Roman retake Carthage

Hello everyone I am a new member and this is my first post so please don't be too hard on me.

In 460 Carthage and the coast of North Africa had been under Vandal control for quite some time and this had dramatically bad affects on the empire with the loss of grain.

The eastern and western empires built a huge fleet to retake it. The invasion ended in disaster and fiasco with the Roman ships burning and the treachery of certain senators.

What if the Roman's had retaken one of their most crucial provinces and crushed the Vandals in North Africa?
 
It's too late to save the Western Roman Empire, sorry.
Didn't one emperor Majorian was it have some plan to reconquer Carthage and then replicate the conquests of the Roman Empire centuries prior? Taking Iberia, Gaul, Britain etc... Basically redoing the expansion as it were? Or am I misunderstanding?
 
The problem is that 407-410 the Western Roman Empire lost a lot of prestige and legitimacy among its own people. They also ran out of funds around this time.
 
Hello everyone I am a new member and this is my first post so please don't be too hard on me.
Welcome on board! I hope you'll enjoy it as much as we do.

In 460 Carthage and the coast of North Africa had been under Vandal control for quite some time and this had dramatically bad affects on the empire with the loss of grain.
More than the problem of grain (which was quite real after the mid-450's (it seems that Vandal had maintained the annonarian supply up to Valentinian III's death) it was the problem of fiscal revenues that were entierly captated by Vandals, whom relation with Rome was far more independent (if not hostile) compared to other Barbarians.

The eastern and western empires built a huge fleet to retake it. The invasion ended in disaster and fiasco with the Roman ships burning and the treachery of certain senators.
Treachery is a common trope of Roman defeats in the Vth century tough, and how they were commonly explained even in face of evidence sometimes.

What if the Roman's had retaken one of their most crucial provinces and crushed the Vandals in North Africa?
As Majorian took the (shared) lead of the WRE, things already went too far : he skillfully managed to play Barbarians against other Barbarians (as Aetius did in his time, which probably inspired Majorian) by forcing them into obedience but never crushing them as he depended from their military resources : in short, it was an expedient.
Even Roman troops were importantly Barbarized, Ricimer already having too much control on imperium to really accept a too powerful and too monarchical emperor, especially if he was more and more dependent from Constantinople : in the mid to late Vth century, WRE couldn't really stand on its own and was either to search ressources among Barbarians or in the eastern Roman state.

Don't get me wrong, a reconquest of Carthage could lead late WRE to survive longer than IOTL, but with ressources already depleted, but would wear it eventually and make it unable to undergo important reforms (as Majorian's demise points), either turning it into a patrician Italy acknowledged by Constantinople, either being swalloed up by eastern emperors that tought themselves being the only legit supreme authority (even during Majorian's reign).

We know Romans already, at this point, managed to take back some points, especially places where Vandalic power wasn't that certain, such as Tripolitania, so let's assume they continue their advance. Eventually, Vandals would be forced to negociate at sword-point, as the coalition couldn't be maintained eternally, and give up several territories and assets.

I think that the first to go would be territories losts or cut off from Vandals : Tripolitania, Corsica, Sardinia, Balearic Islands and Sicily. You certainly noticed that didn't mentioned Africa : well the goal of the expedition was to curb down Vandalic thalassocracy that allowed them to raid everything in sight, rather than reconquer Africa.
Eventually, giving the poor state of WRE at this point (if Majorian couldn't hope to hold Africa, Athemius sure couldn't), it means that these regions would be de facto under control of Constantinople, making the ERE having a more western foothold in the west in the coming decades, a bit like Dalmatia was in the same period.

Assuming Romans and their auxiliaries takes back Carthage and the "Vandalic sors", the lands in Proconcular Africa that Genseric directly took over (the rest of Africa being still under its direct authority but with fewer changes), you'd still have Vandals in the regions, probably pushed back in their short-lived foedus in Numidia : again, WRE depended on the presence of Barbarians in military matters. IOTL it only gave some time to WRE to die in its corner. It would ask, as pointed, a slightly different strategy that wouldn't be based on the acceptance of the loss of Africa, which predominated in the mid-Vth century tough, and more subsides from ERE.

It would have interesting consequences having central Romania being swalloed up by its eastern counterpart, tough : when Africa was reconquered by Byzzies in 535, and altough the Vandalic defeat was swift, Byzantines had a really bad view of Roman Africa's history at this point, mostly ignoring the relationship between Mauri and Africans that existed at least since the IInd century, causing a costly and not that stellar (for Romans) guerilla.
They, mostly wrongly, saw these kingdoms and tribal entities as invaders (mostly helped by the threat they represented as for what mattered the coastal population) rather than parts of the old system and actively searched to crush them ; the whole campaigns of Solomon is to be understood as a tentative to gain African to Byzantium and to get rid of what was seen as a foreign presence.

ERE having a better approximation of the local geopolitics would really help preventing the mistakes made in Africa, which led to decade of semi-guerilla warfare (and decades of neglects from the late VIth onwards) after having defeated Vandals, with (for exemple) allowing policies similar to Toglita's being adopted early on (and with more success).

But it would be an ERE reunifing most of Romania, rather than a surviving WRE being absorbated after a longer period of weariness.
 
It would give another place to make a Soissons-like state, but they would be lucky to take back and hold Africa Proconsularis. They'd probably just end up yet another Romano-Berber state, although with a much better pedigree than, say, Altava. The best you'd get is "actual" Romans (descended from Majorian's Empire or whoever he appoints to rule the area?) ruling over Romanized Berbers (most people in North Africa to some degree or another) who can claim to be legitimate heirs of the Roman Empire.
 
It would give another place to make a Soissons-like state
Which probably didn't existed, tough.

See, the whole idea of a Gallo-Roman entity stretching from Brittany to Rhine in opposition to Franks comes from the XIXth century, when historical carthography apparead, and when there was a "gap" of knowledge of Northern Gaul.
What do we have, in ancient sources, about Syagrius? Grégoire of Tours, which mentions him twice.

Ægidius died, letting a son named Syagrius
[...]
In the fifth year of his reign, Syagrius, king of Romans and son of Aegidius, was in the city of Soissons, whom Aegidius took once

And that's it : anything more is either interpretation at best, wild speculation at worst.
Before the fall of the Roman state, you had something of a Gallo-Roman continuum/Condominium which was based on the relation between Romans and Frankish federates, but as well Britto-Roman reinforcements and the lot of settled Barbarians in northern Gaul (Saxons, Alans, etc. at the noticable exception of Alamans).
It more or less disappeared after the Battle of Déols, which weakened everyone : Childeric power wasn't that assured, and Syagrius own rule was probably limited to a Noyon/Senlis/Soisson region whom it's not sure how much you hadn't a Frankish presence before.

The idea of a Roman state spawning from Channel to Meuse (instead of a varied, desunited ensemble of Gallo-Romans landowners and their own bucellarii or auxiliaries (probably not that distinguishable from what Clovis led) was essentially a way to "fill the gap" on the maps : as nothing was mentioned directly in the region, it meant for XIXth national historians that Syagrius ruled over the whole territory even in face of evidence (such as a sequential conquest of Northern Gaul by CLovis)
On this regard, Syagrius was hardly unique, when it comes to remnant of provincial power : you have Vicentius in Taracconensis; Apollinaris Sidonius and Ecdicius in Auvergne; Victorius, Desiderius and Namatius* in Aquitaine, Syagrius and Avitus in Provence, Arbogast in Germania, etc.
These men were invested (or, more often than not, invested themselves) in the late Empire with administrative (militia) roles would it be military (Vicentius was probably trusted the military charge of Taraconnensis by Majorian) or civil (which was generally translated by an episcopalian position, but not always) and eventually joined up Barbarians, as part of their kingoms' militiae, as the fall of the Roman state in West only let Barbarian imperium as a legitim authority coming from imperial institutions.

*Namatius was possibly related to two others Namatiu one bing bishop of Orléans, and the other bishop of Vienna, both in the VIth century.


This situation wouldn't be easily replicable in Africa after Genseric's conquests, as he took great care to decapitate (sometimes litterally) the Roman elites, especially in Proconsular Africa where not only functions but lands were taken over by Barbarians, with the traditionally Roman episcopalian function being strictly forbidden to Roman (altough it was in the rest of the kingdom, if under watch).

A Romano-Berber kingdom, akin to what existed in matter of relations and fusion of populations in Gaul, or Spain (or even Britain) is doable, but more after the 484 and without a Byzantine conquest.

although with a much better pedigree than, say, Altava.
How exactly Altava isn't a (rump) Romano-Berber state? I'd point, if you're interest, to the above linked study on Late Roman, Vandalic and Byzantine relations with Berbers : while limited, you really had the possibility of a large Romano-Berber ensemble (more or less unified, altough possibly confederal in a first time) which was aborted by Justinian. But even there, you had the maintain of confederal frames among "Inner Mauri" and "Outer Mauri" which explains (partially) the Berber resistence to Arab conquests.
Of course, with an ethnicized view of history, Berbers couldn't be Romans (conveniently forgotting that Romano-Berbers formed a strong base of African society, if mistrusted) : we agree, I think, that their distinction with Africani was, as it happened between Franks and Romans, a matter of political-civic identity before any cultural difference (anyone able to spot a big cultural difference between "Inner" and "Outer" Mauri?)
 
I think we can have a local North African state (based in Carthage) which is either is ruled by local Romans and not so much Berbers/Mauri/locals. Although they would have to rely on the Berbers, remnant Vandals, etc. for their power. Maybe even it could be a powerbase for a usurper, and the last decade or so or Western Rome is definitely a good place for usurpers.

Regarding Altava, I think it would be less conventially Roman than a state in Carthage would be. Especially if you have a leader there claiming to be Roman Emperor which makes the authorities in Rome, Ravenna, Constantinople, etc. wary.
 
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