Just got caught up. The Crusades were my main area of study at college so this is awesome - following intensely!
So...Tancred is dead. That'll have ramifications...
So...Tancred is dead. That'll have ramifications...
And All Nations Shall Gather To It - Volume I: The Abode of Peace
- Thread starter Ricard (i.e. Rdffigueira)
- Start date
Thanks, I hope you are liking it, then. The Crusades are, IMHO, the most fascinating Medieval phenomenon, and even if it "failed" as a whole, it really influenced the Late Medieval and Early Modern European worldview. I really enjoy reading about it and the 1st Crusade seems relatively forgotten in comparison to the 3rd and 4th Crusades.
Tancred's "untimely" death leaves Bohemond as the sole Norman aristocrat in the Levant.
Bohemond can go and conquer Damascus and establish himself as Prince of Syria.
Now you are getting warm... Damascus is indeed a big prize for a landless and powerhungry lord.
Damascus would certainly be a prize equal to or greater than Antioch I would presume, and it would definitely be a boon to the Crusader States. The real question is if Bohemond can actually pull that off and hold onto it for any significant period of time.
Also aside from Bishop Adhemar, have any other notable leaders of the Crusade stayed in the Kingdom of Jerusalem compared to OTL?
Indeed. For now, Damascus will remain untouched.
Regarding the paramount leaders, we had: Robert Curthose (son of William the Conqueror), Robert II of Flanders, Hugh of Vermandois (King Phillip I's brother) and Stephen of Blois (father of OTL King Stephen of England). IOTL, all of them actually returned to Europe, and in my head I really did not think that ITTL, with the circumstances about each one of them unchanged, they would really desire to remain. I actually considered leaving Robert Curthose in KOJ, because he was, of all them, the only without lands, andthat he had already mortgaged Normandy to his brother, King Henry I of England. Perhaps he would be, under the right circumstances, willing to accept a fief in Jerusalem. I let the idea go, in the end, however, because, unlike OTL Raymond, Godfrey, Bohemond, Tancred or even Baldwin, none of the historical sources give any indicative that Robert Curthose had any interest in remaining in the Holy Land, and so I imagined that he had no purpose there beyond the pilgrimage itself.
Regarding the others, they have even less reasons to remain, considering they all had fiefs of their own in Europe, and, unlike Godfrey or Raymond, for example, did not forfeit them, which indicates that they had intention of returning home. Remember, as well, that Godfrey was unmarried, and Raymond took his wife to the Holy Land, while the others left their wives and children back in the west.
All of this, coupled with the fact that all of them historically returned ASAP after OTL Battle of Ascalon, made me decide (and, trust me, I considered many ideas when I was writing these parts) that all of them would ITTL also return to Europe, and thus we are left with all but Raymond and Bohemond (as well as Bishop Adhemar, as you pointed out) as the sole leaders in KOJ. This, I believe, might bring us to some interesting narrative developments.
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Seeing as most of the lords will return to Europe there will be a need for reinforcements in the future. Will we see something similar to the Crusade of 1101? And given that relations are significantly better with the Romans will Alexios be better able to utilise any future crusaders for his own purposes on the way to Jerusalem?
We will, indeed. The Crusade of 1101 will be touched in some detail, and considering that these little flying insects with oft-brightly colored wings that we use as an colloquial metaphor for the causality effects in diverging TL's are in flight already, the results of this new expedition promise to be very different from those OTL.
Alexios was and will always be half-horrified by the arrival of Crusading expeditions in his empire, as they in most of the cases appear to be nothing above a bunch of rapacious barbarians, but he is savvy enough to take advantage of the situation, even so as, for the first time since the arrival of the Seljuks in the Near East, the Turkish "empire" is in decline and fragmented. Besides the fact that so far the Romans still have reputation as a reliable and serious ally of the Crusades as a whole, the Latin European spiritual and temporal leaders will be much more friendly to "Byzantium" than OTL. I've In time, it might happen that both "sides" of European Christendom realize that their roles are mutually beneficial, like the Carolingians and the Ottonians, and various Popes (for example) had somewhat recognized.
BTW, I'll try to post something tomorrow to wrap up this last phase of the First Crusade.
Yes, of course. I'm owing you guys some maps. I usually use Google Earth when writing the chapters, because many times it is more handy than drawn maps, but in my research I've come across some very useful ones.
In fact, in this very month I found the list of maps by the University of Chicago's Middle Eastern Studies. It has an immense list of detailes maps from biblical times to post-WW2, spanning the Near East, Africa, and even India and SE Asia. Anyone who might be interested, here is the link:
https://cmes.uchicago.edu/page/maps
10. The Aftermath of the First Crusade
Romanticized paiting of pilgrims returning from the Outremer to Europe
The capture of Ascalon is considered to be the “final act” of the First Crusade, and, indeed, after it, even the magnates that had remained to see it submitted at last decided to return to Europe with their entourages, like Robert of Normandy and Robert II of Flanders, as well as Stephen of Blois, while Baldwin of Boulogne bid farewell to Raymond and Adhemar and returned to his principality in Edessa.
The conquest of Jerusalem had allowed the Franks to occupy the region of Judaea, a mountainous and rugged country stretched between the Mediterranean coast from the Jordan valley. There lay cities of historical significance to Jews and Christians alike, like Bethlehem [Bet Lehem], the place where Jesus was born, and Bethany [Beth anya], where his friend Lazarus had lived and died, and was then resurrected by Jesus’ most powerful miracle. These places, like the various Hebrew villages and towns around, had no military presence – as they lacked strategic significance – and were thus easily occupied by the newcoming settlers. Farther to the east, a small detachment of Toulousain veterans took control of the ancient settlement of Jericho [Yeriḥo], which had indeed a more significant role in the power-projection (from the point of view of a feudal lord) over the lowlands of the Jordan valley.
The region directly north of Judaea was named Samaria, homeland of the Samaritans, a traditionalist Jewish sect that had survived both Christianization and Islamization and various persecutions. The main city there was Nablus [Šəḵem], located two days’ march north of Jerusalem, not a particularly significant city in the demographic or economic aspects, but, being a walled town located on a promontory, it represented a strategic point of interest. It was captured by Pons of Aguilers, Raymond’s vassal, and thus he claimed the city for his liege.
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Bohemond of Taranto, with a handful of Italo-Norman knights and men-at-arms, possessed by a festering grudge against Duke Raymond and Bishop Adhemar and his former Crusader associates, finally succeeded in obtaining a petty realm for himself in Ramla [ar-Ramlah] and in Lydda [Lod], cities located in a valley in which the road linking Jerusalem to the sea (Via Maris) had been built. Both districts had flourished under the Umayyad Caliphate but were ruined by an earthquake in 1068 A.D. In the next decades, the Turkish invasions forced the remaining population to evacuate, and thus, despite its strategic significance, the settlements were almost ghost towns when the Crusaders arrived. It is no surprise, then, that Bohemond immediately took measures to besiege the nearby port of Jaffa. This Levantine balneary fell, too, in September 1099, not solely by the violence of the Normans, but also by the providential arrival of a large Pisan fleet, eager to assist the son of Robert Guiscard, in Italy regarded as a living legend.
It is likely that Bohemond intended to establish himself as an autonomous ruler, explaining why he must have been very uncomfortable with Bishop Adhemar’s demand that he must profess a solemn vow to pledge his loyalty to the Church of Jerusalem, in communion with the Church of Rome. Bohemond, in spite of his ambition and greed for material wealth, was no less of a religious leader than many of his contemporaries – one who had spent two nights wide awake after the capture of Jerusalem praying in the Holy Sepulcher –, and was thus forced to comply to Bishop Adhemar’s whims.
Nevertheless, Bohemond was, for the moment, somewhat satisfied with his progress. He had abandoned everything behind in Europe, travelling across seemingly half the world with a handful of valiant knights to seek for himself a realm and a lineage in the Holy Land.
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To most of all of Bohemond’s contemporaries not hailing from an ecclesiastic background, there was no obvious contradiction between the quest for material rewards and patrimony, and the unending search for spiritual salvation and virtuousness. These two goals could coincide, and, accordingly, many of those that arrived as pilgrims decided to remain as inhabitants of this new kingdom, fashioned from the wrecked remains of the Islamic empires of Egypt and Persia.
Be as it may, the early expansionist movements of the Crusaders owed their success more, again, to the balkanized state of the Near East after the Seljuk invasions than properly to the Frankish military might or heroism, despite what the popular songs and epics of the period might claim. The growing Frankish presence, in demographic terms, was negligible if compared with the Syriac, Levantine, Jewish, Arabic and even Hellenic ethnic groups that inhabited the region. Among the Franks themselves, there remained a clear majority of Occitan-speaking settlers that had came in Duke Raymond’s army, and a few pockets of Francophone Normans, Lorrainers and Burgundians from the retinues of the other magnates, with a substantial Italian population in the port-cities.
The modern view that the Latins had come to colonize and Christianize the Levant is an exaggerated misconception. Only a minority of those who had participated in the capture of Jerusalem and the final battles against the Fatimids actually chose to remain in the land, mostly minor and usually landless aristocrats, like the Normans under Robert Curthose, and Bohemond’s kin, and but a few commoners, parochial clergymen and soldiers that genuinely saw a way to increase their fortunes and spiritual fervor in the Orient.
The pattern of Crusader expansion on the domains that would soon enough be forged into a genuine “Dominion of Jerusalem”, depended much more on improvisation, on the chaotic and fractured state of the Islamic polities in the Levant, and on sheer luck, than upon a “grand strategy” to consolidate the realm. For example: it is likely that the capture of Ascalon and Gaza would not have represented their very first conquest if somehow they lacked a united hostile neighbor in Egypt, because, from an economic and demographic standpoint, the settlements of Caesarea and Acre (in Palestine), as well as Tyre and Beirut (in Lebanon) were much more relevant. The conquest of these cities, however, resulted from individual efforts and offensives from the arriving Christian warlords, in many cases with the cooperation from the Italian navies – mostly from Genoa, Venice and Pisa – that, for at least a generation, had already been protecting their commercial interests in the eastern Mediterranean, and rapidly saw the benefits of supporting the Frankish occupation.
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Historical Notes: With this chapter we end Act I, that was basically the recounting of the initial historical events before the divergence and the POD itself. Now onwards, we will begin to explore these divergences, based on that caveat by which anything that is not mentioned happened just like OTL. To be honest, and I'll likely get to it many other times in future chapters, I am personally fond of the "chaos theory" approach to Alt-Hist, that is, I believe that we should treat anything beyond the POD with all the possible causalities, in which many will be similar (but never equal) to OTL. Nevertheless, I realize that this theory in many cases provides a poor structure for a story-based TL, and thus I'll try to, in what measure I find plausible and possible, to have events flow from the POD more naturally, in some cases similar to OTL, in some cases different.
This chapter adresses some points that will be brought again in future installments namely the role of the Italian city-states in the strengthening of the Latin Crusader states, much like OTL, as well as the multicultural nature of this new "kingdom". What I intend, in the long run, is to have a much less pronounced French predominance in the Holy Land, emphasizing mainly the role of the Occitan-speaking and the Italian-speaking peoples than those coming from France proper.
Bohemond's anedocte that he prayed for two straight days in the Holy Sepulcre is atested by sources, and an useful example to dispell the popular idea that the Crusaders went to the orient in seach of plunder and conquest.
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Hope Jerusalem -- or perhaps Egypt -- get a German and Central European presence as well
Yes! That's one of my main objectives with this TL, creating a very cosmopolitan Jerusalem - or perhaps Egypt -, a home of many cultures, obviously not only European. Among the ruling elite, however, I wanted to reduce the western European preeminence (mostly Francophone) by introducing representatives from Germany proper, Czechia, Hungary, and, why not, Wales, Scotland and others, which IOTL formed somewhat of a "periphery" of Latin Christendom, consolidated in France, England and Italy.
Of course, some of them had their own reasons to war nearby, such as the Saxons against the West Slavs and Baltic pagans, and the post-Asturian kingdoms of Spain against the Moors - lest we forget, they right now are put in defensive again by the maelstrom of the Almoravids, and then the Almohads - but I believe that a more successful Jerusalem provides a magnet for all kinds of Crusade-minded individuals, and, in turn, mitigates the perpetual manpower deficit of the Latin kingdom.
In the long run, this melting pot might create even more interesting narrative setpieces.
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Cuāuhtemōc
Banned
Teutonic Knights in Egypt employing a Christian counterpart to the Mamelukes against their enemies would be very cool.
A German-dominated Egypt would rule in part because instead of Danubian or Volga Germans, we'd have Nile Germans. And so many Magdeburg charters. And, inshallah, the Teutonic Order fighting the good fight in, like, Nubia or something
That's awesome. I'm making NOTES, God forgive me if I forget this. Although I suppose they would be keen to make good relations with the Christian peoples of Sudan and Ethiopia, notably Makuria (by then Abyssinia had collapsed, from what I've researched). From the POV of cultural exchange between the Mediterranean civlizations, we expect an even greater "Prester John" Orientalist craze in Europe than OTL, with idealistic pictures of the exotic Ethiopians defending the Christian faith in the Dark Continent against unknown beasts, and maps of the Orient with "hic sunt dracones" south of Axum.
That's goddamn awesome. Instead of Battle in the Ice, we'll have Battle in the... Nile's canyons or in the oasis(es).
TBH, Prussia by then is still a mix of Slavs and Balts, so, its more like, a Saxon/Bavarian/Franconian/Swabian Egypt (or vice-versa)
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Cuāuhtemōc
Banned
Aksum may have collapsed prior to the timeline's POD but there were still Christian statelets in the area that makes up OTL Ethiopia, one of which (led by the Zagwe dynasty) would eventually form the Ethiopian Empire. In fact, the Ethiopians tried to form an alliance between themselves and the Aragonese against the Muslims and proposed a double wedding between the Aragonese infante and the Ethiopian emperor's daughter and the Aragonese king's daughter and the heir to the Ethiopian throne: would be cool if we could get something like that going.
Of course, Ethiopa (or any of the proto-Ethiopian Medieval polities) will certainly deserve a mention in the future. Perhaps like Jerusalem they are somewhat "strangers in a strange land" in the sense that they are surrounded by hostile and "foreign" cultured civilizations.
The tidbit about the Aragonese alliance is interesting, I didn't knew about it (I knew about the Portuguese missions to Ethiopia in the 16th C.). It could warrant an interesting TL in its own right
A German-dominated Egypt would rule in part because instead of Danubian or Volga Germans, we'd have Nile Germans. And so many Magdeburg charters.
And, inshallah, the Teutonic Order fighting the good fight in, like, Nubia or something
There are actually Nile Germans in another TL, The Age of Miracles, by Basileus444. Cairo is called Marienburg am Nil.