WI: No/different First Crusade

As I understand it the Crusades began with a request from the Byzantine Emperor Alexius Komnenos to the Pope for reinforcements to help him retake Anatolia from the Sultanate of Rum. Pope Urban II saw this as an opportunity to begin mending the great schism and enthusiastically supported the idea. Then things started to get out of hand. The Peasants Crusade cut a swath of destruction across Europe en route to the Holy Land, especially against Jews who were butchered by the thousands, and then once they reached Anatolia proceeded to raise all sorts of mayhem before being slaughtered by the Turks. The Princes Crusade fared better militarily, managing to secure large sections of the Levant, but ultimately reneged on their oath to Komnenos and established several Catholic Crusader states in former Byzantine territory.

The effect that this and subsequent Crusades would have on World history is immense. The mass fanaticism it kicked up in Europe had significant long-term consequences, in particular the violence against European Jewry which is regarded by some as a major turning point in European anti-Semitism. The establishment of the Crusader States would also have a significant impact on the geopolitics of the Levant for the next few centuries. The Fourth Crusade is widely regarded as being the beginning of the end for the Byzantine Empire after the sack of Constantinople (or at least greatly hastening its fall). Economically, it reopened the Mediterranean to trade and travel which played a significant role in the rise of Venice and Genoa as economic powers. The vast majority of monastic military orders were established in the wake and because of the Crusades (according to Wikipedia only one holy order pre-dated the Crusades) Most importantly it established a precedent for large scale aggressive holy war, sanctioned by the Pope and drawing support from across Christendom. This would lead to multiple future Crusades in the holy land, as well as other crusades in Europe, such as the Reconquista in Spain against Muslims, the Northern Crusades against Pagans, the Albigensian and Hussite Crusades against heretics in Southern France and Bohemia respectively, and the Stedingen Crusade against political upheaval and anti-Clericalism, to name but a few. In short the legacy of the First Crusade was kind of a big deal.

Now what would happen if the First Crusade had been prevented, or had gone more according the the Byzantine's original plan. Say for example if the negotiations surrounding the terms of the Crusade had broken down and the Pope decided to call it off? What if there was a less ambitious Pope who was more willing to support the Byzantine vision, and instead of offering a remission of sin for everyone involved in the Crusades, it's limited to a request to the major Catholic Monarchs to send a few thousand knights to back the Byzantines up? At the very least that might end up butterflying away the Peasants Crusade and all the associated fun that came with it. Furthermore, what if the First Crusade had been a resounding failure, and how would that affect future potential crusades?

What would the impact of all this be on European history? Would the Papacy take a less aggressive stance on holy wars, perhaps sticking to a more rigid just war theory? Would the Church play as active a role in suppressing heresy, or would it be considered the responsibility of the local Christian nobles first and foremost? If so how would this affect the various heresies that arose and would they have a better chance of surviving? Might this lead to an earlier reformation? Would this butterfly away the establishment of military orders, or at least the majority of them? Finally how would this affect the strength of the Catholic Church, given that they and their military orders were often one of the major beneficiaries of a success crusade?
 
As I understand it the Crusades began with a request from the Byzantine Emperor Alexius Komnenos to the Pope for reinforcements to help him retake Anatolia from the Sultanate of Rum.

That's the immediate cause, yes : but Crusades were possible thanks to a social/ideological evolution and integration of miles into a Christian way-of-life : If violence against Christians from a class whom whole legitimacy was based on warfare was frowned upon, the logical outcome for milites, in order to be religiously legitimized, was to use this violence to serve Christians.

Legitimisation of violence and more generally of a military-based social class (less nobility as a whole strictly speaking than milites, aka warring nobility) that is in the direct continuation of Truce of God and XIth councils (it did help that Urban II was issued from this nobility, and most able to speak to them as they could agree with) played the most important part there.

As armed protection of pilgrimage, partially-religious led expeditions (as in South Italy or Al-Andalus, while not Crusades) were already a thing, if Byzzies wouldn't have asked for reinforcement, eventually a religious expedition similar to Crusades would have been launched with the whole base being present.

Pope Urban II saw this as an opportunity to begin mending the great schism and enthusiastically supported the idea.
The Great Schism is more of an historiographical construction, and less of an actual historical reality : don't get me wrong, by the late XIth century, the distinction between Latin and Greek Christianities were undoubtly a thing.
But, and First Crusade is an exemple of that, relations between Pope and Emperor never fully stopped including religiously-wise, at this point.

Eventually, for Crusaders, it was less about servicing the basileos from the beggining, than Crusaders being convinced they are needed to deal with a growingly more unstable situation that prevents the safety of more and more popular Palestinian pilgrimages while that the fusion between milites mentality and classical medieval Christianism is already done.

It was extremely unlikely that they would just service Constantinople and go away : Normans were foes of Byzantium mere years before.

Again, the big point there is the re-evangelisation of feudal society in the XIth century.

The Peasants Crusade
The Peasant Crusades is a bit complex, but roughly it mixes up peasants and small knights groups being led by nobles, groups being led by visionaries, and local expeditions with links with Crusades being quite limited).

Tough, getting out of hand would imply it was organised by Rome as was the nobiliar crusade (which, in spite of its name, included as well a really important part of peasants, paupers, and so on), when it clearly wasn't and was actively fought against.

Violences there were eventually less due to an initial fanaticism (it really mixed millenarism, visionarism and outright weird stuff* than rationalised trough this : these people were not able to pay as they advanced, and resorted to plunder; that being mixed with anti-establishment revolt due to re-evangelisation of the XIth centuries and social troubles, as a central point that nobles lost their right to really lead because they lead an un-christian life (René Grousset spoke of jacqueries, allowing "foes of social order to destroy everything").

That said these had sometimes a solid nobiliar presence (Gautier sans-avoir or Emerich of Lesingen for exemple) which was either part of the wake or, less genuinly, tried to harness it at their own benefit.

There, the opposition between fringe, millenarist clergy more close to peasantry and regular, urban clergy is telling : on most matters, we're again in presence of a millenarist peasant rebellion attacking towns.


*For exemple, gooses being venered on one church because the rumor said that they were sent by God to lead people on Holy Land


The effect that this and subsequent Crusades would have on World history is immense.
Not much actually : it was often joked about that the only real lasting success of Crusades were that they bring oranges in Europe.
More seriously, the gains and legacy of Crusades themselves are less than obvious.

One I could certainly agree with was the kick in strategics and tactics in medieval warfare : you certainly had a before and an after Crusade on this matter (both for defense and fortifications, than for siege tactics).

However, without Crusades, such would have been as easily taken from either Muslim Spain or Sicily where almost all transmission between Arabo-Islamic world and Western Christiendom happened IOTL.

The mass fanaticism it kicked up in Europe had significant long-term consequences, in particular the violence against European Jewry which is regarded by some as a major turning point in European anti-Semitism.
"Fanaticism" is more of an all time cliché than really opening a real view on it. Some regions that participated most on Crusades could be ones that didn't knew similar actions against Jews (Tolsan and Provence, South Italy, etc.) and the antijudaic (which is to be distinguished from antisemitism : roughly, with the first, we're talking of religious opposition than often ends with (forced) conversion).

How it was handled after by autorities (secular as religious) points that institutional anti-judaism was still pretty much limited.
A more relevant turning point in medieval anti-judaism would be more the IVth Council of Lateran where Judaism was assimilated to heresy (which meant not only loss of legal protection, replaced by arbitrary protection, but made their persecution legit and commendable).

The establishment of the Crusader States would also have a significant impact on the geopolitics of the Levant for the next few centuries.
Yes, and no. Latin States were almost all the time on the verge of crumbling. They lived on as long they did less because of the irregular and politically troublesome reinforcement from Crusades, but because it was eventually a convenience for Muslims States in the region (basically, it allowed an buffer state to be present between Fatimid Egypt and Syria).
There's not much there, that couldn't have been done by Turks or Arabs of Palestine (that were building up small states, eventually taken over or integrated by Crusaders).

Economically, it reopened the Mediterranean to trade and travel which played a significant role in the rise of Venice and Genoa as economic powers.
At this point, Mediterranean basin was already not only re-opened to Christian merchants (it was the case since the late IXth century) but was largely dominated by them : it's how the Italian maritime republics managed to supply Crusaders in Syria.

Wouldn't have they been able to do that, First Crusade would have failed, simple as that. The whole "re-open Mediterranean" is a cause of the Crusade, not a consequence.


And even if it was the case, which is not, relations between Christians traders and Muslim shores were totally doable : see Venetians in Egypt.


While it impacted (mostly, it allowed Maritime Republics to be a mandatory partner of transmaritime operations, and that made a part of their political power), their strong presence in Mediterranean was already a thing.

Quoting Croisades et Croisés

Crusades, as military expeditions, may have troubled, if not interrupted temporarily trade relationship, critically with Egypt. Crusades, in its long length, didn't fudamentally affected a trade that would have develloped anyway. But one can't say that it did changed nothing :it allowed Akka's development, then Ayas and Cyprus, then at least Black Sea

The vast majority of monastic military orders were established in the wake and because of the Crusades (according to Wikipedia only one holy order pre-dated the Crusades)

Which mostly impacted in Latin States, rather than Europe (where their influence was essentially metapolitical, and short-lived with the fall of Jerusalem). There, they certainly couldn't compete realistically, monastically-wise, with regular clergy.

Most importantly it established a precedent for large scale aggressive holy war, sanctioned by the Pope and drawing support from across Christendom.
Precedents were already there, tough. Long story short, you had religiously involved expeditions in Spain in the XIth already (it shouldn't be a surprise that one the main contingent of First Crusade came from Aquitaine, Tolsan and Provence).

What First Crusade changed, is less the process of legitimisation of violence (which was already in process since the Xth century) than its relative institutionalisation (relative because it's essentially a retrospective thing : contemporary witness of Crusades weren't really able to define it or even to give it a name).

There's little doubt that an institutionalisation of these expeditions would have been used, and maybe with more success by secular authorities, if it didn't became a pontifical thing. (Critically with the introduction of Justinian Law in the XIIth century, that allowed the identification of heresy as a lese-majesty thing, and therefore allowing secular authorities to act on their own behalf).

Now what would happen if the First Crusade had been prevented
The safest bet would have been to override the evolution of the Xth century.

Eventually, what you would need is a weakened papacy, maybe no HRE in order to butterfly away the Ottonian Reform, making Rome unable to really support movements as Peace of God or at least having them remaining under local religious control, and therefore and while more or less respected, not really susceptible to gather as much.

It wouldn't butterfly away religious expeditions, would it be only because they already existed by then, but it would remain a more regional concern, directed against Arabo-Andalusian or Arabo-Africans, maybe some on behalf of Byzantines (I'm not sure you'd have both ideological motivation and general structuration to launch autonomous expeditions, tough) and maybe Baltics. All with a more important secular drive.

It would have important consequences on political conceptions in Western Europe : overall, XIth Europe would be a relatively different place to live with less restriction on war and more direct nobiliar power or influence on regional clergy.

On Middle-East...Byzantines could have it a bit harder, but the truly chaotic situation regionally at this point would prevent a complete Turk takeover, especially with Fatimids being unopposed in southern Syria.
That said, Constantinople could meet an earlier end, being more under pressure from Normans and not beneficing from as much Anatolia they had IOTL (altough I think Kommenoi could take back 1/3 of it with their own means).
 
Would an Imperial controlled 'Crusade' produce better results for Byzantium than OTL results? I think that the formation of the Crusader States and the occasional passage of armies through the area gave the Islamic powers something to occupy themselves with other than attacking Byzantium, which is handy. They also helped the Komenenos with campaigning on occasion, which is another bonus.
 
Would an Imperial controlled 'Crusade' produce better results for Byzantium than OTL results?
I'm not sure what you mean. Byzantine Emperors had strictly no way to call on milites directly, or to even attempt call on their conceptions. Too far, too different would it be only because the concept of religious military expedition was foreign to Byzantium : the closest thing you could have would be John Tzimiskes' campaigns and they were vastly different.

You had tentatives, but for political (it would mean the military matters would have escaped direct imperial control) and cultural reasons, the whole concept of religious war didn't root

If you meant having Byzantine using western mercenaries directly, they did that IOTL. It didn't exactly worked smoothlessy : whithout going in details about peoples as Roussel de Bailleul that ended forging his own principality, relations could often be really tense. With even more milites involved, the situation could really become unworkable : remember that the sack of Constantinople in 1204 was made possible because the basileus' son called Crusaders for help him against a pretender.

Of course, fact that Normans actively attacked Byzantium on its western borders didn't help.

I think that the formation of the Crusader States and the occasional passage of armies through the area gave the Islamic powers something to occupy themselves with other than attacking Byzantium, which is handy.
First Crusade effectively crushed Seljuk rule in Anatolia, so we're rather in the reverse situation. As for the others, the foes of Crusaders weren't often the same than Byzantium's and, as Fatimid (more or less partners of Constantinople) exemple points, ennemies of Crusaders could be friend-ish of the emperor.

They also helped the Komenenos with campaigning on occasion, which is another bonus.
Relationship is particular : Kommenoi gained a bad reputation because their goals were political and focused on Byzantium, when Crusaders were a mess of personal policy and religious drive. (Of course, Norman Antioch was way more hostile than Tolsan Tripoli, for obvious reasons).

Manuel Kommenos, thanks to a sound policy, managed to gain some suzerainty on Latin States (Kingdom of Jerusalem's annals, at this point, used the regnal date of Byzantium as well than their own), but we're rather in a political stabilization goal, than military one : again, the whole concept of Crusade is quite foreign to what existed in Byzantium.
 
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