Arabs capture Constantinople

What is, IMHO, impossible, is to have a continuation of the OTL Arab-wank once Constantinople has fallen. It's a lot more difficult for the Arab armies to fight through the Balkans with the fearsome Slavic and Turkic tribes swarming through the area, than it is for them to take over the relatively well organised plains of North Africa. Indeed, I'd say a Caliphate that takes Constantinople is likely to be substantially smaller- it'll take Thrace and roughly the borders of modern Greece without much of an issue, but resources are likely to be diverted, which will allow the survival of some form of Christian state in both the Exarchate of Africa, and in Visigothic Spain.

I disagree on this. Maybe not in the Balkans, but:

1) Conversions are quite possible (as they were in OTL from Constantinople). I wonder if the Magyars turn Muslim...

2) I can't see Sicily and Africa having the resource base to hold the Muslims at bay. In OTL it was a grinding conflict for North Africa; but in the ATL, without Constantinople, where will the resources from from? It's not like the Lombards will let up in Italy because Constantinople fell.
 
I agree with Falecius given the resources under the command of the Muslims in this ATL -I think that the Bulgars would chose to endorse whatever Islam was mainstream in Constantinople. Unlike OTL, the Bulgars are in precarious position but also (as I have said before) the Bulgars would have a definitive interest in forging and maintaining a strong alliance with Islamic Constantinople. The Bulgars are the strongest non-Islamic polity in the Balkans but would have to legitimize their conquest of pagan Slavic tribes and their expansion into parts of the Balkans that the Constantinople-based-Arabs find hard to reach. Unless they wanted to remain in a state or more or less constant war with the Muslims then Islam is their best bet. Moreover, unlike with Orthodox Christianity, the Caliph of the Faith would not have the power to appoint clergy -technically Islam has no clergy -in Bulgaria (which was one of the main obstacles to Bulgarian conversion to Orthodox Christianity OTL).

A thought occurs to me -if the Islamic advance into Central Asia is slowed then what happens to the discovery of paper? Probably slowed for about fifty years rather than aborted altogether. How does this effect Islamic history and civilization?

If we agree (as Amedras rightly suggests) that a Greek Islam will be very different from OTL Islam then what does Greek Islam look like? Something that is often raised is the Muitazila question. Or does the Murji'a view (that neither good deeds nor bad made a man a true Muslim but faith and intention) win out? Could we imagine even imagine an Iconophile Islam? There are so many options it is hard to know where to start...
 
I agree with Falecius given the resources under the command of the Muslims in this ATL -I think that the Bulgars would chose to endorse whatever Islam was mainstream in Constantinople. Unlike OTL, the Bulgars are in precarious position but also (as I have said before) the Bulgars would have a definitive interest in forging and maintaining a strong alliance with Islamic Constantinople. The Bulgars are the strongest non-Islamic polity in the Balkans but would have to legitimize their conquest of pagan Slavic tribes and their expansion into parts of the Balkans that the Constantinople-based-Arabs find hard to reach. Unless they wanted to remain in a state or more or less constant war with the Muslims then Islam is their best bet. Moreover, unlike with Orthodox Christianity, the Caliph of the Faith would not have the power to appoint clergy -technically Islam has no clergy -in Bulgaria (which was one of the main obstacles to Bulgarian conversion to Orthodox Christianity OTL).

Why are they in a more precarious position than OTL?
 
Why are they in a more precarious position than OTL?

First the Bulgars will undoubtedly expand into the Balkans more freely and more quickly than OTL due to the post-Constantinople power vacuum. This will bring many Slavic tribes under their control (which, as history tells us, are not the loyalest and most of docile of subject peoples) and give them a bigger area of territory to defend than OTL. So the Bulgar will have a tough time holding their expanded empire together against a hostile Islam power in Constantinople.

Second the Umayyad Muslims are going to have more resources at their disposal than OTL. On the one hand, the Banu Umayya may have less interest in conquering the Bulgars than the OTL Byzantines: the Balkans in the 7th and 8th centuries are relatively poverty-stricken compared to the other theaters of operations the Umayyads will be playing in. But on the other hand, the ATL Umayya will certainly be more powerful players than the OTL Byzantines in the 7th and 8th centuries.
 
First the Bulgars will undoubtedly expand into the Balkans more freely and more quickly than OTL due to the post-Constantinople power vacuum. This will bring many Slavic tribes under their control (which, as history tells us, are not the loyalest and most of docile of subject peoples) and give them a bigger area of territory to defend than OTL. So the Bulgar will have a tough time holding their expanded empire together against a hostile Islam power in Constantinople.

So a bigger and stronger empire makes them more vulnerable?

The Slavic peoples in the area seem to have accepted rule by any of the various empires well enough to hold a state together in this era.

Second the Umayyad Muslims are going to have more resources at their disposal than OTL. On the one hand, the Banu Umayya may have less interest in conquering the Bulgars than the OTL Byzantines: the Balkans in the 7th and 8th centuries are relatively poverty-stricken compared to the other theaters of operations the Umayyads will be playing in. But on the other hand, the ATL Umayya will certainly be more powerful players than the OTL Byzantines in the 7th and 8th centuries.

More powerful players, but also dealing with a lot more on their plate - its not just whether the Balkans are poverty stricken but that they're only one of many fronts.
 
I think the Caliphate would have had much more resources to fight off it's other enemies than in OTL. The wars against Byzantium were devastating -and long. If the Arabs captured Constantinople at about 700 AD, they would have conquered the pagan Tribes in the Balkans very soon. Byzantium only took that much time because there was a much more powerful enemy to the eastern front. The Caliphate wouldn't had this handicap.

Also also don't think that the remaining parts of the Empire would have had the power to survive the fall of the capital. Carthage would survive a couple of years as it did in OTL, but Greece and Sicily would have fallen very soon bevause there wasn't an autority able to unite and lead the remaining forces.

The Christians in Asia and Greece would have accepted the Dhimmi status as the rest of the christian peoples did. The only remaining Problem would have been the byzantine senatorial nobles and their fellowmen.

The Islam would never change to an iconodule Position. Roman and greek Influence was still present and the different confessions of Islam are already there. This wouldn't chance that much.
But the Catholics never would have got the chance to conquer Jerusalem. They would instead have to fight the arabs out of Europe in a two-front war with uncertain result.
 
I am not an expert on this period of history but I think maybe the posters here are greatly underestimating the resilience of the Byzantine people, culture, religion, state and army that fought off enemies from every point of the compass for over a thousand years. When the Crusaders captured a vastly weaker Byzantine state 500 years later, the Byzantines moved their headquarters to Nicaea and fought their way back to Constantinople within two generations. They did this even without the system of military themes and superiority in heavy armed cavalry that the Byzantines had enjoyed in the 7th and 8th century. A great defeat followed by a comeback in the 8th century might actually have transformed Byzantium in ways that would enable it to last into modern times and not have its creativity stifled. Remember that even in its weakened and politically decrepit form in OTL in the 14th and 15th century it played a huge role in the Renaissance.
 
A Byzantium which loses Constantinople to a Caliphate that does not have to rely on Anatolia or Thrace for resources is not coming back.
 
Constantinople

I am not an expert on this period of history but I think maybe the posters here are greatly underestimating the resilience of the Byzantine people, culture, religion, state and army that fought off enemies from every point of the compass for over a thousand years. When the Crusaders captured a vastly weaker Byzantine state 500 years later, the Byzantines moved their headquarters to Nicaea and fought their way back to Constantinople within two generations. They did this even without the system of military themes and superiority in heavy armed cavalry that the Byzantines had enjoyed in the 7th and 8th century. A great defeat followed by a comeback in the 8th century might actually have transformed Byzantium in ways that would enable it to last into modern times and not have its creativity stifled. Remember that even in its weakened and politically decrepit form in OTL in the 14th and 15th century it played a huge role in the Renaissance.
I agree to a certain extent. But the capture of Constantinople would have been an enormous psychological blow. If a Greek splinter state is founded in Asia Minor, I don't think it would ever have become strong enough to recapture Constantinople from the Arabs.
 
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