AHC/WI: Byzantine Empire Holds on To Egypt

Deleted member 67076

Technically they were already losing chunks of it by the Arrival of Islam. The Vandals started a long series of destabilization of Roman rule in the region that saw increasing mobilization and automanization of the Berber communities throughout North Africa. By the time of Justinian the great city of Magnis Leptis was a shell of its former self and Byzantine control largely only fully extended along the coastline. The Visigoths kicking out the Byzantines from Hispania did not help either.

That is to say Byzantine rule in the region was largely dependent on maintaining a series of alliances and deals with the local Berber populations for nominal suzentry over the region. Piss off a important leader of one of these Romano-Berber Kingdoms and revolt was abound.
I doubt they would lose the entire province though.
 
If Egypt persists as Byzantine then North Africa likely does as well. Sicily, Sardinia, and the Balearic Islands may also remain in Roman orbit for much longer. Visigothic Spain will eventually be the target for a reconquest by the Byzantines, as will southern Italy and potentially coastal France. Should the Arabs be able to fare better against the Persians then there may still be an Arab threat in the years to come, but if the Persians can quell that threat then Islam will probably go south into Africa and east into India by trade from Arabia.

The butterflies would be huge, but it might involve an ERE surviving longer...or being cut short as overconfident emperors overextend and eventually cause internal dissention.
 
Iberia is rather far off from the Greek speaking world, and it might be worth noting that the Byzantines are going to be busy at least to some extent in the northwest (relative to Constantinople) when contemplating Byzantine expansion in the near future.
 
More like Spanish and Portuguese would become Hellenophone. Though with a Byzantine Iberia, could we see a very different "Exploration Age"?
 
Could the Byzantines even hold onto any Iberian territory? It's awfully far from Constantinople, and IOTL they lost it all within a century.
 
Doubtful with Islam just disappearing. It depends on what happens next. If they Conquer Persia like OTL and keep moving eastward than it spreads eastward.

I have serious doubts that the Arabs of the 630s and 640s were even "Muslims" at all: certainly, they didn't call themselves that. The idea that the Islamic religion suddenly sprang out of nowhere fully-formed seems to me to be quite silly, and I think it should be rejected by historians. You'd certainly get a form of Arab monotheism that venerates Muhammad, but it'll likely have some serious differences from Islam if it's not influenced by the early years of Arab rule over the settled peoples of the Fertile Crescent.

I imagine the rest of North Africa would remain Christian as well. Could the Visigothic Kingdom survive or would it being Arian cause it's downfall still?
Fairly sure the Visigoths had converted to Chalcedonian Orthodoxy by the end of the sixth century, so that's a bit of a moot point. I think the Visigoths will do just fine for the foreseeable future.

Technically they were already losing chunks of it by the Arrival of Islam. The Vandals started a long series of destabilization of Roman rule in the region that saw increasing mobilization and automanization of the Berber communities throughout North Africa. By the time of Justinian the great city of Magnis Leptis was a shell of its former self and Byzantine control largely only fully extended along the coastline. The Visigoths kicking out the Byzantines from Hispania did not help either.

That is to say Byzantine rule in the region was largely dependent on maintaining a series of alliances and deals with the local Berber populations for nominal suzentry over the region. Piss off a important leader of one of these Romano-Berber Kingdoms and revolt was abound.
I'm pretty sure that Justinian's province was ruling after the suppression of the 540s revolt an area bigger than Roman Africa ever had been. I don't dispute your statement that the Berbers were becoming more organised and generally formidable, but I don't think that that's necessarily going to spell the doom of Roman rule over Africa. More likely, I think, is that a Syria analogue eventually develops, with the Roman province being shielded by allied Christian Berber states from hostile Berbers.

Plus there's the fact that pretty much from the moment of Justinian's conquest, resources were being focused hugely on the East for a period of warfare with the Iranians more intense that at any time since the Third Century Crisis. I think it's safe to say that the Sasanians (or whichever other dynasty takes over) are going to be a good deal quieter in the seventh century than they were in the sixth.

Could the Byzantines even hold onto any Iberian territory? It's awfully far from Constantinople, and IOTL they lost it all within a century.

It's possible, but I'm not sure why they'd want to. Like you say, it's a long way from Constantinople, and effective influence and power can be projected from holding Ceuta and the Balearics.
 
The Eastern Roman Empire might not fall in this TL. It might even have a chance to rise again.

Egypt was for the Romans like India was for the British: The latter was nothing without the former.
 
More like Spanish and Portuguese would become Hellenophone. Though with a Byzantine Iberia, could we see a very different "Exploration Age"?

Why? There's no reason for them to adopt the language of something that distant - at least not to the extent of it being more than some words showing up in the language of the day (saying "Spanish" and "Portuguese" with this early a POD is a bit much).


King Helü of Wu: Four centuries of history (and this is ignoring the possibilities of a POD from Isaac I on) would disagree with you.
 
King Helü of Wu: Four centuries of history (and this is ignoring the possibilities of a POD from Isaac I on) would disagree with you.

I can sort of see his point, to be fair. Sure, the Empire could survive without Egypt, but the loss of that province (providing maybe something approaching a third of Constantinople's tax revenue) meant a century of chaos and institutional restructuring on a scale unseen at pretty much any other point in Roman history. I've said it before, and I'll say again- the seventh century losses marked the end of the "Roman" state and the emergence of the "Byzantine" one, and Egypt was by far the most important of the lost provinces.
 
I can sort of see his point, to be fair. Sure, the Empire could survive without Egypt, but the loss of that province (providing maybe something approaching a third of Constantinople's tax revenue) meant a century of chaos and institutional restructuring on a scale unseen at pretty much any other point in Roman history. I've said it before, and I'll say again- the seventh century losses marked the end of the "Roman" state and the emergence of the "Byzantine" one, and Egypt was by far the most important of the lost provinces.

True, it was major. But it's not as if the Byzantine Empire was anything to take lightly in the Mediterranean world - it may not have been a superpower (in the context of "the world" being Western Eurasia), but it was definitely a very strong great power.

Even in that age of chaos and restructuring, the empire held on and dealt with some pretty serious threats.
 
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