Christian Mamluks

One frequent complaint heard about the Crusader States is that they never had enough native troops to defend their borders, and thus were always one decisive Muslim victory away from being destroyed. That decisive defeat came, and the Kingdom of Jerusalem was virtually destroyed, clinging only to a few coastal cities.

In Egypt a short time after the Crusaders were being pushed into the sea, armies of slave-soldiers were being mustered by the various heirs of the Ayyubid dynasty. The slave-soldiers were preferable to locally raised troops because they were loyal only to their master, not to local tribes or communities, meaning that in the case of civil war they could be relied on. These slave-soldiers, known as Mamluks, would eventually overthrow their masters and make themselves Sultans of Egypt. So what-if the Crusader States came up with the same idea? The people who became Mamluks came primarily from north of the Black Sea, and were shipped south to Egypt. The Italians could very easily get into the slaving business, since i believe that the Genoese already controlled one or several Crimean ports.

Thoughts?
 
Very interesting idea, Matthias...

AFAIK, Christian nations, much unlike their Muslim counterparts, never really developed a tradition of creating armies of slave soldiers.

But I see no reason why the Christian nations couldn't have developed a system of slave soldiers, and like you said - it would have been quite easy for, say, the Genoese and Venetians, to go to Georgia and the Crimea, and buy large numbers of strong, male Qipchaq and Circassian slaves.

Then they'd only have to convert and train these slaves.

Such slave soldiers would propably not be quite as good in combat as the Egyptian Mamluks (who were bought as children and were carefully raised and trained), but it would be a relatively quick and easy way to create an army of capable soldiers.

Creating armies of slave soldiers could greatly increase the chances of survival for the Crusader states...
 
Very interesting idea, Matthias...

AFAIK, Christian nations, much unlike their Muslim counterparts, never really developed a tradition of creating armies of slave soldiers.

But I see no reason why the Christian nations couldn't have developed a system of slave soldiers, and like you said - it would have been quite easy for, say, the Genoese and Venetians, to go to Georgia and the Crimea, and buy large numbers of strong, male Qipchaq and Circassian slaves.

Then they'd only have to convert and train these slaves.

Such slave soldiers would propably not be quite as good in combat as the Egyptian Mamluks (who were bought as children and were carefully raised and trained), but it would be a relatively quick and easy way to create an army of capable soldiers.

Creating armies of slave soldiers could greatly increase the chances of survival for the Crusader states...

Could there also even be a religious 'justification' in terms of by buying and converting the pagans their saving their souls? However, with adult slaves how do you secure their loyalty rather than them possibly just defecting?

More controversially could the crusaders have developed a policy like the janissaries, using some of the local Muslin population. [Expect a lot of opposition to this but possibly someone more knowledgeable of the period would tell whether the idea might fly or not].



Steve
 
Could there also even be a religious 'justification' in terms of by buying and converting the pagans their saving their souls?

Frankly, I can't see why the Church would not approve of converting pagan slaves.

However, with adult slaves how do you secure their loyalty rather than them possibly just defecting?

Simple - give them certain rights and privileges if they convert and become slave soldiers.

Especially if you select only the slaves who convert more or less voluntarily when given the choice (i.e. the choice between remaining just a slave and improving your own situation a bit - slaves usually don't get that many opportunities to gain a bit of wealth, respect, and privileges) you'll weed out the individuals who are likely to defect at the first opportunity.

That's one of the main methods with which the Muslims kept their slave soldiers loyal to them.

Mind you, training slave soldiers from childhood on is a much better way to secure their loyalty - but that's also much more expensive, and it takes much longer.

More controversially could the crusaders have developed a policy like the janissaries, using some of the local Muslim population. [Expect a lot of opposition to this but possibly someone more knowledgeable of the period would tell whether the idea might fly or not].

I can't see a janissary-like system work in the Crusader states - one of the most efficient ways to keep your slave soldiers loyal to you, is to make sure that they are not from a people which you're opressing or with which you're frequently at war.

Even if enslaved and conscripted when they are still boys, the slave soldiers would retain ties with the local population, whereas imported slaves from abroad would have no ties to the local population.
 
Alternatively, the Christian states could tap the large numbers of peasants back in Europe. This could be done using the penal system. Just as in the Napoleonic War convicts were drafted into the Royal Navy so guilty peasants could be loaded on to convict ships and sent out to Outremer. You wouldn't need to train them in archery; some of them would already know how to use bows, especially those caught hunting.

The system could be payrolled by the Church partly from its own finances and partly from contributions from senior nobles. Give it a Papal stamp and one is in business.

Of course convict troops aren't the most trustworthy, but European draftees would be ideologically more reliable than pagan slaves or Muslim recruits.
 
A few problems would need to be overcome first, but by and large it should be doable.

Firstly, you'd need to get the aristocracy to accept the system. Canon law cares not a button who fights or hiow it is done (as long as the church and its immunities are respected), but secular law does very much so. To many contemporary Muslims, fighting was a lower-class occupation best left to barbarians (such as Seljuq Turks, Kurds and Sudanese) and peasants while most of Christendom regarded it as an aristocratic endeavour, or at least the defining prerogative of free men. It is not easy to see them reviewing this position. Necessity might do it - they adopted Turcopoles, after all.

A system that doesn't rely on training from an early age is dependent on a reliable recruitment reservoir. For the Muslim world, that was Central Asia and the Caucasus. Where would Outremer source its Mamluks? The only places that come to mind are the Balkans and the Caucasus, but both would be problematic. Thus I think it would be safer to go with an early training system and use it to create professional household troops.

Finally, early Mamluks were a commodity and it is conceivablne that some Christian lords would simply purchase a few on the open market and the tradition grows from there.
 

trajen777

Banned
Intresting to note - the mamuluks were captured by the Mongols - transported by Genose sold in Byzantium and transported to Egypt by the Genose / Venice.

If these troops had been Christianized and kept in Byzantium as troops or raised in Crusader states you would have had a much stroger Christian army and a much weaker Egyptian army.

Think of them being raised as Templars or Hosp / Tutonic Knights

As to Jannisaires another situation much the same.
 
most of Christendom regarded it as an aristocratic endeavour, or at least the defining prerogative of free men.
I've read that there were villein knights in Central Europe, in other words fighting aristocracy that was legally bound to the land.

Yeah, this;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministerialis said:
Ministerialis (plural ministeriales); a post-classical Latin word, used in English, meaning originally servitor, agent, in a broad range of senses. In Germany, in the High Middle Ages, the word and its German translations, Ministeriale(n) and Dienstmann, came to describe those unfree knights who made up a large majority of German knighthood during that time.

As for training from childhood, i could only see that happening in the militant orders. The rest of the aristocracy would want the best places for their own and be understandably reluctant to make room for slaves. Though i could see an occasional slave knight.
 
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I've read that there were villein knights in Central Europe, in other words fighting aristocracy that was legally bound to the land.

Yeah, this;


As for training from childhood, i could only see that happening in the militant orders. The rest of the aristocracy would want the best places for their own and be understandably reluctant to make room for slaves. Though i could see an occasional slave knight.

Ministerials were trusted household servants whose family origins went back to times when the distinction between homage and unfreedom were still much fuzzier. That swaid, I think this would make a reasonable analogue, though it would have to be a different underlying idea. A man was made a ministerial as a reward for loyal service whereas military servitude would be conferred as a precondition. Nonetheless, some variation on the theme of household troops sounds a promising approach. I could see it coming from Italy or even Outremer itself - urban upper classes arming their slaves, buying Mamluks to train them, slave troops seeing battle and distinguishing themselves.
 
As to Christian janissars, I think the orders of knights would be an ideal place to bring them up.

I can't quite see that, given how arrogant the militant orders tended to be. As far as they were concerned, joining their number in any capacity was a privilege. I could see it in households, or maybe in the hands of a cloistered order in the Cistercian mould.
 

trajen777

Banned
AS to arogance - that would depend on when the process was started if early - no problem as the Knights became established then we have a problem
 

Keenir

Banned
Then they'd only have to convert and train these slaves.

Such slave soldiers would propably not be quite as good in combat as the Egyptian Mamluks (who were bought as children and were carefully raised and trained), but it would be a relatively quick and easy way to create an army of capable soldiers.

agreed.

...and with the time the Crusaders buy with these purchased adult soldiers, they can start to buy and raise children for the same purpose.
 

trajen777

Banned
Another key point if the Christan slave troops / holy orders/ Templars / whatever they were called ---- this would have cut the supply of slave troops to Egypt -so really no mamuluks.

The Mamulks were bought in Byzantium from the Golden Horde (major source of there income) which had an alliance with Egypt. The persian Mongols (Ilkhans) were allied with Crusader states and fought Egypt and the Golden Horde.

Divert the flow of slaves from Egypt and redirect to Crusaders / Byzantium and you have a total reversal of quality - additioanl troops to Crusaders / Byzantium
 
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