DBWI: The Egyptian Crusade goes ahead

I mean, looking at the Albigensian Crusade it isn’t hard to picture the most zealous Catholics wanting to wipe out the heretics. It was a patently impossible idea, though—a handful of zealots couldn’t bring down Orthodoxy, let alone all of the varied flavors of Eastern Christianity.

The Roman invasion of Sicily did certainly put the fear of the Basileus into Italy and beyond—but in the long run I’d argue that was bad for Rome. That fear helped Giacomo Albizzi begin his unifying efforts in Tuscany, and in the long run paved the way for the unification of Italy as we know it. The Italian navy proved itself to be a huge thorn in Rome’s side on more than one occasion, not to mention its obscene economic power and influence.

Besides, it’s not like Rome held the parts of Sicily it conquered for more than two decades. They would’ve had better luck holding parts of the Italian boot proper, where IIRC there were some actual support for Rome among native Greek speakers.



I dunno, the Romans still controlled Bithynia and beyond at this point. Total Turkish conquest isn’t inevitable even in the wake of a nasty collapse of authority.

If some kind of unitary Turkish Empire was founded, I’d agree with your analysis. The Romans could hold them out of Europe proper with their navy, not to mention support from other Orthodox powers like Serbia.

The Roman Invasion of Sicily had a larger symbolic meaning. It was a sign that caused the Pope not to threaten the Roman Empire in any way. The war was started as a way to secure Sicily as a marriage gift demanded by the Emperor, giving his sister Helena to the Anjou King of Sicily. The possibility to invade Italy after all the humiliation since Basil II death put fear as far as Lisbon. The use of Turkish Soldiers proved its worth. The invasion succeeded in a decade.

At the end, it was more important to secure the Balkans after the Mongols left a vacuum there in the mid 14th century. Ruling Sicily without Moravian Serbia was a risky move anyway.

I'm more interested on how the Imperial Faction lost so much power to the Patriarch class in the "Century of the Patriarchy". The seven Emperors since Andronikos II to Basil V were weak as hell and the Patriarch of the Church had most of the Power. Could this have been avoided if the costly Italian War went better, rather than being crushed far in Lombardy?
 
That was the time that the Bulgarian Tsar claimed the Roman throne through his mother, right?

Of course, we all know that wasn’t the last time that the Bulgarians claimed the purple...
Your right, the Bulgarian Tsar was Nikephoros’ cousin thanks to his mother Eirene Komnena.

I could definitely see it. The additional forces would turn the tide and allow Roman reconquest into the interior at a point when Turkish identity was less entrenched as well, getting rid of a lot of future headaches for the Roman state.

On the other hand, the Crusaders and Romans colluding so openly again would definitely sour relations between the Empire and the rest of the Muslim world. I hope it wouldn’t butterfly the eventual bustling trade between Rome and Egypt...
Well if the Crusaders successfully replace Egypt with a christian version of it, and both the Romans and the Crusaders keep a good relationship then you would still see the development of trade between Constantinople and Alexandria (the likely capital of this Christian Egypt). The remaining Muslim powers left won't be able to affect the Romans, surely not any Persian polity nor the Western Muslim states in Africa.
I'm more interested on how the Imperial Faction lost so much power to the Patriarch class in the "Century of the Patriarchy". The seven Emperors since Andronikos II to Basil V were weak as hell and the Patriarch of the Church had most of the Power. Could this have been avoided if the costly Italian War went better, rather than being crushed far in Lombardy?
Or alternatively you could avoid the election of Michael V to the Patriarchal throne. As a member of the imperial family, it was easy for him to weaken the power of his nephew Andronicus II (back then only a minor) to his own advantage.
 
The Roman Invasion of Sicily had a larger symbolic meaning. It was a sign that caused the Pope not to threaten the Roman Empire in any way. The war was started as a way to secure Sicily as a marriage gift demanded by the Emperor, giving his sister Helena to the Anjou King of Sicily. The possibility to invade Italy after all the humiliation since Basil II death put fear as far as Lisbon. The use of Turkish Soldiers proved its worth. The invasion succeeded in a decade.

The real reason why it changed the balance of power was that the marriage of Helena to Roger (and defeat of his brother Phillip) marked the beginning of Sicily’s shift into the Roman sphere of influence. With Roman influence reaching the borders of the Papal States itself, the Pope could no longer declare himself superior to the Patriarch in Constantinople without fear of rebuke.

On the other hand, Rome’s invasion of Sicily (the island) was a costly, useless endeavor that failed in unifying it to mainland Sicily.

At the end, it was more important to secure the Balkans after the Mongols left a vacuum there in the mid 14th century. Ruling Sicily without Moravian Serbia was a risky move anyway.

(OOC: Moravia rules Serbia? What does that have to do with Sicily?)

Especially since Rome needed to present a picture of strength. The tributes to the Mongols that kept them out of their Asian and European lands probably saved the Empire, but was at the time viewed as a symbol of weakness.

Of course, when the Golden Horde tried to demand the same payments later Rome refused—and backed up their words with steel.

I'm more interested on how the Imperial Faction lost so much power to the Patriarch class in the "Century of the Patriarchy". The seven Emperors since Andronikos II to Basil V were weak as hell and the Patriarch of the Church had most of the Power. Could this have been avoided if the costly Italian War went better, rather than being crushed far in Lombardy?

The death of Ioannes VI at Piacenza and capture of his family caused a serious crisis over leadership in Constantinople. The able and cunning Patriarch Michael took full advantage of the power gap and supported the young Andronikos II coming to power as a puppet and creating a precedent.

So yes, the Century of the Patriarchy could have easily been avoided if Leon’s ambitions had been checked.

Well if the Crusaders successfully replace Egypt with a christian version of it, and both the Romans and the Crusaders keep a good relationship then you would still see the development of trade between Constantinople and Alexandria (the likely capital of this Christian Egypt). The remaining Muslim powers left won't be able to affect the Romans, surely not any Persian polity nor the Western Muslim states in Africa.

Would a Christian Egypt prosper and succeed as much as the Ayyubid Caliphate, though? Ruling as a religiously intolerant and zealous minority as they did in Palestine would make life very difficult for them.

I doubt they’d have the resources to rebuild the Canal of the Pharaohs in the 17th century, let alone the 15th.

Or alternatively you could avoid the election of Michael V to the Patriarchal throne. As a member of the imperial family, it was easy for him to weaken the power of his nephew Andronicus II (back then only a minor) to his own advantage.

The imperial family’s (or rather, Andronikos and Michael’s branch, since the male members of the main line died at Piacenza) grip on the Patriarchy and throne was a major part of how the Century lasted so long, true.

That’s why when Basil V won the Dynatoi War and executed the former Patriarch for conspiring with the rebellious nobles he implemented the law that the Patriarch could not be from the ruling family line.
 
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(OOC: Moravia rules Serbia? What does that have to do with Sicily?)
OOC: probably means this or an ATL version of it
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moravian_Serbia

Would a Christian Egypt prosper and succeed as much as the Ayyubid Caliphate, though? Ruling as a religiously intolerant and zealous minority as they did in Palestine would make life very difficult for them.
Wow! Anti-Syrian blood libel in 2019? I mean the Holy Land under the Borjigins was pretty tolerant by any reasonable medieval standard, and thats who was ruling by the 1400s.
 
OOC: probably means this or an ATL version of it
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moravian_Serbia

OOC: Weird, why isn’t it called Moravan Serbia?

Wow! Anti-Syrian blood libel in 2019? I mean the Holy Land under the Borjigins was pretty tolerant by any reasonable medieval standard, and thats who was ruling by the 1400s.

No, I’m talking about the zealously Catholic kingdom of the Frankish Crusaders, not the extremely tolerant Nestorian successor with the same name. The Mongols re-established the kingdom with a Borjigin prince explicitly to re-establish it with the Mongol faith at the time (and also to replace the Frankish nobility).

It is a very bizarre quirk of history that the Borjigin Kingdom of Jerusalem ended up outliving all of the other Mongol states.
 
OOC: Weird, why isn’t it called Moravan Serbia?
OOC: Serbian history just makes no sense, in my brief skimming of it.

No, I’m talking about the zealously Catholic kingdom of the Frankish Crusaders, not the extremely tolerant Nestorian successor with the same name. The Mongols re-established the kingdom with a Borjigin prince explicitly to re-establish it with the Mongol faith at the time (and also to replace the Frankish nobility).

It is a very bizarre quirk of history that the Borjigin Kingdom of Jerusalem ended up outliving all of the other Mongol states.
To my understanding it's mostly down to the Borjigins making nice with the Pope and other Italian power players (maintaining the Frank's trade links, not trying to impose Nestorianism at the expense of the Latins and Uniates, ect...). When the Ilkhanate lost Iran and Mesopotamia, Venice and Genoa shipped over a new batch of Crusaders free of charge to prop up their primary income stream.
 
To my understanding it's mostly down to the Borjigins making nice with the Pope and other Italian power players (maintaining the Frank's trade links, not trying to impose Nestorianism at the expense of the Latins and Uniates, ect...). When the Ilkhanate lost Iran and Mesopotamia, Venice and Genoa shipped over a new batch of Crusaders free of charge to prop up their primary income stream.

It’s hilarious just how diplomatically adept they became compared to...pretty much every other incidence of Mongol diplomacy.

I think them being Nestorian (or I guess I should use the proper term, Oriental Orthodox?) helped them strike a balance between the Catholic, Orthodox, and Muslim nations around them. At various times they swore vassalage to Egypt, Rome, Venice, and even Italy once IIRC.

Of course they loved the merchant republics best, since they propped them up militarily and provided the troops you mentioned that let them conquer southern Syria.
 
It’s hilarious just how diplomatically adept they became compared to...pretty much every other incidence of Mongol diplomacy.
Syria in general is a odd part of the world, bunch of Arabs with French last names and jousting as their national sport. Wonderful place for a vacation if you ever have the chance.
 
It’s hilarious just how diplomatically adept they became compared to...pretty much every other incidence of Mongol diplomacy.

I think them being Nestorian (or I guess I should use the proper term, Oriental Orthodox?) helped them strike a balance between the Catholic, Orthodox, and Muslim nations around them. At various times they swore vassalage to Egypt, Rome, Venice, and even Italy once IIRC.

Of course they loved the merchant republics best, since they propped them up militarily and provided the troops you mentioned that let them conquer southern Syria.
I'm not sure I agree with the first bit, as a whole Mongol diplomacy was extremely effective, it was how they obtained the submission of large kingdoms and the entirety of China, from relatively "small-scale" battles. Plus, pagan khans making obvious references to animism and a sky deity in their correspondence, still convinced the Crusaders to fight alongside them during the establishment of the Ilkhanate.

Granted, the Armenians and Georgians did end up defecting during the Siege of Baghdad, allowing the Abbasids to save the city from a sacking and defend the House of Wisdom.

Such incidents would be avoided by Mongol Jerusalem -- and that was not as much a result of adept politicking but more due to outright tyranny in the ranks. Well that and it was more agreeable to fight for a Nestorian khan than a pagan one.
 
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I could easily see the Crusaders attacking Constantinople. Even Bohemond of Taranto directly attacked Alexios shortly after the First Crusade.

If the Crusaders took Constantinople, the Turks would at least be able to take all of Anatolia, and then the Eastern Roman Empire is screwed whether it's Orthodox or ruled by a small elite of Catholic Frankish knights. Probably a Turkic Anatolian empire would combine Hellenistic and Turco-Persian attributes, raid the coast of Greece (they'd never actually conquer it though, as raiding it would be too profitable) and temporarily take Constantinople before the Italian age.

How exactly would the Crusaders take Constantinople? That's like saying "if the 1856 Revolution had succeeded in Prague they could take Toledo". It is as close to impossible as it gets and takes several steps to get there.

Now, I could see this "crusade" raiding the Romans like the Normans of the time did and inflicting some serious damage if they're aimed in that direction. But I don't know where you're getting the idea that they could take Costantinople, unless they invented gunpowder overnight.

Back to the OP, the crusade didn't have a chance of taking Egypt. If it goes the conventional route maybe it can help the Kingdom of Jerusalem, but more likely it just ends up as yet another failed effort against the Abbuyids.
 
How exactly would the Crusaders take Constantinople? That's like saying "if the 1856 Revolution had succeeded in Prague they could take Toledo". It is as close to impossible as it gets and takes several steps to get there.

Now, I could see this "crusade" raiding the Romans like the Normans of the time did and inflicting some serious damage if they're aimed in that direction. But I don't know where you're getting the idea that they could take Costantinople, unless they invented gunpowder overnight.

Back to the OP, the crusade didn't have a chance of taking Egypt. If it goes the conventional route maybe it can help the Kingdom of Jerusalem, but more likely it just ends up as yet another failed effort against the Abbuyids.
Obviously it would take a lot of luck for the Crusaders to take Constantinople, but Byzantine civil wars were so frequent that they could arrive in the middle of a civil war and prop up one of the emperors against the other. Then establish themselves as power brokers for a few months before taking over.
 
Obviously it would take a lot of luck for the Crusaders to take Constantinople, but Byzantine civil wars were so frequent that they could arrive in the middle of a civil war and prop up one of the emperors against the other. Then establish themselves as power brokers for a few months before taking over.
I guess they could be recruited by someone, but it's not like Latin mercenaries the Roman's of the time used took over. I don't know where you are getting this idea, it has no basis in reality. It is creative, though.
 
Syria in general is a odd part of the world, bunch of Arabs with French last names and jousting as their national sport. Wonderful place for a vacation if you ever have the chance.

I’ve always wanted to see the monasteries and mosques in the region, especially Damascus.

I’ve heard Palestine is pretty similar culturally, with an added dash of Mongol nationalist imagery. Pretty funny, since IIRC the medieval Borjigins did their best to associate themselves with their faith more than their ethnicity.

I'm not sure I agree with the first bit, as a whole Mongol diplomacy was extremely effective, it was how they obtained the submission of large kingdoms and the entirety of China, from relatively "small-scale" battles. Plus, pagan khans making obvious references to animism and a sky deity in their correspondence, still convinced the Crusaders to fight alongside them during the establishment of the Ilkhanate.

That’s true, but their diplomacy in East Asia was largely of the gunboat kind, impressive displays of shock, awe, and horror. That’s why all of those conquests fell apart quickly and bloodily.

I thought the story was that the Frankish nobles misinterpreted the references to Tengri as a strain of Oriental Orthodoxy?

Granted, the Armenians and Georgians did end up defecting during the Siege of Baghdad, allowing the Abbasids to save the city from a sacking and defend the House of Wisdom.

I still hold that if Subotai had actually tried to take Baghdad immediately he would have succeeded. It was his decision to take care of the Persian rebels first that allowed the Abbasids to declare jihad and pull together a huge volunteer force to defend Baghdad.

Oh, and get enough gold to bribe the Caucasian leaders in the Mongol force.

Such incidents would be avoided by Mongol Jerusalem -- and that was not as much a result of adept politicking but more due to outright tyranny in the ranks. Well that and it was more agreeable to fight for a Nestorian khan than a pagan one.

It was tyranny, but it was egalitarian tyranny—as long as you obeyed the Khan it didn’t matter what faith or ethnicity you were, and the Palestinians approved of it.

Hell, wasn’t one of Kitbuqa I’s main advisors a Frankish defector?
 
I’ve always wanted to see the monasteries and mosques in the region, especially Damascus.

I’ve heard Palestine is pretty similar culturally, with an added dash of Mongol nationalist imagery. Pretty funny, since IIRC the medieval Borjigins did their best to associate themselves with their faith more than their ethnicity.
As someone who has visited palestine/Israel/The Holy Land or whatever you prefer to call it, it is apparant that being Mongol there means something else than being a Mongol on the steppe. The Mongol ruling class in Israel was supplemented by 'joiners' from other communities. Much of the Frankish aristocracy was mongolcised over the first 100 years of Mongol rule. The Mongol assimilation was a slow process, had it been quicker it might have lead to the adoption of the Frank's language by the Mongol's instead of the other way around, because of the greater size of the Frank population than the Mongol population. Still, the Mongol language of Palestine has been greatly influenced by local Semitic and Latin languages.
 
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