Europe Buildup

[Borys]

Ahoj!
Why is Bosnia Roman? IMO at this point in time it should be Croatian / Hungarian.
Borys

[Jefgte]

I suggest to add Danemark & north Belgium (Flamands) to the Nordic Nations
& add south Belgium (Wallonie) to France.


Jef

[miketr]

Ahoj!
Why is Bosnia Roman? IMO at this point in time it should be Croatian / Hungarian.
Borys

A border zone of neutral nations is to be created to separate the big bad Roman Empire from Hungry / Croatia.  Bosnia will be one such.  Sicily and Sardinia will go back white.  It has been suggested that Byzantium get Mesopotamia and I suggested the Suez Canal.  I am not exactly in favor of the former as I think it would open the door to me at some point going conquistador in the Middle East.  Which I am going to attempt mind you but not till well into the game.

Michael

[miketr]

I suggest to add Danemark & north Belgium (Flamands) to the Nordic Nations
& add south Belgium (Wallonie) to France.


Jef

Idea is for France to be a failed state here, it will be several minor nations.  When the nation came apart will need to be debated. 

Michael

[miketr]

Part of the Mods objectives is to prevent players from having direct access to lands open to colonization.  So Persia as a player nation isn't allowed.

That's nice. I'm allowed to have my opinions on the matter.

Yes the players are allowed to have such but someone needs to have veto over such things.  Again we want the players A) to be next to each other and B) not having direct connections to territory to expand into.

Gray/Black it is hu. Well never mind.

Closest I could get to Feldgrau

Michael

[miketr]

Added Italy and gave them Sardinia and Sicily.  Also the neutrals.
http://img846.imageshack.us/img846/2811/europev4.png

Michael

[Barcaii]

Well, this might be fun. I was thinking of having italy/greece and call it the second roman empire but I might need to change that plan considering we already have one empire trying to reestablish the roman empire. Unless you feel like it would be a fun diplomatic situation with two nations claiming to be the true roman empire?

[miketr]

Well, this might be fun. I was thinking of having italy/greece and call it the second roman empire but I might need to change that plan considering we already have one empire trying to reestablish the roman empire. Unless you feel like it would be a fun diplomatic situation with two nations claiming to be the true roman empire?

Remember that Byzantium has an unbroken linage of its emperors back to Rome itself.  As far as Byzantium is concerned it IS the Roman Empire.  All other nations of Europe are nothing but nations in revolt against the one true Empire.  ;)

Yes this was the historic attitude of Byzantium during the Medieval period and caused all sorts of problems.  European nations response was to call the Emperor of Byzantium, King of the Greeks.  Its sorta like what China did during the 19th century where the Imperial state viewed anyone outside of the middle kingdom as Barbarians.  So in Chinese memos Victoria was referred to, roughly, as the Barbarian Vassal Queen.

Michael

[Nobody]

Well, this might be fun. I was thinking of having italy/greece and call it the second roman empire but I might need to change that plan considering we already have one empire trying to reestablish the roman empire. Unless you feel like it would be a fun diplomatic situation with two nations claiming to be the true roman empire?

Remember that Byzantium has an unbroken linage of its emperors back to Rome itself.  As far as Byzantium is concerned it IS the Roman Empire.  All other nations of Europe are nothing but nations in revolt against the one true Empire.  ;)

Yes this was the historic attitude of Byzantium during the Medieval period and caused all sorts of problems.  European nations response was to call the Emperor of Byzantium, King of the Greeks.  Its sorta like what China did during the 19th century where the Imperial state viewed anyone outside of the middle kingdom as Barbarians.  So in Chinese memos Victoria was referred to, roughly, as the Barbarian Vassal Queen.

Michael

Don't forget that Germany is sort of also successor of the "Holy Roman Empire" as well!

[miketr]

Don't forget that Germany is sort of also successor of the "Holy Roman Empire" as well!

The Holy Roman Empire wasn't Holy nor Roman nor much of an Empire.   ;D

OK so how do we have unification of Scandinavia and Iberia?

For Iberia I suggest

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iberian_Union

For Nordic I believe Korpen was thinking along the lines of a Dynastic union between Sweden Norway and Denmark. Finland is easy enough, the Sweds never loose it I guess or get it back at some point.

How do we have Germanic Unification and a shattering of France? 

Michael

[Barcaii]

Anyone got a suggestion for Italy if Im not going for a Roman Empire? I was sorta feeling it as it would give me a reason to play arrogant and exansionistic. I could maybe go for something more traditional with a slight twist. I'm thinking that during the unification of Italy, instead of the Holy see failing to keep and power of the Papal states they instead establishes themselves as the major power in Italy(posobly be establishing some sort of alliance with some country of power). intresting or booring idea?

[miketr]

Anyone got a suggestion for Italy if Im not going for a Roman Empire? I was sorta feeling it as it would give me a reason to play arrogant and exansionistic. I could maybe go for something more traditional with a slight twist. I'm thinking that during the unification of Italy, instead of the Holy see failing to keep and power of the Papal states they instead establishes themselves as the major power in Italy(posobly be establishing some sort of alliance with some country of power). intresting or booring idea?

If you want to play at being a "ROMAN" state by all means.  Kaiser is German for Caesar as is Tsar for Slavic.  Charlemagne had himself crowned as Roman Emperor in the West.  Napoleon was clearly playing to Roman Imperial Symbols.  Benito Mussolini dreamed of making Italy a new Rome.  The USA did such to a limited degree with the formation of the Senate and its vague Roman Trappings.

If you want Italy to view itself as a ROMAN EMPIRE then by all means do it.  Just have a good reason.  I suggest perhaps that Unification of Italy isn't as much of popular effort but one of the kings / dukes pulling it off.  So they promote themselves to Emperor.  Last Navalism had an Italian Roman Empire trying to be Rome unbroken linage and I don't think that really works.  An Italian state trying to call upon the Roman Tradition is much better.

One thing to keep in mind is that Legitimacy is an important thing.  There is a reason that so many states tried to copy Rome.  It was powerful and respected so they wanted to lend that aurora of respect to themselves.  Why did Kings place such importance on family connections, etc when trying to go after bits of territory.  Like the 100 years war in France as the British tried to take over.  Its that aurora of Legitimacy  and that could be what you do in Italy.  Italy was last truly unified the Roman Empire / Republic.

Michael  

[Guinness]

This could be fun: what if Italy were officially a "Papal State", ie the result of expansion of the holdings of the Papal States to the entirety of the boot?

[miketr]

This could be fun: what if Italy were officially a "Papal State", ie the result of expansion of the holdings of the Papal States to the entirety of the boot?

Interesting, not sure how that is managed but interesting.

Michael

[miketr]

Where I am at so far.

Byzantium Lives Time Line

1071 Byzantium Wins Battle of Manzikert afterward  Emperor Romanos IV Diogenes dies of typhus.  Byzantium plunged into Civil War and is unable to follow up the victory against the Seljuq Turks who are also in disorder with the death of Sultan Alp Arsian.

1072-1081 Byzantium Wracked by civil war as various claimants via for the Purple and a number of Mercenary units revolt and attempt to setup their own kingdoms.  While Seljuq Turks are a problem they are too weakened to push very deeply into eastern provinces.  Some territory is lost but the core of the Empire is intact.  Later the Turks under their new Sultan Malik-Shah attack Egypt and capture Edessa, Aleppo and Damascus.

1081 Alexios I Komnenos takes the throne and founds the Komnenian dynasty.  First test of his reign is an invasion of Balkans by Normans under Robert Guiscard.  The Normans had taken Southern Italy from Byzantium in the 1060's and finished the conquest in 1071.  Alexios I drives off Normans by 1083 and is able to focus on internal reforms.

The Byzantine Military is reformed with less emphases on mercenaries and more on internally raised military units and militia. 

1086 - 1092 Renewed  war with the Turks.  Sultan Malik-Shah makes an alliance with the Pecheneg to destroy Byzantium.  Pecheneg nomads head from their territory along the north Coast of the Black Sea for Byzantium while the Turks attack in the east.

1088 Battle of Sebasteia "Sivas" sees Turks defeated.

1091 Battle of Levounion sees crushing defeat of invading Pecheneg

1092 Treaty ends war with Turks following death of Malik-Shah and Turkish state fractured.  Of course raids from both sides continue.

1095 With Byzantium recovered Alexios looks to destroy the Turks once and for all.  Ambassadors are sent to Rome and Pope Urban II, the result is the Crusades.  In 1096 a large force of Western Troops pass through Byzantium to invade the Holy Land.

Alexios spends the next 20 years helping the crusaders, crushing internal revolts and continuing his reforms.

1118 John II Komnenos takes the throne and using the restored empire handed him by his father goes on a series of carefully handled military expeditions.

1122 Battle of Beroia Pecheneg Khanate dealt with once and for all.

1128-30 Fought a war with Kingdom of Hungry that saw Serbia crushed and formally annexed to Empire.

1130-43 Several battles were fought with Crusader states but mostly the Turks.  It is during this time period that John II gains his reputation as a great master of siege warfare.  Taking city after city and driving the Turks back.  1139 was his most ambitious campaign where John II marched on Baghdad.  While Baghdad was not taken Mosul was taken and sacked.  Afterwards the Turks quickly retook Mosul while the Emperor was celebrating back in Constantinople but the Turks fortunes were at an all time low.

John II was considering an invasion of Egypt when he died in 1143.

1143 A Warrior Emperor comes to the throne.  Manuel I Komnenos took his father's throne and with it a stable and prosperous state.  Manuel believed it was time to restore Byzantium to Greatness and to recover lands long lost.  Over the next 37 years Manuel spent a great deal of his time on campaign against many enemies. 

Campaigns against the Turks in Syria and Iraq to attempt to hold his father's gains.  In the Holy Lands sometimes with the crusaders and sometimes against the crusaders; such as when the second crusade arrived in 1146.  The invasion of south Italy in 1154 restored much of the area to Byzantine Control by 1158.  Most of Manual's reign was spent in increasing Byzantine control and influence in the Balkans.  Several times the Emperor went on long campaigns in Balkans.  So by 1172 most of the Balkans was either directly controlled by Byzantium or were vassal states.  Croatia and the Dalmatian coast were taken, a great fleet had defeated Venice forcing the city state to pay tribute and Hungry was made a 'friend and ally' of Byzantium.  Manual's greatest expedition came in 1169 when a Byzantine and Crusader army invaded Egypt.  By 1177 many of the key Delta cities where in the hand of the allies but there were also problems.  The Crusader Kingdoms and Byzantium squabbled over division of spoils in particular territory. 

Still when Manual I died in 1180 he had extended Byzantium's control in all directions.

1180 saw the young Alexios II Komnenos came to the throne with a regency under his mother the  Empress Maria.  Tensions and the light control that Manual I had over most of the newly taken territory came to a head.  Followed by repeated internal revolts and various contenders attempting to claim the Purple for themselves.  Hungary revolted and with Venetia was able to retake Croatia, while Southern Italy was lost to first the Normans and then the Holy Roman Empire under the Hohenstaufen's but the greatest enemy was Saladin.  While Saladin had been a thorn in Manual's side in Syria and Arabia he was not a great threat with the Empire united and well led.  With the Empire in disorder this was not the case.  Over the next 13 year Saladin went on a binge of conquest on a vast scale.  By the time of Saladin's death in 1193 he controlled the Muslim Holy cities in Arabia, Syria, Egypt, Mesopotamia and much of the Holy Land uniting it all in one state.  This state being the Ayyubid Sultanate.

Even the death of Saladin did not bring peace to Byzantium as no emperor could hold the throne for more than a few years. 

1204 Brought Byzantine Fortunes to a new low as one of the factions in civil war, Alexios IV Angelos, requested the Crusaders of the 4th Crusade to help him in the civil war for a large payment.  The crusaders did so and with Venetian were able to get a large army to Constantinople.  The problem with Mercenaries is they some times ask the question why work for someone when you can take over yourself?  The Crusaders sacked Constantinople, ripped off large sections of the European part of the Empire while the Serbs and Bulgars revolted.  This was the final straw for Byzantium and it would be many years before any Emperor would make large scale us of Mercenaries.     

The reduced Empire now centered on Anatolia and was ruled by the Laskaris Dynasty till 1260.   Three fairly capable emperors Theodore I Laskaris (1204–1222), John III Doukas Vatatzes (1222–1254) and Theodore II Laskaris (1254–1258) were slowly able to recover the position of the empire in Europe.  This was possible because the empire still had its primary recruiting ground in Anatolia intact and the Emperors kept peaceful relations with the Ayyubid Sultanate.   Theodore II first major campaign was the recovery of Constantinople in 1255 and moving of the capital back there.   

In 1261 a new Dynasty took the throne, Palaiologos, under Michael VIII (1261-1281) and they would rule the empire till this day.  Despite recovering much of the empire's position more still had been lost in the last century.  Also a new threat had arisen for in the late 1250's the Mongols had come on the scene.  Sacking Baghdad in 1258, Aleppo and Damascus in 1260 and were only defeated by a new kingdom in Egypt, the Mamluks in 1261.  The Mamluks were able to roll back the conquest of Syria but not anything else.  The Ilkhanate Mongols would be a major threat if not always enemies for the next century. 

Michael VIII spent much of his time on the throne locked in diplomatic struggles.