raharris1973
Gone Fishin'
Could the Umayyads have invaded Sicily and southern Italy in the 711-730 timeframe instead of Spain?
Would they have had the naval and military power to overcome Byzantine opposition, as opposed to the Visigoths?
In OTL, Muslim invaders didn't start making progress on Sicily until the 830s CE. By this time it was the Tunis-based Aghlabid vassals of the Abbasids, not the Umayyads. Was it coincidence that it took this long, or had there been some sort of shift in the balance of naval power in the Med against the Byzantines and in favor of Muslim powers in that time?
If the Ummayads had success in Sicily and possibly Calabria a century earlier, could this have weakened the Byzantines further, and stunted some of their later revivals?
Would they have had the naval and military power to overcome Byzantine opposition, as opposed to the Visigoths?
In OTL, Muslim invaders didn't start making progress on Sicily until the 830s CE. By this time it was the Tunis-based Aghlabid vassals of the Abbasids, not the Umayyads. Was it coincidence that it took this long, or had there been some sort of shift in the balance of naval power in the Med against the Byzantines and in favor of Muslim powers in that time?
If the Ummayads had success in Sicily and possibly Calabria a century earlier, could this have weakened the Byzantines further, and stunted some of their later revivals?