The New World of the White Huns
- Thread starter Practical Lobster
- Start date
Haha probably. Although it doesn't help that China's now ruled by a succession of foreign dynasties and had two of their more famous inventions "stolen" by India in this timeline.
Anyhow, next post will be detailing *Australia, for all those interested. Expect to see a paucity of kangaroos and surplus of sea cucumbers. We're also going to meet the Maori!
Anyhow, next post will be detailing *Australia, for all those interested. Expect to see a paucity of kangaroos and surplus of sea cucumbers. We're also going to meet the Maori!
The Wash of the Procellaric
The Procellaric Ocean and Greater Oceania
Early European voyages around Watya Cape were broadly speaking, disastrous. The early vessels of European exploration could just about make it all the way south to the very tip of Africa, although doing so involved a level of bravery and planning comparable to those who wished to cross the Atlantic. In the early days, friendly kingdoms and waystations had not yet been established along the coast. Chance encounters with locals could spell disaster.
It was worth it, however, to reach Watya, a land of strange and exotic spices where precious stones were (supposedly) as cheap as dirt. However, the Randryan prohibited European vessels from carrying on beyond the cape. Much as Tangrasirabh had a monopoly on trade to Watya, Watya sought to establish themselves as a middleman for the pale-faced Ispanan traders.
If the Ispanians wanted to circumvent this trade system, they would have to work with a group of smuggling cartels traditionally known as the Seven Cliques. However, the Cliques themselves were not terribly interested in anything beyond bypassing the customs taxes which kept Tangrasirabh afloat, and with the language barrier such as it was, the Ispanians struggled to make deals or even find the Cliques, open secret that they might have been to a local or a native. Furthermore, without local knowledge and charts, even attempting to navigate the Cape was extraordinarily dangerous for these early European ships. Several attempts were lost, and several more were caught in the act and had their cargos seized.
It was thus no surprise that as European adventurers explored down the southern coast of Solvia, they began to realize that perhaps there was an alternate way to the Indies – if Solvia could be circumvented, perhaps they could find India. Surely the mystical land of spices and wealth was not so far away once you bypassed the Solvian continent?
None of those early mariners who tried ever returned. The “Ocean of Lost Sailors” or the “Ocean of Storms” (Oceanus Procellarum) claimed them all. Thus for Europeans the name Procellaric Ocean would endure even after many explorers found that the ocean itself was in many places peaceful and calm.
The southern continent was far larger than anyone could have imagined. Explorers like the Sri Lankan Prashant Alakeshwar assumed that they would only find islands of varying sizes -- a continued archipelago not unlike what they came from. They treated Javanese tales of the great desert land to the south as rumors and superstition. Even if the Javanese had made sparse contact with forested capes to the south, it seemed unlikely that there were any great landmasses so far from the center of their world. When these South Indian and Sinhalese naysayers were proved wrong, they almost immediately began fabricating tales of great kingdoms with legendary wealth and new, never-before tasted spices and strange, never-before seen birds and beasts.
They were half right.
The Sanskrit names “Daksinakhand” or “Yolnadvipa” came into common use among the educated, although the sailors often just called it “Pula” or Island – a way of making the strange and unfamiliar world beyond seem small and quaint. To treat the southern continent like any other island was to make it safe. And the Southern continent was not safe.
The natives of Daksinakhand were primitive by the standards of the world that discovered them. Their tendency towards outsiders was, broadly speaking, suspicion and violence, suspicion aggravated by the lack of a mutual language. They were not overly impressed by the northerners who came, not at first. The Yolgnu in particular were a practical people. They had no desire for useless trinkets, but rather iron tools, cloth, alcohol, and other such gifts. In return they traded what little they had – food, particularly sea cucumbers, and sex for practical implements such as the Javanese were willing to part with.
In general the expeditions to Daksinakhand found little of value. Unlike the Europeans, the Javanese and Indian explorers sought cities and populated regions with which to do business. There was no missionary of Votivist zeal to animate them, and unlike the Europeans and Africans, they never did find any urban centers, at least none close enough to the coast as to be useful. Generally, they found a barren and unsafe continent with little to recommend it to the outside world.
However, the Malay would return to the north in great numbers. Sea cucumbers were delicacy in China and some parts of the archipelago. By trading with the Yolgnu, they were able to acquire vast quantities of the delicacy for outrageously little cost. The Yolgnu had little comprehension of how easy it was to manufacture an iron-tipped weapon or cloth, and accordingly would work for a pittance wage in kind, harvesting and drying their ocean’s bounty for the Malay, who in time established trading posts directly in Yolgnu territory.
It was in this way that agriculture was introduced to the Yolgnu. Although the agricultural package of the Malay isles was not exactly compatible, it was sufficient to augment their diets and allowed an increased level of health and consequent population growth.
The rest of the “Island” was explored in piecemeal voyages over the course of the next two decades. Prashant was the instigator of most of these voyages. His trading company, the Nanadesi, was convinced that they simply had to explore in greater depth to find the mythic southern kingdoms of the continent, and they pursued this goal to ultimate financial ruin. However, they were instrumental in mapping the coastline of the southern continent and identifying safe harbors and major inland rivers and terrain features. They made contact with countless native groups, and although they broadly struggled to have peaceful interactions with them, one group, who called themselves the Gunditjmara, who according to Prashant dwelled in stone houses and had a sophisticated system of aquaculture revolving around eels. Digging channels, they were able to expand the wetlands that were their primary source of food and in another world perhaps they might have developed primitive agriculture of their own accord. In hard times and times of drought, they subsisted on tuberous roots which they cultivated with artificial fires. The wild yam fields of the continent were not truly domesticated however – and without this critical leap there was no great civilization on the Island, much to the disappointment of Prashant and his fellows.
Other explorations were equally frought with disappointment. The unfavorable winds off the coasts of Daksinakhand were perilous at the best of times, and it was only Prashant’s crew’s skilled sailors and navigators that kept their dhangis from dangers and being thrown off course. A Javanese guild expedition was less lucky. Strong winds from the north meant that a group of three ships were forced to go East into empty ocean. Though they thought themselves doomed, ultimately the group, led by the explorer Sudirmana, came into contact with what they called the “Deep Clouded Isle” in 1265. It was an empty island to their eyes. The first tentative arrivals of Polynesian settlers went unnoticed by them. The people who would come to call themselves the Tengata Whenua were then very few in number – surviving by hunting the enormous birds that roamed the land.
Sudirmana and his men marveled for finding a virgin land, unknown by humans in its entirety. A learned man, a guru, was among their number, and he drew sketches of the strange birds and wildlife of the island. The men would kill many of these birds, and hew trees for lumber. Then they would depart, and the tales of the clouded island they found would become exaggerated and strange with time and retelling.
The Tangata population would grow rapidly. Several other waves of Polynesian colonizers arrived by 1300, and with abundant food supplies, even the relatively short and brutal lifespans of these early settlers did not keep birth rates low. In time, clans began splintering and the new settlers spread across the hills and mountains of their new homeland, everywhere they went hunting the huge birds of the island and making huge mounds of their bones.
Later voyages would find a very different island.
These extreme voyages are perhaps notable for their scope and grandeur – there is something romantic in pushing the envelope of human knowledge, of discovering huge new continents and meeting civilizations who had lost contact with the broader human race beyond. However, while Prashanti and his contemporaries were circumnavigating Daksinakhand, the empires of Indonesia were also engaged in a much more immediate sort of colonization.
The Maluku islands and increasingly the whole of Melanesia played host to trading posts of the rival Malay powers. Isyana, Srivijaya, and the Silendra competed over the valuable Maluku islands, trying to gain monopolies on the production of spices such as cloves and nutmeg. The value of these islands had long been known, but under Srivijayan hegemony, trade had been largely peaceful. The native peoples had been slowly converting to the Hindu-Buddhism of their Javanese neighbors, and gradually adopting the styles and language of the Malay to the west. However, now outright imperialism was the order of the day – no power could afford to let any other power become wealthier or gain more productive territory than any other, lest a new hegemony be established.
The trade wars of the early twelfth century were a zero sum game for those involved, and accordingly the indigenous populations suffered immensely, declining in numbers quite significantly and being replaced with a combination of migrants and slaves taken from other nearby islands. Fortresses and fleets were used to contest the islands, and trading posts became armed camps overseeing spice plantations. The large island of Wanin came to have fortified trading posts as well – its forests were utilized for timber during the naval arms race, and the Silendra in particular were fond of establishing bases wherever they could.
The trade wars, if anything, only increased demand for spices. More cultivated terrain meant simply more availability, which opened the envelope of those, particularly in places such as China and India, who could afford to purchase spices and in turn demand only rose. Attempts to open up Wanin to cultivation by the Silendra were met with resistance by the warlike Korowai and other tribes who raided any outlying Silendra frontier settlements.
Discovery of the broader Procellaric Ocean would have to wait. There were few commercial interests to explore beyond Melanesia and Daksinakhand. The Malay agricultural package was poorly suited for any climate beyond their tropical zone, and accordingly settlement was an uncertain prospect going forwards. With each ambitious voyage out to sea, it became increasingly obvious that the peoples of the utter eastern ocean were violent and had little to entice colonial ventures. Their islands became small and volcanic, their remarkable double-hulled vessels a not insignificant threat to incautious explorers. Even storms and a lack of knowledge of the region could prove fatal – archeological and genetic evidence seems to hint that Polynesia did have contact with the broader “Old World” but that said contact was essentially one-way – rare, and primarily conducted by people who were lost and stranded rather than ambitious adventurers.
The Procellaric demanded of would-be explorers a level of technology, desire, and expertise that was simply not available at the time. For those who threw caution to the wind and explored anyhow, it swallowed them whole.
[I considered commenting on one of the Tamil voyages bringing back a Kangaroo to the court of the Isyana Maharaja, where it would compete in wrestling tournaments, but I decided that was too absurd.]
Early European voyages around Watya Cape were broadly speaking, disastrous. The early vessels of European exploration could just about make it all the way south to the very tip of Africa, although doing so involved a level of bravery and planning comparable to those who wished to cross the Atlantic. In the early days, friendly kingdoms and waystations had not yet been established along the coast. Chance encounters with locals could spell disaster.
It was worth it, however, to reach Watya, a land of strange and exotic spices where precious stones were (supposedly) as cheap as dirt. However, the Randryan prohibited European vessels from carrying on beyond the cape. Much as Tangrasirabh had a monopoly on trade to Watya, Watya sought to establish themselves as a middleman for the pale-faced Ispanan traders.
If the Ispanians wanted to circumvent this trade system, they would have to work with a group of smuggling cartels traditionally known as the Seven Cliques. However, the Cliques themselves were not terribly interested in anything beyond bypassing the customs taxes which kept Tangrasirabh afloat, and with the language barrier such as it was, the Ispanians struggled to make deals or even find the Cliques, open secret that they might have been to a local or a native. Furthermore, without local knowledge and charts, even attempting to navigate the Cape was extraordinarily dangerous for these early European ships. Several attempts were lost, and several more were caught in the act and had their cargos seized.
It was thus no surprise that as European adventurers explored down the southern coast of Solvia, they began to realize that perhaps there was an alternate way to the Indies – if Solvia could be circumvented, perhaps they could find India. Surely the mystical land of spices and wealth was not so far away once you bypassed the Solvian continent?
None of those early mariners who tried ever returned. The “Ocean of Lost Sailors” or the “Ocean of Storms” (Oceanus Procellarum) claimed them all. Thus for Europeans the name Procellaric Ocean would endure even after many explorers found that the ocean itself was in many places peaceful and calm.
The southern continent was far larger than anyone could have imagined. Explorers like the Sri Lankan Prashant Alakeshwar assumed that they would only find islands of varying sizes -- a continued archipelago not unlike what they came from. They treated Javanese tales of the great desert land to the south as rumors and superstition. Even if the Javanese had made sparse contact with forested capes to the south, it seemed unlikely that there were any great landmasses so far from the center of their world. When these South Indian and Sinhalese naysayers were proved wrong, they almost immediately began fabricating tales of great kingdoms with legendary wealth and new, never-before tasted spices and strange, never-before seen birds and beasts.
They were half right.
The Sanskrit names “Daksinakhand” or “Yolnadvipa” came into common use among the educated, although the sailors often just called it “Pula” or Island – a way of making the strange and unfamiliar world beyond seem small and quaint. To treat the southern continent like any other island was to make it safe. And the Southern continent was not safe.
The natives of Daksinakhand were primitive by the standards of the world that discovered them. Their tendency towards outsiders was, broadly speaking, suspicion and violence, suspicion aggravated by the lack of a mutual language. They were not overly impressed by the northerners who came, not at first. The Yolgnu in particular were a practical people. They had no desire for useless trinkets, but rather iron tools, cloth, alcohol, and other such gifts. In return they traded what little they had – food, particularly sea cucumbers, and sex for practical implements such as the Javanese were willing to part with.
In general the expeditions to Daksinakhand found little of value. Unlike the Europeans, the Javanese and Indian explorers sought cities and populated regions with which to do business. There was no missionary of Votivist zeal to animate them, and unlike the Europeans and Africans, they never did find any urban centers, at least none close enough to the coast as to be useful. Generally, they found a barren and unsafe continent with little to recommend it to the outside world.
However, the Malay would return to the north in great numbers. Sea cucumbers were delicacy in China and some parts of the archipelago. By trading with the Yolgnu, they were able to acquire vast quantities of the delicacy for outrageously little cost. The Yolgnu had little comprehension of how easy it was to manufacture an iron-tipped weapon or cloth, and accordingly would work for a pittance wage in kind, harvesting and drying their ocean’s bounty for the Malay, who in time established trading posts directly in Yolgnu territory.
It was in this way that agriculture was introduced to the Yolgnu. Although the agricultural package of the Malay isles was not exactly compatible, it was sufficient to augment their diets and allowed an increased level of health and consequent population growth.
The rest of the “Island” was explored in piecemeal voyages over the course of the next two decades. Prashant was the instigator of most of these voyages. His trading company, the Nanadesi, was convinced that they simply had to explore in greater depth to find the mythic southern kingdoms of the continent, and they pursued this goal to ultimate financial ruin. However, they were instrumental in mapping the coastline of the southern continent and identifying safe harbors and major inland rivers and terrain features. They made contact with countless native groups, and although they broadly struggled to have peaceful interactions with them, one group, who called themselves the Gunditjmara, who according to Prashant dwelled in stone houses and had a sophisticated system of aquaculture revolving around eels. Digging channels, they were able to expand the wetlands that were their primary source of food and in another world perhaps they might have developed primitive agriculture of their own accord. In hard times and times of drought, they subsisted on tuberous roots which they cultivated with artificial fires. The wild yam fields of the continent were not truly domesticated however – and without this critical leap there was no great civilization on the Island, much to the disappointment of Prashant and his fellows.
Other explorations were equally frought with disappointment. The unfavorable winds off the coasts of Daksinakhand were perilous at the best of times, and it was only Prashant’s crew’s skilled sailors and navigators that kept their dhangis from dangers and being thrown off course. A Javanese guild expedition was less lucky. Strong winds from the north meant that a group of three ships were forced to go East into empty ocean. Though they thought themselves doomed, ultimately the group, led by the explorer Sudirmana, came into contact with what they called the “Deep Clouded Isle” in 1265. It was an empty island to their eyes. The first tentative arrivals of Polynesian settlers went unnoticed by them. The people who would come to call themselves the Tengata Whenua were then very few in number – surviving by hunting the enormous birds that roamed the land.
Sudirmana and his men marveled for finding a virgin land, unknown by humans in its entirety. A learned man, a guru, was among their number, and he drew sketches of the strange birds and wildlife of the island. The men would kill many of these birds, and hew trees for lumber. Then they would depart, and the tales of the clouded island they found would become exaggerated and strange with time and retelling.
The Tangata population would grow rapidly. Several other waves of Polynesian colonizers arrived by 1300, and with abundant food supplies, even the relatively short and brutal lifespans of these early settlers did not keep birth rates low. In time, clans began splintering and the new settlers spread across the hills and mountains of their new homeland, everywhere they went hunting the huge birds of the island and making huge mounds of their bones.
Later voyages would find a very different island.
These extreme voyages are perhaps notable for their scope and grandeur – there is something romantic in pushing the envelope of human knowledge, of discovering huge new continents and meeting civilizations who had lost contact with the broader human race beyond. However, while Prashanti and his contemporaries were circumnavigating Daksinakhand, the empires of Indonesia were also engaged in a much more immediate sort of colonization.
The Maluku islands and increasingly the whole of Melanesia played host to trading posts of the rival Malay powers. Isyana, Srivijaya, and the Silendra competed over the valuable Maluku islands, trying to gain monopolies on the production of spices such as cloves and nutmeg. The value of these islands had long been known, but under Srivijayan hegemony, trade had been largely peaceful. The native peoples had been slowly converting to the Hindu-Buddhism of their Javanese neighbors, and gradually adopting the styles and language of the Malay to the west. However, now outright imperialism was the order of the day – no power could afford to let any other power become wealthier or gain more productive territory than any other, lest a new hegemony be established.
The trade wars of the early twelfth century were a zero sum game for those involved, and accordingly the indigenous populations suffered immensely, declining in numbers quite significantly and being replaced with a combination of migrants and slaves taken from other nearby islands. Fortresses and fleets were used to contest the islands, and trading posts became armed camps overseeing spice plantations. The large island of Wanin came to have fortified trading posts as well – its forests were utilized for timber during the naval arms race, and the Silendra in particular were fond of establishing bases wherever they could.
The trade wars, if anything, only increased demand for spices. More cultivated terrain meant simply more availability, which opened the envelope of those, particularly in places such as China and India, who could afford to purchase spices and in turn demand only rose. Attempts to open up Wanin to cultivation by the Silendra were met with resistance by the warlike Korowai and other tribes who raided any outlying Silendra frontier settlements.
Discovery of the broader Procellaric Ocean would have to wait. There were few commercial interests to explore beyond Melanesia and Daksinakhand. The Malay agricultural package was poorly suited for any climate beyond their tropical zone, and accordingly settlement was an uncertain prospect going forwards. With each ambitious voyage out to sea, it became increasingly obvious that the peoples of the utter eastern ocean were violent and had little to entice colonial ventures. Their islands became small and volcanic, their remarkable double-hulled vessels a not insignificant threat to incautious explorers. Even storms and a lack of knowledge of the region could prove fatal – archeological and genetic evidence seems to hint that Polynesia did have contact with the broader “Old World” but that said contact was essentially one-way – rare, and primarily conducted by people who were lost and stranded rather than ambitious adventurers.
The Procellaric demanded of would-be explorers a level of technology, desire, and expertise that was simply not available at the time. For those who threw caution to the wind and explored anyhow, it swallowed them whole.
[I considered commenting on one of the Tamil voyages bringing back a Kangaroo to the court of the Isyana Maharaja, where it would compete in wrestling tournaments, but I decided that was too absurd.]
Looking, as ever, for feedback. Do events so far feel plausible? What areas and topics would people like to see more of? Any questions?
One thing I really wonder about is why the African explorers ventured to the Caribbean instead of sailing to the shore of OTL Brazil. I mean, I understand that they didn't know that Brazil was there, but still, I'd imagine they'd have much easier time crossing the ocean in the nearest point. I guess the first expedition could've been somewhat random, but I think future exploration should concentrate much more on the South-Solvian coastline. Even if it can't provide an immediate access to loot due to lack of major civilizations, at least it's some land that many African exiles would love to colonize.
Hmmm, the Inca aren't scheduled to form until the 1400s, while the Mississippian culture is still around. The more piecemeal nature of the ATL conquests, combined with plenty of competing private and state interests that can be played off each other means that at least one native civilization will make it to ATL's present day... but also that these cultures will be different from the most well-known pre-Columbian civilizations of OTL...
You hit the nail on the head. The African explorers were explicitly looking for the already found territory - they weren't really explorers in a pure sense at all. They came not as settlers but as a small army seeking treasure and plunder. Future African explorers will definitely seek out nice land in South Solvia to settle, but that awaits me figuring out what in the West African agricultural package will transfer well to the New World.
Both of those are things that imo will make this timeline interesting for me to write down the road. I should note that without a single unified Andean Empire, the odds of an equivalent "Spanish conquest" in that region are supremely low. In addition to their scattered, piecemeal arrival, the Europeans and Africans are finding scattered cities and small tribal states, not easily toppled empires. And while this gives them plenty of opportunities to work with, it doesn't give them the dramatic, sweeping coups of OTL. The riches that OTL the Spanish managed to extract might remain in native hands for far longer...
Just to clarify: the Prolleric Ocean is the ATL term for the Pacific, correct? I was a bit thrown off by the mention of the Europeans and their trying to get around the cape (a journey via the Atlantic) then immediately followed by a discussion of ATL Polynesia, which signifies either that the OTL Pacific has absorbed the Indian Ocean IATL in the public consciousness or there was some misunderstanding on my part.
No, it's just a rather abrupt transition, for which I apologize. The key point is that the Europeans, vexed trying to get around Watya, try instead to reach India via the Pacific Ocean. (Procellaric) this fails, in large part because they don't know what they're doing, and these initial voyages are lost. A few nameless explorers die trying to circumnavigate America, which is called in TTL Solvia.
Then, I transition to talking about Indian experiences with the Pacific Ocean - in particular Oceania.
Then, I transition to talking about Indian experiences with the Pacific Ocean - in particular Oceania.
I just thought of something-- why don't the Berber kingdoms try and get in on the colonization action?
There's three or four of then=m, and the one corresponding to present-day Morocco is especially well-placed for colonial ventures.
I can't judge their exact potential because... well, I don't really know much about them in ATL. They suffer from Makuria Syndrome-- they have a place on consecutive posts, but then they don't get mentioned much in posts. Of course, Makuria's been explained already, so it doesn't have Makuria syndrome anymore. The Berber kingdoms on the other hand... I think one of them, the Tunisian one, was mentioned as a pirate's den of some kind where Mauri remnants, Europeans of ill repute, and the Berbers mingled. Then there was the Libyan kingdom with its syncretic sorta-Christian faith. There was probably more, but I can't recall it right now
There's three or four of then=m, and the one corresponding to present-day Morocco is especially well-placed for colonial ventures.
I can't judge their exact potential because... well, I don't really know much about them in ATL. They suffer from Makuria Syndrome-- they have a place on consecutive posts, but then they don't get mentioned much in posts. Of course, Makuria's been explained already, so it doesn't have Makuria syndrome anymore. The Berber kingdoms on the other hand... I think one of them, the Tunisian one, was mentioned as a pirate's den of some kind where Mauri remnants, Europeans of ill repute, and the Berbers mingled. Then there was the Libyan kingdom with its syncretic sorta-Christian faith. There was probably more, but I can't recall it right now
Masamida (Morocco) in particular and the Mauri in general will definitely be getting in on the colonial race.
North Africa in general has probably been underserved by this TL. The Mauri had a major impact as merchants and as a post Roman state with a lot of power - a sort of Latinized Carthage born again. But after their fall the Berber tribes who replaced them were relatively isolated and insular, especially politically speaking.
Part of the problem is that the Berbers themselves never developed a maritime tradition - relying on others for that and remaining inland has prevented them from playing a huge role in Mediterranean politics. However as the Masamida become more unified, I expect they'll begin overseas adventures, perhaps joined with other Berber states.
North Africa in general has probably been underserved by this TL. The Mauri had a major impact as merchants and as a post Roman state with a lot of power - a sort of Latinized Carthage born again. But after their fall the Berber tribes who replaced them were relatively isolated and insular, especially politically speaking.
Part of the problem is that the Berbers themselves never developed a maritime tradition - relying on others for that and remaining inland has prevented them from playing a huge role in Mediterranean politics. However as the Masamida become more unified, I expect they'll begin overseas adventures, perhaps joined with other Berber states.
Yemen and Rhom
Yemen and Colonialism
While Tamil merchants explored the ironically calm blue vastness of the Procellaric Oceania and asserted maritime hegemony over the Malay Isles, through the twelfth century, the mercantile cities of the Chandratreya asserted dominance across the western half of the Indian Ocean.
This work would not have been possible without the complicity and indeed alliance with many prominent Arab groups. The Arabs of Yemen sought safety from the growing power of the Bakhtiyar, who unlike the Khardi were very comfortable expanding along desert paths that had been safe from the “civilized” grasp of Susa. The Bakhtiyar also understood the value of trade – they did not disdain merchants for many of them were the sons or brothers of merchants before Akhsau had brought them together and made them conquering heroes and Shahs.
The explosion of Tayzig nomads southwards into the old caravan lanes culminated in the sack of Al-Taif by a Bakhtiyar companion and later successor-Shah named Gashayar Harun and a small cohort of swift cavalrymen. The overland routes, which had prospered as Egypt declined, were now cut off once more. The southern kingdoms folded one by one as the northern peoples descended southwards, taking the rich incense-growing country. As an aside, it was the Bakhtiyar who would introduce the world to the glories of the coffee plant. They discovered it among the Yemeni towns that they conquered, and the “Zanj drink” in time would spread across the middle east, where it became a popular beverage for farmers in the morning and to give to soldiers before battle, mixed with strong wheat alcohol. [1]
The Yemeni, particularly the Hadhramut and Aden, feared the growing power of the Bakhtiyar, with their swift horses and camelry. The coastal cities were in danger of plunder, and pleaded with their merchant connections for relief – for firepowder arms, for ships and men to resist the onslaught, for loans to hire mercenaries. In this way, cities such as Bharukaccha became truly colonial. Rather than simply striking unfavorable trade pacts, now they were permitted to send guild armies on permanent station in Arabia and elsewhere. Sahputi and Gurjar mercenaries were shipped en masse, along with a small corps of Bharukacchan advisors.
As their local contacts became embedded, Chandratreya licensed merchant houses were able to invest in and buy the manufacturing of the Arabian peninsula, dominating the coffee and incense trade of the region without having to lift a finger or provide their own labor. State and Guild mercenaries provided the defense of Yemen, and an uneasy alliance grew between the Malik of Aden and his foreign patrons.
In 1171, a full scale Bakhtiyar invasion of Yemen occurred under the leadership of the brilliant tactician Gashayar Harun – but the Shah was dealt a rare reversal, underestimating the vast number of mercenaries that would take the field against him. He retreated north towards his fortress at Taxitar-in-Palestine and from there would spend several years licking his wounds. However, so long as the threat of the Bakhtiyar remained, the Malik of Yemen was content to maintain his deals, and quickly he realized that these foreign banks and guilds could be useful. Several Arab trading houses sought to restore a Hawiya Shah in Ethiopia, and believed they had a viable pretender – a family of Gidayan exiles who had lived for more than a few generations among the Hadhramut and were culturally quite Arabized and religious Buddhist. However, these small details were overlooked by the Yemeni in their fervor to restore the profitable plantations and manufactories of Ethiopia – under Arab rule.
The Yemeni partisans of the Hawiya approached the Chandratreya Maharaja for a loan and soldiers, promising him a substantial cut of the profits. However, the Chandratreya were distracted and reeling. The Afghan Shahs and their Sahputi cavalry had won three major battles against the Chandratreya and their Gurjar allies in the past five years. The Chandratreya, despite their gunpowder and numerous armies, lacked the discipline and cavalry tactics of the Sahputi. They suffered grievous losses in their engagements, but thanks to their vast resources and long-established pre-eminence on the subcontinent, the Sahputi could not gain ground against them.
The Yemeni would have to turn to the Mahatitta banks for help.[2]
[1] There is a substantial drinking culture in the Middle East, which various Buddhist injunctions against alcohol have done almost nothing to combat. Bakhtiyar Shahs are expected to drink with their companions much as Akhsau Mansar did with their forefathers, and a Shah who does not engage in hedonistic debauchery, elaborate hunting parties, and other such activities is barely a Shah at all. In this, among many other ways, the Bakhtiyar have done almost nothing to earn the support or sympathy of the Nowbahar.
[2] A story for another time, but in case you've forgotten, Mahatitta, Sri Lanka, is one of the major financial centers of the world at this juncture. They could with relative ease provide ships and money enough to buy whole armies of mercenaries.
Shahs and Romans
In the twelfth century, the Xasar state was able to take advantage of the collapse of Asia and the growing weakness and internal division within Francia to expand and consolidate its borders. While the Xasar Shah had long claimed titles which hinted at an ambition to universal empire, in 1122, with the ascension of Shah Ormatsidar, they began claiming to be the “King of Kings” in addition to their many lofty titles which included Shah of Rhom. The latter title was part of a broader pretension to the Roman legacy which vexed and frustrated the Frankish Emperors, who not without reason regarded themselves as truer heirs to the Roman Empire than Iranian nomads who took pride in sacking the Eternal city in past centuries.
The cultivated plains of the Danube and Thrace supported a large population and in turn a large tax base, which in turn allowed the Xasar to build a sizable, well developed state apparatus to govern the disparate peoples under their rule. The Christian populations, however, posed a unique challenge from the standpoint of legitimacy. What right beside force of arms gave the Xasar Shahs the authority to rule over Christians? While the number of Christians they ruled over grew, the Xasar were forced to grapple with this more and more.
To Konstantikert, the answer was clear. Persecution had never really been considered viable. They made heavy use of Christian soldiers as auxiliaries and Christian populations had always been too substantial for persecution to be viable. Rather, Christian elites in newly-conquered regions were forced by treaty or “encouraged” to send their children to be raised in the palace. These “Gold and Purple Sons”[1] were expected to take part in Buddhist-pagan religious rituals and serve in the royal guard cavalry. In a generation, with peer pressure, the wealthy and important landholders of an expansive Christian region were culturally alienated from their parents and in time would identify more as Xasar than as Slavs or Romans or Franks. These children were at the forefront of a dramatic cultural shift – the Slavic, Roman, and Italian populations of the Balkans who remained Christian were largely ruled by an aristocracy that despite disparate origins identified with the Turko-Iranian culture in which they had been raised.
Unlike many other “pagan” peoples who came into such a situation, the Xasar could not and would not convert. Their eclectic version of Buddhist paganism was a part of their identity and a unifying factor. Temples and stupa were the central of Pannonian and Danubian cultural life for the overwhelming majority of the people, and these crossed the diminishing barriers of ethnic identity.
In this way, the Xasar were able to do what the Khirichan for all their military superiority and vast resources could not. The Xasar Shahs chipped away the last bastions of Christendom in Asia and the Balkans. Combined with a strong navy, they were able to secure the Aegean and engage in a wave of conquests which while geographically less impressive than the ambitions of the Khirichan, were far more long lasting.
Under Shah Ormatsidar and his successor, the usurper Arjaxa Darasakya, the Xasar expanded deep into Slavonian and Asian territory. Ormatsidar (1122-1141) followed a relatively traditional pattern of expansion, pushing deep into the Balkans, taking advantage of Frankish distraction and repairing fortifications he knew he would need to withstand the inevitable counterattack. Gone were the days of sweeping into Europe on horseback and pillaging the fields. His war was one of attrition on all fronts, relying on siege engineering and some small quantities of firepowder imported from the Khardi lands at great expense.
Arjaxa, however, had a different opportunity. When he rose to power, it was a coup for the bureaucratic faction and palace-raised nobility, with whom he identified. The Darasakya family were not high nobles – they rose to power by merit and won the throne because Ormatsidar had insisted upon appointing his mentally handicapped son Mihirdata to the throne and making Arjaxa a mere Regent. Within a month Mihirdata suffered a “hunting accident” and the throne was secure for the Darasakya. Arjaxa grew up in Konstantikert, unlike Ormatsidar who’s early life had been spent in military camps and on the warpath. Arjaxa instead focused on the urban, developed world of Asia. To him, Slavic princelings and Frankish marchers were a poor harvest for the Empire. There was no wealth in the Balkans, merely farms and antique ruins.
Within the 4th year of his reign, in 1145, he would accept the surrender of the Sklavenian King George Alos at Salunicha. George had spent most of his reign watching the Xasar press the Franks out of the Balkans, and he had pre-emptively seized a series of ports on the Adriatic, so as to keep them out of pagan hands. This turned out to be his undoing, as the Franks refused to come to his aid. The Xasar defeated the Sklavenian army and besieged Salunicha – and although their victories would be hard-fought and hard-won, the Xasar triumphed.
Defeating Sklavenia once and for all solidified the power of the Xasar. Arjaxa returned to Shahdijan in a spectacular triumph. The Xasar mathematicians were hired to make a trail of Sklavenian heads on pikes running along a road that in antique times was the Via Egnatia. Durasa became a major base for the Xasar fleet, which now could directly threaten the Italian possessions of the Frankish Empire. The hills and forests of the Balkans would remain bandit country, untamed and uncontrolled for a generation longer, but in time the last holdouts of resistance were rooted out, in no small part because they became increasingly desperate and apocalyptic in their ideology, and alienated the common people.
Asia was the real triumph of Arjaxa’s reign however. By 1150, the Bakhtiyar and their Tayzig allies were everywhere – Phokaia, one of the last holdouts on the Aegean, was besieged in 1151 by the Tayzig warlord Khalid Shira, and sent numerous appeals to Rome and Aachen for aid. However, these requests fell on deaf ears. Instead, it would be a Xasar fleet that offered them protection from a certain Bakhtiyar sack. In coming months, the Bakhtiyar would be pushed back – the Xasar actually managed to portray themselves as heroes and liberators because of the famed brutality of the Bakhtiyar. Over the next decade, the Bakhtiyar would be pushed out of Nikaia, Amastris, and Sinope. All Bithynia and Pontus was retaken, as was much of the old Roman province of Asia.
Akhsau himself would ride into Asia in 1162, and strike the peace of Ammorion, which allowed the Bakhtiyar to retain a sprawling territory, including wealthy regions such as Lycia and Trebizond. The Bakhtiyar also aligned themselves with the Christianized pastoralists of the Anatolian plateau, using them as enforcers and auxiliary soldiers.
Arjaxa, however, would take credit as being one of the greatest Xasar Shahs in the history of their empire. From humble Pannonian origins, the Xasar now ruled a not insubstantial portion of the Roman Empire. Konstantikert was made the official capital once more, with Shahdijan relegated to secondary status as a major military center and local economic hub. While plunder was light, the economic advantage of conquering Asia was substantial. The coastal cities were still very rich and very powerful, and the sons of their merchant families were now obliged to be held as hostages in Konstantikert and serve in the Xasar army.
In 1165, on his deathbed, Arjaxa took his nephew, Nanaivant and crowned him Shah to great acclamation. “To you,” he said, “I leave the Empire of the Romans and the Xasar.”
[1]The Xasar nation’s symbols in this era are white stork on black – the banner of the Darasakya, or golden chakra on purple – a royal symbol similar to that used by the Gardaveldi.
[Poll: is the Xasar Shahdom a continuation of the Eftal Rhom Shahdom]
[Poll: is the Xasar Shahdom a continuation of the Roman Empire?]
[Poll: is the above continuation poll a continuation of previous continuation polls?]
While Tamil merchants explored the ironically calm blue vastness of the Procellaric Oceania and asserted maritime hegemony over the Malay Isles, through the twelfth century, the mercantile cities of the Chandratreya asserted dominance across the western half of the Indian Ocean.
This work would not have been possible without the complicity and indeed alliance with many prominent Arab groups. The Arabs of Yemen sought safety from the growing power of the Bakhtiyar, who unlike the Khardi were very comfortable expanding along desert paths that had been safe from the “civilized” grasp of Susa. The Bakhtiyar also understood the value of trade – they did not disdain merchants for many of them were the sons or brothers of merchants before Akhsau had brought them together and made them conquering heroes and Shahs.
The explosion of Tayzig nomads southwards into the old caravan lanes culminated in the sack of Al-Taif by a Bakhtiyar companion and later successor-Shah named Gashayar Harun and a small cohort of swift cavalrymen. The overland routes, which had prospered as Egypt declined, were now cut off once more. The southern kingdoms folded one by one as the northern peoples descended southwards, taking the rich incense-growing country. As an aside, it was the Bakhtiyar who would introduce the world to the glories of the coffee plant. They discovered it among the Yemeni towns that they conquered, and the “Zanj drink” in time would spread across the middle east, where it became a popular beverage for farmers in the morning and to give to soldiers before battle, mixed with strong wheat alcohol. [1]
The Yemeni, particularly the Hadhramut and Aden, feared the growing power of the Bakhtiyar, with their swift horses and camelry. The coastal cities were in danger of plunder, and pleaded with their merchant connections for relief – for firepowder arms, for ships and men to resist the onslaught, for loans to hire mercenaries. In this way, cities such as Bharukaccha became truly colonial. Rather than simply striking unfavorable trade pacts, now they were permitted to send guild armies on permanent station in Arabia and elsewhere. Sahputi and Gurjar mercenaries were shipped en masse, along with a small corps of Bharukacchan advisors.
As their local contacts became embedded, Chandratreya licensed merchant houses were able to invest in and buy the manufacturing of the Arabian peninsula, dominating the coffee and incense trade of the region without having to lift a finger or provide their own labor. State and Guild mercenaries provided the defense of Yemen, and an uneasy alliance grew between the Malik of Aden and his foreign patrons.
In 1171, a full scale Bakhtiyar invasion of Yemen occurred under the leadership of the brilliant tactician Gashayar Harun – but the Shah was dealt a rare reversal, underestimating the vast number of mercenaries that would take the field against him. He retreated north towards his fortress at Taxitar-in-Palestine and from there would spend several years licking his wounds. However, so long as the threat of the Bakhtiyar remained, the Malik of Yemen was content to maintain his deals, and quickly he realized that these foreign banks and guilds could be useful. Several Arab trading houses sought to restore a Hawiya Shah in Ethiopia, and believed they had a viable pretender – a family of Gidayan exiles who had lived for more than a few generations among the Hadhramut and were culturally quite Arabized and religious Buddhist. However, these small details were overlooked by the Yemeni in their fervor to restore the profitable plantations and manufactories of Ethiopia – under Arab rule.
The Yemeni partisans of the Hawiya approached the Chandratreya Maharaja for a loan and soldiers, promising him a substantial cut of the profits. However, the Chandratreya were distracted and reeling. The Afghan Shahs and their Sahputi cavalry had won three major battles against the Chandratreya and their Gurjar allies in the past five years. The Chandratreya, despite their gunpowder and numerous armies, lacked the discipline and cavalry tactics of the Sahputi. They suffered grievous losses in their engagements, but thanks to their vast resources and long-established pre-eminence on the subcontinent, the Sahputi could not gain ground against them.
The Yemeni would have to turn to the Mahatitta banks for help.[2]
[1] There is a substantial drinking culture in the Middle East, which various Buddhist injunctions against alcohol have done almost nothing to combat. Bakhtiyar Shahs are expected to drink with their companions much as Akhsau Mansar did with their forefathers, and a Shah who does not engage in hedonistic debauchery, elaborate hunting parties, and other such activities is barely a Shah at all. In this, among many other ways, the Bakhtiyar have done almost nothing to earn the support or sympathy of the Nowbahar.
[2] A story for another time, but in case you've forgotten, Mahatitta, Sri Lanka, is one of the major financial centers of the world at this juncture. They could with relative ease provide ships and money enough to buy whole armies of mercenaries.
Shahs and Romans
In the twelfth century, the Xasar state was able to take advantage of the collapse of Asia and the growing weakness and internal division within Francia to expand and consolidate its borders. While the Xasar Shah had long claimed titles which hinted at an ambition to universal empire, in 1122, with the ascension of Shah Ormatsidar, they began claiming to be the “King of Kings” in addition to their many lofty titles which included Shah of Rhom. The latter title was part of a broader pretension to the Roman legacy which vexed and frustrated the Frankish Emperors, who not without reason regarded themselves as truer heirs to the Roman Empire than Iranian nomads who took pride in sacking the Eternal city in past centuries.
The cultivated plains of the Danube and Thrace supported a large population and in turn a large tax base, which in turn allowed the Xasar to build a sizable, well developed state apparatus to govern the disparate peoples under their rule. The Christian populations, however, posed a unique challenge from the standpoint of legitimacy. What right beside force of arms gave the Xasar Shahs the authority to rule over Christians? While the number of Christians they ruled over grew, the Xasar were forced to grapple with this more and more.
To Konstantikert, the answer was clear. Persecution had never really been considered viable. They made heavy use of Christian soldiers as auxiliaries and Christian populations had always been too substantial for persecution to be viable. Rather, Christian elites in newly-conquered regions were forced by treaty or “encouraged” to send their children to be raised in the palace. These “Gold and Purple Sons”[1] were expected to take part in Buddhist-pagan religious rituals and serve in the royal guard cavalry. In a generation, with peer pressure, the wealthy and important landholders of an expansive Christian region were culturally alienated from their parents and in time would identify more as Xasar than as Slavs or Romans or Franks. These children were at the forefront of a dramatic cultural shift – the Slavic, Roman, and Italian populations of the Balkans who remained Christian were largely ruled by an aristocracy that despite disparate origins identified with the Turko-Iranian culture in which they had been raised.
Unlike many other “pagan” peoples who came into such a situation, the Xasar could not and would not convert. Their eclectic version of Buddhist paganism was a part of their identity and a unifying factor. Temples and stupa were the central of Pannonian and Danubian cultural life for the overwhelming majority of the people, and these crossed the diminishing barriers of ethnic identity.
In this way, the Xasar were able to do what the Khirichan for all their military superiority and vast resources could not. The Xasar Shahs chipped away the last bastions of Christendom in Asia and the Balkans. Combined with a strong navy, they were able to secure the Aegean and engage in a wave of conquests which while geographically less impressive than the ambitions of the Khirichan, were far more long lasting.
Under Shah Ormatsidar and his successor, the usurper Arjaxa Darasakya, the Xasar expanded deep into Slavonian and Asian territory. Ormatsidar (1122-1141) followed a relatively traditional pattern of expansion, pushing deep into the Balkans, taking advantage of Frankish distraction and repairing fortifications he knew he would need to withstand the inevitable counterattack. Gone were the days of sweeping into Europe on horseback and pillaging the fields. His war was one of attrition on all fronts, relying on siege engineering and some small quantities of firepowder imported from the Khardi lands at great expense.
Arjaxa, however, had a different opportunity. When he rose to power, it was a coup for the bureaucratic faction and palace-raised nobility, with whom he identified. The Darasakya family were not high nobles – they rose to power by merit and won the throne because Ormatsidar had insisted upon appointing his mentally handicapped son Mihirdata to the throne and making Arjaxa a mere Regent. Within a month Mihirdata suffered a “hunting accident” and the throne was secure for the Darasakya. Arjaxa grew up in Konstantikert, unlike Ormatsidar who’s early life had been spent in military camps and on the warpath. Arjaxa instead focused on the urban, developed world of Asia. To him, Slavic princelings and Frankish marchers were a poor harvest for the Empire. There was no wealth in the Balkans, merely farms and antique ruins.
Within the 4th year of his reign, in 1145, he would accept the surrender of the Sklavenian King George Alos at Salunicha. George had spent most of his reign watching the Xasar press the Franks out of the Balkans, and he had pre-emptively seized a series of ports on the Adriatic, so as to keep them out of pagan hands. This turned out to be his undoing, as the Franks refused to come to his aid. The Xasar defeated the Sklavenian army and besieged Salunicha – and although their victories would be hard-fought and hard-won, the Xasar triumphed.
Defeating Sklavenia once and for all solidified the power of the Xasar. Arjaxa returned to Shahdijan in a spectacular triumph. The Xasar mathematicians were hired to make a trail of Sklavenian heads on pikes running along a road that in antique times was the Via Egnatia. Durasa became a major base for the Xasar fleet, which now could directly threaten the Italian possessions of the Frankish Empire. The hills and forests of the Balkans would remain bandit country, untamed and uncontrolled for a generation longer, but in time the last holdouts of resistance were rooted out, in no small part because they became increasingly desperate and apocalyptic in their ideology, and alienated the common people.
Asia was the real triumph of Arjaxa’s reign however. By 1150, the Bakhtiyar and their Tayzig allies were everywhere – Phokaia, one of the last holdouts on the Aegean, was besieged in 1151 by the Tayzig warlord Khalid Shira, and sent numerous appeals to Rome and Aachen for aid. However, these requests fell on deaf ears. Instead, it would be a Xasar fleet that offered them protection from a certain Bakhtiyar sack. In coming months, the Bakhtiyar would be pushed back – the Xasar actually managed to portray themselves as heroes and liberators because of the famed brutality of the Bakhtiyar. Over the next decade, the Bakhtiyar would be pushed out of Nikaia, Amastris, and Sinope. All Bithynia and Pontus was retaken, as was much of the old Roman province of Asia.
Akhsau himself would ride into Asia in 1162, and strike the peace of Ammorion, which allowed the Bakhtiyar to retain a sprawling territory, including wealthy regions such as Lycia and Trebizond. The Bakhtiyar also aligned themselves with the Christianized pastoralists of the Anatolian plateau, using them as enforcers and auxiliary soldiers.
Arjaxa, however, would take credit as being one of the greatest Xasar Shahs in the history of their empire. From humble Pannonian origins, the Xasar now ruled a not insubstantial portion of the Roman Empire. Konstantikert was made the official capital once more, with Shahdijan relegated to secondary status as a major military center and local economic hub. While plunder was light, the economic advantage of conquering Asia was substantial. The coastal cities were still very rich and very powerful, and the sons of their merchant families were now obliged to be held as hostages in Konstantikert and serve in the Xasar army.
In 1165, on his deathbed, Arjaxa took his nephew, Nanaivant and crowned him Shah to great acclamation. “To you,” he said, “I leave the Empire of the Romans and the Xasar.”
[1]The Xasar nation’s symbols in this era are white stork on black – the banner of the Darasakya, or golden chakra on purple – a royal symbol similar to that used by the Gardaveldi.
[Poll: is the Xasar Shahdom a continuation of the Eftal Rhom Shahdom]
[Poll: is the Xasar Shahdom a continuation of the Roman Empire?]
[Poll: is the above continuation poll a continuation of previous continuation polls?]
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There's a substantial Jewish and Saihist population in western Yemen, along with small Jain and Buddhist communities. Eastern Yemen, where the Hadhramut are, is thoroughly Buddhist. The King of Aden is Jewish, while the Malik of Sana'a is actually an indigenous monotheist presiding over what is still largely a pagan population.
Xasars calling themselves romans…hey look Nanaivant, angry Frank's with twitchy eyes coming towards you :O
In all seriousness though, I think there won't be any immediate votive war. But I doubt the frankish empire are going to let this slide.
Also, I noticed many of the Frankish emperors are called Aloysius. I could see the Frankish Emperor's eventually calling all their sons Aloysius. Family life would be a headache
In all seriousness though, I think there won't be any immediate votive war. But I doubt the frankish empire are going to let this slide.
Also, I noticed many of the Frankish emperors are called Aloysius. I could see the Frankish Emperor's eventually calling all their sons Aloysius. Family life would be a headache
The Xasars have graduated from Hungarian stand-in to Ottoman stand-in, I see
Now, as long as they don't neglect the Balkans too much and come to depend on their vulnerable Asian territories, they should be fine.
Also, looks like the last independent Greek state is now gone. The eastern Anatolian Greeks are under the Bakhtiyar, and the western Greeks are either growing up in Konstantikert and Shahdijan or learning Italian in Attican academies. They'll have fun chatting with the Eftal in whatever Hospice Care For Empires looks like :|
Now, as long as they don't neglect the Balkans too much and come to depend on their vulnerable Asian territories, they should be fine.
Also, looks like the last independent Greek state is now gone. The eastern Anatolian Greeks are under the Bakhtiyar, and the western Greeks are either growing up in Konstantikert and Shahdijan or learning Italian in Attican academies. They'll have fun chatting with the Eftal in whatever Hospice Care For Empires looks like :|
Aw man, can't believe I missed the White Huns starting up again. Really excited to see how the New World fares here!