The raven's flight : a TL

What have happened :

Outside their frozen homeland, Chukotko-Kamchatkan peoples have had little impact upon world history.Numbering a few ten of thousands at best, they fished and herded reindeer in the north-eastern reaches of Siberia until discovered by the Russian during the XVIIth century. The Chukchee proved a tough nut to crack, defeating several expeditions and forcing the closure of the Anadyrsk fort, but were ultimately incorporated into the Russian then Soviet Empire. They still speak their language and still herd reindeers, and are the subjects of somewhat two-edged Russian jokes, but if we set aside the buterflies, they have little impact upon world affairs.

What might have happened :

We dont't know much about the prehistory of north-eastern Asia. The bulk of the population was apparently tungusig in the South and Chukotko-Kamchatkan in the north, while some form of Japonic dominated in Korea. Relict populations speaking now extinct languages probably survived in the Amur region - their only modern descendant being the Nivkhs. Nomadic confederations controled the western steppes, while Mandchuria was disputed between Chinese states (first the kingdom of Yan, then the Qin and Han Empires) and the states founded by the Buyeo peoples, an extinct group which spoke a language akin to Japanese and which seems to have originated from a non-chinese fishing culture on the coast of the Yellow Sea.

Migration of small tribes were relatively common place at the time, and could have huge consequences. The Japanese, for instance, were the descendants of fishermen from the Yellow Sea who had sailed east to flee Chinese encroachments. Around 300 BC a small Chukotko-Kamchatkan group - no more than 500 persons in all - are forced to leave their frozen homeland by tribal wars. They head south-weast and by 203 BCE they reached the territory of the Xiong-Nu confederation.

The Xiong-Nu elite was Yenisseian speaking, but their subjects were of mixed ethnicity, with proto-turkic or proto-mongolic tribes. The newcommers were quickly integrated into the Xiong-Nu power structure as the Raven clan (Chinese 烏鴉 ) and settled in the Ordos region. They adopted the nomadic lifestyle but kept their language and religion. They were quite low in the internal Xiong-Nu hierarchy and tended not to attract much attention but they fought in the Xiong-Nu armies against the Han in the Xiong-Nu - Han wars and participated in raids into Buyeo and Koguryo territory.

The impact at this point is still limited; A few Chinese or Koguryo soldiers who would have lived in our timeline are killed by Raven arrows. This will have a major effect later, but for the moment, only their families notice.

In 60 BC the Xiong-Nu Empire was shattered by a civil war as the throne was usurped by Woyanqudi, a grandson of the 12th Chanyu's cousin. Huhanye, the son of the late Chanyu revolted, driving the usurper to defeat then suicide but couldn't quite assert his authority. His brother claimed the kingship, followed by no less than three pretenders. Huhanye managed to keep his throne by submitting to the Han, but could not subdue his elder bother Zhizhi Chanyu who had allied with the Kangju and set up a rival kingdom in Turkestan.

The Raven had sided with Zhizhi and shared his fate when he was finaly defeated by the Han in 36 BC. They fled west and disapeared from history, for a time.

A few individuals took refuge in the Chinese army then became herders or farmers. They had no immediate impact upon the history of either Xiong-Nu or Han, but their sinicized descendants would.
 
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Europe 120 AD - 470 AD

Vassals of the Huns :

Very little is known about the history of the Raven during the first centuries of the Common Era. They seem to lived in the steppes north of the Caspian Sea. There, they have grown in number and power, absorbing several minor peoples in the process.

They probably headed a minor tribal confederacy during the third century CE, launching raids northward and eastward into the forested areas populated by Uralic and Paleo-European tribes. They appear to have been absorbed quite early by what would become the Hunnic Confederacy, headed by a Turkic tribe that may or may not be related to the Xiong-Nu.

The Raven were one among a number of tribes vassal to the Huns and moved westward with them during the late third and early fourth century, probably continuing to raid Uralic lands north of the Dniepr.

In 375 CE, the Huns and their vassals crossed the Volga and attacked the Alans, who, defeated, retreated toward the Caucasus. Under their leader Balamber, the victorious Huns continued westward into the Gothic Empire, which, at the time, held most of Eastern Europe.

Facing defeat, the Ostrogoth king Ermanaric, commited suicide., his great-nephew, Vithimiris, took over but was killed in battle in 376. Most Ostrogoths submitted while Wisigoths, led by Athanaric, fled into Roman territory. There, they triggered a major crisis, which culminated with the battle of Adrianopolis and the death of Emperor Valens in 378 CE.

While the Goths laid waste to the Balkans, extorting "protection money" from the Greek cities, the Huns consolidated their gains, launching their first large scale raid into Roman territory in 395 CE. They then reached Syria and threatened Antioch before being repulsed by the eunuch Eutropius in 398CE. The raven, however, moved northward, settling in southern Germania and in Pannonia, taking part, as mercenaries in the campaigns against Radagaisus in 406 and againt Alaric in 409.

The war against the Burgundians :


In 411, the Burgundian king Gundahar and the Alan king Goar had set up a puppet emperor, Jovinus, who granted them lands on the left (Roman) bank of the Rhine. This grant was later confirmed by Hnorius, but Burgundians continued to raid northern Gallia.

In 436, Aetius hired the Raven, along with an unknown number of Hunnic mercenaries, and attacked the Burgundian kingdom, which was soon overrun. Gundahar was killed in the fighting and the Burgundians were decimated. As a reward, he settled the Raven on the mouth of the Loire river, where he had just supressed a revolt of the bacaudae, and gave them the status of foederati.

The Raven participated to Aetius' campaigns against the Wisigoths and the Franks, and were apparently instrumental in the defeat and death of the Frankish king Chlodio in 448 at Vicus Helena. When the Hunnic king Attila invaded Gaul in 450CE, the Raven were a part of the grand alliance which opposed him. They fought under him at Chalons and were granted further lands, officially to reward them, in reality to counter the growing Gothic influence south of the Loire.

After Aetius' death in 454 CE, Roman authority in Gaul all but collapsed. Valentinian III was assassinated a year later by soldiers faithful to Aetius. His successor Petronius Maximus ruled only 11 week before he was stoned by an angry mob. Infuriated by the cancelling of the the betrothal of Licinia’s daughter, Eudocia, to his son Huneric, the Vandal king Gaiseric attacked the city three days after the Emperor's death, thoroughly sacked it. Avitus, a general he had sent to the Wisigoth king Theodoric II for support, came back in Italy with a Gallic - and probably Gothic army - and declared himself Emperor in july 455.

While he was a competent ruler and defeated twice the Vandals in Southern Italy, he failed to stop the Gothic expansion in Hispania. In Rome itself, he quickly grew unpopular. the population of Rome, devastated by the Vandal sack suffered a scarcity of food due to the Vandal naval supremacy that controlled the naval routes, a scarcity aggravated by the foreign troops which had arrived with Avitus. The imperial treasury was almost empty and, after disbanding his Visigoth guard because of popular pressure, Avitus was obliged to pay their wages by melting down and selling the bronze of some statues.

The Magister Militum Ricimer and the Comes domesticorum Majorian rebelled in 457. Avitus gathered all the men he could find and attacked them near Piacenza but was defeated and exiled.

Majorian, perhaps one of the last effective Western Emperor, held the power for four years, defeating the Wisigoths at Arelate in 458 and forcing them out of Septimania and Hispania. He also drove the Burgondians out of the Rhone Valley. In 460, he defeated the Suebi, who had settled in north-western Spain. He then chose his trusted general Aegidius as the new magister militum per Gallias (military commander of Gaul).

He was, however, betrayed by his magister militum Ricimer in 461 and executed near the river Iria. Ricimer replaced him by Libius Severus. Wisigoths quickly reoccupied Spain, however, and Aegidius in Gaul, as well as Marcelinus in Illyria refused to recognize his authority, an authority his master Ricimer was unable to enforce outside Italy.

The kingdom of Aegidius :

The magister militum per Gallias, Aegidius, a staunch supporter of Majorian, refused to aknowledge its deposition and began to rule northern Gaul as an independent kingdom. The Rhone Valley was under Burgundian control and the Wisigoth held the region of Tolosa, effectively cutting it from the main body of the Empire.

Aegidius relied upon the Ravens and Breton warlords installed in western Armorica and along the Loire Valley. He was unable, however, to reach an aggreement with the Wisigoths and a violent conflict started. Aegidius managed to take Aurelianis, defeating King Theodoric's brother Frederic, but could not press on his victory because of Frisian raids in the region of Lutetia.

Aegidius's control of the territory under his theoretical jurisdiction was brittle at best. The Breton warlord Riothamus held the area of Blesum and numerous Breton colonies were established along the Loire River. At the mouth of the Loire River itself, the Raven held a part of the old civitas of the Namnetes and ruled it as an independent kingdom under their king Enciv (probably a nickname, meaning the strong one). Various Roman leaders jockeyed for position, sometimes allied, sometimes opposed to Aegidius the most powerful being Paulus and Arbogast. In most cities, the real power went with the local bishop.

During the six following years, Aegidius campaigned all over Northern Gaul, fighting inconclusively the Wisigoths and the fortunately divided Franks. Although nominally allied to the Roman authorities, the Breton warlords were a constant threat. Dumnoeans had already taken over the westernmost part of Armorica and launched frequent raids eastward. Saxon raiders regularly laid waste to the coastal towns. The Raven were often the targets of both Bretons and saxons, but managed to hold their lands with Roman help.

Anthemius' reconquest

In 467, Libius Severus died of natural death. He was replaced by an appointee of the Eastern Roman Empire Leo I : Anthemius. Unlike his predecessor, Anthemius was a competent general.

His first action was to organize an offensive againt the Vandals of Geiseric. the result was a failure: the bad weather obliged the Roman fleet to return to its base before completing the operation.

In 468, Leo I, Anthemius and Marcellinus organised a huge operation against the Vandal kingdom in Africa. The commander in chief of the operation was Leo's brother-in-law Basiliscus (to become Eastern emperor seven years later). A huge fleet was collected to transport the combined Eastern-Western-Illyric army, and while most of the expenses were paid for by the Eastern Empire, Anthemius and the Western treasury contributed to this operation's costs. The operation was however a failure, with Marcellinus killed at Roman hands in the wake of the operation. Leo decided to sign a separate peace with Gaiseric; Anthemius lost his allies and, with the imperial treasury almost emptied by the failed operation, renounced taking Africa back and concentrated on the second problem of his Empire, keeping under his control the Western provinces that were the target of Visigoth expansion.

After the disastrous campaign in Africa Anthemius turned to the reconquest of Gaul, occupied by Wisigoths under the ambitious King Euric who had exploited the weak Roman control caused by political instability. Euric's sphere of influence had also separated some imperial provinces from the rest of the Empire. Even though Arelate and Marseilles in Southern Gaul were still governed by the Western court, Alvernia was isolated from the rest of the Empire and governed by Ecdicius, son of Emperor Avitus.

To prepare his offensive, Anthemius negociated an alliance between Aegidius, the Breton warlord Riothamus and the Raven king Enciv. The allied army met Euric's host on the bank of the Loire River in 470. The battle lasted a whole day and, according to Zosimus and Jordanes, the outcome remained in doubt until the Raven light cavalry outflanked the Gothic line and attacked it from the rear. Euric was killed in the ensuing route and a large part of his army drowned in the Loire river.
 
Good idea and start of the timeline. A few questions:
-Is it possible to travel from Chukotko-Kamchatkan territory all the way to Xiongnu territory? On the map it looks quite far.
-You don't tell about this in the timeline, but I am still curious, would the Raven actually stick to their old language? Aren't they more likely to adopt a new one?
-Would the Raven actually remain a tribe? Since they only counted 400 persons in the beginning?
The rest looks good so far.
 
-Is it possible to travel from Chukotko-Kamchatkan territory all the way to Xiongnu territory? On the map it looks quite far.

Well it's a long way, but those area were - and are still - sparsely populated, beside we are talking of a hunting tribe, without much belongings to carry along. There were no centralized state in the area north of Koguryo, only tribes, so the Raven negociated or fought their way through their territories without being able to settle.

-You don't tell about this in the timeline, but I am still curious, would the Raven actually stick to their old language? Aren't they more likely to adopt a new one?

Yes, they do. Enciv is 100% Chukotko-Kamchatkan. I know it is far fetched, as they are not numerous an surrounded by people speaking other languages. Yet I feel its possible as long as they remain a tribe, which is made easier by the relatively loose structure of nomadic empires.

-Would the Raven actually remain a tribe? Since they only counted 400 persons in the beginning?
400 is a lot in the frozen waste they come from, and their number will grow as they adopt a pastoral lifestyle. Of course in an agrarian setting they would be assimilated but both the Taiga and the steppe are sparsely populated
 
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