WI: No Seljuks

What if the Seljuks had been stopped from establishing the Great Seljuk Empire? Suppose at the Battle of Dandanaqan in 1040 (https://worldhistoryproject.org/1040/5/23/battle-of-dandanaqan) the Ghaznavids defeated the Seljuks after one of their leaders (the grandchildren of Seljuk himself) was killed. Besides the lack of a Sultanate of Rûm, how would the rest of the Middle East fare? Would the Buyids have lingered on? Would the Ghaznavids have been more successful?
 

B-29_Bomber

Banned
What if the Seljuks had been stopped from establishing the Great Seljuk Empire? Suppose at the Battle of Dandanaqan in 1040 (https://worldhistoryproject.org/1040/5/23/battle-of-dandanaqan) the Ghaznavids defeated the Seljuks after one of their leaders (the grandchildren of Seljuk himself) was killed. Besides the lack of a Sultanate of Rûm, how would the rest of the Middle East fare? Would the Buyids have lingered on? Would the Ghaznavids have been more successful?

If the East Romans get out of their post Basil II slump they may well reconquer the Levant and Egypt over the course of the next few centuries.
 
If the East Romans get out of their post Basil II slump they may well reconquer the Levant and Egypt over the course of the next few centuries.
Too hard, IMO. Egypt and Syria were too filled to the brim with muslims. If it is the goal of the byzantines to reconquer these areas, then they'll have ti abandon their religious rhethoric, like the british empire.

Answering OP's question, I think the most plausible scenario is that:
-The Fatimids retain their hold on Syria and the levant.
-The Ghaznavid persians survive.
-The Abbasids remain stronger.
-The byzantines end up stronger in their eastern borders due to a lack of Manzikert.
-Something about Armenia.
 

B-29_Bomber

Banned
Too hard, IMO. Egypt and Syria were too filled to the brim with muslims. If it is the goal of the byzantines to reconquer these areas, then they'll have ti abandon their religious rhethoric, like the british empire.

The Romans were surprisingly tolerant of Muslims. The only reason why they considered Muslims their enemy at all was because for centuries they were an existential threat to the Empire.

The Empire even had a mosque in Constantinople for visiting Muslim merchants to pray at.
 

Red Orm

Banned
The Romans were surprisingly tolerant of Muslims. The only reason why they considered Muslims their enemy at all was because for centuries they were an existential threat to the Empire.

The Empire even had a mosque in Constantinople for visiting Muslim merchants to pray at.

I think they'll find the large Christian minorities in general and Christian majorities in many areas more troublesome that Muslims. These Christian "heretics" were certainly more afraid and hateful of the Byzantines than anybody else in the area.
 
The Romans were surprisingly tolerant of Muslims. The only reason why they considered Muslims their enemy at all was because for centuries they were an existential threat to the Empire.

The Empire even had a mosque in Constantinople for visiting Muslim merchants to pray at.
Turkish people even lived in Constantinople.
 

Deleted member 67076

The Abbasids are going to bounce back and become the regional power without the Seljuq interruption. Similarly, I suppose the Turks would more likely invade India rather than Persia as that'd be seen as an easier target.

Too hard, IMO. Egypt and Syria were too filled to the brim with muslims. If it is the goal of the byzantines to reconquer these areas, then they'll have ti abandon their religious rhethoric, like the british empire.
Egypt was roughly 50% Christian at this time, and Syria was slightly more-so with the Lebanese coast still majority Orthodox.
 

B-29_Bomber

Banned
I think they'll find the large Christian minorities in general and Christian majorities in many areas more troublesome that Muslims. These Christian "heretics" were certainly more afraid and hateful of the Byzantines than anybody else in the area.

Yeah, but even so, I doubt these heretics would be much of a problem if the Romans put some effort into reconquering the area.

It was ultimately a lack of desire to put the effort into reconquering the area than their ability to hold the area long term that held them up.

Why reconquer Jerusalem when we have the New Jerusalem right here in Constantinople, with the benefit of that "New Holy City" smell?
 
Icing Tughril just means some other Oghuz Turk comes west in some direction.

At the time, the Oghuz are under pressure from the Kipchaks, and the Oghuz Yabgu itself is badly fractured by internal disputes over draconian taxation of the tribes. Eventually someone else is going to be displaced by the Kipchaks, and it'll probably be another rebel tribe that's shaken loose. Where they go from there is anyone's guess, but Persia is probably the most natural place to go. Beating the Seljuks back at Dandanaqan preserves some of the Ghaznavids' lands, but the rest of the Seljuks don't go away - they're going to wind up somewhere, and going home isn't all that appetizing. As for where they end up, the Middle East is just too tempting, what with the Ghaznavids dealing with the fallout of the feud between the sons of Mahmud and the Abbasids weakened and under the Buyid yoke.
 

Red Orm

Banned
Yeah, but even so, I doubt these heretics would be much of a problem if the Romans put some effort into reconquering the area.

It was ultimately a lack of desire to put the effort into reconquering the area than their ability to hold the area long term that held them up.

Why reconquer Jerusalem when we have the New Jerusalem right here in Constantinople, with the benefit of that "New Holy City" smell?

I'd say it was a lack of ability to put the effort into reconquering. Remember, the Roman and later Byzantine empires literally fought civil wars that had a huge religious component to them. There were riots and massacres in Africa, Egypt, the Levant, and other places over Arianism vs. Nicene Christianity, and then Donatism, Iconoclasm, etc. The Greeks even preferred to be ruled by Turks than by Catholics, for god's sake, heretics were a huge problem to almost every Christian government at the time.
 
Where they go from there is anyone's guess, but Persia is probably the most natural place to go.

But would they necessarily conquer Persia like what the Seljuks were able to do? The Ghaznavids saw a brief revival under Ibrahim from 1058 to 1098, and continued for a while under the penultimate Ghaznavid Shahanshah Masud. If the Turks attacked the Ghaznavids during this period of stability, surely they could be thrown off?
 
But would they necessarily conquer Persia like what the Seljuks were able to do? The Ghaznavids saw a brief revival under Ibrahim from 1058 to 1098, and continued for a while under the penultimate Ghaznavid Shahanshah Masud. If the Turks attacked the Ghaznavids during this period of stability, surely they could be thrown off?
They might not. The fact that Turks are coming doesn't necessarily follow that they're coming as a giant bulldozer. They could easily come in dribs and drabs and make like the Pechenegs by just vanishing into the footnotes of history and assimilating into a culture, probably as mercenaries.
 
Thanks for the interesting discussion!


Too hard, IMO. Egypt and Syria were too filled to the brim with muslims. If it is the goal of the byzantines to reconquer these areas, then they'll have ti abandon their religious rhethoric, like the british empire.

Answering OP's question, I think the most plausible scenario is that:
-The Fatimids retain their hold on Syria and the levant.
-The Ghaznavid persians survive.
-The Abbasids remain stronger.
-The byzantines end up stronger in their eastern borders due to a lack of Manzikert.
-Something about Armenia.

So this could make that medieval Armenia wank, I guess? Who would come out on top in terms of Fatimids/Abbasids/Ghaznavids?

They might not. The fact that Turks are coming doesn't necessarily follow that they're coming as a giant bulldozer. They could easily come in dribs and drabs and make like the Pechenegs by just vanishing into the footnotes of history and assimilating into a culture, probably as mercenaries.

I get it, the Turks were a migration like the Germans were into Rome. They're coming west no matter if some leader is killed. But yes, the idea of them integrating into Persia is a potential alternate outcome...

The India idea is interesting too. Was it too late for some Turks to convert to Hinduism and create a state there?
 
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