Byzantium Resurrected: A Second Alexiad
Oh thanks for the maap. Lookin dire for the romans. In my opinion timur swooping all of anatolia is a lil meh but its ur timeline and ur decision. It is in my oppinion just a lil much for the romans lol. is a lil piece to much to ask for hehehheh.
Also what i wanted to add about the ethnic situation in the empire at the end
Also what i wanted to add about the ethnic situation in the empire at the end
This is not that likely in my opinion cause after doin some research abt that kinda stuff i came over this. I cant realy say if Its accurate but thats the best thing i could find in the internet so sadly no good source. This would tho implie that the greeks were roughly 40 procent of the population as most of them were Christian. in the anatolian conquest many turks would convert to christianity and many would start speaking greek. as the opposite happened otl one could look at the urum turks or the karamanli if one wants to believe greek sources were turkified greeks. Through consequent colonisation with greeks and other christians, assimilation or expulsion the greekbpopulation could be even 50% or more, also what i wanted to add is that as the ottomans did settle numerous muslim groups like the daghs or tatars or kurds in the empire wich were either expulsed from the saffavids or the russian empire the romans could settle numerous Armenians, antiokhen greeks, copts or maronites in the empire. Keep up the good work
Attachments
Btw are there sum differnces on the eastern front? Wouldnt the byzantines do better with the philantropoi still intact? Wasnt the border further east in otl that would mean that the green blob right next to smyrna would be byzantine or would i be missled?
(edit: this is what i meant
1295, Pt.10
Eparkhos
Banned
1295, Pt.10
(REMOVED)
Look, I know the quality is very, very bad, but I'm not in a good place right now. My grandparents both have the virus and have gone into hospice. The series'll be on hiatus until things have changed for the better. Thank you for reading, I'll try to get back soon.
(REMOVED)
Look, I know the quality is very, very bad, but I'm not in a good place right now. My grandparents both have the virus and have gone into hospice. The series'll be on hiatus until things have changed for the better. Thank you for reading, I'll try to get back soon.
Last edited:
Take care. You and your grandparents are in our thoughts. We'll all be waiting patiently for the timeline to continue, but until then, take care.
1295, Pt.10 - The Real One
Eparkhos
Banned
1295, Pt.10
In the first days of June Aléxios repositioned his camp across the coastal mountains in the small town of Stavrós. The motivation for this had been two-fold; While remaining in Khrystoúpoli the Imperials had been unable to project power onto the plains and thus unable to disrupt reported attempts by Mikhaēl to rally the local militia to his cause, and as the Via Egnatia curved around the coastal town they were exposed to attack from any direction; By moving to Stavrós, he maintained access to the road from the rear while leaving his flanks impenetrable because of the location of steep hills on either side.
After relocating his base of operations, the basileus then dispatched three allagia of Turkish cavalry to assert dominance over the plain on 3 June. Atmán (Kezelolgu; I changed the name to reflect historical terminology) took two allagia, a mixture of his personal tribe and some Cumans, north along the edge of the plain to intercept any Vlakhs moving west to reinforce the loyalists. The third, under a minor Turkish beg named Targhan, moved west, also along the edge of the plain, in the same general direction as the local peasants had reported the loyalist army moving in. Riding with Targhan was a Turkophile Rhōman named Mikhaēl of Proúsa, who later retired to a monastery and wrote a record of his life. It is from this record that we draw our history of Targhan’s allagion.
The unit rode west for the rest of the day, camping that night outside the deserted village of Kokkinókhōra. Shortly after dawn on 4 June they rode on, several of the officers noting that from the signs left in the empty buildings the locals could only have left a few days previous, and as such had likely been called up as militia to supplant loyalist forces. This excited Targhan, who ordered the force to pick up their pace. Proúsa speculates that he desired nothing more than to win glory for himself, but this is unconfirmed. What is known is that at dusk on the 4th, after camp had been raised, a small group of foragers stumbled upon a very lost group of militiamen. Their leader had been dragged before Targhan and after being poked with red-hot irons a few times he confessed his orders, which were to join the primary Loyalist force at Právē (previous written as Eleutheroupoli; Critical Research Failure on my part, sorry) where they would ambush Aléxios’ army. Targhan sent a small group of escorts to take the officer back to the main camp, which Mikhaēl of Proúsa was a member of. His record ends abruptly two pages later, having died shortly after completing the relevant section.
This party returned to Stavrós on the 5th, followed shortly after by the ragged survivors of the rest of the force. What exactly happened to Targhan is unknown as Planoúdēs’ chronicle cuts out for all of June 1295 and Psarímárkos merely states that “The ouzon was over-eager to do battle and thus met a superior force on bad terrain.” No matter what happened, the allagion was absolutely shredded and had only a few survivors. However, the information returned by both groups from the column gave the basileus and his generals a solid, if not perfect, idea of the strength (~6,000, a mixture of mercs, militia and professionals) and location (hills surrounding the pass of Právē) of Mikhaēl’s army. Unfortunately, this news was not good; Aléxios had only 4,500 soldiers available to him, and Právē was located at a natural chokepoint and could only be attacked from either the north of the south. No-one in the command tent that afternoon had any doubt as to what their chances of finishing the campaign in a single battle was.
That was, except for the basileus.
Aléxios had undergone a change in strategic philosophy caused by the revelation of the enemy position, and now to him the difficulty posed by the positioning of the loyalist forces wasn’t; In simpler terms, while Právē was a juicy strategic target, it was by no means essential. If by playing to Mikhaēl they would lose, and there was no reason to play to him, then the best move was to not play at all. Rather, they should try and bring the Loyalists to battle on ground of their choosing. The best way to do that would be to threaten their capital at Thessaloníkē, but doing that would require decoupling the Imperial cavalry and infantry and that would be such a massive strategic risk that….Oh God, you can’t be serious.
The basileus’ plan was to divide his army into three parts; He would send a small force of cavalry west to raid the suburbs of the Second City, while moving his infantry (~2,500) around the north side of the hills to Amphípoli, where the Strymōn River’s turns combined with the coastal hills to make an excellent kill zone. The remainder of the cavalry, numbering about 2,000, would remain on the plain opposite Právē so that Mikhaēl would voluntarily pin his forces down. Then, once word from the west reached the Prince he would hurriedly withdraw west, exhausting his troops, and then try to ford the Strymōn, whence they would pounce on the Loyalists as they were fording and crush them; If this failed, then they just had to wait for the cavalry to arrive.
After Aléxios finished speaking there was almost certainly several minutes of stunned silence, followed by a flurry of confused and outraged responses, highlighting all the many, many things that could go wrong; The raiding party could be defeated, the loyalists could see through their diversion and wipe out the horse archers, or reposition and catch the infantry when they themselves went to ford the Strymōn. According to Psarímárkos, whose account of the meeting is the only one which has survived, the only lieutenants who raised objections to this plan would all later betray the Philanthrōpēnói, but this is likely a later invention to cast shade upon their legacies. The Krētēan general himself is completely silent during this period, as he usually is whenever he is in a position that could make himself look bad, which suggests that he too objected to the basileus’ scheme.
Aléxios, however, ignored his subordinates and set his plans into motion. On 6 June a hundred Cumans were quietly shuffled out of the camp. They rode due west, soon disappearing into the hills. In the same hour, a rider went north with a message for Atmán that ordered him to put his second in command in charge of his force and ride south to join them. On 8 June the Turk returned to the main camp, and was put in charge of the remaining cavalry. The army then marched west, camping on the plains south of Dáto within sight of the ambuscade. The Turks rode up to the edge of the pass and fired upon the poorly-concealed militia; while Mikhaēl was thus distracted, the infantry decamped and moved west. For the next week the infantry moved west as quickly as possible, while the cavalry continued to harass the loyalists. Several infantry contingents sallied out onto the plains but were soon destroyed in a death by a thousand cuts.
On 16 June the Imperial infantry reached Amphípoli. They were given a day to recover from their exhausting maneuver before they were immediately put to work again, destroying the northern bridge over the river and erecting earthworks around the western mouth of the southern bridge[1]. After almost a week of work the defenses were completed, and on 24 June the expected messenger from Thessaloníkē arrived. He was imprisoned and one of the Imperial couriers was sent to carry the message on.
Word of the raids on the Second City reached the loyalist camp on 28 June. Mikhaēl was furious, as he had spent the last three weeks failing to bait what he believed to be the primary Imperial army into attacking him on ground of his choosing. Khatzēpanagēs had dominated his lord’s planning and when news of the assault reached the camp the general tried to convince him that it was all an effort to divert their attention from a successful stratagem. The prince was having none of it, and told Khatzēpanagēs to go screw himself sideways, forcefully expelling him from the camp. He then conferred with his other generals, who told him that the threat to his home base was potentially existential and needed to be addressed swiftly, but that leaving the Turks at his back would be a horrible mistake. Mikhaēl decided to kill two birds with one stone and put Khatzēpanagēs in charge of two allagia of militia to hold off the Turks while he took the other ten and moved to defend his capital.
On 29 June the primary loyalist force marched south-west away from the passes. It took less than two days for Atmán to receive an anonymous letter detailing where and when most of the enemy army had gone. He sent a rider to the basileus informing him of this, then began preparing to force the now thinly-defended pass.
On 2 July, the loyalist army was camped outside the town of Dōmátia when they were awoken by thundering hooves. The soldiers scrambled to get under tree cover in the nearby foothills, but still took losses from arrow fire. Mikhaēl managed to get his forces back in formation and the column began to move on through the sheltered terrain. Nonetheless, for the next week the horse archers continued to harass the defenders, slowly wearing them down and exhausting them. While the loyalists were able to successfully trap two attacking parties, the morale boosts proved short-lived as the attacks wore on.
On 9 June, as the loyalists approached the Strymōn valley, the cavalry attacks suddenly stopped. Unknown to Mikhaēl, Atmán had been given forged orders, likely from one of the infantry commanders, to turn back. The loyalists only became aware of the presence of the enemy army late in the day, when they struggled to the top of a hill overlooking the plains below. Quoting one of the Prince’s personal chaplains, “It was as if the life of the entire force suddenly drained away.”
The army camped there upon that hilltop, staring mutely down at the lone bridge across the river. It was obvious to all on both sides what would happen on the next day; The final climax of the Civil War of 1295 would occur, as the outnumbered supporters of Aléxios faced off with the exhausted supporters of Mikhaēl. Neither had the resources or wherewithal to survive another defeat, and so the fighting would carry a kind of desperation never seen in a Rhōman civil war.
“O thánatos sto éna, o vasileía sto állo.”
[1] This statue would later be transported to the capital, where it would languish in a warehouse until the construction of the Mégas Physikóthéama in 1381.
In the first days of June Aléxios repositioned his camp across the coastal mountains in the small town of Stavrós. The motivation for this had been two-fold; While remaining in Khrystoúpoli the Imperials had been unable to project power onto the plains and thus unable to disrupt reported attempts by Mikhaēl to rally the local militia to his cause, and as the Via Egnatia curved around the coastal town they were exposed to attack from any direction; By moving to Stavrós, he maintained access to the road from the rear while leaving his flanks impenetrable because of the location of steep hills on either side.
After relocating his base of operations, the basileus then dispatched three allagia of Turkish cavalry to assert dominance over the plain on 3 June. Atmán (Kezelolgu; I changed the name to reflect historical terminology) took two allagia, a mixture of his personal tribe and some Cumans, north along the edge of the plain to intercept any Vlakhs moving west to reinforce the loyalists. The third, under a minor Turkish beg named Targhan, moved west, also along the edge of the plain, in the same general direction as the local peasants had reported the loyalist army moving in. Riding with Targhan was a Turkophile Rhōman named Mikhaēl of Proúsa, who later retired to a monastery and wrote a record of his life. It is from this record that we draw our history of Targhan’s allagion.
The unit rode west for the rest of the day, camping that night outside the deserted village of Kokkinókhōra. Shortly after dawn on 4 June they rode on, several of the officers noting that from the signs left in the empty buildings the locals could only have left a few days previous, and as such had likely been called up as militia to supplant loyalist forces. This excited Targhan, who ordered the force to pick up their pace. Proúsa speculates that he desired nothing more than to win glory for himself, but this is unconfirmed. What is known is that at dusk on the 4th, after camp had been raised, a small group of foragers stumbled upon a very lost group of militiamen. Their leader had been dragged before Targhan and after being poked with red-hot irons a few times he confessed his orders, which were to join the primary Loyalist force at Právē (previous written as Eleutheroupoli; Critical Research Failure on my part, sorry) where they would ambush Aléxios’ army. Targhan sent a small group of escorts to take the officer back to the main camp, which Mikhaēl of Proúsa was a member of. His record ends abruptly two pages later, having died shortly after completing the relevant section.
This party returned to Stavrós on the 5th, followed shortly after by the ragged survivors of the rest of the force. What exactly happened to Targhan is unknown as Planoúdēs’ chronicle cuts out for all of June 1295 and Psarímárkos merely states that “The ouzon was over-eager to do battle and thus met a superior force on bad terrain.” No matter what happened, the allagion was absolutely shredded and had only a few survivors. However, the information returned by both groups from the column gave the basileus and his generals a solid, if not perfect, idea of the strength (~6,000, a mixture of mercs, militia and professionals) and location (hills surrounding the pass of Právē) of Mikhaēl’s army. Unfortunately, this news was not good; Aléxios had only 4,500 soldiers available to him, and Právē was located at a natural chokepoint and could only be attacked from either the north of the south. No-one in the command tent that afternoon had any doubt as to what their chances of finishing the campaign in a single battle was.
That was, except for the basileus.
Aléxios had undergone a change in strategic philosophy caused by the revelation of the enemy position, and now to him the difficulty posed by the positioning of the loyalist forces wasn’t; In simpler terms, while Právē was a juicy strategic target, it was by no means essential. If by playing to Mikhaēl they would lose, and there was no reason to play to him, then the best move was to not play at all. Rather, they should try and bring the Loyalists to battle on ground of their choosing. The best way to do that would be to threaten their capital at Thessaloníkē, but doing that would require decoupling the Imperial cavalry and infantry and that would be such a massive strategic risk that….Oh God, you can’t be serious.
The basileus’ plan was to divide his army into three parts; He would send a small force of cavalry west to raid the suburbs of the Second City, while moving his infantry (~2,500) around the north side of the hills to Amphípoli, where the Strymōn River’s turns combined with the coastal hills to make an excellent kill zone. The remainder of the cavalry, numbering about 2,000, would remain on the plain opposite Právē so that Mikhaēl would voluntarily pin his forces down. Then, once word from the west reached the Prince he would hurriedly withdraw west, exhausting his troops, and then try to ford the Strymōn, whence they would pounce on the Loyalists as they were fording and crush them; If this failed, then they just had to wait for the cavalry to arrive.
After Aléxios finished speaking there was almost certainly several minutes of stunned silence, followed by a flurry of confused and outraged responses, highlighting all the many, many things that could go wrong; The raiding party could be defeated, the loyalists could see through their diversion and wipe out the horse archers, or reposition and catch the infantry when they themselves went to ford the Strymōn. According to Psarímárkos, whose account of the meeting is the only one which has survived, the only lieutenants who raised objections to this plan would all later betray the Philanthrōpēnói, but this is likely a later invention to cast shade upon their legacies. The Krētēan general himself is completely silent during this period, as he usually is whenever he is in a position that could make himself look bad, which suggests that he too objected to the basileus’ scheme.
Aléxios, however, ignored his subordinates and set his plans into motion. On 6 June a hundred Cumans were quietly shuffled out of the camp. They rode due west, soon disappearing into the hills. In the same hour, a rider went north with a message for Atmán that ordered him to put his second in command in charge of his force and ride south to join them. On 8 June the Turk returned to the main camp, and was put in charge of the remaining cavalry. The army then marched west, camping on the plains south of Dáto within sight of the ambuscade. The Turks rode up to the edge of the pass and fired upon the poorly-concealed militia; while Mikhaēl was thus distracted, the infantry decamped and moved west. For the next week the infantry moved west as quickly as possible, while the cavalry continued to harass the loyalists. Several infantry contingents sallied out onto the plains but were soon destroyed in a death by a thousand cuts.
On 16 June the Imperial infantry reached Amphípoli. They were given a day to recover from their exhausting maneuver before they were immediately put to work again, destroying the northern bridge over the river and erecting earthworks around the western mouth of the southern bridge[1]. After almost a week of work the defenses were completed, and on 24 June the expected messenger from Thessaloníkē arrived. He was imprisoned and one of the Imperial couriers was sent to carry the message on.
Word of the raids on the Second City reached the loyalist camp on 28 June. Mikhaēl was furious, as he had spent the last three weeks failing to bait what he believed to be the primary Imperial army into attacking him on ground of his choosing. Khatzēpanagēs had dominated his lord’s planning and when news of the assault reached the camp the general tried to convince him that it was all an effort to divert their attention from a successful stratagem. The prince was having none of it, and told Khatzēpanagēs to go screw himself sideways, forcefully expelling him from the camp. He then conferred with his other generals, who told him that the threat to his home base was potentially existential and needed to be addressed swiftly, but that leaving the Turks at his back would be a horrible mistake. Mikhaēl decided to kill two birds with one stone and put Khatzēpanagēs in charge of two allagia of militia to hold off the Turks while he took the other ten and moved to defend his capital.
On 29 June the primary loyalist force marched south-west away from the passes. It took less than two days for Atmán to receive an anonymous letter detailing where and when most of the enemy army had gone. He sent a rider to the basileus informing him of this, then began preparing to force the now thinly-defended pass.
On 2 July, the loyalist army was camped outside the town of Dōmátia when they were awoken by thundering hooves. The soldiers scrambled to get under tree cover in the nearby foothills, but still took losses from arrow fire. Mikhaēl managed to get his forces back in formation and the column began to move on through the sheltered terrain. Nonetheless, for the next week the horse archers continued to harass the defenders, slowly wearing them down and exhausting them. While the loyalists were able to successfully trap two attacking parties, the morale boosts proved short-lived as the attacks wore on.
On 9 June, as the loyalists approached the Strymōn valley, the cavalry attacks suddenly stopped. Unknown to Mikhaēl, Atmán had been given forged orders, likely from one of the infantry commanders, to turn back. The loyalists only became aware of the presence of the enemy army late in the day, when they struggled to the top of a hill overlooking the plains below. Quoting one of the Prince’s personal chaplains, “It was as if the life of the entire force suddenly drained away.”
The army camped there upon that hilltop, staring mutely down at the lone bridge across the river. It was obvious to all on both sides what would happen on the next day; The final climax of the Civil War of 1295 would occur, as the outnumbered supporters of Aléxios faced off with the exhausted supporters of Mikhaēl. Neither had the resources or wherewithal to survive another defeat, and so the fighting would carry a kind of desperation never seen in a Rhōman civil war.
“O thánatos sto éna, o vasileía sto állo.”
[1] This statue would later be transported to the capital, where it would languish in a warehouse until the construction of the Mégas Physikóthéama in 1381.
1295, Pt.11 - Amphípoli
Eparkhos
Banned
1295, Pt.11 - Amphípoli
Few in either camp slept well, if at all, on the night before the battle. Aléxios, aware of how the loyalists had been harassed and concluding that they must be exhausted, ordered his men to bang drum, beat their shields and shout at the top of their lungs all night to keep the enemy from sleeping. He was gambling that his men, even sleepless themselves, would hold the edge on their counterparts who would’ve likely gone days without decent sleep. While this was true, it did little to appease the tired soldiers who shuffled from their tents into formation that morning. Before deploying into their battle line the allagia from up on a small field north of both the camp and bridge, where the basileus stands upon an upturned bucket. The speech was recorded in its entirety by Psarímárkos;
“Romans! I know you are tired from a restless night, and it is only natural for men in such a state as yours desire to sleep. But what you feel is but a small portion of that which is felt by our opponents, for they have spent the last week without sleep. While there are more of them than there are of us, their wills have been so degraded by exhaustion that they will be as weak as children. They will come across that bridge four abreast, and we shall easily slay them four abreast, until they throw down their arms or flee--I am so sure of this that I will stand in the ranks with you. It is natural for a soldier to be daunted by the odds we face, but I assure that there is little reason to. Our honor, and the honor of Rome with it, has never been besmirched by cowardice, and with our foe as he is there is no reason to now. Show no fear, the end of this war is near and shall see us triumphant.”
Aléxios was cheered by his men, and the Imperial force was arrayed for battle. Moúzálōn the Younger, his pride smarting from failing to take the Loyalist camp as promised at Asprē, volunteered his allagion for the front rank, on the bridge itself. Two other allagia were positioned behind it, while the other two lined up along the west bank of the river to fire on any forces trying to cross the river. They were in position by the time of Terce (9 AM).
Meanwhile, on the far side of the river, the night of constant cacophony had done as intended and worn down the already-poor morale of the Loyalist force. When Mikhaēl mustered his forces on the plain the next morning the ~5,000 veterans, mercs and militias had dwindled to ~4,500, many of the deserters being from the officer corps. When the soldiers noticed this the morale went into the floor. Knowing that the whole army could very well collapse if he wasn’t able to rally them, the young prince climbed the hill overlooking the camp and gave a speech to the soldiers. Unfortunately, no transcript has survived of this speech, but it can be assumed that it was at least somewhat effective, as the Loyalists rallied to fight the battle.
Mikhaēl arrayed his forces thusly; The crossbowmen were lined up along the riverbank, for the same reason as their counterparts, while the rest of the infantry amassed on the east end of the bridge. The militia were placed in front, likely to soak up casualties and wear down the Imperials without losing any of the quality troops, who were directly behind them. Knowing that the morale of his subordinates was truly abysmal, the prince himself was with the first professional allagion. They, like the Imperials, were in formation by Terce. For the next hour the melee forces stared each other down across the bridge, shouting insults at each other while the archers on either bank taking potshots at each other but mostly missing.
Finally, the leader of the forwardmost militia unit ordered his men forward. They raised their spears and shields, forming as tight a phalanx as they could, and started to stalk forward across the span. They took a volley from either side and the formation halted, the officers dead. Fearing that one unit turning back would trigger a route, Mikhaēl ordered the other militia allagion and his own unit to charge forward. With the wall of armor coming from behind men the first militia unit charged forward, hitting the front ranks of the Imperial force and forcing them several steps back. Seconds later the other units hit with a wall of momentum, throwing the ranks back nearly off the bridge. The quarrels and arrows that had been falling upon the units suddenly stopped, both sides fearing striking their own units, and for a few desperate minutes spears glanced off of shields as men fought and died. Bodies spilled over into the river as blood pooled on the span and made the ground slick. More Imperials soldiers rushed forward to brace the buckling line and the Loyalists were pushed back. They fell back across the bridge, coming under fire again and briefly reversing off the bridge.
Mikhaēl was distraught, as the nervous energy that normally filled the air during a battle was fading away, a sure sign of exhaustion, and the enemy seemed to be in the same condition as it was before combat. To rally his men he ordered his personal standard to be raised at the front of the line and sounded another charge.
However, Imperial forces weren’t as strong as the prince thought they were--the initial charge had either killed or wounded nearly everyone in the lead unit, and the reserve concealed on the far bank was being hurriedly brought forth to replace the severely injured. Aléxios himself had nearly lost his left arm to a billhook, and was barely in fighting condition.
The second charge hit the enemy line less than fifteen minutes after the first, resuming the push of shields and forcing the Imperials back yet again. The line nearly broken, the last of the reserves rushed forward in a desperate attempt to allay the oncoming route. Mikhaēl himself was in the lead ranks, and for a few brief moments the bodyguards of the two units met. But by then the strength of the Loyalists was starting to fade, and the Imperials could sense it. The footmen threw themselves forward and the Loyalists began to pull back.
And then the banner of the Palaiológos plunged into the river, its holder the victim of a stray Genoese quarrel. With the Prince seemingly dead, the Loyalist line almost instantly collapsed, men trampling each other in their panic to escape the bridge. The officers of the Imperial army, operating on orders given the previous day, shouted that those who surrendered would be spared and the professionals soldiers began throwing down their arms as the mercs and militiamen fled for their lives.
Out of an initial force of ~4,500, a thousand of which were mercs, the Loyalists lost ~2,000 dead or fled, the rest surrendering. Out of their initial ~2,500, the Imperials lost roughly 700 dead or severely wounded, most of the rest being injured to at least some extent. The mercs spread out into the surrounding countryside, where most pissed off the locals enough to wind up dead in a ditch. However, in the nearby small towns of Mesolakkiá, Palaiokōmē and Mikrósoúli the mercs filled the void left by dead militia men and integrated into the community. To this day, locals of the three towns speak a creole language that is a mixture of Rhōman and Zeneize called Trepálēs.
As the Imperials rounded up the surrendering men, they stumbled upon the unconscious body of Mikhaēl, who had been trampled during the route. He was taken back to the command tent where Aléxios orders him blinded and his hands and tongue cut off. However, Planoúdēs intervenes and points out that treating an ex-emperor in such a way is not the precedent a usurper such as Aléxios wants to set, and his punishment is commuted to having a single eye removed and his nose and ears slit. By doing this, he was removed from candidacy from the throne, but didn’t suffer serious quality of life issues beyond his vision being halved. He was then paraded before the surrendered soldiers, to fully quell any rumors of his unmolested survival, after which riders were sent to Thessaloníkē with news of the defeat.
The Civil War of 1295 was over, and Aléxios was secure upon his throne.
Few in either camp slept well, if at all, on the night before the battle. Aléxios, aware of how the loyalists had been harassed and concluding that they must be exhausted, ordered his men to bang drum, beat their shields and shout at the top of their lungs all night to keep the enemy from sleeping. He was gambling that his men, even sleepless themselves, would hold the edge on their counterparts who would’ve likely gone days without decent sleep. While this was true, it did little to appease the tired soldiers who shuffled from their tents into formation that morning. Before deploying into their battle line the allagia from up on a small field north of both the camp and bridge, where the basileus stands upon an upturned bucket. The speech was recorded in its entirety by Psarímárkos;
“Romans! I know you are tired from a restless night, and it is only natural for men in such a state as yours desire to sleep. But what you feel is but a small portion of that which is felt by our opponents, for they have spent the last week without sleep. While there are more of them than there are of us, their wills have been so degraded by exhaustion that they will be as weak as children. They will come across that bridge four abreast, and we shall easily slay them four abreast, until they throw down their arms or flee--I am so sure of this that I will stand in the ranks with you. It is natural for a soldier to be daunted by the odds we face, but I assure that there is little reason to. Our honor, and the honor of Rome with it, has never been besmirched by cowardice, and with our foe as he is there is no reason to now. Show no fear, the end of this war is near and shall see us triumphant.”
Aléxios was cheered by his men, and the Imperial force was arrayed for battle. Moúzálōn the Younger, his pride smarting from failing to take the Loyalist camp as promised at Asprē, volunteered his allagion for the front rank, on the bridge itself. Two other allagia were positioned behind it, while the other two lined up along the west bank of the river to fire on any forces trying to cross the river. They were in position by the time of Terce (9 AM).
Meanwhile, on the far side of the river, the night of constant cacophony had done as intended and worn down the already-poor morale of the Loyalist force. When Mikhaēl mustered his forces on the plain the next morning the ~5,000 veterans, mercs and militias had dwindled to ~4,500, many of the deserters being from the officer corps. When the soldiers noticed this the morale went into the floor. Knowing that the whole army could very well collapse if he wasn’t able to rally them, the young prince climbed the hill overlooking the camp and gave a speech to the soldiers. Unfortunately, no transcript has survived of this speech, but it can be assumed that it was at least somewhat effective, as the Loyalists rallied to fight the battle.
Mikhaēl arrayed his forces thusly; The crossbowmen were lined up along the riverbank, for the same reason as their counterparts, while the rest of the infantry amassed on the east end of the bridge. The militia were placed in front, likely to soak up casualties and wear down the Imperials without losing any of the quality troops, who were directly behind them. Knowing that the morale of his subordinates was truly abysmal, the prince himself was with the first professional allagion. They, like the Imperials, were in formation by Terce. For the next hour the melee forces stared each other down across the bridge, shouting insults at each other while the archers on either bank taking potshots at each other but mostly missing.
Finally, the leader of the forwardmost militia unit ordered his men forward. They raised their spears and shields, forming as tight a phalanx as they could, and started to stalk forward across the span. They took a volley from either side and the formation halted, the officers dead. Fearing that one unit turning back would trigger a route, Mikhaēl ordered the other militia allagion and his own unit to charge forward. With the wall of armor coming from behind men the first militia unit charged forward, hitting the front ranks of the Imperial force and forcing them several steps back. Seconds later the other units hit with a wall of momentum, throwing the ranks back nearly off the bridge. The quarrels and arrows that had been falling upon the units suddenly stopped, both sides fearing striking their own units, and for a few desperate minutes spears glanced off of shields as men fought and died. Bodies spilled over into the river as blood pooled on the span and made the ground slick. More Imperials soldiers rushed forward to brace the buckling line and the Loyalists were pushed back. They fell back across the bridge, coming under fire again and briefly reversing off the bridge.
Mikhaēl was distraught, as the nervous energy that normally filled the air during a battle was fading away, a sure sign of exhaustion, and the enemy seemed to be in the same condition as it was before combat. To rally his men he ordered his personal standard to be raised at the front of the line and sounded another charge.
However, Imperial forces weren’t as strong as the prince thought they were--the initial charge had either killed or wounded nearly everyone in the lead unit, and the reserve concealed on the far bank was being hurriedly brought forth to replace the severely injured. Aléxios himself had nearly lost his left arm to a billhook, and was barely in fighting condition.
The second charge hit the enemy line less than fifteen minutes after the first, resuming the push of shields and forcing the Imperials back yet again. The line nearly broken, the last of the reserves rushed forward in a desperate attempt to allay the oncoming route. Mikhaēl himself was in the lead ranks, and for a few brief moments the bodyguards of the two units met. But by then the strength of the Loyalists was starting to fade, and the Imperials could sense it. The footmen threw themselves forward and the Loyalists began to pull back.
And then the banner of the Palaiológos plunged into the river, its holder the victim of a stray Genoese quarrel. With the Prince seemingly dead, the Loyalist line almost instantly collapsed, men trampling each other in their panic to escape the bridge. The officers of the Imperial army, operating on orders given the previous day, shouted that those who surrendered would be spared and the professionals soldiers began throwing down their arms as the mercs and militiamen fled for their lives.
Out of an initial force of ~4,500, a thousand of which were mercs, the Loyalists lost ~2,000 dead or fled, the rest surrendering. Out of their initial ~2,500, the Imperials lost roughly 700 dead or severely wounded, most of the rest being injured to at least some extent. The mercs spread out into the surrounding countryside, where most pissed off the locals enough to wind up dead in a ditch. However, in the nearby small towns of Mesolakkiá, Palaiokōmē and Mikrósoúli the mercs filled the void left by dead militia men and integrated into the community. To this day, locals of the three towns speak a creole language that is a mixture of Rhōman and Zeneize called Trepálēs.
As the Imperials rounded up the surrendering men, they stumbled upon the unconscious body of Mikhaēl, who had been trampled during the route. He was taken back to the command tent where Aléxios orders him blinded and his hands and tongue cut off. However, Planoúdēs intervenes and points out that treating an ex-emperor in such a way is not the precedent a usurper such as Aléxios wants to set, and his punishment is commuted to having a single eye removed and his nose and ears slit. By doing this, he was removed from candidacy from the throne, but didn’t suffer serious quality of life issues beyond his vision being halved. He was then paraded before the surrendered soldiers, to fully quell any rumors of his unmolested survival, after which riders were sent to Thessaloníkē with news of the defeat.
The Civil War of 1295 was over, and Aléxios was secure upon his throne.
Excellent update! The battle was well described, as always. Hopefully Alexios has a successful reign.
1295, Pt.12
Eparkhos
Banned
Thanks.
Thanks, I'm pretty sure that the battles draw in something like half of all readers or something.
I'm glad to hear you're enjoying it.
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1295, Pt.12
After the battle, the total number of the combined force under Aléxios, along with Atmán’s Turks, who arrived on the far bank of the river later that day, was slightly under 6,000. Given the losses that were incurred during the campaign they were reformed into eleven allagia, the most heavily damaged unit being dissolved. On the 18th, after waiting a week to allow the wounded to recover, the combined army began to move. A column of two allagia were dispatched under Psarímárkos to subdue Sérres and the other fortresses along the Strymōn valley, while the rest moved west along the Via Egnatia. The four cavalry allagia camp at the small fortress of Pennána at the eastern edge of Lake Volvi, so as to not appear as a foreign conqueror, and on the 28th the remaining five allagia arrive outside of Thessaloníkē.
At dawn the next day, Aléxios and Moúzalōn’s allagion enter the city through the eastern gate, with the mutilated Mikhaēl riding beside the basileus. The people of the city give an overwhelmingly positive reception, cheering, shouting and throwing flowers. The basileus and most of his retainers and advisors believe this to be the people showing their support for the new regime, but as they advance further into the city the true meaning of the crowd’s excitement became disturbingly apparent; The Thessaloníkans weren’t celebrating the ascension of Aléxios, they were celebrating the downfall of their hated governor, whose presence only a few feet beside the basileus gave an unnerving reminder of the currents off Rhōman politics.
After making their way to the center of town, the allagion took up a defensive posture. Aléxios, eager to leave the city quickly, holds a rushed meeting with the city’s beloved metropolitan, Ignátios Stéphaniadēs, who has been the de facto leader of the city since the time of Mikhaēl VIII. The usually kind and outgoing Ignátios is unusually blunt and hostile to the new emperor, after only a few minutes of conversation requesting (more like demanding, really) that his nephew, Iákōvos, be installed as governor of the city. Naturally, Aléxios balks at this and tells Ignátios that he’ll appoint whoever he damn well pleases as governor. Ignátios gives him a harsh look and tells the basileus that an outsider would not be well-regarded by the locals, and as such he would be unable to guarantee his safety. Seeing the obvious threat for what it was, the Imperial retinue withdrew from the city after hurriedly investing a distant cousin of Aléxios’ named Iōánnés Rállēs as governor.
Two days later, Rállēs shows up on the edge of camp, shaken but unharmed. The basileus raises two allagia and marches on the city to re-install his cousin, only to find the gates barred against him. Supposedly swearing under his breath, Aléxios returns to camp, knowing he is in the middle of what could very well be a no-win scenario.
The Turkish units were sent for, and on 2 August they arrive, giving the basileus enough men to surround the city in a loose blockade. He is unwilling to risk a close-in blockade, due to the sheer number of potential combatants located inside. The Second City had survived the wars after the Fourth Crusade fairly well, and its populace was 1 ⅓ times that of the capital herself. The number of fighters that could be raised from the great metropolis were no doubt what had emboldened the Metropolitan to bar the gates against the Imperial army. Without being able to muster enough soldiers to take the city be force, Aléxios seemed to have no other option than to sue for peace and give in to Ignátios’ demands.
However, this was not what he did. The emperor was very much aware that he couldn’t afford to look weak, and the thing that would make him look the weakest was to give in to the demands of a vassal. Instead, he began planning a counter-stroke.
The powerbase of the upstart clergyman rested entirely upon the support of the Thessaloníkans, and so to reduce him the people of the city had to be turned against him. The logical next question was, why did they support him? After a few minor nobles slipped out of the city in the second week and were interrogated on the realities of city life, the basileus and his advisors concluded that the reason why Ignátios was so well-supported was that he treated the people of the city with basic human decency and allowed them a measure of self-government. Logically, the best way to maneuver against him was to up the ante and promise (and deliver on, because Good Lord pissing off a mob of that size would be a very Andronikine decision) even further self-government to the people.
During mid-August, rumors raced across the streets of the city, many speculating that the basileus would be willing to give the people the right to govern themselves in exchange for turning the Metropolitan over to him. By the end of the month there was not a soul in the city who wasn’t aware of it. As such, when heralds rode up to the walls on 2 September and shouted other that Aléxios would negotiate with any elected representative chosen by the city there was a rushed assembly on the docks, where an elderly fisherman named Iōánnés Xiphias, a pottery maker named Thōmás Katsarōs and (barely making a majority) a lawyer named Iōánnés Nōtárás. After they had been elected Ignátios intervened and tried to convince the assembly that they would inevitably be double-crossed, but he was ignored.
Following several days of preliminary, shouted negotiations along the wall, on 8 September, the three representatives, escorted by twenty-five veterans from the city, walked out of the eastern gate into no-man’s land. Aléxios, escorted by twenty-five of his own men, rode out to meet them and, equidistant from the lines and the gate, the two groups met.
Over the course of the next three days, the scribes of both parties drafted a series of agreed upon terms that would be included in an Imperial chrysobull. That was an important part of the totally not negotiations--it was not a series of negotiations, but rather a petition to the throne, which would be granted by the good will and love that Aléxios bore for his people, thus saving face for the emperor and not hurting the commercial prospects of Thessaloníkē, which would’ve been damaged by a popular uprising.
- The people of Thessaloníkē would elect an Árkhōn every two years, who would then be raised to the status of Éparkhos (roll credits) by the emperor. If the emperor had objections to the Árkhōn taking power, then it would be put to the Ecumenical Patriarch, who would have the final say.
- The Árkhōn would be elected by secret ballot, with the electorate consisting of all laymen over 16 and widows (the logic being that windows were voting on behalf of their late husband) in good standing with the church, bar only clergy, ‘usurers’ (read Jewish converts) and the forsworn.
- The Éparkhos would be an effectively autonomous ruler with control over all secular happenings within the walls of the city “As a representative of the emperor”; In matters dealing with the surrounding lands he would have to appeal to the emperor.
- Criminals who fled into the city would have to be returned; If the Éparkhos was not notified of their presence within six months of entering the city they would be allowed to go free. The same was true for slaves.
- Customs duties were to be collected by Imperial agents as with other ports, with any duties raised by the city being collected after. The Imperial treasury was also to be paid one-quarter of the city’s total income for each year.
- Thessaloníkē was forbidden to raise soldiers apart from a civil militia, and could not expand her fortifications without Imperial approval.
On the surface, this looks like a series of massive concessions for the sake of recovering a single city, however powerful it may be. However, as time passed it proved to be a boon to the Empire; The taxes and customs duties raised from the port had been the true value of the city, and with the Chrysobull of 1295 the Empire maintained these while simultaneously discarding a seething canker of rebellion and religious discontent. The emperor also retained a good deal of indirect control, as the Ecumenical Patriarchate was very much subservient to the throne (as evidenced by Andrónikos’ king, er, priest-making). Additionally, the manner in which it was proclaimed made him look like a caring ruler rather than a weak one; All in all, it was a win for the throne.
On 12 September the chrysobull was issued and after a public reading along the docks the gates of Thessaloníkē were thrown open. Ignátios was surrendered to the Imperials, while a rushed election was held that ended with Nōtárás being elected as the first Árkhōn. On 14 September he was confirmed as Éparkhos by Aléxios in the city’s central square to the roar of the crowd. Both men were cheered by the mob, but the basileus, mindful of the fickleness of the mob, made sure to depart the city by the end of the day. He stayed near Thessaloníkē for the rest of the month while the other western governors swore loyalty, then turned for the capital in October.
1295, Pt.13
Eparkhos
Banned
Well, if he wasn't clever or at least clever enough to listen to informed advisors, he would hardly be restoration material, would he?
1295, Pt.13
The winter of 1295-1296 was a fairly quiet one, with the new dynasty settling onto the throne and web of dynastic ties that Grēgórios and Planoúdēs had been weaving. I’m not really feeling like writing today, so here it is in bullet point form;
- The Imperial army arrives outside the capital on 3 November, most of the force remaining outside the walls in the coastal town of Eudoxioúpoli, just west of the Imperial city; After the incident outside Thessaloníkē earlier that year, Aléxios really didn’t want to have to deal with a mob whose feelings had been enflamed by the presence of an army in the city.
- Upon entering the city the basileus conferred with his appointees within the city. Upon discovering the many, many things Grēgórios had done in his name but not with his permission he flies into a range and beats his brother severely before the guards pull him off. However, he acknowledges the wisdom behind these decisions and lets them stand, warning Grēgórios not to do any such thing again on pain of….well, you know, them being Byzzies and all.
- The marriage plans that had been worked the year previously take place, albeit with a slight hang up when the Patriarch protests that remarrying the brother of your former husband is still consanguinity even if the marriage has been annulled. However, this problem disappears when the city guard are brought out to drill in the Aygoústaĩon. Aléxios’ marriage with Eirénē Libádaria is annulled and the basileus soon remarrying Iōánna Palaiológina in a public ceremony on 2 December. At same time, in a small chapel across town, Eirénē is quietly remarried to Nikēphóros. However, what none could’ve known was that she was already a month pregnant.
- In mid-December there is an unofficial pact made between Aléxios and Iōánnés IV; the latter will be supplied with liquor, food, women and entertainment in exchange for shutting up and going along with whatever his senior partner decides. For someone who spent thirty-four of their fourty-five years (Sorry to keep hammering, but melting an eleven-year old’s eyes out then throwing him into a dungeon and throwing away the key pisses me the hell off) Iōánnés is surprisingly withdrawn, spending most of his time alone with a bard.
- Aléxios attempts to become something analogous to a father figure for Andrónikos’ two surviving sons. Both of them respond surprisingly well, as Iōánnés had never had a good relationship with his father due to differing temperaments, and Theódōros is too young to have more than vague memories of his father. The three spend most afternoons together, riding in the abandoned areas inside the land walls and mock-sparing with blunted weapons. They also go on long (and escorted) walks through the city on market days. This has the added benefits of making the emperor appear more human to the typical city-goer, as well as providing a public symbol of how the succession was secure and there was no need to worry about further succession disputes.
- Meanwhile, Planoúdēs had (with the basileus’ approval) promoted a promising young bureaucrat to lead a commission to reform the tax system to provide enough income to fulfill Aléxios’ primary desire, which was to create a professional army to wage multi-season campaigns against the Turks. Said bureaucrat, named Aléxios Kyparissiōtēs, concluded that the three things that the exchequer needed to do to provide the army the basileus wanted. The first, to stop the process of tax farming in favor of centralized tax agents, could be done rather easily, only requiring some rudimentary background checks for the new agents. The second, to increase the custom duties paid by the Italians (which were currently a fifth of that paid by Rhōmans) could be done, but would require playing the Genoese and Venetians off each other. The third, and most important one, was that the many pronoiai needed to be revoked. Needless to say this would be opposed….violently….and the only way to insure this went well would be to make sure that any rebels could be out-gunned. To do this they needed to create at the very least the nucleus of a professional army. However, paying wages for a professional force larger than four allagia would almost bankrupt the state, and so they couldn’t do that. The logical alternative was to use slave soldiers, but both the basileus and his generals were skeptical of their value in battle, as well as their large up-front cost.
- It took several days of pointless speculations for an answer to be found when Grēgórios remarks that the two greatest motivators are survival and freedom, and thus slave soldiers would turn the second they had the chance. Aléxios leapt out of chair, shouting that his brother had found the answer; They would take a group of slaves, train them to fight and then give them their freedom and maybe even land after they finished a long term of service. Thus, they would be fighting for their freedom, and would be unwilling to flee the field and thus risk their futures. Of course, that still didn’t solve the problem of where they would find said slaves. This time, however, the answer of was obvious; They would raid the slave markets of the Crimean ports, which were supposedly the largest in the world. The fate of these slaves was almost universally horrible with the lucky ones usually dying in the Egyptian desert or drowning in the wreckage of a sinking galley. They would certainly be willing to fight for the empire and emperor who rescued them from such a fate and gave them a path back to freedom.
- While preparations for such a raid are laid, the executive decision is also made to drastically reduce the number of salaried Imperial positions for the aristocracy (read; Not starving/being shot at by Turks/Bulgarians/Serbs/Italians) from over five hundred at 82 different ranks to about a hundred at eight distinct ceremonial ranks (Cupbearer [not literally, of course], Arranger of Banquets, Arranger of Hunts, Grand Secretary, Grand Chairman, Lesser Secretary, Lesser Chairman, and Petition-taker) and the twenty or so offices that actually did something, which were grouped together in distinct divisions, called asēkrētonoi;
- Secretary of the Internal Security Asekreton (Protokrypteros)
- Secretary of the Economic and Financial Asekreton (Protovestarios)
- Secretary of the Western Military Asekreton (Protodysestrategos)
- Secretary of the Eastern Military Asekreton (Protoanatolestrategos)
- Secretary of the Foreign Relations Asekreton (Protoexodromon)
- Secretary of the Internal Relations Asekreton (Protokhartoularios)
- Secretary of the Ecclesiastical Integrity and Relations Asekreton (Protopapias)
These reforms were hurriedly implemented, with the six secretaries meeting with the basileus each morning. None of the nobles were notified of this shrinkage, as it was deemed a risk to inform them of this before the raid could be launched.
Nice update! Interesting to see that Alexios is also a good administrator, not just a good general.
Eh, shouldn't it be seven?