Early Crusades

Quote:
Originally Posted by Midgard
There was sufficient talk about a Crusade around 830s or so in OTL, after the Muslims inflicted a major defeat on Emperor Theophilus. Of course, we know that it came to nothing, and that the Empire managed to not only recover, but also to fight back with some success, but technically, a Crusade two and a half centuries earlier could have been plausible, even if its ultimate success would have been in doubt.

So have Theophilus be killed in one of the many battles he fought against the Arab Caliphate in Anatolia? With his death a time of chaos (ala post-Manzikert) occurs, and the Empire loses central Anatolia to the advancing Arabs.

The Eastern Empire sends urgent pleas for aid to the West, where feuding Carolingian princes are busily destroying Charlemagne's Empire. So lets say that the timeline is exactly post-Manzikert, and the West finally decides to send a major crusade in about 860.

The Crusade is an attempt to staunch the blood that three decades of near-constant warfare have released. Various Carolingian princes set off to fight in the East, and the exit of these princes from the scene eases the violence in the West.

I don't know if people think this is all that plausible, but I would think that under these conditions the Franks might actually fight as allies of the Emperor, rather than as a totally independent force (ala OTL Crusaders). I don't know if the Arabs would have been able to settle into Anatolia as the Turks did OTL, so its possible that central Anatolia is open for settlement. Even if it isn't and the Franks just march into the Holy Land, there was a breakdown of central authority at this time in the Middle East as the Abbasids began to decline, just as there was a similar breakdown of authority OTL as the Seljuk Turks fell apart.

So how does a Frankish Syria, 200 years early sound?
 
Weak and not supported, as the Tulunids, Ikhshidids, Qarmatids, or Fatimids come and annex it on their great expansions?

Since this is my scenario I'll be a bit more specific in what I'm imaging. The situation in ATL, though it may bear a superficial resemblance to the situation that occured OTL post-Manzikert, has several important differences.

The first is that it is not possible for the Franks to travel overland to get to the Byzantine Empire. The area that would become Hungary had been ruled by the Avar Khaganate, but Charlemagne had broken their power and the Magyars would not arrive for another 30 years. It isn't feasible to march an army through the area, because that would constitute another military campaign in and off itself.

Thus the Franks are going to rely on a fleet to ferry them from Italy to Anatolia. This fleet is probably going to be Byzantine. If there is going to be this level of cooperation between Byzantine and the Franks, it will probably require a greater level of diplomatic back and forth than OTL Crusades. The Frankish Emperor is basically taking advantage of a lull in the fighting to send some of the losing princes off to fight infidels at the ends of the earth. He is aided in this by a Pope who doesn't want his Frankish protectors shedding each others blood while the Eastern Empire slips into defeat.

The added reliance on the Byzantines (because of the fleet) and the greater level of cooperation is probably going to end up meaning that the Franks are much more subject to the dictates of the Byzantines then they were OTL. The goals are also much different. Rather than saving the Holy Land the mission is one of aiding fellow Christians. The idea of aiding the Byzantines is going to be massively helped by the fact that the Franks and Romanoi don't consider each other heretics yet. The Eastern and Western Churches had not yet irrevocably split, and thus the Eastern Empire is not viewed as a the nest of heretical Greeks that OTL Crusaders saw the Byzantines as.

So these Franks end up serving as units in the Byzantine Army. They are certainly special units, whose commanders take orders directly from the Emperor, but they are nonetheless part of the Byzantine command hierarchy. With the loss of central Anatolia I'm imagining the Franks as basically taking the place of the Byzantine heavy calvary. In this TL, though the Empire was badly defeated and then rocked by bloody civil war, the Arabs did not settle central Anatolia as the Turks did, so the Byzantines, with Frankish aid, are able to drive back into Anatolia and capture their pre-Theophilus borders. The Frankish units end up being settled in central Anatolia, where they constitute a military elite. The units formed at the beginning of the Frankish involvement in the Byzantine Empire end up as father-to-son affairs, and the unique arrangement with the Emperors continues. The Franks' penchant for fortification of their seats creates a line of fortifications in the east that will well serve the Empire when the next wave of horse nomads arrive on their Eastern Marches.

With these special Frankish units and the promise of rich rewards, the flow east of war-ready young men in search of glory continues. With the coming of the Norse and Magyars the flow ceases. Maybe the intervention is enough to perhaps maintain the idea of a single Frankish political entity, that is, the concept of the 'Roman Empire' includes France, Germany and Italy?
 
I don't really see why the Franks, bend on destroying their own Empire should rush to save another. :D

But as the Franks folly around the Middle East the Vikings have a BIG TIME.
Or rather with OTL in mind it'll be VIKING BUKKAKE in Western Europe. :D:D:D
 
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