The Shadow of the Mongols.

[Alex Richards]

By now it's clear that just about every concievable POD for world changing events has been used already. However, I think (hope) that this is an original take on the effects of a well-used POD, the death of Ogedi Khan in 1242. Simply put, his death is delayed by another 5 years, allowing the conquest of Europe to occur.

 

[Alex Richards]

Extract from the Historia dei europa a 13th-14th Century text chronicaling the history of Europe during the great collapse.

In the year of our LORD one thousand, two hundred and forty-two, barbarians from the east ravaged the lands of Christiendom and plunged the lands of Europe into anarchy.

Extract from This fractured Isle by Christopher Lee, reproduced with consent from the author.

For the average Englishman, the 13th Century must have been horrific. Peace had never been hald for long in England, the wars of Stephen and Matilda had occured a century earlier, the Norman conquest a mere 50 years before that, and a long history of sucessive raids, invasions and conquests stretching back to the Romans. However, for the first time England was tearing itself apart, as surviving members of the aristocracy fought for the increasingly defunct throne of England. With King Henry III, his wife, children, immediate family and much of his extended family and court killed in the sack of Bourdeaux in 1243, an obscure great-granson of Henry II, and heir to the throne of France, Alfonso, Count of Poitou to claim the throne of England. Though after his defeat at the Battle of Aylesbury in 1269 he never held any temporal power in England, he and his decendants continued to claim the title King of England long after it had ceased to have any meaning.

Indeed these were dark and dubious times for England, though how the arrival of invaders from the east could cause the collapse of the English state was unprecidented, and certainly is was never expected that this disunited realm would become the center of the greatest revolution the world has ever seen. To find the answers, we need to journey to Hungary, 1241.

 

[Alex Richards]

Chapter 1: The Battle of Vienna

January 1242

He lay on the ground, his woolen blanket providing a layer between his body and the snow. Above him, the bare trees pointed mutely at a leaden sky, and the hill sloping away below him was spotted with the thick clumps of gorse, and trees. From here he could see the River, poderously winding through the landscape. To his right, the spires of Vienna punctuated the horizon, to his left, nothing but the plains, and hills and the river. Far off on the horizon, a thin plume of smoke could be seen. A plume of smoke that had been on the horizon for a week now. It was Bratislava, burning still though the hordes of barbarians from the east had left days before. His reason for lying in the cold was before him. With a backdrop of the Alps, and the river between him and them, was the army of Austria. It looked small, far to small to face off the hordes that had already destroyed the armies of Poland and Hungary.

He Couldn't see Duke Frederick II in amongst the knights, but he knew he was there. How could he not be, for the morale he gave his men was crucial. There had been no way to call a larger army, no one was ready, after all it was the middle of winter. No-one expected an attack now. Though he hoped that victory would be achieved, he had given orders to his family before he left: gather everything you can, herd the livestock, collect food and ale, be ready to flee when I return. The whole villiage had been preparing when he left, and he knew that his family would have help in his absence, after all his news could decide the fate of many, so who were the villagers to begrudge aiding him.

As he looked to the left, away from Vienna, he saw them. A dark mass of bodies, cavalry galloping through the snow towards the awaiting army. As he watched, they loosed a volley of arrows that flew through the air towards the knights, darkening the sky with their numbers. Several knights fell immediately, and more were dehorsed. Those few militia archers that the duke had gathered loosed their arrows, but could not match the invaders for range or power. When the enemy finally attacked, it was in a solid wall of horsemen, swinging swords and scything the heads off several knights before they had time to move their swords to a stabbing position. The battle became a rout, then a massacre, and, though he did not see it happen, he knew when the duke was dead due to the suddenly breaking and fleeing of those few remaining troops that could escape.

As he watched the survivors flee, he knew with a cold certainty that they would be caught before they could reach the safety of Vienna. As he ran back to his village, he knew also that his family would be lucky to survive the winter, though the fact they had already killed and salted the pigs meant that they had some meat, and wouldn't be slowed down by an animal that was unsuited for walking through the snow.

A week later, he stood on a hill and looked back at the smoke and flames rising from Vienna. Then, shouldering his pack, he and his family continued on their way, a few among the many heading for Bohemia.

 

[Alex Richards]

If anyone wants to post comments, please do.

 

[sahaidak]

Well, it sounds plausible. The Mongols would have troubles moving through woodlands of Europe... but they did it in Rus', even more so - in China, so, I think it would be possible to go all the way to the Last Sea, especially using some Europeans as auxiliaries.
One nitpick - you've mentioned Lithuania as the Mongols' defeated enemy. By 1242 there was no Lithuanian state. There were some scattered Pagan tribes, sometimes united by successful warleader, more often waging war with each other. It doesn't mean that the Lithuanians would be easily subdued by the Mongols. Quite opposite - without centralized leadership, but with swampy, densely forested terrain, Lithuania would be one of the last victims of the Mongolian invasion. In OTL Batu Khan did not bother himself with conquest of Lithuania proper at all.

 

[Alex Richards]

Ahh, thanks for the Lithuanian info. I'll edit it out

I'm going for Central and Western Europe ravaged leading to anarchy.

Does anyone have a suitable map I can edit?

 

[Cylon_Number_14]

Unfortunately, you and another very recent poster have the same POD

But his had the Mongols kill off something like 60% of the entire population of Europe from Moscow to Manchester to Madrid. Somehow that sounds a bit implausible even for the most ruthless and successful rampaging hoards the world has ever known.

I like the idea of you focusing on England and perhaps another state or two so that we get a better feel of what the destruction does to Europe other than "extinguish it" which is unlikely.

I have always thought that the results of 5 years of Mongol rampages would be to delay European technological (and therefore explorational and expansionist) progress by something in the neighborhood of 100 years, give or take depending on the scientific field. What is your take on this?

 

[T3h_shammy]

Or it spurs an uber Franco-Anglo alliance that dominates the whole world by 1900.

 

[Valdemar II]

While a conquest of Europe is theorectical possible, it wouldn't happen in 5 year, it would demand the Mongols setting themselves up in East Europe and from there use decades to conquer Europe with auxiliary troops raised among the local Europeans, I personal doubt that they would be succesful, mostly because they would start up with depopulate Hungary to create base to begin, which would limits their ability to raise troops, and make them easy victims of potential unified campaigns, escially because Hungary couldn't feed more than 100-200 thousand horse limiting the European Mongols to around 50000.

 

[Philip]

While a conquest of Europe is theorectical possible, it wouldn't happen in 5 year, it would demand the Mongols setting themselves up in East Europe and from there use decades to conquer Europe with auxiliary troops raised among the local Europeans,

Using European auxiliaries takes away some of the Mongol's principle advantages in warfare.

escially because Hungary couldn't feed more than 100-200 thousand horse limiting the European Mongols to around 50000.

I think most people who propose a Mongol conquest of Europe overlook this limitation.

 

[Alex Richards]

I was thinking along the lines of 5 years of raids, looting, pillaging and destruction across Germany, France and Italy (including English lands in France), rather than actual conquest, though the possibility of collapsing Egypt has been thought about (The Byzantines are doomed as well).

 

[Valdemar II]

Using European auxiliaries takes away some of the Mongol's principle advantages in warfare.

Yep, it would them just another European army.

I think most people who propose a Mongol conquest of Europe overlook this limitation.

I think so too, people forget that Europe at the time was woods, swamps, rivers and marchland, while both cold and damp, really lousy horseland, especially for horse skirmisher, which was why cavalry only made up a small part of European armies and was primary used as shock troops, a Mongol cavalry army which couldn't retreat would be in big trouble, when it met European troops, European cavalry would run through the Mongols force like a knife through butter, while archer and infantry would get rid of the rest, while they were trying to reorganise themself. The truth is that no army was better than the Mongols on the steppes, but in Europe, it would be like arctic troops in Congo (a bit hyperbole).

 

[antisocrates]

Yep, it would them just another European army.

No, it'd just be one of the most sophisticated premodern combined-arms army in history. Actually, a lot of this would depend on who set shop in Russia. The mature combined arms Mongol army was the creation of Kublai and his father for conquest of China, and its creation was one of the reasons for the Mongol civil war, in which Kublai came out on top. Historically, further you got away from China, more traditional Mongol rulers were in warfare. Both Golden Horde and the Ilkhanate were primarily steppe cavalry, using tactics that went back farther than Attila. Genghiz Khan and his cohorts brought revolutionary strategic vision to warfare, as evidenced by the much-admired invasion of Central Asia, but tactically they were still mostly steppe. It was only his successors, finding China proper to be inhospitable to cavalry (especially subtropical southern China), that the Mongol army became truly combined-arms. Depending on who ruled in Russia, the Mongol army might meet the challenge, or it might not. A steppe army, as was the Golden Horde, had little chance of conquering Western Europe. A combined arms army as used in China had good deal of chance to conquer Western Europe.

I think so too, people forget that Europe at the time was woods, swamps, rivers and marchland, while both cold and damp, really lousy horseland, especially for horse skirmisher, which was why cavalry only made up a small part of European armies and was primary used as shock troops, a Mongol cavalry army which couldn't retreat would be in big trouble, when it met European troops, European cavalry would run through the Mongols force like a knife through butter, while archer and infantry would get rid of the rest, while they were trying to reorganise themself. The truth is that no army was better than the Mongols on the steppes, but in Europe, it would be like arctic troops in Congo (a bit hyperbole).

Not really. It had more to do with the manpower system in Europe of the time that heavy cavalry predominated. And infantry was not an integral part of European manpower system of the time. Sure, communes had militias, but their effectiveness varied greatly and were in any case, mostly for defensive purposes. Proper wars were waged by mostly lancers, which's why the size of armies of the era was small. For example, the battle of Benevento which ended the Hohenstaufen dynasty was fought almost entirely by lancers. Furthermore, with few exceptions, European armies of the time had little articulation and coordination between different and even same arms. More importantly, because an European army of the period considered knights to be the main weapon, if a set battle were to occur between the Mongols and Europeans, it would be over a level terrain suited for cavalry-- both Mongol and European.