The genetic traces would take Alien Space Bats to have not occurred, and there are a few families of Arab Christians that claim such decent. The challenge is to have, as of 1900 and with a POD no earlier than the fall of Jerusalem to Saladin in 1187, a measurable portion of the 'native' Levantine population as a whole* being Latin Rite** Christians openly claiming crusader lineage.
(*: Not a large one, 1-2% is quite enough)
(**: As opposed to Melikite, Maronite, or other such Uniate. Conversely getting linked to one of the local patriarchates rather than formal obedience to the See of Rome is not an issue if they retain the distinctive liturgy)
Bonus points are for the taking if there are areas where the local gentry started out as Crusader knights and/or barons, as well as if a language recognizably derived from Old French/Proto-Italian/West Germanic is still spoken on a household/village level by more isolated sorts (think Aramaic).
The ramifications for 19th century and later relations between the Levant and the West, I leave to your imaginations.
(*: Not a large one, 1-2% is quite enough)
(**: As opposed to Melikite, Maronite, or other such Uniate. Conversely getting linked to one of the local patriarchates rather than formal obedience to the See of Rome is not an issue if they retain the distinctive liturgy)
Bonus points are for the taking if there are areas where the local gentry started out as Crusader knights and/or barons, as well as if a language recognizably derived from Old French/Proto-Italian/West Germanic is still spoken on a household/village level by more isolated sorts (think Aramaic).
The ramifications for 19th century and later relations between the Levant and the West, I leave to your imaginations.
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