WI: Ottomans take Constantiople early?

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Deleted member 67076

Had an interesting idea lately: Lets say that the Mamluks decide to intervene in Mesopotamia during Timur's invasion of the place, leading him to invade Egypt instead of Anatolia. Further more, lets say he dies while campaigning there, while still giving the Egyptians a thrashing.

At the same, with no distractions at hand, the Third Ottoman siege of Constantinople succeeds, and the city falls in 1402. So the Ottomans have a 50 year head start.

What happens next? How big can the Ottomans get?

Its worth noting that most of the powers that can fight them have been weakened by recent conflicts (Egypt and Persia by Timur, Venice by Chioggia) or are currently embroiled in their own issues (The Hundred Years war).
 
What do the Ottomans gain in the short term from gaining Constantinople? European trade flows trough Egypt, Constantinople and Aleppo, and now that they're all in Muslim hands, how will European merchants react? Do the Orthodox clergy rally in Greece or in the Russian Principalities' 'third rome'?(they are definitely weaker in 1400 than in 1450)
 
In terms of how big the Ottomans get, maybe a little bigger than OTL.

I'm pretty sure they OTL nearly hit their zone of natural expansion, but I could be wrong.

Of course, if you weakened Russia from unifying under Muscovy, you could perhaps have the Ottomans expand up the Don River and try building that Don-Volga canal they tried to do OTL. But this time they stay north of the Caucasus.

If they also avoid the weakness of the interregnum following Timur's invasion, they could possibly get a leg up on the incipient Safavid's and take Persia for themselves given time. That would put them into serious Imperial overstretch though.
 
Suleiman the magnificent might START his reign with the Siege of Malta, instead of the Siege of Rhodes. His Father Selim having already sacked Vienna.

Although the Ottomons were nearing their natrual limit, Suleiman the magnificent legacy of attempted Conquest might include Italy, Austria and southern Poland. These rich areas were too fortified rather than too distant in OTL and might be more vulnerable two generations earlier.
 
There will still be a lot of butterflies to consider, lol, but this is a sure way towards Ottowank !

No instance of Ottoman Southern Germany, but the Turks will have quite a chance to become quite bloated. Preventing the rise of Russia and Persia into becoming constant resource drainers will do many wonders. If Austria should fall as well, then all right, the Ottomans will reach their utter maximum. Peripheries will get chipped on gradually in the end, but they'll have more then enough strategic depth to survive indefinitely, with the entire Balkans. Actually, without partition, Hungary won't likely go away. Even if it will, likely won't be as christians.
 
While it seems somewhat likely to help the Ottomans, especially if it's because the Timurid invasion never happened (rather than because the reduced Ottomans are choosing a different focus)...

The new and scarier Ottomans will be threatening Europe smack in the middle of Sigismund's reign, rather than after it. The Council of Constance hasn't happened yet, so on the one hand western christianity is officially in schism - but on the other, there's no Hussite war yet either. The Teutonic Order also hasn't been eliminated yet as a serious force.

Now, I am not saying any of this will matter, the crusade of Varna was a failure after all, but perhaps a Council to resolve the western schism will also solve the eastern schism (at least nominally) in exchange for a serious western attempt to curb the Ottomans. In history, the real attempt happened and then the Ottomans took Constantinople - with the fall of the City as rallying cry and no recent failure to contemplate, maybe there will be a stronger push.
 

Redhand

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I don't think the Ottoman state had the ability to handle Constantinople by this point as they had not yet really made Anatolia adequately free of Greek influence by this point and they may have found the Orthodox Church and the Byzantines in Greece more difficult to subdue. Also this was a time of instability for the Papacy so really you only need one of the two (or three?) Popes at the time to decide not to support them like in 1453 and the other competing Pope will mobilize parts of Europe against the Turks to show up their rivals.

The Ottomans may be able to take Constantinople but may not be able to keep it. If the bulk of attention is in Europe in the early 1400s than maybe the Timurids may destroy their base of power even more in Anatolia. Really the best time to strike is 20 years later when the last true nomadic threat is gone and Europe outside of Iberia is truly falling apart.
 
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