperial laws they found less than appealing.

Fujiwara no Mitchitaka, the Regent, ruled until 1017, at which point he yielded control of the reigns of state to his son Tadamichi. Tadamichi, like his predecessors, presided over a trend of increased decentralization and the rise of powerful family institutions to legalized prominence. Clans were allowed to govern their own territories with relative autonomy, and Tadamichi allowed decentralization to increase so long as it meant that he could maintain his stranglehold on power in Kyoto. The Fujiwara, along with other prominent clans such as the Taira and Minamoto, owed their power to a new caste of warriors known as Bushi or Samurai. Upper class warriors and landholders, the samurai served as private military forces for the major families and allowed them to maintain control independent of imperial decree.

However, other powerful factions in the country opposed the growth of independent armies. Starting with the reign of Mitchitaka’s great-grandfather Fusasaki, large numbers of Han Chinese intellectuals and scholars had fled China. These learned men generally travelled to Korea, but a large percentage also reached Japan, where the majority entered into the monasteries. Those who did not pursue the monastic life, however, had given new strength to the bureaucratic institutions of the Heian Emperors and thus by extension the Fujiwara. These bureaucrats were not respected by many of the Fujiwara, and accordingly had limited power to prevent the decay of central institutions.[1] However, over time these bureaucrats would ensure that the tax system did not totally collapse, preventing the rise of feudalism from becoming total. The average landholder accordingly still paid taxes and still considered himself a subject of the Heian Emperor.

The great monasteries, such as the school of Tendai, also benefitted from the arrival of Chinese intellectuals. Accordingly, in this era many of the major schools, including the more esoteric Shingon school, split into “Ancient” and “Reformed” sects. The old bases of power such as the Mount Koya monastery rejected the foreign wisdom of the Chinese philosophers in favor of a more “authentic” religion, ignoring the fact that their faith was largely imported from the mainland in any case. The reformed schools became major allies of the bureaucratic administration. Known as the Insei, or Cloistered Administration, certain monasteries worked to reign in the excesses of the major noble families, forming a loose coalition which checked but did not outright threaten the dominance of the Fujiwara. At times, the Fujiwara even cooperated with the insei monasteries, realizing that their bushi vassals did indeed require a counterbalance, and fearing the rising power of the Taira. More typically however, they made use of bushi bureaucrats who lacked the religious ties which made the insei dangerous.

Japan in this era was exceptionally isolated by the standards of most other advanced Eurasian polities. While Srivijaya traders did from time to time reach the southern part of the isle, trade and commerce was relatively limited. The past several centuries had seen a regression in the country’s economy, as currency became less common and the average peasant diminished into poverty. A relatively small and aristocratic elite prospered through the system of warrior or temple patronage, but for the average person the late Heian era was a time of lawlessness and political uncertainty. There were no Japanese embassies to foreign countries, and overall the country, particularly the elite, turned inwards.

[1] From the perspective of this timeline. Compared to OTL, the central government is much stronger, if utterly a puppet of the Fujiwara.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Hwaet, the Ring-Breaking Danes: Angland and Skotland

Of the British Isles, Angland in particular enjoyed a sort of golden age under the Danish yoke. Firstly, it helped that said Danish yoke was exceedingly light, and that the Danes were cheerfully willing to intermarry and live beside their Saxon and Briton subjects. Secondly, when the heirs of Harthacnute united Angland they brought with them a time of peace and prosperity. Many of the battles on the Welsh frontier were little more than glorified cattle raids and were treated with little more than derision by the court in Winchester. The crowns of Angland and Skotland intermarried, frequently as well, and in general territorial expansion came second to foreign raiding and mercenary work.

Those who returned from such adventuring brought back foreign wealth, styles, and ideas to enrich the beer halls of their new Kingdom. Winchester’s great Assembly Hall itself was decorated with jewels and gold from as far away as Carthage and Konstantikert.

Besides general calm, the rise of the South in prominence was the other major trend of the two centuries in which Angland came to be supreme on the British Isles. It was perhaps inevitable – a matter of geography. The south was richer, more populous, and more connected to the beating heart of the European world. From southern Angland sailed the mercenaries who would return battle-hardened with new knowledge and tales of the lands beyond the channel. Leicester and Jorvik could make no such claims, and thus were subordinated to Winchester under King Sweyn Thunderer – who even before their conquest had been calling himself King of Angland.

The Anglo-Dansk and their northern counterparts on Skotland and the Isles maintained the seafaring traditions of their illustrious ancestors. They set sail on the Whale-Road, becoming mariners and traders par excellence. Indeed, Anglo-Dansk ships had more contact with the peoples of West Africa than the Franks in the early era of contact between Africa and Europe. Despite their susceptibility to disease and the perils involved, many risked the journey, knowing that there was much gold and salt to be found. Many more, especially more established communities of adventurers, preferred to seek out safer adventures close to home. Wars in Anatolia and the Polish frontier attracted many warriors “going Viking.”

The Khardi Empire in the West

The devastation of Egypt in the early eleventh century should not be underestimated. By all contemporary accounts, the damage done was severe: both in terms of human lives and the enormous damage done to the canals and irrigation networks which sustained the bounty of the Nile. Berxwedan, the Satrap of Egypt, was both brother and friend to Artaxser, and as a member of the royal family he could do no wrong even after his elder brother’s passing. He ruled as a despotic King, and his ordinances were brutal and designed to break the will of a proud, independent people with a long history. Huge numbers of rebels were executed, their families and villages sold into slavery and made to undergo forced marched through the Gaza desert which only a fraction survived. The wealth of merchants and nobles was universally confiscated to pay soldiers.

Berxwedan’ short sighted policies would have long-term ramifications. While Mesopotamia blossomed under the enthusiastic stewardship of small Khardi landholders and local farms, Egypt suffered horribly. The country was divided into vast estates run by people without even basic knowledge of farming – nomadic mercenaries who were acutely aware of how outnumbered they were by their subjects. And yet more important, perhaps, than this devastation was the economic toll that the capture of Egypt would have on Europe. The grain shipments of Egypt, which were crucial to the substantial urban societies of Italy and Anatolia, were cut off for perhaps five years. When they resumed, they were intermittent and far fewer than before – revolts and chaos in the interior prevented substantial trade, and the merchant houses and guilds of Egypt were largely destroyed. New relations had to be cultivated with Khardi interlopers seeking to make quick profits off of their conquest.

Furthermore, for the first time since the Roman Empire, the Eastern Mediterranean lay in the hands of a single unified power. There was no longer even a heretical Christian state with which to trade if one wanted the luxuries of the orient – the Khardi were the only option, and clever administrators back in Susa, well aware of this fact, raised significant tariffs on these goods. Almost overnight, Mediterranean trade contracted and the economic certainties which had allowed the flourishing of interconnected urban societies across Spain, Italy, Africa and Asia alike collapsed. Many urban centers stopped growing or, in the case of Asia, contracted significantly.

Fear and uncertainty for this new era gripped Europe. Pilgrimage too was as difficult as it had been in the early days of the Eftal. The weak grip of the Khardi on Palestine meant that travelers either had to pay exorbitant fees or risk banditry if they wished to visit Jerusalem. While the loss of Jerusalem to heathens had happened before, it had not occurred in recent memory – and thus the shock was to many a fresh blow. A new generation grew up believing that once again the end times were upon them. The Khardi seemed an imminent threat to the very safety of Europe. Merchants brought back exaggerated tales of atrocities and the conversion of Jerusalem’s churches to pagan temples. While there is no evidence that the latter occurred, atrocities were commonplace. The Khardi armies were by no means exhausted either – Mesopotamia and Syria provided a substantial well of manpower and incursions into Asiana increased as the century wore on.

If the Khardi were in reality very far from Europe, they were much closer to the Asian leagues. Ghorshid, the Satrap of Kilikia, attacked Ikonion several times between 1020 and 1030, each time only barely being repulsed. Ironically, the Ikonian army was primarily Christianized Eftal, and thus while the conflict was often called the “War of the Asian Votives” in practice it resembled an inter-tribal conflict – raid and counter raid with few significant engagements or sieges.

Ghorshid himself was an interesting figure about whom there are many conflicting stories. According to the Greek historians of the time, he had been born in Kappadocia, and taken as a slave during the siege of Nyssa. (His birth name is sometimes given as Isaac) From there he impressed his captors with his literacy and noble bearing, and was adopted into an Eftal family. Some sources call him a Christian Eftal from beyond the Kilikian Gates, others say that he repudiated Christ after being enslaved or was born a pagan. Whatever the case, through capable leadership he managed to become the bitterest enemy of the Hypatate of Ikonion.

When Artaxser I died in 1033, his son Mitradarma II took power. An energetic and enthusiastic young man, Mitradarma felt the need to assert his strong leadership in the face of an increasingly powerful bureaucracy with ties to many important landholding tribes in Mesopotamia. Almost immediately after being crowned, Mitradarma determined to invade Anatolia, and Ghorshid was assigned to lead the vanguard of this invasion force up through Kappadocia and into Asia proper.

Although he was ambitious and proud, Mitradarma did not have the force of will to unite the powerful Satraps and tribal potentates of his country the way his father did. The lofty grandeur which Artaxser had surrounded himself with actually worked to Mitradarma’s disadvantage – he was unable to form personal relationships with the men under his authority. Powerful figures such as Seneqerim Artsruni, the Satrap of Armenia, and Surxab Haraviya, Satrap of Syria, had little regard for Mitradarma. Both of them could claim ancient and prestigious ancestry – in the case of the Artsruni, back to the Assyrian Empire. They saw through the façade of grandeur which Artaxser had carefully constructed around his dynasty and knew them for the upjumped clansmen and mercenaries they had been in the era before the conquests of Mitradarma’s grandfather and namesake.

Accordingly, the invasion, launched in 1035, was a debacle. Seneqerim arrived late, with a mere fraction of the soldiers he had been requested to bring. Most of those who he did bring were Bajinak mercenaries who barely followed orders and frequently rode off to loot. Seeing which way the wind was blowing, he left the army a mere three months into the campaign ostensibly to comfort a concubine unexpectedly taken ill. Once he arrived at home, he began gathering a proper army of Ifthal veterans and Armenian hillmen to his ranks – perhaps expecting to have to fight the Khardi in due time. The Syrian Ifthal, meanwhile, angered at Seneqerim’s abandonment, began to feel that the Khardi distrusted them as well. Accordingly, Surxab Haraviya did not commit them fully when a battle was fought at Mokissos – hanging back until the fight was almost decided and causing heavy casualties among the Khardi foot which could have easily been prevented. Enraged, Mitradarma confronted him and stripped him of his rank – something which would see mass desertions among the Syrian Ifthal.

In spite of these troubles, the Khardi juggernaut was simply too powerful to be defeated. Their army was huge, and composed of some of the finest light cavalry in the world, backed by massive numbers of archers. In a triumph for Iranian military engineering, primitive cannons even saw use at the siege of Ikonion, and when the city fell, few were surprised. Mitradarma, however, did not get to bask in his victory. He unexpectedly fell ill and died a mere week after his twentieth birthday, several months after his conquest of Ikonion. Serfarrokh, his younger brother by five years, was the only obvious candidate to succeed him. He took the throne in 1036, and though he ruled without a regent, important families (including the Haraviya) would dominate his reign.

In the interim, on his deathbed Mitradarma received word that Nikaia and the League of Samos had put aside their differences, and formed an alliance with Galatia and Pontos. The League of Asiana was thus born, and the Nikaian leader was named Protohypatos, or first of the Consuls. It was an alliance of fear and necessity, an alliance only possible because of the sudden decline of Asiana. Furthermore, the Protohypatos, Niketas Pegarios, had been given broad authority to levy taxes and raise men under the new treaty – authority which most wise men of the alliance realized would quickly become monarchical.

Niketas wasted no time. He raised what forces he could, augmenting them with Anglo-Dansk and Frankish mercenaries. Like Ikonion, he declared that his battle against the Khardi would be a Votive War. Unlike the Eftal of Ikonion, it seems that he actually meant it.

Trade and Technology – the “Indian Revolution” continues

From the perspective of outsiders, particularly those in Arabia and West Africa, the period beginning in the eleventh century is often considered one of Bharukacchi, and thus by extension, Chandratreyan, hegemony. However, this is not entirely accurate. On the subcontinent itself, there were a large number of notable ports. Even locally, Bharukaccha had two major rivals, Suryapura and Khambhayat. The latter of these was an ancient city, dating back to the time of the Ptolemies. However, Khambhayat had the misfortune of not being well-situated to take advantage of the profitable Deccan overland and riverine trade, but rather being best situated to export bulk quantities of wheat, iron, horses, and other less valuable commodities from the dry uplands in which it was situated. While this was undoubtedly valuable, it bought Khambhayat a reputation as a poor and less prestigious city which the metropolis would struggle to shake for several centuries, until its harbor would silt up and the city would be largely abandoned.

Bharukaccha, by contrast, had major overseas connections. Its guilds excelled at using the implicit threat of the City’s naval dominance to extort, bully, and cajole others into partnerships, and despite largely being an entrepot with relatively little production of its own (Suryapura was a major textile site, for example) it gradually evolved into a key financial center. “Bharuch, where only ships and gold are made” wrote one Gurjar lord, upon seeing the city’s marketplaces.

To those in India, however, Bharukaccha was very much the second city of Indian commerce. The island of Sri Lanka held its greatest rival, Mahatittha. Ruled by the Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka was one of the greatest mercantile centers in the world, producing all manner of luxury goods and serving as a vital entrepot and financial hub.

Where north India had brought the world the concepts of the Equal-Kingdom and the Ayat after the fall of the Maukhani, it was south India that turned the guilds from simple alliances, social clubs, and trading partnerships into a financial system that would revolutionize the modern world. Guilds which existed purely as moneylending and banking institutions became more prevalent and more prestigious throughout the eleventh century. Adesha, or “papers of credit” – marked with special seals to prove their authenticity, were used to safely carry vast sums of money between various institutions with nothing more than a sheet of carefully printed paper sealed by wax.

Finance changed mercantile trade across India. One Sri Lankan banking family in particular, the Kashyapani, became exceedingly wealthy. While nominally subjects (and financiers) of the ruling Anuradhapuran monarchy, they negotiated private treaties with guilds and nations, establishing their operation across the coastal subcontinent. Wherever Indian merchant craft went, the Kashyapani operated – as far afield as China and the Watya cape. While certain mercantile groups, such as the Nestorian Christians of Koilon, refused to engage with this new system, usury in Hindu and Buddhist religious practice had long been a relative matter, and was frequently only prohibited to certain high caste individuals who refused to engage with commerce in any sense. Substantial economic opportunities abounded for those who were able to pool money for loans or insurance societies.

However, the march of progress was not even or absolute. The Indo-Gangetic plain in particular saw a regression towards monarchy and autocracy with the rise of the Uparika Anapota Durjaya, a leader whose policies would significantly curtail the autonomy of the once great Pancharajyan guilds and lead to a brief period of imperial resurgence.

[And that’s a story for another post.

Apologies for leaving a lot of stuff hanging in this post - the Khardi-Asiana wars and the general collapse of Mediterranean trade, as I've hinted, is setting up how Frankish and Anglish navigators will take matters into their own hands and start exploring. I just ran out of time to explore the rest of the Indian subcontinent.]

 

[Practical Lobster]

Despots and Rajas

Compared to the commercial towns of the coasts, the Ganges basin was not a site of great innovations in the tenth century, and indeed saw some level of decline. While the Tamil corporations expanded under the beneficence of the Chola and the arrangements of the nagaram cities, the Ganges saw no corresponding economic growth. Tribal land confiscation and the growth of large estates were both coming to an end, and while the manufactories and trading centers of the coasts were increasingly competitive, there was little opportunities for further growth. The cities of the Gangetic plain were already swollen with people – great teeming metropolises shipping vast quantities of cargo downriver. The stagnation they experienced was one of efficiencies.

As some have theorized that the relative weakness of Sinic civilization allowed southeast asia to grow into its own, so too did the weakness of the Pancharajya allow its nearby rivals and competitors to prosper. Vanga in particular saw growth. When the Pancharajya descended into anarchy, their own manufactories were forced to pick up the resulting strain. When trade lanes were disrupted, as they sometimes were, it feel to the Vangans and Assamese guilds to provide the finished goods and foodstuffs. Necessity prompted innovation. The guilds hired on new unskilled laborers to staff monstrous new manufactories.

It is best not to think of the Pancharajya as a strong state. Despite its advantages in sheer population and economic power, the divisions which ran through Pancharajya society were strong. Landholders, temples, and important guilds alike all maintained private armies. The abolition of institutions such as separate guild courts and the reassertion of central authority based out of Pataliputra had merely left the entire country on the brink of civil war. In the Pancharajya, the monarchist tracts written several decades previously began to gain traction once more, as guilds and armies alike saw the goshthi bureaucrats as a worrying combination of incompetent and dangerous – not to mention allied with the sprawling temple estates against their influence. Where once the guilds had repudiated the very notion of Kingship, preferring to take direct power into their own hands, they began to see that the bureaucrats could only be counterbalanced by the same strong central authority that they had traditionally advocated for.

Anapota Durjaya had his origins as a priest’s son, who through favoritism gained a position in the bureaucracy – first as a scribe, and later as a chief record-keeper for the courts. Given his position, he should have turned towards the goshthi, but he was born in an era where many powerful guilds were being dismantled by the bureaucracy, their assets seized by government officials to enhance private estates or in lavish donations to the temples. This corruption angered Anapota, and accordingly he resigned his position and sought a position in politics – which he gained, ironically, with the support of a temple faction. Once in the Ayat, however, he played a subtle game – accumulating power to lackeys and supporters who owed him personal favors. Many historians condemn this as hypocrisy, but it may have simply been an astute understanding that politics in Kannauj depended on such strategies.

Ultimately, he was able to win a seat in the great council at Pataliputra, and shortly thereafter accumulate titles and ranks.

The guilds realized that Anapota was unique. He opposed the goshthi while being from outside the corporate structure. He had the support of a wide range of landholders and his own private soldiery. They threw their support behind him in exchange for favors and influence, hoping that in the upcoming elections he might be named Uparika or perhaps would head a Ministry. In Anapota they saw a chance to undo half a century of humiliations at the hands of the bureaucratic-temple alliance. Harita Sumanatha, a Brahmin and a prominent speaker in the Ayat in favor of the goshthi, gave a powerful oration against the rise of Anapota Durjaya and his faction. However, in a narrow vote, Anapota was appointed Uparika in the year 1019.

Anapota only had a tentative grasp on power. The loose coalition which had brought him into office was already fracturing, and he had made many impossible promises of land and title to various factions in order to achieve his position. But he was an astute politician. He went to his principle backers and claimed that the rewards they had been promised were impossible without more of his people in the Ayat. Accordingly, he requested that a vote be held to create hundreds of additional seats – that he could stack the field with his own partisans. While it was a motion of questionable legality, he went to Harita Sumanatha, won the famed orator to his side by promising the temple faction a third of the newly created seats. Hundreds of recently-founded temples would be invested with formal privileges in the Ayat system.

What they did not realize is that by the time the motion had passed, Anapota was able to stack the Ayat with people who owed nothing except to him. He became impossible to remove from power. Shortly thereafter, he staged an attack on his person by mercenaries who “confessed” to working with the prominent Trilinga Goshthi society, and he utilized the ensuing outrage to carry out mass arrests of “traitors” and “dissidents” who sought to weaken his position. Harita was forced to flee to Vanga. Most of his enemies were exceedingly wealthy landholders and those who coincidentally had long voted against him – their removal turned the Ayat further into a rubber-stamp organization. Whenever private individuals were arrested or exiled, Anapota also made sure to buy up their private armies – swelling his own forces and paying for them out of the state treasury. Effectively the state now had two armies – the official guild forces which notionally were in service to the five confederal cities of the Pancharajya, and his own paramilitary forces.

By this point, Anapota was thinking not of the corruption of the bureaucrats but of his own monarchal ambitions. Next, he turned on the powerful trading guilds, revoking antique privileges and charters with the same impunity that the bureaucratic faction had. His own base of support had dwindled, of course. The newly privileged landholders, however, their estates made up of confiscated land, supported him wholeheartedly. As he played a devout and selfless man, the temples, Hindu and Buddhist alike, tolerated him, and the bureaucracy was toothless and packed with sycophants after his purges. The only force that remained capable of fighting him was the guild armies, and those were divided.

The guild armies of the Pancharajya were not the armies of the late Maukhani era. Their role had increasingly become that of a glorified police force. In foreign campaigns they had a poor record at best, in no small part because the Pancharajya simply had no rivals worthy of the name and thus there was little motivation to be anything more than a passable field army. However, as an aristocratic martial elite who had trained since childhood in the arts of war and could afford all the finest arms and armor, this weakness was more out of a desire to avoid unnecessary loss of life than true incompetence.

Anapota played off this aversion to open battle. He promised the army that life would remain essentially as it was while at the same time forming his own army, a mix of the newly entitled landholders and a professional army based around a corps of mercenaries paid out of the stolen treasury. Soon, the guild armies found themselves outmaneuvered and his forces stormed their barracks and palaces, torching them and capturing many unprepared guild soldiers who assumed that Anapota would not act while negotiations were still ongoing.

Now sole ruler, Anapota gradually gathered to himself the trappings of monarchy, but he did not go so far as to claim Kingship outright. To do so would invite a whole host of additional responsibilities both religious and otherwise which he preferred to leave in the hands of officeholders and the temples. By the year 1021, he had absolute power, and would hold it for fifteen years. He was a particularly lucky sort of tyrant, all things considered. The particular form of autocracy which he practiced lacked formal trappings of any sort, and after crushing his major enemies he took exacting pains to be as inoffensive as possible while promising vicious reprisals to those who opposed him.

It took a generation for the system to wholly collapse, but the cracks were showing long beforehand. The Chandela clan of Khajuravahaka joined the Chandratreya dynasty, whose power rose as they expanded their hegemony to the very borders of the Pancharajya. They made alliances with the cities and temples of Vanga, taking advantage of the total distraction of the five cities to gain power at their expense.

In 1032, this lead to war. Anapota launched vicious attacks against the Vanga, capturing many cities along the flooded length of the Ganges and using his riverine fleet to great effect. Then he marched south, subduing the Chandela Kingdom until in 1034 he was defeated at the battle of the Son river by a massive Chandratreya army. The Jharkhand region, long oppressed and partitioned by temples and guilds alike, rose up as well, massacring Pancharajya garrisons. It would fall into Utkaladesha’s sphere of influence.

It would only take two more years for Anapota’s regime to collapse, but in that time he managed to pass away in his sleep and in doing so die peacefully. However, his body received no honors and was ultimately left for the buzzards by a confused and mutinying army. Anapota did nothing to ensure a successful dynasty or legacy for himself, and with his death the whole Ganges was in near anarchy. So many of the traditional power structures had been neutered. So many proud establishments were broken and useless in the aftermath of the Uparika’s reign of terror.

The Ayat was a near useless institution at this point, and the guilds and bureaucrats were neutered. One of the few forces that could keep order were the mercenary soldiers hired by Anapota, and indeed as soon as the period of anarchy ended, a “barbarian” king from the mountains named Vijaykama Kirata rose out of obscurity. Leading a small cohort of mercenaries, he claimed himself Raja of Kosala, permanently breaking the Pancharajya. With only four kingdoms remaining, the central Ayat in Pataliputra was disbanded and Magadha’s chancellor, Achyuta, was named King. The southern cities fell under the dominion of the southern Maharaja Vishnumitra Chandela, and Panchala came to be ruled as a republic under the mystic Minanatha. In general, while Ayats and guilds remained a part of life, monarchies under military strongmen became the order of the day, a situation that would last until the end of the century.

 

[Practical Lobster]

India

Gandhara – centered around Purusapura, the wealthy “city of men”, Gandhara is a country of stunning mountains and valleys. While nominally a republic (or more accurately an equal-kingdom) after repulsing a full-scale Kipchak invasion in 911, the Bitihrota family has maintained off and on dominance over the state – turning the position of “Prime Minister” into an almost hereditary office. Gandharan politicians have a reputation throughout India and Iran for being clannish and nepotistic, one which has led to the common innuendo “In the Gandharan manner” being used to describe any sort of corrupt family politics.

Gandhara’s less than enviable position at the very gates of the subcontinent has forced them to maintain one of the finest armies in the region. The Gandharan councils can raise hundreds of war elephants and tens of thousands of guild-warriors augmented by Afghan and Turkic tribal auxiliaries. Over time, these Turko-Afghan warriors, called Sahputi, have gained increasing authority at the expense of the guilds. Their knowledge of the hilly country of Afghanistan has proved invaluable in countering ambitious Khardi Satraps, and although they cannot hold political office, the Sahputi have become a military caste in their own right, settled across the the frontier.

At the dawn of the 12th century, Gandhara is a wealthy and proudly independent country. After centuries of Aghatsaghid rule, they have finally become prosperous in their own right, building enormous hydraulic works to maintain alpine rice fields and enormous, decadent temples and stupa across the mountainsides of their equal-kingdom.

Sindh – With the collapse of the Dauwa regime in 1057, Sindh was left in a short-lived state of anarchy. Gandhara proved too weak and disinterested to fix the power vacuum their wars had created. After crushing the last Dauwa monarch in pitched battle, they simply abandoned the country to its own devices. What emerged in the aftermath was a curious hybrid state based on Multan. Alternately called Sindh or Trigarta, this new kingdom was founded by a local warlord named Sansar Chand and by 1082 had reunited Sindh under his authority.

Sansar Chand tore down the Dauwa state bureaucracy and expelled the foreign mercenaries entirely. A pious and devout man, he gave most of the conquered estates to local community temples, founding sangha wherever he went. The new Sindh is accordingly a sort of theocratic merchant republic, albeit one with a powerful dynasty at its head.

Chandratreya Empire – In 1100, the Chandratreya Empire is quite possibly the richest and most powerful empire in the world. While it has had a series of royal capitals, such as rock-cut Elapura and Manyakheta, it is the coastal cities of this vast decentralized Empire where true power lies. Ruled by a Great King of Kings, the Chandratreya have never embraced the concept or structure of the equal-kingdoms which are so commonplace in post-Revolution India. While guilds and republican city-states abound along the coastal regions, their heartland in the Deccan is an agglomeration of directly administered royal territory and companies, and the periphery of their state is guarded by numerous vassal kings.

The royal councilors and adminstrators are often drawn from guild ranks, but the Chandratreya keep their own army, drawn from their vassals and their own professional forces. They distrust armed guilds and prefer to force the merchant guilds to use their soldiers and navy rather than allowing them to keep private forces. This in particular has kept the Chandratreya state from becoming subsumed to the interests of powerful financial factions. Ruling a vast portion of the subcontinent, the collapse of the Pancharajya has left Maharaja Sharva Chandratreya the most powerful man in India, a power broker in the conflicts between the Gangetic kingdoms. However, some whisper that his Jain minister Kannara holds real power, or that he is nothing more than a hedonistic lout madly obsessed with his wife Vijarma.

Chandratreya society, unlike large parts of medieval India, has unprecedented social mobility. The “Sixteen Castes” are all capable of owning land and property, and while certain rules and customs dictate their place in religious observances, in day to day commerce or the civil service people can rise from exceptionally lowly origins to positions of high rank. The language of the court and learned men is increasingly the vernacular Kannada language, and in this sense the Chandratreya have encouraged regionalism of a sort.

Chola – the Chola are first among equals in the great patchwork of south Indian dynasties, ruling over the Pallava, Hoysala and others. Innovators in the field of finance and commerce, their nagaram corporations have influence far and wide. In 1100, they are ruled by Virarajendra Chola, an ambitious ruler who has done much to expand Chola influence over Andhra at the expense of the mighty northern Chandratreya.

The Chola regime has never faced the sorts of difficulties experienced by their northern counterparts. In the south, Equal-Kingdoms are a strange and unwelcome notion. The guilds have prospered in no small part because they lack direct political ambitions, and accordingly spend their energy outwards rather than on self-defeating quests at internal authority. The Chola do not have an Ayat of their own, although traditionally the large corporations have always had the ear of the monarch.

Utkaladesha – after the rebellion of 947, Utkaladesha began to slip into the Chola orbit. Her guilds were prosperous but not so rich that they could avoid being bought out or subverted by powerful Tamil and Vangali organizations. Accordingly, although Utkaladesha remains an equal-kingdom of no little importance, the goshthi faction which dominates in the Ayat is in many senses a puppet to powerful foreign influences. This has not prevented Utkaladesha from expanding into the tribal areas to the north, land seizures which have granted the bureaucratic scholar-gentry more power.

Andhra – Another vassal of the Chola, the Andhran city of Narayanaksherta is now the capital of Andhra, having eclipsed the ancient site of Vinukonda. Narayanaksherta is now the seat of Ayat and answers directly to the Chola monarch. A puppet King has been placed on the throne of Andhra, belonging to the inconsequential Arinjaya Kalapalar, a rubber-stamp for the actions of the Ayat and the Chola guilds.

However, Andhra has become a country divided. Vengipura, the proud ancient capital remains in the hands of the landholding guilds and is an equal-kingdom of its own under the rule of a “viceroy” named Siyata Khottiga. Khottiga’s Vengipuran holdings have become an armed camp of sorts. Since 1080, he has embarked on a substantial program of fortification, shoring up the walls of Vengipura and establishing the Ayat at a new fortified palace-hall cut into a nearby hill. This fortified palace is said to have sufficient granaries and cisterns to survive for five years if besieged, and to be connected by underground tunnels to the city itself.

While open war has been rare lately, Narayanaksherta has been buying up immense quantities of firepowder and Arabian horses, and according to rumor they hope to destroy Vengipura. However, they dare not move without the backing of the Chola, because Vengipura has a powerful patron in the form of the local Chandratreya Uparika.

Magadha – The famous birthplace of empires survived Anapota’s reign relatively intact. A seat of culture, philosophy, and technological innovation since the Gupta era, Magadha is now once more an independent kingdom under Kaivarta Soumitri, the son of a former general of Achyuta who rose to power after the death of the latter man in 1062. Pataliputra remains one of the largest cities on the subcontinent, comparable in population to most of its great rivals and yet far more prestigious. A “city clotted with palaces” in the words of the Chinese adventurer Zhao Li, Pataliputra is also home to some of the greatest Buddhist monasteries in the world.

Day to day management of Magadha is the province of local Ayat councils – Magadha remains an equal-kingdom in that sense. However executive authority is wholly concentrated in the various adopted princes of the Soumitri dynasty, who have broad purview to act extrajudicially. The general populace has no recourse other than appealing directly to the monarch, a complicated process which can only be done through the Ayat. Magadha has fought three wars with the city of Tamralipta, the last of which conquered the city and brought much of Vanga under Magadhan control. Notably, Kaivarta Soumitri is an atheist, a member of a latter Carvaka sect which holds that nothing exists which cannot be observed. This has won him little love from the great universities and monasteries of his kingdom.

Kosala – The Kirata dynasty rules Kosala as an effectively feudal state, having conquered an outsized realm far beyond the traditional boundaries of Kosala. Ayodhya, an ancient and powerful city, serves as their capital, and their kingdom is one of the strongest and wealthiest of the Pancharajya successor states. The Kirata, being a Nepalese warrior clan from the mountains, have brought a certain martial spirit to their kingdom that their rivals typically lack. They are fortress-builders and have used these fortresses to turn themselves into a landed aristocracy not so different from the feudal retainers of Europe or Japan.

Hiring mercenaries from as far afield as the Sahputs of Afghanistan, they have won battle after battle against the guild armies of Magadha and Panchala. Their military tactics, however, are beginning to look outdated in a world where any peasant can be trained to hold a fire-spear or a hand-cannon. Furthermore, their rival guilds have begun adapting tactically, as well as hiring more freely and expanding their numbers immensely. The battle of Kampilya in 1099 is a perfect example of the decline of the Kosala – the Panchala guilds took cover behind quickly erected wooden ramparts and decimated a Kirata charge with firespears and their famed longbows.

Panchala – Republican tradition is preserved among Panchala, a league of cities sometimes called the Three Kingdoms. Here, as in Surasena, the Ayats have remained dominant, and they elect viceroys and ministers rather than kings. Panchala has been on the rise for the past several generations, as their guild armies have adapted, hiring thousands of fresh soldiers and importing large numbers of horses from Iran. Lately they have been winning battle after battle, reducing the Kirata and the republic of Surasena in the process.

Surasena – Centered on the holy Yamuna river, Surasena is a deeply religious country, one with a reputation for mysticism. Having lost many wars against Panchala, it is also an unstable one, ruled by a succession of petty despots. Mathura, its capital, is a place under effective mob rule, and many educated people have called for a union with Panchala, and a restoration of the Pancharajya, under which the people prospered.

Pajcanada – The Country of the Five Rivers, which the Iranians called Panjab, is assuredly one of the most long-suffering of the Indian states. It has long been a land of petty kingdoms, foreign conquerors, and most recently Gandharan dominion. However, in 1046,the city of Lohawar broke free of the Gandharan yoke and has pressed Gandhara back towards the mountains, gaining control of the Sutlej and Ravi rivers. Pajcanada, ruled by the native Panwarawat dynasty, does not have the prestige of many of its rivals. They are seen as upstarts and rebels, tillers of the soil whose country sits wedged between far greater powers.

Lohawar itself has grown substantially in the past thirty years, expanding to cope with the exigencies of the large kingdom it now finds itself ruling. In contrast to the Gandharans, whose regime is increasingly preoccupied with threats from the West, it exists in relative safety – most of Pajcanada’s neighbors are distracted and weak.

Vrji – a long suffering buffer state between the Kirata of Kosala and the Soumitri of Magadha, Vrji has had her borders systematically disrespected over the last seventy years to the point that her Ayat barely controls any territory outside of the city of Vaisali. Currently, the Vrji Ayat pays heavy tribute to the Kirata, and her walls are manned by Kirata soldiers.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Arabia

Aden – The “beautiful sails” of South Arabia all come to dock in Aden. The children of Himyar still dwell in the town which has existed since the dawn of time itself, but Aden is a cosmopolitan and peninsular city now. Jains and Buddhists live among Jews and Pagans, and there is a thriving Egyptian and Indian community.

South Arabia looks to Africa and the East for wealth and opportunity. The collapse of the Hawiya has forced them to seek close relations with the people of Pazudesada along the Savahila coast. From Africa and the Isle of the Moon come the Zanj slaves who work the spice plantations of the interior, where changing environmental conditions have allowed some reservoirs to finally replenish.

The Malik of Aden is himself a Jew, but his sect is peculiar, accepting reincarnation as part of his God’s plan. And while the Malik may answer to the Hadhrami, he does so only begrudgingly, dreaming of the day when the world’s oldest city might one day throw off its shackles and spread its wings.

Hadhramut – The Hadhramut once were the greatest merchants in the world, and they are acutely aware of this fact. Nowdays, of course, they are not the greatest merchants in the world. If any in Arabia claim that title, it is the prosperous cities of the Gulf or perhaps Aden to the southwest. However, they do still have some prestige. Their desert monasteries are the center of Buddhism in Arabia, and they still do excellent trade with Asia. Hadhrami sailors are considered some of the best in the world, even if their ship designs have adopted Chinese and Indian innovations, and their ships are more often than not owned by Adeni aristocrats or Bharukacchan guilds.

Al-Taif - Arabia has had something of a crisis of identity since the collapse of Saihism. While its adherents saw the dawn of the Saihist movement and the revelations of their prophetess as a great and transformative moment in Arab history, the benefit of hindsight has placed the Saihist cult among the great religious upheavals in the wake of Eftal collapse.

Al-Taif remains the greatest city in the Hejaz, a region which as it has ever been is deeply divided. Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and pagans live side by side – here the great conflicts are between tribal groups. Identity is based on kinship, and with the fracturing of the community of believers, Saihism is no more compelling than any other cult. With the fall of Saihism, many of the protections for women that it allowed have gradually begun to roll back. Divorce has become a trickier matter, particularly among the growing minority of Christian converts.

An old Arabic saying says “Prophethood is cheap. Conviction is costly.” Nowhere is that more true than the Hejaz, where many have claimed the mantle of divine inspiration, to speak for Buddha or Christ or any number of pagan deities. However, if prophethood is cheap, it is also appealing. The overland trade routes themselves have become far less valuable in recent years. Warfare between tribal groups is endemic, and people seek inspiration and escape where they can.

The cities of the Gulf – Mazun and Dilmun are the chief potentates of the Gulf, but all of the many city-states of the region are loosely aligned around a single inescapable fact – they owe their very existence to the mercy of the Khardi and Bharukaccha, and should either of those two mighty patrons turn against them they would cease to be with remarkable swiftness.

However, Arabia remains a port of escape for the Nestorian Asorig populations who were capable of fleeing Mesopotamia. Accordingly, eastern Arabia is filled with Christians and Zoroastrians, far in excess of any other religious group, even if these outsiders do often pray at the temples of the Fisher-God and other traditional pagan shrines for the political benefits.

In almost every sense, these are weak powers, but they perform a vital role as mercantile stopovers and a source of rare pearls.


[I agree with Bmao. In particular there's not necessarily any reason for an equivalent nomadic conqueror to be as devastating as the Mongols either, even if they do enjoy sweeping successes.]

 

[Practical Lobster]

North Africa

Masamida – North Africa’s states and territorial borders are effectively calcified. Warfare between the Berber kingdoms is for the first time in centuries extremely rare. The Agilld of Masamida and his peers see themselves as a sort of confederation of brother tribes. Those who have opposed this harmonious union have generally suffered for it.

Masamida is the most prosperous of the Berber states, having a direct route across the Sahara both overland and by sea. The three main trade goods that come across the desert are salt, gold, and slaves, but all manner of goods travel across the desert and enterprising clans have made them rich beyond their wildest dreams.

The Masamida themselves have begun moving beyond the kinship-based trappings of tribal society and towards a more centralized monarchy, as have the other Berber tribes. By 1100 this is a process well under way. The Agilld rules with near absolute authority, and while the army is still called up in accordance with old tribal customs, the practice of recruiting and maintaining “slave soldiers” is growing – armies of black warriors directly employed by the state and freed after a contract of twenty years.

Iktamen – If Masamida is the most prosperous, the Iktamen are perhaps the weakest. Despite what should be a strong position, they have been cut out of the overland trade by an alliance between the Masamida and many prominent Taureg clans. Accordingly they only get a fraction of the trade revenue of their supposed “brothers” to the west.

Iktamen accordingly has a reputation for being a land of brigands and raiders, wild and unruly mercenaries and pirates. The Agilld rules out of the city of Icosi but his power is distinctly limited. He does not have a private slave army to support his ambitions, but instead tries to strike corrupt bargains with local raider-clans. Icosi itself has a well-deserved reputation as a den of sin, inequity, and piracy. To quote the Italian traveler, womanizer, and (eventually) mercenary Niccolo Cosca, who travelled there in 1089, it is “a canker sore on the mouth of our mother sea; to revisit time and again gives pleasure but only increases one’s later suffering.”

Iswaiyen – The Agilld of Iswaiyen is married to the sister of the Iznagen king, and accordingly the two realms in 1100 are incredibly closely allied. The notion of “brother kings” here is not a fiction but rather a potent reality. Iswaiyen has a reputation for being a land of magicians and strange gods – it boasts incredibly light Mauri settlement, in no small part because it suffered the most from the decline of African agriculture several centuries back. Accordingly there are few Christians in the whole of Iswaiyen, and the Iswaiyeni themselves are almost universally pagans.

Iznagen – The Mauri themselves hailed from the western part of North Africa, but you would not know it now. Nowdays, those who have not packed their bags and sailed to Christendom live in Carthago and its environs. Accordingly, the Iznagen rule a surprisingly urban and Christian realm, and the only state which is at all comparable in power with the Masamida. Despite their distance and the presence of two potent buffer states, the Iznagen have a sort of friendly rivalry with the Masamida.

In Carthago, coins pay tribute to holy Isau, son of God, but outside the suburban sprawl of the city, and even in rival cities such as Hifo and Buna, local gods predominated, often worshiped alongside the Christian God or as angels or saints.

Hawwaya – Unlike their western counterparts, the Hawwaya have no one King, and have not for a century and a half. Their realm, the sprawling expanse of Libya and its many oasis states, is fractured into rival clans. Water here is life, as agriculture is extremely limited.

Hawwaya has a reputation for lawless anarchy even greater than that of the Iktamen, but it also controls the trade routes between North Africa and Kanem. By the death of Dunama Kay, they had splintered into a variety of independent oasis cities each under their own king. Despite some consolidation among the magistrates of coastal cities, generally the Hawwaya have remained a tribal group in chaos – at once too poor and too violent to worry about directly annexing.

Christianity has made significant inroads among the Hawwaya as well, although it is as often as not the apocalyptic heresy of the Kanem Students. Dalai Christianity, as it is commonly known, is the faith of desert raiders and bandits who see themselves as bringing purity to the unbelievers, and accordingly can justify any atrocity. Because of the Dalai, if for no other reason, most traders prefer to travel along the safe trade lanes kept by Taureg merchants.

Cyrene – In 1068, Cyrene was brought under the control of the Iranian Empire by the Khardi general Jehatmihra Kakavand, bringing an abrupt end to the short-lived Igiderid dynasty. Kakavand’s nephew Farrokh was installed as the new Shah of the region, and given a small garrison force with which to maintain order. By 1097, however, most of the garrison was recalled to deal with a full-scale Makurian invasion of Egypt, and an Igiderid pretender, Amanar, returned at the head of a column of bandits, executing Farrokh Kakavand and restoring his family’s control over the region.

Amanar has become a near-messianic folk hero in recent times. While it is impossible to prove if he is actually a relation of the original Igiderids, he has certainly been welcomed as one. After the failure of the Makurian invasion, he has begun amassing soldiers, including many Votivists from Europe and Dalai from among the Hawwaya, as part of his ambition to reconquer Egypt for Christianity.

Whether or not he will be able to do so remains to be seen.

The Votives of the 11th Century

Protohypatos Niketas found himself in a deceptively strong position. As the Khardi fell into internal squabbling, a cousin of Seneqerim Artsruni, the Armenian Satrap, had been left in command of Ikonion. Seneqerim’s cousin, Amasi Mardir, who actually proved to be a capable tactician – but one who could not command the loyalty of the Ifthal or indeed any of the Khardi aristocracy, owing to his low birth. Mitradarma had blundered by thinking that the Khardi leadership would support Amasi after his death, and Serfarrokh, now the Padishah, blundered in not removing him from command and replacing him with a better-liked captain.

Niketas was able to reach out to the western world for support and arms. In particular, this meant soliciting the assistance of men such as the famed Italian mercenary general Stefano Cosca[1], captain of the Red Hand Company, and Sven Twosnakes, an Anglo-Dansk captain with a company of axe-wielding mercenaries. Volunteers streamed in from Europe as well, sewing crosses onto their clothes and painting their shields with the Chi Rho. Altogether, he was able to assemble quite the impressive army – perhaps fifty thousand men at its peak.

It should be no surprise that the Protohypatos won victory after victory. Ikonion was retaken in a whirlwind campaign. The Khardi were caught flat-footed, and Shah Artaxser II, young and isolated in his capital, surrounded by flatterers and schemers, was not the man to rescue their Empire after the disasters which followed. His response was tepid and mostly involved sending weak generals piecemeal for the Asian armies to annihilate.

Niketas, meanwhile, went from strength to strength. In 1040 he personally oversaw the annexation of Alania, and shortly thereafter after a triumphal march through Nikaia he was proclaimed Basileus by his soldiers in what was undoubtedly a premeditated event designed to have the appearance of spontaneous acclamation. The various Hypatoi at first refused to acknowledge Niketas as a King, and Niketas himself refused the title out of false humility and a desire to maintain his political position. However, after another successful campaign, striking deep into Syria, briefly capturing Emesa, and threatening Khardi control over Palestine, the Hypatoi could not resist. They placed a crown on his head and once that was done, Asia would never be the same.

In deference to the Franks, who were at least notional allies of his Votive War, Niketas refused to take the title “Emperor of the Romans” calling himself “Emperor in Asia” instead. However the symbolism was clear enough. Once again there was an Emperor in the East. Asia, however disunited it might be beneath the surface, was once again a force to be reckoned with. In 1042, the Iranians made peace with Asia, paying a single indemnity and acknowledging borders which allowed them to retain control of Kappadocia, Cilicia, and Armenia. Many of the Votive rank-and-file were shocked by the treaty. Had they not once come so perilously close to recapturing Jerusalem itself? Had they not beaten the heathen at every turn?

They had, but they were also broke. Extorting money from the Iranians was actually the only way Niketas could pay the massive debts Nikaia and he himself had accumulated waging the war. Even as Emperor, his state suffered from deep divisions. After the first few years, Samos, no longer under direct threat, had begun minimizing its tribute, claiming poor harvests and disrupted trade. Others had followed suit, and despite his political dominance he was forced to swallow his tongue and accept a sort of defeat.

A second major campaign which is often associated with the Votive Wars was the immense but ultimately pointless battle of the Cataract, wherein the Makurian army was destroyed in a failed invasion of Egypt during the reign of the Khardi Shah Artaxser IV.

The increasing weakeness and regionalism of the Khardi Empire hinted at dissolution, but at the same time, the Empire proved shockingly resilient. Even as they gained further power, the prominent generals and satraps of the western and eastern frontiers alike resisted outside incursions. In 1076, a Turkic army led by the Imur clan was defeated. In 1083, the Afghan rebellion ended in a mediated peace that kept Baktria as part of the Empire.

The Iranshah would not be so easily destroyed, whatever the ambitions of their lean and hungry neighbors. Ultimately their collapse would be internal – over the course of the twelfth century an increasingly isolated and feeble succession of Padishahs began handing out monarchial titles like candy. Their final destruction would be a very prolonged process, but even in this early period events like the Imur war hinted at fundamental weaknesses and a porous eastern border which was not rectified by isolated garrison-towns.

[1] Stefano Cosca is perhaps most famous as the father of Niccolo Cosca, writer of adolescent accounts of life as a caravan guard in North Africa and particularly well-knownfor his role as an adventurer in the New World. However, for a brief period in his early thirties he commanded a mercenary company in the Asiatic Votives, experience that would prove vital to his later career and would ensure that his prodigal son had a wide range of contacts across the Mediterranean, and sufficient finances to go adventuring.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Central and East Asia

Oghuz Khaganate – Often better known as the Afsar Khaganate, the Oghuz Khaganate is a confederation of Turkic peoples that stretches from the Kitai Empire in the East to Kundajid and Iran in the West. Loosely united and dominated by the interests of the twelve tribes, all of which can claim relation to the broader Oghuz ethnic group, the Oghuz Khanagate is not exactly a strong state. The Afsar rule by consensus and many young men leave their clans to become mercenaries for the Xasar or the Ifthal, which is becoming an increasing problem in preserving the strength of their confederates. Even when these men return, as they sometimes do, laden with treasury and tall tales of victories over the mail-clad western princes, they bring with them disruptive ideas and foreign brides, often causing chaos. Times are changing for the Oghuz.

They have many vassals, particularly in the east – most notably the Naiman, Merkit, and Jalayr clans who together form the “three blood loyal” a coalition which at times has rejected the rule of the Turks and tried to establish for themselves a Mongol Confederation. In 1087 they were defeated at the battle of the Onon River, and since then have not had the same strength they once did. Now they are mostly content to provide a frontier against Jurchen and Kitai raiding parties.

However, the Onon River and its associated campaign demonstrated the weakness of the Afsar even in victory – as the Khagan proved incapable of restraining his subordinates and vassals. The more the Afsar settle along the rivers of Xvarasm and seek to centralize, the weaker their hegemony becomes – and by 1100 they are very much a settled tribe, with capital cities and great palaces. Reconciling this society and the past century of luxury with the hard life of a nomadic Khaganate is never an easy task. It was the Khirichan who came closest to doing so, but ultimately their model has proven tough to replicate on the more open steppe of Central Asia.

Kitai (Yaol Dynasty) – by the standards of Chinese dynasties, there is a sense of unprecedented arrogance in the Kitai. Successors to the Uighur Khaganate, they have been far more willing to compromise both culturally and politically with the Han majority and in doing so have created a stable empire.

The Kitai are a Buddhist regime which like many of their steppe cousins incorporates syncretic elements of traditional religion. Accordingly, they have granted unprecedented power to the Buddhist temples, a paradigm shift from the persecutions of the Qi. Instead it is the Taoist “mystery cults” which are persecuted, considered a threat and a source of resentment. Clothes and symbols which are part of traditional Chinese religion have been banned outright, allowing the government to easily target those who do not obey their decrees.

Tianzuo of the Yaol is the current Emperor, and he resides in the Great Palace at Kaifeng. There he is surrounded by beautiful songbirds and gardens measureless to man. From the north come Jurchen and Uighur potentates to pay tribute to him, and he no longer calls himself “North King” but, as his father before him, considers himself Emperor.

Despite all their palatial grandeur, the Yaol have some critical weaknesses. They have not been able to gain the merest foothold in the Tarim Basin. In 1081 a joint alliance of the Viasha and the Turfan were able to repel a Yaol invasion. Furthermore, the two major Yangtze states of Wu and Chu remain stubbornly independent and beyond their control, despite the best efforts of the Emperor.

Wu – The Wu kingdom is a major center of manufacturing, controlling most of the ports along the eastern coast of China and the mouth of the Yangtze. It is from Wu that most finished goods come, particularly the famed lacquerware which has made many a merchant wealthy. With the destruction of the Red Standard army, Wu has become something a prosperous, if traditionalist realm.

The Wu army is vastly inferior to that of its Kitai rivals – and indeed the survival of the Wu can be traced more to defensive strategy and a denante with Chu which has ensured they need not fear a two-front war.

Chu – After defeating Tibet, Chu has had few successes worthy of the name. A succession of generals have ruled Chu since that day. Unlike the Wu, Chu has become a very martial state, holding defensible mountainous uplands in excess and fortifying them well. Unlike Wu it has less to fear from the Kitai, but the Yaol dynasty is still the overriding defensive concern, and according Chu has never moved against Wu – maintaining the rough stalemate into the 12th century.

Buddhism is popular in Chu as well, but the people of Chu are very traditional – a mixture of the Hakka exiles from the north and a variety of indigenous peoples including the diverse ethnic groups of the mountainous Yunnan region. Each valley and mountain is said to keep its own rituals and culture, all separate from the Han influenced court rituals at Chengdu

Tai – The Tai are a curious people, deeply influenced by Hindu traders and merchants from Srivijaya as well as the Sinic settler population with which they coexist. To the Chinese their realm is either called the South Kingdom or the Daiya.

The ruler of the “South Kingdom” is an ambitious conquer named Xaysetta or Gaozong. Unlike his northern counterparts, the Tai rule more along the lines of the tribal mandala system used by the Khmer and others. There is a feudal sensibility to their rule as well – fortified villas are commonplace along the hills of the south, and they control the mountainous river valleys which define the geography of the region.

Tibet – In 1035, the Bod Empire finally collapsed. Despite a long-standing alliance between the Chu and the Bod, their pact collapsed due to border struggles, and after a series of major battles in which it seemed the Bod might triumph, Rhasa was sacked by a Chu army. The Bod Emperor was carried back to the Chu capital and the Empire was left in utter disarray.

Since that time, Tibet has been a nation in disarray. Local temples and tribal patriarchs control her mountains and valleys. Artistically and philosophically, it is a nation in retreat, uncertain of its new place in the world. The Buddhist sects which predominate teach utter detachment from the material world, and encourage many of the finest thinkers and teachers to isolate themselves in distant monastic communities. Suffering, after all, is the nature of things. The Empire is gone. There is no glory any longer, and the great halls of Rhasa lie barren and ash-filled. The splendor of Kings is transitory.

What is there now for the children of Bod?

 

[Practical Lobster]

Frankish Empire – The Frankish Empire is a strange and polyglot beast. At the turn of the century, millions of Europeans and the vast majority of Christendom live and die beneath the banner of the Frankish Emperors, all of whom, with the exception of Majorian, have borne the name of Aloysius. In 1100, the Frankish Empire is ruled by Aloysius X, a boy-king whose power and authority are severely curtailed by the rise of powerful factions both temporal and ecclesiastical within his dominion. Despite the geographical factors which would argue against a united Europe, and many particularist tendencies throughout the Empire, the Franks have manufactured an enduring dominion by combining their martial prowess with many elements Roman administration.

The great dukes and other high nobles of the realm are actually not the great holders of power within the Frankish Empire. The Frankish elite have a long memory of the anarchy of several centuries past, before succession was stabilized and when the landholders had all the power. Accordingly, only a select few vassals are actually powerful figures in their own right. Mostly, power is concentrated in the vast Imperial court, where there now reside thousands of Palatine counts and magistrates. These officials run the feudal bureaucracy of the Empire, travelling around local circuits dispensing justice and resolving disputes. Theirs is an essentially hereditary profession, and accordingly they have become an entrenched class, dependent on royal largesse for their salaries.

The eleventh century has been good to the Franks. Viking raids are almost unheard of, and peace has seen unprecedented amounts of riverine trade and the further growth of European cities. Prosperity has even reached the peasant classes, who enjoy better diets and greater safety than they have in centuries. There have been no Empire-wide wars, merely local border skirmishes, and even the Xasar marches enjoyed a relatively quiet century.

If there is any fear, it seems to be that this state of prosperity cannot last forever. The profound optimism of the eleventh century also hides serious divisions within the Frankish state. Tinanian heresy has grown unchecked since Aloysius VI unofficially put a stop to the show trials across Italy and Southern France. Many within the Imperial court themselves hold beliefs that could be considered Tinanian, and despite a fresh round of persecutions in the 1070s, the heresy has endured - although after the latest persecutions it is primarily an underground movement. The push for new Patriarchates across Europe has also caused uncertainty. Despite little progress being made, the Archbishops of Koln and Paris remain outspoken proponents of a reform of Church hierarchy.

(Francia) Francia itself is the beating heart of the Empire. The vast Imperial demesne supports a massive population and is wealthy enough on its own to support the Royal bureaucracy. The Franks themselves are the most loyal subjects, at least by reputation – they provide the heavily armored and mounted forces which are the vanguard of any Frankish war. For the bulk of European nobility, marrying into the Frankish elite is essential, as the Franks enjoy the most privileges. Their sons have the easiest time gaining prestigious court titles or spots in the clergy.

(Germania) The Germans tire of Frankish dominion. The story of the eleventh century might be seen by an uncharitable observer as the Frankish Emperors struggling to resolve administrative crises relating to the Germans. Perhaps, however, German rebelliousness is not unjustified. Italy and France continue to gain most of the favors, and Ispana enjoys benign neglect. It is the people of Germany who bear the burden of frontier defense and who receive little thanks.

The German Dukes are more powerful than their counterparts in most of the other regions – and they have clawed and scraped for every inch of that power. Under the exacting terms of the 1036 Concordant of Koln, Pope Innocent III and Aloysius VII agreed to give the German Dukes direct investiture within their territories, and to establish the Comitium Imperial (Landstag) – a regular assembly wherein their ambassadors could maintain a permanent voice in the politics of Aachen. However, these concessions emboldened the Germans, and allowed them to stack their bishoprics and monasteries with political creatures loyal to their agenda. The German Church is considerably more independent in doctrine and policy than its fellow Catholics. There has been talk of establishing a new patriarchate in some city, perhaps Koln, but this has been met by stern opposition.

There has also been talk of further compromises – of establishing a separate German kingdom with its own Palatine Assembly. In 1066, Aloysius VIII briefly considered such a measure, during one of his tours of the Empire, but he ultimately decided against such a measure.

(Ispana) Ispana often thinks of itself as a sister-kingdom, rather than a mere vassal of the Frankish Empire. The King of Ispana (who is also Duke of Tarragona) is influential by dint of being a cadet dynasty to the royal line. His is the only royal title not directly owned by the monarchy. In the over a hundred years since the “Spanish Troubles” as they are often euphemistically referred to, Ispana has become a relatively calm and settled place once more – more akin to the pastoral region of historical memory than the violent and troubled country it was more recently.

There are few major urban areas in Spain – the population is scattered across many sizable towns, and it has become a sort of breadbasket for the burgeoning cities of Italy, as well as being the chief source of high-quality iron for weaponmaking.

(Italia) Italia is the richest part of the Empire, and its northern half is by far and away the most urban. Here cities dominate, with town councils and local guilds holding more power than the rural lords who notionally rule. While trade fluctuates across the Mediterranean, the Italian cities have generally remained afloat through the highs and lows.

Italia benefits from certain Imperial traditions that its fellow regions have no access to. The coronation march on Rome is so formal and ritualized at this point that there is no tension or uncertainty, and accordingly it is merely an opportunity for powerful Italian grandees to bask in the generosity of a new Emperor.

Sklavenia – Sklavenia’s prime position along major avenues of European trade has brought wealth to a new urban artisanal and mercantile class, and some of the major cities of the region are approaching their population in Roman times once more. In one of the great ironies of history, the Italian architectural styles in vogue among the Sklaveni elite are themselves an evolution of imported Roman styles brought to Italy by Roman refugees fleeing the Sklaveni. Generally, high Sklaveni culture is an imitation of Frankish and Italian norms and customs – while the “low culture” of the common people still retains ancient Slavic folk traditions mixed with some Rhomaic customs.

The Sklavenians, however, are a people diplomatically isolated. Old hatreds die hard, and the Franks, Xasar, and the Asians all have their reasons for disliking and distrusting the Sklaveni. Wars against the Xasar have been mostly inconclusive or debacles for the Sklaveni – who are far more comfortable in the defense of strongholds in the hilly, wooded Balkans than they are marching across the plains to wage war against the armored horsemen of the Xasar. Great Achaia still remains lost to them as well, and in the hands of Italian Franks it is prosperous indeed.

At the turn of the century, King Simon Alos, residing in his capital of Salunicha pays tribute to the Franks and Xasar alike, and still finds himself squished between the two. This seems unlikely to change in the near future, as any war against either of the great powers on his doorstep is a major risk he cannot afford.

Votive Asia – Niketas did not long outlive his titanic wars. He was an old man when he ascended to the position of Protohypatos – long a senior official in the Nikaian regime. But before he died, he began acting as a Roman Emperor would. He named his daughter’s husband, Ioannes Laskaris[1] co-Emperor, and oversaw a relatively peaceable transition of power.

This did not solve Asia’s immediate problems. The Emperor had the loyalty of Nikaia and her allies, but Samos, Kibyra, Galatia, and other regions were less tractable. The only blessing was a mixed one. Alania and the central plateau were now owned directly by the Empire. In other times, this might have been a huge boon – a massive imperial demesne. However, Ikonion and her environs were vulnerable so long as the Iranians were at the doorstep.

In 1072, Emperor Ioannes fought a war to retake Kappadocia, but he was vexed, managing to take several border towns but not make any significant incursions. The Votive enthusiasm of Europe was sapped, and state finances were always a perilous thing. To maintain what many of the Asian cities viewed as an informal league, Ioannes was often forced to make compromises. Protohypatos and Emperor he might have been, but the central administration was only responsible for directly ruled Imperial territories. To gain soldiers and coin from his subjects he had to bargain.

In 1100, Ioannes’ grandson Emmanuel Laskaris holds the throne. He is a famous poet and according to rumor has ambitions of retaking Konstantikert and a vast swathe of Xasar territory. It is unclear to what extent he actually has the talent and capacity to do this, and only time will tell if he can.

[1]His last name, which comes from the Iranian word Lashgari, meaning warrior, hints at origins among the Rhom Eftal.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Imagine the year is 1078.

Imagine you are tired and hungry. The hot sun beats down on your back and there is no surcease. You are out of water. You are near out of food. As Captain, you share the hardships of your men.

Prayers to the beneficent saints and God himself have not availed you. The sea, you now realize, goes on forever. This journey was madness. The Great Land the Norse claim lies to the utter West is false, a mad rumor. The brothers Ragnarssen are liars and con artists. You realize that now. The ocean, as far as you know or care, is as infinite as the vault of heaven.

The boat in which you sail draws tight the confines of your world. Beyond its wooden planks lies only infinite clear blue horizons. Whorls of distant clouds confirm only your heartbreaking isolation. Sometimes thunderheads rear like the fist of some pagan god across the darkening sky.

Your crew are weary, but still yoked together with a common aim. A fat golden coin with the cold ringlet-haired face of Aloysius VIII looks down upon all of you. It will go to the first man who sights land.

But there is no land. There is only the sea. Miles and miles of sprawling ocean and on the other side, China. But China is too far. The world is too wide.

Three days later, you are sprawled across the deck. The crew has killed your sister’s son. The deck is slick with his blood. The crossbow in his hands is still loaded. You crawl towards it. A boot comes down hard upon your neck and pain shoots through you, white hot.

At least you will not starve.

Then, the mutineers shout with something so unlike execration that at first you do not understand their meaning. Field birds! You rise slowly. Great flocks of birds wheel and turn in the distance. Land is near. Hope is renewed.

You get to live and die with the rest of them. Three days later, the thunderheads return. This time, they blot out the horizon. The men make their prayers. You mumble along with those who might well have murdered you, your tongue swollen and heavy. You are not the Captain anymore. There is no Captain.

The storm will leave naught but ruin.

The next morning, weak and confused, you first swim, then stumble through the muck of a white sand beach. The isle is clear and agonizingly bright. Colorful birds screech above you. Your head throbs with pain.

The swarthy women who find you will take you in. They will feed you. They will clothe you. You will drink their water and in time when you are healthy you will lay with them in sinful union. You will never see home again. On your deathbed, surrounded by children who call you father in the tongue of the Hatabey, you will barely even remember the great castles and many spired churches of your homeland. You will pray to the old gods of this island and you will not feel shame.

Over the long years of your fruitful life, you have forgotten why you set out. The quest for glory, for knowledge, for a new land with cities made of gold.

All that glory will go to another man. This era, and the great exchange of people, knowledge, and disease that follows will bear his name.

But you will die having lived in paradise.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Practical Lobster's world tour circa 1104 continues!

Poland – the Poles are the thankless bastion of Buddhism beyond the Urals. By their strength of arms do German knights not range across the lands of Chernarus or sweep down from the north against the Xasar.

However, the Buddhist nations of Transuralic Asia do not have an equivalent to Christendom. Even when they were relatively united under a Khirichan Khagan, there was considerably less sense of shared identity. Accordingly, the Buddhists of Poland find that their neighbors are more likely to critique their doctrine than provide support or welcome aid. The Xasar have their own, southern priorities, and the Kundajid are not nearly as strong as their predecessors. There is no single great faith, and the notion of the Sangha, or community of believers, is split by sectarian divisions. Even those who might come to the aid of the Poles consider them heterodox and barbaric.

Poland is by some definitions a strong kingdom, in that for several centuries it has remained remarkably unified in the face of outside pressure. Their identity is rooted in Slavic customs and traditions, and it stands deeply opposed to the Germanized Christian identity of their Moravian and German rivals. Under King Kazimirez, however, fissures have begun to develop – not the expected cultural ones, but rather a sense of exhaustion brought on by continuous low-intensity warfare. In another world, there might be compromise. The Poles might even have accepted the primacy of the Pope and perhaps the Emperor in Aachen.

However, the German settlers have been loathe to encourage conversion among the Poles. Overpopulation in Europe occurs in roughly generational waves. 1100 is a peak of sorts for the German region, and Germans are flooding into Poland, more often than not heavily armed. This colonialism is rewriting linguistic and cultural barriers, throwing the Polish world into chaos, in the name of a broader Votive expansionism. With expansion into the Balkans checked by stronger and more populous states, comparatively weak and tribal Poland is the only available target.

The future of Poland is filled with questions. The Germans would find it hard to justify their warfare if it was perpetrated against fellow Christians, but others in the Polish court suggest redoubling efforts to find a protector to the East. However, major defeats against Moravia suggest that time is running out for the peoples of the plain.

Baltic Tribes – Slowly opening up to the world is hard. One day, you think your hill-fort is the very navel of the world, what some distant scholars you’ve never heard of and don’t care about call the omphalos. You pray to the Great Thunderer and he has kept your family and your family’s family safe for generations. Slowly opening up to the world is painful. It is especially painful for those bright-eyed western missionaries who come to tell you about their dead God who returned from the dead and fed his body to lambs. They speak your language haltingly and with great uncertainty, and often they pay for it with their lives.

However, it is impossible to remain guarded from the world forever. The Balts, particularly in places such as Prussia have learned that the hard way. While the Lithuanians bend the knee to the long arm of the Han of Byalarus, and the northerners have fallen to the Wheel Realm, others, the Livonians and Prussians have begun to listen to those strange missionaries from Saxony and Denmark. They have begun to hear the word of the risen God.

In time, perhaps, even their Kings will throw off the shackles of the old Gods and pray to the new reborn god from the curly-haired kings of the south.

Xasar Shahdom – The solidification of the Xasar state came at a time when regional and local identities across Europe were also solidifying. But where the European world was diverging along local and often linguistic lines, the Xasar experienced unification and greater heights of political and cultural achievement than at any point in their often violent and tribal past. A sign of this was the Xasar ruler taking the title of Shah, evoking the Khardi monarchy and distancing himself from the Turkish past in favor of a largely mythologized Eftal-Iranian origin story, one reinforced by Konstantikert’s status as a dual capital of the new state alongside double-walled Shahidjan. One of the new Shah’s many titles is Shah of Rhom, emphasizing a false continuity with the relatively-short lived state.

Culturally, the Xasar language has come to dominate, displacing dying languages such as the Avar and Bulgar tongues, although Turkish and Slavic tongues still persist among large portions of the common people. The hill peoples, the Rumana of Kluch, have retained their traditional folk-Catholic religion and their language as well, and while they remain second class citizens to some degree, they are treasured as fierce auxiliary soldiers. The relative stability of the eleventh century has allowed interrelation between villages and regions, and a strong monarchy has engaged in many fortification projects – creating a sort of “defense in depth” which mirrors the fortification of the Frankish marches had has roughly solidified the borders of Christendom and the East. The Xasar themselves are not a nomadic people and have not really been for some time now. Their regime is defined by growing urbanism and steadily rising agricultural productivity.

The Xasar military has undergone significant changes. The chief element of the army is still the elite cavalry, a force which has proved its quality against European chivalry time and again. Despite a preference for lighter armor and mobility, the Xasar have adopted European martial innovations with readiness, and have pioneered the manufacture of the crossbow, a weapon whose bolts in the hands of skilled Bulgar or Rumanian archer (“Turtleback” for their distinctive shields) can kill a knight or armored footman with relative ease. The Xasar military track record has been exemplary, including several major victories against the Moravians – however its evolution is also massive. The horse archer of the new Xasar army, for example is no longer a tribesman part of a federated clan but an aristocrat practiced in a style of traditional warfare who is equally skilled with lance and long single-bladed sword.

The Xasar religious situation has if anything become more clear. The Mahayana Buddhism of the Sogdian school still predominates, with strong undercurrents of Sravakayana – even some small Nowbahar monasteries. The state’s main push has been towards a standardization of the various polytheist traditions. The nobility, starting in 1043 has been required to take an oath sworn at a holy fire temple to “Mihr, Protector of the Dharma” and the sangha as a whole. Actions such as this by the monarchy have provided a sense of shared religious ritual to complement their faith, and reinforced the prestige and status of the Shah.

Moravia – One of two Christian nations among the Slavs, Moravia is the stronger of the two. Modelled off of the Frankish monarchy, Moravia has at various times paid token tribute to the Emperor in Aachen. However, what Moravia refuses to do is kneel, and this is a position happily accepted by the large number of German settlers who are gradually transforming the country culturally.

Moravia’s has had seven kings over the course of the eleventh century, from Jaromir to Jan II. The greatest of these was Sobeslav, whose conquests nearly broke the back of the Polish crown in 1088, setting the stage for the massive onslaught of German marchers a decade later when Polish manpower was at its lowest ebb.

The intellectual and cultural tradition of Moravia is primarily preserved in German – and accordingly it is the stories of German settlers, artisans, and low nobles that history remembers. It is the rise of men like Otto of Barvaria to Chancellor that is remembered, while the history of Moravian gords is commonly forgotten. The intermarriage of the Moravian crown with German princesses did not help either – by 1100 German is as common a language at the Moravian court in Veligrad as any.

 

[Practical Lobster]

East Africa

Savahila polities

Kapudesa - Over the course of the eleventh century, it became increasingly obvious to those of influence in Africa that there were two great seats of economic and political power – axes around which the numerous city-states of the Savahila and their hinterlands orbited. The League of Kapudesa, based around Mzishima, was perhaps the greater of these two leagues, both in political power and influence. It’s language, Kapudesigaru, and its script, are the trade languages of the East Coast of Africa, and have communities of speakers as far afield as Arabia, Iran, and India.

Since the ninth century there has been a republican undercurrent in Kapudesa, brought by Indian merchants. However, there has always been a King, or Rajsah, in Mzishima itself, and that position, though elected, has a broad degree of authority and relatively few checks. However, Kings are limited by tradition and common sense – it does not do to impose oneself heavily when true power depends on league allies and guilds. In a sense, there is a deeper state lurking behind the notional displays of royal authority – that of merchants and landholders.

Public religion is focused around the bhakti version of Indian religion, and is primarily described as Ishvara worship – although Buddhism is also quite popular. Large Zoroastrian, Jain, and Saihist communities still exist as well, and religious tolerance has enjoyed relatively few interruptions. The plurality of religious faiths matches the polyglot nature of the state.

However, for all this tolerance, there are clear social hierarchies beneath the surface. Intermarriage between faiths and ethnicities is commonplace but those who trace their lineage back to the indigenous peoples of Savahila are considered substantially lesser than those whose ancestors were migrants – and in the matter of migrants, newcomers and their children are considered lesser to established families. Ishvara worshippers enjoy more privileges than Buddhists. There is a complex code which controls one’s status in life, and it is difficult to overcome – a legacy of the Indian castes.

Large scale warfare is essentially unknown in Kapudesa – which is not to say that theirs is a peaceful country. As with many frontiers, there is a certain sense of lawlessness in the hinterlands. Those who lack a place in their society can find one often among illegal communities in the high country. Accordingly, Kapudesa maintains an army, although in training and quality it would be an embarrassment compared to an Indian or European army. Their navy by contrast is extremely skilled and crewed by professional citizen-soldiers.

Pazudesada - Once known as the three cities, Kintradoni overcame an alliance of her former federates in 1021 and shortly thereafter reorganized her state into a stronger, more unified regime. Where Kapudesa had remained broadly disunited and polyglot, Kintradoni has not had that luxury. Migrations of the Maa and Garre peoples pose a significant threat – forcing them to import horses and mercenaries from Arabia. Accordingly, Kintradoni has maintained something of a more martial character – allowing her southern sister to surpass her in matters of political dominance is a small price to pay for survival.

Now however, at the dawn of the century the Maa and Garre and their allied clans are largely scattered or forced to submit, broken by two major campaigns led personally by Parajian, Prince of Kintradoni. Clever alliances with the growing “Shah” of the Mbisha and trade pacts with the Ganda have allowed Kintradoni to have a far safer and stronger position than her rivals. So long as she can maintain her position as a vital link the Eurasian trade system, Pazudesada may be the stronger state.

The Shah of Pazudesada is himself an Iranian, descendant of a line of generals who kept the state safe during the 1021 crisis. However, like his southern counterpart he worships Ishvara and speaks the Kapudesigaru language – as do his nobles and bureaucrats. Like Kapudesa, the Indian Sreni still have substantial political importance, and accordingly the Shah keeps a major embassy in Bharukaccha.

Tangrasirabh – Tangrasirabh is very different from the other major Savahila states. While there is a large foreign merchant community, it is a colony run by Izaoriakans, and accordingly for most of the 11th century was governed by a council of Randryan nobles. Tantric Hinduism, rather than the monotheistic bhakti cults, dominate, alongside a few communities of Arabian and Iranian Buddhists. Tangrasirabh, like her counterparts, does two sorts of trade – caravans navigating the often risky land routes into the interior and serves as a waystation for naval trade. By what is now an ancient treaty, Tangrasirabh ensures that no Watyan ships pass the port of Ramamida without paying a toll, and through that toll if nothing else they have become rich.

However, in 1019 the Sakalava monarchy on Izaoriaka was overthrown, and shortly thereafter Tangrasirabh came under the dominion of an Antemoro governor whose rule was despotic and theocratic at the best of times. For some fifteen years this condition persisted, until a man named Hasan Khutay, a prominent Arab merchant who had spent much of his life in the city’s military, rebelled against an attempt by the Antemoro governor to shut down a prominent Buddhist university in the city. He and his followers went south to Ramamida, where they rallied a large army to travel north and overthrow the Antemoro governor in 1034.

Henceforth, Tangrasirabh has been an independent polity, run by a “Mahasangha” or guild council, where members of the Khutay family still enjoy outsized influence.

Other

Kw`adza – the Kw’adza are often considered an inland version of Kapudesa by their contemporaries, and the reason for this is not hard to see. After the legendary Sah Jirata unified the disparate Cushitic tribes in the middle of the tenth century, they established diplomatic relations with Mzishima, including intermarriages between tribal leaders and major coastal potentates. Sah Jirata himself converted to Ishvara-worshipping Hinduism, and encouraged his subjects to worship the same god – in a single step abandoning the polytheistic ancestor-worship of the Kw’adza.

Kw’adza community life is based around the small, crudely fortified agrarian village. These villages typically contain a meeting hall which doubles as a temple to Ishvara (and also often the ancestors) and a mustering field where the young men go in times of war or strife. They fight much as they always have, with throwing spears, round wooden shields, and iron axes. Perhaps because they generally outnumber any tribe migrating from deeper in the interior, and because relations with Kapudesa are generally peaceable, there have been few innovations to the Kw’adzan style of warfare. The King himself has a small force of retainers, heavily armored in mail or scale, who fight ceremonial duels and the battles themselves are typically resolved by a few frenzied charges. Due to the tsetse fly, horses are almost unknown to the Kw’adza.

The current king of Kw’adza is Sidam Busula, whose dynasty claims matrilineal relation to Sah Jirata. He has no fixed capital, but rather tours the villages in a yearly cycle which coincides with a small festival in each township that he visits.

Ganda – Ganda is relatively isolated from the broader world – the kingdom of the great lakes, ruled by the Abakama Ndahura of the Burenzi clan. There are many hundreds of rough kinship groups united by the great kingdom of Ganda, and though the foremost clan changes frequently through internecine plots and sporadic bursts of warfare, the overall system remains as strong as the stone cities which dot the shores of Lake Nyanza.

Gandan culture acknowledges these frequent changes in power structures. Older clans with more historic claims to land receive special deference and are called banansagwa, or “those found in the place.” These clans are also the most traditionally agriculturalist and the builders of the largest and most permanent urban communities. By contrast, many of the newcomers are pastoralists and seek to imitate the traditions and mannerisms of the older, more established clans. The fact that Lake Nyanza’s banks are thickly forested has helped the Gandan agricultural communities to survive and thrive – many of the northern and western newcomers are forced to abandon their traditional patterns of settlement on arrival, leaving them vulnerable to assimilation.

Ganda has some small contact with Makuria, but more commonly they encounter Arab missionaries and merchants from Pazudesada or Mbisha caravans. These caravans have to cross substantial mountain ranges, however, and rely on the good will of intermediaries such as the Taita, Iraqw, and Sabaki tribes – all of which consider themselves allies and federates of the Kapudesa and take pleasure in extracting “gifts” from Pazudesada expeditions. To their north they are bordered by a people called the Kalenjin, who are a semi-pastoralist people who like their southern cousins the Kw’adza have adopted agricultural techniques from the Savahila coast. The Kalenjin are a proper, organized rival, and in a confederation with several other tribes have fought a few wars with Ganda.

Tsaibwe – The High Round remains the primary seat of political power in Tsaibwe society, and still lacks meaningful rivals. Utilizing heavy (by the standards of the region) cavalry to great effect, the Tsaibwe have retained their dominion, crushing any migratory hunter-gatherer groups who might otherwise have posed a threat.

A few notable sites exist outside of the horizon of the High Round’s dominion. The greatest of these in Kangila-Chomo, sitting on a high plateau to the north of Tsaibwe and stubbornly refusing to submit. Like the High Round it has substantial roughstone walls, sufficient to negate the cavalry which traditionally dominate the region, and like the High Round it has impressive granaries. Despite routine wars and sieges, Kangila-Chomo refuses to fall.

Tsaibwe is relatively unique among the indigenous societies of East Africa. Alone it represents the substantial consolidation of political and economic power in the hands of a miniscule percentage of the population. Compared to the relatively egalitarian Gandan and Cushitic societies to its north, the cattle-kings of Tsaibwe hold vast amounts of property and wealth in the form of cattle, stored grain, and precious metals without distributing them among their broader kin-group.

Accordingly, this has left the vast majority of the population dependent on their lords for the ability to maintain more than a lifestyle of marginal subsistence agriculture. It is no wonder then, that the cities of Tsaibwe are far more monumental in their construction than the scattered townships of Ganda or Kw’adza – they are built by what is effectively indentured labor, contracted in exchange for an additional ration of food. Visitors to the High Round and the Eagle’s Seat and other major seats of power describe the ruins of enormous palaces meant to house comparatively tiny populations.

Watya - The sheer availability of precious metals and the lack of centralized state control over its supply (as in West Africa) has depressed the global value of gold substantially. While at first Watya’s production was only a trickle in the grand scheme of things, and much of that production went straight to Izaoriaka, social upheaval in the home country has released huge stockpiles of stored gold onto the markets, coupled with a growing Watyan population who are massive exporters of precious metals and diamonds. Pazudesada and Kapudesa have both struggled economically as Indian financiers are all too aware of gold’s comparative easy availability.

Of course, Watya also exports many other luxury goods – bush tea, rare fruits and herbs. It is a land of impossible wealth, a mysterious place across the sea where many travel to seek their fortune. According to legend its land has healing properties and those who travel there live incredibly long lives. More reasonably, this can be attributed to the easy availability of land and the fact that even those who in their poverty are forced to pledge themselves to a local Randryan upon arrival tend to have a far better diet and manner of living than they might have been accustomed to in their homelands.

Politically, little has changed in Watya over the past half-century. New laws to protect the rights of landholders have been passed, ensuring that frontier violence over “claims” (especially those relating to precious metal finds) is brought to a minimum. However, there is the growing specter of tension as Indian and Arab merchants have begun setting up shop in coastal cities along the cape – and these merchants are stigmatized as outsiders in a society that traditionally has been pretty clearly homogenous – they are often accused of bringing crime and immorality.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Commercial Revolution

1104 has received much scholarly attention of late. The Ragnarssen Exchange was the beginning of vast migrations of people, commodities, and technology across the oceans. Two worlds, which had grown up essentially separate from each other, were brought into sudden and abrupt coalition. Millions of people across the New World would die in the successive waves of disease and societal collapse which followed. Whole nations and empires would rise and fall as a direct result of contact. Millions would suffer and thousands would prosper beyond their wildest dreams.

However, almost simultaneously, across Asia, human history was being changed in even more significant ways – so much so that the discovery of the New World is considered by some historians to be not a cause or a parallel but rather a symptom of the Sri Lankan Revolution. Also known as the Indian Commercial Revolution, was the second cycle of “Revolutions” born out of the Indian subcontinent, a direct successor to the post-Maukhani political revolutions.

The sreni guilds, reborn and revitalized in the aftermath of the Maukhani collapse, were crucial to the Commercial Revolution’s development, but the Revolution would ultimately destroy the very world that allowed it to be born – in time it would allow Indian commercial interests to surpass the often constraining politics of the local guild and become truly global. The general increase in global commerce and the rise of financial services such as banking, insurance, and investing from the tenth century onwards gave rise to new economic models and theories, and perhaps most importantly to an environment of truly global competition. Over the next few centuries, substantial new markets for raw materials would be opened to the vast manufacturing and luxury goods production centers of the Indo-Sino Sphere.

The discovery of the new world would spur a global movement of exploration and conquest in all directions. A reliable trade route circumnavigating Africa was the last step to fully connect the three great landmasses together in a single transcontinental economy, and once it was established, nothing would ever be the same. After the eleventh century, revolutions in shipbuilding and navigation would increase at a rapid pace, spurred on by newfound exigencies.

Inflation, brought on by the vast gold and precious stone deposits of the Cape and West Africa, and eventually the silver of the new world, was crushing to agricultural guilds of India and the landholding aristocracy of Europe. However the new availability of precious metals made commerce easier – as did the use of widely available bank notes of credit and debit by merchants. The vast wealth of financial sreni allowed them to finance even incredibly risky prestige expeditions – including a series of failed attempts to cross the great eastern ocean.

As cities such as Srivijaya and Mahatittha became global centers of finance and exchange, the stage was set for the eventual revolution of not just commerce but industry and ultimately labor. Not without reason is the incorporation of the Kashyapani banking family often considered the start of world history. Before that moment, the story of people and nations was primarily one of separate regions, divided by the constraints of geography and the fundamental limits of technology. After that moment, the whole world would never be the same.

[We're coming up on the end of Practical Lobster's world tour! Hope everyone's enjoying the ride.]

 

[Practical Lobster]

Southeast Asia

Srivijaya – The city of prosperous victory has many rivals now – the days of her easy hegemony over the petty Rajas of the islands are long since passed into memory. However, she has remained pre-eminent by virtue of her position as the first of the great maritime empires. The mercantile networks that dominate Southeast Asia belonged to Srivijaya before the rise of upstart city-kingdoms like Temaseka across the straits.

Accordingly, Srivijayan merchants range across the wide world, and there is no port they cannot be found at, no place where they do not have contacts. The wealth of empires funnels back to Srivijaya, where Maharaja Sri Dharmasetu sits in the splendid Lion Palace. The loss of Malay and Java have hurt them, but the city has turned to new avenues for wealth creation – manufacturing and finance have allowed Srivijaya to survive the collapse of her overseas colonial empire.

Isyana – the latest Javan rivals of the Srivijaya, the Isyana rule an inland state that nevertheless has substantial connections to the global trade system. Their capital at Kadiri is the center of the Javanese dye trade, and accordingly has garnered outsized influence for itself, becoming a center of art and culture and the beating heart of the most populous empire in the Malay Archipelago. Their on and off warfare with Srivijaya has abated of late, quite probably because Srivijaya cannot afford the heavy cost of another failed expedition to take Kadiri.

The Isyana are known for their promotion of monasteries, and under their patronage Java has become something of a center for Hindu-Buddhist scholarship. Massive and beautiful temples and universities rise out of the forests and mountains of their island at every turn, much to the wonder of those who visit Java from foreign lands.

Silendra – The Silendra are a family of exiles and rebels, but nevertheless have many strong footholds on the lesser Sunda isles. There are several Silendra-run principalities scattered across the islands, usually little more than trade posts for merchants seeking dye, spices, and sandalwood. However, the Silendra have done much to spread both Javanese culture and their own ancestral hatred of the Srivijaya across the islands they rule – which has helped Srivijaya’s various rivals immensely in gaining valuable footholds in Maritime Southeast Asia.

Kataha – the “Golden City” on the Malay peninsula, Kataha is also known as the Seat of Tranquility and the City of White Elephants. It’s prestige, however, is often said to outstrip truth and reality. Certainly Kataha has prospered under the “Twelve Happy Sreni” – a coalition of guilds which govern the city and permit no commerce outside of their authority. It has a wide range of trade partners across the archipelago and is famous for launching exploratory missions – including one which claims to have discovered a vast southern continent of endless sands and strange beasts.

However, Kataha is also known for its military weakness, a fact which makes a poor fit with its reputation for prosperity. The Dvaravati city of Phetchaburi sends periodic expeditions to demand tribute from Kataha, and so far the famed “Golden City” has acquiesced without a fight. In old days, it might have sought the protection of the immense Srivijayan fleet, but in striking out on her own Kataha has opened herself up to both prosperity and threats it is quite possibly unprepared for.

Temaseka – Temaseka is a notional ally of Srivijaya, but over the past century it has clawed its way from federate and vassal to equal partner. Maintaining its own massive trade network across the islands and beyond, Temseka also has a critical position on the straits which helps merchants to subvert the Srivijayan tariff system and use it as an waystation in preference to the heavy tolls they would experience across the strait. Temaseka is known for strictly regulating the status of foreigners. Outside guilds are not permitted to do business except in a certain quarter of the city, something which has given the city a distinct and mysterious reputation – despite the fact that unaffiliated foreigners can easily access almost any portion of the city by purchasing a simple ensign from the city guards.

Mahavisayas – The Mahavisayas archipelago lies at the very end of the world. Once a colony of the Srivijaya, it is now an independent polity with its own hegemonic ambitions. A union of local city-states beneath a single Raja, Mahavisayas culture borrows heavily from outside influences and the broader Indosphere. Their architecture, art, and manner of dress is all directly taken from the Srivijaya, especially among the noble classes, who are eager to set themselves above the “village-dwellers” who they rule.

The Mahavisayas are linked into the broader Eurasian trade network only tentatively in 1104. The Srivijayan merchants who established the trading post that would become Srikabu that would become the kingdom of Mahavisyas were explorers, seeking to expand the horizons of their world and thus gain a competitive advantage over rival families and guilds. However, there was little that the Mahavisyas possessed that could not be found closer to home. Only with the slow improvement of naval technology and the colonial expansion race prompted by Srivijaya’s rivalries will the Mahavisyas truly become important.

The Christian North and Scandinavia

Gautaland – Like all the Kings of Gautaland, King Stenkil has come to office by way of election, and when he dies his successor shall be picked in the same manner. Stenkil rules a not insubstantial land, but it is the weakest of the Christian kingdoms of Scandinavia, and often considered little more than a buffer between Sweden and Denmark. Adding insult to injury, the island of Gotland and the major trading center of Visby both lie in the hands of the “Folkthing” – a democratic assembly of landholding men that rejects both sides in the northern Votive Wars, and so far worships the traditional gods.

Gautaland itself is only roughly Christianized. Those of high rank, the King and the Jarls and their retainers, have been baptized but the religion has only slowly spread to the common people. However, Christianity is slowly catching on. In certain trials and local debates, Christian missionaries have won, and this more than anything else has contributed to a massive upsurge in the “Frankish” faith’s popularity.

Norway – The Kingdom of Norway was less enthusiastic than her sister Denmark in persecuting the Votive Wars. The reason for this is not spiritual. Indeed, Norway has become deeply Christian in the past century, although their version of the faith has some curious practices – notably they appoint their bishops and high church officials by way of town assemblies, much in the same manner as they elect Kings from the Sigurdsson dynasty. There are many monasteries and increasingly ornate churches constructed in the Frankish style across their lands.

The current Prince and likely heir to the throne, Hrolf Haakonson, however, does not look towards god or within his country’s borders. He lusts for adventure, and in 1100 has begun discussing with his Jarls the possibility of state sponsored and equipped voyages to the land of the Skraelings, the Great Country beyond the swan-road. Due to the (often exaggerated) tales which have been filtering back to him from across the sea, he is eager to continue the exploratory voyages, and hopefully battle a monster or two. In a world in which the Viking era is coming rapidly to a close, and raiders have qualms about war with fellow Christians perhaps this is the future of Norway – as sailors and warriors exploring the vast new world across the sea.

Denmark – Denmark is ruled from the royal capital of Jelling, but it is the cities of Rosklide and Hethabir which are increasingly becoming the center of power in the country. Jelling itself has if anything contracted, and the Kings frequently have debated moving their hall to somewhere more central to the Kingdom’s affairs. The main thing which stands in their way is the power of the assemblies of these cities. Long centuries of peace with the Franks has meant unprecedented trading opportunities, and Denmark stood perfectly placed to profit both by trade itself and by a series of tolls and inspection fees for ships passing through their straits.

However, while this trade enriched the capital, it enriched the cities more. Local Things have substantial power in Denmark, perhaps more than the landholding nobility or the King himself. A century past, Denmark was at the forefront of the Northern Votive War, but that country is now unrecognizable to an outside observer. The pagan armies who ostensibly clashed over the religious fate of the north no longer exist. Denmark is a Christian nation now, one where the pagan rites of the past are quickly fading into memory. However it has also lost much of its martial strength and adventurous spirit. The new Kings of Denmark use the Geats as a buffer.

Sweden – King Solmundr the Blue-Black had twelve children, and yet it was his nephew Torbjorn who came to power after his death. Torbjorn was not a notable king, despite the high hopes of those who acclaimed him so. However, he did create a series of runestones commemorating the life of his father, hailing Skara as a great victory for the Swedes and a triumph against the tide of the Frankish God. At that point, however, it was perhaps premature. Skara itself was a bloody slaughter with no true victor. The war would wind down only over the next two years, and countless more fields would be bloodied with Northman dead.

Now, a century later, Solmundr’s legacy truly becomes clear. Unlike Denmark and Norway, Sweden is somewhat isolated from the world. The Northern Votive war brought it into the same cultural sphere as Gardaveldi. Increasingly, the blend of Buddhism and Norse traditions that dominated among the people of the thousand towns became popular in the motherland itself. Odin died on an ash tree to achieve enlightenment. Buddhism was a shockingly good fit with their ancient customs and traditions. What changed primarily was the notion of sacrifice, which slowly evolved into a sort of ritual charity. Most importantly, however, Norse customs found the resiliency to combat the growing tide of Christianity.

The Swedes are not truly Buddhist in any sense, but they have quite successfully connected themselves to a larger eastern world by way of the Wheel-Realm. In doing so, they have preserved their ancient traditions and found a sort of middle path between accepting any foreign religion outright. Their kings do not dress in extravagant saffron robes and ramble about chariots which pass without obstruction. Instead, they see themselves as the very heart of the ancient past which their brother-kings have let slip away. Alone on this middle-earth, they keep the old faith.

Angland – Describing the Anglo-Dansk kingdom at the dawn of a new century is perhaps not as relevant as considering what it will become. The Anglo-Dansk have retained the martial, adventuring spirit of past decades. The end of the Viking era is perhaps most accurately described as the beginning of the Anglo-Dansk one. Combining Norse shipbuilding and exploration with an excellent island position and a rapidly growing population, the Anglisch have been some of the most enthusiastic explorers of West Africa and continually push the limits of their feeble craft in attempts to find new and greater glories. The sleepy seaside towns of Ispana, however, have the economic resources to mount a strong challenge, and if the Anglisch had foresight they would see that soon new and greater challengers will rise.

For now, however, Angland is a loosely united Kingdom ruled from Winchester by a line of Norse rulers. Apart from a brief succession crisis in 1040, and a bloody but brief border war with Skotland in 1066, the Kingdom has been largely a stable entity. Part of the reason for this stability is a profound decentralization. Local Jarls largely keep their own affairs, and those on the Welsh or Skottish marches fight their own cattle raids without interference. The central government has a somewhat limited role, existing primarily to mediate disputes and to handle those matters which are in the common interest of “All the Lords and Assemblies of this Land.”

Skotland – Skotland was not truly a Kingdom at the dawn of the century. Sure, notionally it was united, but the great warriors of the Isles felt little need to bow to a single King in Glasga, and there were still independent kingdoms of Picts. The kings of Skotland in those first few decades were numerous and universally warlike. Dynasties rose and fell in internecine intrigues and vicious battles. The Jarl of Orkney played kingmaker while retaining a notion of his own independence until 1052, when the latest Jarl, a clever but undeniably brutal young man named Black Dagmar broke the cycle of chaos and anarchy by declaring himself King of Skotland through a tenuous connection to an exiled princess and sailed down on Glasga and burnt it to the ground.

In the aftermath of this strike he retreated, letting the other claimants come to him. But once they had unified, he sewed dissent, offering, according to legend, that each of them might prosper if only they were to betray the others. At a confused and chaotic naval battle off the coast of Islay, the Skottish Jarls turned on each other and were annihilated.

Black Dagmar Haakonson now turned on the Pictish kingdoms and demanded their surrender, assuring their kings that the entire royal family up to two degrees of separation would be flayed alive if they did not submit. After the fall of Circinn, the King lived up to his promise and the remaining Picts quickly surrendered and were sent to live in monasteries – Black Dagmar did much to expand the Christian Church in Skotland, and gave generously to it.


[This is just part 1 of 2. Western Africa and Makuria will be the official "last" update, I guess! Almost every other part of the world has either been detailed in a post like this or was recently enough covered.

That said, if anyone wants any additional information on literally any part of the Old World, I'll be happy to provide.]

 

[Practical Lobster]

West Africa

Tauregs – Where there are caravans crisscrossing the wide deserts of their homeland, the Tauregs are there. The introduction of the camel several centuries earlier has made their jobs easier, and even with the rise of maritime trade lanes facilitated by the Andilanders (Canary Island Norse) trans-Saharan land trade still is a valuable and indeed crucial part of the West African economy.

Accordingly, the Tauregs have something of a mixed reputation among their fellows. Traditionally they are somewhat few, living on marginal land where the climate does not favor substantial agriculture. However, they are also disproportionately wealthy and powerful, and the vastness of the desert and their importance to the trade networks of the region keeps that wealth safe. But the Tauregs are also outsiders – their distinctive blue veils and unique, “mysterious” customs keep them from ever being fully integrated into the societies they trade with.

Christianity, especially Christianity mixed with Berber polytheism, is well-known to the Tauregs, as they work with many Mauri merchants. However, even among the moderate percentage of Tauregs that have adopted Christianity, outwardly they are much more inclined to identify as members of a tribal group than by religious identification. Uniquely within the time period faith for the Tauregs is a more personal matter, and accordingly for a population of travelers they have produced remarkably few missionaries. The cult of the Supreme Being also has some devotees, but these are few and far between, given the religion's relatively explicit Mande cultural context.

Ghana – The streets of Ghana are not, as they are in legend, lined with shimmering gold. Indeed, the gold of Ghana is mostly hidden. Her kings have always been notoriously stingy with their vast wealth, and this has proven to be an excellent strategy now that the gold and salt mines are lost to her and political power is shifting south to Niani.

The population of Ghana is perhaps half of what it was in her peak, and the foreign quarter is reduced to a few groups of less successful Tauregs and some lingering Mauri mendicants who seek to preach their faith to the King. They whisper that if only the King accepts the true God he will be rewarded as the men of Kanem have been rewarded for their rightly guided faith. Ghana could become great again, they say, if only he would be willing to take up the sword of the Votive warrior.

This is not true, however. Ghana’s days of glory are long behind her.

Djenne – recently, Djenne has grown vast as Ghana has sunk into irrelevancy. Now, Djenne sits at the head of a steadily growing empire which has incorporated much of the river’s length into itself. Indeed, even Gao, its onetime ally, has fallen into its orbit. With Ghana cast into the dustbin of history as the sands advance, Djenne along the river rises to claim its place as first of cities in the Sahel.

The Djenne religion is at least notionally the new paganism of the Mande peoples, the cult of the Supreme Being which holds so much sway among the urban elites and so little sway outside of that small niche. The Supreme Being cult provides a strong justification for the practice of divine Kingship. Just as God rules above with his host of divine servants, the lesser gods, so too does the king rule, and his host of servants answer his will without question.

Niani – The city state of Niani has grown into a sizable empire in its own right, owing to the unification of many Bambara tribes around a single great king, or Mansa. Ruling the southern half of the Mande world, Niani is a fierce rival of Djenne, but the two states have much in common. Both economically depend on the gold and salt trade. Both worship Ngala-Nyama, the Supreme Being, in his manifold forms, as taught by the great Poet-Historian Nakhato.

However, Niani is closer to the sources of wealth, and in recent years they have been seeking a path to undercut the Djenne Empire’s overland trade by turning west. The city of Takrur, one of the largest ports on the coast of Africa, is their path to this. The Fula kingdom there does trade with the Andilanders, and increasingly the Niani think that this maritime route might in one fell swoop cut the Djenne and their Taureg allies out of the equation as middlemen.

However, there is a careful balance to be struck. If trade declines too precipitously, the Niani know that the Djenne will turn on them, seeking to seize the productive land of the south for themselves. So their goal has been to slowly starve their northern rivals, subsidizing merchants to bring smaller and smaller quantities of precious trade goods north each year, while pleading ignorance as they build the “salt road” across the continent to Takrur.

Kanem – roughly a century and a half after their glorious “Votive” victories, the Kanem rule an impressive land empire, and one which is religiously unified to a remarkable degree. As an important stop on West African trade lanes with the Ukwu Empire to the south and the Mande kingdoms to the west, whosoever controls Kanem cannot help but prosper.

Kanem is still a theocracy ruled by the Kay and the Dalai “Students” but it has moderated significantly. Without the zeal of new converts, their religious activities have become subdued – they are now content to send embassies across the continent to preach the good news, but these embassies are generally laughed out of court. So instead Kanem has turned inwards. Beautiful copies of the Bible, written in the Kay language, and enormous churches of clay and roughstone are the legacy of their rule. The artisans who once crafted idols now craft iconography of Christ and the Saints.

East Africa

Gidaya – the story of Gidaya is that of a vacuum that was never filled. The collapse of the Hawiya Empire left Egypt to briefly fill its shoes, but with the fall of Egypt at the beginning of the eleventh century, there has been no local hegemon to enforce order. The Kingdom of Gidaya is a weak, coastal state ruled by the descendants of Hawiya – whose pluralistic monarchy is now nothing more than a distant memory.

The Gidayan state is a Christian one, and time, neglect, and distrust have combined to annihilate the great Jain and Buddhist universities of the North African coast. Whole libraries have been lost to the desert as changes in the climate have substantially diminished the whole region and its former position as a major producer of incense. Now Gidaya’s hinterland is a country of traveling mendicants, subsistence pastoralists, and bandits. The city itself endures as an entrepot, but in that capacity it has been surpassed by other more ideally located seats such as Adulis and Aden.

Axum – The Giramid Kingdom fell to the nomadic pagan and Jewish warlords of the Zanafij tribe in 1024, and after that defeat the ephemeral glories of the Giramid Negus of Shoa have never been restored. Axum now is curious and divided country. Jewish warlord-states sustain themselves on highland pastoralism, and fortified monastery-communities which dot the mountains and hillsides of the region are the major seats of political power. They maintain the history and traditions of Axum in spite of centuries of constant degradation, and maintain the dream of a united Axum once again ruled by a descendant of holy King Solomon.

Adulis – The ruler of Adulis, Cawil Elmidua, is a devout and pious man, and the city he rules is a garden akin to heaven in the great emptiness of the red desert. Intricate irrigation works, a legacy of Hawiya architects maintained by careful stewardship has allowed the city to remain green, with opulent hanging gardens considered to be true wonder of the world. A nominal vassal of Makuria, Adulis is mostly responsible for its own defense and affairs, and to this purpose has built high walls and a series of border forts to guard against the Zanafij.

Makuria – The greatest of the Monophysite kingdoms, Makuria has blossomed with the destruction of Egypt. Many of the greatest thinkers and intellectual works of Alexandria have been transplanted to the south, to Tungul, which is often called the “new Alexandria” and is the seat of the Patriarchate-in-exile.

The current King, Abraham II, has recently presided over a disastrous invasion of Egypt, an event which shall surely define his entire reign. Rumors at court imply that he will step down from the throne in favor of his son Zacharias, who though young and energetic is widely considered to be a rude and arrogant boy. His father however is either unaware or unconcerned with these defects, and in the several-year waiting period before he can truly retreat into monastic seclusion, he has done little to prepare the state or to repair its army.

However, Makuria is not a weak state. Ambitious generals have pushed back the warlords of the south and secured the Daju borders. The bureaucracy, modeled off of the old Egyptian system, is an efficient and well-oiled machine. The monarch’s dispassionate lethargy has not been so crippling as it might have been in another power. The simply calculus of Makurian politics have not meaningfully changed either. To become more than it currently is, to aspire to any greatness beyond the Upper Nile, it must necessarily conquer Egypt. However the Khardi, despite their general mismanagement of the province are excellent warriors – the weakness of Makuria’s armies was starkly revealed to them at the Cataracts. The Makurian army had been prepared to fight its southern foes, disorganized horse raiders and brigands. Against a heavy charge of cavalry sheeted in mail and barding, their forces were found particularly wanting. Despite Makurian skill in archery and experience facing down the lightly armored Khardi soldiery, their forces broke long before the impact of Khardi barge-pole lances, and their center was thrown into total disarray.

If they can overcome this deficiency, or if the Khardi collapse and lose access to heavy Ifthal horse, the Makurian army might sail down the Nile and rule its whole length from Tungul or Alexandria. And then, when Alexandria is theirs and trade flows freely once more, what then? Jerusalem is not so far, and the holiest of cities, the axis mundi, might be theirs.

 

[Practical Lobster]

Vignette: The Grandee and the Leviathans

Nfansou found himself often having to suppress his credulity whenever he saw the wooden ships at dock. Many others were still ashore, great husks like the bodies of beached whales decaying in reverse. Skeletal planks of wood were layered upon each other, coated in tar and pitch until they glistened black in the hot savanna sun.

The timber was brought on huge barges, and the trunks were fatter than the legs of elephants, hoary old trees from the south and the interior, where the empty salt sea was a barrier not an opportunity. His people were the ones blessed by the Supreme God, the ones who would take to the seas and conquer them as the pale-skinned northerners had.

His own people labored under the instruction of these northmen, while he, their nominal supervisor and supposed master of the navy, languished beneath the spreading boughs of a nearby tree, drinking Mauri wine. He understood nothing of the sea, of the wide salt emptiness that was beyond the white beaches of this country. He was a grandee, and like nobility the world over he lived for the saddle, for the rush of wind, and he worshipped a shimmering golden horse with diamond eyes at the altar of the spirits.

These boats however, they were a different sort of thing. The Fulbe had no tales of the ocean, no legends worth recounting, but the peoples who dwelled along the water, who cast nets and dove for shellfish had their own tales of monsters in the outer dark, of vermiculate and muscular leviathans with fat and toothy maws. And beyond the desert the Kay and the Frangis told stories of Nowa, he of the Ark who sailed the oceans for forty days to conquer a new land for his sons, or perhaps to escape some famine or plague. The details of false legends never concerned him.

For this reason, Nfansou, cousin of the king, gave little thought to the fanatic merchants with their starry eyes and their promises of the world beyond. He gave more stock to the words of the Northmen, who said that the afterlife was not so different from this world. That he could see. That he could understand. And if the self-proclaimed prophet of the Tauregs brought the men of the indigo veils down upon the Fula they would fight hard. Were they not a people born to holy struggle? Had their ancestors not brought low the fast horsemen of Ghana? Had Diawallo not broken a demon upon a potter’s wheel? They kept patience through suffering, kept dignity and resolve, and now the gods conspired to reward them.

The people of the north were barbarians in so many ways. They lacked dignity and restraint. Their curiosity was idle and they were at once childlike and akin to slaves. They were tillers of the soil in the main, and kept no cattle. What gold they were given they spent on whores and booze and trinkets. But to them the ocean was life and wealth. And if the King told Nfansou to learn their secrets, then Nfansou would sit in the shade and watch, his Jola attendants and interpreters close at hand.

The northmen would come to him from time to time and they would speak. They would tell him of the laborers’ progress and haltingly explain sailing to the inland princeling who was their patron and their master. The order of the world would soon be restored. Nfansou would cross the ocean and find the lands of gold that lay beyond it. With iron and horse he would break the peoples he found there, and then he too might be a king.

Across the waves, gulls were crying. Nfansou took a sip of the wine.

Today was a good day. Tomorrow would be still better.

 

[Practical Lobster]

The End of the Beginning

As the first Andilander Norse take tentative steps across the Atlantic and the exchange between New and Old Worlds begins, I’d like to go back in time six hundred years for the sake of context.

For all the shock of the initial Hephthalite invasion, for all the ramifications of the death of Shah Kavad, the sack of Ctesiphon, the mass movement of eastern steppe peoples into Syria and Mesopotamia, looking back it is sometimes difficult to understand how that led to the discovery of the New World in 1104 by Bjorn Solva[1], an Andilander of Anglish ancestry.

What if the Hepthalites, or Eftal, as they became known, had simply gone East? One might argue indeed, that the wealthy Indo-Gangetic plain was the logical direction for any ambitious conqueror. India was a far richer prize, valuable beyond reckoning. But the Hepthalites became entangled in the politics of the Near East, and became especially tied to the Sasanian Empire’s policies in many regards. They found themselves persecuting Christians and warring with Rome, and with those twin steps they set in motion events which would be the final nail in the coffin for the classical world.

Meanwhile, the Gupta and their Maukhani successors were allowed to build a peaceful and prosperous universal empire which laid the ground work for scientific and social revolution over the next six centuries. The Hepthalites contented themselves with a lesser prize, although they could not have known what other glories were possible. They did not follow in the footsteps of the Saka and Kushan, though that precedent was long set. Instead they turned their destructive impulses against the Roman Empire. The legacy of the classical world, accordingly, would be limited to the Western Mediterranean.

The imported culture of the Hephthalites was Indo-Iranian, and that culture would endure and dominate the Middle East, filtering through Arabia and Mesopotamia, through Kurdistan and Armenia and ultimately Turkistan. Where in another world Arabic might have come to predominate, here the closest thing to hegemonic culture was the uniquely blended heritage of so many Central Asian peoples.

The Hephthalites might have wreaked unspeakable devastation on India. They might not have closed the floodgates that allowed so many warlike peoples into the subcontinent, by diverting the martial strength of the Iranian world directly westward. Their conquering Shahs might have been known for sacking Buddhist stupas and universities, rather than destroying Christian churches and monasteries.

Within this timeline, less charitable scholars of later centuries, seeking to rebut an established scholarly trend based on the writings of the Khardi, would say that the Eftal made a garden into a desert and called it a golden age. While the climatic degradation of the Near East cannot be attributed to the Eftal, in an intellectual sense that is certainly true. The Eftal golden age was based on received knowledge from India and Iran – it involved few original discoveries, and in that period much of Greek learning was lost across the Middle East, only to be discovered much, much later by researchers seeking lost vaults of knowledge. The Kurds followed in their footsteps, annihilating much of what the Copts had preserved, and taking the rest back to Susa where it would be lost following the collapse of their regime. By contrast, Indian learning had an unbroken source of received knowledge going back to ancient times, a foundation if nothing else kept safe in monasteries and generally preserved by successive monarchs and republics. Even Europe, where the collapse of Rome was certainly disruptive to the social fabric of the time, managed to preserve far, far more.

In another world, however, Europe might have benefitted more from the learning preserved in the Near East and in a longer lived Eastern Roman Empire. Classical learning might have not taken such heavy body-blows, and been far more disseminated. So many times throughout its history, European civilization had to reinvent the wheel, so to speak.

It is difficult to speak in such broad brushstrokes. Plenty of Indian learning was lost through history, and plenty of Greek knowledge preserved. China, for its part, maintained an independent and unbroken tradition of philosophy and science. The world, generally speaking, moved forwards, although it did so haltingly and unevenly. West Africa spent most of the time period we have examined broadly isolated from the larger world, and accordingly its culture was alien to Eurasia – although it will not be for long.

A new era is on the horizon, one utterly different from anything that came before. Global history has been leading to this moment, the dawn of the Ragnarssen exchange and the great Contact which would profoundly alter human civilization. The genie of revolution was out of the bottle as well – the old certainties that had defined the Indian subcontinent up until the Maukhani were gone, and the systems that replaced them were universally more ephemeral. This new era will be one of interconnectedness, of trade and finance, of mass movements and social revolution, of bloodthirsty conquest and the horrors of increasingly modern and global warfare, of unprecedented prosperity and technological advancement for all.

That is what begins in the year 1104. From Bjorn Solva’s boot-print on white island sands radiate out infinite possibilities. His path, whether inevitable or not, will define the coming centuries.

Author's Note

I can’t think of a proper end to this part of the story. It’s been running for over a year, and I’ve poured a lot of time and thought into it. Of course, it won’t end. Not truly. There are guest posts yet to finish, and for my part I plan to take the story onwards into the future for quite some time still.

However, as most of you well know by now, that will be done in a different thread. The story has evolved and changed; the story will continue to evolve and change. I hope everyone who’s slogged their way through the hundreds of thousands of words of print that this alternate history produced has enjoyed their time, and I sincerely hope you’ll all continue to read going forwards.

Stay tuned for the New World of the White Huns.

[1] Unlike Christopher Columbus, Bjorn Solva is actually rather less known in this timeline. The poor guy was the first to discover the New World in 1104, but that credit goes to the brothers Ragnarssen in 988, who found OTL's Newfoundland and profited immensely from telling tales of their adventures amongst the Skraelings. As such there's no Solvian exchange, and while 1104 is marked as the discovery of the New World proper, Solva plays second fiddle in the history books. Poor bastard.

The vignette, though it may be obvious, does not focus on Solva but a less successful contemporary.