Eagles and Hawks
- Thread starter LSCatilina
- Start date
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]734 – 738[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] Charles Martel[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] Charles Martel[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]While his victories against the Muslims made Charles of Heristal growing his position among the Franks and the duchies under their domination, allowing him to reorganize the Borgony* by replacing the nobles with loyal followers and rewarding the Borgonians with lands and wealth in Neustria; Al-Andalus had lost his governor. This time, the governor of Kairouan successfully imposed the new one, Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan al-Fihri, decided to reorganize deeply the peninsula. The little Christian principalities kept their relative autonomy for that touching their fellows believers, but the Muslims -- both Arabs and Berbers -- gained a supervision power, in order to divide the mawali from the Berbers, in the hope that any rebellion would lack the support of the other side.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]He decided to acknowledge the power of the kaysit faction in the western part of Al-Andalus, but treated separately its members as admitting the existence of the principality of Maslamids in the Algrave and creating ties with others families by giving them wealth and position within the administration of the province, critically in the east part in order to cut them from the Kaisits. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Giving the Maslamids a autonomous status was perhaps a strategy in order to assimilating them to the mawali or Gotandolos, and at term reducing their power and influence.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Still, the kalbits kept many positions, as Yusuf ibn Abd al-Rahman al-Fihri, another member of the Fihrids the great and prestigious family of the conqueror of Ifriqiya, who received the wali of Sharkusta, considered as the main base of the gahwza towards Gaul. He had then an important post where he could gain fame and improve a net of followers, when the Berbers still having hardly emir titles for some borders lands.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]When the situation in Ifriqiya needed the return of Abd al-Malik, Ubqa ibn al-Hajjaj al-Saluli was send to replace it and continue his policy.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Alfonso I managed to keep stable relations, paying regularly a tribute to Ishybia and making treaties with the Berbers emirs of the Douro Basin, avoiding the ghazwa that ravaged the Gothia during these years.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Indeed, after the Battle of Gange, Aimairc and the Goths had to fight several raids from the Arabo-Berbers settlers of Tarraconesa. The raiders usually managed to plunder the regions where the few troops where guarding the cities, but some important places where raided or ransomed as the city of Barcino in 736. If the Gothic cities were enough protected , they couldn't support a siege with a lack of support from the north.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]It's to notice that we don”t have mention of any submission of Gothic noble at this time, showing perhaps that the ones in charge of Tarraconesans cities and lands were linked to the royal power, by familial ties or in his clientele.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Aquitània, at the contrary, the situation became quickly dramatic. Odon died in 735, giving the Aquitània to his surviving sons, Unalt and Hutton who share the country.
Charles of Heristal wanted to get back the land, as he could do since Odon recognized his vassalage and went in Aquitània to force the nobility to admit it. His back was secured by his victory at the river Boarn against the pagans Frisians and this victory, accompanied by the support of Boniface, now metropolitan of Germania, improve moreover his position. During this campaign, he destroyed every pagan shrine or cult place, using a strategy that his most famous descendent will use.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But the Aquitàno-Vascon nobility choose to recognize the two Odonids as their legitimate dukes, making the country entering once again in a war against the Franks.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Charles attacked first, advancing in western Aquitània, still having the stigmata of the Arab raid, plundering the northern part and taking Bordèu in few months. Having made another agreement with the governor, Unalt and Hatton prepare a counter-attack, calling their brother-in-law, Aimairc of Gothia, to help them driving back the Franks out their domain.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The king of Gothia refused to give his help despite the familial ties, arguing of the Muslim threat at his southern borders. The heavy Aquitain influence, even with the death of Odon and the wars and raids that ravaged it, was important and threatened to make the surviving Visigothic kingdom only a part of a greater one, from Atlantic to Mediterranean.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Amairic gained then a bad reputation among the Aquitano-Romans, and called « Perfidious king of Septimania » in the Vita Pardulfi[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Still, Unalt had to attack the Franks, and he reached and burned Chartres in 736. But his brother Hatton « loosing confidence on his victory, accepted to encounter the majordomo before the city of Peiteus and, joining the Franks, betrayed his brother ». Unalt conserved notwithstanding his forces, with the revolt against the frankish power still latent forcing Charles to end quickly this campaign.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The two opponents were ready to settle their claims, by the sword.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But the frustration of the nations dominated by Charles led to a series of event that could challenged his power and, perhaps, threatened his « reign ». The Provencals, defeated in 714 when they were led by the Patrice Antenor, and now led by MMaurontus of Avinhon rose again against the frankish rule. The Patrice Maurontus called the the wali of Sharkusta for helping him, hoping probably that Yusuf al-Fihri would attack Charles in Aquitània, giving the Provencals the time to organize their defense.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Seeing the danger, the Aquitains and the Franks agreed to make a truce, where Charles « arbitrated » the supposed dispute between the brothers, by giving each one a part of their father's domain : to Unalt, the Gascony and the Tolzan; to Hatton, the northern part.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Obviously, the war with the Aquitains was reinterpreted by this heritage issue, making Charles moving in Aquitània to arbiter it, and « give peace to his lieges »[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Yusuf al-Fihri had crossed the Pyrenees at this time with 12 000, having invaded the southern part of Gothia, plundering the country but letting the coastal cities, in order to conserve forces to attack the Franks. Amairic joined Charles' forces -- and Unalt one's, probably creating some tension in this common army -- letting his cousin, Julla in charge of the cohesion between the Goths.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Julla and Yusuf al-Fihri fought themselves after the Arabo-Berber took and plundered Elna, hoping that their army would be slowed and far less organizable charged with booty, but the wali of Sharkusta beaten the Goths, forcing Julla and an army reduced to half his number to flee north.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Provence, the Patrice Abbon, loyal to Charles Martel, attacked Maurontus in early 737, as Charles send a part of his army led by his son Pepin to helping him to end the Provencal rebellion. The majordomo entered in Gothia, where Yusuf al-Fihri had advanced until Magalona, sparing only Narbona, to well defended beyond his romans walls, and Carcassona. The Frank chief advanced to attack the Muslim army, but learning that reinforcements led by Umar ibn Halid were arrived in southern Septimania, maybe with the help of Gothic nobles, he changed his mind, giving Aimairc some troops for keeping the passage from Aquitània to Provence free of Islamic occupation.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Once again, Amairic was protecting Nimes, that he gave the possession to his brother -- or maybe his nephew -- Egiric, using the old roman amphitheater as a fortress (still visible today, but without the greater part of medieval adds destroyed in 1863).[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Charles found a new ally : Liutprand, king of the Lombards. In order to avoid a possible contagion of rebellion on the other side of Alps, the Lombard agreed to help the Franks against a Provencal rebellion that was helped by some small Berbers troops that managed to avoid the Christians armies.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The fact that Arabo-Berbers managed or not to reach the Provence was a matter of debate. Felip De Rosas and Susana Martin supported the idea that the Saracens mentioned by the Frankish historians were indeed part of Yusuf al-Fihri army, but some historians suggested that they were only a generic name used to describe the foes of the peppinids/carolingians as the Saxons were first mentioned as Frisians.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Maurontus was chased from Arles in October of 736, and loose the battle of Avinhon the 12 June of 736 when the jointed Franko-Lombard army chased him off the city. Refugee in Marsèlha, the Patrice wasn't a thread anymore and, forced to recognize the Frankish supremacy on Provence, he stood on this city while his rival Abbon gained the authority on the metropolitan seats of Arles and Ais. Due to the ravages and the lack of mercy he showed during this campaign, plundering the provencal cities to chase the not so powerful but determined allies and clients of Maurontus, Charles gained his surname of « Martel », « the Hammer », whose sense was posteriorly changed to « Hammer of the Saracens »[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Freed from a revolt on the other side of the Rhone/Ròse, Charles was coming in Gothia, but Unalt refused to help the Goths, arguing that Aimairc betrayed his alliance. Surprisingly, the majordomo accepted that the Aquitains came back to Tolosa, accordingly to the Frédégaire, « understanding that the Aquitain, if he was forced to go with him would be a sword pointed on him, an unsure staff to repose his faith »[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Furthermore, Charles probably want to impeach Unalt to gain more popularity, as his father did, by fighting the Arabo-Berbers. By helping himself Amairic, Charles could stop a eventual reconciliation between him and the Duke of Aquitània, and strengthen the Frankish influence in Gothia.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Umar, attacking the northern Septimania had blocked the Gothic king in his city of Nimes, but he was defeated by Charles Martel at the battle of the Lake of Peròls in February of 737, where his cavalry was repulsed by a moving Frankish phalanx, and harass by the Gothic light infantry.
The location of the battle is disputed, being traditionally located at Peròls but most probably occurred near Melguèlh, where were discovered two skeletons and horse with medieval weapons .[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Having saved the northern part of Gothia, Charles and Amairic decided to broke definitely the Muslim army and retake at least the northern side of Pyrenees. Due to a persisting and rude winter, the Islamic cavalry had hard times to advance, critically with the booty of their campaigns. Charles, having confided the one he made in Provence to his son, could advance more quickly with the help of locals who showed him the passes in the Corbièras, surprising Yusuf near the modern locality of[/FONT] [FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Tautavuèlh.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]What Yusuf did there is still debatable. The Muslim army obviously leaved the Fenolhedés, but Tautavuèlh wasn't the direct path to continue a campaign in Septimania. Attacking the Aquitània would lead to a difficult campaign, forcing Unalt to act, but maybe the Fihrid was misinformed and not aware of the leaving of the Aquitain from the Christian army. Some have advanced that Yusuf was aware of the moves of Charles and Amairic, and tried to wait them, thinking he had to fight an exhausted army to the end of the massif.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Frédégaire notes that Yusuf didn't made a recognition of the region, sure to beat the Franks, and that they surprised him in his camp. Still, the Arabo-Berber army resisted to the first assault, using their infantry and cavalrymen on foot, but after the death of several leaders as Umar or Malik ibn Abd al-Ashja'i forced Yusuf to withdraw with only a part of the loot, letting the main part to the Franko-Goths.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Shortly after, the Muslims were driven out of Cerdanha by Amairic, Charles being returned in his kingdom by Aquitània, in a provocative act to recall to Unalt and Hutton their ranks in the peppinind Gaul.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Yusuf managed to return to Sharkusta with a little booty, having replaced a part of the one he loose by plundering the Tarraconesa, without imposing his rule to the Gothic cities, in order to avoid a Frankish intervention south of Pyrenees.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Yet this new defeat, without having reached the Provence that he wanted to plunder, in the absence of controlling it – that would be difficult with a Gothia separating it from Al-Andalus – made the Muslims of the peninsula realize that the expansion north of the Pyrenees was impossible with a growing, in power and in size, Frankish Kingdom and that their only way to improve their situation were in the prosperity of the province.
But for the Berbers and, in a less important way, non-Kalbits Arabs, the access to Andalusian prosperity was blocked by the ambition and the greed of the current wali and Arabs emirs who had based their power on their domination on non-Arabs, by pressuring them fiscally and politically.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The governor and the wali, despite allowing and leading small gahwzas until 739 -- as the raid that Ibrahim ibd Aram led in the Pyrenees -- couldn't hold anymore the general frustration of the ones who conquered the Hispania without receiving the right prize for it.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]This assessment would lead to a upheaval that changed the face of the peninsula and of the western basin of Mediterranea.[/FONT]
Last edited:
3 update before the end of Part I of Eagles & Hawks.
To answer to the question that i listen somebody not asking it, i plan to continue it until around 1250, where, OTL, the Reconquista was finished (Grenada being in the situation to be annexed by Castilla anytime). But i'm not saying that ATL the Reconquista will finish here, or not...
Sorry for the absence of maps, but i don't have the basemap now, i'll make them later.
For finish the Part I, after the 3 others updates, i would probably make a short bilan of what we have in the peninsula for military equipment, knowledge, fiscality, agriculture etc.
Please say me what you would want to see for the next Part, for style, etc.
To answer to the question that i listen somebody not asking it, i plan to continue it until around 1250, where, OTL, the Reconquista was finished (Grenada being in the situation to be annexed by Castilla anytime). But i'm not saying that ATL the Reconquista will finish here, or not...
Sorry for the absence of maps, but i don't have the basemap now, i'll make them later.
For finish the Part I, after the 3 others updates, i would probably make a short bilan of what we have in the peninsula for military equipment, knowledge, fiscality, agriculture etc.
Please say me what you would want to see for the next Part, for style, etc.
Cuāuhtemōc
Banned
Another good post, I made a few corrections with that. I don't think MNP minds correcting my corrections of your update that you PM'd me.
I'm searching for someone who could drawn me two or three things, not achieved ones just sketchs, for this TL.
Again, if someone want to correct the text, even partially, thanks to do it.
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The attitude that Arabs have adopted towards the Berbers was a source of resentment, then hate in this people. If the Berbers of Al-Andalus were quite well treated in comparison of their brothers that stood in their native lands, their role in the conquest of the peninsula was denied as their ambition to participate to the governance of the province. Furthermore, the Arabs didn't satisfied themselve no longer to simply refuse the acknowledge it, but they began to apply the same policy of sur-taxation that they did in Ifriqyia. The severe drought that raged in these years increased the fiscal pressure at the point that any spark would have set the fire of the civil war.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]This spark was the revolt of the Ifriqyian berbers against their masters. The governor that replaced Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan al-Fihri,[/FONT] [FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Obeid Allah ibn al-Habhab was knew for his harshness towards the non-Arabs of Ifriqyia. The Berbers were particularly oppressed and, as the governor and the walis of Al-Andalus pursued the same policy, there was no longer the possibility of avoiding it by conquering or settling a new place. In 737 he gained even the control of both Ifriqiya, Maghreb and Al-Andalus, by giving the post of governors to two of his clients.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The financial situation of the provinces was quite bad, as no sufficient raids or conquests could be done from Kairouan to bring wealth into ifriqiyan safes. Furthermore the failure of transpyrenean expeditions associated with the drought led the Arabs to the only solution they could conceive to reestablish the balance of their finances.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Eventually, the Arabs went to declare officially the Berbers as a conquered people and left to the seizing of their properties and to enslaving (by tribute or by repression), even the Muslims.[/FONT]
In fact, Obeid only officialized and institutionalized a situation that existed long before his accession to the governorship.
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Caliphate, traditionally partisan of a balance in the province and to the limitation of the abuses made by the governors let the reins to Obeid, as their own failures to made successful expeditions in the east prevented to help Kairouan fiscality.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Furthermore, this decision put the opposition to the Fihrids in high esteem among the Arabs, feared of their policy of political supremacy in both Al-Andalus and Ifriqiya.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The fierces Berbers, despite their defeats against the Arab administration decided to rise against it, first led by the three majors tribes of western Maghreb : Berghwata, Ghomara and Miknasa and joined by many others. Maysra al-Matghari was chose to lead this coalition, issued from the Matghara. The Sufrite school managed to give an united ideological foundation to this alliance, and a religious answer to the violation of Qur'an laws by the Arabs.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In 739, the governor give the direction of an expedition to raid, and maybe conquest, Sicily to a Fihrid : Habib ibn Abi Obeida al-Fihri, maybe in order to seek a political reconciliation before the growing rebellion among the Berbers. But as soon that Habib gathered his forces and gone, the Berbers openly revolted and lunched the war against the Arabs.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Shouting Qur'anic surates and quotes, tiding them to their spears and writing them to their shields, they took Tanja which fell quickly. The wali was killed as Maysra was declared Caliph by his supporters, claiming to restaure the law of Islam in Maghreb and Ifriqiya. As Maysra let sufficient troops in the city to block the communication and the troops between Al-Andalus and Maghreb, he took all western part of this province, gaining at each victory even more partisans, over-numbering the Ummayad forces.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Habib was quickly ordered to turn back, as the governor have not enough troops to face the great Berber revolt. With the help of the Fihrid, he assembled a heavy cavalry troop, composed of the Arab nobility who had no choice but won to not only keep their position but also their lives . Led by Khalid ibn Abi Habib al-Fihri, the army was sent to reconquer Tanja and waiting the reinforcements.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Berbers managed to keep the city, but the Arabs besieged them. Furthermore, Maysra suffered a coup and was executed for cowardice and impiety as a Zenata chieftain, whom the tribe was in the more eastern portion of Maghreb, was declared Caliph : Khalid ibn Hamid al-Zanati. Khalid decided, to reinforce his new power, to strike back and attack the Arab army before Habib could join them and make any counter-attack impossible. The Berber charge surprised the Arab who were massacred without pity. This “Battle of the Nobles” decimated for years the Arab nobility in Ifriqiya.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The trauma caused by this defeat led the local Arab commanders to take desperate measures to keep control of the land. Sufrite preachers, or alleged ones were brutally executed, their supposed followers massacred. In such cities as Tlemcen, who were quite peaceful, the Berber population rise against this and defeated the Arabs.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Habib, seeing that he didn't have any chance to took back the majors cities or the Maghreb against the hole country in arms, decided to join the Arabs in Tlemcen, only to see the city in the hands of the rebels and only some loyal forces still around the city. The Arab commander, or misinformed or to show his good will to the rebels, mutilated the commander of this loyal army.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]He managed to took the city of Tahert, uniting the few remnants of the Arab army and begged the Caliph Hisham to help the Arabs of Ifryqia.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Before the danger of a revolt in Al-Andalus Arabs decided to call back Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan al-Fihri who was judged both more popular among the Berbers and a appreciable choice among the Arabs. Indeed, he managed to slow down the tension by continuing his policy of putting the pressure, both fiscal and political under the Christian or the converted Goths.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In February of 741, the Caliph Hisham appointed Kulthum ibn Iyad al-Qasi as governor of Ifriqiya, with not less than 30 000 Arabs from Syria, Palestine Egypt. But the Kairouan aristocracy received this reinforcement coolly, fearing a coup that would deprive from their power at the benefit of the newcomers. Here again, the opposition between the kalbits who have conquered and settled the western provinces and the kaysit army led to several oppositions that downed the efficiency of the operations.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In order to secure his back, Kulthum let the direction of the city to Abd al-Rahman ibn Oqba al-Ghaffari who was the qadi before the arrival of Syrian troops. Finally, Kulthum make junction with the troops of Habib, making the united army to 40 000 men. But here again, the national tensions diverted many efforts of Kulthum to organize efficiently the expedition.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Against them, the hole Maghreb have raised. The Berbers have a bad equipment with nothing but spears and knives without armor, but outnumbered the Arabs troops by five against one, having the knowledge of the terrain and united by national and religious cause.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Finally, at Baqdura, the armies confronted themselves. Kulthum disdained the advises of ifriqyians and their experience, made many tactical mistakes, using the classical strategy used against the foes of the Caliphate in the East, but unadapted to the skirmishes of Berbers who managed to isolate and make disband the cavalry, as their infantry attacked in two points the Arabs. The two thirds of the expedition were captured or killed (for the most fortunate ones) and the two Arab commanders as well, eventually agreeing on one thing, their death.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Balj ibn Bishr, Kulthum's nephew have no choice but reach Ceuta with Abd al-Rahman ibn Habib al-Fihri, with at best 10, 000 men, demoralized and exhausted. Finally, as the Berbers besieged Ceuta while the remains of the expedition was slaughtered in its way to Kairouan.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In the same time, the Berbers of Al-Andalus, acknowledging the succeeding victories of their brothers in Maghreb revolted themselves against the rule of Arabs in 741. In southern Galicia and in Leonese, the Berber garrisons decided to form an army who searched to make junction with other revolted Berbers.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Alfonso I couldn't believe his luck and used the situation to took the southern Galicia as far as Tuy, and the cities of Astorga and Leon. Shortly after, he even took back the familial stronghold of Amaia, without any fight, as the Berber garrison left it and the Arabs couldn't hold it anymore. The Kingdom of Asturias have grown of one third of his original territory without any battle worth of mention.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Fleeing the war in the south, many Christian flee to the now Asturian places of Leon or Astorga, or even to the other side of Cantabrian Mountains, creating the “Douro Desert”, empty of men and that remained as such for centuries, in the fear of Muslims raids for riches and slaves.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Arabs accused the Berbers to have gave away these places to Alfonso I for avoiding the Christians to attack their backs. It's more likely that, once the Berbers gone and without a real Arab presence in the border regions, the Gotandolos present in the province rallied themselves to Alfonso, in order to avoid to be engaged in a civil war into that they weren't concerned.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Amairic too used this situation to improve his hold on Tarraconesa and make the Gotandolos of barcelonan hinterland recognize his rule. But at the difference of southern Asturias, the Gotandolos here were mainly converted as the Banu Qasi and the Kingdom of Gothia couldn't count on allies in a far more Arab settled province. The Cassidius, led by Fortunius managed notwithstanding to use their lineage to help the king to hold mountainous and still Christian nobility under his rule.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As in the Asturias, but in smaller numbers, the Kingdom welcomed refugees from Ebre valley. Theses “Ispanicas” settled the Tarraconesa, improving the rule of Amairic in the weakest part of his kingdom. But an important part continued to reach the Septimania were Amairic used it to reinforce the region devastated by the Arabs expeditions.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Berbers of Ifriqyia were joined by the central Maghreb tribes at the news of their victories, even with the death of Khalid, in obscure ways, and the country seemed each day more lost for the Caliphate. The qadi of Kairouan managed to defeat a first army, led by a preacher : Oqasha ibn Ayubb al-Fezari, but he didn't have the forces to exploit his victory.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Anew, Hisham had to appoint a new governor, the governor of Egypt : Handala ibn Safwan al-Kalbi who reached Kairouan in April 742.
Meanwhile, in Al-Andalus, the Berbers have organized three columns, to take Tulaytula, Ishbyia and Alkhadra to respectively crush the more important garrison of central Al-Andalus, to take the seat of Arab power and to seize the fleet to make contact with the Berbers of North Africa.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Arabs managed to hold, for a time, the advance of the Berbers but Abd al-Malik first refused that Balj land in the province, punishing anyone who would supported it, at the point to publicy torture a merchant that dispatched to the besieged two grain boats.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But with the Berbers of Al-Andalus having organized themselves and going to their goals, the governor reluctantly accepted to host the Syrian, at the condition of giving up their commandment and to leave the peninsula as soon the revolt would be crushed.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In early 742, Balj landed in Al-Andalus and quickly defeated the Berber army that threatened Algeciras. After having made junction with Abd al-Malik, the Berber column which wanted to took Ishbyia was defeated too, and soon the third and last Berber army was crushed while it besieged Tulaytula.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Then the Syrian denounced the treaty passed with Abd al-Malik and refused to turn in a boiling Maghreb, wanting to settle the province.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the governor, supported by the Fihrids, threatened them to attack, Balj dismissed Abd al-Malik, proclaiming himself as governor with the support of his troops and of the Maslamids who gave him the support the kaisits of Al-Andalus.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]At the battle of Ishbyia, Abd al-Malik was defeated and tortured to avenge the merchant who have helped Balj during the siege of Ceuta.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Notwithstanding, the Fihrids continued the fight, making the province down in the civil war. Balj and his supporters hold the western and southern part, when the Andalusian kept the control of the East, proclaiming Abd al-Rahman ibn Habib al-Fihri as the rightful governor of Al-Andalus.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Ifriqiya, the new governor have to fight the greatest Berber army never seen, even in the times of the conquest of the province, near of a century ago. The Berbers were about to make junction and form an army to took Kairouan from all sides. Handala decided to make a resolute action to avoid this junction, realizing it was the only way to avoid the eventual took of the city. The Arabs factions finally putting a temporary end to their mutual defiance and fights, the governor managed to stop the Berbers only three miles outside of Kairouan, by not only using his own troops and the remaining of the ifriqiyan ones, but also by arming all the city to avoid a bloody defeat and an ever more bloody taking of the city. Thanks to this union of the Arabs, he managed to crush the Berber troops and to save the eastern Maghreb for the Caliphate.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the Arabs managed to stop the Berber advance, but not the rebellion in North Africa, the civil war in Al-Andalus put the Berber question in a secondary concern. Even more, the Fihrids encouraged the remains of the Berber army to join them, promising to give them a greater role in the administration of the province. In fact, Abd al-Rahman gave to one of their leaders, Yazid al-Hawwari the seat of the wali of Shalamanka.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Seeing that Balj attacked the Andalo-Berber forces at Tulaytula.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The armies fought near the walls of the cities, at the Battle of El-Bab (Battle of the Door). If the Syrians managed to chase the Fihrids forces off the city, the battle was harsh for them, with on third of the army dying with Balj before Tulaytula.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]He was replaced by Thalaba ibn Salama al-Milli, his second if not the sucessor designed during the north african expedition. But the Palestinian and the Egyptians refused to recognize something more than a symbolic power to him and a anarchic rule devastated the southern Al-Andalus, each nation or tribe arrogating itself a territory.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Finally, the Fihrids make contact with the Egyptian jund after having sucessfully taken back the plundered city of Tulaytula, being exhausted by the war and fearing that an eventual unity among the kaisits would defeated them.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The city wont recover from this plunder, and from the civil war before years, accelerating the lost of his capitol rank.
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] They decided to contact Handala who dismissed both the Fihrid and the kaysit governors by appointing Abu al-Khattar ibn Darar al-Kalbi as governor. Indeed, he was his cousin but critically represented of the most weak faction in Al-Andalus, in order to make no side leased at the benefit to the other.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In September of 743, the territorial division among the newcomer was officialized, the Syrian receiving the region of Garnathah, the Jordans and the Palestinians the southern Betica, and the Egyptians in Murcia, making the principality of Tudmir disappearing totally, as all the Gotandolos principalities, gone with the civil war absorbed by or the Christians kings or the Muslims warlords.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In their news territories, the kaisits, both newcomers or previous settlers as Maslamids, gained the power of taxing and rising troops, supposedly for the governor but at their own advantage.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Abu al-Khattar didn't manage to impose his rule, as both the Syrian and the Fihrids obtained the reality of the power in their hands, and were unwilling to share with anyone, especially with a powerless governor.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
The new principalties wouldn't just let their foes quiet and a period of disorders have followed immediatly.
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]739 – 743[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] The Great Berber Revolt[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] The Great Berber Revolt[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The attitude that Arabs have adopted towards the Berbers was a source of resentment, then hate in this people. If the Berbers of Al-Andalus were quite well treated in comparison of their brothers that stood in their native lands, their role in the conquest of the peninsula was denied as their ambition to participate to the governance of the province. Furthermore, the Arabs didn't satisfied themselve no longer to simply refuse the acknowledge it, but they began to apply the same policy of sur-taxation that they did in Ifriqyia. The severe drought that raged in these years increased the fiscal pressure at the point that any spark would have set the fire of the civil war.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]This spark was the revolt of the Ifriqyian berbers against their masters. The governor that replaced Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan al-Fihri,[/FONT] [FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Obeid Allah ibn al-Habhab was knew for his harshness towards the non-Arabs of Ifriqyia. The Berbers were particularly oppressed and, as the governor and the walis of Al-Andalus pursued the same policy, there was no longer the possibility of avoiding it by conquering or settling a new place. In 737 he gained even the control of both Ifriqiya, Maghreb and Al-Andalus, by giving the post of governors to two of his clients.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The financial situation of the provinces was quite bad, as no sufficient raids or conquests could be done from Kairouan to bring wealth into ifriqiyan safes. Furthermore the failure of transpyrenean expeditions associated with the drought led the Arabs to the only solution they could conceive to reestablish the balance of their finances.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Eventually, the Arabs went to declare officially the Berbers as a conquered people and left to the seizing of their properties and to enslaving (by tribute or by repression), even the Muslims.[/FONT]
In fact, Obeid only officialized and institutionalized a situation that existed long before his accession to the governorship.
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Caliphate, traditionally partisan of a balance in the province and to the limitation of the abuses made by the governors let the reins to Obeid, as their own failures to made successful expeditions in the east prevented to help Kairouan fiscality.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Furthermore, this decision put the opposition to the Fihrids in high esteem among the Arabs, feared of their policy of political supremacy in both Al-Andalus and Ifriqiya.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The fierces Berbers, despite their defeats against the Arab administration decided to rise against it, first led by the three majors tribes of western Maghreb : Berghwata, Ghomara and Miknasa and joined by many others. Maysra al-Matghari was chose to lead this coalition, issued from the Matghara. The Sufrite school managed to give an united ideological foundation to this alliance, and a religious answer to the violation of Qur'an laws by the Arabs.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In 739, the governor give the direction of an expedition to raid, and maybe conquest, Sicily to a Fihrid : Habib ibn Abi Obeida al-Fihri, maybe in order to seek a political reconciliation before the growing rebellion among the Berbers. But as soon that Habib gathered his forces and gone, the Berbers openly revolted and lunched the war against the Arabs.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Shouting Qur'anic surates and quotes, tiding them to their spears and writing them to their shields, they took Tanja which fell quickly. The wali was killed as Maysra was declared Caliph by his supporters, claiming to restaure the law of Islam in Maghreb and Ifriqiya. As Maysra let sufficient troops in the city to block the communication and the troops between Al-Andalus and Maghreb, he took all western part of this province, gaining at each victory even more partisans, over-numbering the Ummayad forces.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Habib was quickly ordered to turn back, as the governor have not enough troops to face the great Berber revolt. With the help of the Fihrid, he assembled a heavy cavalry troop, composed of the Arab nobility who had no choice but won to not only keep their position but also their lives . Led by Khalid ibn Abi Habib al-Fihri, the army was sent to reconquer Tanja and waiting the reinforcements.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Berbers managed to keep the city, but the Arabs besieged them. Furthermore, Maysra suffered a coup and was executed for cowardice and impiety as a Zenata chieftain, whom the tribe was in the more eastern portion of Maghreb, was declared Caliph : Khalid ibn Hamid al-Zanati. Khalid decided, to reinforce his new power, to strike back and attack the Arab army before Habib could join them and make any counter-attack impossible. The Berber charge surprised the Arab who were massacred without pity. This “Battle of the Nobles” decimated for years the Arab nobility in Ifriqiya.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The trauma caused by this defeat led the local Arab commanders to take desperate measures to keep control of the land. Sufrite preachers, or alleged ones were brutally executed, their supposed followers massacred. In such cities as Tlemcen, who were quite peaceful, the Berber population rise against this and defeated the Arabs.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Habib, seeing that he didn't have any chance to took back the majors cities or the Maghreb against the hole country in arms, decided to join the Arabs in Tlemcen, only to see the city in the hands of the rebels and only some loyal forces still around the city. The Arab commander, or misinformed or to show his good will to the rebels, mutilated the commander of this loyal army.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]He managed to took the city of Tahert, uniting the few remnants of the Arab army and begged the Caliph Hisham to help the Arabs of Ifryqia.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Before the danger of a revolt in Al-Andalus Arabs decided to call back Abd al-Malik ibn Qatan al-Fihri who was judged both more popular among the Berbers and a appreciable choice among the Arabs. Indeed, he managed to slow down the tension by continuing his policy of putting the pressure, both fiscal and political under the Christian or the converted Goths.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In February of 741, the Caliph Hisham appointed Kulthum ibn Iyad al-Qasi as governor of Ifriqiya, with not less than 30 000 Arabs from Syria, Palestine Egypt. But the Kairouan aristocracy received this reinforcement coolly, fearing a coup that would deprive from their power at the benefit of the newcomers. Here again, the opposition between the kalbits who have conquered and settled the western provinces and the kaysit army led to several oppositions that downed the efficiency of the operations.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In order to secure his back, Kulthum let the direction of the city to Abd al-Rahman ibn Oqba al-Ghaffari who was the qadi before the arrival of Syrian troops. Finally, Kulthum make junction with the troops of Habib, making the united army to 40 000 men. But here again, the national tensions diverted many efforts of Kulthum to organize efficiently the expedition.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Against them, the hole Maghreb have raised. The Berbers have a bad equipment with nothing but spears and knives without armor, but outnumbered the Arabs troops by five against one, having the knowledge of the terrain and united by national and religious cause.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Finally, at Baqdura, the armies confronted themselves. Kulthum disdained the advises of ifriqyians and their experience, made many tactical mistakes, using the classical strategy used against the foes of the Caliphate in the East, but unadapted to the skirmishes of Berbers who managed to isolate and make disband the cavalry, as their infantry attacked in two points the Arabs. The two thirds of the expedition were captured or killed (for the most fortunate ones) and the two Arab commanders as well, eventually agreeing on one thing, their death.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Balj ibn Bishr, Kulthum's nephew have no choice but reach Ceuta with Abd al-Rahman ibn Habib al-Fihri, with at best 10, 000 men, demoralized and exhausted. Finally, as the Berbers besieged Ceuta while the remains of the expedition was slaughtered in its way to Kairouan.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In the same time, the Berbers of Al-Andalus, acknowledging the succeeding victories of their brothers in Maghreb revolted themselves against the rule of Arabs in 741. In southern Galicia and in Leonese, the Berber garrisons decided to form an army who searched to make junction with other revolted Berbers.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Alfonso I couldn't believe his luck and used the situation to took the southern Galicia as far as Tuy, and the cities of Astorga and Leon. Shortly after, he even took back the familial stronghold of Amaia, without any fight, as the Berber garrison left it and the Arabs couldn't hold it anymore. The Kingdom of Asturias have grown of one third of his original territory without any battle worth of mention.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Fleeing the war in the south, many Christian flee to the now Asturian places of Leon or Astorga, or even to the other side of Cantabrian Mountains, creating the “Douro Desert”, empty of men and that remained as such for centuries, in the fear of Muslims raids for riches and slaves.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Arabs accused the Berbers to have gave away these places to Alfonso I for avoiding the Christians to attack their backs. It's more likely that, once the Berbers gone and without a real Arab presence in the border regions, the Gotandolos present in the province rallied themselves to Alfonso, in order to avoid to be engaged in a civil war into that they weren't concerned.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Amairic too used this situation to improve his hold on Tarraconesa and make the Gotandolos of barcelonan hinterland recognize his rule. But at the difference of southern Asturias, the Gotandolos here were mainly converted as the Banu Qasi and the Kingdom of Gothia couldn't count on allies in a far more Arab settled province. The Cassidius, led by Fortunius managed notwithstanding to use their lineage to help the king to hold mountainous and still Christian nobility under his rule.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As in the Asturias, but in smaller numbers, the Kingdom welcomed refugees from Ebre valley. Theses “Ispanicas” settled the Tarraconesa, improving the rule of Amairic in the weakest part of his kingdom. But an important part continued to reach the Septimania were Amairic used it to reinforce the region devastated by the Arabs expeditions.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Berbers of Ifriqyia were joined by the central Maghreb tribes at the news of their victories, even with the death of Khalid, in obscure ways, and the country seemed each day more lost for the Caliphate. The qadi of Kairouan managed to defeat a first army, led by a preacher : Oqasha ibn Ayubb al-Fezari, but he didn't have the forces to exploit his victory.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Anew, Hisham had to appoint a new governor, the governor of Egypt : Handala ibn Safwan al-Kalbi who reached Kairouan in April 742.
Meanwhile, in Al-Andalus, the Berbers have organized three columns, to take Tulaytula, Ishbyia and Alkhadra to respectively crush the more important garrison of central Al-Andalus, to take the seat of Arab power and to seize the fleet to make contact with the Berbers of North Africa.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Arabs managed to hold, for a time, the advance of the Berbers but Abd al-Malik first refused that Balj land in the province, punishing anyone who would supported it, at the point to publicy torture a merchant that dispatched to the besieged two grain boats.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But with the Berbers of Al-Andalus having organized themselves and going to their goals, the governor reluctantly accepted to host the Syrian, at the condition of giving up their commandment and to leave the peninsula as soon the revolt would be crushed.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In early 742, Balj landed in Al-Andalus and quickly defeated the Berber army that threatened Algeciras. After having made junction with Abd al-Malik, the Berber column which wanted to took Ishbyia was defeated too, and soon the third and last Berber army was crushed while it besieged Tulaytula.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Then the Syrian denounced the treaty passed with Abd al-Malik and refused to turn in a boiling Maghreb, wanting to settle the province.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the governor, supported by the Fihrids, threatened them to attack, Balj dismissed Abd al-Malik, proclaiming himself as governor with the support of his troops and of the Maslamids who gave him the support the kaisits of Al-Andalus.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]At the battle of Ishbyia, Abd al-Malik was defeated and tortured to avenge the merchant who have helped Balj during the siege of Ceuta.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Notwithstanding, the Fihrids continued the fight, making the province down in the civil war. Balj and his supporters hold the western and southern part, when the Andalusian kept the control of the East, proclaiming Abd al-Rahman ibn Habib al-Fihri as the rightful governor of Al-Andalus.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Ifriqiya, the new governor have to fight the greatest Berber army never seen, even in the times of the conquest of the province, near of a century ago. The Berbers were about to make junction and form an army to took Kairouan from all sides. Handala decided to make a resolute action to avoid this junction, realizing it was the only way to avoid the eventual took of the city. The Arabs factions finally putting a temporary end to their mutual defiance and fights, the governor managed to stop the Berbers only three miles outside of Kairouan, by not only using his own troops and the remaining of the ifriqiyan ones, but also by arming all the city to avoid a bloody defeat and an ever more bloody taking of the city. Thanks to this union of the Arabs, he managed to crush the Berber troops and to save the eastern Maghreb for the Caliphate.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the Arabs managed to stop the Berber advance, but not the rebellion in North Africa, the civil war in Al-Andalus put the Berber question in a secondary concern. Even more, the Fihrids encouraged the remains of the Berber army to join them, promising to give them a greater role in the administration of the province. In fact, Abd al-Rahman gave to one of their leaders, Yazid al-Hawwari the seat of the wali of Shalamanka.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Seeing that Balj attacked the Andalo-Berber forces at Tulaytula.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The armies fought near the walls of the cities, at the Battle of El-Bab (Battle of the Door). If the Syrians managed to chase the Fihrids forces off the city, the battle was harsh for them, with on third of the army dying with Balj before Tulaytula.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]He was replaced by Thalaba ibn Salama al-Milli, his second if not the sucessor designed during the north african expedition. But the Palestinian and the Egyptians refused to recognize something more than a symbolic power to him and a anarchic rule devastated the southern Al-Andalus, each nation or tribe arrogating itself a territory.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Finally, the Fihrids make contact with the Egyptian jund after having sucessfully taken back the plundered city of Tulaytula, being exhausted by the war and fearing that an eventual unity among the kaisits would defeated them.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The city wont recover from this plunder, and from the civil war before years, accelerating the lost of his capitol rank.
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] They decided to contact Handala who dismissed both the Fihrid and the kaysit governors by appointing Abu al-Khattar ibn Darar al-Kalbi as governor. Indeed, he was his cousin but critically represented of the most weak faction in Al-Andalus, in order to make no side leased at the benefit to the other.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In September of 743, the territorial division among the newcomer was officialized, the Syrian receiving the region of Garnathah, the Jordans and the Palestinians the southern Betica, and the Egyptians in Murcia, making the principality of Tudmir disappearing totally, as all the Gotandolos principalities, gone with the civil war absorbed by or the Christians kings or the Muslims warlords.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In their news territories, the kaisits, both newcomers or previous settlers as Maslamids, gained the power of taxing and rising troops, supposedly for the governor but at their own advantage.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Abu al-Khattar didn't manage to impose his rule, as both the Syrian and the Fihrids obtained the reality of the power in their hands, and were unwilling to share with anyone, especially with a powerless governor.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
The new principalties wouldn't just let their foes quiet and a period of disorders have followed immediatly.
[/FONT]
Last edited:
Some mentions for this update
1. Again, one update that talk about pratically unchanged events. It is planned to be the last to did it about important events, but i thought that the berber revolt was too important to be just mentionned at one point in the update.
2. Some change notwithstanding : the Fihrids have a better hold on eastern Al-Andalus, the Maslamids (entierly ATL faction), the Arab settlement is lesser important and more divided. And of course, the better place for the Asturians and the Goths.
3.It was supposed to be a part of an update that would be about all the civil war and the events in Gaul. But it was just too many things for one update. So, the next will be about the 741-755 events in Gaul + the civil war in Al-Andalus up to 755.
1. Again, one update that talk about pratically unchanged events. It is planned to be the last to did it about important events, but i thought that the berber revolt was too important to be just mentionned at one point in the update.
2. Some change notwithstanding : the Fihrids have a better hold on eastern Al-Andalus, the Maslamids (entierly ATL faction), the Arab settlement is lesser important and more divided. And of course, the better place for the Asturians and the Goths.
3.It was supposed to be a part of an update that would be about all the civil war and the events in Gaul. But it was just too many things for one update. So, the next will be about the 741-755 events in Gaul + the civil war in Al-Andalus up to 755.
Again, if someone want to correct it
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the war ravaged the western provinces of the Caliphate, the death of the majordomo of the Frankish Kingdom, Charles Martel, led the Gaul to its own conflicts.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The two elder sons of Charles, Pepin and Carloman received each one a part of the Kingdom, just as if their father was really the king of a realm still without crown. To Pepin was become due the Neustria, the Borgony and the Provence, to Carloman the Austrasia, the Thuringia and the Alemania, and their younger half-brother Griffon nothing but resentment towards his most fortunate siblings.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Each peppinind was in position to threaten the national duchies : Aquitània and Bertanny for Pepin, Frisia and Bavaria for Carloman.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Nevertheless, the death of their main enemy awaken the independence sentiment in the hearth of Odilon of Bavaria and Unalt of Aquitània. Odilon of Bavaria made the first move by marrying against their will their sister, Hiltdruda who have passed trough the Rhine to join him. Unalt made an alliance with him against the peppinid, trying to make their Frankish opponents act under the pretext of freed the Merovingian pretender Hilperic III, since the Frankish Kingdom didn't had a king since the death of Hlothar. This legitimist pretext didn't manage to get the all other nobles join them and the brother of Unalt, Hatton, joined the side of the peppinids; but Griffon joined the side of his brother's foes.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
As the Duke of Aquitaine (opposed of Duke of Gascony as the Frédégaire calls Unalt) was defending the Frankish border against the “Romans”, the peppinids attacked the Bavaria, without any decisive success.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In fact, the legitimist pretext seems to have been more efficient that admitted by the Frankish chronicles and, more surprisingly, by the Aquitains ones. Pepin and Carloman probably have to reaffirm their power in Francia, using more troops that they wanted to secure the country instead of ending the revolt of the national duchies.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In the beginning of 742, Unalt move his army, mainly composed of Vascons cavalrymen to the old capitol of Odon, Bordèu. His brother, having the resources of north Aquitània, but quite unreliable troops stood in his town of Peitieus, hoping for reinforcement of Pepin. But the Alamans revolted themselves and the peppinids focused on this led by their former duke Theudabald, letting Hatton fight his brother.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Unlat was proclaimed Duke of Aquitaine by his troops and many northern Aquitains nobles who rejected the alliance made by Hutton with the Franks. At this time Unalt have conquered half the domain of his brother, letting him only Peitieus and the border with the Franks, minus the Auvernha. But the events in Al-Andalus worried him, and he let garrisons in this place to prevent any surprise attack from a Muslim warlord, Berber or Arab.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In March of 743, once the Alamans defeated, the peppinids decided to fight Odilon, judged a more present threat.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The departure of Frankish troops allowed Unalt to by-pass his brother's possessions and to plunder the southern Neustria as far as Chartres.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As Hutton seemed to be isolated and full of his prestige among the Aquiline nobles, Unalt attacked him near Peitieus hoping to restaure his father's domain. The Vascon cavalry led by the duke had managed to break the Franko-Aquitains of Hatton, but the elder Odonid was killed during the final charge, making his army disbanding.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Unalt's son, Gaifièr was particularly young, but not incompetent. Understanding that his age would open ways to this opponent, he agreed to make a truce with the peppinids who recognized him his possessions between Bordèu and Orlhac at the condition to acknowledge the Frankish suzerainty and his uncle's domain, now reduced to its half.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In fact, the legitimist pretext was became useless, as the peppinids have put Hilperic III on the throne to avoid a rebellion in Neustria during their campaign in Bavaria.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Odilon was eventually defeated and the two peppinids began the reformations that would mark their rule.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Particularly in the religious subject, traditionally let to the bishops even if they were often linked to the great families, where the conciles were followed by “royal” laws and prescriptions against the “bad and unwhorties clerics”.
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]There enter in contradiction the wills of Carloman, more intransigent and influenced by St-Boniface and Anglo-Saxons clerics, considered then as the more loyal to Rome, and Pepin, who wanted to settle a compromise between the restauration of the Church and both the interests of his clientele and to the preservation of the Frankish clerics, who helped him to safe his eastern possessions.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Al-Andalus, the situation became more and more tensed between the fhirids and the Syrians.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Quickly, the first ones searched to make a truce, fearing that their Kalbits allies would leave them being in quasi-war with the followers of Balj. But at the moment where they could make a deal with the Djudham, the family of Thalaba ibn Salama al-Milli, the Kalbits rose and choose the governor as their new leader.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Indeed Abu al-Khattar never dissimulated, since his arrival in the peninsula, his personal preferences to the Kalbites. Moreover, it was his only way to gain the power he wanted as governor, as the Syrians and the Fihrids despised him.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The civil war was growing again, and the Ifriqyian governors were too busy with their inner issues to settle it this time.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Soon, Kairouan was directed by the Fihrids once again, and Abd al-Rahman ibn Habib was more occupied to safe the Maghreb to offer his family an holdout than searching to pacify a troubled province. Furthermore, the disorder could be used later by the Fihrids to promote themselves as the only ones able to unite the Arabs, and gain then all the western Dar-al-Islam.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the Muslims fought themselves, the Christians of Asturias continued to expand their domains, but this time Alfonso, continuing his policy of razzias, attackedd the Bardulia*, from his stronghold of Amaia. Still, he seems to have hard times to keep the southern Galicia from Arabs and he prefers leave the region to preserve his forces.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Gaifièr, seeing his possibilities of development blocked in the north, tried to increase his power south of the Pyrenees, using his prestige to make the Vascons join him, but it remained quite unsuccessful the first times. Again, pretexting “growing troubles in Gascony”, the peppinids attacked him.
But, or by alliance with Gaifièr or by using of the loosing grasp of Frankish power in their lands, the Bavarians and the Frisians revolted themselves once again. And once again, the Franks made a truce with the Aquitains, judged a lesser threat.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The young duke had to renounce to his his title to the profit of his uncle who had to support a great tribute and to accept to let the Frankish monasteries keep the lands that the peppinids gave them. Meanwhile he could keep his lands under the Garona, as long he recognized the sovereignty of his brother.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Some Aquitano-Goths refugees seems to have joined Amairic to flee the perpetual war between Aquitains and Franks. By example, the nobles in charge of Carcassona and Albi during Bera's reign seems to have been linked to Vascon families.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But, Hatton died soon from an eye infection due to a wound, and the franks choose a noble of northern Aquitaine, not linked to the Vascons : Peìre of Nevers. Gaifièr reappeared then, and recover the two thirds of his domain, letting Peìre rule the last one, perhaps to have a more free hand to his transpyrenean policy.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Indeed, his power was recognized in some parts of southern Vasconia, until Pampelona and at least one exchange was made between the duke and Alfonso I.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]However, his suzerainty was not really present and served critically as a possible safety plan in the conflicts that followed the civil war in the peninsula. In this context, the exchange with the Asturians provably was in reality a tribute.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The situation in Hispania was indeed troubled and the outcome was enough unpredictable, making Alfonso searching possible support from the Duke.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]After the Battle of Guadalete (to not confuse with the Battle of Asido), the Kalbits were defeated by a coalition between the Maslamids, the Syrians and the Fihrids. In order to preserve it, a new wali was elected: Yusuf al-Fhiri, but with the power shared between the Maslamids and the Syrians, represented by al-Sumail.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But once again, the tribal and national rivalries led to a new war. Abu al-Khattar was freed, this time by a coalition between Berbers and Kalbits, united by a common hatred of the Syrians.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]At the beginning, wanting to preserve a certain balance between the Berbers, not allies but neutrals and the Syrians, the Maslamids were expelled by al-Sumail from the power and Umar ibn Abd al-Rahman was forced to join the side of Abu al-Khattar. These unending war and change of alliance were remembered by al-Mour as the “Law of the Sword” :[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In 746, Amairic died and Bera was elected king by the nobles of southern Septimania. The northern part of the region reluctantly accepted his rule at best, or refuse simply to recognize him, appealing to the Aquitain duke.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Bera managed nevertheless to took the Barcelonese countryside, safing the coast using the civil war among the Muslims.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Before turning in the north part of his kingdom to put an end to the troubles, he managed to took Tarragona, which only recently recovered from the campaigns of 719. Going up to Ebra, “He united around him the inhabitants of this region and commanded them to join the Bishop Georgius to hold for him his cities”.
He finally ended the rebellion by killing its leader, the count of Magalona.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Meanwhile, Alfonso successfully took the northern Bardulia and began to be once again a threat in the Douro region, whereas the Muslims opponents encounter themselves at the battle of Elvira, won by Yusuf al-Fihri and al-Sumail.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Kaysits and the Maslamids were sent back, when the Kaysits began to reorganize the province.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Berbers even began to left Al-Andalus, in order to join their fellow countrymen in Maghreb.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Finally victorious, the Syrians and the Fihrids have to rebuild a devastated country, when their opponents were defeated but still presents and Alfonso daring advancing as far the Douro, claiming his own.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In 750, Bera even took Osca in order to control the upper Ebra valley, giving the control to the Cassidians.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The death of Peìre in 748 during the finals fights against Odilon gave the opportunity to Gaifièr to recover the last part of Aquitaine. This time, it was his younger brother, Griffon who took for himself the Duchy of Bavaria.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Pepin, only majordomo since Carloman was forced to renounce his power because of his supporters joining Pepin due to his intransigence, relieved Griffon and let Tassilon of Bavaria, his nephew, recover his title.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Carloman was send in Italy, in the monastery of Monte Cassino, where he could still be useful to his brother, in order to improve the link between papacy and Franks.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Griffon accepted his brother's offer to give him the March of Bertanny, a region at the borders of both Bertanny and Aquitaine, used to threaten these lands and give the Franks a sure supplying center. He wanted first join Gaifièr court, but renounced as the Aquitain was isolated by Pepin politically, with his traditional allies defeated and “religiously” as the Church have created privileged ties with the Franks.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Frankish Gaul, Pepin successfully imposed his power, until reaching the point of his clientele began to talk about his election as king at the loss of Hilderic. It's a done thing when, in 749, a query send by Boniface about who should have the power was answered : “It's better to call king the one who have royal power more than the one who don't”.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Influenced by the Anglo-Saxon tradition which want to give the pope a rule on the legitimacy of power, Boniface gave to Pepin the moral ascendent on the Merovingian and was freed of his word toward his liege.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Using the Gothic usage of the consecration of the election by bishops, Pepin was crowned king in 751. By using this rite, inspired by the sacrament of David, issued from the vetero-testamantary tradition of visigothic church; Pepin was probably trying to achieve both the degradation of the Merovingians and the weak claim of the Goths to be issued from religious legitimacy.
Both the sword and the sky have failed to them, but their minds were more focused on the south, where the sword could have changed of side.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Furthermore, this classical interpretation is maybe erroneous. Pepin needed reliable allies in southern Gaul to contain the Aquitains and the eventual Muslims raids after the end of civil war. Using their traditional crowning rite could be a tentative to gain them to the Frankish cause.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]741/743 – 751[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] “The Law of the Sword” - Al-Mour[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] “The Law of the Sword” - Al-Mour[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the war ravaged the western provinces of the Caliphate, the death of the majordomo of the Frankish Kingdom, Charles Martel, led the Gaul to its own conflicts.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The two elder sons of Charles, Pepin and Carloman received each one a part of the Kingdom, just as if their father was really the king of a realm still without crown. To Pepin was become due the Neustria, the Borgony and the Provence, to Carloman the Austrasia, the Thuringia and the Alemania, and their younger half-brother Griffon nothing but resentment towards his most fortunate siblings.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Each peppinind was in position to threaten the national duchies : Aquitània and Bertanny for Pepin, Frisia and Bavaria for Carloman.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Nevertheless, the death of their main enemy awaken the independence sentiment in the hearth of Odilon of Bavaria and Unalt of Aquitània. Odilon of Bavaria made the first move by marrying against their will their sister, Hiltdruda who have passed trough the Rhine to join him. Unalt made an alliance with him against the peppinid, trying to make their Frankish opponents act under the pretext of freed the Merovingian pretender Hilperic III, since the Frankish Kingdom didn't had a king since the death of Hlothar. This legitimist pretext didn't manage to get the all other nobles join them and the brother of Unalt, Hatton, joined the side of the peppinids; but Griffon joined the side of his brother's foes.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]
As the Duke of Aquitaine (opposed of Duke of Gascony as the Frédégaire calls Unalt) was defending the Frankish border against the “Romans”, the peppinids attacked the Bavaria, without any decisive success.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In fact, the legitimist pretext seems to have been more efficient that admitted by the Frankish chronicles and, more surprisingly, by the Aquitains ones. Pepin and Carloman probably have to reaffirm their power in Francia, using more troops that they wanted to secure the country instead of ending the revolt of the national duchies.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In the beginning of 742, Unalt move his army, mainly composed of Vascons cavalrymen to the old capitol of Odon, Bordèu. His brother, having the resources of north Aquitània, but quite unreliable troops stood in his town of Peitieus, hoping for reinforcement of Pepin. But the Alamans revolted themselves and the peppinids focused on this led by their former duke Theudabald, letting Hatton fight his brother.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Unlat was proclaimed Duke of Aquitaine by his troops and many northern Aquitains nobles who rejected the alliance made by Hutton with the Franks. At this time Unalt have conquered half the domain of his brother, letting him only Peitieus and the border with the Franks, minus the Auvernha. But the events in Al-Andalus worried him, and he let garrisons in this place to prevent any surprise attack from a Muslim warlord, Berber or Arab.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In March of 743, once the Alamans defeated, the peppinids decided to fight Odilon, judged a more present threat.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The departure of Frankish troops allowed Unalt to by-pass his brother's possessions and to plunder the southern Neustria as far as Chartres.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As Hutton seemed to be isolated and full of his prestige among the Aquiline nobles, Unalt attacked him near Peitieus hoping to restaure his father's domain. The Vascon cavalry led by the duke had managed to break the Franko-Aquitains of Hatton, but the elder Odonid was killed during the final charge, making his army disbanding.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Unalt's son, Gaifièr was particularly young, but not incompetent. Understanding that his age would open ways to this opponent, he agreed to make a truce with the peppinids who recognized him his possessions between Bordèu and Orlhac at the condition to acknowledge the Frankish suzerainty and his uncle's domain, now reduced to its half.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In fact, the legitimist pretext was became useless, as the peppinids have put Hilperic III on the throne to avoid a rebellion in Neustria during their campaign in Bavaria.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Odilon was eventually defeated and the two peppinids began the reformations that would mark their rule.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Particularly in the religious subject, traditionally let to the bishops even if they were often linked to the great families, where the conciles were followed by “royal” laws and prescriptions against the “bad and unwhorties clerics”.
[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]There enter in contradiction the wills of Carloman, more intransigent and influenced by St-Boniface and Anglo-Saxons clerics, considered then as the more loyal to Rome, and Pepin, who wanted to settle a compromise between the restauration of the Church and both the interests of his clientele and to the preservation of the Frankish clerics, who helped him to safe his eastern possessions.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Al-Andalus, the situation became more and more tensed between the fhirids and the Syrians.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Quickly, the first ones searched to make a truce, fearing that their Kalbits allies would leave them being in quasi-war with the followers of Balj. But at the moment where they could make a deal with the Djudham, the family of Thalaba ibn Salama al-Milli, the Kalbits rose and choose the governor as their new leader.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Indeed Abu al-Khattar never dissimulated, since his arrival in the peninsula, his personal preferences to the Kalbites. Moreover, it was his only way to gain the power he wanted as governor, as the Syrians and the Fihrids despised him.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The civil war was growing again, and the Ifriqyian governors were too busy with their inner issues to settle it this time.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Soon, Kairouan was directed by the Fihrids once again, and Abd al-Rahman ibn Habib was more occupied to safe the Maghreb to offer his family an holdout than searching to pacify a troubled province. Furthermore, the disorder could be used later by the Fihrids to promote themselves as the only ones able to unite the Arabs, and gain then all the western Dar-al-Islam.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As the Muslims fought themselves, the Christians of Asturias continued to expand their domains, but this time Alfonso, continuing his policy of razzias, attackedd the Bardulia*, from his stronghold of Amaia. Still, he seems to have hard times to keep the southern Galicia from Arabs and he prefers leave the region to preserve his forces.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Gaifièr, seeing his possibilities of development blocked in the north, tried to increase his power south of the Pyrenees, using his prestige to make the Vascons join him, but it remained quite unsuccessful the first times. Again, pretexting “growing troubles in Gascony”, the peppinids attacked him.
But, or by alliance with Gaifièr or by using of the loosing grasp of Frankish power in their lands, the Bavarians and the Frisians revolted themselves once again. And once again, the Franks made a truce with the Aquitains, judged a lesser threat.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The young duke had to renounce to his his title to the profit of his uncle who had to support a great tribute and to accept to let the Frankish monasteries keep the lands that the peppinids gave them. Meanwhile he could keep his lands under the Garona, as long he recognized the sovereignty of his brother.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Some Aquitano-Goths refugees seems to have joined Amairic to flee the perpetual war between Aquitains and Franks. By example, the nobles in charge of Carcassona and Albi during Bera's reign seems to have been linked to Vascon families.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But, Hatton died soon from an eye infection due to a wound, and the franks choose a noble of northern Aquitaine, not linked to the Vascons : Peìre of Nevers. Gaifièr reappeared then, and recover the two thirds of his domain, letting Peìre rule the last one, perhaps to have a more free hand to his transpyrenean policy.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Indeed, his power was recognized in some parts of southern Vasconia, until Pampelona and at least one exchange was made between the duke and Alfonso I.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]However, his suzerainty was not really present and served critically as a possible safety plan in the conflicts that followed the civil war in the peninsula. In this context, the exchange with the Asturians provably was in reality a tribute.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The situation in Hispania was indeed troubled and the outcome was enough unpredictable, making Alfonso searching possible support from the Duke.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]After the Battle of Guadalete (to not confuse with the Battle of Asido), the Kalbits were defeated by a coalition between the Maslamids, the Syrians and the Fihrids. In order to preserve it, a new wali was elected: Yusuf al-Fhiri, but with the power shared between the Maslamids and the Syrians, represented by al-Sumail.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]But once again, the tribal and national rivalries led to a new war. Abu al-Khattar was freed, this time by a coalition between Berbers and Kalbits, united by a common hatred of the Syrians.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]At the beginning, wanting to preserve a certain balance between the Berbers, not allies but neutrals and the Syrians, the Maslamids were expelled by al-Sumail from the power and Umar ibn Abd al-Rahman was forced to join the side of Abu al-Khattar. These unending war and change of alliance were remembered by al-Mour as the “Law of the Sword” :[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] “[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Whoever could bring with him a thousand of men became more a friend than the neighbor or even the brother. Whoever have gain a battle became a prince more than the one who tried to bring peace. The Law of the Sword became more important to the Muslims than the Law of Allah who punished them with the same number of punishments than swords in Al-Andalus[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]”[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Syrians nevertheless managed to unite their forces whereas their opponents knew the dissensions about the future of Al-Andalus.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In 746, Amairic died and Bera was elected king by the nobles of southern Septimania. The northern part of the region reluctantly accepted his rule at best, or refuse simply to recognize him, appealing to the Aquitain duke.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Bera managed nevertheless to took the Barcelonese countryside, safing the coast using the civil war among the Muslims.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Before turning in the north part of his kingdom to put an end to the troubles, he managed to took Tarragona, which only recently recovered from the campaigns of 719. Going up to Ebra, “He united around him the inhabitants of this region and commanded them to join the Bishop Georgius to hold for him his cities”.
He finally ended the rebellion by killing its leader, the count of Magalona.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Meanwhile, Alfonso successfully took the northern Bardulia and began to be once again a threat in the Douro region, whereas the Muslims opponents encounter themselves at the battle of Elvira, won by Yusuf al-Fihri and al-Sumail.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Kaysits and the Maslamids were sent back, when the Kaysits began to reorganize the province.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The Berbers even began to left Al-Andalus, in order to join their fellow countrymen in Maghreb.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Finally victorious, the Syrians and the Fihrids have to rebuild a devastated country, when their opponents were defeated but still presents and Alfonso daring advancing as far the Douro, claiming his own.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In 750, Bera even took Osca in order to control the upper Ebra valley, giving the control to the Cassidians.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]The death of Peìre in 748 during the finals fights against Odilon gave the opportunity to Gaifièr to recover the last part of Aquitaine. This time, it was his younger brother, Griffon who took for himself the Duchy of Bavaria.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Pepin, only majordomo since Carloman was forced to renounce his power because of his supporters joining Pepin due to his intransigence, relieved Griffon and let Tassilon of Bavaria, his nephew, recover his title.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Carloman was send in Italy, in the monastery of Monte Cassino, where he could still be useful to his brother, in order to improve the link between papacy and Franks.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Griffon accepted his brother's offer to give him the March of Bertanny, a region at the borders of both Bertanny and Aquitaine, used to threaten these lands and give the Franks a sure supplying center. He wanted first join Gaifièr court, but renounced as the Aquitain was isolated by Pepin politically, with his traditional allies defeated and “religiously” as the Church have created privileged ties with the Franks.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]In Frankish Gaul, Pepin successfully imposed his power, until reaching the point of his clientele began to talk about his election as king at the loss of Hilderic. It's a done thing when, in 749, a query send by Boniface about who should have the power was answered : “It's better to call king the one who have royal power more than the one who don't”.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Influenced by the Anglo-Saxon tradition which want to give the pope a rule on the legitimacy of power, Boniface gave to Pepin the moral ascendent on the Merovingian and was freed of his word toward his liege.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Using the Gothic usage of the consecration of the election by bishops, Pepin was crowned king in 751. By using this rite, inspired by the sacrament of David, issued from the vetero-testamantary tradition of visigothic church; Pepin was probably trying to achieve both the degradation of the Merovingians and the weak claim of the Goths to be issued from religious legitimacy.
Both the sword and the sky have failed to them, but their minds were more focused on the south, where the sword could have changed of side.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Furthermore, this classical interpretation is maybe erroneous. Pepin needed reliable allies in southern Gaul to contain the Aquitains and the eventual Muslims raids after the end of civil war. Using their traditional crowning rite could be a tentative to gain them to the Frankish cause.[/FONT]
Well, it depends.
Seriously, the map of post-carolingian Europe is going to radically change, with the same dynamics axes, but with different political combinaison of thems.
___
NOTA : Bera took Urgell, and not Huesca/Osca. Sorry, it was from an early draft.
So, you will take account of the butterfly effect.
I guess that Pépin and Griffon are different from OTL ITTL.
I guess that Pépin and Griffon are different from OTL ITTL.
Not Pepin, the butterfly effect don't affect that quickly and that deeply.
Griffon, on the other hand. OTL he have joined Waifier/Gaifièr court, but as Aquitània is more isolated from OTL (by exemple, as Unalt is dead, he couldn't make an embassy with the Lombards), Griffon decided to accept his brother's offer to took the March of Bertanny (ATL Britanny)
Great updates, it's very interesting to focus on the Franks and the differences from OTL. I really have to do more reading on this time period though, I regret to say that my detailed knowledge of France really begins in 987. (And by this I mean I've only read books that focus of 987-after.)
Scipio
Yes, the Carolingian Empire and this time period is such a crucial point that set up the political foundations for europe until, well, now. Any changes will be huge, especially in terms of how many of Charlemagne's sons survive. I for one would love to see a kingdom centered on the Frankish heartlands of Neustria and Austrasia, I think it would be very interesting to see how that kingdoms develops.LSCatilina said:
Scipio
To resume, the main differences between pre and carolingian periods and the post one, were :
-The nobility didn't hold a title as a personal and familial possession. Technically, the king (who had to renounce to all his other titles to be crowned) had the power to took back the land and to give it to another.
Except that 1)He didn't have always the power to did so, 2) and even when he had, the former owner or his heirs wanted to have it back.
It cause many wars between 1)The first ones, 2)The king, 3)The new owner that been etc.
The nobility isn't so that based on a land but on familial and "friendship" ties, called a "clientele".
Furthermore, the religious titles, both secular and monastic, were taken by the nobility. In Ireland, yet in the case of Irish Christianity which is...well, singular, we even see monasteries fighting each other, being at one side of two belligerents.
-We don't have A Church, but many national Churches, that all recognize the more or less nominal superiority of the Pope that is more focused on the byzantine and italian business to do something about it.
-The economic is less controlled by the king, whom the money-making is more a symbolical power and a war to give tribute or gifts to his lieges. Due to non usual money (not silver coins by exemple), Barter is far more used.
-Even more as the "classical" Middle-Ages, Europe is a rural zone. Except in Italy (with maybe 30-35% of the population living in towns), we have nearly 90% of the population living in countryside, with greater proportions when you go North.
Okay, this is a little in "preview" of the "end" of Part I (710-762).
In 762, the population of the peninsula was around 3 500 000, maybe 3 750 000. In comparison of the other western countries as Gaul, who was populated with 8 500 000 inhabitants being the largest population of Western Europe, the Hispanic peninsula seems to be less inhabited than his potential prosperity would allow it.
Since the Roman times, the province didn't stop to loose population, in a faster rhythm than the neighbouring regions, due the permanent civil war and the climatic changes, important in the prosperous but dry soil.
After the Muslim conquest, the civil war and the fall of al-Sumail, the Hispano-Roman population, merging old Iberic, Celtic, Roman and Visigothic population, represented the main part of the demography. With approximatively 2 800 000, they composed 80% of the peninsular population.
But the territory was unequalled settled. Due to the invasion and the subsequent civil war, around 600 000 refugees flee to the Gothic successors states, in Asturias and Gothia.
In Gothia, they settled the northern part of the kingdom, in Septimania. There the 250 000 "Hispanicas" left little by little their uses and their language, not that different than the locals'. In the same time the Tarraconesa (or, as known since the X, the "Castelha") was too mountainous and too exposed to the Muslims raids to be as attractive. The coastal and mountainous cities and settlemend avoided a complete depopulation by the actions of Gothians kings, as Bera, who forced the population of Ebra's valley (at least in the areas they managed to raid and reach) to settle these regions, making cities as Tarragona loose their population and their political or religious role.
The population of the kingdom is estimed between 400 000 and 600 000 people, mainly in the northern province and more prosperous Septimania, who was, even before the invasion, a region of high population due to his old settlement and his high producing of cereals.
The Asturias were first far less inhabited. This mountainous zone was traditionally the refuge of older populations chased by the newcomers and the romanisation of Hispano-"Romans" was far less deep than in Gothia.
Nevertheless, the conquest of Galicia, a quite rich region in comparaison of Asturias and the arrival of 200 000 refugees from South gave to the first asturians kings a more important population and task force, both for production and military purposes.
But it led to a relative surpopulation and, thanks to the civil war, the king Alfonso having took the other side of Cantabrian Mountains, it allowed to a part of this people plus to the new refugees, maybe 100 000, to settle the Leonese and the Bardulia, both safing the hold of Asturians in these zone against a fragile Berber colonisation and preserving the singular face of Asturo-Cantabrian population, still quite different today than the other parts of the peninsula.
At the end, the population of the Kingdom of Asturias could be guesstimed around 400 000 people.
The emirate had both the major part of the peninsula and his main population, around 2 750 000 with the Hispano-Roman population having here too the major part.
The Muslims population didn't exceed 80 000 people, mainly composed by Berbers who came in the peninsula with entire part of maghrebian clans, with women and children.
The Arab population, mainly caming from officers at first, then from court or administration needs with some part of clans, reached 25 000 men, caming from the migrations following the conquest made critically by Berbers. If the Kalbit formed the first arrival of Arabs, they're followed and eventually equalled by the Kaysit population from the Maslamids, Syro-Egyptians djunds, and Ifryqian troops.
After the Arabs, we have others, even smallers populations in the country, as the Jews, who formed at best 15 000 people, a number that their political role didn't deserved.
In the medieval Hispania, maybe more than elsewhere at this time, the demographic importance, if it was one of the base of political power could use, didn't define it. In despite of their numbers and their division the Arabs had a great role in the history of Al-Andalus, whereas the Hispano-Roman population was surprisingly passive for two centuries.
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Thanks for the demography update! I knew some of it, but I don't have more detailed estimates until the later Al-Andalus period. I appreciate it greatly.
I'm not sure you are describing the situation that will be in your TL, OTL, or both. I know that there were degrees of less passivity. For instance, significant preaching against Christians adopting the ways of Arabs (Mozarabation) by around the turn of the century (800) and Hakam I deposing or killing a number of his Christian officials let alone the later Martyrs of Córdoba.