AHC: Christian 'Saladin' in the 12th Century.

Saladin united the big Islamic areas of Egypt, Syria and Mesopotamia and used this concentration of power in his hands to capture Jerusalem.

But could the same or similar happen in reverse during the 1100s? In my mind possible candidates for even temporary unification are Outremer, Cicilian Armenia, Georgia, Byzantium, Ethiopia and perhaps a western power or Crusading army.

What would the temporary concentration of power under one ruler achieve?
 
Pretty much ASB. The regions Saladin united were all sunni, arab-dominated and spoke pretty much the same language, and had a history of being united.

Byzantium is orthodox, Outremer and the western powers are catholic, Ethiopia is coptic. French, Greek, Italian, Amharic, Hungarian, Armenian, Georgian...

No one since the Roman Empire's heydays have ruled all of this at once, and I seriously doubt someone will soon either.

Your best bet is probably;

The King of France is made King of Jerusalem.
England descends into civil war or a serious war against the Irish and/or Scots and are unable to trouble the French, but still strong enough to make the English holdings in northern France seem too much to chew.

This French King has excellent relations with the currently dominating Italian naval power (let Pisa, Genoa or Venice win big against the others).

The Eastern Roman Emperor is a competent man with a good power base - he has forced the Armenians and Georgians into vassalage and have good relations with the dominant Italian naval power too.

The Pope is a reasonable man, thinking the muslims must be beaten first, and differences with the orthodox church resolved later, and the schism is temporatily ignored.

Then you might get a similar effect.

However, Seljuk disintegration, Hungarian Balkan schemes, the arrival of the Mongols, the plague, French-English wars, Byzantine civil war, power shifts in the Italian naval states, Papal elections and many other things can make all this fall like a house of cards.
 
Even temoporary alliances tended to underachieve, look at the assistance John Komnenos got in Palestine, or the 2nd crusaders before Damascus.

What about one of the Kings of Jerusalem inviting some of these other Christian Kings to come on armed pilgramages?
 
Part of the problem is that the ERE, for instance, has no real interest in the independent survival of the Crusader States.

As distinct from controlling them. Its not just a matter of Jerusalem or even primarily a matter of Jerusalem - rather, they're on formerly Imperial land (Antioch is a particularly shameful example) and supposed to be Imperial vassals.

John was willing to work with them anyway, but it was an issue. Manuel...

Would have to, for once in his life, concentrate on a project for it to matter. OTL he did go - once (not counting his reminder to Reynald that Antioch is under his suzerainty), and that didn't work out so well, admittedly for other reasons.

After Manuel things went south and you'd need to have the ERE able to do anything before it can come up.

Ciliian Armenia depending on the period is part of the ERE, and the periods it isn't are ones the ERE is trying to do something about that.

Georgia might be a possibility, but it would depend on the king and the situation.

Ethiopia I know virtually nothing about.
 
The Crusader states were handy as a buffer for Byzantium, but I don't think Byzantium could unite Christendom to pursue goals in Palestine. But if someone else could unite the Christian powers in the region an on-board Komenene Byzantium would be a major asset.
 
The Crusader states were handy as a buffer for Byzantium, but I don't think Byzantium could unite Christendom to pursue goals in Palestine. But if someone else could unite the Christian powers in the region an on-board Komenene Byzantium would be a major asset.

Unfortunately, it would require the ERE to have more interest in the Crusader states than the alternatives.

Which - unless there's some power (not necessarily Muslim) they're a buffer against - is not any kind of certainty.

Possible, but I think it needs to be emphasized that the Komnene Byzantine Empire would have as much reason to mind a Christian concentration of power in the region as a Muslim one, to the extent it isn't said Christian power.

I hate repeating myself on things like this, but the ERE doesn't want a Saladin-like unification of the region, period, unless its the power uniting the other states under its banner and its Emperor.

Moving on from that, Egypt is probably going to be attacked.
 
I think the biggest issue to a Saladin-esque unification is geography. Saladin unified realms that were actually adjacent and his forces could move to a fro within their own territory.
 
I think the biggest issue to a Saladin-esque unification is geography. Saladin unified realms that were actually adjacent and his forces could move to a fro within their own territory.

This is definitely an asset, but the ERE does border Antioch (assuming it controls Cicilian Armenia) and almost does Georgia.
 
The ERE borders both Cicilia and Georgia, but as the 2nd and 3rd Crusades show not well enough that a large army could travel safely from Outremer to Constantinople. What routes did John and Manuel take when they campaigned in Syria?

Perhaps in lieu of a unification campaigning in the Holy Land became seen as something of a duty for Christian rulers without the stirring up of a Crusade as such. So the Georgians and Ethiopians sent an army on campaign much like Sigurd and the Byzantine campaigns.
 
Why would Georgia or Ethiopia send soldiers to fight and die in some Crusade hundreds of miles from their homeland when they can be used to defend their own lands? They have no interests in participating in the Crusades unless you're talking about a token amount.
 
I have a recollection of reading Georgia did have some plans to take part, but the Mongol invasion consumed that force.

And why did Western Europe have an reason to send soldiers even further?
 

Kosta

Banned
Why would Georgia or Ethiopia send soldiers to fight and die in some Crusade hundreds of miles from their homeland when they can be used to defend their own lands? They have no interests in participating in the Crusades unless you're talking about a token amount.

Not to mention that "Eastern" Orthodox Christianity sees the concept of the Crusade as a perversion of Scripture, so I'd imagine that the "Oriental" Orthodox-Christian Church does, too.
 
I have a recollection of reading Georgia did have some plans to take part, but the Mongol invasion consumed that force.

And why did Western Europe have an reason to send soldiers even further?

It wasn't so much so Western Europe that petty little knights and nobles wanting to carve themselves a new niche in the Middle East.
 
Alexios' initial motoivation for asking for western troops, which morphed into the Crusade, was to clear the Turks away from western Anatolia. In the event this request became a Crusade, but along the way captured Nicea and defeated the Turks at Dorylaeum, which was probably as much as Alexios hoped for if not more, but to the Crusaders themselves this was just an aside in their pilgrame to Jerusalem. So perhaps other Christain state leaders could make a pilgrame to Jerusalem for religious reason, and give the Muslim states a drubbing along the way as an aside and this would benefit the KoJ.
 
Alexios' initial motoivation for asking for western troops, which morphed into the Crusade, was to clear the Turks away from western Anatolia. In the event this request became a Crusade, but along the way captured Nicea and defeated the Turks at Dorylaeum, which was probably as much as Alexios hoped for if not more, but to the Crusaders themselves this was just an aside in their pilgrame to Jerusalem. So perhaps other Christain state leaders could make a pilgrame to Jerusalem for religious reason, and give the Muslim states a drubbing along the way as an aside and this would benefit the KoJ.

Don't forget (on the subject of what Alexius wanted) them seizing Antioch and not giving it back - you know, despite the whole "turn over anything once part of the empire to us" deal they made.

But the West giving Muslim states a drubbing on the way to Jerusalem - entirely possible.

In my half-aborted timeline, Alexius II takes advantage of the Third Crusade to hit the Turks with a German sledgehammer.

Though that's for the ERE.
 
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