And All Nations Shall Gather To It - Volume I: The Abode of Peace
- Thread starter Ricard (i.e. Rdffigueira)
- Start date
jocay
Banned
Followed by The Khan Awakens, The Last Norman and The Rise of Christendom.
On a more serious note, I do expect some form of confrontation between the Latin East/West and Byzantium somewhere down the road, once that the Sunni powers have been marginalized. Perhaps in the years leading to the alt-Mongols there will be a war?
I don't think that there will or can be a Mongolian Empire. Considering how absolutely ASB Genghis truly was and that there hasn't been someone like him ever before or after. You could though have a great turkish warlord who unites the Turkish tribes and becomes a Seljuk 2.0.
Any horse nomadic super confederation is a treat to the settled societies during this era.
Any horse nomadic super confederation is a treat to the settled societies during this era.
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yeah, I could see conflict over southern Italy and the Balkans, but that won't cause the conflict to happen just tension it will condense until Egypt when they could splinter off, if it happens before the Mongol invasion and restart of the alliance over again, if after then they won't unite until Arabia is united under Yemen, or Omen, or both.
Oh and don't forget the roman menace, attack of the Christians, revenge of Muslims, and a Christian hope
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It would be more interesting IMO seeing a conflict in between the Eastern Catholic and Western Catholics
well, I would've agreed with you if only Rdffigueira didn't say that he was basically going to create the biggest butterfly genocide ever that I've heard (which isn't that much).
Because alternate history is more interesting when you compare the changes you have made to the straight line of history.
If your story is about how the middle east during the middle ages would have turned out if the crusades had been more successful then one of the questions that raises is how that kingdom would cope with the Mongols.
If instead you just go well for reasons outside the narrative that never happened and the greatest threat to these kingdoms just never arose, that's narratively unsatisfying.
I am not saying that a nomadic horse Archer threat shouldn't be there, what I am saying is that it shouldn't be Mongolian or Genghis Khan. There was never another conquest dynasty other then Qing who became one of the great legitimate Chinese Dynasties.
Mongolians weren't even a majority on the steppe that was Turks... More realistic to have a great Turkish nomad Khan who will most likely be as brutal as the Mongolian not just as though against his enemies.
Mongolians weren't even a majority on the steppe that was Turks... More realistic to have a great Turkish nomad Khan who will most likely be as brutal as the Mongolian not just as though against his enemies.
This has been suggested many times on the thread, and who would get the throne for Africa and Marocco, etc... but I've been interested in the demographics of all of this. I think it's safe to say that we won't be seeing any African Reich, but instead, the more westward the rump African Kingdoms are the more Spaniards and Portuguese will settle. It might be a stretch, but we might see the survival of the Mozarabic and Andalusi Arab. Furthermore, Lybia, ITTL "Africa" would be mainly settled by Italians. Egypt would still have a large number of Arabs, so more copts this time around?
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A great nomadic empire without Genghis is like a pizza without cheese: it’s still a pizza...but it’s not as good.
As far as I know the Steppe produced plenty of Warlords. Genghis Khan was the greatest, the Seljuks and Timurids were second tier (for the mid-east), and it falls off from there... but Genghis Khan to me was more the pinnacle of a trend, rather than something unique.
And nothing in the story so far stops the trend, so there will still be a bunch of steppe conquerors and one of them will be the greatest one who affects Iran, China, and Russia, and many others will affect one of the three. Still, it could be that the greatest Mongol warlord only affects China, while the greatest Turkish one affects them all.
Genghis Khan is God tier. He is alone there. No other leader wether settled or nomadic is next to him. He is a strategic master mind, the biggest pull yourself upp from the bootstraps story ever. And is able to create a stable succession to his heir. He is also from one of the less populated people's. The great majority of the steppe People were Turks at this time.
Seljuk, Attila, and Timurid were A class leaders. Not second tier. One doesn't create a nomadic steppe empire with anything less.
It isnt cheese you are missing if it isnt the Mongols, the cheese will be on there. The Mongols are the finest steak you will ever see.
A pizza without Cheese isn't a pizza...It's just bread with tomato sauce. (Assuming the person in question isn't lactose intolerant in which case...non-lactose cheese?)
Details; I call Genghis first and those others second tier, you call Genghis zeroth tier and the rest first tier.
And the point remains, one of the Steppe warlords will be the greatest; if not Genghis then someone else.
jocay
Banned
There's always Temujin's father Yesugei, the de facto leader of the Khamag Mongols. He was only 37 when he was assassinated. Had he not been poisoned by the Tatars according to The Secret History of the Mongols, it's likely he would've united the Mongol tribes under his authority.
As an alternative (out of many), there's the Qara Khitai or Western Liao. It was a steppe empire of the Khitans that took the trappings of the Chinese imperial state and brought it to Central Asia. They followed a mixture of Buddhist and animist traditions though a noticeable minority were Nestorian Christians. It is because of them was China were referred to as Cathay by medieval Europeans.
As an alternative (out of many), there's the Qara Khitai or Western Liao. It was a steppe empire of the Khitans that took the trappings of the Chinese imperial state and brought it to Central Asia. They followed a mixture of Buddhist and animist traditions though a noticeable minority were Nestorian Christians. It is because of them was China were referred to as Cathay by medieval Europeans.
oh yah not in short term.yes losing Jerusalem would cause a crusader but losing parts of northern terriotry? sure you lose an important land and just some land but it won't cause a crusade. Maybe small puntive efforts like the muslim did but a crusade? I don't think so. Against the byzantines and esspically if the previous crusades isn't too far off. Sure most likely anyway between the 2 would cause a crusade but would it be the massive crusades of all christodem? I don't think so unless juerlsum is taken.
Assuming this army is organized well enough and can make use of Roman logistics, they should be able to reach Mosul. There is no way for the crusaders to hold onto it, but after all this sacking and raiding, if they take Mosul they in all probability reduce it to a ruin in return and call it justice.
51. Homs is Taken by the Crusaders (1139/1140)
Disclaimer: I'm not ignoring the previous posts. I intend to answer one by one. I'm just taking advantage of some free time before I leave for my GF's house, where I'll be without computer. So, enjoy, and do keep the discussions, I'm liking to read it!_________________________________________________________________________________________
Non-contemporary painting depicting the downfall of Homs, one of the last Islamic bastions in the Levant, incorporated to the Outremer in 1139
The Crusader army that came from France was among the largest hosts assembled thus far in commitment to a holy war ever since the days of Charlemagne, numbering between twenty to twenty five thousand souls. Even if it included non-combatants among the hundreds of auxiliary personnel, its character was much more militarized than that of the previous Crusades, with a sizable amount of professional soldiers and knights levied from various regions of the west, mostly from the Kingdom of France proper, but also from Brittany, Aquitaine and Gascony, Burgundy, Normandy, and from as far as the Rhineland. Likely because of this, the expedition took various months to be properly organized, to the point that the Pope personally wrote to the court in Paris admonishing the monarch to hasten the preparations and march at once, seeing that the Sicilians had long since returned from the Orient, and those from the Low Countries and England were already on their way there.
This massive army, however, hampered by its sheer size, only arrived in Constantinople in November 1139, and would take a few more months to arrive in Palestine; by then, Mosul and Shah-Armen’s forces had already departed, and the parts of Edessa that had not been reduced to a smoldering ruin were incorporated into Rhōmania. We know that, until then, the Basileus was preparing only a punitive expedition to keep the Turcomans of Armenia at bay, seeing that his hold over the eastern parts of Anatolia was still sub-par. The central region of the peninsula, and those provinces that formed the ancient Kingdom of Armenia, were still underpopulated and demanded a large military presence to secure the travelling and trading routes to the Outremer.
However, the arrival of such a massive Frankish army presented a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to John II Komnenos; even more than simply check Seljuq expansionism, he might be able to unleash a dedicated campaign of conquest to restore the whole imperial dominion over Armenia - this, in turn, would allow the demographic and economic recovery of the Anatolian peninsula. Besides, the Komnenoi wanted to stay close to the Crusaders so as to keep them at bay.
Now, the Emperor eagerly vested himself in his traditional role as the ultimate marshal of the Crusade - as his father Alexios had done -, charged with overseeing the restoration of the Earthly Kingdom of God.
When the King of France crossed the straits into Asia, he was sided by a vast Rhōmaîon military force, and the keen organizational and logistical acumen of the Rhōmaîoi was the sole guarantee that such a gargantuan contingent could traverse an extensive country of rugged plains and mountains into the frontier of Syria. For the first time in various months, the Frenchmen, hitherto weakened by constant hunger and disease due to the mismanagement of resources, welcomed a season of plentiness and nonchalance.
Aware that they could not go as far as Palestine in a single corps, the principal divisions of the Rhōmaîoi and Crusaders were ordered to quarter in Antioch and Laodicea, respectively, while the entourages of the Emperor and of the French King voyaged to Jerusalem in compact companies, to undertake the traditional pilgrimage sightseeing.
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Now, it took a few months for the campaigns to be resumed, already in the sowing season of 1140. The combined host of the Crusade would be divided in three parts: (1) the army of Rhōmania, led by John Axouch and Sebastokrátor Andronikos Komnenos, the second of the Basileus’ sons, regarded as a reborn Diomedes; (2) the royal army of Francia, itself divided in various sub-armies, led each one by their own grand duke; (3) the Outremerine army, led by Roger of Syria and Archbishop Gregory. This time, the Outremerine army afield would be much smaller than usual, as most of the nobles would march to the Crusade with only their retinues and sergeantry, leaving the levies in reserve to protect Palestine and Syria against offensives to the border provinces, mostly notably in case the Egyptians attempted to invade from the Sinai... or, God forbid it, the cursed Turks coming from the Syrian desert a third time.
There was some debate about the course of action to be taken. Some nobles argued that they ought to take the opportunity to invade Egypt, once and for all, striking them in their moment of weakness, to topple the Fatimid Caliphate. This time, as it might be expected, they remained a minority, because most of the officers advocated a campaign in Armenia and Mesopotamia, to avenge the grim fate of Edessa - evidently enough, in this they had the enthusiastic support of the Basileus. Indeed, after some deliberation, the Crusaders, appalled by the tales about the grisly and barbarous fate suffered by Edessa, resolved that it was urgent that they restore the northern frontier holdouts in the Euphrates valley.
However, to the surprise of the Komnenoi, and of the Outremerines, the French grand dukes determined that they should, first of all, annex Homs and Hama to the Crusader State. Confused by the argument, Prince Roger tried to argue, feebly, that the Emir of Homs was an ally and tributary, and had never conspired against the Christian principality, but, to his irritation, he was scolded and reproached by the King of France himself. *Phillip II affirmed that they, as warriors of the faith, could not permit the Saracens to hold any land inside the Kingdom of God, lest it might facilitate an insidious conspiracy against them! Archbishop Gregory, seeing no use in arguing against the resolution imposed by the French suzerain and his lords, even if he believed that an action against Homs at the moment would be an unnecessary delay, nonetheless sanctioned the campaign.
Of course, the Outremerine patricians knew that this was all but a convenient pretext used by King *Phillip II and his partisans to conquer new lands and spoils for his own followers, considering that more than one of his vassals had voiced concerns about the fact that campaigning in the spoliated fief of Edessa would not yield enough riches to compensate for the costs of the expedition. And, indeed, as it commonly happens in these situations, tales about fabulous treasures and exotic stereotypes abounded and stirred the caprices of these European aristocrats.
Thus, one can only imagine the abysmal reaction of the ruling Emir of Homs when he received an ultimatum from his hitherto allies and protectors: abandon his lands and titles and treasures or perish.
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As-Salih al-Himsi, Emir of Homs was no fool to believe that he would be ever safe bordered by the Franji; they had submitted every city of Syria, why would they stop now? As it commonly happens in states surrounded by hostile expansionist nations, he had long ago weaved a network of spies, spread about in Syria and Palestine, so as to monitor every step of the Latins, and this various intelligence reports were frequently given to Baghdad; indeed, the Abbasid Caliph saw in Homs, if not a dedicated ally, at least an useful asset against the Franks.
At the moment, his most serviceable allies were actually the Bedouins from Diyar Mudar, with whose dreaded scimitars the unfortunate population of Damascus had all been too acquainted. By the time the Crusaders besieged Homs, these bands had been joined by Rukn al-Dawla Dāwud [Turkish: Rükneddin Davud], dynast of the Artuqid branch that ruled Hasankeyf [Ḥiṣn Kayfā], and had recently been defeated and expelled by the Shah-Armens. Together, and stimulated by religious devotion and by the dinars of Homs, the Artuqids and the Arabs marched to relieve the besieged city. As a reward, al-Himsi promised them the treasure of Hama.
The Saracens did not seek pitched battle, but their attacks and incursions against the foragers and scouts became repetitive, and their very presence inspired Homs to resist the siege, after al-Himsi refused the ultimatum and cursed the Franks.
The Christians, realizing that the relief forces intended to establish themselves in Hama, acted quickly and detached a third of their army to encircle that city as well. With perspicacious coordination of the Rhōmaîoi, they maintained two simultaneous siege operations. Soon enough, the fortune of these metropolises was drained in the useless war effort, and the Artuqids abdicated from the campaign, and instead went on to occupy the formidable fortress of Shmemis [Arabic: Qal’at ash-Shmamis], near the village of Salamīya. This was an ancient stronghold, erected atop a petrified volcano by the priest-king Sampsiceramus; destroyed by the Sassanians centuries ago, it was rebuilt by the Umayyads and stood there ever since. The Syrian locals were submitted to a de facto slavery to sustain the new hideout of this Turcoman bandoliers.
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Abandoned, Homs fell first, in a few weeks, the time it needed for the Franks to build their siege towers and battering rams, all while the walls were bombarded by trebuchets. Its soldiers were slain almost to the last man; bizarrely enough, the very fact that the conquerors seemingly exacted the whole of their violent spirits against the military personnel in turn prevented the extension of such a barbarity against the civilians, whose women, children and non-combatants were unusually spared from bloodshed – even if their patrimony was reclaimed as a prize of conquest.
Hama, in spite of its smaller size and population, continued to offer resistance for many days after the fall of Homs, but its fate was sealed nevertheless. This time, oddly enough, they too were spared from violence. The non-Christians were simply expelled, and its buildings were rapidly occupied by the numerous French armed pilgrims. The largest religious building of Homs had been a very ancient pagan temple dedicated to the sun god Elagabalus, in the times when the city was called “Emesa”, and which later became a basilica, and then a mosque, and now, once again, it was consecrated as a place of Christian worship; there, Gregory presided over a mass to commemorate victory.
Al-Himsi himself was spared, and would be sent, together with his family, as a prisoner to Constantinople, but they would live the rest of their lives peacefully, in a small estate granted by the magnanimous Basileus in Bithynia.
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The Outremerine lords fruitlessly proposed a deliberation to discuss to whom the lands of Homs would be attributed, as a fief of the Earthly Kingdom of God. To their surprise, King *Phillip, in a display of political ineptitude, simply ignored their pretenses and claimed Homs as his right of conquest; it would not be the first time that he would treat the Latin-Levantine grandees as no better than lesser barons, but no one dared oppose him - not even Prince Roger -, lest they might lose the support of France in the Crusade.
Now, Phillip evidently had no intention of remaining in the Outremer, and thus ceded it to one of his younger brother, Robert of Paris, now created “Duke of Emèse”, a title that displeased more than one of the Latin-Levantine lords, most noticeably Roger, who was supposed to be the only Duke in the Outremer! The biggest problem was that Robert was, then, aged 14 years, and thus the King appointed one of his trusted men, Amalric III [French: Amaury], Count of Vexin - whose daughter Bertrade had been his father’s second wife, and thus held a significant position in the French court - to serve as regent. As it would happen, Robert, soon after attaining legal age, would return to Europe with a substantial portion of the treasure of Homs, and would never revisit the Outremer, leaving the administration of the Duchy to his trusted friend and steward, Simon III of Montfort - Amalric’s second son - fated to rule it as a perpetual regent.
Also recognized as part of the newly-created “Duchy of Emèse”, were the urban centers of Hama, enfeoffed to William of Vermandois [French: Guillaume de Vermandois], Baron of Chaumont - the King’s brother-in-law, married to his bastard sister Isabelle - and Shayzar, one that had escaped the clutches of the Franks, but had been peacefully annexed by the Himsidids, now given to the patrimony of Elias [French: Hélie/Helias], the second son of Fulk V of Anjou, and titular Count of Maine. This one concession resulted from an arrangement made between the King and Count Fulk, who wanted to avoided the partition of his inheritance between his two sons, Geoffrey and Elias, and thus secured that only his firstborn would retain all of his French fiefs.
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The annexation of Homs, Hama and Shayzar, barely a few years after the conquest of Damascus, effectively allowed the Crusader State to incorporate the fairest parts of Syria, with only a few of its settlements remaining independent, like Palmyra and Bosra, which, for being too remote, the Latins had little interest in conquering at the time.
In the span of short of half a century, the Frankish invaders had not only wrestled Palestine, but also expanded in such a quick and impressive fashion that, undoubtedly, they ought to be receiving divine agency. Now the masters of the wealthiest lands and hubs of the Orient - the place that once harbored the Garden of Eden itself, now lost forever to mankind -, they were poised to collect the best share of the Earth’s resources.
At least this is what they believed, when, in late 1140 A.D., they set their next course of action, which seemed sprung out of a feverish and insane dream.
First they would restore the defunct County of Edessa, and, as per the wishes of their patron and benefactor, the Basileus, would revive the Kingdom of Armenia from the decadent rump emirates that feasted on its corpse.
Finally, once they had secured Edessa and Armenia, they would undertake the most dauntless of the holy expeditions, one that had only been achieved once in human history, by the great King Alexander: the conquest of Babylon; that is, Baghdad.
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