Pls not Poland. Not again, I just want to see a Poland that doesn’t get killed so much.
An Age of Miracles Continues: The Empire of Rhomania
- Thread starter Basileus444
- Start date
I'm surprised that no one is talking about how the HRE/Germany might not even be able to escape the rut that they're in, leaving them open to a partition themselves down the line. I'd be fascinated to see a scenario where Hungary, Poland, and Lotharingia each take a piece of the HRE for themselves if it ever collapses.
Rhomania will consider that poetic justice...just saying.
Its too soon to think that this new moravian union will last forever. Maybe for two centuries it will last or even only a few decades. Either way we've seen many unions and most don't last long or even successful. For emperor Demetrios III treaty to belgrade to last a third hungarian collapse will be needed if they ever look south and east again.
This way the Hungarians will never be a problem again.
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I suppose it could happen. But Poland just got smacked down hard. They've lost a lost of territory and they are surrounded by stronger powers. The HRE might be vulnerable now, but Poland isn't in a place to capitalize on it. Maybe Poland will recover quicker, but they'll still be working from a smaller base. Lotharingia is under Triune control and the nature of the personal union there makes expansion difficult. If they were to regain independence it's likely going to be with support of the other German states.
It would be an interesting turn of events though. I think there's a kneejerk reaction with most posters here that German nationalism will always happen, myself included, but it's extremely possible that this timeline may be different. So many of the major players in the world theater are not nation states, Rhomania, Hungary, the Triunes, and the Empire of All the North are all multi-ethnic states with a fair degree of stability.
@Basileus444 would you be able to give an overview of the Roman military as well? Like the primary units and what they do, what they specialize in,....
Something interesting I just thought about is the cultural fusion of the Triune Kingdoms. I believe someone once said that Joan of Arc was unintentionally the savior of England because, if she didn't exist, if England won the Hundred Years War and took over France, then there would have been a really high probability that England would have been thoroughly assimilated by the larger French culture. So it is interesting that England here is still relatively distinct from French identity.
Oh, and another thing is the treatment of the Irish, are they considered equal or are they considered inferior like they were OTL?
Oh, and another thing is the treatment of the Irish, are they considered equal or are they considered inferior like they were OTL?
I’d say that one big mistake of the Third Triumvirate (Helena I and sisters) was trying really hard to enter the ‘western club’. This was a mistake for two reasons. The most immediate is that if you are a member of the ‘western club’, it is to be expected that you play by western rules. And by those rules, Theodor did have the better claim and Demetrios Sideros the worst. By the standards of strict hereditary succession, Theodor was the rightful heir to Andreas III. Rhomania tried to act like a western dynastic state, and Theodor thus viewed it as one. Queue…things.
The second mistake is that Rhomania can never really enter the ‘western club’. It can get close, but never quite make it. It will always be an ‘Other’. I’m basing this not just on OTL western-Byzantine relations, but also on OTL western-Russian relations (pre-1917, to keep Soviets from muddying the issue). For all Russia’s efforts at westernization in the 1700s and 1800s, it was still very much an ‘Other’. Russians get along better with the Chinese; the British say it’s because the Russians are half-Asiatic themselves. (This is from OTL.)
And being an ‘Other’ comes with its own issue. The ‘Other’ is held to different, and typically double, standards. The Russians of Peter the Great’s suite are described as having atrocious table manners, while Louis XIV apparently got angry that his children were being taught to eat with utensils rather than just using their fingers as he did. The Russians of the 1800s are greedy imperialists who are following a secret will of Peter the Great to take over the whole world, which is rich when you realize these claims are coming from Victorian Britain.
This is why Roman shenanigans will always be considered more sinister than similar shenanigans conducted by someone ‘inside the club’ like, say, the Triunes. Because anything an ‘Other’ does is automatically worse.
For the record I'm arguing against the claim seen often here that somehow being the Roman empire and believing to be so, precluded them feeling and believing themselves Greek. It did not.
Yeah, I’ve never understood why the concept of being able to be ‘Roman And Greek’ is so hard to accept.
Ravens have already done a lot of printing with their own words. Magdeburg had its own printing presses and Johann Eck knows the power of the written word. (Think Martin Luther, except as a peasant revolutionary).
The Ravens are still anathema to Romans. The idea of taking all the property of the rich and redistributing it to the poor until everyone has a minimum standard that is then sacrosanct before anyone can accumulate more would be utterly abhorrent to any Roman rich.
TTL Prussia isn’t really tied to the HRE except for some German cultural links.
Hungary and Eastern Europe: Hungary is like an alternate Habsburg empire, including the ‘being big but administratively unwieldly’ part. One big issue from Constantinople’s perspective is that Vlachia currently holds Transylvania and the Banat, and the Hungarians are not okay with that. Now Constantinople couldn’t “reward” Vlachia for their help in the Great Latin War by making them cede those back to Hungary, but that’s an obvious bomb, especially when you add in the Poles having an identical grievance with Vlach Galicia.
Partition (beyond the loss of border provinces as we’ve seen) is off the table.
Don’t really know what to say. There are the thematic tagmata in the themes and the guard tagmata at the capital, all of which have their infantry, cavalry, and artillery components. The Thrakesian tagma doesn’t have any specialties distinct from the Macedonian. They’re just recruited from different areas.
I think a key point is that the English are not intermeshed with the French population, like various non-Han peoples in medieval and early modern southern China that are up in the hills, islands in a Han sea. The French blob may be much bigger than the English blob, but they’re both distinct blobs that don’t intermingle much. One could just look at OTL Ireland as another example. The English blob was much bigger than the Irish blob, but the Irish blob was able to stay distinct because the English blob mostly stayed over there, with Ulster being the exception that proves the rules.
As for the Irish, they are considered inferior. English contempt for the Irish is, if not pre-POD (although it almost certainly is, based on how the English described 12th century Welsh), really close to it. It can’t be explained by the Reformation, because it predates it by centuries. I can’t remember the reference, but I remember reading about an English ordinance in the early 1300s outlawing Englishmen from wearing Irish clothing. The rationale? They wanted Englishmen to not be murdered by other Englishmen who were mistaking their murder victims for Irishmen in the dark. The English did that rather than, I don’t know, tell Englishmen to just not murder Irishmen.
There may have been a brief surge of treating the Irish like equals back during Arthur I’s reign, but that’s long since dissipated. (OOC, that was written before I realized how truly awful the English were in Ireland, and for how long.) And as English frustration at French domination of the Triple Monarchy grows, so will the abuse of the Irish. After all, what better way to feel good about yourself, to feel you have power and agency, then to punch down on somebody else? (This is not an English trait, but a human trait, lest anyone think I’m picking on the English here.)
Yesterday, I posted the next update of Not the End: The Empire Under the Laskarids for Megas Kyr level patrons on Patreon. It is the first part of Chapter 7: Ioannes the Well-Served. It is the beginning of Ioannes IV’s reign. While personally the new Basileus may not be very impressive, he is well-served by capable subordinates. While southern Italy tears itself apart in the War of the Sicilian Vespers, the prelude to the Laskarid re-conquest of Anatolia commences.
Thanks again for your support.
Guess what happens next will depend on what Hungary wants back first, Polish Slovakia or Transylvania and the Banat. Depends too on whether Poland likes the HRE more than Hungary.
I suppose this makes sense in that the Raven ideology is quite extreme. At the same time high taxes on the rich and something approaching UBI or at the least an extensive welfare program seem very much in the Roman style at this point. You've got a very literate and urbanized population and an imperial structure that is very much against too much power being concentrated amongst the wealthy. So the rich may hate anything approaching the Raven ideology, but I would not be surprised to see an emperor/empress at some point say, "My responsibility is first and foremost to the lives of the Roman people, not their solidi, and in that regard every citizen is equal."
Maybe that's just me being overly optimistic though.
just finish reading this timeline and i got to say that this is a great timeline, it is awesome how @Basileus444 you are able to make us care about the many characters in this story, something that is quite impressive since there is a lot of character in this timeline.
pls don't ban me
Monthly Donor
If Hungary starts another war with the romans especially now that they have removed the enemies in every border outside europe( persia is neutral-friendly and settled the mesopotamian issue with a buffer swiss-like-state, Georgia is the oldest ally, Egypt is guarded with another buffer) they are dead.
The only thing the hungarians can do is try to make the Vlach anger the Basileus and thus broke the alliance. Otherwise Hungary stands no chance alone.
I'm curious about how the Rhomanoi Commonwealth will develop. While Egypt and Tunis are relatively loyal with no wish of independence, the same cannot be said about southern Italy.
Commonwealth? I thought we were going for a more compact centralized federation state like empire?
Wasn't the one of this ttl point is a different kind of world with different states and institutions?
Evilprodigy
Donor
I think you're going to want to re-read B444's responses to the comments that came after that update if you think south italy's asking for independence.
Transylvania is an issue, but I don't think Hungary is itching for a fight with Rhomania any time soon given the previous posts. Heck, they're even somewhat friendly with the White Palace, so I'll be interested if a sort of partnership could be reached between them in the near future. B444's notes on Vlachia being forced to give back Transylvania and the Banat to Hungary is interesting though...would Rhomania backstab Vlachia if it meant a stronger alliance with Hungary? Probably not, but I'll be very intrigued if it happened!
The Despotate of Sicily is still loyal to Rhomania, and I don't think they'll split as long as the Romans and the Sideroi maintain their autonomy.
I think you're being overly optimistic if a Roman Emperor actually says that out of the goodness of his own heart. Of course, that sort of duty exists within the role of the Emperor as an unspoken covenant, but it's much more likely he will commit the same actions that D3 did towards those corrupt moneylenders if he ever wanted his point to come across in the most vivid manner, imo. The Romans sure prefer that over simple platitudes.
pls don't ban me
Monthly Donor
didn't meant straight independence, but even more autonomy. From my POV since the Pope got " off with his head " the still majorly catholic southern Italy got somehow pissed off( despite no will to leave the commonwealth/federation)
Why keep saying commonwealth? Just say the empire or despotates.
The Lands of Germany, 1643-46
The Lands of Germany, 1643-46:
There were no Popes. For the first time since the schism had begun near three centuries earlier, both Pontiffs had passed away in near proximity to each other, and both thrones were vacant. This was clearly viewed as an opportunity by many.
The theological differences between the Avignon and Roman Papacies were practically nonexistent. Certain cardinals and clerics might be more reform-minded than others, and certain theological issues considered more pressing at times, but this was the usual variety present in any large organization and something with which the Catholic Church was used to dealing. The split had been because of disputes over power and position, and maintained by the same desire, by the refusal to give up perks one had gained in the name of compromise.
It was clear to many of the faithful, including those in the upper hierarchy, that the situation had gone on far too long, and was actively dangerous to the faith. Since the schism heresy had flourished. In the early 1640s, the mightiest states in Europe were heretical, either Orthodox or Bohmanist. Everywhere Catholicism seemed to be on the retreat, with a few successes in Terranova the only patches of light in the darkness, and even then Mexican Catholicism wasn’t the most doctrinaire.
Nobody asked ‘what had gone wrong?’ That was because the answer was bloody obvious; it was the schism. The Orthodox and Bohmanists were wrong, but they were united. (Fractures and dissensions in both groups were less obvious to outsiders such as Catholics, but even so neither of them so obviously demonstrated disunity by having two Heads of the Church.) A house divided against itself could not stand, so of course Catholicism was failing. It was time, well past time, to make it right.
The Pope in Avignon had been the first to die, at the end of 1642, but it was known that the Roman Pope, Clement VIII, was ill in Prague and not expected to last much longer either. Pope Clement had opened negotiations with the See in Avignon as early as 1640 to explore a means of ending the Schism. The sack of Rome and the flight from the Eternal City had underscored the weakness of the Catholic Church and the resulting dangers. A reunited Catholic Church, which had the loyalty of the faithful of the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, Arles, Hungary, Poland, and Scandinavia, would be far more secure.
Everything has been arranged by the time Pope Clement breathes his last in Prague in July. As a compromise location, the Curias meet in Mantua, hosted by King Niccolo, who is eager to use the opportunity to boost the prestige of the monarchy and his parvenu dynasty. The electors are the combined colleges of cardinals from both Papacies, making this a rather crowded conclave, but letting everyone keep their red hats was necessary to keep the reconciliation process going.
The election lasts for five weeks, which is lengthy but far from the worst in the history of the Catholic Church. The delay is due to the need for compromise. Everybody wants the process to work but doesn’t want to wreck things by forcing a hasty decision. It is much better to take time to establish a consensus rather than trying to ram through a candidate that might inspire one side to leave and continue the schism.
To that end, any of the cardinals are out, which throws out the obvious candidates. There are certainly bitter disputes and arguments, but in the main area where deliberations occur, a cavalry saber from Rhomania and another saber from the Triple Monarchy are laid out in the center of the room. There must be no confusion about the stakes here. Many of the Roman cardinals had lost family and friends in the sack of Rome, while the cardinals of Avignon had had to fear similar fates in the concerns over Roman expansionism in Italy.
Eventually a decision is reached, with a compromise candidate found and selected. He is not Spanish or Arletian, associating him with Avignon, nor is he Italian, associating him with Rome. He is a native of the Bernese League, which ties him to Avignon, but the Bernese League is still de jure part of the Holy Roman Empire, tying him to Rome. He is Ferdinand von Habsburg, Bishop of Speyer.
He takes the name Callixtus IV, partly because that name choice doesn’t involve any awkward questioning about numbering. For numbering purposes, declaring one line illegitimate at this point would just alienate the other branch, which nobody wants. (Eventually, the numbering system is that both lines are considered valid, with numbering reordered as necessary, with precedence determined by when their reigns started. Doing such is messy, frankly a little embarrassing, and not something the Catholic Church much likes discussing, but if that is the price for unity, so be it.)
Callixtus is a robust man in his late 50s, known for his appreciation of fine wines and his interest and skill in botany and bee-keeping. He also has an appreciation for religious art, delighting in sponsoring budding artists to create works for churches in his see. Because of his interest in botany, he is part of the unofficial Europe-wide Society of Letters, corresponding both with Bohmanist Lotharingian botanists (in French) and with Orthodox Roman botanists (in Greek). He also has a fondness for the wines of Morea and Attaleia.
His relationship with Rhomania is complex. He continues, even after becoming Pope, his correspondence with some of the wardens at the Sweet Waters of Asia, as well as his orders of Roman wines. He opposed Theodor’s war on the grounds it would waste German gold and blood for no gain whatsoever, but he was enraged by the massacre of Ulm and is a stout opponent of Roman expansionism in Italy.
His relationship with the Triple Monarchy is simpler; he doesn’t like it. When he is elected Pope (to his surprise), he is at some of the Habsburg family lands in the League. Triune forces had occupied Speyer, and the contingent included a large portion of English troops, and these troops were largely Puritan in religious sympathies. They’d been outraged by the ostentatious decoration and religious art they’d seen everywhere and gone on an iconoclastic rampage, destroying most of the local art dating back centuries. They’d also destroyed his apiary, which included bees he’d studied through a microscope, some of the first studies of bees using the instrument. Ferdinand had been apoplectic, excoriating the soldiers as brutes.
(This, along with other incidents, results in English troops having an exceptionally bad reputation in Germany. This is unfair, as overall their behavior is no better or worse than French troops. But English troops are the ones responsible in several high-visibility events such as this, partly because as English soldiers are more likely to be Puritan, they are more likely to engage in religiously-motivated violence, such as the torture of Catholic priests. The English company that has a banner depicting a naked man with a drawn sword and erect penis and the motto ‘ready to use both’ also contributes substantially to anti-English sentiment. [1])
He is not amused by the behavior of the new Holy Roman Emperor, which is how Philip Sigismund is styling himself. The argument is that papal coronation is required to assume the Imperial title, although the case is undercut by the fact that the Wittelsbachs largely ignored that requirement and got away with it.
For now, Philip Sigismund ignores the diatribes from the new Pope, who sets up shop in Avignon, as had been the plan after the conclave. It was a secure base, safe from heretics and territory controlled by the Popes directly. He is focused on the Rhineland. In negotiations with Henri II, he agrees to cede the west bank of the Rhine to the Triune Emperor. The east bank is more complicated, with a redistribution of territories and consolidations of holdings to create a series of small-to-middling coherent and compact German states such as the enlarged Duchy of Baden.
The purpose of these reorganized states is to serve as a buffer for the now much-enlarged Kingdom of France’s border. The states on the east bank are still officially part of the Holy Roman Empire, but the rulers know on which side their bread is buttered. Their consolidated and larger holdings are due to pressure from King’s Harbor. This is not altruism on Henri’s part. Their gain does impose a debt of gratitude on the princes involved.
However while their power is such as to still not be a threat to the Triunes, they are stronger vis-à-vis the Holy Roman Emperors, and thus less likely to take kindly to marching orders. One example of possible orders would be an attack to regain the west bank, triggering a war with the Triunes that would be of extreme danger to the east bank states. The example of Sicily, agitating against Constantinople in anger over a risk of war of which Sicily would bear the destructive costs, is possibly in Henri’s mind.
But that does not end matters. Philip Sigismund does have several issues still facing him. There is the matter of the Ravens’ Rebellion, the need to secure compensation for the various minor princes who’ve lost territory, and the two powers in the Holy Roman Empire that can pose a credible threat to his authority, the Kingdom of Bohemia in union with Hungary, and Elizabeth von Wittelsbach, effective ruler of Bavaria and Wurttemberg on behalf of her son.
He tries to resolve the first issue with an attack on Magdeburg in 1644 with his troops, although he is not in command. After some success massacring peasants who aren’t quite fast enough to get away, the Hesse-Brunswick soldiers encounter a very angry Friedrich Zimmermann. Using the same tactics of a mass of skirmishers to cover the approach of columns who then break the firing line of the enemy, the Ravens shatter the Imperial army. In reprisal, they kill everyone who aren’t quite fast enough to get away.
It is a humiliating blow to Philip Sigismund’s power and authority and he is now forced to lean even more heavily on Henri II for money and even troops to maintain his position. This is much to the disgust of the German intellectual Manfred von Nimitz, who castigates Philip Sigismund as one willing to sell out the Empire to foreigners so long as he sees a profit.
Manfred von Nimitz is far from the only one making such claims, which is alarming to both Philip Sigismund and to Henri, who doesn’t want to see a pliant Emperor replaced by someone more difficult. The greatest threats come from those two large Imperial states, Bohemia and Bavaria-Wurttemberg.
In 1644, Bohemia looms as the bigger threat. King Stephan is an adult male, as opposed to Elizabeth who is a woman acting as regent for a son, so by the argument of sexism Stephan is more dangerous. On less misogynistic grounds, Stephan has more material resources. Aside from Bohemia, he has Hungary, Austria, and Saxony, an alliance with Poland, and some kind of Russian connections. He even includes in his army 4000 Greek mercenaries, all veterans.
The attack comes in 1645, directed at Saxony. Bohemia is protected by mountains, while an offensive into southern Germany would have to tangle with Wittelsbach forces as well, and potentially trigger a Roman intervention. By this time the Roman garrison in Vienna has been removed due to Austro-Hungarian pressure, but that is still a risk in Philip’s and Henri’s mind.
There is some sharp fighting, but mostly restricted to siege works, and Saxony falls to the vastly superior numbers of the Imperials and Triunes by the time winter sets in to end the fighting. The treaty of Leipzig signed in early 1646 ensures that hostilities don’t resume in the spring.
In the treaty Stephan forfeits the Duchy of Saxony, but is recognized by both Philip and Henri as King of Bohemia. Furthermore Stephan must abandon all agreements with enemies of the two Emperors and agree to extradite any enemies who should arrive in his lands. This is to close an obvious bolt hole for Elizabeth, who’d been allied to Stephan but unable to provide any assistance to Stephan in Saxony.
Stephan agrees to these terms to guarantee the security of his remaining holdings. Keeping the fight contained to just Saxony is to his benefit. An Imperial-Triune invasion into Austria and Hungary would be immensely destructive, and Stephan has no desire to trigger a Roman intervention either, even if it is to ostensibly help him. Given the extremely bad grace many in Constantinople greeted his request to remove the Roman garrison in Vienna, even though it was granted in the end, he is skeptical that if the Romans came to help, they would leave when he no longer needed the help. He would prefer not to take the chance.
For a new Duke of Saxony, Henri proposes an unexpected candidate, Leopold von Habsburg, the nephew of the new Pope. The obvious reason is to conciliate the new pontiff; popes have a habit of wanting to aggrandize their nephews. Furthermore such an effort would help conciliate the Bernese League, agitated by all the border adjustment just across from its northern frontier. Henri is well aware of the vulnerability of his southern frontier and has no wish to end up fighting the Accord powers while still mired in Germany. Finally, Saxony is a major Imperial state in its own right, while the Habsburgs seem to be content with being a big fish in the small pond of Alpine politics. Even with a Saxony, they are unlikely to be a threat.
Leopold is an athletic twenty-two-year-old at the time of his appointment as Duke of Saxony. While the Habsburg family has been known for its handsomeness, Leopold seems to have been quite the looker even by their standards, if the testimony of the Roman ambassador to Arles, Ioannes Mantzabinos is anything to go by.
“His face is oval, his nose graceful, his eyes like two almonds set in a bowl of milk…
The body of Leopold is that of the most brilliant of the ancient statues, perfect in form and symmetry. His limbs are long but perfectly proportioned to his body, stout and strong, lean and powerful. His hair is that of the soft downiness of youth just turning into the thick locks of manhood. His loins…”
Errr, it’s getting a little hot in here. Ioannes, why don’t you eat something cool to calm down?
NOT the cucumber!
Sigh, the things I have to deal with with this…
Anyway, Leopold becomes the Duke of Saxony in early 1646. Despite the humiliation of 1644, the power of Philip Sigismund and particularly Henri is clearly in the ascendant. The Ravens may be difficult to root out from their nest, but they are not an expansionist threat. Meanwhile the only serious rival remaining is the isolated Elizabeth.
But having said that, Henri’s plan for a Holy Roman Empire beaten down and subservient to Triune interests would falter due to two mistakes. The appointment of Leopold was the first.
[1] This is from an OTL English company from the English Civil Wars that had that exact banner.
