The Eftal Shahs

Here goes nothing.

An Eftal Shah

The fall of the Sassanian regime was not necessarily unexpected.

The emergence into the historical record of the peoples the Greeks called the Hephthalites, and
the Persians came to call Eftal, came at a time of great upheaval, famine and ethnic and
religious conflict in the Sassanian Empire. Despite a scarcity of historical record, we see that
they waged on and off war with the Sassanian Shahs, and in time would break out onto the
Iranian plateau, raiding and pillaging. Latter Sassanian Shahs paid them exorbitant tribute.

Their culture was not wholly unfamiliar to the Iranian civilization - they worshiped similar
divinities, a syncretic faith which seems to be based on fire-worship but also Buddhist and Hindu
conceptions of divinity - indeed they often tolerated and patronized Buddhist worship. From their
capitals at Balkh and later Piandjikent, they asserted a dominion which was primarily
established by their willingness to settle the lands they conquered. Since the middle of the fifth
century, the Eftal had won major victories against the Sassanian Empire, gaining a foothold on
the Iranian plateau that would become permanent.

The latter Sassanian Shahs were generally placed on the throne with the aid of “Tokharian”
nomads. Firuz himself, the last Shah, was originally granted his throne by these nomads.
However, he would, after gaining the throne, turn against the Eftal, temporarily driving them
back and putting an end to the incessant raiding that had characterized their arrival in Iran.
However, it was not to last.

In 484, in the province of Khurasan, Firuz was defeated in battle and slain after riding into an
ambush. “Cudgel-armed and swift” warriors rode down his retinue and seized many of his
family, killing the Emperor, and capturing a column of war elephants some of whom would see
action at the later siege of Edessa, among other places. A succession crisis followed, with
various Sassanian royals attempting to seize the throne. One of them, Kavad, was aided by the
Eftal, but shortly after being placed on the throne, he reneged on his promises to pay the
“barbarians” – trusting that his own troops would be sufficient to repel the Eftal and restore the
Iranian Empire to its former glory.

They were not. Despite a few inconclusive battles near Spahan, Kavad was chased south
towards Sostar, where he was captured and executed and the Eftal King Akhshunwar rode into
Ctesiphon as a conqueror, becoming in time the Shah of Iran. At first, the regime was essentially
one of plunder. Ctesiphon and many of the Mesopotamian cities were sacked. Fortresses such
as Nisibin surrendered to avoid a massacre and Baktrians, Sogdians and Kidarites among
others were transplanted into newly founded garrison cities. Emulating the practices of settled
conquerors proved a remarkably successful practice which would lead to a long-lasting
dominion.

From Susa, the new Shah Akhshunwar I would rule in the style of an Emperor.

Roman-Eftal War

Anastasius Dicorus, the Roman Emperor at the time, was struggling to manage the affairs of
state. The dilapidation of many of the major eastern fortifications, and the lack of a fortified base
such as Nisibin presented many logistical challenges to any General assigned to the Persian
frontier. Ongoing sporadic warfare in the Isaurian mountains and religious challenges combined
to threaten to undermine the Emperor much as they had his predecessor, Zeno.

The Roman Empire appeared strong, but in truth was in many ways a paper tiger, one which
had not been capable of responding to the vacuum established by the fall of the Sassanian
Empire. Cursory diplomatic relations had been established, and a Hephthalite ambassador had
arrived in Constantinople, where the Emperor tried his best to overawe the “barbarian” with the
splendor of the Imperial City. Contemporary Byzantine records indicate that the Hephthalite was
impressed, and it seems that the Emperor decided to respect a continuity of sorts – treating the
new “Shah” Akhshunwar as merely the founder of a new dynasty of Persian kings.

It would not last. By 499, Syriac records show that the Eftal were raiding in force into Syria and
Orsoene. Roman reprisal was swift, and a Roman army under the elderly Flavius Patricius
scored several major victories, even investing Nisibin for a time, before the Eftal armies rode
north and enveloped the Roman army at the battle of Saokoros. Despite the slow Eftal
response, Nisibin held out long enough that it mattered little. Despite the fall of such cities as
Dura and Anat to Roman sieges, the battle of Saokoros would force the Romans to retreat.

Saokoros was a major turning point in Roman history, though few would recognize it at the time.
There were other armies, and other generals. But in the meantime, Edessa and Hierapolis
would fall, and a series of inconclusive engagements such as the famous battle of Samosata
between General Aerobindus and the Eftal Prince Kosnavaz would prolong the war until 503,
when peace would finally be agreed upon. The war had been far more costly for the Romans
than for their Hephthalite foes – Saokoros and Samosata alike represented major blows to
Roman manpower - not blows that couldn't be absorbed by one of the most prosperous and
powerful states in the world, but blows nonetheless.

Seven years later, when the war resumed, the political situation had changed in ways less than
favorable to the Romans - but yet paradoxically, under able leadership, the Romans triumphed.
The Balkan provinces had been denuded of manpower they critically needed, and a Bulgar tribe
called the Kutrigurs had settled along the Roman border. Meanwhile the blond-haired Gepids
were raiding into Moesia with relative impunity. Despite a series of punitive actions against the
Gepids, the Romans were shaken – and forced to commit additional forces to the Balkans from
the east. Yet this time against the odds, the Roman General Vitalian, a half-barbarian beloved
by his troops was able to score a major victory and retake Edessa - though not many of the
other cities lost.

The Eftal and Persian aristocracy blamed their defeats for unknown reasons on the Christian
populations of Mesopotamia. A series of vicious pogroms marked the first of many. Despite a
series of rebellions, including the notable Insurrection of Ctesiphon, (511) the Eftal prevailed,
settling Kidarites, Sogdians and their own people throughout the region in an effort to prevent
further rebellions.

Vitalian

With Anastasius’ funding, Vitalian oversaw massive reforms to the defenses of the territory, and
the construction of new walls to replace a series of dilapidated fortifications. However, a year
later, in 512, a cabal of Thracian generals and bureaucrats, increasingly uncomfortable with
Anastasius’ Miaphysitism, approached the General, and helped him gain the acclamation of his
troops. Vitalian marched west. The Thracian troops marched on Constantinople and invested
the city, preventing a rapid response – and allowing Vitalian to win a few early battles against
loyal troops in the East.

However, the Syrian Marinus, and trusted ally of Emperor Anastasius, refused to join the rebels.
A Monophysite, and a famous tax reformer, the Emperor placed him in command of the fleet, a
task he performed admirably at – preventing Vitalian from crossing into Europe and ensuring
that the siege of Constantinople by the Thracian allies did not cut off the capital’s vital Egyptian
food supply. However, the Constantinopolitan mob, knowing that they were besieged, broke into
open rebellion nonetheless.

Areobindus, a distinguished General who fought in the Hepthalite wars, was proclaimed
Emperor by the mob. Most sources seem to agree that this was against his will – and also that
the mob was unaware of Vitalian’s march, the flow of people and information in and out of the
city being tightly controlled by Marinus. Anastasius managed, in a public appearance to calm the
mob – but Areobindus could not be found, and a subsequent riot saw Anastasius struck in the
head by a roof-tile. The Emperor retired to the palace, and Marinus, now in charge of the city for
all intents and purposes, put down the riot which called for his head with a massacre.

Administration

As mentioned before, it was the willingness of the Eftal to settle which ensured their dominion.
Buddhist missionaries from China reported “A people scattered in foreign countries, the masters
of scores of strongly walled cities and towns, a thousand thousand lords. They are tent dwelling
as well, and move with changing seasons.”

While the rule of the eastern Eftal was decentralized, with many rulers in that region acting as
absolute kings, the western regions, and the Sassanian provinces were ruled by a centralized
bureaucracy based out of Susa. Patronizing temples to the “Holy Fire, Ahura Mazda, Mitra, and
Visnu” the Shah spent his time alternating between riding from place to place, touring the
regime and meeting with his vassals and governors, and residing in the administrative capital at
Susa.

The flaw with this system was evident in the Hepthalite-Roman wars, where it took the Eftal a
remarkably long period of time to muster their armies – far eastern princes had be cajoled into
sending assistance, and the Shah himself was sometimes difficult to track down. However, the
Eftal armies enjoyed remarkable superiority over the Romans in the field, and had inherited
quality auxiliaries and siegecraft from the Iranians.

With the collapse of the Iranian state, the aristocracy and priesthood alike had fallen. The
religion of the Magi was poised to undergo drastic changes, as the Eftal brought both their own
unique version of Iranic paganism, and Buddhist and Hindu settlers into Iran and Mesopotamia.
The great monasteries of Arghan and Sat-Sabuhr were built by Akhshunwar’s successor
Toramana, as was the library at Mosil.

By the reign of Shah Toramana, parts of the Arabian peninsula were swearing fealty to the Eftal,
notably the city of Mazun – representing the continuation of Iranian pre-eminence over the trade
routes of the Persian Gulf.

A treaty between the Gupta Emperor Narasimhagupta Baladitya and Akhshunwar is credited as
establishing clear defined borders between the two dynasties. Our Hindi sources describe a
series of spectacular defeats of the “Hunas” – but little can be confirmed, save that an additional
two hundred war elephants were sold to the Hunas in exchange for a series of Huna fortresses
in the Hindu Kush – representing the focus of Akhshunwar’s policies on westward expansion
rather than into the Indian subcontinent.

Consolidation in the Latter Migratory Era

Aging

Akhshunwar, after the Insurrection of Ctesiphon knew he was not long for the world. A hard
drinker and a hard fighter, he was known to his contemporaries as a man of short stature and
broad shoulders. The Greek historians reported he was attractive, light-skinned and “not
hideous.” But in his old age his rule became increasingly tyrannical, especially over the Iranian
bureaucrats, who came to fear his notable wrath.

He favored his nephew, Toramana, over the husbands of his many daughters. Not a single one
of his sons lived to adulthood. His religion was the traditional shamanic paganism of his
peoples, but it would seem he gave little credence to faith beyond the ritualized practice of it. He
adopted Zoroastrian rituals and styles as part of his rule, beginning the assimilation of his
people that was already beginning early in his reign.
His legacy would be one of conquest. With the Western Roman Empire a forgotten memory
shattered by the Goths and the Sassanian dynasty defeated, the Eastern Roman Empire
remained the last tenuous link to the classical world, and cracks were showing in its armor. The
great cities of the Hellenic east still stood, but cultural and social transformations begun in the
late Roman era would ultimately lead to a fundamentally new world. European economic decline
continued unabated and the Roman populations in the west were slowly coming to
accommodate their new Germanic overlords.

The fall of the Sassanian dynasty by contrast was the collapse of an inefficient feudal regime
into an efficient but highly exploitative one, one based on plunder and a mere replacement of
the upper aristocracy with a new one. The division of societal roles was not wholly dissimilar to
that of Gothic Italy - the Eftal forming the role of a culturally different warrior caste that adopted
parts of Persian culture while maintaining a distinct identity even as they settled. The major
difference was the transplanting of eastern societies into the Mesopotamian basin, a move
which primarily was implemented to replace famine and massacre reduced populations that had
been neglected due to climate changes and the often violent sacks of the initial Eftal invasion,
as much as it was to create a loyal population base in the heart of an unruly region.

Arabia

The Banu Lakhm, the prominent Arabian allies of the Sassanian regime survived the fall of their
patron Empire. Their ruler was a clever and effective leader, Abu Ya'fur ibn Alqama, who had
seized power in a coup d’etat several years earlier.

Al-Hirah, the Lakhmid capital, was a fat and wealthy city perched on the banks of the flood-
swollen Euphrates. Opulent churches and gardens made the city famous for having, as one
Arab poet put it “the façade of paradise itself” – and indeed Al-Hirah was heavenly, wealthy from
trade and the blessing of the Sassanid Empire.

It was also a tempting target for a young Shah looking to expand his power. Toramana, new-
made Shah, appointed by his uncle Akhshunwar, was a cautious and prudent man, a warrior of
some renown, but more scholarly and intelligent. By the time he ascended the throne in 516, the
Eftal dominion had been established for almost thirty years. Many young Iranians had grown up
under the rule of the Eftals, and the ethnic makeup of Mesopotamia had changed.

The Christians still enjoyed a sizable plurality, an ever-restless population which felt they had
more in common with the Syriac peoples to their north than their Eftal overlords, but followers of
Manichaeism, Buddhists, Zoroastrians and many others had begun moving in. A melting pot of
cultures and beliefs, the land of the Tigris and the Euphrates was fraught with tensions under
Eftal rule – but the dynamic, warlike people who ruled it were not shy about suppressing
dissent.

And the Banu Lakhm, were far too close to home in the eyes of Toramana. He sent his cousin,
Kosnavaz, south with a “great host with dragon banners and cloth-of-gold” in the words of the
anonymous Arabian poet who wrote “The Sack of Al-Hirah” in truth, it was a relatively small
force – Toramana was, as he would be for much of his reign, preoccupied with subduing
rebellious eastern tribes whose chiefs were discontent with the idea of becoming “satraps.” It
also was a force of primarily Persian auxiliaries, with only a small elite cadre of the veterans
who Hellenistic historians called the “Hephthalite Companions.”

The battles were swift. Kosnavaz, famed taker-of-walls, was reportedly first through the gates.
This seems uncharacteristic of him, but some later historians speculated that Toramana was
attempting to kill his cousin, who in another life might have been Shah, and that the Lakhmid
expedition was never meant to truly succeed. At any rate, it did succeed.

Al-Hirah, the Garden of Paradise itself, was put to a brutal and uncompromising sack. Many
slaves were taken, and the great churches were looted. Abu Ya'fur was put to the sword, as was
his entire family. According to our Christian sources, Kosnavaz at that point, after bathing in
blood for three days, had a vision of God, rebuking the Prince for his cruel actions against His
holy flock. And thus Kosnavaz was struck blind and seven days later died an unrepentant man.
Or, more likely, Kosnavaz simply fell ill, or was assassinated by soldiers loyal to Toramana.

The destruction of Lakhm in the short term was a great boon, for it replenished the Eftal coffers,
which were still largely maintained by plunder - as was the loyalty of many Eftal troops.
However, it was a reflection of Toramana’s refusal to understand the subtleties of the politics of
the state he now ruled – a tributary, patronized Lakhm regime might have provided a powerful
buffer. As it was, the now ruined region was open to raids by Bedouin – the pagan caravan
raiders of the interior had new, more appealing targets, and the Eftal were unprepared to deal
with them, especially after a resurgent Roman Empire was growing more aggressive in the
West…

Roman Revenge

Vitalian had almost all the advantages in 513. He needed only to use them – and he managed
to quite well. The delay in crossing over to Europe merely gave him time to consolidate his hold
on the East, and by 514, Marinus’ fleet was in open mutiny after having not received pay,
Anastasius I was dead of a festering infection, and the mob would eventually get their wish – the
heads of both the Syrian and the Emperor on stakes after grisly mob executions which would
set the tone for Roman regime change for years to come.

Vitalian arrived in Constantinople at the head of a veteran army, well-trained and well-
disciplined, and no sooner had he finalized his status as Emperor than he rode north to break
the Gepids – and did so with great success. Upon his return to the capital, he was granted a
marvelous triumph. Little did he know that his victories would only give the Bulgar-Hunnic
successor states which were forming a vacuum to further establish their power in.

By 518, Vitalian had completed, ironically, the centralized taxation system begun by Marinus,
increasing state income and using it to outfit new armies and repair some of the devastation
inflicted by the previous round of warfare with the Eftal – as well as a new line of forts in Moesia
and Thracia. New legions of the comitatenses were raised, and he felt confident enough to
order reprisal raids into Orsoene, even as he began eying with suspicion the Goths to the west,
whose power and unity seemed to be growing under Theoderic.

Toramana (516-532)

Despite low-intensity conflict along the Roman border, Toramana’s reign is largely regarded as a
peaceful one. He rarely settled long enough to see the results of his building projects, but they
were impressive – bringing a Baktrian style into vogue. His main efforts were focused on
creating satrapies out of the nomadic tribes across Sakastan and Baktria, where many of the
Eftal had settled, subduing rebellious Christian elements with a mixture of tax breaks and
vicious reprisals, and finally, towards the end of his reign, Armenia, where he sought to build
new fortresses to guard against Roman incursions, and negotiated a marriage alliance with a
local Alan leader.

While he was sympathetic to the Buddhist populations, and founded many monasteries and
libraries, Toramana was also seemingly sympathetic to all religions – perhaps due to the amount
of privileges he was forced to grant the commissions, he founded an enormous Zoroastrian
temple in Komish, and a series of Manichaean temples in the Mesun region.

Toramana had no children, but he had “adopted” a close friend of his, Khauwashta, who would
succeed him. Khauwashta, half-Kidarite by birth, and either a Buddhist or a Buddhist
sympathizer, was not as easily accepted by the nobles, many of whom were prejudiced against
Buddhists, and some historians have mused that one of the reasons for Toramana’s frequent
state visits between the satrapies was to ensure that the young Khauwashta could make
personal friendships with some of those who he would one day have to rule.

Up next: A Look to the West

A Look to the East

By the time of Chounu Qagan, the Rourans were a people on the decline. Their hegemony was
failing. To their north, a people called the Tujue, or Turks, were growing in strength, subverting
Rouran authority, driving their allies and confederates south with incessant warfare. These new
“Celestial” Tujue were powerful, adaptable, and numerous. Already they were driving what
remained of the Gaoche tribes south, where the displaced Gaoche were coming into clashes
with a people that the Chinese called the I-ta, and the Greeks called the Hephthalites.

Attempts by the Eftal satrapies to funnel these migrations constructively tended to lead to
violence. As a emi-nomadic people the I-ta or Eftal were still more adept at handling these
migrations than their Persian counterparts, frequently incorporating them into the military
apparatus as mercenaries. The Eftal were already a polyglot mix and had little compunctions
about alliance with these new migratory peoples. The Gaoche in particular, composing much of
what remained of the Xiongnu, were something of distant linguistic and cultural cousins to the
Eftal. While some of these migratory tribes were allowed to give their loyalty to the Eftal Shah or
individual satraps and serve alternately as mercenaries or auxiliaries, many were either
annihilated or redirected back towards the Eurasian steppe.

The Tujue, or Kokturks as they would come to be known, would present a growing threat to the
Eftal Empire, but only with the benefit of hindsight could they have been prevented from rising.
In 526, the Rouran sent ambassadors to the Eftal court at Balkh, pleading for aid. In the vacuum
caused by the Eftal migrations the Turks had grown strong, incorporating into their hegemony
many disparate peoples. It is unclear if the Satrap of Balkh sent any aid, but it unlikely, since by
549, the Rouran hegemony would be properly broken, and the Celestial Turks would seem, at
least by the records of Chinese historians, to have taken their place, driving the Rouran south.

The fall of the Rouran was a slow affair, as many such tribal conflicts were. It was not the effect
of any one decisive war but rather the effect of migrations – migrations that would spur on
another wave of refugee peoples – Iranic tribes scattered south or west, movements which
would precipitate even greater migrations amongst the Slavs and Bulgars. In certain cases,
these migrations provided fresh steppe manpower to the ever outnumbered Eftal Shahs. In
many other cases however, they offered threats and opportunities to the eastern satraps,
satraps who gained more delegated power due to the magnitude of the threats facing them and
became increasingly independent despite attempts at centralization.

A Look to the West

In the year 519, Theoderic the Great lay dead, and in his wake it was uncertain what would
become of his Kingdom. Nominally a part of the Roman Empire, he had toed a careful line
between autocrat and custodian, playing different roles for his various subject populations, and
a different role for the Roman Emperor than either. But now he was buried with all the splendor
befitting a king.

It was not look after that Eutharic, his son-in-law was crowned. An Ostrogothic aristocrat, he had
been onetime Consul in Rome. His marriage to Amalasuntha had been one of clever political
maneuvering – an attempt to unite East and West Goths together under one crown. He was
invested with the title of Magister Militum by Emperor Vitalian not long after his crowning, in an
attempt to shore up the allegiance of his Gothic “ally.” Eutharic was not, however a tolerant man,
but an Arian through and through, famous for siding with even Jews over the Roman
Chalcedonian Catholics.

He kept his wife’s Romanophilic tendencies in line, ensuring that their children were fostered
among various Gothic nobles. Despite Vitalian’s increasingly overt attempts to curry favor with
him, he gave every indication of wanting to rule as a sole King, not as a subordinate of an
Emperor. And it soon became clear why Vitalian had been cozying up to him.
Despite ongoing low-level conflict with the Eftal Shahs in the East, Vitalian was increasingly
confident that the threat from the east was less important than reclaiming the West, and further
had been able to secure with a very low tribute even a cessation of that level of violence. Vandal
North Africa made an appealing target, and despite Zeno’s proclamation of eternal peace with
the Vandals, the recent persecutions of Catholics in the region, not to mention what appeared to
be the utter collapse of Vandal rule in the face of Berber invasions meant that the time to strike,
if ever, was now.

After all, all reports seemed to indicate that the Eftal were preoccupied, and the Vandal realm
seemed to be collapsing. An unwarlike king named Hilderic had taken the Vandal throne, and all
reports indicated that the Igherman people the Romans called Gaetuli were raiding and slowly
gaining control of the region. Vitalian hoped to strike while Hilderic was distracted with matters
in the interior.

It is unclear to what extent these were the ambitions of the Thracian Emperor himself, and to
what degree these were the ambitions of his nephew, Ioannes who Vitalian planned to give
command over the operation, despite his relative inexperience. Perhaps to offset this
inexperience, subordinates such as Bessas, a Gothic officer who had distinguished himself in
the East with Vitalian. Whatever the situation, planning quickly fell flat as Eutharic flatly denied
the Roman Empire the bases he would need in Sicily to carry out such an operation. Eutharic
reportedly feared that the bases were part of a plan by the Romans to wrest Sicily from his
control. This would turn out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Cautious voices in the Imperial administration counseled wisely against attempting to strike
without nearby ports from which to do so, and Vitalian became increasingly wary of the Gothic
regime – especially after the Roman Senate sent letters to Constantinople pleading for an
intervention. With the schism of Emperor Anastasius resolved, many of the Roman population
increasingly felt that they were a people occupied, and that the Goths were eroding their
influence. Some of these conspiratorial letters were intercepted, leading to a series of
executions in 522, including that of the philosopher Boetius and his two sons and the near-
dismantling of the Senate. All this cemented the idea in Vitalian’s mind that invention in Italy to
bring back a pro-Roman regime would be a prerequisite to any intervention in North Africa.

And further, with all immediate threats seemingly resolved, Vitalian felt comfortable sending
forth his nephew…

A Look to the South

The relative era of peace in the East lead to great prosperity. Many of the urban areas which
had been damaged in the early Eftal sacks showed signs of recovery – particularly Ctesiphon
and Al-Hira, now called Khishiwan and settled by a mixed population of Eftal Xiongnu and Arabs
– a sign of the new reality of Persia. The famed gardens would recover by mid-century, and
Khishiwan or Al-Hira, whichever one chose to call it, would become a great center of Nestorian
Christianity once more.
The trade with India was a great boon – with the advent of relative peace, goods could flow
through Mesopotamia once more, and some of the great east-west highways of commerce were
restored. The Eftal were not a particularly mercantile people, and indeed allowed affairs on the
Arabian peninsula to continue much as they always had – with Arabian, Hindi, and Persian
merchants plying their goods, and only the faces of the tax collectors having truly changed, so
to speak. Tax collection under the early Eftal Shah was not always efficient or well ordered, and
as such local merchants often made exorbitant profits.

However, this was still a world in flux. Trade lanes went either through the Eftal Shah, or the
Aksumite Kings who dominated Himyar – a situation which brought the Iranians into direct
competition with the Aksumites. While the historical record of this region is spotty, it seems
around the year 525 the Hadhrami, a mercantile people themselves, threw off the Himyar, and
thus Ethiopian yoke with the aid of Iranian money and mercenaries. It is highly probable that this
was the act of the local satrap of Mazun.

[Unfortunately for the Romans, a lot of Justinian's famous generals are butterflied in this timeline
from actually gaining overall command of armies. Vitalian is a different sort of Emperor and
rather into nepotism. So we get an earlier, and potentially less ably planned attempt at
reconquest.]

The Gothic Wars and another look into the east

What I know all you Romanophiles have been waiting for: The Gothic Wars

[for the buildup to these wars, check the prior page]

The plan for the invasion of Italy was mostly that of the Germanic general Bessas, who landed
in early 523 with some seven thousand men in Sicilia, and in a rapid campaign seized control of
the territory, with the exception of well-fortified Panormus, which was held by determined
soldiers under the Gothic noble Witiges. Despite being blockaded and surrounded, the city
refused to submit, and a series of determined assaults did not dislodge the defenders. Roman
naval superiority however, ensured that Bessas felt comfortable dispatching most of his forces
under an officer named Julian, who crossed the strait and took Rhegium after a brief siege and
moved to link up with Ioannes.

Despite Bessas’ struggles, Ioannes landed at Hydruntum and marched quickly north towards
Neapolis with an army of twenty thousand men, nearly a third of which were elite imperial
cavalry, including Alan mercenary archers. Along the way he gained the surrender of isolated
Gothic garrisons, and successfully linked up with Julian.

Meanwhile, the magister militum of Illyria, Coutzes, Vitalian’s son, marched on Salonae. Some
distance out from the city, he engaged a small force of Gothic cavalry and was mortally
wounded while riding in the vanguard. The army fell back in disarray and was brutally mauled
on its retreat to Doclea. The Gothic advance force allowed time for Ostrogothic Illyricum to
prepare for a long war and raise significant forces, including Langobard mercenaries.

Ioannes did not run into determined resistance until he arrived at Naples, which refused to
surrender despite only a minimal Gothic garrison. The citizens themselves rose up and manned
the walls, giving Eutharic an entire winter to raise an army. After Naples’ surrender it was put to
devastating sack, a sign of things to come. It was not until late 524 that Panormus finally
surrendered and was similarly devastated.

The Ostrogoths had raised large forces, and the aging Liberius, an important Roman official
under Theoderic counseled the citizens of Rome, at Eutharic’s request, to not welcome the
invading easterners. The Goths, he said, had preserved the institution of the Empire and
defended Italy – it was Vitalian, a usurper in the East, who sought to undermine what had been
built.

Ioannes lacked enough troops to encircle Rome, and he knew it. Despite the city being
depopulated, it was vast and not easily besieged. Further, Eutharic had now arrived with an
advance force of some six thousand men, with tens of thousands more en route – he contested
Campania with his horse and garrisoned the city of Capua, bringing in great reserves of grain
and ensuring the walls were in good repair. After Ioannes crossed into the flat coastal region of
Campania, his inexperience in commanding such a large army was already showing – further,
much of the force was newly raised and inexperienced – a far cry from the veteran troops along
the Thracian and Iranian frontiers, who were capable of creatively interpreting poor orders. The
Roman army performed poorly in a series of indecisive skirmishes, and Eutharic brought his
entire army together and marched on Naples.

Ioannes avoided engaging Eutharic’s superior force, retreating to Naples and ensuring that he
could be supplied by sea even as the Gothic siege lines closed around the city. After an abortive
sally attempt which did great damage to the Gothic foot but was nevertheless unsuccessful, he
settled in for a long siege, waiting for his uncle to send aid.

Illyrium, however, was actually not as much of a disaster as first feared. Witiges, the Gothic
commander, had a decent force, but it was heterogeneous and nowhere near as discipline as
the Imperial troops. Now under the command of the Isaurian general Leon, the Roman army
smashed Witiges over the course of a three day battle and marched into Illyrium, destroying
Salonae and reducing many of the fortifications in the region. However, Witiges rallied his forces
and prevented further advances.

Liberius arrived in November as ambassador of the Ostrogothic Kingdom in Constantinople,

where he presented terms – the Romans could retain Sicily, in exchange for a tribute. These
negotiations failed. Vitalian had tasted a few victories and was perhaps unaware of Ioanne’s
failures. He ordered Leon to land at Ancona and proceed inland towards Ravenna. Despite
having a relatively small force, Leon did so, and enjoyed early successes, taking the still
densely populated urban region south of Ravenna.

Eutharic rushed north, with Ioannes in pursuit. However, in truth, Ravenna had a strong
defensive position and he was not unduly worried. Noting Ioannes’ pursuit, he delayed his
march north, turned about and engaged the Romans. Ioannes was defeated, and his forces
retreated south in poor order. In the north, Leon besieged Ravenna while a detachment of the
Roman fleet blockaded it by sea, but the Roman campaign was collapsing.

By 525, the Roman-Gothic war was seeming increasingly untenable to the Roman court in
Constantinople, and many advised the Emperor to renew attempts at negotiations. Despite
Leon’s capable leadership and a series of victories in the north, the Roman campaign
represented a massive loss of blood and treasure for seemingly little gain – and indeed the
death of any notion that the Eastern Romans still ruled in Italy. And yet the bloodshed continued.
Two Roman armies still operated in Italy, one small but effective, the other large and wildly
unsuccessful.

Around this time, Vitalian recalled Ioannes, leaving Bessas in overall command of the Italian
war. As Ioannes departed, an additional five thousand veteran comitatenses arrived from the
east. The war was far from over.

Legacy of the Gupta

The failure of nomadic states to penetrate the Indian Subcontinent is not a universal trend in
history. The Aryan peoples seemed to have arrived by invasion. The Greeks and the Saka also
left their mark on the Indus river valley and sometimes even further into the continent. However,
the Middle Period of Indian History, marked by the ascension of the Gupta in 320 C.E.
represents both the period of Magadha dominance of the Subcontinent and also a period of
intellectual flowering and economic prosperity uninterrupted by invaders from the North.

It was the Gupta who annihilated and incorporated the Saka into their empire, and prevented
the Sveta Hunas from ever truly establishing a foothold in the region, and this breathing space
allowed northern Indian culture to flourish. Indian scholars developed the concept of zero. The
legacy of the Gupta was one of mathematic and scientific advancement, but also literary and
philosophical splendor – the remarkable tolerance of the Gupta monarchs – like the Maurya
before them - allowed the development and coexistence of a remarkable number of competing
religious and philosophical traditions. Despite local communal violence and the frequent
endemic warfare of the era, under Gupta patronage the arts and sciences thrived.

The enduring influence Gupta architecture can be still seen from Aden to Kalingga, in Gandhara
and Ceylon. Trade cities such as Mahathitha grew splendid in this era, taking in trade from
Arabia and Iran, China and Indonesia. One awestruck Iranian Buddhist began his famous travel
narrative with the lines “In white-harbored Thambapanni sits Mahathitha, the seat from which all
goods flow...”
Even as the Gupta waned and splintered, the great entrepot cities such as Sopara and Kottura
became true powerhouses, and Indian traders, primarily Pallava, continued to spread across the
world, settling in the growing city-states of Sumatra and Tarumanagara and Sailendra. In the
west, Persia and Arabia began to see a small but growing diaspora of Indian merchants from
the Vakataka Kingdom. These merchants would go on to establish scattered trade posts across
the African continent. Indian traders sailed as far as Madagascar, bringing back giant lemurs
and vast flightless birds for the wonder of their local Rajas’ courts. Later in the 7th century,
Hadhrami traders would establish the first trading ports on the island, but by then the
megafauna of the island were all but extinct. But still, the impact of these new markets should
not be underestimated – this was the beginning of a transformative era for the Indian Ocean, a
golden age which would continue even after the collapse of the Gupta into a succession of
warring states.

Touba Wei and the Bodhisattva Emperor

The “Northern Wei” were at this time a people in utter collapse. Rebellions and internal division
were only compounded by the rule of a weak Emperor, Xiaoming. This was not a time for a
weak Emperor either. The Rouran, displaced from their traditional homeland by the Tujue, were
riding south in increasing numbers, pillaging as they went. The Xiongnu General Erzhu Rong
was responsible for managing this incursion, but failed utterly to match the threat, and he and
his clan suffered grave losses.

In 524, Angui Qagan moved into the region at the head of what remained of the Rouran
confederacy. Over the next three years, they would conquer much of the Wei state. The death of
the Wei Emperor, Xiaoming only further exacerbated the anarchy. This period of chaos would
only benefit the Southern Liang, whose generals took the opportunity to expand their territory
northwards, driving back the Wei over the course of the next five years. They managed to take a
few notable victories and secure several major cities, but ultimately it was the Rouran who
benefited the most - becoming the new rulers over the region after the collapse of the Wei.

The Liang, ruled by Emperor Wu, known as the Bodhisattva Emperor was a kind and lenient
man, a lover of Indian culture by all accounts, who greatly patronized Mahayana Buddhism and
was largely beloved. However, he was also weak, overly kind to his relations and his
subordinates, unwilling to punish dissent or rebellion. And thus, by expanding the Liang
dynasty's power over the north, he also gave increasing power to his generals and
administrators, who frequently chose to exploit their position for personal gain.

If the Liang could endure would remain to be seen.

[There will be a lot of White Huns in the next update. Don't fear!]

Gothic-Roman war
The dream of Italy refused to die. While Bessas advanced north on Rome with a reconstituted
army, Leon fought a battle of delay against the bulk of Eutharic's forces. With a mere six
thousand men, the wily Isaurian commander retreated to the coast and evacuated - landing
again in the south, and retreating slowly back towards Bessas. As he went, he encouraged his
soldiers to pillage to feed and sustain his army, which had been under considerable stresses
due to frequent small-scale engagements. His incursion left a significant region of northern Italy
devastated, and a bloody swathe across the South.

Bessas and Leon linked up in late 525, and after a series of skirmishes, finally brought Eutharic
to battle. The Gothic army had been bleeding away for some time. Eutharic had been forced to
siphon away much of his infantry to provide garrisons for cities in the north, and where the
Romans seemed to have more than sufficient reinforcements, he did not. Nevertheless, he
finally met the Romans in battle outside Cumae, and there the two armies fought for "a day and
a night, till exhaustion claimed them".

Contemporary accounts of the battle seem relatively unreliable, especially on the Gothic side.
What can be understood is that neither side won the total victory both had hoped for. Eutharic
had intended to drive the Romans into the sea, and perhaps even reclaim Sicily and Illyrium.
The Romans had hoped to entirely change the tide of a war they knew themselves to be slowly
losing. While Leon's Thracians distinguished themselves in the fighting, as did the Byzantine
cavalry, Bessas retreated back along the coast, while Eutharic besieged and sacked Cumae
and Naples.

Through 526, the war showed no signs of stopping. The Romans seemed to have regained a
measure of their famous stubbornness, refusing to give up what Italian possessions they still
had - and knowing that Eutharic lacked sufficient soldiers to reclaim them. It was only in 528 that
peace would finally come - a peace that recognized the borders as they had become. Dalmatia,
Sicily, and the region of Apulia and Calabria remained Roman.

Back in Constantinople, Vitalian had been suffering. The war aged him immensely, and with
every reversal he was worn down. By 529, Vitalian named his son, Bouzes, Co-Emperor. Taking
the ruling name Zeno Augustus, the new Emperor would oversee the affairs of the East, raising
one of the Imperial bodyguards, a young man named Belisarius with whom he had found favor,
to an important command of a wing of cavalry in the East.

Despite these losses, the fortunes of the Empire remained apparently strong. Trade had
suffered, perhaps, but the Eastern Mediterranean remained prosperous even as Italy burned at
the hands of the Goths and Romans, and Africa crumbled under the mismanagement of Hilderic
(who in 530 would be assassinated by his own nobles). The Italian wars did not come to effect
Imperial defense greatly either - the Roman army was bloodied but not overstretched, and it
was still one of the most effective fighting forces in the world.

But the world, it would seem, was changing...

The Eurasian Steppe and Persia

By 527, Shah Toramana was increasingly aware that his life was coming to a close. He settled
down finally, ruling in Susa, as Akshunwar did towards the end of his life. Ever the builder,
Toramana constructed an enormous palace outside of the city gates, in which he would live the
rest of his life surrounded by gardens and "every sensuous delight the mind might conceive of."

Our Armenian sources indicate that Khauwashta was made "Commander in Chief, or Spatavad,
of the whole Shahdom" - and indeed, Khauwashta seemed to have absolute power in
Toramana's waning days. Though he expressed Buddhist convictions, beliefs that seem to have
stemmed from his mother, Khauwashta was also a warlike man, not inclined to cowardice.

While Toramana lost focus on the affairs of state, Khauwashta took control of affairs in the East.
The Gaoche and other tribes had not abated their pressure on his satraps, passing over the
Gozan river in force, passing through the region of Xvarezm in great numbers. Khauwashta,
with a great host of Eftal cavalry drove them back once and for all in 528, making "corpses of
many and slaves of others" after his victory. The closure of this southern route once and for all
spelled the disastrous end of the Gaoche confederacy, one-time allies of the Rouran.

Many of the peoples of the Gaoche confederacy, the notably the Xasar, Shipan, and Sahu
continued their westward drive, a movement which would . The stronger tribes, with older roots
in the region, notably the Uighur and Khirgut remained, many striking treaties and intermarrying
with the Eftal peoples of the region. Strict borders were difficult to enforce, even in victory.

What would emerge from this was a Xasar-Sahu migration up north around the Caspian sea,
where they would cross the Rav [IOTL Volga] by 534, into the lands of the Hunno-Bulgarian and
Slavic tribes they found there, displacing many of them and precipitating a mass exodus. This
exodus would take time to gather steam, of course - and many of the eastern Bulgar tribes
found themselves assimilated into the growing ranks of the Sahu.

While Khauwashta managed the East with remarkable skill, winning the loyalties of the satraps
and overseeing a reform of the system by which land was apportioned. The various nomadic
tribes under the Eftal banner, the settled peoples, and the various landed aristocrats of Persia
and Baktria alike had varied, often competing claims, and these claims led to frequent
communal violence which often organized itself along religious or ethnic lines. Khauwashta's
reforms were not always welcomed, but the "Royal Apportion" as it became known was
ultimately by most measures a successful policy, reducing violence. It helped, of course, that
Khauwashta had the strength of an army to enforce his degrees - as he did on several
occasions, including during the famous insurrection at Bamiyan.

Even as the eastern regions were brought under strict royal control, the west was becoming
more chaotic. The Satrap of Mazun, one Arhaxorai, was now openly backing the Hadhrami
rebellion and essentially in a state of open war with Axum and her Himyarite client regime. This
had every potential to drag the Romans into open conflict with the Eftal, especially as certain
tribes among the Eftal who had settled in the West had begun raiding in force into Syria once
more, despite half-hearted attempts by Toramana to reign them in. These raids across Syria
were rarely successful - determined Roman reprisals by contrast were, and this strained the
situation to the breaking point.

Further exacerbating the situation in 532 the Hadhrami, with the help of Arhaxorai, successfully
drove the Christian Himyarite ruler and his followers into exile. Occupying the whole of Yemen,
the spice routes were once again effectively under Persian control - the Hadhrami Malik was a
vassal of the Eftal Shahs in all but name. This situation did not last - Hadhrami was poised to
preside over a South Arabian golden age - but yet for the time it merely confirmed to the
Romans that their position in the Orient was gravely imperiled.

Transformations

The third decade of the sixth century CE was a calm before the storm across the eastern world.
In Eftal Iran, it was a time of economic prosperity and also seething turmoil beneath the surface.
The local Iranian nobility rose up in a series of failed rebellions before finding a new place in
society, turning inwards and becoming self-reflective. Unlike the Insurrection of Ctesiphon and
the Christian uprisings of previous decades, the uprisings of the nobility had a heroic, hopeless
quality to them. They would become immortalized in poetry and the growing Persian literary
movement. The melancholy achievements of these noble poets would become the beginning
beautiful epic tradition, particularly as the differences between Eftal and Iranian slowly began to
dissolve, and increasing Eftal influences became apparent within the work of the great poets.

Shah Khauwashta ruled a polyglot Empire which frequently was decentralized and inefficient,
but had a powerful military. However, being a man "blessed with the multitude of virtues, chief
amongst them foresight" it was the military which he sought to reform, breaking apart the
organization along tribal lines which so long had defined it. He would let the satraps use their
tribal retainers to enforce order, but Khauwashta was a King of Kings, and he needed a military
bound more directly to the state than to the lines of tribal coalition. However, while many
historians, especially the Roman sources, emphasize the scope of reforms it is unclear how the
traditional Eftal army, or the forces which battled Peroz in the fifth century actually were
organized. Further, almost all of our Iranian sources are focused on the land reform and
changes to the tax code and a series of national urban building projects centered around the
Persian Gulf - leaving open questions about the degree to which the military reform was simply
a result of organic changes in the emerging Eftal-Iranian society.

The period of Buddhist patronage continued apace, but tolerance of almost all faiths continued.
The Eftal had little desire to enforce their religious convictions on others, and one of the Shah's
prominent generals was a Nestorian Christian who took name of Thomas.

The Roman Empire, under the reign of Zeno II (Vitalian having died in 533) was on a very
different trajectory. Monasticism and factionalism was on the rise, and the Empire was in an
uncertain state despite appearing quite strong. Defeats in Italy had sounded the death knell of a
united Empire. The Gothic successor state under Eutharic would slowly abandon all pretension
to Imperial status, ruling as an elected King, raising his son as a Goth, and doing little to mend
the division between the Romans and the small military elite that ruled them. Africa was similarly
left to its own devices - despite having gained a base from which to attack, it seems that Vitalian
did not have the motivation to plan such an enterprise. Zeno, in another time might have
attempted it, but his would be a reign focused on internal politics and on the East.

In Constantinople, the beating heart of the Empire, the Blue and Green factions retained
powerful influence at court, and religious controversy consumed much of the Emperor’s
attention. His father had risen to power as a preserver of Orthodoxy, and Zeno maintained that
tradition in spite of difficulties and occasional rumors of insurrection. But Syria and Egypt were
growing apart from the Empire, and frequent persecutions did little to endear them to
Constantinople.

Further, the two superpowers of the East were on a trajectory that would inevitably bring them
into conflict. The Eftal interventions in Arabia posed a threat to Roman trade, and in 536
Belisarius, now responsible for the Roman armies of the East, convinced Zeno that the Eftal
were weak - and that a successful military campaign into Persia could provide the prestige he
needed to sew up the divisions within the Roman state.

He could not have known that a far greater storm was coming.

Changes and
Plague

Africa

As the Vandal Kingdom collapsed, in 534 Hilderic was overthrown by one Huneric. Where
Hilderic's policies had been favorable to Chalcedonian Christians, Huneric was an Arian through
and through, and this lead only to more bitter hostilities between the ruling Vandals and their
Roman and Moorish subjects - and further, Huneric was forced to put down a rebellion by
Hoamer, Hilderic's cousin. Between 534-537 near anarchy reigned in North Africa, an anarchy
which disrupted trade and lead to some level of food scarcity in the remaining great urban
centers of Italy.

The exact timeline becomes very uncertain however - but it clear that by 537 Huneric was dead
in a battle against one Gharmul, and a Mauri "Rex" named Tamesus (Tamenzut) was ruling over
a vast swathe of territory ranging fromSufetula. While some historians have categorized this as
a migration of the Berber peoples, that is a not a wholly accurate characterization. While
certainly there were movements of people and semi-nomadic tribes, this was also a series of
rural and urban uprisings which lead to the overthrow of the Vandals and the replacement of the
Vandal elite with a rural Mauri one - while the urban character of changed little.
It is a tribute to how Romanized Africa was that during the collapse of the Vandalic Kingdom to
the Berber invaders, the Mauri peoples preserved much of the Roman culture of the region.
Latin was still the language of the urban dweller, regardless of ethnic background. Latinized
forms of Berber languages gained traction, particularly in the Kingdom of Thagaste, while
inscriptions from the the Mauritanian Kingdom ruled by one Masuna show that the written
language was perhaps almost exclusively Latin. The urban-rural division in Africa remained
strong, but was increasingly blended. The Vandals, by contrast became an increasingly isolated
people under ever greater pressure to Romanize and abandon their traditional heritage.

Certain Romanized kingdoms developed out of Mauri tribal groups - this was an era of petty
kings whose territories were uncertain, with borders that frequently shifted. In certain areas,
Vandal settlers still held sway as well, although these areas rapidly shrank and assimilated. By
550 there was little trace of the Vandals in Africa - and petty Roman regimes ruled by duces had
emerged on their island territories as well.
The Christian Mauri ruler Amesghin the Greater would eventually form a degree of hegemony
over many of the petty Kings - his capital at Hippo Regius became a regional center of
commerce, religious scholarship and grand public works. Contemporaneously, Isemrases, his
brother ruled over a Carthage tenuously recovering from pillage. It might have recovered too, if
it was not for the Great Plague.

Eftal-Roman War (537-542)

Veteran Roman armies, under highly capable commanders such as Leon the Isaurian, Flavius
Belisarius (Master of the Soldiers of the Orient), and the Armenian Hovnan prepared a multiple
pronged attack. The actual declaration of war was ostensibly a response to a recent cross-
border raid by Eftal tribesmen, but in truth the war had been long in planning, and the attack
when it came was well-coordinated, seeking to demolish the relatively weak Eftal grip over their
northwestern satrapies.

Hovnan struck into his native Armenia, and then further on into the region the Eftal called
Adurbadaghan and the Greeks called Atropatene, marching south through the mountain passes
where the Eftal were light on the ground. Despite an attempted ambush, his troops pushed
inwards,conquering with ease much of Armenia and finally coming to Naxcavan, but the large,
well-fortified city resisted all attempts to claim it, and harassing raids stressed Hovnan's supply
lines. Within a year the Armenian would be retreating in disgrace, but he would try again on
several occasions - but by then his foes were prepared, and the cities and mountain passes of
Armenia well fortified.

Leon detached from his own army a force which put Edessa to siege, while Belisarius marched
towards the interior - aiming to put to siege high walled Nisibin. The wily Isaurian was out of his
element in conventional siege warfare however - and knowing this he struck south at Zeno's
order, meeting up with Belisarius' main force, of which he would command the right flank. The
Roman Magister Militium had been eagerly reforming the army - raising new elite cataphract-
style units to combat the traditional Eftal superiority of horse, hiring on mercenary Alan and
Bulgar archer cavalry.

It was a shockingly different Roman army which met Shah Khauwashta outside of Nisibin one
under one of the greatest of the later Roman commanders. But Khauwashta was a capable
general in his own right, and had his own corps of brilliant, able officers, veterans of many
battles. Instead of battle however, Belisarius arranged a meeting, and the two men conferred in
neutral ground between the opposing camps. At a tent established in the middle of a dry flat
battleplain, the two legendary figures of history spoke at length. We have no record of the
meeting between these two, but we do know that it came after a series of vicious one-on-one
duels, of which the Roman champions emerged supreme.

At the second day, both sides displayed against each other, and some pitched cavalry
skirmishes were fought. The evening saw a second conference between this time subordinate
commanders. Both men were stalling for time. By the third day, Leon had arrived with
reinforcements, bringing the two armies to rough parity in numbers. A cavalry charge by the
Romans lead to the a decisive victory in the battle of Nisibin, but Belisarius could not follow up
on his triumph - the Roman cavalry had taken severe casualties, and the main body of the Eftal
horse was intact. Belisarius was unable to put Nisibin to siege, knowing its defenses to be far
too well-maintained to be assaulted while the Eftal could still harass him.

The two armies would not meet again until 538. A year of maneuver culminated in the battle of
Amphipolis, where this time Khauwashta won a decisive victory. The Eftal histories report the
Shah personally slew Leon with his own lance, while the Romans report no such occurrence,
merely that Leon was wounded and succumbed to infection over the next week. The Eftal took
Zeugma and pressed onwards, aiming perhaps for Antiokheia - to split the Roman Empire wide
open. But it was not to be. Belisarius successfully prevented the Eftal from penetrating too deep
into Syria, and fresh Roman armies captured most of Sirakan and pressed on towards Mosul,
where the Eftal Satrap Thomas barely repulsed them.

The next few years would see a gradual recovery of lost Eftal territory. Armies of local leaders
who prized the relative autonomy they enjoyed under Eftal rule joined up with their coreligionist,
the Eftal Thomas, and ensured that the Romans acquired no long-term gains in the region.
Thomas even pushed as far as Manzikert before he was defeated by General Bessas, returned
from Illyria with fresh manpower. "Fighting at Manzikert" would become a Greek expression for
a snatching victory from the jaws of defeat for centuries to come. Thomas would be
subsequently slain at the battle of Sewan during a disastrous retreat, but the pendulum would
eventually swing back in favor of the Eftal.

The Egyptian Plague (540-542)

The Egyptian Plague would come to encompass the entire Mediterranean. According to Syriac
historians, it was Egyptian grain ships traveling to Constantinople which brought the plague
there. At its devastating peak, the disease is said to have killed thousands by the day in the
Queen of Cities alone. All the great maritime urban hubs declined precipitously in population,
from Hispania to Italy, to Africa to Syria. Mesopotamia, it would seem, was also effected,
although to a lesser degree.

The disruptions to agriculture and trade, the depopulation of major agricultural regions and the
uncertainty of the times saw twofold responses - a spike in the already increasing trend of
Christian monasticism, and bread riots in the capital. These riots were put down in no small part
due to the Emperor Zeno's willingness to work with the Blues, and the casual effectiveness with
which he dispatched Imperial troops against them when that proved only partially effective.

Military camps were no less effected than urban populations, and the Roman state had only a
fraction of their original manpower to draw upon - numbers that would not recover for some
time. The Eftal found themselves forced to increasingly rely on nomadic forces, their Persian
auxiliaries being depleted. Ultimately, millions would die. The urban, Roman societies of the
Mediterranean would take a blow which they would perhaps never recover fully from.

In North Africa and Asia Minor particularly, but also in many other regions, apocalyptic
predictions and preachers reigned supreme, and their influence would not go away for some
time, despite attempts by the Romans to reign in such talk in their own lands. By contrast in
North Africa such apocalyptic and messianic religious thought was often encouraged by the
sometimes heterodox Mauri kings, with long-lasting implications on the philosophical traditions
of the thinkers there.

The plague would recur for some time throughout the Mediterranean. At no other time would it
be nearly as devastating, but these "aftershocks" frequently correspond with additional periods
of urban decline in Roman history. In no small part the Egyptian Plague would come to define
the subsequent half-century to come.

Conclusion of the War

Khauwashta himself fell victim to the plague, but ultimately recovered. Nevertheless weakened,
he left an veteran Eftal commander named Switamei in command of his army while he
recovered - only for Switamei to fall ill mere weeks later. The aging commander died within a
day, and his nephew Arshvadata, an Eftal-Baktrian, took overall command.

Meanwhile, Iashe, Khauwashta's wife, was increasingly forced to assume the responsibilities of
power. It was somewhat unprecedented that she would act in her husband's name, but women
were not without powerful positions in the Eftal social hierarchy - particularly in spiritual matters.
Despite Shah Khauwashta's recovery he continued to delegate power to his wife, to the point
that he would ultimately name his daughters husband, Akhshunwar, as his successor at Iashe's
request.
The plague put an end to active campaigning to a great degree, but the war did not formally end
until 542, when peace was signed. Both sides were bloodied. Osrhoene and Adurbadaghan,
Armenia and Mesopotamia were in ruins, and the plague had hollowed out many of their urban
centers as surely as the general pillaging annihilated the granaries which those same urban
centers depended on after the plague induced agricultural collapse.

Both the Eftal and the Romans, however, had little trouble settling their veteran soldiers on
vacant plots of land. Communities of Alan mercenaries took up residence in Syria and many
more Xiongnu and Baktrians came to live along the Euphrates. Many of them in time took up the
Nestorian Christianity of their newfound homeland.

If there was any victor from this conquest it was the Hadhrami. Their Red Sea trade remained
open to the Romans, in defiance of attempts by the Eftal to close it. The Hadhrami state
prospered, as did coastal cities under their patronage - this was the beginning of a period of
great expansion in growth. With foreign trade came foreign ideas and foreign wealth. Roman
and Hindi merchants lived side by side in its teeming streets, and the red-sailed trade vessels of
South Arabia plied incense to foreign ports as far away as China and Madagascar (which they
came to call Al-Komr).

The Crumbling
Giants

Slavic Migrations

It was in 548 that the Antes finally crossed over the Danube in force, but it was perhaps not
more than a larger example of an ongoing trend prevalent over the past decade. The Antes had
long been a people known to the Romans. In earlier, more peaceable times they had been an
ally of sorts, settled along the river and given occasional gifts in exchange for keeping the
border secure from the Bulgars. Until 540, this was a task the Antes had succeeded at
admirably - but the Romans had been forced to reduce their regular payments due to budget
shortfalls, the Bulgars were being driven westward, and the Antes, clan by clan, raiding party by
raiding party, were finding the Danube border ill fortified and poorly garrisoned. The Romans
were stretched thin, and the majority of the forces they did have were emplaced to watch the
waning Gepid Kingdom.

The Antes raiding parties were small and mobile, groups of lightly equipped men ahorse or on
foot. Their raids were disorganized - and indeed the Antes were not even a unified people, being
a mix of Iranic and Slavic tribes under the nominal hegemony of a common King named Idariz.
Their tendency to take the Thracians as slaves only further damaged an already critically
depopulated province. Soon, various groups of raiders and brigands marginally loyal to the
Roman regime were squatting in captured forts in Scythia Minor and Moesia Inferior, and
despite the best efforts of the Roman commander Julian, a veteran of the Gothic War, several of
these fortresses were not recaptured - rather treaties were re-negotiated.

The favorite Roman practice of divide and conquer was used here, and it was not without short-
term benefits. These new petty warlords provided settlers in a region ravaged by plague and
their own deprivations, and were cheerfully willing to keep Idariz from re-asserting dominance
over them.
But by 547, the Antes were on the warpath in a semi-unified form. The "foederati" were just as
quick to betray the Romans and allow their kin to cross into Roman territory. Meanwhile, another
related people, called by the Romans the Sklaveni, crossed the Danube at Sykibid, plundering
Thrace and Dacia. The walls of the city of Serdica had been allowed to fall into ill repair, and the
city was subjected to a five day sack. The Antes made it as far as Hadrianopolis before
Belisarius, recalled to Constantinople by Emperor Zeno II lead an army out and repulsed them,
killing Idariz in the thick of the battle. But despite consistently strong Roman performances on
the field of battle, the Balkans were now a sieve. The Diocese of Thrace was breaking open.

There was simply no room for the Slavic tribes to retreat. In 550, it was the Kutrigurs under
Samur Khan who now filled the role Attila once played - driving the barbarians to the gates. The
deployment of an additional Roman army stemmed the tide somewhat, but a group the Roman
historians call "White Sklaveni" defeated it in battle in 551. After this, Belisarius fought a long
holding action - capably preventing the Balkans from being penetrated south of an imaginary
line stretching from Hadrianopolis to Doclea, and reasserting Imperial authority over much of the
Balkans. However, the constant stress of campaigning and a lack of reinforcements took its toll
both on the army and Belisarius. The Emperor's increasingly unrealistic demands to reclaim the
Danube fortifications further exacerbated the situation, but the General fought on heroically on
through 553, when he passed away under unclear circumstances, falling from his horse never to
rise.

His replacement, one Flavius Hadrianus would enjoy mixed success. Despite being popular as
a commander, he was a Monophysite, and also prone to personal scandals and insubordination.
Under Hadrianus, the Romans lost their tentative control over the Sklaveni territories.

By 556, the Langobards, which under the rule of Emperor Vitalian had been "given" jurisdiction
over Pannonia had also subjugated the Gepids and brought them under their crown as allies.
However, their King, an aged but charismatic man had other ambitions, and the Empire's
imperiled situation allowed him great leeway to act as he saw fit with tacit Imperial consent from
the regional governor. Ostensibly protecting the Empire from the depravity of the Sklaveni,
Audoin sent armies south, battling the Sklaveni and also ensuring that what was once Roman
Illyrium was now his own personal fief, occupied and defended by his own troops. That local
leaders did not object overmuch is a sign of the collapse of Imperial authority in the Balkans.

In 558, Samur Khan and his Kutrigurs crossed over the border themselves, subjugating what
remained of the Antes. However, this proved to be perhaps the saving grace of the Romans -
despite initial failures in repelling the Kutrigurs, they were ultimately repulsed against the
Danube, and the border fortifications recovered. Despite this success, Illyrium was not wholly
reclaimed - an exhausted Zeno signed a treaty allowing Pannonia and Dalmatia to remain under
Langobard rule, and the northern Balkans were heavily depopulated.

Transformations Continued

Sogdia and Baktria, the twin crossroads of cultures were in a period of great growth. The
"Thousand Cities" were not ravaged by plagues and warfare as Mesopotamia was -
accustomed to low level tribal raiding, and well defended by their Eftalid overlords, Sogdia in
particular blossomed artistically and culturally, entering a golden age which mirrored that of
India in time and place. Buddhism and the veneration of Hindu deities (with Sogdian names)
became more commonplace, and with the patronage of the Eftal Shahs, those religions
overturned the traditional Zoroastrianism of the Sogdian mercantile elite.

It was an era typified by the construction of beautiful viharas and temples, of beautiful paintings
and great works of Buddhist philosophy. Further south in Baktria, Balkh grew into a city of
famous opulence, her merchants traveling far afield with their carvans. Not far from the
wealthiest commercial hub of the eastern Eftalid Empire, Piandjikent became a great palace
city, famed for its opulent frescoed walls and sublime gardens. Ruled by the Satrap of Balkh,
Queen Iashe's brother, it was said to have far surpassed Susa in beauty and decadence.

Across the Gozan river, which the Greeks called the Oxus, the Iranian peoples of Xvarazm did
not perhaps welcome their overlords with open arms, but these were people not dissimilar from
the Eftal - both had the same heritage, worshipped similar deities, and paid tribute to the Satrap
in Piandjikent. They relied on their Eftal cousins for defense against the migrations which
periodically came down from the steppe, and to that end, high walled fortresses, designed by
Baktrian architects were constructed along the Gozan and leased to local dihqan (lords) and
their retainers to guard.

The Celestial Tujue were growing in power on the horizon, but they had not yet come into
contact with the Eftal in any violent way. The two powers enjoyed aimiable relations - nephews
of the Tujue Qagan were fostered in Pianjikent, and one of the Satrap's sons, Ezwarhran, was
married to a Tujue noblewoman. They preserved and protected the trade routes which wound
through their territories, making a great deal of profit from this mutual security and respect. The
latter half of the sixth century CE was a safe one for merchants, in contrast to the turbulent wars
and upheaval of the first fifty years.

The other region which truly prospered was that of the Persian gulf, a region where few Eftal
lived - a small ruling class of Eftal controlled a major route of trade, often with the help of
Arabian mercenaries and Kidarite settlers. Temples to gods such as Mahadeva and Mithra were
patronized heavily in this region, indicating the decline of Ahura Mazda and orthodox
Zoroastrianism as ever more complex heretical, local traditions developed, incorporating new
deities and spirits, and frequently accepting the concept of reincarnation - an idea which had
been growing for some time. The Persian gulf was rich in poetry and art, sculpture and
architecture. Like the East, it was a place where philosophical and scientific traditions could mix,
but here also new agricultural activities - it is around this time that citrus plants began to be
cultivated in Mesopotamia in large quantities. They would come to be an important ingredient in
much of Iranian cooking.

Indian Ocean trade brought much wealth to the region. It was between 550-650 that the trading
cities of Pangani, Rapta, Msasani, Shanga, and many others were founded in East Africa by
Arabic, Persian, Marathi, and Tamil merchants and adventurers, often with the backing of the
Hadhrami, who benefitted greatly from the new flow of ivory, slaves, gold, and spices. Even
Javanese merchant vessels reached the Island of the Moon in this time period - by 600, there
was a flourishing international trade across the ocean, financed by Persian and Arab merchants.

The Alans, the Armenians and the Loyalists

The Eftal-Roman wars were fought with large numbers of Alan mercenaries, but the Alans were
a people under pressure. Their traditional homeland, across the Caucasus, was under threat by
the Sahu tribal confederacy, an Iranic group who drove the Alans further south each year. By
546, they had reached the breaking point, and streamed through the Caucasian Gates - at first
as a trickle of refugees, but eventually as a military force - into Armenia and Lazica. Aligning
themselves with an opportunistic Abasgian prince, they conquered Lazica and many of the river
valleys of Iberia.

Their attempt to penetrate Armenia and thus the Eftal Shahdom ended at the battle of Kumyari,
when the Armenians repulsed the Alans relatively single-handedly. Since the early sixth century,
Armenia's local lords, the naxarar, had enjoyed essential total autonomy within their region.
When the Eftal had broke the back of the Sasanian Empire, they had not settled Armenia or
even done more than acknowledge it as a vassaldom. However, within the past twenty years
leading up to Kumyari, the Armenians had slowly been asserting their independence against a
distracted Eftal regime. After the Eftal-Roman war, and the devastating plague which had
effected their isolated mountain communities only lightly, they began to push their limits.

Kumyari was that limit. The Eftal had sent aid, of course, but it had been so late in coming that it
had been irrelevant, and shortly thereafter the Eftal were driven out in a concerted uprising, lead
by one Anastas Varazhnuni. Khauwashta now was forced to respond to this uprising of the
Armenians - one which Anastas characterized in the language of religious war, rallying his
people. He defeated Shah Khauwashta at the battle of Surenapat, and a second, primarily
Iranian army in the battle of Xram, an ambush which saw the Satrap of Adurbadagan slain. By
552, the Armenian Kingdom was acknowledged as independent at the treaty of Dvin.
Khauwashta, in spite of his legacy of economic prosperity and military reform, would see his
legacy primarily defined by two unsuccessful campaigns - the stalemate against the Romans
and defeat against the Armenians cemented his position in history, and overwrote his early
victories on the steppe.

Retreating home battered and beaten, Khauwashta was incapable of preventing his own son-in-
law, Akhshunwar, from overthrowing him with the assistance and complicity of his wife, Iashe,
whose role in the coup would alternately be exaggerated or denied depending on the history
one reads. Either way, Khauwashta's legacy would finally be an inglorious one, in spite of his
many accomplishments. He was slain in 553 while hunting outside Susa. Akhshunwar II would
not be crowned until a year later, after being forced to flee the capital by the "partisans of
Khauwashta", he retreated to Pianjikent, where he raised an army of Sogdian and Xionite
auxiliaries, gained the allegiance of the eastern Eftals, and rode back on Susa.

The loyalists were a mixed group, a scattering of Eftal and Persian aristocrats. Akhshunwar
enjoyed broad support, no doubt to the clever scheming of his mother-in-law and the humiliation
of Khauwashta in battle. Although Khauwashta's younger half-brother, Nijara led the loyalists, he
failed to act decisively enough in this instance, and had never had any expectation of gaining
the throne, nor was he willing to attempt to claim it once Akhshunwar did. This confusion of his
intent doomed his movement from the beginning.

When Akhshunwar marched on Susa, Nijara and Khauwashta's loyalists fled. They attempted to
find sanctuary in Ctesiphon, but the Satrap there kept the gates closed to them, and indeed
sallied forth from his walls with his retainers, scattering the loyalists. Defeated, the loyalists
retreated to Khishiwan, where they hoped to gain the loyalty of bedouin mercenaries and carry
on a long war. But it was not to be. Akhshunwar proved to be a capable commander and an
excellent politician - soon the local cities had turned against the loyalists, and to avoid an
hopeless siege the loyalists fled into Arabia, reaching first Tayma, where they stayed for a few
months, and then Yathrib.

This period is seen as the first low point in Eftal history, despite the blossoming of commerce
and culture in the east and south. The loss of Armenia was a minor blow, perhaps more the
confirmation of a long-established truth, and the migration of the Alans was a defeat for Roman
interests just as much as Eftal interests - both sides had lost control over parts of the Caucasus
they regarded as part of their hegemony. The Romans, of course, would send try to send forces
to recover the territory of their lost vassals, but these forces were small and many of the most
competent Roman generals were long past their prime. They ultimately settled for
acknowledging the Alans as an ally, and making diplomatic overtures to the new Armenian state.

Akhshunwar II -
(554-557)

Shah Akhshunwar II would ultimately, in spite of his remarkable charisma and savvy, fail to hold
the Eftal Empire together. The first blow to his attempt to establish his legitimacy came mere
months after his coronation. The Satrap in Piandjikent died, his only child by all accounts a
"child in mind, slow to speak and slower still to comprehend" Akhshunwar thus appointed a new
Satrap from his own household, a friend of his named Pharashapha to the position, but the local
Eftal refused to acknowledge that fact, and Pharashapha was forced to go east with an army.

The new-made Satrap did not last a year after his arrival. He was overthrown and the forces
under his command seem to have mutinied not long before. The east was quickly lost to
Akhshunwar, and seemed to quite quickly rally around a new figure named Mihiragula. What we
know of Mihiragula was that he was an Eftal, born somewhere in Sogdia. What is notable about
him is the meteoric rise he enjoyed, seemingly becoming quite quickly a presence in the East.
His earliest possible mention is as a young standard-bearer in the army of Khauwashta.

Akhshunwar traveled those territories still loyal to him, much as his predecessor Toramana had.
He gained many allies in this way, and rallied a great number of men to his banner, but not so
many as he had hoped. In a curious move, he seems to have tentatively embraced Christianity
as a means of cementing his support amongst the economically powerful Mesopotamian cities.
Knowing that the East was lost to him, he couched his hopes on the support of both ethnic
Persians and Christians. Amongst the former he enjoyed modest success, and the latter were
wary of the reprisals they might have suffered for aligning themselves with a lost cause, but
many of the Nestorians among the Eftal flocked to his banner.

Soon, Mihiragula was on the warpath - gathering Tujue and Huna mercenaries and his own
corps of war elephants, he marched west, gathering his own allies. In early 557, he marched
through Gilan, and then struck south towards the royal capital at Susa.

The stage was set for a decisive battle, and it nearly transpired in Ahmatan. But ultimately,
Akhshunwar refused to engage, beginning a long retreat which would see Susa fall after mere
skirmishing. The true decisive battle would happen at Zabe on the Tigris, after Akhshunwar's
tribal affiliates refused to retreat further. It would be quick but bloody, an affair in which
Mihiragula gave no quarter to those who fought alongside with Akhshunwar. The usurper
himself was captured and executed in a particularly grisly manner, the details of which no two
historians seem to agree upon.

And thus Shah Mihiragula took the mantle of the Empire upon his shoulders.

"Primary Source"

From The Life of Kaosha, a text of unknown authorship, translated

Nijara, the loyalist of Khauvashtha had been given by his wife a beloved son by the name of
Kaosha, who grew into a man of Persian features and accent. Nijara was a worshipper of fire,
but his son was a mystic, and spent the latter days of his youth in a vihara at until the reign of
Axsunavar the Usurper, when he joined his father in the house of the sons of 'Aus. His father
was ill then, wounded at Tesifon, and would perish soon after. Ill-fortuned was Nijara indeed!
From there Kaosha took his companions southwards, saying to them "let us seek a fortune in
this country, let us not wait for the one whose dominion is boundless to find us. Surely he shall
murder us all if he comes upon this sanctuary." And so his men made themselves caravan
guards and journeyed south under arms to old Marib, and further on to Aden, which was in
those antique times subservient to the Hadhramaut.

The Malik of Aden did welcome them in secret, and give to them many lavish gifts. Khauvashtha
is said had been an ally of his. With these gifts they lived in ease and the eyes of the world were
not upon them, a blessed thing for hunted men. What a refuge is Aden! There they Kaosha
came to meet the Teacher who called himself Sattiga, and the two became inseparable
companions, the Krishna to his Arjuna.

When the Malik did make war upon the people ofSaylaq and the Habash in the country of
mangroves, he sent Kaosha against the barbarians, and Kaosha set himself upon Saylaq and
upon its taking made a ledger of the people there, accounting their numbers and their cattle.
The ones the Hellenes called the Avalites were richest among them, and he aligned himself with
their cause, striking down Abraha, who was King in Habash, and winning great victories and
loading ships with plunder, which he sent to Aden as signs of his victory.

Then he marched south along the coast, and deep into the heartland, bringing low the cities he
found there. He made himself a Shah of the barbarians, sitting at Amud, and giving lands to his
followers.

A Shah in Africa

Our understanding of the Horn of Africa and the surrounding regions is prejudiced by the
descriptions of the Greeks and the Arabs, who described a land of small cities, fractured and
chaotic at the best of times. To the northwest was Axum, a state on the decline but nevertheless
powerful in its own right as a local trade power. To understand Kaosha's peculiar campaign we
can trace the history back to a single account, an anonymous history upon which most other
accounts were subsequently based and embellished. What is clear is that the fragmented
Cushitic peoples were brought under the unified sovereignty of the exiled Eftal prince and his
retainers, who had seemingly been serving as mercenaries in the army of a local Adenite
chieftain until they decided to strike out on their own.

Kaosha's army was a small, mixed group. Persian and Eftal aristocrats with fine equipment rode
alongside South Arabian mercenaries and brigands. It was at its core a profit seeking mission -
conquest for plunder and perhaps the potential for long-term wealth, if Kaosha was successful.
Their enormous successes can be attributed to the disunity of the region and the relative decline
of Axum. In any other period they would have been a mere footnote in history.

Most of the cities he would have found were quite different from what later historical accounts
would describe. The Greek historian Maurianus gives us descriptions of urban areas that
resemble the large cities of the Eastern Mediterranean - archeological evidence does not point
to such a thing being plausible. Rather it would seem that the typical "barbarians" of the region
were nomadic pastoralists, keeping herds of cattle and frequently engaging in low-level tribal
conflicts. Kaosha's conquest of the region he called Awalastan generally ignored or made
treaties with the nomadic peoples, conquering a few interior cities and many coastal outposts.
These outposts were typically very small, trading cities traditionally bound up in the tribal
structure of Somalia. But this was a rich country, wealthy in incense, gum, and spices as well as
entrepot trade, and thus the conquest undoubtedly made Kaosha and his followers incredibly
wealthy.

There was perhaps another motivation, however, one only hinted at in the early texts, and
elaborated upon in the work of Maurianus, where the "heathen prophet" takes on a major role.
One way or another, this religious impetus would feature prominently in Kaosha's actions and in
archeological records of a temple to "the limitless great God" constructed in the city of Amoud.
What Sattiga preached was it seems an Arabian influenced form of Shaivism, an iconoclastic
pursuit of ecstatic unity with the divine impulse, and it was this which gave unity to Kaosha's
small band of followers. On the other hand, the native peoples still worshipped gods not
dissimilar to those of the pagan Hadhrami - temples and statues to the god Ilmuqah feature
heavily in this period, and it seems probable that Kaosha and his Arab allies gave sacrifices to
these traditional pagan gods as well, so as to better cement his legitimacy.

The fifth Eftal Shah

The end of the Akhshunwarid Dynasty and the ascendency of Mihiragula marks the beginning of
the end of the chaos and transition which marked the reign of his predecessors. He maintained
relative peace along the long, steppe border by choosing to continue to honor pacts made with
the Celestial Tujue. This period of peace allowed for trade of both commerce and ideas with
China and India.

The Gupta continued to preside over a golden age of art and culture even as their Empire
collapsed and was reduced to a still-potent but much reduced regional power along the Ganges.
Their decline paved the way for the era of the Kalachuri and the Vakataka along the coast, now
freed from Gupta influence. Stone-cut Takasashila, still a great center of learning and Buddhist
civilization was freed from the Gupta Empire in this period by an uprising which saw Gandhara
ruled from Purushapura once more. The ruling dynasty, called the Johiyava Rajas seems to
have had good relations with the Eftal, exchanging hostages and trade. The Johiyava
developed a reputation as a warrior people and as patrons of Hinduism, and from time to time
feuded with the Rai dynasty to their south and the Arjunayanas.

Meanwhile, the Western borders were far less peaceful. The Roman Empire was holding itself
together but at increasing expense, her population only just beginning to recover from the
plague. The Bulgar Samur Khan and the Langobard King Alboin were both now technically
"allies" of Emperor Zeno, but the Balkans had not come under this great of a threat since the
days of the Goths - and the Imperial diplomats were working overtime, trying to sew tensions
between the patchwork confederations of tribes at their gates. This was perhaps far more
successful than swords had been - the Utigurs invaded the territories of their kin and the
resulting war would distract both parties. Meanwhile, certain nobles amongst the Langobards
were elevated in status and formally given large estates in Dalmatia, a move intended to direct
their loyalty more directly towards the Empire.

Seeking to restore the East to some measure of stability, the Roman Emperor began to work
with King Anastas of Armenia, bringing order to the Caucasus and putting an end to Alan raids.
The Emperor's niece married the son of King Anastas, and the Empire financed a joint
fortification project.

Fearing that Armenia would fall into the hands of the Romans, Mihiragula had no choice but to
begin to prepare for war. A successful war against the Romans would also solidify his legitimacy
as Shah, and even an unsuccessful campaign would allow him opportunities to conveniently
dispose of those who might still be loyal to Akhshunwar II. Striking secret pacts with the Alans
and also a confederation of Arabian tribes, the Kindah, who would oppose the Banu Ghassan,
Mihiragula went to war with the Romans in 559, not giving the Empire any time to catch its
breath after the bloody wars in the Balkans.

Mihiragula set forth from Nisibin, and unlike his predecessors, he was triumphant, capturing
Hierapolis and Edessa and striking into the very heart of the Empire.

To look at the reasons for his successes, it may help to look at the reasons previous Eftal Shahs
failed. Akhshunwar was ruler of a vast territory only recently conquered, and his tribal army was
not able to translate successful field battles into major gains of territory. Khauwashta faced a
capable Roman army under a group of brilliant commanders. Mihiragula, by contrast, had a
well-established state and a capable army, veterans of warfare on the eastern steppe. Many of
the men under him had fought under Khauwashta as well, and Mihiragula was, if not a warrior
like Khauwashta, a tactician and a statesman who could bring together the disparate peoples
under his command into an effective fighting force.

Meanwhile, in the south Kindah would see few successes in their raids - they were on the
decline by the late sixth century, but managed quite capably to disrupt the overland caravan
trade between the Roman world and Arabia - concentrating this trade in the hands of the
southern Arabians and their associated maritime city-states.

Third Eftal-Roman War

The Roman state, despite its exhaustion refused to give up without a fight. The eastern frontier
troops proved ineffective at stopping the incursion of Mihiragula, despite their successes in
preventing further Alan incursions into Asia Minor. The Eftal army enjoyed a series of easy
victories and captured or extorted tribute from many cities in Syria and along the Euphrates.
Then, Mihiragula swept south and met the Romans in battle at Pagrai. Here, the Roman army
was utterly destroyed and the Eftal given "free license to do what they would with the whole of
the Orient."
Antiokheia, a city in decline ever since the 526 earthquake, was taken shortly after Pagrai, a
short siege ended by Iranian siege engineers. Mihiragula presided over a devastating sack,
wherein many relics and great works of art were either captured or destroyed, and the city's
already declining population massacred. Riding north, Mihiragula earned through diplomacy and
overwhelming force the submission of the Cilician plain and crucially, the city of Tarsus.

A Roman army under the command of one of Hadrianus' former subordinates, Serenos, was
sent into Asia Minor with a fresh army, veterans of the Balkan wars mixed with raw recruits.
Serenos took a northerly route, hoping to link up with an Armenian army and force Mihiragula to
commit troops further north, ideally granting time for the Romans to retake Syria. However, this
plan failed. King Anastas was defeated by a General named Hiramaosha at the battle of Zarisat,
and when the news reached Serenos he stalled, allowing Mihiragula to meet him in battle
outside of Caesarea and, with that triumphant victory, Asia Minor lay open to the Eftal.

By spring 561, the Eftal had raided as far as Nikaia, devastating the Anatolian plateau and
wreaking havoc. Around this time, Zeno II was deposed in a coup orchestrated by one
Kallinikos, a Greek military officer who had served with distinction in a time where few officers
had. Ruling as Flavius Callinicus Augustus, he was an active Emperor, spending much of his
time personally ensuring the defenses of cities in Asia Minor. Still, it would take Kallinikos time to
truly command the apparatus of state - having come to power in a coup, he was forced to move
carefully and establish himself as a defender of Christendom from the pagan hordes, no matter
how nuanced the reality of the situation was.

What he could not do is save the Orient. Mihiragula rode south, leaving Hiramaosha to oversee
the raiding of Asia and vex the reformed Roman field armies there. Hiramaosha proved more
than capable at this task, but ultimately was slowly forced back by Kallinikos, who personally led
the Roman armies and pushed Hiramaosha back to Caesarea. Damascus fell easily, and after a
long siege, Jerusalem was taken in January of 562.

The shock throughout the Roman world was immense. As one Roman playwright wrote, "Holy
Jerusalem has fallen! Weep for all the generations of Christians, weep for the martyrs. The Hun
have destroyed the object of all our vows. The Heavenly City lies destroyed." Exaggerated tales
of massacres were spread, but in truth it seems that the region was not heavily depopulated, in
contrast to the annihilation of Antioch - although the Patriarch was, according to our Greek
sources, killed, and many holy relics taken as trophies of war.

Mihiragula, after erecting a great monument to his victory, praised both Shiva and Mithra for
delivering him the victory, but his language was not one of religious war. The victory monument
lists Jerusalem as one of many cities taken, and while he must have known the effect its
conquest would have on his enemies, for him his war was an explicitly political one. By contrast,
Kallinikos was whipping the Roman Empire into a religious frenzy. The heathen was at the
gates, the vicious Huns stood poised to annihilate the very Empire.
Mihiragula would reach as far south as Gaza before turning north once more. Egypt, despite not
having large armies at its disposal, was a tough nut to crack in the best of times, and attempts
by the Eftal to encourage a popular uprising seem to have enjoyed little success.

Of course, the Eftal possessed no way to cross into Europe, and by the time Mihiragula linked
up with Hiramaosha (leaving his new conquests under the often-feeble control of Persian
garrison troops and new made local administrators), the Shah was on the back foot. Attacking
deep into the Asia Minor three more times between 562 and 565, each time was met with less
success - the Roman war machine remained capable and despite a series of brutal famines,
there was no rioting in Constantinople or the provinces, and the Romans enjoyed victories as
often as they suffered defeats.

A Roman embassy in 565 nearly achieved peace, but for Mihiragula's confidence in his ability to
push on. Nearly his entire reign had been spent at war, and he had, at least on paper, enlarged
and restored the Eftal Empire. Reincorporating Armenia as a vassal state after her King's
crushing defeat and conquering the Orient had assured him of his invincibility. The tribute he
demanded was crushing and utterly unrealistic, and Mihiragula expected to retain all of his
tremendous territorial gains. Unwilling and quite likely politically unable to concede Jerusalem or
allow the Empire to be severed and drained of all her incomes, Kallinikos had little choice but to
fight on.

Mauri Africa and the Goths - the Western Mediterranean

While what remained of Rome burned, her heirs rose in power and prestige. Their merchants
re-established old trade links and it seems that the coastal cities were some of the quickest to
recover, even as the tribal kingdoms of the far interior began to decline and desiccate.
Patronizing great philosophers and artists, the Mauri Kings also took to the increasing trend of
monasticism, founding many new desert monasteries.

Isemrases II, King of Africa and Mauritania (r. 552-574) ruled a semi-feudal patchwork of tribal
cities. Much of his reign was preoccupied with maintaining this status quo while also attempting
to expand the paltry fleet at his command. Over his reign he would deal with six separate
rebellions, the most famous of them seeing Tingis sacked. In the final of these rebellions, in 566,
many tribes of the Gaetuli were enslaved and annihilated en masse for their role in assisting the
rebels, finally establishing the dominance of the settled, Latin speaking coastal tribes.

Famously, Isemrases patronized the great artist Maisara, whose work began a revival of Roman
art and architecture in the region, characterized by a unique Berber flair. Romano-African
merchant ships could be seen in all the ports of the Mediterranean, and the city of Lilybaeum,
despite nominal Roman rule, enjoyed a great resurgence as Berber traders set up shop. Sicily
as a whole benefitted enormously from this Mauri "renaissance", and the Prefect of Sicily, a
Greek by the name of Maurice enjoyed a close relationship with Isemrases, viewing the Africans
as a counterweight to the Goths.
The Goths under Athalaric, the arrogant son of Eutharic, was enormously popular with his
nobles because he lived as they lived, drank as they drank, and ultimately, died as they died,
drinking himself to death six years after taking the crown in 548. By contrast, his father
Eutharic's long life had been a distinguished one. But despite having beaten back the Romans
to a mere toehold in Italy and fought long and hard against the Franks, he nevertheless ruled an
increasingly divided state, his Goths forming a military aristocracy which, after the depopulation
of Italy from war and plague, was totally entrenched, and slowly becoming Romanized.

Concurrently, the work of Cassiodorus helped bridge the divide between Roman and Goth,
while also promoting a resurgence of classical thought. One of the notable philosophers of the
period, his work would ultimately have a long-lasting impact. Founder of schools and
monasteries, it was not until the short reign of Athalaric that he achieved high office, and shortly
after Athalaric's death he disappears from the historical record into a quiet life of contemplation.

"Primary Source"

From the accounts of Khinjila [1] "The Peoples of the North and East"

From the city of Kasyar caravans come into the broader territory of the Ashina, who call
themselves Celestial Turk, and are ruled by one Arslan Kaghan. Over that city is set no man in
power, save the Khagan, but he has a minister in the city whose name is Niriryam, and from
that source all power flows. Over the cities of the caravan road Niriyam has hidden strength,
speaking with the voice of the Khagan. Kasyar is his home because it is the greatest of these
cities which support the movement of caravans, and upon the border with our nations. It is
home to many of the Sugd but also a thousand other peoples of the world.

Arslan Khagan is a victorious man. His father defeated the indolent peoples who called
themselves Ruru[2], and Arslan has made peace with them, and they rule uneasily over a broad
country in the south that was once the lands of Wei. The Ruru, once refugees, have become
strong and arrogant in their hold, and rule from the city of Pinchayinj. Their ruler, whose name is
Poulomen Teifa Qagan holds in his heart little desire to adopt the manners of the conquered
Han, but it is vast territory he holds, and much of it he holds only weakly, with the aid of allies
and federates. To his south is an empire of much wealth, but he cannot strike against it in
strength, and this vexes him.

If one were to travel north from Kasyar, as a peerless and predatory bird might, over the rugged
mountains and dry country without oases, one would come to the lands of the Qangli, who are
federate to the Ashina as the Xionites were federate to Akhshunwar, but they keep kinship and
are the "blacksmith slaves" of the Ashina. They have a great city which is Tarban, and there
they trade with the Xvarezm, Sugd and our nations. There they have built a great ensemble of
Buddhistic temples and great monuments, but there are also temples to the God of Mani, and
regardless of where they prey the Qangli venerate Heaven still.
To the northwest of the Qangli are the lands of the Asvha, the newcomers, who are cousins of
the Sahu and worship Surya[3] and Siavash. The Asvha are far-ranging and ride finer horses
than their neighbors, but are federate to the Khagan of the Ashina nonetheless. They wear
great conical hats and keep retainers as we do. When a great man of their tribe dies, he is
buried with statues of his companions, that they might in some form preserve him. When they
raid it is against the Xasar-Sahu, and they do this with the permission of the Turks. The Asvha
do not push overmuch the Xasar, for the Xasar are perhaps four times again[4] more numerous
than they, and rule a broad country of many waters.

The Xasar[5] are a people of many tribes, and their Khagan is named Itemei. Their ruling clan is
the Sahu, but there are many Turks among them as well, and many Xiongnu, and many who
were once Gaoche. The Sahu worship the countless gods, among them Anahita and the Moon.
Their priests are women. Their subordinates worship the Sky and the Rain. As a people they
are said to be great lovers of music and war, and take to these tasks in equal measure, training
their children with fierce games of skill to be peerless with bow and sword when they come of
age. They have no great love for the Eftal, for many of their kin died against the might of
Khauwashta Shah of Shahs and his companions, but in truth they have no great love for any
people of the world.

[1] One of the few (possibly) ethnically Eftal Historians of the period, little is known about him,
except that he lived in Farghana, which was in his lifetime an autonomous tributary of the Eftal,
and seems to have been part of an embassy of sorts.

[2] Or the Rouran Khaganate.

[3] Asvha would certainly not have called the Sun by the name of Surya. While their origin is
unclear, they are an Iranian tribal people which emerged after the collapse of the Gaoche and
Xiongnu.

[4] This is likely utter conjecture on the author's part, but the Xasar-Sahu Confederacy was
certainly much larger than the Asvha alone, and was slowly but surely moving its way westward,
causing a wave of displacements amongst the Sklaveni and Bulgar peoples.

[5] It should be noted that the Xasar-Sahu and OTL's Khazars, despite similar names have
relatively little in common, both in ethnic makeup and origin.

565-568 In the Balance

Mihiragula had not managed to make a peace on the terms he wanted, but by the summer of
565, nothing seemed to be going against him. A rebellion in Judea had been beaten, just barely,
by the Persian auxiliaries stationed there. One of his most trusted companions, Ariasb, ruled the
Orient from Damascus, leading a small but veteran force of Eftal cavalry in continual attacks
against the Arab allies of the Roman Empire. The Banu Ghassan, now cut off their allies, were
crumbling. The Alans had begun raiding in force into Pontus, and he still held Caesarea. The
past years had seen devastating raids into Roman territory, but also continual reversals.
Emperor Kallinikos was a capable commander, easily defeating Hiramaosha in both of the two
occasions they had met in pitched battle. His legions were less adept at stopping prolonged
raiding however, but the noose was closing. The Romans were hemming in Mihiragula, and the
Eftal had been unable to take many cities in Asia Minor - disciplined Roman infantry and grain
shipments from Egypt preserved the urban population, despite endemic rural famine and the
devastation of Eftal raids.

After a year of further raids, in 566, Mihiragula decided it was time to force Kallinikos to battle.
The Eftal track record against the Romans in pitched battles was historically excellent. Field
engagements, even if they had not been decisive or war-winning, frequently resulted in the
depletion of Roman manpower and might free him up to carry the war further westward.
The two armies maneuvered for several months until finally, Kallinikos took the bait and moved
to intercept Mihiragula near the city of Mokissos. The commander of the Roman vanguard, one
Athanasius, fell on Mihiragula's camp in the earliest hours of the morning, and despite a spirited
defensive holding action by the Gilani mercenaries, Mihiragula was forced to arrange his forces
in relative disarray and confusion. The Romans had managed, against the odds, to leave him
blind as to their approach until it was too late for Mihiragula to take command of his army. The
Eftal were forced to react to new events, rather than decide their own strategy.

Both armies were ponderously large. Kallinikos had brought three separate forces together to
intercept the Shah, and Mihiragula commanded a vast field army which even at the best of
times required individual initiative from his commanders to work in concert. As the Eftal forces
arrayed and countered the Roman attack, the remainder of the Roman army arrived and drew
up for battle. Kallinikos brought his cavalry down on the Eftal flank, scattering the Persian and
Baktrian cavalry. Mihiragula might have attempted to sound a retreat, but the his experience
with Akhshunwar II and also the relative disorganization of his forces reminded him that any
retreat could be a disaster.

So the Eftal fought on.

"Batzas, the Emperor's brother-in-law, took a spear in the thigh, and fought on until he was
dragged from his horse. His bodyguards recovered him with great losses, while the Prince of
the Hephthalites brought forward the lances of his companions and made a great charge
against our right. When the lances were broken and lost the Hepthalites with their cudgels and
their axes bled our legions hard." - Dioscorus of Sardis

It is unclear who the Prince of the Hephthalites was in this context, as Mihiragula had four sons
of roughly similar ages, but it probably Varhran, the most martial of them. What is clear is that
the Eftal and Romans both broke each other's flank and the two armies began to slowly pivot
around a central axis, until a large contingent of Bulgar mercenaries aligned with the Romans
began pillaging the Hephthalite camp, and in the confusion were caught by a significantly
smaller force of Persian infantry and massacred. After this, the Roman army retreated, and the
Eftal were too disorganized to follow up on their (admittedly qualified) victory.
The situation in Asia Minor was ultimately unchanged. Despite the large size of the battle, it
seems that almost every unit on both sides was present at later engagements. The Battle of the
Camp, as it became known, was indecisive, and the two brilliant tacticians in overall command
seemingly had only a limited impact in the actual engagement.

The next two years would see further raiding and pillaging. The Roman armies were depleted of
manpower, and in 567, Mihiragula would sack Ikonion, Sozopolis, and Pessinous, but he did not
get to hold them for more than a few months. Pessinous massacred the garrison left behind,
and a Roman army recaptured Ikonion and Sozopolis. Kallinikos waged a defensive war which
saw a battle outside Ankyra go in his favor, and 568 saw the Romans take Caeserea back. The
Eftal were pushed out of Asia Minor, and the Romans rejoiced.

Meanwhile, a Roman fleet arrived at Laodikea in Syria, and the Christians there overthrew the
small Persian garrison and resisted a siege by Ariasb. Unable to gain the city's walls with his
unreliable levies and unwilling to force his few Eftal and Kidarite horsemen to dismount and
attack the walls, Ariasb was forced to tolerate the loss and send petitions to the Eftal
commander at Nisibin for aid and reinforcements. But reinforcements were few on the ground, a
sign of the toll caused by the continual warfare.

The Homefront

Mihiragula had spent only two years out of the first ten years of his reign inside the de jure
borders of his Empire. Two of his sons, Vinayaditha and Faganish, seem to have ruled in his
stead. Our Persian historians record that Vinayaditha was a scholarly man, an administrator,
and patronized Iranian artists and philosophers. It is perhaps for this reason that he is regarded
favorably, while Faganish gets little mention and is often characterized as a drunken and
incompetent child. However, the Eftal historian Khinjila reports that Vinayaditha was a coward
who let his wife run the affairs of state, not unlike Khauwashta, and praises Faganish and
Varhran for their "manly virtues". The fourth son, Toramana, receives little note in the historical
record, save that he was raised among the Turks and married a woman of Turkic royalty.

Despite these disputes, trade and tax revenue seem to have declined under the "Rule of Sons"
as this era is often known. War with the Romans hurt trade and the Hadhrami and the Kaoshid
Shahdom benefited immensely from this, becoming the gateway for Roman-Indian trade. A
small border conflict with some of the cities of the Tarim Basin and the Shah of Farghana further
exacerbated the situation.

This was, however, the beginning of the Eftal Golden Age. Economic hardship aside, many of
the famous Persian artists, philosophers, and mathematicians patronized by Vinayaditha would
revolutionize their fields. Formerly of aristocratic families but denied their traditional role, these
scholars would go into Buddhist and Christian monasteries or local courts and palaces, and
there produce great works. A joint Eftal-Persian culture was being born, a true synthesis of the
two peoples.
 War and Aftermath
Ariasb, the de facto governor of Palestine and Syria, would receive no relief. Rebellion, not of
the Christian majority but rather the Jewish minority in Galilee, further aggrivated an already
collapsing situation. Urgent letters were sent to Mihiragula, but without joy. Jerusalem fell late in
568, and Caesarea fell early in 569. While it is unclear just how many Jews participated in the
rebellion, what is clear is that the Christian population was as likely to see vicious reprisals as
the small Iranian garrisons. This period of communal violence was particularly directed against
the urban, Hellenized population, and the rebellion itself was more opportunistic than motivated
by a desire to escape Iranian rule - the Jewish population believed, quite accurately, that the
Eftal were losing, and that simultaneously the Romans were too weak to regain their lost
ground.

By the summer of 569, much of Palestine was lost, and Ariasb chose to concentrate on holding
Syria. He retook Laodikea and, riding south to Tyros, began fortifying it and many of the other
Christian cities of Lebanon for a siege. Compared to the bitter, hostile reception the Eftal
typically received, the population of Tyros welcomed Ariasb with open arms, our Iranian sources
report. It was, however, a ruse. Ariasb and his retainers were murdered in their beds, and with
that blow, uprisings in Syria became general. While many among the Syrian population were not
overly pleased with Roman rule, the Eftal were old enemies, and had done little to ingratiate
themselves with the occupied populace, preferring to loot and pillage the countryside and
occupy the cities, levying tributes from them not dissimilar to Roman taxes. As such, in the wake
of these rebellions, the Eftal were forced to commit additional forces, and Mihiragula was
incensed.

Shortly thereafter, the Shah, by way of one of his companions, engaged the Jewish leaders in
negotiations, agreeing to recognize their small state in exchange for peace and their support. It
is clear that Mihiragula still had notions of incorporating Roman Syria into his Empire, and his
reprisals, motivated chiefly by the death of his companion and friend, when they came, were
swift and brutal. His philosophy seems to have been that fresh settlers from the East were
always available.

Kallinikos, meanwhile, attempted to invade Cilicia. After taking many of the fortified places of the
rocky uplands, he descended east into the plains and there Mihiragula met him in another
battle, and this time was triumphant, scoring the decisive victory he had long hoped for. The
Roman infantry were massacred and Kallinikos barely escaped with his life. The Battle of the
Pyramus River, as it became known, was yet another in a long list of catastrophic battles for two
Empires which could ill afford them.

Mihiragula's army was a shadow of the force that had begun the war. Eleven years of bloodshed
had weakened his core of retainers, and there were simply not fresh Eftal warriors to replace
them any longer. Mercenaries and Persian auxiliaries both cost money, and the latter were of
often unreliable quality. In 570, Mihiragula sought peace, and this time, Kallinikos agreed.
Increased threat of Slavic migration and Bulgar raids seem to have played as much of a factor
as any, and Mihiragula finally abandoned his hold on Syria, settling for a reduced conquest
which nevertheless brought much of the Euphrates under formalized Eftal control, including the
cities of Edessa and Samosata. Further, a great sum of wealth was paid to the Eftal Shah.

The "Rule of Sons" was only saved by this large influx of wealth - wealth which allowed the Eftal
dynasty to continue its patronization and give some measure of relief to the mercantile class.
With the end of the war, trade experienced a brief revival as well, but the damage to the Eftal
Shahdom had already been done, and it was unclear if the Shahs could recover. Mihiragula
found himself a peacetime ruler now, a position he was unaccustomed to. His sons, meanwhile,
had grown accustomed to the power and status they enjoyed in the long absence of their father,
and relations at court were strained to say the least.

Kallinikos, meanwhile, moved south and put down the Jewish rebellion with ruthless efficiency,
restoring Jerusalem to Christian rule for the first time in many years. The Emperor spent several
months in the city, treating it as an extended pilgrimage before returning to Constantinople
victorious. The Empire was restored.

Culture and Society

It was in this time that the differences between the Eftal and the Iranian aristocracy truly started
to become minor. Like so many conquering nomadic peoples before them, the Eftal were losing
their distinct culture. Few enough of them were truly nomads now in any case - the Eftal had
become landholders, distinct from their subject peoples such as the Kidarites who in many
cases had not abandoned their cattle-herding lifestyle.

The Eftal had always been willing to dwell in cities and adapt to the lifestyle of settled peoples
and this willingness was part of what would see their unique identity and customs begin to
disintegrate. Unlike some of his predecessors, there is no indication Akhshunwar II or Mihiragula
bound their heads in the traditional Eftal style. The new Eftal dressed no differently than their
settled Iranic subjects, and generally adopted their languages with ease.

It was in religion that the Eftal imparted the greatest changes to society. The Eftal firmly
entrenched their own particular sorts of Sogdian inspired Buddhism and Shivaist Hinduism
throughout the eastern part of their domains, and granted Buddhism a foothold as far west as
Mesopotamia, although there many of their settlers ultimately became Nestorian Christians.
Zoroastrianism would undergo, if not decline, significant changes.

Those in urban centers, particularly the artisan and merchant classes, were some of the first
either accept Buddhism or begin worshipping Mahadeva, but the aristocracy and the
bureaucracy, by the time of Khauwashta was following suit. The cult of Zurvan remained
prevalent and powerful, and even Mazdakism remained - although slowly but surely it lose
ground, becoming a series of isolated, cultic communities. Traditional Zoroastrianism would
become the faith of the rural peasant, appealed to in times of domestic upheaval and rebellion.
The paganism of the Eftal however, would never truly die out. Mithra and other such gods would
find their place among the Buddhist teachings most popular in the Eftal Shahdom.
The willingness of the Eftal to settle many conquered peoples or tribal federates in their territory,
often very far afield, was a practice as old as the Middle East, but the Eftal used it to great
effect. Many of the migratory peoples who came against them ultimately found themselves living
alongside their conquerors, and these migrations would have a profound impact on the culture
and demographics of places like Mesopotamia, creating a new aristocracy out of settled Turkic
and Iranic peoples, subordinate to the Eftal and a critical supply of manpower which contributed
to the enduring legacy of the Eftal as these transplanted peoples gradually found themselves
identifying with their new overlords, becoming "Eftal" in spite of their varied origins.

The meaning of the word Eftal thus became an expansive one, a broad term for all the formerly
nomadic peoples who came to settle across what had once been the Sasanian Empire. And
thus the Eftal would endure long after the collapse of the great Eftal Shah, as both a visually
distinct ethnic group and a reliable source of soldiers and mercenaries, even as they culturally
assimilated into the majority population. However, as time went on, even the visual distinctions
would fade - intermarriage with the locals had always been a part of the Eftal strategy for
rulership.

Vultures Circling

In the aftermath of the Gupta Emperor Narasimhagupta Baladitya seizing much of the Hindu
Kush from the "Sveta Huna", the Eftal had never been capable of reclaiming it. The land of the
Kamboja was simply beyond their reach, high mountain passes unsuitable for cavalry. In
another world they might have passed into India through those passes, but no sooner did the
Gupta collapse than another dynasty had arisen to fill their place, and they were dynamic and
powerful.

The Johiyava represented a blend of cultures and traditions. Fearsome warriors, famed for their
cavalry and archers, their regime in Purushapura might have paid a small annual tribute to the
Eftal, but they were independent in law as well as fact, even if they gave lip-service to the notion
of being yet another satrap, they were a native Gandharan dynasty, and they did not allow the
Eftal to extend their dominion south into the subcontinent.

Vexed in their own attempts to expand south, the Johiyava would ultimately come to make their
mark on Baktria as one of the many vultures circling the Eftal Empire, waiting for a sign of
weakness. By 575, they were raiding the Eftal in turn, and the once mighty Shahdom was
having considerable trouble stopping the horsemen, warriors of the Asvaka clan, and their
lightening attacks out of the mountains. Despite not enjoying the official sponsorship of the Raja
Anandakumara, they were nevertheless protected once they entered the Hindu Kush, and thus
proved a major thorn in the side of the Satrap of Balkh.

Piandjikent sent an embassy to the Raja, and when it was ill received, there was little the Satrap
could do but raise additional retainers and hope to keep the situation under control. Shah
Mihiragula sent additional soldiers, primarily Iranian mercenaries, but that appears to be the
extent of his involvement.

The Asvha, an Iranian nomadic group not dissimilar from the Eftal, meanwhile had begun
raiding into Xvaresm, taking the great wealth in livestock of the pastoralist peoples there. While
their raids were ultimately of little consequence in the grand scheme of things, it is certainly
symptomatic of the times and perhaps also deteriorating relations between the still-expanding
Gokturks and the Eftal Shahs.

Splinterings

Mihiragula died in 572, succeeded by his son Varhran, who was not his eldest but was perhaps
the most like him of his sons. It might seem remarkable to some observers that this choice did
not lead to civil war or conflict, but the Eftal laws of succession tended to permit no objection to
the Shah's choice, and Varhran was given many offices shortly before the death of his father,
offices that allowed him to consolidate his power.

Vinayaditha, Mihiragula's eldest son is the only one to remain in the historical record, a noted
traveler and patron of the arts and sciences, presiding over the blossoming of art and culture in
western Persia which would continue roughly until the end of the century. He spent his final
years (it would seem he died relatively young) retired in the Vihara of Syarzur.

Varhran was not a capable administrator, though he seems to have been beloved by the Eftal
elite. Inscriptions and monuments from his reign praise a variety of pagan gods, chiefly Mithra,
who seems continually favored by the Eftal, but also "the fellowship in dharma, the gift of the
dharma" and other Buddhist ideas - ideas which, co-opted by the Eftal Shahs, provided an
ideological framework in which their polytheism could still endure.

Varhran was incapable it would seem, of maintaining the carefully orchestrated centralization of
his predecessors. Increasingly the far-flung satrapies of his Empire were autonomous in all but
name, and he was incapable of reigning in the Johiyava raiders. The plunder won by the various
clans of the Johiyava served to allow Raja Anandakumara to increase his own power by
extracting a tribute or tax upon the loot, and in time it was the Raja's own clansmen who were
coming down from their mountain strongholds to take caravans. While the Johiyava did not
leave a detailed record of their history, their stele record Anandakumara's "victories" in great
detail, praising the gods for his conquests - conquests which seem to have in truth amounted to
raids, but raids that nevertheless had a great disruptive effect on trade. The Kidarites were
granted a tributary sort of sovereignty over the regions of Sakastan and Kerman in this time, an
attempt to guard against the raids of the warlike clansmen of the Hindu Kush.

In 574, Eftal histories mark an attack of Piandjikent by a Turkic clan. An unimaginable event a
few decades ago, the defeat of the Satrap of Sogdia left the region open to Turkic invasion. A
Qa'an named Tulan, of unknown origin struck deep into the heart of the region, seemingly with
the consent of the Gokturks, and though he was ultimately repulsed, even in defeat he sparked
a great migration of refugees towards the safety of the west. It was around this time that the
government in Susa began granting their vassals and Satrapies increased powers designed to
curb perceived anarchy in the East.

Much of this newfound autonomy was because Varhran was struggling with affairs in the West -
attempting to reform the tax code and bring in new revenue from trade. These attempts would
be broadly unsuccessful, in no large part because Varhran had little understanding of mercantile
affairs, and left his reform programs to cronies whose policies would have depressive effect on
trade (while lining their own pockets) and lead to simmering resentment among the Iranian
merchants of the Persian gulf. Ultimately, faced with declining revenue, Varhran turned to state-
sponsored raiding of Rome, perhaps eager to relive his glory days as a cavalry commander
rather than a Shah.

By 576, the Asvha seem to have been given the region of Xvaresm to rule as a vassal - a not
uncommon arrangement similar to that struck with the Johiyava and the petty Shah of
Farghana. Subsequent records would call the region, or perhaps merely the territory
immediately to the north, around the Aral sea, Asvhastan, a name that seems to have stuck for
some time.

This loss of prestige and central authority was by no means total. Although history records riots
in the Mesopotamian city of Sumra, the West was relatively calm, although the Satrap of
Edessa began raiding Syria and Asia Minor once more in the early 580's, and other border
tribes followed suit not long afterwards. The notable efforts of atribal warlord named Heshana
are first recorded in this time, during a period of relative anarchy in both the Eftal and Roman
Empires where such independent figures could prosper. Although the East began to assert
additional autonomy in the face of nomadic incursions, this autonomy also seems to have been
largely successful in enabling the preservation of at least nominal Eftal authority in the region.
Some of the eastern satraps might have been emboldened by newfound kingly powers, but they
still used those powers to preserve the status quo, by and large.

Migrations

The Balkans, long depopulated, were saved from invasion during the Eftal-Roman war by adept
diplomacy and clever trickery - Roman garrisons were made to seem far larger than they
actually were, and the Roman army engaged in frequent patrols, giving the illusion of strength.

But in truth, such strength simply no longer existed. The devastated eastern regions of Anatolia
were no longer available for mass recruitment, and Syria and Thracia were similarly
depopulated by constant war. Paltry Roman garrison troops were the only reinforcements
Emperor Kallinikos could expect if the barbarians crossed the Danube in force - the main body
of his army was concentrated in the Orient, and when his advisors informed him that the
situation in the Balkans was deteriorating, he was forced to deplete the army of the Orient to
bring the Roman forces in the Balkans up to respectable levels.
Vitalian and Zeno had been willing to acknowledge the Langobards as Imperial allies in
Pannonia and Dalmatia, and despite their best attempts to preserve the uneasy balance of
power, the Langobards had only grown in strength, and when Audion, their loyal ally died in 568,
the certainty of Langobard fidelity vanished overnight. Alboin, his son and heir, was a different,
more ambitious figure even than his famously ambitious and successful father. To say that
Alboin could not be relied upon to be a reliable Roman ally was an understatement.

Countless allies flocked to the new king's banner. What remained of the pagan Gepids were
cowed by force into serving Alboin, and the Sklaveni and many Iranian Bulgar tribes were willing
to work with him. With the Xasar-Sahu wreaking havoc on the steppe, the Khans knew their
time was running out. Being on the other side of the ancient Roman fortifications looked to many
disparate peoples to be the best way to avoid subjugation under the Xasar yoke.

And thus Alboin openly invaded his former allies, striking a devastating opening blow to an
already devastated Empire. The Roman commanders generally refused to give him the field
battle he desired, but the Langobards proved adept at besieging and taking Roman fortresses
nonetheless. Certain cities, such as Thessalonica, Athens, and Corinth did not fall, but the
hinterlands were nevertheless taken, and cities such as Sardike and Stoboi suffered sacks from
which they did not quickly recover. In many cases the already small Greek populations, much
diminished by constant raids and pillaging, were subsequently massacred, making way for
Hunnic and Slavic settlers. The Langobards generally were less brutal in their conquests, but
they displaced many Greeks nonetheless.

Kallinikos, who had originally based his claim to the Roman throne on his ability to push back
the barbarians, was forced to respond - and yet his response came slowly, perhaps owing to his
exhaustion after years of uninterrupted campaigning. He stalled, trying to raise additional forces
to counter the Langobards and their countless allies. Despite a few early successes, which gave
his men hope that he would repeat his great victories in the East here, he slowly retreated back
towards Adrianople in the face of Alboin's army. At Adrianople, however, he fought a major battle
against the Langobard King and won. His numerically inferior but disciplined veteran forces
fought their way out of an encirclement by the enemy Bulgar cavalry and saved the day - but at
a terrible cost. In the confused barbarian rout that followed, Kallinikos was knocked from his
charging horse and suffered a terrible blow to the head.

Our Greek sources report the Emperor was not quite the same afterwards. His sub-
commanders were forced to intercede, and though many of them were capable and
experienced, they lacked the Emperor's personal charisma, and the tide of the barbarians was
simply too great. They would ultimately retire to Constantinople, using the Roman fleet to
ensure that the Peloponnese would not be taken, and reinforce the garrisons of many yet-
untaken coastal cities.

Alboin never attempted to besiege Constantinople himself. After his defeat at Adrianople, he
seems to have lost the confidence of his many allies, allies he desperately needed. The
coalition he had designed was splintering, carving out their own autonomous tribal states. His
own Langobards received the lion's share of course, choice lands in Thessalia, Macedonia, and
Epirus, but his Slavic vassals would prove far more unruly in the north than he could have
intended. The Kutrigurs themselves now ruled an expansive, wealthy territory on either side of
the Danube and their Khan did not acknowledge Langobard superiority at all.

The long term ramifications of this invasion were huge. While the long-established, populous
cities of the East proved relatively more invulnerable to Germanic and Slavic invasion than their
western counterparts, and the Langobardi contented themselves with ruling the interior, the
cultural heart of Hellenic civilization was forced to shift further East. The general devastation of
the very center of Hellenism would mark the true "end of antiquity" and the emergence of
something new. What the new era would bring was as of yet unclear, but it seemed certain that
it would not be peaceful.

Two regions of the Empire were relatively unspoilt by war - the Diocese of Asia, and the Diocese
of Egypt. Both were wealthy and ancient, heirs to far older traditions than that even of Rome,
and both had avoided the worst of conflicts that had brought their neighbors to unprecedented
lows. Egypt, however, had the unique distinction of being essential to the feeding of
Constantinople- so essential to the continued function of the Empire was the province that the
military and civil offices of the province were often combined - as indeed they were under the
Prefect Anastasios, an old comrade-in-arms of Emperor Kallinikos, who was also the
commander of the armies of the Diocese.

Despite the alienation the Miaphysite majority of Egypt had experienced under past Emperors,
Anastasios proved to be a capable administrator and diplomat, finely attuned to the religious
views of his majority populace. More than any religious council, he managed to reconcile the
Miaphysites to a degree through clever negotiations and a willingness to give Miaphysite
leaders positions within his administration. In no small part, Anastasios' negotiations and
political savvy prevented the province from breaking into outright rebellion when the Eftal had
invaded, despite a series of devastating riots in the countryside, riots only put down with the use
of brutal force.

However, in 572, these riots occurred again, this time breaking out into open civil war. A
massacre of Roman administrators in the province cut off the grain supply to Constantinople yet
again during a time of crisis. The great cities of the Mediterranean were forced to buy vital
foodstuffs from Berber merchants who made exploitative profits selling North African grain
during the time of unrest. The government in Constantinople was forced to dispatch additional
soldiers to Egypt, and dissent was brewing in the ranks.

The Anatolian army, having gone without pay for some time, erupted into open rebellion shortly
thereafter, acclaiming one of their own sub-commanders, Constantine, as Emperor. Kallinikos,
who seems to have been a mere figurehead after Adrianople, nevertheless maintained the
fanatic loyalty of his forces in Constantinople and much of the fleet as well. Constantine, like
Vitalian before him, was forced to consolidate his hold on Anatolia, but was unable to cross the
Bosporus and take the Imperial capital. He was enormously fortunate, and perhaps crafty, in
that the Eftal were too distracted to take advantage of the chaos in the Roman Empire, and his
forces moved into Syria, wresting much of the devastated province of Oriens from Kallinikos'
prefect there, Julian Menas.

The Emperor's advisors, however, began to see which way the winds of change were turning. In
the night, they fled south with much of the fleet, arriving in Egypt, where Anastasios welcomed
them hospitably. However, the Emperor did not live long after his flight, and seems to have
passed away two years later, in 574 - and a final blow to his legitimacy came early in the same
year, when Constantine finally was welcomed into Constantinople, having built his own fleet and
pushed the Imperial fleet out of the Aegean, at least. Constantine seems to have had little desire
to remain in Constantinople - he clearly had ambitions to retake the Balkans, but those came
secondarily to restoring the supply of grain to the capital cut off when Kallinikos fled to
Constantinople.

Anastasios ultimately would, at the urging of the late Emperor's staff and advisors, take on the
mantle of Empire, but favored the Greek title of Autokrator. Ruling out of Alexandria, he secured
Crete and Cyprus, and Palestine to his regime, but Anatolia and parts of Syria, as well as what
remained of Greece, were lost to him. Constantine attempted to march south into Palestine in
575, and indeed, made it as far as Gaza before he was repulsed, and Anastasios never
attempted a similar invasion, although he did take Damascus and Phoenicia back in the
aftermath of Constantine's failed invasion. The two regimes regarded themselves warily across
the Mediterranean, in time referred to by historians as the Anastasian and the Constantinian
Roman Empires.

Constantine, for his part, barely held on to his throne in the aftermath of his failed invasion of
Palestine. Despite a near-mutiny of his forces, and a rebellion in what remained of Roman
Syria, he managed to retain control of the apparatus of state, and both Emperors were forced to
acknowledge each other's dominion for the time being. No sooner than tentative peace was
signed than Constantine was forced to march into Pontus to deal with Alan incursions there, a
task he would only be partially successful in, due to minimal manpower and a small budget.

Almost none of the Emperor Constantine's reign would be spent in Constantinople, a city which
declined in population during this period, failing to recover from the Egyptian Plague even in an
era when many of the other cities of Asia Minor finally did so. It must be stressed this is due in
no little part to the role which Anastasios played - maintaining an indefinite grain embargo cost
the city dearly. Constantinople, like Thessalonica many other Roman cities, continued in
unchecked decline as the Romans lost their influence in the Balkans and around the northern
rim of the Black Sea. While these massive cities were still well-defended (Constantinople in
particular famed for her land walls) and large compared to the urban centers of the West, they
nevertheless suffered and lost much of their former prestige.

A Look to the West

Sicily, meanwhile, under the Prefect Maurice, at this point severed ties with Constantinople. It
seems, from various Roman historians and inscriptions left in the city of Panormus, that Maurice
began ruling with the title of Dux, and paying a small tribute to the Mauri Rex in Africa. Maurice,
a capable administrator and general, is recorded as having defied a Gothic attempt to reclaim
southern Italy, with no small assistance from the Mauritanians, who by 570 had truly begun
projecting military power outside of their holdings in Africa.

The Gothic Rex Theodoric II was killed in this war, beginning a period of fifteen years known as
the "Regency" where his infant son was raised by his wife, Matasuntha, and she seems to have
exercised relative power over the regime. It was, by all accounts, a peaceful era. The young
Rex, Alaric, was betrothed to a Frankish princess from the age of five onwards, and the
Ostrogoths and Franks solidified their border - something that cannot be said for their Hispanic
cousins, who waged a series of bloody borders wars against the Franks, contesting the
ownership of the city of Narbo and its hinterlands.

Matasuntha's regency was a time of peace and increasing Romanization. Gothic aristocrats with
ever more Romanized names become more and more common, and despite religious
differences, Italy in the late sixth century was a peaceful region recovering from the devastation
of plague and war. With Berber grain, depopulated cities began to experience a revival.
Between 575 and 590 was a period of uninterrupted prosperity, and though Rome might have
been a shadow of her former glory kept aloft only by the Papacy, a traveler to sixth-century
Ravenna or Milan might well have thought that the Roman Empire had never fallen.

[In response to the comments, Glad everyone still likes what's happening and sorry, Abe, the
poor Jewish state was doomed from the outset - it barely even got to be a state before
Kallinikos got at it again.

As for the next update, Constantine tries to retake the Balkans from the Lombard yoke, a look
what's going on in Africa, and maybe some more India. Haven't quite decided yet.]

Next post, and well...

it's a big one. Didn't get to many of the things I'd like to cover, and didn't cover others in nearly
as much detail. I'm going to need to go back and fill in some of the blanks, and also I think it's
about time I make a map about what's going on.

Kaosha's Legacy and African Trade Revisited

Alone of the regions impacted by the Eftal, the Eastern shore of Africa remains shrouded in
myth. Although the late sixth century is the era in which the region which would become known
as Awalastan came into its own, its true founding is obscured by local history of questionable
authenticity. From the city of Amoud, Kaosha Shah changed history, but the narratives of his life
are of unknown authorship, although his followers might have claimed that Sattiga, the
"Teacher" wrote them.
Kaosha came into his own against a backdrop of rising Hadhrami and declining Axumite
fortunes - and thus it can be little surprise that almost until the end he remained aligned with the
Malik of Hadhramwt and his interests, and fought Axum, or "Harsha" at every turn. His armies
enjoyed qualitative superiority over the locals, and he made great use of that - his elite band
winning triumphs over much larger armies time and again, even until his death. Kaosha
ultimately broke the tribal society that governed the rural hinterlands, creating a hydraulic
empire based upon urban developments. It was no easy task, but it was an impressive legacy.

But this period of glory could not last. Kaosha had a son, Nijara, named after his grandfather,
whose rule would be not that of a holy figure but rather a secular ruler by all accounts. Taking
power in 575, Nijara was a young man born into a society that would have been utterly alien to
his ancestors, a fascinatingly bizarre mix of Persian and Arabian rites, all overseen by the now
decrepit figure of Sattiga, and his "limitless divine" to which the Shah and his retainers paid
tribute. Indian travelers and merchants, often heterodox themselves, nevertheless found the
world of Nijara Shah an incredibly strange one. Awalastan was a land of scattered entrepot
cities dominated by control of water and a small, privileged cultic elite, and though it was in the
midst of transformative flux and radical centralization, the trends begun here would carry
resonance across the African continent.

Further south, the same merchants who patronized Awalastan were founding colonial ports.
Increasingly these Arab and Hindu merchants were settling down, building temples to their
gods, but more importantly, infrastructure to regulate and promote commerce with the tribes of
the interior. Ivory and gold, jewels and spices would make these merchants (and to a lesser
degree the tribal groups they aligned themselves with) incredibly wealthy - especially the Arabs,
who opened this new market up to the insatiable desire of Egypt and by extension the entire
European West.

It was a polyglot land, a land settled by Arabian pagans and Jews, Buddhists and Hindus who
crossed the black water. The polities that would eventually develop would be Indianized to
varying degrees, but their language would co-opt words most liberally from Arabic, and their
culture would be an unrecognizable synthesis of ideas from across the world. By the mid-
seventh century, they would call themselves Savahila, and their city states formed a coalition of
interlinked, truly global and cosmopolitan trade powers in a region otherwise filled with petty
kings focused on regional interests. Across the sea ruled the Rajas of Shakilava, on the island
the Arabs called Al-Komr, and the Hindus called Karnara. Their rule was not absolute, but a
hegemony of tribes. They farmed rice and many fruits adjusted well to their tropics, and traded
wood and precious metals.

Migrations and Consolidation

It is difficult, for various reasons, to discuss the existence of states in the Balkans. While there
were certainly monarchs, most notably Alboin of the Langobards and the Khan of the Kutrigurs,
the Slavic and Gepidae tribes tended to raid and move as they chose, with little regard for these
hierarchies. Alboin's own Langobardi had established the rudiments of a centralized, almost
proto-feudal state, their warriors providing garrisons for the Roman cities they conquered and
taking for themselves land grants, but this did not prevent the Slavs from raiding, both into what
constituted Roman territory and also north on occasion, into Gothic Italy. While many tribes,
notably the White Sklaveni and Vaioniti, were willing to serve Langobard interests, many others
did not.

To his north, Khan Bayan ruled over the Danube forts, but it seems under his rule they fell into a
state of relative disrepair. In contrast to Alboin, who seems to have ruled as a settled lord after
the initial invasion, the Kutrigurs kept many rich pasturelands and their Khan and his warriors
remained mobile. Many of the Slavic tribes were forcibly made vassals of the Kutrigurs,
including the Dragoviti and Marvatsi. With these vassals, Khan Bayan was able to successfully
push south and sack Adrianople, which at the time was still Roman city loyal to Constantine.
The path now lay open to Constantinople as well - but such a siege was beyond the capacity of
the Kutrigurs, who like the Langobards were more concerned with solidifying their power.

Further, the Pannonian provinces of the Langobard patrimony were under attack at this same
time - the Avars exploited the power vacuum to great effect, subduing those Germanic and
Slavic peoples they found residing in a broad swath of territory west of the Carpathians. A
scattering of Langobardi federates were defeated at the Battle of the Tisia River were the only
major opposition they faced - Alboin was too busy fighting in Macedonia to react quickly to their
incursions, and the Avars and their allies raided as far as Aemonia before they were turned
back. They took ancient Tarsatica and Siscia as well, and after Khagan Anakuye made a pact
with the Kutrigur Khan, King Alboin realized the threat might well be a mortal one. He and his
warriors turned north, but after an indecisive campaign he was forced to return south. He would
winter his troops in Dyrrhachium during the notably hard winter of 576, and the next summer he
would attempt to negotiate with both his fellow warlords, with limited success. In the end he
would be forced to concede the loss of Pannonia, and it was perhaps not the blow the histories
seem to make it out to be - refugees fleeing the Avars were quickly and easily incorporated into
his army, and despite his failed campaign, his army swelled with their numbers. These new
recruits, despite their mixed origins, would prove far more loyal than the tribal "vassals" who
prided themselves on relative independence.

As Alboin licked his wounds, he would find that there was no rest for him - the Emperor
Constantine and a small but veteran force would land at Thessalonike, from there planning to
strike at the very heart of the Langobard threat, before Alboin's consolidations turned to
renewed aggressive campaigning. The Emperor was a battle-tested companion, and following
in Kallinikos' footsteps he was willing to lead armies personally. Winning easy early victories, he
secured the Thermaikos Bay and Demetrias. In his wake, Alboin laid siege to Thessalonike, but
was unable to take it - the city was well defended and supplied by ship.

Zvonomir, a slavic warlord of indeterminite origin meanwhile attacked the previously unmolested
Peloponnese. Landing by way of a small group of ships in Achaea, he burned and pillaged his
way across the lightly-defended region. His raid would become a more permanent victory, as he
came to reside in the city of Patrae. A sizable company of Bulgars allied with him, and when
Constantine dispatched troops to repulse Zvonomir's raiding party, they found themselves
outnumbered and unable to do more than hold what territory had not yet been lost - notably the
city of Corinth.

If 577 saw only minor victories for Constantine, 578, according to our Roman historians, was a
year of triumphs. Reportedly, he won a crushing victory over the Langobardi and Slavs, retaking
Thessalia and much of Makedonia, before marching north and defeating Bayan Khan at the
battle of Trimontium. The Khan retreated to Sardike, which Constantine besieged, along with
Adrianople in the south. It seemed the tide had turned. The Bulgars were in chaos, and indeed
Bayan Khan, according to our Roman historians, committed suicide not long after, being
replaced by his cousin Kubrat, who was "as savage and warlike a man as any, a pagan who
burned churches and slaughtered priests." This portrait of him seems inaccurate, perhaps
informed more by the hatred of the Romans than any truth, but at any rate, Kubrat rallied the
Bulgar army and forced Constantine south - but the Emperor did not attempt to retreat to
Thessalonike, still besieged by Alboin, but rather towards Constantinople. From there, the
Bulgars hemmed him in.

The next three years would see Constantine forced to devote attention to the rest of his
Emperor. The siege of Thessalonike dragged on, and despite Bulgar raids which came within
sight of Constantinople, the city was never seriously threatened. Zvonomir was finally forced to
flee Patrae, but he would return a year later, in 581, this time perhaps for good. He defeated the
local Roman commander and captured Corinth after a short siege - unlike his previous
incursions, Zvonomir was now concerned with long-term occupation - he looted far less and
instead appointed trusted commanders to oversee the various towns and cities he captured,
and petitioned Alboin to accept him as a federate ally, a petition which was accepted.

In 582, Constantine returned with a larger army, and met the Bulgar Khan in battle at
Arkaidioupolis. He had spent his reign wisely - naming his younger brother Ioannes co-Emperor,
giving him broad authority to organize the defenses of the East and indeed administer his
portion of the Empire, restructuring the tax system and levying new tariffs on valuable eastern
commodities imported from Eftal territories. However, for all this work, Khan Kubrat seems to
have made better use of his time, and the Bulgar army that met Constantine was prepared and
indeed significantly larger than the Roman force.

Arkaidiouspolis was a crushing blow to the Empire. Constantine was defeated after his cavalry
was routed and the infantry surrounded, and indeed the would-be Emperor was captured. The
terms of his release were crippling, and though the Emperor had little intent to actually abide by
them, the whole of Thrace was lost save Constantinople and its environs, and the Emperor was
forced under duress to confirm the Bulgar Khanate's right to a broad and expansive territory.
Humiliated, Constantine returned to Constantinople, only to be murdered there. According to
legend, the act was done by a frustrated mob, and even by the vicious standards of the
Constantinopolitan mob, it was a brutal one.
No sooner did Emperor Anastasios hear of his rival's capture than he launched a renewed
invasion. Sending the Prefect of Syria, Julian, in command of a large army, Ioannes retreated
before him, but ultimately would lay an ambush for Julian, defeating the Prefect and scattering
the Anastasian forces with a small but elite force. After a hasty truce was established, Emperor
Anastasios would have to confront the inferiority of his officer corps and army, who despite
having lost far fewer battles than the beleaguered, often understrength units of Constantinians,
also lacked that critical experience. A few units of Anastasios' army might have seen action, but
many were freshly raised Egyptian levies.

Collapse

The latter raids of the Eftal Shah were not as ambitious as those of later eras, and mostly
served to further devastate an already devastated region. Apart from a single major campaign in
582 between the competing Roman Empires, major military engagements were rare, but vicious
back-and-forth raids and counter-raids were commonplace, but the Eftal Shahdom in the east
had reached a state of terminal decline. Most notably, it seems that the satrap Sogdia began
minting independant coinage sometime around 583, and these coins refer to "Shah Tarkhsuna"
who seems to have been totally independent. Tarkhsuna was of Eftal origin, but he married into
the Sogdian merchant class, and employed many Turkic mercenaries in his various wars
against the Qangli and later the Gokturks.

The newly emerging eastern powers were very fluid in their borders. Tarkhsuna captured much
of Baktria after defeating Varhran in battle in 585, only to himself be deprived of at least a
portion of his conquests by the aggressively expanding Johiyavan clansmen. The Asvha as well
continued their expansion, striking into the Iranian heartlands. While the Kidarites maintained
the at least nominal fiction of obedience to the Eftal, their own semi-autonomy and relative
unwillingness to assist Shah Varhran meant that it was no more than a fiction.

And Varhran had other worries. Smelling weakness and seeking to fulfill his own Imperial
ambitions, the satrap of Pars, Akhshunwar Malkha rebelled with the help of the local Persian
aristocracy and his own coalition of loyal Eftal tribes. A distant relative of Akhshunwar I's
dynasty, he won followers by promising a return to the glory days. Moving north, he captured
much of the Mesun province and its satrap, whom he captured and kept as an honored "guest"
in comfortable confinement.

Varhran rushed back from the East to confront the newest rebel claimant to the throne, but he
was too late. Susa had already fallen by the time he arrived. Seeing which way the wind was
blowing, he fled north with a core group of loyal guards and retainers but was captured and
executed. While this may appear an uncharacteristic move from a heroic warrior-king, Varhran's
portrayal as such was an attempt by certain Eftal and Persian historians to characterize him as
the last capable Shah, and while he was undoubtedly a warrior, we know little of the actual state
of his army beyond that it was defeated but a year earlier in Sogdia.
Akhshunwar Malkha, however, would prove to be not a restoration of the old days, but rather the
final nail in the coffin. Formally taking power in 587, his claim to be a restoration of the old
dynasty was not taken seriously. The nature of Eftal power was, in this moment of sudden crisis,
revealed to be not, as Akhshunwar had assumed, based entirely on dynastic prestige and
historical legitimacy so much as clever coalition building and oftentimes personal loyalty, and
Akhshunwar does not seem to have had the loyalty of the many tribes and ethnic groups
beyond his immediate region. His ascendency is marked by near total anarchy as pretenders
emerged from the woodwork across "his" Empire.

If Akhshunwar is to have a positive legacy, it should be known that his portion of the Empire
does not seem to have suffered unduly. While much of the northern and western parts of the
Empire suffered from war and migrations, the cities of the Persian Gulf remained a prosperous
manufacturing hub, and this, more than anything, allowed Akhshunwar to maintain a larger army
and retain more Turkic mercenaries than his competitors.

One of the pretenders, an Eftal Christian by the name of Isaiah emerges onto the historical
scene for a time as a conqueror who united much of northern Mesopotamia behind him. His
greatest victory came with his capture and sack of Tesifon in 590. However, as Nestorian
Christian, his appeal was simply not widespread, and he failed to unite the Empire behind him,
and he died in 591 and his dominions would be absorbed by the satrap of Arbayestan, who,
despite remaining under the authority of Akhshunwar had sufficient power to refuse all requests
of the Shah in Susa.

Much of the north broke away under another pretender who ruled from Afrahrot, whose name
was Huvishka Prajana. A devout Buddhist, his reign was marked by massive donations to
temples and monasteries, constant proselytizing, and also a series of major urban construction
projects. His Shahdom encompassed the whole of the Caspian sea, and having at his disposal
a vast force of Gilani mercenaries, his own conquests united much of northern Persia. Across
the Empire, satraps began asserting their independence where these pretenders could not
reach.

Over time, these varying pretenders would gradually morph into successor states, characterized
primarily by their intensely personal nature - rarely did these smaller kingdoms outlive the
deaths of their leaders. While often various satraps did pay some form of allegiance to the
government in Susa, the existence of pretenders and powerful de facto independent satraps
served to divide loyalties and create chaos.

Heshana - a Shah in Syria

Since around 582, a tribal Eftal warlord named Heshana had come to increasing prominence as
a brigand and mercenary. Raiding the retreating army of Julian in the service of Ioannes,
eventually Heshana broke that contract and began to gather Bedouin and Eftal, Christians and
Pagans, horse thieves and professional soldiers to his banner. Of mixed origin himself, a
descendent of the Gaoche and Eftal only on his mother's side, as the anarchy grew he
managed to begin taking cities, turning a profitable business of raiding into the more profitable
business of conquest.

With the collapse of the central Eftal state into civil war, he grew more brazen, taking Edessa
itself, and the next year, Samosata. An expedition in 585 lead by a general of Anastasios' army
was repulsed by the wily commander, who began minting coins calling himself Shah and striking
deep into Roman and Eftal territory quite indiscriminately. Fortune seemed to favor him - his
victories he attributed to Mithra, but they are an excellent example of just how much power a
charismatic leader with proven success could amass.

By 587, he had taken Nisibin, the major fortress-city left massively undermanned in the wake of
Shah Isaiah's conquests. Despite an attempt by the Shah to retake it, the fortress did not fall a
second time, and Isaiah found it more profitable to continue his expansion in Mesopotamia.
Shortly thereafter, Heshana gained the loyalty of Alan mercenaries settled in the area, and with
these newfound allies, the stage was set for further conquests. Experience fighting Anastaios
convinced him that the Roman Empire was an easy target, and despite his still relatively small
force, Heshana was confident that he could succeed where Mihiragula had failed.

Consolidation Continued

The Lombards and Bulgars took very different approaches to rulership of the vast territory they
found themselves holding in the wake of the Roman collapse. Twenty years into their reign,
these differences were become more and more marked. While the Langobards took to their
position as settled rulers with increasing ease, the Bulgars seem to have had greater difficulty
adapting their regime to one of settlement and permanent conquest.

King Alboin had often referred to himself by the title of Doux, and it seems this did not change
after his conquests. Acting the part of a Germanic king to his nobles and a Roman provincial
governor to the Greek population was essential to his regime, as was maintaining the urban
power structures in the regions which he ruled over. In the countryside, he might have
apportioned to his loyal soldiers large grants of land, replacing the rural aristocracy wholesale,
but his approach to the cities was a temperate, moderate one. After initial sacks, largely carried
out by his slavic allies, he restrained his troops. Having grown up in Dalmatia, surrounded by
Romans, speaking both Greek and Latin as well as his own tongue, he chose to present himself
as a defender of Roman traditions, rather than a conqueror.

While it is unclear to what degree the locals bought into this, they were nonetheless complicit.
Roman officials became his tax collectors and governors. His tribal vassals were managed as
federate allies, encouraged not to overstretch the bounds of their demesne, and though they
were often unruly, he did his best to make them understand that their conquered territory was a
grant of land from the King to them - oftentimes resorting to force when diplomacy failed.

Demographics were simply on the side of the conquerors here. Unlike the Eftal conquest of
Persia, this was not a nomadic people impressing their will upon a vast settled population - the
Germanic people might have been uprooted, or come as refugees in some cases, but the lands
they moved into were often made vacant by the Slavic invasions of previous decades, and
where they were not, the Germanic peoples tended to live alongside the Greek population,
although violence did break out on the communal level often enough.

Alboin was concerned also with making a fleet. His long siege of Thessalonike, and frequent
Roman naval operations convinced him that he would not have true security without one. It was
for this reason that he began hiring Greek shipbuilders and sailors to outfit a new fleet, and
though the small naval force did not actively contest the Aegean against the far more formidable
Roman fleet, its mere existence was part of the actively shifting balance of power.

The Bulgars, by contrast, seemingly had little interest in fleet-building, nor in settling down. Their
society was at least partially a nomadic one, and though they now found themselves the
garrison-masters of cities, it was often their slavic subjects who were called upon to fill the role
of town guards and low-level administrators. The Bulgar regime was based more upon plunder
than taxation, and for this reason and many others, they were often willing to raid into Lombard
territory as well as what remained of Roman lands. While they were not afraid to attack
Constantinople's suburbs, the city itself intimidated them, a people still relatively unfamiliar with
siegecraft.

The Khan of the Kutrigurs (who by 590 was Khan of the whole Hunno-Bulgar Confederation)
settled in the city of Adrianople, but the Hunno-Bulgar allies of his regime remained nomadic,
and though he might have had ambitions of an ever-greater dominion, his power was limited by
their limitations. The extent of Bulgar settlement never extended too far beyond good
pastureland. Even as his slavic subjects slowly began to assimilate into the Greek world that
they now lived in, and his own people began to consider settling down, they remained relatively
aloof and distinct from the conquered people.

And yet for all of this, Khan Kubrat was the one who craved Roman acceptance, making their
recognition of his conquests a key term in the peace treaty they had arranged, being named an
"Archon" over a vast territory, much of it actually in the hands of the Langobards. The wealth,
power, and order of the Empire impressed him. Beautiful churches and cathedrals, elaborate
villas and palaces, even devastated and ruined by his pagan invaders still did strike him. The
"God of the Greeks" had once owned many great things, and his victories over the soldiers of
that god served merely to confirm the relative greatness of his own pagan gods, notably Tangra,
the great God of the Sky.

A Realm Divided

Even as Persian philosophers charted the motion of the stars, designed ever more advanced
mathematics, and created great works of literature, their world was falling apart. The adoption of
Indian numerals developed under Gupta patronage lead to the development of algebra, and
revolutions in medicine lead to the repudiation of the Greek system of humors. The writing of
these great thinkers however, stops short in many cases of true revolutions in medicine and
science because of the spontaneous collapse of the civilization which patronized them.

This was an era of mercenaries, hired from amongst the Gilani and the Turks, the Alans and the
Arabs. A multitude of Eftal tribes sought mercenaries as a way to augment their forces,
frequently offering plunder as the greatest incentive for service, and in turn these Eftal tribes
would serve local leaders in exchange for pay, middlemen in the destructive wars that ravaged
Persia.

The Turks in particular joined the warring with great enthusiasm. Numerous and exceptionally
warlike, they were the most prized of the mercenaries that served alongside the Eftal. Primarily
Buddhists and Tengrist pagans, after their service many tribes would settle across Persia,
further altering the demographics of the region. By contrast, the Indian-influenced Persian Gulf
would see the increasing triumph of Mahadeva as a sole God, often with Mithra and other Iranic
gods described as aspects of him. Divorced from his Indian context, this version of Shiva would
become uniquely Eftal, clad in a lion's skin and a radiant sunburst halo, holding a cudgel and
spear in his more warlike aspect, or cross-legged in meditative bliss in his more mystical
interpretation.

The personal god of Akhshunwar Malkha, Mahadeva would gain great popularity after the Shah
entreated his companions subjects to swear their devotion to him, one of the only cases of a
mass conversion in the history of the typically cosmopolitan and pluralistic Eftal Shahdom. For a
time too, Akhshunwar was seen as triumphant over the other pretenders - Isaiah was crushed
quickly (leaving Mesopotamia much reduced in his wake) and Huvishka Prajana was on the
retreat. However, in a mere moment, Akhshunwar undid all his progress by attempting to bring
the Satrap of Arbayestan more firmly under his control.

The Satrap, named Yaghar, rebelled, and, holding much of Mesopotamia, was capable of
raising an impressive army, sustained by the plunder gained from his savage defeats of Isaiah
and a comprehensive and devastating pillage of Ctesifon from which the city never truly
recovered. Akhshunwar's campaign to unseat Yaghar was halted by an invasion of Turkic and
Gilani mercenaries loyal to Huvishka Prajana. Yaghar was independent for a time before
ultimately he was murdered by a jealous male lover, at which point his wife, Roshana,
commanded the lover put to death and indeed ruled the satrapy between 594-597. Her brother,
Sheskh, turned out to be a brilliant commander and quite capable of scoring major victories both
against Akhshunwar and later Persarmenia, which he subdued and added to his sister's
dominion. Sheskh's legacy would long outlive that of his sister, as he left monumental
inscriptions to mark his victories, and after his sister's death in childbirth, declared himself
formally a Shah. His other great legacy would be as a persecutor of Christians, and although
many of the claims made against him seem exaggerated with the benefit of hindsight, he did not
allow them to hold office or fight in his armies. He was recorded as being present at one of
Akhshunwar's early mass conversions, but it is unclear what his actual religious beliefs were.

In the core territories of Shah Huviskha, the Persian intellectual revolution continued. His
demesne around the Caspian sea was untouched by war, even as he sent mercenaries south to
plunder and cause chaos in the territory of his enemies. He married one of his daughters to a
scion of the Asvhastani Shah, and his personal rule was characterized by leniency and mercy (if
hypocrisy, considering the devastation he inflicted upon those territories not under his control)
and his propaganda often couches his various wars in the language of "spreading harmony" - a
significant change, considering that no previous Eftal ruler, no matter how religious, had really
bothered seeking religious ethical justification for their war.

Heshana Shah

Heshana's conquests left him with a small territory, but one which was only barely centrally
organized. A charismatic leader of men, Heshana was characterized by handsome features and
personal bravery, but his prowess did not extend to governing the territories he gained - he was
merely the king of bandits, and aspired to little greater than that status. Cities such as Edessa
were made tributaries of a mobile horde, not incorporated into a greater state.

Heshana might have been called Shah, but there is little evidence that he himself had that idea.
Clever administrators, including Narsai bar Aprem, who held an indeterminate role as some sort
of second in command, were behind the organization of his regime from the early days. But
these were not bureaucrats, but rather murderous brigands with slightly more ambition than
average - men such as Narsai established their position by force and kept it by adeptly
maintaining the fiction of a centralized monarchy until it became a reality. By making the
extortion of major cities along the Euphrates into a "tribute" Heshana's dominion was solidified.
Coins could commemorate victories, such as the 585 victory over the Prefect of Syria, or the
587 taking of Nisibin, the great armories of which, when opened to organized plunder, armed
and equipped Heshana's forces to a relatively more uniform and high standard.

After Nisibin, Heshana's standing forces numbered perhaps eight thousand - a paltry force, but
almost entirely mounted, and under a commander who understood well how to utilize those
forces to stunning effect. The "Shah of Osrhoene" was perhaps the weakest and poorest of the
Eftal successor Kings, but his army was capable and, with the establishment of an organized
system of taxation, no longer merely dependent on plunder for their loyalty.

Local tyrants, recruited from Heshana's direct companions, were placed over small regional
commands, given small retainers of soldiers. It was Narsai who had the notion to ensure that
these retainers were ethnically mixed and lacked kinship, ensuring both the spread of an
Eftalized version of Persian (the language of Heshana's closest companions) as a lingua franca
even amongst the Arabs and Alans, and that the only functioning tribal loyalty was to Heshana's
own people, regardless of background or language of birth.

There might have been some dissent in the ranks but for the continued profitability of Heshana's
conquests and his willingness to divide the loot generously. Disorder only became an issue as
conquest and the river of plunder which had made rich men of Heshana's followers began to dry
up. For these reasons as well as titanic ambition, Heshana began to contemplate raids on the
Roman Empire itself. At first, these raids represented little more than a continuation of the Eftal-
Roman border raids, but they would grow from there, particularly as certain marginalized Arab
tribal groups unaffiliated with the Romans found common cause with him and began to turn on
the Romans and Ghassanids.

The fall of Syria

Julian Menas was still in charge of the Diocese of the East, and despite numerous failures and
reversals he had just barely maintained his position. He had connections and was an amiable,
scholarly man, with a bookish, thin face. He had the loyalty and close personal friendship of
many in Anastasios' military, and the Emperor in Egypt feared to remove him, knowing that
Julian Menas, another of Emperor Kallinikos' former friends, had every bit as much legitimacy to
the Imperial mantle as he did - which was to say little. As such, the Emperor did not ask for his
resignation, even when Constantine wrested the entire region from him, or Ioannes ambushed
and destroyed nearly the entire Imperial army.

Rather, he wrested military command from him, undoing the reforms of Kallinikos and making
Julian Menas merely a governor of the province rather than a prefect with broad extraordinary
powers. If Julian objected to this change it is unknown, but a loyal companion of the Emperor,
Proklos of Damascus, was given overall military command, and surviving letters between
Emperor and General indicate that Julian's command had deteriorated significantly from its
paper strength, and not truly recovered. Fresh soldiers were raised to fill the gaps, and Proklos
set about constructing a series of border fortifications along the border with Cilicia, still occupied
by Ioannes' forces and locked in an uneasy truce.

After a period of a few months, Julian was summoned to Alexandria, and there he seems to
have lived out his life in relative comfort with his family and young children. His replacement for
governor of Syria was an Egyptian bureaucrat named Bonus, and with the perceived threat
taken care of, Anastasios felt that he could rest easy.

Unfortunately, he could not. Heshana's raiders were moving into Syria in force by the spring of
590. Despite overtures to the Banu Ghassan for assistance, the traditional buffer state was
enfeebled by on-and-off war with the Bedouin of the interior - Proklos was on his own.

However, the Emperor's companion was, unlike his predecessor, quite capable. A strong, barrel-
chested Greek, he won the loyalty of Julian's men and gave Heshana hell as the Eftal warlord
attempted to break into Syria, blunting the advance totally. After this unexpected reversal,
Proklos marched north and besieged Edessa. The city held however, and despite a few months
of siege and internal chaos (the locals reportedly attempted to massacre Heshana's men and
give the city to Proklos) Heshana endured. A few weeks after the worst of the rioting, Proklos
retreated, and Heshana's men rallied and harassed the Romans as they fell back southwards.
Reportedly, there were also a series of massacres in Edessa, and the city remained significantly
reduced in size for some time to come.

The reason for Proklos' retreat remains unclear. Heshana was on his last legs, a nomadic raider
bound up in the defense of a walled city that seized even the narrowest opportunity to try to
murder him. But the warlord would endure. Proklos would never again have such a good
opportunity to end the threat and expand the Anastasian half of the Roman Empire. The
following year, Narsai travelled south, uniting a group of Arab clans in a coalition against the
Banu Ghassan and their Roman allies. Lead by the Banu Kalb, this coalition scored a few minor
victories against Proklos' forces and formed a major distraction.

In 592, Palmyra and Bostra, both long diminished from their historical apogees, were taken by
Arab raiders. Proklos was personally distracted by Heshana's resurgent campaigns, and his
lieutenants were incapable of stopping the invasion. Shortly thereafter Al-Jabiyah fell and the
Ghassanid King, Al-Mundhir, fled to Alexandria where he would live out the rest of his life with
his family. With the fall of Al-Jabiyah, the traditional residence of the Ghassanid kings, the
multitude of Arab tribes could raid with impunity - as could Heshana.

However, Heshana's plan assumed that Emperor Ioannes in Asia Minor would be too distracted
with the deterioration of the Balkans to intervene. And it was true that much of the Roman army
was away, including the Emperor, who, breaking from the trend established by his predecessors
preferred to not take the field, and indeed after his victory over Julian Menas would never again
lead an army in person. However, despite the absence of the main body of the Roman army, a
small expeditionary force under the Cilician comtes Baduarios with some six thousand men,
most of them mounted, struck into Heshana's territory. His force was small, largely because
most of the soldiers in Asia Minor were guarding against the Alans and thus not prepared for an
expedition to Syria.

Marching through Syria, Baduarios encountered an Anastasian ambush near Issos and repelled
it in good order, opening the entirety of Syria to him. Antiokhea opened its gates to him, as did
the coastal cities along his route. Then, Baduarios, his lines of supply secured, swept south and
endeavored to cut off Heshana from Osrhoene. Heshana was forced to ride north and deal with
this new threat, barely persuading his Arab allies to accompany him north. Hujr, their leader, had
his own ambitions, but was temporarily willing to concede that the threat Baduarios posed was
too great to ignore.

Both the Arab and Eftal cavalry rushed north, reaching the wealthy regional hub of Apamea in
the midst of a scorching summer. There, Baduarios intercepted them, and though he was
repulsed after some initial skirmishing, he left Apamea well garrisoned and well-supplied, and
the city refused to surrender. Baduarios retreated into a nearby well-watered valley, and from his
base in the hills struck at Heshana's siege. The Shah's men lacked siege equipment and, as a
mostly mounted force, found their attempts to capture the city futile. Narsai and Hujr agreed that
the best course of action would be to ride into the hills and deal with the Roman field army, but
Heshana refused. Baduarios was a capable commander, he argued, and there could be any
number of ambushes waiting for them in the hills.

While Heshana stalled, Baduarios persuaded another Roman force stationed at Kaiseria and
numbering some five thousand, to march on Edessa. This army had a corps of engineers and
was lead by Hypatios the Black, a veteran of the Roman defense of Thessalonike. By the time a
rider managed to inform Heshana, Edessa itself was under siege.

Heshana was forced to act quickly. Leaving Hjur to besiege Apamea, he rode into the hills to
confront Baduarios. His vanguard appeared to be nothing but a scout party, and the Romans
descended on it in ambush - allowing Heshana to in turn surround the Roman forces. This
would prove to be a costly victory for Heshana however - perhaps one in every four of his own
men died, but the Cilician general was himself slain. The surrendered Romans were executed
and their arms, horses, and armor were looted.

Heshana then rode into Orshoene with all haste, slaughtering the supply columns and outriders
which maintained Hypatios' forces. Combined with a fortuitous outbreak of disease, Hypatios'
forces starved and died far quicker than the garrison of Edessa, which this time had no issues
with the much-diminished civilian population. When Heshana's victory came, it was total,
although Hypatios himself would escape west to the town of Dolikhe before he would be
captured and ransomed back to the Emperor.

These victories proved the critical flaw with the divided Roman Empire. Had Anastasios and
Ioannes merely worked together, Heshana's small force and the even smaller forces of his Arab
allies could never have triumphed - but instead the two Empires only acted independently and
occasionally fought, harassed each others efforts, and most importantly did not coordinate their
attacks but rather went up against Heshana one at a time with far inferior manpower. As such, in
the aftermath of his triumphs Heshana was capable of capturing the whole of Syria, raiding with
impunity into Cilicia and finally in 593 taking Melitene and Anazarbos. Meanwhile, his Kalbid
allies, with the help of a second force commanded by Narsai and now equipped with their own
corps of Persian engineers, effected the capture of Damascus.

Anastasios however, was not slow to respond to this new invasion. His fleet was capable of
supplying the coastal cities such as Tyros indefinitely, and Kaiseria and Gaza underwent new
fortification projects - the riches of Egypt proving more than capable of providing fresh soldiers
for their defense. However, the interior was all but lost it seemed - and despite a Roman punitive
attack on Al-Jabiyah which leveled the city, the raids continued, and Damascus remained out of
the Emperor's reach. Further, the Emperor's recruitment of fresh troops was stymied by his fear
of the Miaphysite population of Egypt rebelling against their primarily Orthodox leaders who no
longer had the rest of the Empire to call upon for support. Anastasios maintained an uneasy
balance but his attempts to mend the schism fell short of the endorsement of the Coptic church
seemingly demanded of him.

Johiyava and Sogdia

Anandakumara Raja died peacefully in his sleep at the age of fifty six, in 595. He was
succeeded by his son Visvajita, whose first act as Raja was to kill his brother Pulindaka.
According to the Eftal historians, Pulindaka attempted to organize a coup against his dying
father and take power with the help of a clan of Turkic mercenaries - but Visvajita, being
informed by Pulindaka's barber, struck first, summoning his brother to court at sword-point and
having him executed. However, Kudhipasri, Pulindaka's son, fled south and became a great
warrior-prince among the Kidarites.

If this story is true is immaterial. Kudhipasri in particular seems wholly invented, What it
represents is far more important - the Eftal fears. Ambitious Turkic mercenaries attempting to
play Kingmaker. Dynastic disputes leading to exiled sons who carve out their own states. Even
the power and prestige of the court Visvajita rules over is a source of anxiety for the anonymous
Eftal writer, who was a companion of Tarkhsuna Shah, the warlord who ruled Sogdia. Tarkhsuna
both paid Turkic mercenaries to fight the Johiyava and also paid tribute to the Gokturks. His
kingdom was squeezed between those two powers, and Tarkhsuna saw no escape, choosing
the distant confederacy of the Turks over becoming a satrap of the aggressive power on his
doorstep.

His son and heir Gokharna, however, was perhaps more clever than Tarkhsuna. Aligning himself
with the Asvha through marriage, Gokharna was able to assert greater independence against
the Turks. Though he would still pay a tribute to the Gokturks and the Johiyava, the reign of
Gokharna was one of peace backed up by force. Only once did the Johiyava provoke him to war
- in 596, and that war would prove devastating. The Johiyava fell back into their mountains and
when Gokharna pursued, they destroyed his army and after a year long siege captured Balkh
and made vassals of many of the Baktrian tribes. Visvajita forced the Shah to pay an enormous
tribute for the first five years of his reign.

However, on the domestic front, Gokharna overcame this inauspicious start. Piandjikent was
restored to its former glory, and peace was good for prosperity and trade. The silk road
reopened, allowing goods to flow from the Rouran Khaganate in northern China to Persia.
There, the Rourans had begun to settle down and co-opt the traditional Chinese system of
governance, patronizing Buddhist monasteries and beginning bureaucratic examinations which
were at first shunned by the indigenous aristocracy but slowly accepted as a method of
advancement. These examinations required familiarity with traditional Confucian and Buddhist
texts, and were somewhat different than those of the Liang dynasty in the south.

Sheskh's Vision

Shah Sheskh after Roshana's death in 598 ruled at first in an uncertain position. While he was
Shah in his own right, acclaimed by his soldiers and quickly the primitive bureaucracy of his
satrapy-cum-kingdom, he was also considered by some to be merely a regent for his young
nephew Toramana. It was an arrangement which would not last. Sheskh had many sons and
was married to an Armenian noblewoman, and had already proven himself energetic, capable,
and ambitious. It should be no surprise that the child Toramana died, all-too-conveniently, before
his first birthday. By 599, Shah Sheskh ruled in his own right one of the wealthier successor
kingdoms. A year later he would make his own son, Khauwashta, his successor and subordinate
Shah in his own right.

However, Sheskh also ruled a regime splintered by religious controversy. His Armenian
subjects, whom he relied upon for military support, belonged to the miaphysite Church, a church
which had increasingly broken away from Rome and forged its own path. This provided the
Armenian people and aristocracy a kind of proto-nationalism based around a unique religious
and linguistic identity, and made them insubordinate at the best of times. Thus Sheskh was
opted to arrange, often with veiled threats, the taking of numerous young noble hostages to
raise among the Eftal, a move which forestalled any threat of rebellion, and integrated his own
tribal aristocracy with that of the Armenians.

The city of Huniyag, close to war-torn Asoristan but far enough north to avoid being raided,
became Sheskh's base of operations for renewed war with Akhshunwar Malkha. The two
kingdoms had previously concluded an uneasy peace under Roshana, but sensing weakness,
Sheskh abandoned his sister's treaty and rode south, scoring major victories at twin battles in
Kaskar and Karka. Both victories showcased Sheskh's capability for fighting sweeping battles of
maneuver, wherein his Eftal cavalry, backed by Turkic archery and Armenian heavy armor,
managed to isolate and massacre Akhshunwar's forces in detail. The cities along the Persian
gulf surrendered quickly afterwards, which left only Susa, the royal capital.
Akhshunwar made preparations for a siege. He sent letters to the Kidarites begging for aid, and
to the various satraps and tribes of the east. However, his Eftal companions defected en masse,
and his Turkic mercenaries, unwilling to die for a ruler they had no personal stake in,
surrendered Akhshunwar to Sheskh in 600. The mercenaries themselves would be handsomely
rewarded and then sent far away at once, to counter raids engineered by Huviskha.

For even as these battles were being fought, Huvishka Prajana, ever the opportunist, took
Shahrizor and much of central Persia. More than a mere King, he began to proclaim his right to
the entire Eftal Empire, which he swore solemnly to restore. This left Sheskh in a difficult
position. Huvishka Prajana and Akhshunwar Malkha could both tie themselves by blood to
Akhshunwar I and his dynasty, and while the Eftal might have often cared more for personal
merit, Sheskh had begun to fear that the vast number of Eftal who had defected to him were not
truly loyal. A majority of them had kept to the worship of Mahadeva much as Akhshunwar had
patronized and designed it, and this only exacerbated Sheskh's paranoia.

Executing Akhshunwar Malkha had given Sheskh an empire, but managing the complex and
geographically distant state which he inherited was no mean feat. One of the greatest
challenges he would face was a series of Zoroastrian-inspired uprisings of the common people,
based around ridding the country of foreigners and preparing for the "Great Renovation" when
evil would be driven the world by the forces of good. These uprisings, lacking the support of
either the mercantile or aristocratic classes of Persian society (which were by and large merged
with the Eftal by this point) had little hope of true success but were nevertheless devastating to
the countryside and necessitated strong measures to put them down. Meanwhile, the Kidarites,
lead by a man named Vinduyih, made a pact with Shah Huvishka and the Johiyava Raja and
began raiding into Pars, driving a not insignificant portion of the wealthy population to flee
towards the coasts, where the high-walled trading cities renovated and patronized by Toramana
and Khauwashta almost a century ago offered superior protection from rural rebellion and
banditry. Cities such as Mihirapat and Ram swelled in population but ultimately were forced to
close their gates against the influx of refugees. Many who were turned away from the gulf cities
fled across the gulf to Hatta or Mazun, where the local petty Shahs welcomed them with open
arms and often recruited them for their feuds with the Hadhrami.

Sheskh lead the campaigns to put down the rebels, and did so with relative ease. Along the way
he confiscated significant amounts of land, either abandoned by fleeing aristocrats or the
peasant rebels, distributing it to those Eftal who had once been loyal to Akhshunwar, hoping to
win them over with kingly generosity. However, the Kidarites proved a far greater challenge.
Sheskh was incapable of pinning them down in a pitched battle, and he would die
anticlimactically in a skirmish, where the Kidarite cavalry managed to attack the camp of his
vanguard. Dying in 604, he left a dangerous situation for his son and heir.

Back in Huniyag, Khauwashta wasted little time attempting to assert his authority. He rode south
to the royal palace at Susa and was quickly declared full Shah. He sent envoys east and made
an unfavorable peace with the Kidarites, offering them a large tribute to curtail their raiding.
Then, he gathered what forces he could and prepared for Huviskha's move. Huvishka had been
wintering in Kermanshah, building up his own military. Sheskh's legacy was a state which was
"hollow" - a vast crescent shaped territory from Armenia to Mesopotamia to the Persian Gulf.
Huviskha by contrast controlled a contiguous, well-defended territory shielded by mountains on
many sides.

Shah Huviskha's army was perhaps the largest raised since the legendary campaigns of
Mihiragula, though few of his men had fought in them. His forces, despite a core of Eftal cavalry
and Gilani footmen, were bolstered by his Avshastani allies and Turkic, Alani, and Balasagani
mercenaries. Commanded by Huvishka's experienced son, Khingila, the swifter elements, the
Turkic and Avsha cavalry broke out onto the plains of Mesopotamia, wreaking havoc and
interrupting Khauwashta's attempts to muster forces from his far flung provinces. The army
Sheskh had led against the Kidarites had largely melted away as well - the Turkic mercenaries
defected en masse, just as Sheskh feared they would. Khauwashta was left with a relatively
small force, and within a year of Sheskh's death Khauwashta personally controlled little more
than the cities along the Persian gulf and Susa.

However, Khauwashta had inherited his father's skill in warfare and diplomacy. He succeeded in
making Akhshunwar Malkha's companions his own, and retained the loyalty of the Armenian
lords, whose raids would open an additional front and cause Huviskha no end of headaches on
the homefront. Riding up the Tigris, he defeated Khingila in battle outside of Dastkart, and then
again at Hulwan, his heavy cavalry punching through the center of Shah Huviskha's line and
causing the "Universal Ruler in Fellowship" to flee the field. After this unacceptable display of
cowardice, it was only a matter of time before the edifice came crumbling down. Many of
Huviskha's Eftal allies deserted, the Avsha returned home, and the Turkic mercenaries
murdered their former employer, only to find that Khauwashta was not as lenient as his father
had been. He did not take the Huviskha's Turkic mercenaries into his service but rather
massacred them, riding them down wherever he could find them and subjecting them to grisly
punishments.

"This act, more than any, won him the friendship of the common man of Iran, who had long
suffered at the hand of the Tujue..." one Eftal historian writes. However, this historian, flatters
Khauwashta. Khauwashta would ultimately employ many Turks in his own army as well, settling
them in certain depopulated regions of Persia much as his ancestors had settled Xionites and
Gaoche, hoping that in time they would become loyal reserves of manpower indistinct from the
Eftal warriors they served alongside.

By 605 Khauwashta ruled a "unified Empire, united in the fellowship of the Dharma and the
patronage of the God", pardoned Huviskha's son Khingila for his "treason" and sent him to live
out his days in a monastery. From the first moment he returned to Susa, Khauwashta tried to
imitate the manner of the old Eftal Shahs, acting as if he had always been Shah, and that the
war he fought against Huviskha was that of a rightful monarch suppressing a rebel. The world,
however, would show how false that truly was. This was not a return to the old days. Distinct
regional identities had had a generation to develop in the absence of a central authority not
present since Mihiragula and the Reign of Sons. Khauwashta ruled a lesser territory than his
predecessors, an Empire stripped of much of its periphery.

More crucial than the loss of the periphery was the development of regional identity. Buddhism
was powerful and influential in the east and north, especially in the region the Greeks called
Hyrcania, in but also in Sogdia and the satrapies around the Caspian. Further, the Gilani had
served in important positions in Huviskha's government, but did not in Khauwashtas, and this
would be a source of simmering resentment. Trade and industry flourished anew in the south,
where Eftal and Persian identities were the most blurred - but this synthesis of culture excluded
the Persianized but fundamentally different Eftal culture in Mesopotamia, Shahrizor, and the
Iranian plateau. The "northern" Eftal were commonly more traditionally pagan and sometimes
Christian. They had mixed with far more tribal groups from outside the traditional "White Huns"
and lived a more traditional lifestyle, maintaining their cavalry traditions which the Gulf Eftal had
begun to lose in their "decadent urban" lifestyle.

Armenia, though now tightly bound to the Eftal Shahdom, was similarly independent in their
identity - and indeed had been even during Mihiragula's reign. Khauwashta granted them
exceptional privileges and autonomy, as he did to the Kidarites when Vinduyih finally
acknowledged his overlordship. Both regions maintained their own vassal Shahs, making
Khauwashta little more than first among equals in the periphery of his regime. Concerned with
the internal politics of his realm, Khauwashta would also never incorporate Osrhoene or Syria
into his state, though monuments from his reign claim that Heshana paid him a magnificent
tribute on several occasions.

The Sahushah - Statebuilding on the Steppe

The Sahu clan which came to give their name to the Sahu Shahs was, as mentioned before, a
polyglot group. The Xasar-Sahu confederacy's sole commonality was being defeated by the first
Khauwashta generations ago, and subsequently breaking out onto the Eurasian steppe, taking
the Rav [IOTL Volga] and Don river plains and driving the Hunno-Bulgars and Avars west into
conflict with the settled peoples they found there. But from there, the Xasar-Sahu would not
merely pass into history like so many of their predecessors. Rather, they began to found
something more enduring.

The Sahu, like the Eftal before them, were not opposed to urban settlement. Indeed they
patronized it, modeling their new cities off a mixture of imported Persian style and the
indigenous Greek designs which they encountered around the Crimea. Much trade flowed up
and down the Dnieper, Volga, and Don rivers, and though their urban project began as merely a
series of trading posts, these posts began to blossom into true cities, the largest of them being
Tangravata, built over the ruins of the Greek city of Tanais. These cities were small affairs, often
dingy and dirty, but the blossoming of the Sahu urban tradition was well underway by 590. Their
subjugation of the Crimean Goths and the Greek population provided them with skilled builders
as well, and allowed them to lay tariffs upon the traditional trade of the region - and from the
"Sahu River Tolls" came a level of wealth which allowed the Sahu to further centralize and
assert their dominion.

Slaves, amber, lumber and grain flowed south, and this trade with Constantinople and the cities
of the Caspian sea benefitted all parties. By ensuring relative peace in the regions of their
dominion, they imitated the success of the Silk Road, only with the added benefit of riverine
transport. While Sahu dominion was often loose and chaotic, involving vicious tribal conflicts
with their confederal allies and subjects, it also successfully imitated the Eftal style of
statebuilding. The fortified palace city of Apaxauda (near to IOTL Sarkel) in particular gave the
state a permanent, central hub, a place where six months out of the year petitioners could go
and seek audience with the Sahu Shah.

Traditionally considered the founder of the Sahu state, Shah Ayadhar cultivated a level of
detachment from the other tribal lords who might have considered themselves his peers. One
way in which this was achieved was by cultivating foreign relations and forbidding his allies from
doing the same. During the glory days of Huviskha's monarchy, the Shah bragged of sending
missionaries to Apaxauda, where they remained and founded a monastery. Ayadhar had an
embassy in Constantinople, where he sent several of his sons to serve as mercenaries, and
raided the Alans, supposedly at the behest of Emperor Ioannes. These raids would ultimately
prove beneficial to the Sahu, pressing the Alans out of excellent grazing land, but forced more of
the Alans to cross into the Caucasus and, though these refugees were much reduced in
number, desperation would force them to attack the weakening Roman state.

Huviskha's propagandistic tale of spreading Buddhism seems to have not been false, but the
Greek and Gothic peoples of the Crimea certainly were unimpressed by these Eftal missions,
and some of the Turkic peoples among the Xasar-Sahu already worshipped their own synthesis
of Buddhism which incorporated their own deities. Ayadhar's attempts to unify his people under
a single faith seem to have been flawed - Manichaeans, Pagans of many backgrounds and
Christians each made up a significant minority, and the Christians in particular were vital to the
western half of his trade.

Shah Ayadhar is almost a mythic figure, only corroborated by the existence of his name in the
records of many settled peoples around the same time. But his successors would step out of
myth into history as a peoples located on the crossroads between civilizations. Administering
the great rivers, the Sahu Shahs would be the conduit for a cultural exchange which would
fundamentally change the character of the eastern Slavic peoples.

The West and Romanization

The succession of capable African Kings continued with Tamenzut (574-607) and then his son,
Idirases. Tamenzut came to the throne inheriting a unified, powerful state with mercantile and
hegemonic ambitions. Over his reign, he forged agreements which provided security for the
Roman populations of the various western Mediterranean islands in exchange for a series of
trade agreements which brought the urban Roman population in Africa prosperity.
When the Prefect of Sicily died of old age, in 602, he sent Idirases as his representative to
Syracuse. Maurice had been an able friend of the Mauri, and had repulsed two Gothic
invasions, but he had left almost nothing to account for his succession. He had two daughters,
the younger of whom was unmarried, but he had left no indication of who should follow him.
Immediately, Maria, the eldest daughter, and her husband Cometas sought to take the title of
Doux of Sicilia, but Maurice's second-in-command and foremost general, Isidorus rebelled with
the loyalty of most of his military. Idirases fled to Lilybaeum, and shortly thereafter returned to
Syracuse, this time with a not insubstantial military and fleet of his own.

After a convoluted intrigue described in great detail by the Roman historian Martinus, Cometas
was murdered, Maria married Idirases, and Isidorus fled to Naples, and then on to Ravenna,
where he offered his loyalty and troops to the Gothic King Recared in exchange for support in
being made Doux of Sicily. Recared rode south and met with Idirases. The two men reportedly
despised one another, but a compromise was reached - Idirases would be Doux of Sicily, but
would abandon all claims to the southern Italian cities Maurice had controlled. The entire
Pennisula fell under the control of the Goths.

Apart from small Berber garrisons, the Roman cities under Berber rule, either in Africa or abroad
continued much as they always had. Local governors paid taxes to a Rex, but there was no
attempt to impose any sort of foreign settlement. In a sense, the Roman Empire continued in
north Africa as well as Egypt and Asia Minor.

The trend of re-Romanization was also evident in Hispania. King Gesalec, the Gothic King of
Hispania, ruled a territory that had been much reduced from its heydey. A series of battles had
cost his predecessors all of Gaul beyond a few isolated coastal cities, and his father, Athanagild,
had lost the rest shortly before his death. At the dawn of the seventh century, he was
preoccupied with putting down rebellions, particularly in the south where the Roman population
defied him, with, he suspected, assistance from the new Mauri King after he had wed an
Ostrogothic Princess, an attempt at uniting the two realms in the face of Frankish aggression.In
608, he went to war with the Frankish King Clothar, who came south after a series of successful
campaigns in the north against his various brothers, and, despite being by most accounts an
uninspiring monarch and a coward, Gesalec won a major victory - keeping the Franks north of
Pyrenees for the time being.

After this victory we can trace a significant change in policy. Increasingly, Gesalec chose to
describe himself as the protector of Hispania from the northern barbarians. Realizing, perhaps,
that he needed to keep the Romans on his side, he sought to bridge the gap between the Arians
and the Chalcedonian Romans, trying to present himself as more Romanized than his rivals,
drawing on the works of the Roman philosopher Cassiodorus whose effect on the Ostrogoths
had been profoundly stabilizing. While he would never convert to Nicene Christianity (and
indeed could not, if he wished to maintain his throne) he did patronize Nicene monasteries and
the renovation of many Roman churches.
Rome holds the line

In 596 Anastasios' Empire signed a peace accord with the Heshana Shah and his Arab allies,
acknowledging the territorial losses in exchange for a token yearly tribute - acting as if the Shah
was a Roman ally rather than a conqueror, softening the blow to his prestige even as he
acknowledged the impossibility of retaking Palestine or Syria at this point. The Autocrat of Egypt
knew where his core territories lay, and they were along the rich banks of the Nile, not war-torn
Syria. The periphery could be lost, but it would only be temporary - nomadic rulers rose and fell
all the time. He could regroup and sweep back the whole Empire that was rightfully his in a
period of his foes weakness.

It would never happen. Anastasios died a year later of a disease linked by historians to the
Egyptian Plague of 540, and his son, Theodotus took power. A mystic with Miaphysite leanings,
Theodotus was profoundly distracted from worldly affairs, regularly fasting to the point of
incredible weakness and spurning the attention of women, especially his famously manipulative
wife, Maria. He was not popular with the military or the bureaucrats, but the Coptic religious
establishment and the common people tended to hold him in high esteem, and both bureaucrats
and military alike quickly learned how easy it was to administer affairs without him. However,
against the wishes of the military, Theodotus re-affirmed the peace with Heshana, leaving
Emperor Ioannes to face the Arabo-Eftal hordes alone.

Around 599 there was an attempted coup attempt by a cabal of ranking Greek officers, but it
was foiled by Theodotus' guards and a prominent court faction who had been profiting
excellently from Theodotus' detachment from the world. The aftermath of this coup attempt was
a vicious purge of many of the higher-ranking officers in the Alexandrine military, leaving the
Egyptian empire in even worse shape than before.

Meanwhile, Constantinople was at this point a shadow of its former glory, but it was still a great
city, the greatest in the Balkans, and there were indications it might recover - trade with the
Sahu provided cheaper grain than had once been available, and with relative peace between
Romans and Bulgars, people had begun to return. It remained well-fortified. Ioannes invested
great sums in restoring the Anastasian wall, a possible first line of defense against attack.
Further, by retaining an army in Constantinople, he kept a dagger pointed at the Bulgar
Khaganate's heart. This allowed him to negotiate a treaty with Khan Kubrat which ceded a
series of coastal cities including the port of Heraclea back to the authority of Roman
administrators, gaining more through diplomacy than his predecessor had with arms. Twenty
years of peace in the Balkans benefitted Rome as much as it did Kubrat, whose attempts to
order a state composed of so many chaotic and multicultural elements were often difficult.

The Romans thus turned their full focus against Heshana, abandoning their dreams of
recovering the Balkans. Ioannes settled a massive band of Alan refugees, lead by a man named
Vanyuk in Cappadocia and the western parts of Roman Armenia, regions heavily depopulated
by Mihiragula's savage warfare and Heshana's raiding. These new Alanian settlers deeply
angered the Roman populace, but Emperor Ioannes had few options. His own manpower was
depleted, and the Alanians were willing and excellent soldiers, capable of more than holding
their own against the Eftal raids.

With these fresh troops, he sent the Isaurian commander Dioskoros against Heshana, and the
general circumvented the Eftal defenses in Cilicia, striking at Melitene. Edessa, still notionally
Heshana's capital, was perilously close, and the Eftal warlord rushed back with a large force of
Arab and Eftal cavalry. After a period of indescisive skirmishing, both men realized neither was
willing to commit to a potentially costly engagement, and Dioskoros settled in to the siege of
Melitene, using Alan raiders to guard his baggage train and keep Heshana from encircling his
forces. After thirty three days of siege, the city fell when the Romans within the city rose up
against the small Eftal garrison and butchered them.

From Ioannes' standpoint, this was the sort of vital symbolic victory he'd been looking for. The
Emperor quickly made peace. Seeing that there was now a dagger pointed at Edessa, Heshana
decided to move his court to a more southern and defensible location. Emesa, once a holy city
of the Sun, became his new capital. Heshana valued its strategic central position from which he
could watch over his Arab vassal-allies and also reside further from the frontier. He now had
many subordinates, including an excellent raider in Hujr ibn Wa'il, and, perhaps seeking to
temper their ambitions he encouraged them to raid from the uplands of Cilicia into Asia Minor,
and these raids, while sometimes countered by Alan horsemen, nevertheless had the effect of
pushing the Roman population further towards the larger cities and safer lands of the west,
placing ever greater strain on the agriculture of the region.

This shift in population would further contract and centralize the rump Empire. While the
Empire's tax revenues remained strong, a critical lack of manpower forced the Ioannes to rely
more and more on Sahu and Alanian mercenaries. The now aging Roman general, exhausted
by the struggle of holding together his regime against this shifting tide, would take little
aggressive action. The Balkan peninsula's loss was all but acknowledged - and while many
Romans would dream of a reconquest, it would not come in the life of the beleaguered Basileus.
Ioannes would pass away in 607, succeeded at first by a nephew of his, Justin, who would die a
few days into his reign.

A pause for breathing

The reign of Khauwashta, son of Sheskh, and his brother Mihiradata was characterized by a
remarkable period of peace and internal unity. The sole threat in Khauwashta's reign would
prove to be the Gokturk Khaganate, but even they preferred stability along the major overland
trade routes, and the brief interruptions of that trade would prove sufficiently costly to their
incomes that ultimately in 609, the two states signed an "eternal peace" accompanied by an
exchange of hostages.

The burden of ruling even the much diminished Eftal Empire was high. Many of the peoples
within it had become accustomed to relative autonomy or dreams of independence. The Eftal
had always been somewhat decentralized by nature, never quite giving up their nomadic
notions of loyalty, but it was unique to see the many conquered peoples of their empire pressing
for increased influence at court. The tradition structure, wherein Eftal tribal loyalties ruled, was
disintegrating. Much of Khauwashta's reign was characterized by elaborate ritual and these
attempts to distance himself from his subordinates with increasingly elaborate court ceremony.

Khauwashta's brother Mihiradata was indispensible to the regime. Where Khauwashta

cultivated semi-divine aloofness, especially to his various vassal Shahs, Mihiradata provided a
personal touch, touring the expanse of the Empire so as to hear petitions and address local
grievances. Further, he commissioned a series of fortresses in Mesopotamia, knowing that with
Osrhoene lost to Heshana their borders were remarkably weakened. Nasibin and Dara had long
been the fortified frontier of the empire, but now both cities were in the hands of an oft-unreliable
vassal.

Around the Persian Gulf, the wealthy merchant potentates who had been supporters of
Akhshunwar Malkha continued to grow both in number and in wealth, and their mystic religion
endured even if it took on a uniquely Persian dualism. Ahuramazda and Mahadeva become
synonymous in the new cult. The reunification of the Eftal Shahdom made trade safe, and there
was sufficient food imports from Mesopotamia to support significant urban growth of the cities
there, and allowed many of the refugees who had fled from the Iranian plateau during the wars
to remain and find work amongst the urban artisan class. Khauwashta properly recognized
these merchants and artisans as indispensible and loyal supporters, rewarding the most
important of them with positions in the local government, and making their relatives part of his
bureaucracy.

The Avars
Emerging into the historical record as an organized state in the last twenty years of the sixth
century, the Avar Khaganate has unclear origins. The communities of Pannonia maintained
close contact with the Roman Empire until the loss of the Balkans, but also with the Germanic
world of the Franks, and at this crossroads of cultures, the Avars left their bloody mark. Much
like the Sahu, the Avar Khagan was part of a relatively small but militarily powerful tribal elite,
with various federated tribes, some nomadic, others settled, beneath him. Unlike the Sahu, the
Avar displayed little interest in settling down or city-building. They were far less influenced by
the Eftal or even the Bulgars.

The Avars were an entirely nomadic people, moving seasonally with herds. The conquest of the
Germanic and Roman peoples within Pannonia brought them a permanent base from which to
launch attacks, as well as the sort of long-term wealth that could be extracted from a sedentary
population, but little more. Their economy was entirely based around plunder and exploitation,
but they were experienced warriors and quite capable of maintaining such a system. Their
Khagan, Anakuye, lead near-constant raids, pressing south into Illyria and also Italy and the
Germanic tribes to their north.

Italy in particular was a profoundly appealing target for them. Striking south, they wreaked
havoc along the Po valley, at first in small, disorganized bands, mixed companies of Slavic and
Avar warriors. The wealthy monasteries of the region, benefitting from decades of patronage by
the Ostrogothic Kings were prime targets, as were the wealthy rural manors populated by a
motley mix of Gothic and Roman aristocrats - by this point near unrecognizable in their minimal
distinctions. The high-walled cities were at first ignored, but in time as the plunder of each
expedition seemed only to increase, the Avars penetrated Italy in greater force, prompting a
response by the King.

The Avar invasion of Italy in 604 was reportedly a force of some six thousand cavalry, disparate
raiding groups drawn together and reinforced by a central core of the Khagan's companions.
Cautious but believing the odds to be in his favor, the Gothic king Recared assembled what
forces he could at short notice - still perhaps double what the Avars had raised, with his own
large contingent of cavalry. They met the Avars not far from Placentia.

The Khagan was ready. Slaughtering the scouts of the hastily assembled force, he reached the
Gothic Rex's camp at dawn, but finding it well fortified and the Goths prepared, he refused to
attack. Instead, he arrayed the bulk of his horse in three columns and allowed the Goths to sally
from their camp and attempt to drive him off. When they did, their heavy cavalry charged his
center, which loosed arrows and retreated, allowing the other two elements to envelop the
Gothic cavalry and bleed them badly before being forced to retreat by the Gothic infantry, who
formed solid defensive formations "bristling with spears in all directions".

Anakuye 's cavalry archers harassed these formations, but to little effect. Frustrated and hoping
that the Goths had been weakened by the arrow volleys, he sent his best cavalry into the center
of the Gothic force, where they broke through the Gothic formation and wreaked havoc. Despite
being a prepared line of infantry, the death of King Racared and the Avars totally outflanking the
semicircular Gothic formation caused the Goths to break hard. The Avars rode down almost the
entire force, taking thousands of captives, many of them aristocratic, and killing almost as many,
and plundering the camp for additional supplies, armor and equipment.

After Placentia, the Gothic nobility was nearly annihilated. Chaos in the one prosperous realm
followed, especially after the ambitious Doux Isidorus in Naples persuaded the local populace to
back a bid of his for power in Italy. With the decline of Roman prestige in the East, perhaps he
even had Imperial ambitions. Though he had a small force, he needed little more to complete a
swift reunification of the southern half of the Pennisula, and from there marched on Rome,
where the Senate welcomed him with open arms - here was a fellow Roman, a liberator, and a
Nicene Christian. In Rome, as in many cities, the Romans fell upon their Gothic garrisons and
slaughtered them when Isidorus arrived outside the gates. Thin on the ground in Southern Italy,
the Goths had little recourse. The only response from Ravenna, was to send a prominent
member of the royal family, Alaric, with three thousand men. While by some accounts this force
actually outnumbered the troops available to Isidorus, it was nowhere near what would be
required to besiege Rome, and when Isidorus sallied out, he put the levied force to rout.
Meanwhile, one of the Khagan's nephews, Bati Apsih, rode south and opened negotiations with
Isidorus. The era of Gothic Italy was all but over. The peninsula would be in time divided
between the Berbers, Romans, and Avars.

The Great Raid

Shah Heshana fell sick in early 617. An adventurer who had carved out his expansive levantine
dominion at the expense of one of the most powerful Empires in the world, he would be lucky to
die in his sleep, surrounded by his extended family. And yet as his death loomed ever closer, his
closest followers became nervous. His Eftal-born wife Natigaya had borne him a son, now
seventeen years of age - a year older than when Heshana began his career as a bandit. Named
Syavush, the boy showed promise. And yet the Eftal had no law governing succession, and
Heshana seemed loathe to speak on the matter. His illness robbed him of his voice and quickly
vultures moved in.

Standing in Syavush's way was the aging but brilliant administrator Narsai bar Aprem, a
childhood companion of Heshana's and, when his friend was away, the de facto ruler of the
state. Narsai favored a cousin of Heshana's, a captain in the Shah's army by the name of
Nanivadh for rulership. He approached Nanivadh and brought him before the Shah, seeking to
have the young man named co-Shah before Heshana passed away. He was unsuccessful. On
his arrival at many-templed Emesa, the Shah had already passed away, and Natigaya had
outmaneuvered him. Marrying Syavush to a daughter of Hujr ibn Wa'il, her son now had the
acclamation of his father's polyglot army. According to the Roman historians, he quickly won
their allegiance and love through a dramatic display of mourning and two months of lavish
funeral games. Happening contemporaneously with a vast expansion of Emesa into a proper
royal capital, it was not long before the plunder-laden coffers of the Shahdom began to strain.
Coupled with an extravagant tribute to the Eftal in the east, the situation could not last.

It was Narsai who brought this to the young Shah's attention. Further, their truce with the
various Roman states would not last forever. The past twenty years of Theodotus' reign had
seen Heshana's Eftal cheerfully end their tribute without a response while the Emperor's corrupt
advisors blundered from mistake to mistake. From the opulent palace-city of al-Jabiyah, Hujr
could see an opportunity, and the two aging advisors set aside their differences and
recommended that the young Shah cement his reign with the prize of Egypt.

It was not improbable that Narsai had ulterior motives. A failed campaign by Syavush might see
the boy dethroned in short order, paving the way for Nanivadh to summarily take power. Further,
whatever intelligence Narsai had suggested that the remaining orthodox elements of the army
were distinctly displeased with the state of affairs in the capital.

Over the years since Theodotus' purge, they had not had any reason to love their Autocrat, and
they had in secret appealed to Basileus Justin that he come south and liberate Egypt from the
Monophysite Theodotus. Justin however, had more conservative ambitions, and saw in Egypt
much potential risk and a sink for soldiers he could ill afford. While the soldiers did not turn to
the pagan Syavush or the heretic Arabs for aid either, their poor performance in the invasion of
Egypt is easily explained by a combination of poor leadership and low morale.

The army Theodotus assembled to stop Syavush's march on Egypt was a mixed bag. The core
of his force were veterans but hugely apathetic to his regime. His rather more loyal native
Egyptian soldiers were still not wholly impressed by him, and he was forced to command the
force in person for lack of trustworthy commanders who wouldn't alienate even further some
part of his army. His wife accompanied him as well, much to the derision of his men.

By the time Syavush marched on Egypt, the situation would have been unrecognizable to
Anastasios. The Roman coastal cities, even the great fortress of Gaza, fared very poorly. Their
new constructions and defenses were torn down by trained siege engineers. While Syavusha' s
force had a strong component of light cavalry recruited from Arabia and the western Eftal and
Alans, his infantry resembled in dress and equipment the Romans they so commonly fought. In
his latter years, Heshana and Hujr had even trained a unit of elite heavy cavalry in the manner
of Cataphracts.

Theodotus would meet Syavusha at Pelousion. The Nile was not due to flood for some time,
and at the advice of one of his few trusted generals, Eudoxios he allowed Syavusha to take the
city and cross the river. The autocrat wagered that a swift, decisive battle would be preferable to
a protracted campaign. Showing confidence in this situation would raise the morale of his troops
and rumor had it that Syavush had prepared for the long haul, bringing a vast supply train
across the desert at great expense. Both men had wagered everything.

The Romans collapsed with remarkable swiftness once battle was joined. The veteran Greeks
on Theodotus' left were outmanuevered by Hujr's swift cavalry and suffered grievous losses. As
Syavush brought up his heaviest cavalry he personally lead a charge straight at Theodotus'
command, but it was blunted and the young Shah barely escaped with his life. Some historians,
most typically those who seek to paint Narsai as a scheming and disloyal subordinate have
claimed this was part of a plan to secure the throne, but in any event Syavush survived, and it
was Theodotus who would be betrayed. Eudoxios led his contingent, primarily Egyptian, from
the field in good order without even engaging. A legate by the name of Paulos followed suit,
taking the cavalry from the field and allowing the Eftal cavalry to surround Theodotus' remaining
forces.

The collapse of the Roman line was inevitable. Soon after, the collapse of Roman Egypt
followed. Syavush's army plundered up and down the Nile, and Eudoxios surrendered
Alexandria without a fight, having negotiated lenient terms for the treatment of the Egyptian
people. These terms were at least partially followed, but in many cases they were not. The
wealth of the city, especially what remained of its famous library, was taken back to Emesa to
further enrich the capital. The Patriarch fled to Cyprus, but many of the common people were
not so lucky. It would take a further two years to finish mopping up all resistance, at which point
Syavush left all of Egypt in the hands of Hujr and rode north to Emesa.
As opposed to Syria and Palestine and the general Eftal practice of settling their kinsmen in
conquered territory, Syavush, perhaps feeling overstretched, simply levied taxes upon the
already plundered territory. Garrisons were established, and cleverly Syavush ensured that
these were drawn from various rivals of Hujr, preventing his aging father-in-law from exercising
effective military control of the province in the most subtle way possible. The newly-minted Shah
of Egypt and Syria had enriched himself and proven a force to be reckoned with - and yet his
vast new territory would prove tough to hold. Even those Arabs and Eftal under his command
who worshiped Christ were rarely considered anything but heterodox, and the majority of Eftal
and Alans were still various forms of "pagan" in the eyes of the Copts. Syavush, in the tradition
of the Eftal Shahs, was tolerant of all faiths, if sometimes ignorant of their particulars.

Red Sea trade and the Savahila

Perhaps the greatest value to maintaining control of Egypt lay in controlling one of the two major
trade lanes between orient and occident - and the only lane not within the hands of the often
chaotic Eftal Shahdom. In the era of Anastasios and Theodotus, Egypt had remained wealthy on
both its own produce and this elaborate trade network, stretching from the Cushitic city states of
Savahila in the far south and Al-Komr (Madagascar) to the remaining trading centers of the
Mediterranean.

Chief among the cities of Savahila was white-walled Shangani, a federate of Awalastan.
Awalastan was in the year 600 still ruled by the enigmatic Nijara Shah, an on-again off-again
rival of the hegemonic Hadhrami power in the south. From time to time the Awali would
patronize Makkah and al-Ta'if in their raids on Hadhrami caravans or try to incite rebellion
amongst the Jewish population of Aden, as it was generally to the profit of all to avoid open war.
Through the sixth century, both powers recognized their part in the complex network of trade
which brought profit to both - allowing the Hadhrami to maintain their narrow hydraulic
hegemony and the Awalastanis their wars against Axum. But by the third decade of the seventh
century, this balance would change.

Despite their incredible early successes under Kaosha, Awalastan in 630 was a state on the
decline, pressured by the more numerous and agriculturally prosperous Axumites, and slowly
cut out of their share trade by the more savvy Hadhrami merchants. Cities such as Amoud and
Shangani would prosper, but they would do so as clients of Axum or the Hadhramut. The great
cosmopolitan libraries and universities Amoud would later become known for would develop
under the patronage of Hadhrami merchant families, not the insular, warlike cult of Sattiga's
interpretation of "Mahadeva". And yet the cult's influence would nevertheless endure in the
martial spirit of the peoples who dwelled outside the city's walls, enough that Awali mercenaries
became highly prized in the armies of the "civilized" states nearby.

The power vacuum left by the collapse of Awalistan would serve the interests of the Eftal Shahs
in distant Susa, whose machinations and concurrent reduction of taxes on merchants saw the
oversea lanes decline, leading towards the rise of the Banu Thaqif, who in 624 conquered the
pilgrimage site of Makkah in the name of a god/goddess our Persian sources call Alilat or Mihir.
Dominating both overland trade and pilgrimage, they became fabulously wealthy and more
brazen, striking deep into Hadhrami territory on raids for slaves and plunder.

The Thaqif would in time become allies of Syavush's Shahdom to the north, a pact which would
only further strengthen their overland trading network. Poets patronized by the Thaqif, including
the famous ibn Sakhr would travel north into Palestine, bringing Arabic poetry into vogue in the
garden courts of al-Jabiyah, a place ibn Sakhr would compare to heaven itself. It was the
beginning of the end of centralized Hadhrami hegemony. As the Eftal began to withdraw their
patronage, even the long-monopolized trade in Arabic spices began to slide under the control of
petty, local powers. The Malik became more and more a figurehead for influential local families
jockeying for influence between the great powers, and the potential wealth of the Savahila cities
rendered cities such as Shangani more important entrepots in any case. The Hadhramut
Kingdom would not fall so much as peter out, replaced by a more competitive and decentralized
system which did not bring the same degree of royal revenue, but enriched a larger percentage
of the population at the expense of military power projection.

In the far south, in cities such as Rhapta, Tanga, Kintradoni, and Mzishima, (the last two roughly
OTL Mombasa and Dar es Salaam) Indian culture was spreading much as it had through
Southeast Asia, Baktria, and to a lesser extent eastern Persia. In time the Arab and Indian
merchants had allowed a loose but nevertheless enforced caste system to develop, separating
themselves from the indigenous peoples, who themselves had long had distant links to the
peoples of Southeast Asia. Ruled by local oligarchs, the "Malikiya" these city-states would
prosper and develop into a loose confederation of sorts, lead by a Mzishima merchant named
Citrasena.

Across the sea, in an island called by its inhabitants Izao Riaka (but by the Arabs Al-Komr) the
Austronesian peoples had prospered - trade had allowed them to develop a far more complex
agricultural package on the islands. Cattle and citrus fruit allowed a more balanced diet but only
contributed to the deforestation of the island and the near-elimination of its megafauna, who
among other things were traded as novelties to the courts of potentates in far away Susa and
Pataliputra. It was an era of population growth and prosperity, but with this prosperity came
consolidation. One tribe was becoming predominant: known as the Sakalava, the people of the
long valleys, they had been fierce raiders in the time before the coming of the foriegners across
the great water. The Sakalava had long been the bane of the more prosperous highland tribes,
but in time would prove to benefit most from the introduction of cattle and, from this prosperity
would overrun most of the highlands, establishing a loose hegemony and tribute from the
scattered other tribes. As part of this tribute came slaves, and thus the Sakalava found their way
into the world of global trade developing around them. Young men of the Merina tribe found their
way as far as Sopara, where they formed the elite bodyguard of the Raja there.

The Sahu revisited

In the north, the Xasar-Sahu state was in the beginning of a golden age of sorts. Ayadhar's
semi-mythic legacy of statebuilding had become a centralized reality. Cities such as Apaxauda
and Tangrabat which once had been little more than fortified trade hubs now hosted significant
urban populations, fed by the bounty of the Don and Volga rivers expanded by royal irrigation
projects. In the half-century after Ayadhar's death in 598, the Sahu became more and more
capable of exerting their influence on the various steppe peoples and the Greek colonies
beneath their hegemony, transforming tribute to direct administration. Part of the secret of this
dominion lay in the influence of Persian merchants, who in time would become colonists and no
small part of the urban makeup of these new cities.

But what was the trade that so enriched the Sahu, and allowed them to construct these great
cities and monasteries? In no small part it was a blossoming slave trade, as the eastern Slavs
were transported south to work estates in Egypt, Asia, and Mesopotamia. Decades of near-
constant war had left even the most populous regions depopulated, and also at least among the
Eftal had created a new victorious aristocracy in dire need of laborers. And thus the vast steppe
and forests of Eastern Europe became an integral part of the growing Eurasian trade network.

While the more mercantile Greek colonists of the Crimea remained and prospered from this
arrangement, living in harmony with these relative newcomers as they had for centuries, the
Crimean Goths fought back. After the Kutrigurs went south, the Goths had enjoyed relative
independence from both the Romans and the steppe tribes. This situation was not to last. Shah
Qarajar rode south in 618 and, with the help of Roman engineers he besieged and took fort
after fort from the Goths, massacring or selling them into slavery en masse. By 624, the Sahu
Shah had appointed a "satrap" over the region out of his own family, and the region was
subdued. The Gothic population would slowly merge into that of the Greek colonists and would
never again trouble the Sahu.

The Sahu, like the Eftal, were a tolerant people, but Buddhism prospered under their patronage
to a far greater extent than Christianity. Despite the traditional staying power of Christianity, and
its resilience to persecution, the Sahu remained part of the Indo-Iranian world, and part of a
worldview which was more Eftal than Roman. The philosophies of the Indian subcontinent,
adapted for the steppe, allowed Anahita, Mihir and other Iranic gods to retain their traditional
places of importance. While some important subjects, of the Sahu were Christian and
Manichaean, neither of these religions would be able to gain the patronage of the tribal elites
whose carefully structured alliances and river tolls dominated Sahu society. Christianity
remained the faith of the influential Greek minority and some of the remaining Alan tribes.

Rise of the Universal Ruler - a tale of two Rajas

Maharaja Visvajita of Purushapura had every reason to feel content with his legacy. The past
few decades had seen the Johiyava expand their power by leaps and bounds. The wily Eftal
warlord Gokharna had passed away, taking an unlucky arrow in the eye fighting the Qangli
Turks. He had died instantly, and in his wake the Gandharan Johiyava had only pressed their
power further into Baktria, arriving at a sort of natural limit to their westward expansion. In 602,
Sabuhrakan had fallen into their sphere of influence, and in the years that followed his brother
had taken the cities along the Hari river, most notably Pusang.

And yet this period of peace and prosperity bred complacency. Along the Gangetic plain, a new
power was rising. The scattered, fragmented states of the Indo-Gangetic plain would become
slowly unified by a new, ambitious ruler named Rajyavardhana who styled himself as
Chakravartin, or Universal Ruler. Tracing his origin back from one of many petty Rajas, his rise
to power was meteoric. Through shrewd alliances he found himself the Maharaja of Pataliputra,
displacing a feeble Gupta ruler whose territory barely extended beyond the capital, but his real
capacity lay in military tactics, leading a small army to victory after victory. By the age of
eighteen he had conquered Gauda and Kamarupa. By twenty he had unified the petty states of
the Ganges and made Sakala on the Indus his westernmost frontier.

His rise was unprecedented in Indian history. Empires rose and fell across the subcontinent, but
rarely had one ascended so quickly. While many of his contemporaries were quick to attribute
Rajyavardhana's victories purely to his own greatness, the truth is rather more complex.
Rajyavardhana was a talented and capable commander and an adept ruler, whose personal
charisma did wonders for his power. But he also was able to hijack and restore the failing Gupta
state, and many of his nearby rivals were relatively small, and did not band together against him
until it was too late. Any notion that Rajyavardhana could not be defeated is little more than an
illusion. After his meteoric rise he had trouble sustaining his momentum. His state further would
live in the shadow of the more prosperous Gupta, and he spent little time attempting to revitalize
the economy, preferring to remain constantly on some grand conquest or other.

The Chalukya would be his true rival, and despite early successes, here Rajyavardhana would
meet his match. Maharaja Pulakesi ruled a large empire straddling the Deccan, and after
Rajyavardhana's conquest of Gujarat in 622, he was spurred into action. The remarkable chain
of conquests ended. In 625, the "Universal Ruler" limped back to Pataliputra and would never
again mount another campaign into the Deccan. Four years later, he would march on Takasila,
one of the great cities of the Johiyava. An aging Visvajita met him in battle, and despite what our
Eftal sources describe as an uninspired strategy, Visvajita was able to wear down
Rajyavardhana with mercenary Turkic and Eftal horse-archers and finally charge home with his
own fierce cavalry. The intercession of Rajyavardhana's elephants saved his army from a rout,
driving off the Johiyava cavalry. In years following this battle, Sindh and Punjab fell into his
grasp, but Takasila remained in the hands of the Johiyava.

The Chakravartin was wounded in battle however, and the last ten years of his reign (until 639)
would prove tedious to a man whose life had been warfare. He was said to have travelled his
Empire extensively, and given up some of his more martial inclinations, but he would ultimately
die relatively young, leaving a vast and unwieldy Empire for his young nephew (having never
had children of his own.) On account of the influence of his sister, he was a great patron of
esoteric gurus which he encountered on his travels, and patronized both Buddhists and Vedanta
scholars heavily.
Replacing the Gupta as he did, Rajyavardhana is often seen as the transition point between
periods in Indian history, a conqueror emblematic of the Imperial era to come. And yet for all his
rapid campaigns, and his reunification of the Indo-Gangetic plain, little changed culturally or
socially as a result of his reunification. Since the Saka there had been no great flow of foreign
culture or ideas into India. The Eftal had only a passing impact on the vast subcontinent. Those
changes happening to India amounted to a bloody restoration of the Gupta-era status quo,
except on the coasts - coasts which remained on the periphery of his river-valley focused
Empire. If one was to look at the world as Rajyavardhana saw it from his death bed, one would
barely see the new India that was to come.

(And that's the way alternate history version of Harsha happens. A restoration of the Gupta
Empire in a sense, but ultimately less interesting, if only because the "Sveta Huna" never
penetrated the subcontinent. Instead you have a Hindu dynasty projecting power out of
Afghanistan and India remains rather more insular and rather less feudal that IOTL. But society
is seriously changing along the coasts, and we've successfully butterflied the rise of feudalism
and also the Islamic invasions, which should only do good things for the prosperity of India.

A Less Universal
Ruler

Rajyavardhana Maukhani's early death left an empire likely to collapse, except for one fortuitous
factor - he had a nephew, fifteen years old, residing in one of the royal centers of authority,
Kankyakubja. Named Visnuvadhana, the boy was quickly elevated by the court bureaucrats to
authority. Having been groomed for authority for a young age, there were few obstacles to
overcome in the matter of succession. However, rebellions on the periphery would consume his
early reign.

Two important leaders, Janasriya and Govindahagda, ministers placed in overall authority over
Kamarupa (Assam) and Vanga (Bengal) respectively sought to rebel. Haritiputa, a general in
Rajyavardhana's army, was placed in command of the force sent to put down the rebellion.
Initially, Haritiputa had great success through covert means, stalling the rebellion until he could
secure a betrayal which saw Govindahagda deposed and murdered. However, Haritiputa's
attack up the massive Brahmaputra river would be met with less success.

Despite some seventy thousand men, thousands of war elephants, and perhaps two thousand
riverboats, his forces bogged down in the immense floodplain and in an indecisive two year
siege of Guyahati. The siege would be commemorated in a great epic poem, "Guyahati" which
became part of the Kamarupan history and held the foreign-born Janasriya as a national hero of
sorts. Without a decisive battle and with Janasriya not falling to intrigue, victory was impossible.
Finally, with news of the Maharaja of Valabhi declaring himself independent, the army was
recalled and peace signed. Kamarupa would remain beyond the fold of the new Empire.
Haritiputa's fate is unclear. Some sources record he did not survive the immense siege, while
others say he was executed shortly thereafter in a palace intrigue. Whatever the case, a new
commander named Damodara rose to command shortly thereafter, and lead a significantly
reduced force south through Malava, "obtaining the submission of many cities there" and finally
leading a campaign through Gujarat that lead to Valabhi being brought back under the at least
nominal control of the Maukhani Empire. However, cities like Valabhi were rich from trade with
Persia, Africa, and Arabia, and as such could use their wealth to buy influence with local
governors. This ensured that the Satraps of Gujarat were frequently able to rule as Rajas in
their own right. In such coastal cities the rules governing caste and proper behavior were
considerably looser than inland - and the cosmopolitan foreign traders who resided in them saw
a very different world than those who travelled to say, Pataliputra.

It is also notable that Visnuvadhana claimed a lesser title than Emperor. He ruled as a
Maharajadhiraja, but never aspired to the same divinely-mandated rulership his father did.
Perhaps as a consequence of his weaker reign, dominated in his youth by ministers and
scholars, he often saw himself as a student rather than a patron, far into adulthood. Whatever
his early inclinations, he seems to have never found enlightenment, for in 631 launched a
campaign into the Punjab with great success at restoring borders eroded by Samantayava, the
latest Johiyava Maharaja. At the culmination of this campaign, he wed Samantayava's sister,
Karmavati in a grand ceremony at Takasila. This decision granted the Johiyava a protector and
secured Punjab against raids from the north.

The Crossroads of Civilization

For centuries, the Middle East was the birthplace of numerous religions. Zoroastrianism,
Manichaeism, Judaism and Christianity all had their foundations within the broad region which,
by the year 620 was entirely under the broad banner of "Eftal". From Baktria, where Sveta Huna
clansmen languished under the Johiyava, to Egypt, where the Arabs and Eftal were busy
establishing a new empire, the arrival of the Eftal had permanently upended the dynamic of
religious belief in the region. Through their conquests, they brought the religious traditions of
their steppe home to the East in force, and more than that, they brought a certain tolerance that
allowed a melting pot of faiths to grow.

Out of this melting pot came many scholars. It was, at first, primarily the province of Christians
and Buddhists, two faiths far more inclined to missionary work than Eftal paganism or
Zoroastrianism. The Hindu mystics would come later as well, their ideas complicating an already
rich religious framework. A Buddhist missionary, Sonuttara of Vattaniya, is often hailed as the
forerunner of the western Buddhist tradition, a tradition which grew out of the direct competition
between the emerging Buddhist monastic communities and the traditional Zoroastrian classes.
Arriving in 540, he spent some twenty years proselytizing, and his writings, notably "The
Characteristics of Wisdom" and "The Noble Dialogues" would inform Buddhist missionary work
for years to come. The latter was vital as it was one of the first writings to contemplate how to
blend the Persian and Buddhist religious mindset - something that would be invaluable to latter
scholars.
This, among other things, allowed Zoroastrianism to decline or be subsumed. The veneration of
traditional Iranic dieties continued, of course. Little effort was made to stop Eftal from
worshipping Mitra, or to put out the sacred fires. As such, despite the growth of these religious
movements, the decline of Zoroastrianism frequently cited by many scholars could well be
called an illusion. The faith of the elites transformed, but at a local level Zoroastrianism endured
in many different folk traditions that were sufficiently well-respected by the elites as to avoid
persecution. And where Zoroastrianism could not endure, it changed.

With this growing tolerance and the decline of Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism enjoyed an
upsurge in popularity again, and without persecution it made inroads into Mesopotamia, its
traditional heartland, and into Syria as well. The gnostic religion had a distinct appeal to both
certain marginalized local groups but also many of the Alan and Turkic tribes who had been
settled in the region. The great Manichaeist preacher Sabrishu (544-591) was notable for
spreading the religion, but would ultimately be murdered during the Sack of Tesifon, while
fleeing the advancing armies of Shah Isaiah. After this period, the "Religion of Light" would
slowly begin to lose popularity in Eftal lands, ultimately being relegated to the steppe. Its ideas
would endure however. Sabrishu's disciples would travel far and wide, many reaching courts in
Africa and beyond, where they would go on to introduce eastern ideas further into the west than
any of their rival creeds.

Mahadeva began as an Indian god, a name of Shiva. By 550, his rapid popularity among the
Eftal elite was readily apparent. Like Mitra, Mahadeva appealed to a certain warlike eastern
sensibility, but unlike Mitra, Mahadeva-worship also had certain universal elements, imported
wholesale from the traditions of the Upanishads. The Persian philosopher and mathematician
Arash was one of the first indigenous converts, and much like Buddhism, Mahadeva worship
was willing to tolerate polytheism, allowing it to subtly inform the religious traditions of the Eftal
and become accepted by the even the most traditionalist Eftal. It was, of course, Shah
Akhshunwar Malka who brought this religion into mass acceptance, but its endurance can be
attributed to an underlying cultural foundation which could easily accommodate Mahadeva as a
supreme being and a path to moksha.

However, the proliferation of Indian philosophies, of reincarnation and nirvana/moksha was a

consequence less of philosophers and rulers than it was of mass preachers laying the
groundwork. Asceticism was an alien concept to the peoples of Persia, but very familiar to the
Eftal, who had long provided safe haven to traveling mystics in Central Asia. This patronage
was on the level of local tribal/clan groups, not royal support, but allowed these missions to
continue on a grand scale, reaching even Arabia, where Persian and Indian ideas enjoyed a
vogue under Hadhramut patronage. Mahadeva in particular found root in Awalastan and Arabia,
and even after its practitioners were driven out or persecuted, Indian philosophy would leave a
profound effect on the region, influencing the heterodox monotheistic cults which would grow in
subsequent decades, and the sanskritized Savahila states, where Buddhism would
predominate.
Ascetics were also more familiar in Mesopotamia, a populous and strongly Nestorian region,
and Armenia, a Iranic but nevertheless Christian country. While Armenia was able to benefit
from Eftal distraction and tolerance, and thus remain rather peripheral to the horse-lords to their
south, Mesopotamia early on inherited the off-and-on persecution of the Sassanian regime. This
persecution was however uncharacteristic of the Eftal, who had Christians among their ranks in
any case, and therefore slowly came to an end as the Eftal divorced themselves from the
Sassanid rulers whose position they had usurped. Many Eftal would come to embrace
Christianity.

If any one region is to be considered a melting pot however, it should be Mesopotamia. The
Nestorian Christians had long been persecuted, creating long lists of martyrs and hardening
their congregations against adversity. In the aftermath of the great Egyptian Plague of 542, and
even before the region was settled by many eastern peoples. Rouran, Turks, and Baktrians
were relocated to the region throughout the Eftal era, part of a series of great exoduses and
resettlements. Tengri, Mithra, and Buddha became as venerated as Christ for many elements of
the population, and yet the long-suffering Christians of the region saw this not as a threat but as
an opportunity. They began to proselytize openly, and for the next century would do so with the
support of the Eftal. Christianity spread into the heartland of Iran much as Buddhism did, albeit
without the same state support. Notably, some of the local saints who would become popular on
the Iranian plateau had curious similarities to local religious practices - a process which it should
be noted was by no means exclusive to Christianity.

It was not until the reign of Khauwashta son of Sheskh that the first royal-sponsored religious
debates took place. At the Shah's winter palace near the Gulf city of Ram-Ardashir, the debate
was held between the Nestorian Bishop Elisha of Bavel, the Syriac Buddhist monk Bhedhisho,
and a group of various Zoroastrian and Indian mystics, most notably the rail-thin ascetic
Khalinga of Argan, one of the earliest Iranian Advaita devotees and a traveler and historian who
spent much of his time in Balkh. While such debates had happened before in satrapal courts
and in the latter days of the Reign of Sons, they began again under the renewed tolerance
ushered in by Khauwashta.

This debate, and those which occurred before and subsequently, rarely caused direct upheavals
in the religious framework of the Eftal world. But, by encouraging these traveling holy men to
travel, they reinforced the patchwork intermingling of various faiths on a very local level, and
helped offset to some degree the growing regionalization of the Eftal world. The Caspain sea
coast would remain a great center of Buddhism, Mesun the beating heart of Mahadeva worship,
and Arbayestan the center of Nestorian Christianity, but hard lines never managed to establish
themselves - even if among various Eftal or Turkic groups (in and of itself a blurring distinction)
religious beliefs often fell along tribal lines. The most important element of this blurring however,
was the spread of "eastern" culture westwards, carried by the earliest Eftal whose worlds were
shaped by Baktrian and Soghdian dress, food, and societal organization. The version of Indian
culture that spread west was one rooted in the interpretations of these earlier Iranian peoples,
and this is an important distinction to make, and necessary to understand how Zoroastrianism
was in many cases pushed aside or subsumed, while Christianity fared better.
(Continued - the Western Crossroads)

In the Syrian state carved out by Heshana however, the religious situation was rather different.
Here the Indian thought that had so influenced the eastern Eftal was all but absent, and unlike
among the Sahu, eastern missionaries were met with little success. Like Armenia, Syria and
Egypt had their own long-established Christian tradition, and here, at the periphery of the Eftal
conquests, the natives were less inclined to abandon their own creeds. Plague and war had
provided inroads for conquerors to establish themselves. Steppe paganism flourished in
Osrhoene, where many warlike clans had settled in some of the very first waves of Eftal
invasion. The Eftal Sun-God [perhaps called Huareh] had a particularly strong worship in this
region, and provided the basis for the religion of Heshana and many of his close tribal affiliates.
Along with a number of other pagan deities, these beliefs remained strong but in the absence of
an organized belief system had little effect on a deeply Christian region.

Instead, Heshana's whirlwind conquest and his son's taking of Egypt had little impact on the
average Roman citizen. The Christians were treated little differently than before, save that those
belonging to heterodox sects were not persecuted, and Jews especially found their situation
improved. The Eftal deeply respected the Hellenistic learning they encountered, preserving it
where possible, and copying many of the more notable texts for private libraries. Their Arab
allies had a similar fascination - many of them were Christians as well, or Jewish. What
differentiated the Eftal conquerors was the way that, despite having become Persian in many
regards, they did not abandon their culture wholly, using their identity to remain separate from
those of the conquered peoples. Rather, they assimilated more Arab ideas, developing a love
for poetry and the garden palaces favored by the tribal elite.

However, the true benefactor of the Eftal conquest was in some ways Egypt. Freed from the
Roman yoke, Coptic Christianity was free to evolve without the threat of persecution.
Decentralized local governance by tolerant administrators more concerned with regular tax than
religious orthodoxy allowed Egypt to become a hotbed of Christian theological debate.

As long as these debates did not progress to rioting or communal violence, they were
encouraged by the Eftal, who in 625 would found a new fortress city, Hvarapat, on the eastern
bank of the Nile. Populated by Arabs and a mixed group of Persian colonists and merchants, the
new city would not immediately take off - rather it would remain most importantly a secure base
of operations for campaigns to suppress dissent, such as the violent uprising by a former Coptic
officer named Paulos, who briefly claimed to be "Basileus." By 627 however, he had been
chased south and would ultimately flee to unhappy exile in Axum.

Certain cities, like Emesa and Hvarabad became Eftal strongholds in a region largely apathetic
to their new conquerors, and the temples to Mithra and the Sun built there, were built in a
distinctive Helleno-Iranian style remain a testament to the unique culture of the western Eftal.
And yet the Shahs in Emesa never fell into the growing Indian cultural sphere, even as they
remained part of the cosmopolitan Eftal world.
 Berber Africa

A century of Mauri rule in Africa had led to an increasingly centralized but nevertheless feudal
state. As tribal distinctions began to blend, the Rex of Mauritania and Africa,
[FONT=&quot]Takfarinas presided under a continued zenith of Mauri power. Takfarinas spent
much of his reign in Sicily and Sardinia, where he played a sort of Roman Emperor to those
local potentates who hosted him. In the wake of the declining power of Constantinople, the
African King was remarkably well received. Though Takfarinas had dreams of a campaign
against the Visigoths, he would ultimately listen to his advisors and avoid upsetting the status
quo. [/FONT]

Back in North Africa, after Isemrases II's death in 574, a renaissance of theological debate
began. Influenced by Cassodorian apologism and a growing monastic tradition in North Africa,
the ideas that began to take vogue were often bordering on the heterodox. But where their
European counterparts would press towards a unification with Arianism, the African movement
tended towards Gnosticism, encouraged by Manichaeist holy men from Syria. These refugees
were often persecuted, but due to the patchwork nature of North Africa, they could move from
region to region, enjoying the patronage of certain tribes which developed into a small but
nevertheless influential following.

Takfarinas died in a hunting accident in 586 at the beginning of this movement. Under his wife
[FONT=&quot]Meghighda[/FONT], who took power after his death however, the opportunities
Takfarinas longed for would become a reality. During the first years of her reign, she was forced
to negotiate uneasily the loose feudal structure that the Mauri Kings so commonly held together
through force of will, and the displeasure of the Church, which not-so-quietly considered herself
and her late husband to be almost heretical. But against the odds, she gained the respect of
important vassal tribes and the critical cities of Hippo and Carthage. The army, a mix between
tribal levies retained by nobles and a central corps of late-Roman style soldiers, was initially
torn, but after the centralized legions, commanded by a "Roman" general named
[FONT=&quot]Massensen began to work for her the remaining tribes were forced to quickly fall
in line.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]However, in 604 Northern Italy decisively fell to the Avars, and [/FONT]Doux
Isidorus' coup swiftly displaced the remaining Gothic hold on the peninsula. Now undisputed
master of Southern Italy, he sought to consolidate his power by driving the Mauri from their few
remaining strongholds around Rhegium. Drawn into a war, the Prefect of Sicily, a Mauri by the
name of [FONT=&quot]Ilayetmas respectfully asked for the aid of the Queen. Isidorus, who had
proved adept at backstabbing Gothic garrisons, proved less adept in a proper war. Massensen
sailed to Rhegium with a large fleet and reinforcements, ending the siege and marching north
with the Prefect. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Unlike Isidorus however, the Mauri armies lacked the loyalty of the Italian
citizenry, who found Isidorus, a Roman like them, preferable to a new era of foreign rule.
Despite setback after setback and a chaotic retreat to Naples, the Mauri could not win the
hearts and minds of the Italian people. Despite the conquest of Canusium, which was awarded
to General Massensen, the bulk of Italy fought back hard. The Doux learned to delegate his
command to more capable subordinates, and in a skirmish near Capua, the Mauri were brought
to a bloody stalemate that cause Massensen to stall. The General had already won from his
Queen an enormous prize - the whole of Apulia and Calabria was his to rule as Doux, if he could
hold it. There was little chance he would receive additional territory. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Rather, he made a pact with Ilayetmas and together the men approached
Isidorus, who bit his tongue and accepted the concession of Apulia and Calabria in exchange for
peace and the promise of future assistance against the Avars. When the Queen
Meghighda[/FONT] [FONT=&quot]discovered this, she was furious, but cautious of angering the
two commanders. Rather, she waited until the bulk of their forces began to trickle home and
then quietly arranged for the Prefect's arrest and execution. In 608 her orders were carried out,
and with Illayetmas out of the way, she divided Sicily into numerous small city-duchies under the
command of handpicked Legates. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Massensen was no fool. He saw the future and his own impending demise. The
royal army had been placed under the command of the Queen's heir and nephew, Amezwar and
for two years now it had been stationed in Africa. He was the tenuous tyrant over a war-scarred
province which had little love of him. Meghighda[/FONT] [FONT=&quot]could defeat him even
without calling her tribal vassals. He appealed to the Langobard King, [/FONT]Valthar, for aid,
but the young King sent his ambassador home with only empty promises. With the Queen
closing in and his own paranoia growing, Massensen packed up his household and his
remaining soldiers and fled - at first to Roman Asia, but when that proved unpromising, to Egypt,
where he offered his services to Shah Syavush as a mercenary.

Apulia was granted to Amezwar within mere weeks of his departure. Under his patronage, it
would become a thriving addition to the sprawling Mauri Kingdom, a realm now larger than the
Vandal state it had supplanted.

Chaos in the Balkans

King Alboin could not live forever. The young conqueror whose clever leadership had brought
his people dominance over Greece was an old man, riddled with gout by the time he passed
away in 589. His son, Valthar, would prove to have few of his talents at a time when talent was
in short supply. The warlord Zvonomir still ruled much of the Peloponnese, and the various
Slavic tribes he and the Bulgars nominally ruled over were difficult to coerce into unified policy.
Pannonia was overrun, and the Lombard powerbase had shifted south, to Illyria, or as many
were beginning to call it, Langobardia.

Langobard culture was difficult to summarize. It was a mixture of many different peoples, a
loose confederation whose aristocrats were independent at the best of times. The more
ambitious of them carried out their own raids, either north on the Bulgars or into the remaining
Roman territory, and increasingly commonly against local Slavic tribes. In the main, the
Langobards were pagan, but increasingly were converting to the local Christianity. Valthar was
among those who converted, shortly after ascending to the throne. While many Germanic kings
found the realm unified by the adoption of a new faith, this merely lead to increasing instances
of violence, now along religious lines. The Roman population themselves did not care that the
barbarian invader had adopted their faith, and did not support him, and the Christian
Langobards were firmly in the minority. Despite Valthar's attempt in 603 to stage a mass
baptism, he found himself increasingly isolated.

This isolation would culminate several months after the "Baptism of the Few" when a Christian
gastaldi (ambassador) was murdered by the Slavic lord Bogomil, and general chaos erupted. A
massacre of Greek-speaking Romans living in the city of Argithea followed shortly thereafter,
and the burning of several churches. Valthar rode south with a core group of his retainers and
executed Bogomil, placing a Christian deputy in charge of the city, but the damage had been
done. In many cases the already much diminished Greek population of the Balkans had been
safe primarily in cities, but that was no longer the case. The history of the pennisula was slowly
annihilated in revolts and genocide. That Valthar and his Christians would ultimately emerge
victorious was almost irrelevant, given how greatly they weakened themselves in the process.

After the few hundred-day reign of the Roman Emperor Justin in 607, the throne would pass to
a general by the name of Constantine, who inherited a much better position. Helped to the
throne after Justin died on relatively suspicious natural causes, he quickly turned his attention to
shoring up the situation of a crumbling Empire. He would find Ioannes had not been idle. With
Alan tribes guarding the east, the Emperor had turned his attention westward. Federates of the
Xasar-Sahu cheerfully raided the northern border of Bulgar lands, carrying off slaves bound for
Eftal markets. The Avars cheerfully accepted Byzantine aid in pressing southwards into Illyria.

Constantine could not have missed the growing weakness of the Langobards. To protect the
Roman citizens being massacred, he ceremonially revoked the status of "Doux" Valthar.
Sending an embassary to the Bulgars, he struck an alliance and after a quick naval
engagement, prevailed and scattered the Langobard fleet. After landing, he met Valthar in battle
at Dausara and smashed the Langobard army in a two day battle which was decided when a
detachment of Bulgar cavalry arrived and encircled the Langobard forces. Valthar's regime
unraveled shortly thereafter. While the Roman campaign stalled in Illyricum, the reconquest of
much of Greece marked an impressive resurgence in the fortunes of an Empire which seemed
from the perspective of many to be finally dying. As far north as Macedonia was now Roman
once more.

And yet Constantine's reconquest could not have been more hollow in many ways. He
recovered a ruined land populated in large part by Slavic tribes, burnt out by years of raiding
and war. Economically devastated, it would take much work to leave the region a prosperous
again. And the Romans, after finding out the devastation inflicted on their coreligionists and
countrymen were more than willing to forestall the prospect of prosperity in favor of vicious
vengeance against the remaining Germanic and Slavic peoples. Massacres and mass
enslavement were the order of the day.

Central Asia

While relations between the Eftal and the Gokturks had remained friendly throughout first three
decades of their "eternal peace" fragmentation in Sogdia meant opportunity, and a new khagan,
Kultegin Shad, saw opportunity. The Gokturks had only grown in power, particularly by
cementing an alliance with the stubbornly un-sinicized Jin dynasty, the descendants of Rouran
Khagans ruling over northern China. Trade along the silk road had allowed them to become
wealthy far beyond their local subject clans, and the slow decline of the Eftal in the East
presented opportunities which they began to exploit.

At first this exploitation was subtle. Local dhiqans in frontier cities such Khojand as were
intimidated or forced into paying tribute. The Qangli Turks, under their vicious Khan Yarin, killed
Shah Gokharna and left much of Sogdia unprotected. Difficult choices had to be made. In the
south, around Baktria, the Johiyava were quick to offer protection to the various petty dhiqans
who established themselves. Eftal companions accustomed to war with both the Gandharans
and the Turks, they bit their tongue and accepted the interference of Johiyava tax collectors and
clansmen, the latter of whom they were often required to settle on choice land. While in the
wake of Turkic raids this was not necessarily difficult, it was a humiliating concession to men
who had enjoyed relative autonomy under the nomad Shah Gokharna.

The northern cities however, including fantastically wealthy Samarqand, fell. In 612, a native
Sogdian lord in Samarqand was given the title of Iltabar by Kultegin Shad Khagan, replacing
almost two centuries of White Hun rule. In general, those cities conquered to the Turks were
granted to local Sogdians, and while the distinction between Sogdians and Eftal was by this
point not always clear, it was nevertheless a clear indication of who had power on the steppe.

More tragic than the loss of Samarqand for the Eftal was the loss of Piandjikent. The palace-city
had long been outside even their largest pretensions to empire, and yet it had remained in the
hands of an Eftal. Now Kultegin Shad rode through its hunting grounds and subjected the city
itself to a brutal sack from which it would not recover for centuries.

Asvhastan and Xvarazm, two powers in their own right, resisted the Turkic menace rather more
strongly - but Xvarazm's tribal warlords slowly folded into the growing Turkic state, and
Asvhastan was forced to seek protection from the Eftal.

History Repeats
The Eftal viewed the deteriorating situation on the steppe with no small measure of concern.
They had not forgotten history, nor that they had begun their rise to power much as the Turks
now had, pressing slowly westward. Khauwashta, whatever his personal religious convictions,
was inclined to see time as cyclical. The Eftal had become the settled people, not so different
from the Iranians they ruled. Those Iranians had hired Eftal mercenaries, much as the Eftal now
hired Turkic warriors to augment their armies. They had come to rely upon those mercenaries to
prop up a weakening state, never imagining that it would only take a single battle to
permanently undo native rule. The Pahlava before them had been nomads as well, once. The
river Wehrot (Amu Darya) was no barrier to an ambitious Khagan, nor were promises of eternal
peace.

And yet Khauwashta, unlike his predecessors, was actually equipped to do something about the
threat. When the Shah of the Asvha, Salanavira appealed to his "elder brother" in Susa, the
"elder" sent money and soldiers, allowing the Asvha to fend off Gokturk raids. Mihiradata, the
younger brother of Khauwashta and his close confidant, rode to the relatively neutral ground of
Samarqand along with two of the Shah's sons, and attempted to broker a new peace with the
Gokturks, perhaps based on marriage as many of the Eftal-Gokturk pacts had previously been
based. But the Khagan was ambitious, and unlike many of his predecessors, well aware that
previous treaties had been disproportionately favorable to the Eftal. Historically Turkic part of the
Silk Road could be more easily circumvented than the whole of Persia, and Kultegin Shad had
little desire to yield up this newfound source of revenue. More travelled than his predecessors,
Kultegin knew well that the Eftal elite lived lives of ostentatious luxury, even relative to the
wealth and power of his own retainers. According to our Eftal sources, the Khagan had seen the
opulence of Piandjikent and the prosperity of Eftal cities, and might well have imagined similar
wealth for himself and his people, or perhaps believed that the Eftal had forgotten their origins
and become weak and lax in their virtues.

Accusations of avarice aside, Kultegin was also clever. The Gaoche confederation had been
displaced by his ancestors, and had attempted to invade Persia after being repulsed from the
high mountain passes of India. A hundred years ago, another warlord named Khauwashta had
seen them back with relative ease, and brought the survivors under his wing as mere vassals.
The Gaoche had served only to strengthen the Eftal, uniting them around a common foe and
allowing their Shahs to maintain control over their eastern territories in a time of fragmentation.

Kultegin made careful preparations, and struck only after receiving some fortuitous news. In
617, Khauwashta had slipped from a horse while travelling to his royal hunting grounds, and
broken his neck. Mihiradata was forced to return from the East with haste. There was no doubt
as to Khauwashta's choice of successor - his oldest son, Shahriyar, was already acclaimed. And
yet Mihiradata needed to arrive, personally pledge his loyalty to the new Shah, and ensure that
he was not seen as a threat by the new Shah's companions, who might well have considered
him a potential usurper.

However, these months of cautious politics among the Eftal allowed the Turks a window of
opportunity to mount a massive invasion. A series of three columns of Turkic cavalry rode south.
The various tribes and nations of Eftal who lived south of the Wehrot however, did not respond
timidly as their northern cousins had. Rather, they used night raids and swift ambushes to cause
chaos in the larger Turkic armies. But ultimately these outnumbered raiders were dispersed and
the Turks proceeded deeper into the heart of Iran, striking for Spahan.

This penetration of the Eftal heartlands ensured a swift response and near-total unity behind the
new Shah, Shahriyar. Displaced tribes from the East rallied what mount warriors they could,
their style of warfare having changed little since the first Eftal arrived in the region. Heavy
cavalry armed with cudgels from Pars, archers from Mesopotamia, the famed Armenian
horsemen, their shields painted with Christian imagery - the united Eftal Empire was a potent
force. The young Shah rode east and met Khagan Kultegin near Spahan.

Spahan (618) would become a battle for history. It represented the high-water mark of the short-
lived Gokturk Khaganate, a time when it seemed that the Eftal could well have been subjugated
much as the Persians had a century ago. The Turkic columns converged, but rather than resting
and preparing for a pitched battle the next day, Kultegin opted to attack Eftal vanguard in their
camp. Under the command of an Eftal general named Artavazda, the vanguard held until the
sixteen year old King could bring the bulk of his army around. Contingents of lightly-equipped
Eftal cavalry seized two of the Turkic camps, causing a general rout to develop as word spread.
Despite being largely cavalry, many exhausted Turkic contingents were surrounded and
slaughtered.

Artavazda was named commander and chief for his role in the day's masterful defense of the
Eftal camp, and Kultegin himself was captured three days later as his scattered army was
ridden down by relatively more fresh Eftal troops - their supplies lost and their horses
exhausted, countless Turks were captured and sold into slavery. Kultegin himself would be
paraded in an opulent triumph through the streets of Susa, after which time he was executed.

Between 620 and 625, Artavazda led a series of campaigns into Sogdia and Xvarazm, pressing
as far as Kashgar. With royal authority, he created a series of new satrapies out of this territory.
While some of these battles, particularly those against the vicious Qangli Turks, were hard-
fought, they demonstrated the power of a unified Eftal state against the steppe and ensured the
enduring power of the Iranic cultural sphere. The battle of Spahan ensured a stricter East-West
division of the steppe, preventing the whole region from falling under Turkic cultural hegemony.
While these victories would do little to weaken Turkic power in Turkestan proper (although they
did for a time reduce it to a squabbling succession crisis) they did re-assert Eftal power in such
a way as to encourage the Johiyava to cease their raiding and direct their energies into the
subcontinent, which would ultimately lead to the general subjugation of them and their fellow
Kamboja tribes as tributaries of the growing empire of Visnuvadhana Maukhani.

History Repeats in the West too

Just when fortune had seemed ready to consign what remained of the Roman Empire to history,
the Emperor Constantine had scored, thanks to the internal division of his foes, a magnificent
triumph. But it was not enough. The Balkans represented a sink for manpower. The region
known as Illyria Langobardia remained outside the grasp of his soldiers, and anarchy reigned.
Rulership required negotiating settlements with the surviving Gepidic and Slavic settlers, making
treaties and acknowledging the claims of certain local warbands - arousing the ire of the
Constantinopolitan elite. Constantine no doubt intended to strip these "grants" at the earliest
convenience, but they were still taken as an insult by the aristocracy, who whipped the
population of Constantinople into a frenzy.

While the riots were ultimately dispersed and the aristocracy and soldiery placated with
promises and land they could not realistically claim, the Romans still incurred great expense
garrisoning Greece. The Avars were moving south. Khagan Anakuye had struck south at
Constantine's request, but he had made Slavic and Langobard vassals in Illyria and even had
the Bulgar Khagan sending a token tribute and referring to him in deferential language. Moving
against either of the invaders who now settled south of the Danube with impunity would cost
him. The Bulgars in particular had been reforming their military, raising a standing force of
soldiers paid in money and land. Constantine's reign would be one of frustrations.
Unquestionably brilliant, reportedly a multilingual polymath who in his relative youth had been
concerned with theology and the natural science and in his middle age wrote book on military
tactics (published posthumously by his daughter), he found himself beset on all sides by threats.
The Alans he'd settled in Eastern Anatolia were often restless, and in times of regional famine
(notably the year 621) they nearly erupted in open rebellion. Two years later, a general of Alan
birth named Eutychius attempted to lead a coup in the city after his soldiers went without regular
pay for the better part of a year. But for the timely intervention of the Excubitors. The Imperial
Guards arrested most of the conspirators and mass executions were held, but many managed
to flee and escape the city.

As a result, distrust of the Alans would grow. The Roman military officers in particular began to
refuse to cooperate with them, favoring the hiring of Xasar-Sahu or Avar mercenaries - but
these were relatively less available and as a result the military suffered.

Further, in the south Shah Syavush was yet another "heathen" holding the holy city of
Jerusalem. The holiest city in Christendom languished in the hands of the "pagan Persians and
the vilest Hun." The Western Eftal and their Arab allies still held Cilicia and rumors among the
Romans held that the Alans were willing to cooperate with them, so as to gain immense power
and become themselves counted amongst the ranks of the Eftal. Syavush for his part would be
Shah of Rome, and within years the Byzantines would be forced to worship the Sun and the
demonic figure of the Buddha. ...Or so the most alarmist of the Roman patricians believed.

Constantine, a devout Christian, was inclined to agree, but he was also a realist, aging as each
year in supreme power over the Roman state took a profound toll. In 623 he signed a new treaty
with the Avars, attempting to drive a wedge between them and the Bulgars. It was only partially
successful however - the Avars were rampaging through Italy, and very distracted. Further, the
Bulgars were building a fleet, and repairing the Roman navy was a top priority of his.
Opportunistic pirates had begun to operate on Crete, and even Syavush was building himself a
navy - although composed entirely of native auxiliaries - the Eftal had no tradition of naval
warfare to speak of, and the Arabians who comprised his state were traditionally landlocked.
However, Syavush's advisors had learned well the value of navies from Heshana's campaigns,
where it had been one of the great disadvantages of an otherwise seemingly unbeatable army.

But for now, Syavush focused on the short term. Preoccupied by rebellions and matters of
administration, he would spend the 20's primarily in Egypt. On his coins, he portrayed himself
stylistically as a Greek or Roman monarch, adopting a style radically unlike that of Heshana. He
made an effort to accommodate his new, more Hellenized subjects even as he remained at
heart an Eftal. Like his father, he was an able administrator and leader, and in the Egyptian
tradition, he became a capable master of propaganda, playing Roman to his Roman subjects
and Eftal to the rest. Speaking Greek, Aramaic, and Persian, he was in many respects a match
for Constantine much as Mihiragula had been for Kallinikos some eighty years ago. When the
cautious, diplomatic Narsai passed away in 629, it would set the stage for a new confrontation.

[I hope I've set up some interesting plot twists. Not much new on the western front, but the
Turkic conquest of the Eftal I may have foreshadowed a few times has been either delayed or
averted. Frankly it seemed both too early and also something that should have happened during
the "civil war" if at all. Now, despite the regionalism of the Empire, its unified and invasion would
only be a catalyst for that. The reference to "tribes and nations of Eftal" represents just the
degree to which Eftal has become a term for all the various nomadic peoples under the Eftal
banner - even the Turkic ones to some degree. Of course the ancestors of the original Eftal are
higher on the totem pole, and those who can trace Akhshunwarid lineage even higher...

Syavush's Empire right now is a shaky one. There's only so many Eftal in Syria and Osrhoene,
and only so many Arabs. Have they reached the limits of their conquest? I don't know. What I do
know is that the Roman revival is equally unsteady at this point. I like the idea of two talented
leaders who have very little to work with - I think this could become something of an interesting
narrative and something worth focusing on. Unless you guys are more interested in
developments with say, the Avars or in India.]

The Ride Never

Stops - the Eastern Mediterranean aflame

The Avar Khagans had, within a few generations, created an expansive state. From central
Pannonia their raiders ranged across the Danube basin and into Italy. The Avar warriors formed
a martial aristocracy maintained by labor of Slavic and Germanic client tribes - and increasingly
co-opted Roman estates. Material evidence suggests a culture which had much in common with
those of Iranic peoples such as the Sahu, but also incorporated many Turkic, Slavic, and
Roman elements. Documents found from the era indicate the Avar venerated many Turkic
deities, chief among them Tengri.

The Avar in many ways were becoming victims of their own successes. Victory after victory had
brought them a sprawling empire, but much of it was unsuitable to their nomadic raiding
lifestyle. Accommodating the Slavic and Germanic tribal aristocracy into their own armies
provided additional manpower, but the system was fragile. Their conquests in northern Italy and
Illyria had brought vast populations loosely under their control, and this uneasy state of affairs
was complicated by the migration of Slavic tribes such as the Abodrites and Sagudati into the
Po Valley, and the settling of the Hrvati and Smolyani in Dalmatia. Much like their Roman rivals,
the Avar were forced to make accommodations with the far more numerous by internally divided
Slavs, but because of the lack of cohesion amongst the multitude of tribes, the Avars were able
to more often than not control these migrations.

The Bulgars faced similar concerns, but were more able to handle them. Khagan Sulabi ruled a
vast, territory whose original inhabitants were largely replaced with Slavs. Further, the longer
history of cooperation between the Bulgars and their subject peoples allowed cultural synthesis
to begin. Perun and Tangra/Tengri grew to be seen as two sides of a similar coin, and this
religious fusion would be promoted by the ruling elite. The Roman-style bureaucracy and
monumental architecture that would characterize the later Bulgarian Empire were still in their
infancy, but both had their origins in this time. Like the early Eftal, adopting the customs and
techniques of settled peoples allowed an enduring society to develop. Gradual linguistic shifts
had also begun to homogenize the Slavic dialects into a single language which made use of
extensive Hunnic and Greek loanwords. In time this language would also become the language
of the elite.

Unlike the Avars, the Bulgars were not overstretched. The occasional raid southwards from
tribes at the periphery of the Xasar-Sahu proved the primary concern, and these were also not
an existential threat to what was overall a stable society. The Avar could by and large be bought
off with ease, and the Romans under Constantine were wary of provoking their neighbor to the
north - with good reason. Further, Constantine's ambitions, after his conquest of the ruin that
was Greece, had shifted to internal reform (desperately need) and finally, by 620, to the
relatively more valuable Southeast.

Within Syavush's regime, Egypt remained a thorn in his side. While rebellion within Egypt proper
was generally difficult, owing to the lack of viable places for rebels retreat into, the country was
still vast and prone to riots. In 627, Syavush was baptized into the Monophysite faith at the
urging of the aging Narsai ben Apram, who himself received a deathbed baptism into the faith.
While this was disappointing to the Nestorians among the Eftal and Arab armies, and worrying
to the Jewish population (who had enjoyed undreamt of privileges under the Eftal, who delighted
in playing the local populations against each other) it seems to have been almost entirely a
political move. Apart from a few close converts, few other Eftal converted, and Syavush paid at
mostly lip-service to the new religion.

What conversion did bring him, however, was the cooperation of the Egyptian Church. The
incidence of rioting dropped dramatically, and the Church very quickly began to see the Eftal not
merely as pagan invaders but rather as a people who might be amenable to mass conversion.
They would be somewhat disappointed when their victory at converting the Shah did not
immediately result in a groundswell of support for Monophysitism amongst the ruling elite.
Meanwhile, Constantine prepared for an invasion of the western Eftal. The Romans had been
whipped into a frenzy over the pagans and heretics that occupied Jerusalem, and their army
was renewed, battle-tested in Greece, and augmented by a large force of Alan mercenaries -
swift horsemen intended to blunt the traditional Eftal superiority in cavalry. Unlike in previous
campaigns, there also came the promise of plunder - Emesa was said to be a city of incredible
(stolen) wealth, and Constantine swore not to rest until Jerusalem, much farther south, was
taken.

In the spring of 630, the invasion began, crossing through Cilicia almost uncontested. The Eftal
harassed the baggage in Flat Cilicia, slowing its advance and allowing the Eftal to gather a large
army, under the command of Koshnavash, Syavush's childhood friend. The Shah himself spent
critical weeks raising additional troops from among the Egyptians and Arabs before marching
north.

Koshnavash however, was reckless, and sought to interdict the Romans before they crossed
the Syrian Gates. His motivations were unclear. The Romans decisively outnumbered his force,
and ultimately cooler heads prevailed. The abortive Battle of the Syrian Gates had few
casualties except among the Roman vanguard, but Eftal morale plummeted and the myth of
their invincibility, built up by Heshana's long history of victories, was shattered.

Syavush, on his arrival, was furious. He had nearly doubled the size of the forces available to
him, and critically he had brought a large infantry contingent, evening the odds. Meanwhile,
Constantine swept south, besieging Antioch. Antioch was a largely depopulated city, a shell of
its former glory, but it would make an excellent base of operations. However, Constantine's
initial attacks proved futile to say the least - the garrison, bolstered by a contingent of zealous
Jewish soldiers who had been dispatched just in time, refused to surrender.

For several months, Syavush would shadow the siege, endeavoring to cut the enemy's supply
lines with vicious raids and deny them forage. The Alans and other Roman auxiliaries fought
several small skirmishes but came off worse, and Constantine, becoming desperate, attempted
to offer pitched battle. When Syavush failed to take the bait, he redoubled his efforts to gain
entry to the city, and in late August as rationing became severe he finally achieved his goal at
the cost of very heavy casualties, only to find himself now trapped in a city without adequate
food reserves. The men were quickly reduced to eating their own horses, and starvation was not
far off.

The Eftal bided their time, and when they attacked the walls themselves, it was with waves of
Egyptian troops. They wore down the Romans, until, in an act of savage desperation,
Constantine sallied out at dawn, personally leading the heaviest Roman cavalry. The act caught
the Eftal off-guard, and the desperate Romans fought their way through to the Eftal camp, which
they plundered greedily for provisions.
Constantine hugged the coast as he advanced southward, denying the Eftal another chance to
cut off his lines of supply - the Roman navy had easily brushed aside the small Eftal fleet, and
now provisioned their countrymen with ease. He avoided the temptation to strike into Osrhoene,
where the Eftal were numerous and well-prepared, and instead marched south, finding loyalists
and coreligionists willing oftentimes to yield cities without a fight. Another battle was fought near
the coastal city of Laodikeia, and here the Eftal failed again, but both sides were exhausted. The
same year, Hujr ibn Wa'il died, and with his death, the outlook seemed even more grim.
Constantine settled in to Laodikeia to await reinforcements, and the Eftal retreated to Emesa to
lick their wounds.

Syavush's court was suffering a great crisis of confidence. His companions, who he trusted
above all others, spoke freely. They told him that his failure lay in his refusal to venerate the
more martial Eftal Gods. The God of Christ and the Jews was one among many, and awarding
him even the pretense of exclusivity was a foolish mistake. The Egyptians made unreliable
soldiers, and the Jews were too few in number. The entire Egyptian venture was a mistake - it
had overstretched them. Finally, when they saw their Shah slip into a depression, Koshnavash
advocated petitioning the Shah of Shahs for assistance. Shahriyar would come - technically was
not Syavush his tributary?

A deal was struck. The ambitious Shah of the eastern Eftal was advised by Mihiradata to
radically alter the terms of their treaty, increasing the tribute immensely. But in secret he had
little interest in maintaining the treaty at all. Syavush was a legacy of an era when the Eftal were
divided, and thus personally distasteful to a man who saw himself as the sole ruler of all the
Eftal.

In 631, the commander-and-chief of the Eastern Eftal armies, Artavazda, lead a force some
eighty thousand strong through Syria. He retook Antioch with ease, his veteran troops
overrunning a small garrison before reinforcements could arrive. Artavazda sent a small but elite
contingent north under Mihiradata, retaking Cilicia and striking out into Anatolia towards Ikonion
while the main body of his army descended on Laodikeia, where Constantine made the bold
decision to press on. His troops were hardened by a year of suffering and starvation, and
though he was heavily outnumbered, even his reinforcements were veterans, stripped from
garrisons in Greece.

Artavazda met up with Syavush near Apameia, and the two men took an instant dislike to each
other. Mihiradata, an elder and more conciliatory figure, was in the north, raiding an Anatolia
which had only just begun to recover from the brutality of the previous century. Artavazda had
little regard for Syavush, feeling it necessary that he be placed in overall command, and
Syavush refused to give way on account of his rank. The battle of personalities ensured
relatively little would be done until Constantine began to march inland towards Emesa.

When news reached Artavazda, he ordered his forces to sweep west and intercept the Roman
army. Syavush stubbornly refused to go along, arguing that a defense of the rugged terrain
around Emesa was a better tactical decision. And yet, In some anonymous valley lost to history,
a numerically superior Eftal force put the Roman army to rout. Constantine himself barely
escaped with his life.

This battle, historically, has been considered something of a paradox, and has often been
considered a tale inflated by Eftal propaganda. Contemporary Romans seem to have regarded
it as a minor setback. Despite the initial rout, the elite core of Constantine's army remained
intact and retreated in good order back to Laodikeia, where it was then shipped back to Asia
Minor. On his return, the Emperor found that a usurper, a general named Nikephoros, had
proclaimed himself Emperor and taken Constantinople, mistakenly thinking Constantine to have
died in battle against the Eftal. Despite the imminent threat of Mihiradata's forces in Asia, the
Emperor was forced to fight for his throne.

This circumstance has more to do with the increasing illegitimacy of the Roman Emperors than
anything else. From the reign of Kallinikos onwards, no Emperor in Constantinople had lived a
peaceful life, and most had to seize power with some mixture of force and bribes. Those who
did not were nevertheless suspicious of the military beneath them - in these turbulent times it
was Generals with provincial armies who posed the greatest threat. The trends of the Late
Western Empire in many ways repeated themselves, with the critical exception that Emperors
were expected to be first and foremost military leaders, and thus the candidates for their
successors themselves had to have equivalent military credentials or risk being viewed as
weak.

The Eftal failed to capitalize overmuch on their victory. Artavazda celebrated his victory with a
triumphal ceremony organized in Emesa, but behind the scenes tensions were at a fever pitch.
Artavazda was forced to consider Shahriyar's true instructions - to overthrow Syavush's
monarchy and reorganize it along the lines of the rest of the Empire. Many of the Eftal in
Osrhoene and Syria would even be amenable to such a change after Syavush's poor
performance in battle, and during the festivities would be the ideal time to engineer such a
covert betrayal.

At the same time, there were many risks. Currently, the Roman Empire lay wide open.
Artavazda believed he could but reach out and seize Anatolia away. The Romans were crippled
and in chaos, their momentary resurgence seemingly nipped in the bud - but they could recover
- their state was nothing if not resilient. He might never get such a chance again... to be the
conqueror of the Roman Empire. And yet if he waited, Syavush, who was clever and adept at
the game of politics, might well improve his position and prove impossible to dislodge.

In 631, sitting in the golden palace of Emesa, sipping Syrian wine, Artavazda had to make a
decision which would change history.

[If you believe in some sort of "great man" theory of history, that is. But this makes a sort of PoD
within the broader story. I imagine if Alt-History develops in this timeline, loads of people will
wonder what might have happened if he makes the opposite choice.
Also, I don't really buy that particular theory about Islam, fi11222. That said, it seems plausible
that something like what you described might happen here. Maybe.

Next post will cover Arabian developments and probably answer the cliffhanger I've left.

Also, Count Peter, not to spoil anything, but I rather agree that the endurance of dharmic
religions in the Middle East is a cool concept, and one that I intend to explore for a good while
yet. But I have no idea if they'll go as far as say, Constantinople. That will take time and a lot
more planning than I've currently done.]

Emesa, 631 CE

Artavazda, after making his decision, immediately sprung into action. Employing the talents of a
local bureaucrat, he created forged correspondence between Syavush and the Emperor
Constantine, correspondence which discussed a plan to unify against the greater threat of Shah
Shahriyar. In the correspondence, Syavush clearly had designs on becoming ruler of all the
Eftal, and in return would offer to restore a large portion of the original Roman Empire to
Constantine. Despite the exact terms of the agreement being blatantly absurd, and more a
testimony to Shahriyar's fears than anything else, it was all the phony justification Artavazda
needed.

Before his soldiers were to depart and strike at Rome, before a ceremonial dinner to be held in
his honor, Artavazda's companions and a group of elite infantry stormed the palace, dispatching
the royal guards. Syavush attempted to organize his companions to escape, pre-emptively
sending away both his wife, Hafsa, and his young son, Heshana. If he could make it to his army
and rally them, he might yet retain the city and defeat Artavazda.

But the Eftal moved too quickly. More prominent officers within their army had been informed of
the plan, and as the general signal went up, they attacked, besieging the royal barracks and
disarming those soldiers encamped with them, outside the city walls. There was little resistance
on either front. Those soldiers in the barracks opted to negotiate with their besiegers, avoiding
bloodshed, while the main camp was merely taken by surprise. A large contingent of Arab
cavalry fought their way free of the camp, and isolated units sometimes chose to fight rather
than surrender, but these isolated units were generally quickly dispatched.

Meanwhile, in the palace, Syavush's men fought back viciously, but were outnumbered. Eftal
troops were swarming the streets. Hafsa and young Heshana managed to escape through a
servant's passage and make it out of the city with a bundle of royal insignia and three of
Syavush's companions, including Koshnavash. Syavush, however, would not be so lucky. After
escaping the palace in relatively flimsy disguise he and a group of his men made it three blocks
to the market district, where a group of Eftal soldiers identified him. They attacked the Shah and
wounded him badly, and as the Shah and his men attempted to flee, the Eftal soldiers signaled
loudly, drawing the attention of many nearby units. Unable to escape and unwilling to be
captured or to die at the hands of Artavazda, Syavush ordered one of his companions to kill him
and then gave them permission to surrender.

However, this swift and relatively bloodless victory was not complete. Many were loyal to the
memory of Heshana, who forged a kingdom out of nothing. Many of the Eftal and Arab soldiers
had ridden with Heshana in battle, and though the northern tribal Eftal were assuaged by
Shahriyar's giving of the satrapies of Syria and Osrhoene to local tribal patriarchs, the Arabs
knew well that in such a vast Empire, their contributions were less necessary. They and a small
faction of the Eftal chose to rally around the child Heshana. Further, the Egyptians knew well
that Shahriyar would not adopt their religion - again they would have to languish under a
heathen. They negotiated the baptism of young Heshana, and the surviving veterans of Paulos'
rebellion in 627 were rallied to help train a new Egyptian army.

Constantinople, 631-633

Constantine was trapped between a rock and a hard place. Much of Greece had betrayed him,
crowning a commander he had personally appointed, Nikephoros, to be Basileus after his
presumed death. While they had assumed it to be his will, Nikephoros could no longer back
down without at the least being consigned to a monastery. Adding insult to injury, Nikephoros
offered Constantine a similar fate - if he surrendered, Nikephoros would be merciful.

With Mihiradata closing in, Constantine made a bold decision. He turned back East, rallying
additional Alan mercenaries to his cause, and then, his army restored to full strength, he met
with Mihiradata. Realizing he was outnumbered, and having recently heard that Artavazda was
preoccupied with his coup, Mihiradata proposed a peace treaty wherein the Romans agreed to
pay a moderate indemnity and recognize Shahriyar's right to all of Syavush's territory - in
exchange for a five year truce and a recognition of the current borders. Shahriyar would later
confirm this arrangement, ensuring a period of peace which would benefit both sides.

Constantine was now free to move west, and he did. Using his navy, he besieged
Constantinople by both land and sea. The subsequent year he would mount several assaults
along the section of wall adjacent to the Golden Horn, where he judged the defenses to be
weakest. But Nikephoros had extensive food reserves, and sufficient forces to easily repulse the
assault. The worst blow, however, came when Nikephoros' small navy, using a flammable liquid
compound which could be bottled and hurled by catapult to great effect, broke the naval siege.
"Usurper's Fire" as it came to be known made the siege all but untenable, and Constantine
considered surrender.

As the year progressed, the Bulgarians seized the opportunity to renew their raiding into the
Roman-held Balkans. Finding them stripped of their garrisons, the raids quickly became outright
conquest. Cities such as Thessaloniki, which held out against the Lombards on-and-off for
decades fell outright. A group of Nikephoros' officers, seeing the existential threat, and realizing
their Emperor had put personal ambition ahead of the Empire's survival, opened the gates of
Constantinople, and Constantine's vengeful soldiers took delight in torturing the usurper to
death. But the Balkans were again lost, and before long, a Bulgarian army was outside the
gates of Constantinople.

Arabia - the religious experiment of the seventh century

With the increase of overland trade and the beginnings of the seventh century religious
experiment in Arabia, one city in particular must stand out from the others: Al-Ta'if, home of the
powerful and mercantile Banu Thaqif, and one of the most important pilgrimage sites in the
Arabian peninsula after the fall of Makkah in 624. Cosmopolitan and wealthy, al-Ta'if was the
seat of a growing cult to Alilat, a religion which took elements of Arabian paganism and mixed
them with the Persian and Indian influences Arab traders brought back from the broader Eftal
world. A mysterious religion, emphasizing sunrise prayers, paradise as a metaphor oneness
with the divine, and the role of female priests, the cult would gain broader recognition within the
Hedjaz. Even though the cult made Alilat chief among gods, its willingness to compromise and
recognize other divinities made it palatable to a broad audience. The devotional poetry of early
prophetic figures in the religion, notably the prophetess Fadia and her merchant husband
Abdulilat would eventually be summarized in a text known as the Suwar.

Meanwhile, in the south, the "religious experiment" tended towards greater Indian influence,
merging with the Judaism and monotheistic trends commonplace in that area. Here, Indian
missionaries actively traveled and proselytized, leading to such unlikely things as a community
of Jain merchants in Aden. While the Jewish population proved largely unwilling to convert with
a few notable exceptions, defining their faith in opposition to the pagan Hadhramut who ruled
them, the Hadhrami themselves, ever cosmopolitan, eagerly adopted the foreign ideas which
came to them. It was among the Hadhrami that the iconoclasm of early Buddhism was
preserved, with the Buddha represented by absence.

Among the northern Arabians however, Christianity remained most common, and this
Christianity would slowly spread south. Early in the seventh century, the prominent central
Arabian tribe of the Banu Tayy converted en masse, and the Arabs who lived near to the Eftal
began to convert as well, especially in the aftermath of Syavush's death. Due to the proximity of
these tribes to major Christian communities, relative orthodoxy was maintained, and over time
these tribes would often integrate their identities with those of the Syraic speaking settled
peoples. Certain of these converted tribes, like the Banu Sulaym would war against and raid the
caravans of the Banu Thaqif and their Quraysh subjects, and in time be driven north into exile
from their traditional homelands, exacerbating the process of assimilation.

These wars however took on a religious connotation, both sides attempting to some degree to
insulate and defend themselves from the influences of unbeliever societies. However, these
reactionary efforts were rather ineffectual by both sides - the importance of trade allowed ideas
to spread like wildfire. The text of the Suwar reached the massive tribe of the Banu Ghatafan by
640, where their young and warlike patriarch, Nu'maan ibn Mundhir al-Sa'ih pledged himself to
Alilat and made worship of the goddess the religion of his people. From there, he would launch
vicious raids against the "unbeliever" tribes of Jews and Christians, culminating in the sack of
Yathrib in 646 and the capture of Tayma' in 647. Nu'maan al-Sa'ih would become one of the
principle founders of the religion in its enduring form, laying down elaborate legal codes which
afforded additional rights to women, and laid down strict punishments on those who violated the
sanctity of priestesses or their "marriages". Taking a legalistic perspective to faith, he codified
specifically which gods could be considered "beautiful birds" and "children of Alilat" and which
ones were explicitly false tricks and "illusions". This was an authentic, Arabic religion, and its
influence on the later history of the peninsula cannot be understated.

[No, this new religion (I'm considering Saihism for a name, your thoughts?) shouldn't be
considered an alt-Islam though, but rather a consequence of 200 years of very different
influences on Arabic thought and a much-subdued Jewish presence. Anyhow, next up is India,
Egypt, and the Bulgar Siege of Constantinople! I apologize that very little got done in this post,
but I wanted to answer the cliffhanger and get some of this stuff out of the way, although I've
probably raised more questions than answers at this point.]
Society, Culture,
and Law in Central Asia
(and the broader Eftal world)

The 4th to the 8th centuries were at time of major changes in the material culture of Central Asia
and Persia. These changes are perhaps best viewed as a series of waves - contraction and
crisis followed by short-term expansion which inevitably contracted due to environmental and
political factors.

During the 4th and 5th centuries, the predecessors of the Hephthalites, the Chionites, did
immense damage to the urban culture of the one thriving region, and brought about economic
crisis and decentralization.

Archeological evidence shows that agriculture did not recover until the period of Shah
Akhshunwar, when large fields of cereal crops and cotton can be again found. Irrigation systems
were reintroduced and the Hephthalite tribes which would coalesce into the broader social
group known as "Eftal" began to build lavish palaces - of which the royal palace-city of
Piandjikent is perhaps the best example. Striking artistic works, jewelry, and oranmented
weapons have been found in these sites, in styles heavily influenced by Persian and Indian
culture.

Into the sixth century, many of these palaces began to develop into proper cities. The conquest
of Persia allowed a chaotic amalgam of tribal arrangements and ancestral ties to coalesce into a
proper state. Tribal rulers became Satraps, and bureaucrats were sent forth to collect taxes on
these growing urban areas. Careful city planning becomes more commonplace, and
archeological digs have revealed goods from global sources. During the invasion of Persia,
irrigation fell into neglect and population dropped significantly. Cities shrank and many sites
show signs of abandonment. While the Hephthalites were more than willing to patronize urban
regions and accommodate them, many traditional urban sites would not recover fully until the
seventh century. By contrast, there was a proliferation of small urban sites, walled and centered
around local sources of water. These formed a hallmark of Hephthalite and later Eftal
settlement, especially in peripheral such as Syria and Osrhoene and Sogdiana and
Tokharestan. These "castles" contributed to the defense of these regions and enabled them to
survive endemic raiding and sporadic times of upheaval and civil war.

In times of upheaval, these "Satraps" and local nobles would quickly revert to the complex tribal
alliances that underpinned their legitimacy. As much as they integrated in dress, language, and
culture into the broader Iranian world, the Eftal political system remained distinct from that of
their more autocratic subjects. By the sixth and seventh centuries, we have written legal codes
from the Eftal, confirming the earlier accounts of foreign travelers. Law tended to be strict, with
the only mercy being that minor crimes were often overlooked or settled by inter-tribal
arrangements. Those under Eftal rule who could not take advantage of such connections were
at a severe disadvantage - a disadvantage which explains why the Persian mercantile, artisanal,
and noble classes all frequently attempted to marry into this tribal network - ultimately ensuring
that tribal loyalty would penetrate all levels of Eftal society save the lowest.

Hephthalite succession law was complex. Written codes indicate that from the earliest times,
only "the best" could rule. There was no allowance for heredity in these early codes. Rulers
regardless of rank were expected to choose a worthy successor and receive the acceptance of
their companions and tribal affiliates. In practice, primogeniture was occasionally used, and the
ruling family frequently sought to consolidate power - but these early codes provided legal
legitimacy to pretenders and usurpers because of their vagueness and factions developing
amongst the companions. Court title and ritual in the early period was primarily derived from
Kushan and Chionite precedent, but this would slowly evolve, taking on Persian and Roman
elements. As it did so, among the Eastern Eftal in particular the role of the companions would
become smaller and smaller, until ultimately they were reduced to an elite bodyguard unit and a
pool from which talented commanders could be drawn. Because of their lack of blood ties to
important dynasties, the companions could be trusted more than many of the powerful clans
within Eftal society.

In the seventh century as Turkic raiding would become more pronounced, we see the trend
shifting towards economic and social crisis. While few cities actively shrunk, growth and new
urban foundations became rare. The fortification of monasteries and religious sites became
prominent. Escape into these sites became a common method for the common people to avoid
raids, as the Turks respected the sanctity of Buddhist sites in particular, despite their frequent
wealth and relative vulnerability.

The flight of the Asvha due to these raids marks the end of a growing agrarian culture in
Asvhastan and a return to the traditional nomadism of that region. Unlike the Hephthalites, the
broader Eftal world, and the Sahu, the Asvha were newer converts to the sedentary life, and
their abandonment of it also marked the end of their distinct culture and rapid assimilation into
the Eftal. It would seem the majority of the Asvha settled on the central Iranian plateau,
accepting a place in the Eftal social hierarchy and the loss of their independence in exchange
for safety. Their migration is but a single example of the broader collapse of semi-settled culture
around the Aral sea region, even as it endured and weathered the storm in many parts of
Central Asia.

A Look to the East

Past the sweeping plains and arid deserts of Central Asia, China, long at turmoil, was once
again reunited. The Ruru had been driven back, the tottering, deeply decentralized Liang
dynasty overthrown after a series of peasant rebellions. An ambitious general named Yang
Baxian, promoted to deal with both the Ruru and peasants rioting in the wake of famine
accumulated power to himself until in 620 he dethroned the Liang Emperor, establishing the Qi
dynasty.

Baxian, more commonly known by his ruling name, Wen, embarked on a massive program to
centralize and strengthen his new China, unified for the first time in centuries. Chang'an was
restored, and the Nine Ministries created, an immense, regulated bureaucracy which was given
expansive powers to reorganize society and address the concerns of the common peasantry.
Emperor Wen however distrusted his fellow Generals, perhaps recognizing how he himself
came to power. He surrounded himself with a loyal corps of Turkic soldiers, a palace guard of
sorts, and he kept his commanders on the frontier, frequently rotating them between postings,
something which would overtime degrade the effectiveness of the army.

Like many of his predecessors, Wen portrayed himself as a Chakravatin. "May all the world
between the Four Seas be brought to enlightenment and be governed by dharma." He
proclaimed in the first of many edicts. In many senses he was not dissimilar from
Rajyavardhana, but unlike Rajyavardhana, he had a greater tradition of centralization to work
with - the Gupta had never been quite as expansive as the whole of China, and though they
certainly possessed a strong bureaucracy it did not rival the Chinese tradition.

Meanwhile, to his north, a power vacuum was developing. With Khagan Kultegin's death, his
ancestor's steppe Empire collapsed overnight. Old animosities exploded, and a northern tribe
called the Kirkur aligned themselves with a Uighur Khan named Bayanchur and rose in rebellion
against the Ashina clan - who struggled to find a well-respected replacement for Kultegin Shad.
This led to a snowballing series of wars, beginning the displacement and migration of a new set
of Turkic tribes. The displacement of the Gokturks would spell the permanent demise of the
Eftal-Turkic treaty system which had provided relative peace and safety for transcontinental
travelers. As the power of the Uighurs grew, they found themselves confronted by the Basmyl
and the Kimeks, and this warfare left only the southern desert roads safe for travel - and even
they became more risky.

Attempts by the Eftal to renegotiate these treaties were met with no successes. The "Four
Turkic Nations" or the Turgish, Qarluq, Kangar, and Qangli all were feeling pressure to migrate
west, leading to more common outbreaks of violence on the frontier. Those who headed north
came into contact with the growing hegemony of the Xasar-Sahu, and those who headed south
came to blows with Eftal tribal groups along the borders, notably the Asvha, many of whom fled
deeper into the Eftal Empire. The two settled, Iranian states would be forced from 640-650 on to
confront increasing pressures which the battle of Spahan had ultimately only exacerbated.

Syavush's Legacy

Queen Hafsa, the four-year old Prince Heshana, and Koshnavaz would, after their escape from
Emesa, quickly arrive in Al-Jabiyah, where they would be greeted warmly by Hafsa's kin. Arabs
who owed their fortunes to the elder Heshana and Syavush alike, they had sent back only the
decapitated head of Shahriyar's embassy. However, no sooner had they done so than some
might have regretted their rash decision. Nanivadh, the onetime rival of Syavush's for the
throne, had come to a deal with Artavazda. He would rule the Satrapy of Palestine as Syavush's
successor.

Though Nanivadh lacked Syavush's charisma and personal touch, he had fought alongside his
younger cousin with distinction, and in the eyes of many Eftal, he was a better alternative than a
four-year old child. With the northern Eftal mollified to a large degree, the situation was slipping
out of the hands of Hafsa's faction. Al-Jabiyah was defensible, and most of the Arabs and a not
insignificant number of Jews and Eftal supported the young Heshana (who was helped in no
small part by the legacy of his namesake).

Raising an army, Koshnavaz and Hafsa's cousin, Aiham, prepared to face down the inevitable
invasion from Emesa, where Mihiradata had finally linked up with Artavazda. Together the two
Eftal commanders had an army of perhaps 75,000 men, and the primary army that Syavush had
raised had either melted away or been disbanded. There was little hope for anything more than
a delaying action, harassing the massive Eftal army as it swept through hollow Syria. Ultimately,
they were able to achieve relatively little, and finally, despairing, Koshnavaz sent Aiham and the
bulk of his forces south. Queen Hafsa arrived in Egypt and was well received. The Monophysite
population rallied around them, seeing the young child as the best hope for a truly Christian
King in Egypt. New forces were trained and mercenaries hired, but the army was nevertheless
small, and would only truly begin to grow after the arrival of Aiham, who was himself baptized
two weeks after his arrival.

Koshnavaz meanwhile, made a final stand at Al-Jabiyah with a group of Syavush's companions
and a motley force of warriors. Attempting to gain the sympathy of the populace (and little more
- he was a devout pagan according to most Eftal historians, a fact corroborated by his criticism
of Syavush's decision to be baptized) he ordered his soldiers to paint crosses onto their shields.
This act would build in the retelling into a defense of Christianity against a massively superior
heathen army - it would become the subject of poems and tall tales, be embellished with
miracles and heroic last words. Regardless of the truth, Koshnavaz and his retainers were
ultimately slaughtered. Artavazda, eager to subdue what he now saw as rebellious territory,
ordered a series of sacks of coastal cities such as Tyros which refused to surrender on his
arrival.
[FONT=&quot]Only after subduing Palestine totally did the Eftal general turn his attention to
Egypt.

[/FONT] No we can't go back to Constantinople

The Bulgar Siege of Constantinople was, appropriately, a tremendous affair. Having struck a
temporary treaty with the Avars to their north, Khagan Sulabi was free to draw on the
tremendous resources of his young state without fear out outside interference. All the other
European territories of the Romans had fallen with ease - the shrunken, dilapidated cities and
depopulated countrysides were easy pickings for a Bulgar army said by the Roman historians to
number over a hundred thousand (hardly a realistic estimate).

The territories around the lower half of the Danube were some of the most populous and least
ruined by war in the whole of the Balkans - having been securely under the patrimony of the
current Hunno-Bulgarian dynasty for some time, and thus being capable of supporting a large
population of Slavic migrants.

Of the extensive siege works built by Constantine in his attempt to regain his city, the engines
and palisades had been wrecked, but the ditches and latrines were still viable, and the
defensive walls were quickly repaired and expanded. Meanwhile, the Bulgar fleet, under the
Khagan's son and heir, Asparukh, while keeping a respectful distance of the city walls, was able
to prevent food shipments from reaching the capital. Constantine's own devastated fleet now
possessed the Usurper's Fire, but the first attempt to use it resulted in the annihilation of a large
stockpile without any effect. The second time it was used to greater effect, but the Bulgar fleet
could not be entirely annihilated, and the land siege continued.

The Bulgars concentrated their efforts on the weaker Blachernae walls, where there was but a
single line of defenses, and the Second Military Gate. Waves of Slavic soldiers were able to
gain significant ground, including several footholds on the first line of walls, but Constantine had
concentrated some of his elite guardsmen in the Blachernae and there the Slavs were repulsed
with heavy casualties. Unable to cut off the city's food supply, victory for the Bulgars depended
absolutely on control of the walls. However, as the months wore on, the Bulgar army began to
be bled thin with little to show for it. However, with a new fleet, built using expertise gleaned
from a group of Mauri shipwrights and Langobard mercenaries, the Bulgars were able to bring
freshly levied soldiers and a fresh naval force to the siege. Despite heavy losses from the Fire,
the Bulgar fleet was able to finally destroy the atrophied Roman navy, and the City's defenders
drew up the harbor chain.

Assaults on the city's Sea Walls began in the second year of the siege. Towers were mounted
atop two galleys lashed together, and with favorable winds the contraptions were able to truly
threaten the city, forcing the Romans to spread their forces thin. Starvation began to break out
amongst the defenders, who themselves were unable to bring on fresh soldiers from the East
due to Bulgar naval superiority. And yet, for all of this, the Bulgars were suffering even more. A
new Avar Khagan, Zavargan, had risen to power, and raids deep into Bulgar territory caused
much of the Bulgar besieging force to break away.

With this news, the Romans sallied forth and dealt a crushing blow to the remaining forces - and
with the siege on land broken and rumors of a new fleet being constructed in Asia, the Bulgar
fleet retreated, allowing fresh food and soldiers into the city. Emperor Constantine took part in
massive public celebrations thanking the Virgin Mary for the victory over the "massed armies of
the Huns." When the siege began anew in 636, the Roman navy was able to deal yet another
crippling defeat to its Bulgar counterpart, and within twenty days sally forth.

Constantine's cavalry were brutally mauled by hidden metal spikes laid by the defenders and
subsequent volleys of arrows by the Bulgar army, but the disciplined, veteran Roman infantry,
accustomed to standing their ground against reversals and retreating only when truly
overwhelmed, held their own and routed the undisciplined Slavic levies arrayed against them.
Only the personal intervention of Sulabi was able to stem the rout and push back the
unsupported Roman infantrymen, who took great pleasure in burning sections of the Bulgar
camp as they retreated.

Sulabi, vexed at every turn, did not lack for patience. Constantinople's capture became a
fixation. The city's advanced walls resisted his engines with almost contemptuous ease.
Attempts to mine the walls had been defeated by effective Roman counter-mining, and been
almost as costly as his failed naval attacks. For seven days he prayed and offered sacrifices to
the gods, and missives to the Eftal offering them all of Roman Asia in exchange for their
assistance. From a preoccupied and overstretched Shahriyar he received no encouragement.
Upon reading the Shah's reply, his son Asparukh encouraged his father to make peace with the
Romans, but the Khagan refused until his troops erupted into open mutiny - incensed at their
losses, they refused to mount another assault on the city.

Finally, concealing the fact that his own soldiers had nearly deposed him, Sulabi finally met
Constantine beneath the walls, and the two Emperors signed a truce honoring the current status
quo.

[Sorry that the last section is essentially a huge post wherein nothing happens. But it will have
immense ramifications for the future of both the Bulgarian and Roman Empires down the line,
both of whom are pretty exhausted by this slugfest for all of nothing. Constantinople in this
timeline is much reduced from the version of it that exists at the same time OTL (no Hagia Sofia,
for example, smaller population) but it's still the toughest fortress-city that I can think of, and the
Roman bureaucracy is pretty good at coping with shortages, given that shortages have been the
story of their life since Anatolia was depopulated/settled by Alans and Egypt was lost.]

The First Holy War

For the Monophysite population of Egypt, it would take a miracle to deliver them from the hands
of the Eftal army. Fortunately, they believed wholeheartedly that their God could deliver such
miracles. After a five month siege of Gaza, it was some twenty thousand Egyptian soldiers that
sought to deny the Nile crossing of some fifty thousand Eftal. Despite being outnumbered and
poorly equipped, the Egyptian army had high morale bordering on outright fanaticism and an
elite corps of Eftal and Arab soldiers. As Artavazda built rafts and waited (while secretly planning
to effect a crossing several miles south) the Copts sang hymns and shouted jeering taunts
across the lazy course of the Nile.

Artavazda had hoped for far more men, but the depletion of the main Eftal army can be
attributed to Mihiradata remaining in greater Syria with a large force of his own, campaigning
against the various partisan forces arrayed in favor of Heshana. Despite his political acumen,
Mihiradata was a poor commander - he stalled and exercised caution when decisive force was
called for, and had a frequent habit of overestimating the foes arrayed against him, much as he
had in Anatolia. Finally, a year later, the Shah recalled him and replaced him with one Ariasb of
Hariy, a favored hunting partner who had distinguished himself in the campaigns against the
Turks.

Meanwhile, Artavazda's plan was complete. Under the cover of darkness his army moved south
and crossed near Hvarabad, but defectors in his camp had forewarned the Egyptian army. As
the first rafts came ashore and columns of infantry waded out into the marsh, the more lightly
equipped but mobile Egyptian soldiers fell on them in great numbers. Well-armored, many Eftal
sunk and drowned, and they could not bring their peerless cavalry to bear in any numbers.

Despite relatively light casualties, the defeat was a stinging one. Supplies were running low -
raids prevented Artavazda from establishing regular supply and rationing was in effect. Morale
dipped low, and the Eftal were unable to utilize any of their advantages while the Egyptians
could merely bide their time. During the second attempt to cross, Artavazda was struck by an
arrow, and the festering infection left it to his second-in-command to organize the retreat back to
Pelousion, and from there back across the desert. Artavazda would die in Gaza and with him
the dream of Egypt would be put on hold. Negotiations recognized the young Heshana's rule
over Egypt and also free transit for pilgrims to Jerusalem.

Syavush's legacy would endure. The regime's loyalists fled south to Egypt en masse in the
ensuing months, against the often-violent persecution of Ariasb. This exodus, while relatively
insignificant in total numbers, helped to preserve the hybrid Eftal-Arab culture of Egypt's new
ruling elite. Hafsa would rule as queen regent until her son came of age, with the backing of the
Patriarch of Alexandria. However this new era was very different - there were no illusions that
this would be an Egyptian regime, even if its monarch and his companions happened to be
foreign. The loss of Syria and Emesa ensured that, forcing the new rulers to focus on the wealth
and strengths of Egypt, rather than their traditional semi-nomadic lifestyle. Coptic would be the
language of the state, and Monophysite Christianity its religion. Young Heshana would in due
time be called Basileus, not Shah.

Subcontinental subterfuge in an era of expanding frontiers

The Johiyava were the greatest of the kamboja warlords in the Hindu Kush, but they had yielded
their sovereignty to the Maukhani. By binding themselves to the ruling dynasty they had ensured
their continued power, but found themselves forced to work within the bureaucratic system
established by Visnuvadhana. And yet they proved adept at such manipulation, using
Karmavati's influence on the Maharajdhiraja to establish a system of patronage in the Indus
valley region. Their kamboja subjects were granted posts as local administrators and overseers,
and through this system tribes which otherwise had little reason to remain loyal to them still
answered to Samantayava in Purushapura.

The Turkic raids into Tokharestan which so vexed the Eftal effected them to a much lesser
extent. While the Johiyava controlled, essentially as a personal fief, much of the region,
including prosperous cities such as Balkh, the Johiyava were able to alternately buy off or
intimidate any wandering Turkic forces - the largesse of an empire allowed their people to
remain relatively safe. It would not be until the latter decades of the seventh century that they
would have to ride in force against the Turks. The Johiyava had seamlessly transitioned from
warrior-princes to bureaucrats, and though they may have found that transition distasteful, they
were nothing if not pragmatic. In time, the Maukhani Empire might fall - but for now there was no
sense in fighting the storm.

In the south, others were discovering that firsthand. Visnuvadhana's southward expansion was
almost entirely unchecked. His army, reorganized, professional, and under the command of
officers hardened by the reversals of his earlier campaigns, was unparalleled in the
subcontinent. Between 630 and 640, the Chalukya were broken, and the Deccan plateau fell
under his control. Despite an enormous defeat at the battle of Manyakheta in 633, the campaign
continued. The secret to his success was a well-organized state apparatus, something his
father's whirlwind conquests had neglected. Eager to not repeat the same mistakes,
centralization was the primary focus of his administration. Local Rajas and urban councils found
themselves hamstrung by bureaucrats and heavy tributes. Magistrates called Vishayapatis (in
deference to the earlier Gupta title) in time reduced local tributary kings to mere figureheads.
These positions were non-hereditary and thus the Vishayapatis owed everything to the state.

This central administration allowed him to directly recruit large armies and raise them to a
relatively uniform standard. Taking advantages of the vast population of the Indo-Gangetic plain,
his armies were more numerous and could afford greater losses than those of his rivals. The
coastal mercantile cities in particular were ill-equipped to face such threats, and preferred to
negotiate favorable treaties rather than fight. The proud inland despots, by contrast, put their
faith in what now seemed like antiquated militaries. In particular, the Maukhani fielded an
extraordinary cavalry force, trained in the Eftal or Johiyava style - horse archers augmented by
an elite force of heavy horse. Their standard infantry were armored and disciplined, their elite
corps equipped with fine steel weapons, maces and axes, backed by a huge standing force of
foot archers.

As the Deccan and Orissa were subdued, Visnuvadhana remained in his capital, a rebuilt and
massively expanded Pataliputra. Surrounded by ministers and scholars, he did not lead armies
or personally oversee the expansion of his empire, setting a precedent that would be followed
by his son and heir, Ammaraja. This detached system worked excellently so long as the
bureaucracy was running effectively, however it did allow corruption to seep into the system. No
matter what centralizing measures he introduced, the periphery would find ways to subvert
them. The subcontinent was simply too vast to be easily ruled by a single standard, but
Visnuvadhana would not understand that.

Hispania

The decline of the Gothic identity as separate from that of their Roman subjects was a long time
in coming. In Italy, invasions and uprisings had contributed to the final straw, but in the relatively
more peaceful Hispania, undamaged by endemic warfare and raiding, the Visigothic identity
was able to endure longer than that of their Ostrogothic cousins. However, with the decline of
Arianism under King Gesalec (582-611) the Gothic elite had increasingly begun to identify
themselves as little different from the Romans among which they lived. In dress and speech all
differences had dissolved, leaving a form of provincial Latin sprinkled with Gothic loanwords.
Legal codes published in the latter years of Gesalec's reign were the first to not address the
cultural divide, which had gradually been effaced.

Accordingly, it did not take long for Gesalec's successor, Sisenand, to accept Nicene Christianity
as a state religion and enforce the mass conversion of the remaining Arian aristocracy.
However, Sisenand, encouraged by the Nicene church, also persecuted the Jewish population
viciously, encouraging a unified state and seeking to bolster state revenues through the
confiscation of Jewish wealth. Unfortunately, this would have the negative effect of further
damaging the declining Hispanic urban culture, and causing many of these Jews to flee south to
the Mauri Kingdom, where they were welcomed with open arms.

Despite urban decline and the consequent growing power of landed estates, Spain was
prosperous. The peasant classes were relatively prosperous and did not fear upheaval or
warfare. Shielded by the sea and mountains, the unified peninsula thrived. The growth of the
Hispanian economy, based around agricultural produce and mining, was spurred by trade with
the Mauri which brought luxury commodities from the East to the new Romano-Gothic elite in
exchange for the export of bulk goods.

In the north, a distracted Frankish Kingdom posed little threat, although Narbo was not
recovered. The Pyrenees made an excellent natural border, one which King Sisnenand did
begin to fortify, establishing a line of watch-towers, waystations and forts. Some of these forts,
such as the famous citadel at Elna, would in time become the residences of local nobles
seeking safety from occasional small-scale raiding. Stylistically, the buildings patronized by the
Gothic nobility, be they churches or villas or fortified castles, resemble the architectural styles of
the late Romans to the point of being indistinguishable.

Doux Isidorus
Doux Isidorus, a Greek general by birth had clawed his way up from humble beginnings as an
officer in Emperor Kallinikos' campaigns against the Eftal. After being assigned to Sicily, then
still a Roman province, he had through acumen and personal charm managed to become Doux
Maurice's second-in-command. Then, when Sicily was lost to the Mauri, he had found himself in
the service of the Ostrogoths. Now, he was the ruler of most of Italy.

Knowing when to cut his losses had been the secret to Isidorus' success. A small army, modeled
after the Roman forces he'd fought in for most of his early life, and his personal charm and
gregariousness had allowed him to dismantle the crumbling Gothic state from the inside. By
604, he was functionally independent. The Roman Senate heaped on him whatever titles he
desired, and the Princeps Senatus served as a chancellor of sorts for his regime. When Pope
Honorius died in 608, it was he who appointed the successor. He might have paid tribute to the
Avars to the north, but it was small and served as an insurance of sorts against invasion by the
Mauri to the south, who fancied themselves heirs to the Roman legacy much as he did. While
he never took a title greater than Doux, in correspondence between his nation and others,
particularly the Avars, he was frequently referred to as "King of the Romans".

Notably, in the later years of his reign he kept his court in the small but well-situated city of
Florentia - a city which he greatly expanded and fortified. Ideally positioned to watch over the
Avar frontier and serve as a military base, it would also host a decadently furnished palace.
Ravenna, more traditionally the Western capital, was now occupied by a Sagudati warlord
named Radomir, and while this proved frustrating to the ambitious Doux, he was incapable of
rectifying the situation.

Isidorus would finally pass away in 615, but before his death he took steps to ensure that his
son, Julian would step smoothly into his position, effectively making his title hereditary by
granting Julian the same senatorial privileges he had enjoyed. Equally critically, the Avars
recognized his position, ensuring that the status quo would be maintained on the Italian
peninsula.

The first fifteen years of Julian's reign would pass quietly. He confronted the ad hoc nature of
the state his father had fashioned, creating uniform legal codes with the help of the Senate, and
making an unpopular but necessary census of the "provinces" he ruled, allowing for tax
collection that was more organized than mere military extortion. As the Avar grip over the Po
valley weakened, the Khagan invited him to garrison Liguria as well. This request, given in 622,
is an artifact of how the Avar Khagan (Bati Savaryan) saw the Italians as federate vassals,
rather than an independent state. Julian was forced to play a double role, acting as defender of
the Romans and also a loyal servant. The need for Roman soldiers in Liguria also shows the
growing Avar fear of Frankish power.

The Franks and Slavs

By 607, the disunited Frankish kingdoms had been brought under the banner of Chlothar II.
Militarily powerful, Chlothar was able to call on numerous retainers and the levies of many
tribes. If it was not for the hopelessly fractious succession system, guaranteed to ensure war
upon the death of any monarch, and the limited power of the Frankish King, the state might
quickly have developed into a regime to rival the Roman Empire. Instead, the Frankish kingdom
was held together only by compromise and decentralization. Different tribes were allowed to
keep their varying legal traditions and the nobilities of these tribes fiercely guarded their rights.

Frankish Gaul did not have a significant urban life, however. Trade networks had atrophied with
exception of the southern coastline. There, Mauri merchants provided an attenuate connection
between the Franks and the great Eurasian networks which stretched as far as India and China.
In 616, the prominent Eftal-Persian traveler Kanaran found travel on one of these mercantile
missions, traveling as far north as Paris. He was singularly unimpressed with the city and the
Frankish society as a whole, writing a scathing critique of their "ignorance and barbarism which
knows no bounds in its dismissal of the whole of the wider world." However, he was impressed
with the monastic tradition, and perhaps rightly so. The monasteries patronized by the Frankish
monarchs, the Benedictine and Cassadorian orders provided a system by which classical
knowledge could be preserved.

The migrations of the West Slavs had proven less disruptive than those of their southern
cousins. Rather than empires and nations, they had moved into a vacuum left by the migration
of the Germanic tribes, and they conquered and assimilated those who remained. There,
amongst the deep forests of central Europe, the infrastructure for complex states simply did not
exist. And yet these tribal princes nevertheless were capable of putting pressure on the
Germanic tribes under Frankish rule. Overtime, these princes would come to establish larger
states, but for now their main impact was cultural and demographic, fundamentally altering the
character of the region around the Elbe river much as their southern cousins had done to the
Balkan peninsula.

[I'll be the first to admit that much of this is as OTL. Main difference is that Hispania is doing
better and Italy is looking to retain a lot more "Roman" character than in OTL. Still, its good to
check in with Western Europe and keep everything up to date. The two major European powers
I haven't yet touched on, the Avars and Bulgars, are due for an update as well - especially to
show what happens to the Huns after the costly siege of Constantinople takes its toll.]

Tibet - the
foundations of Empire

In the mountains of [OTL] Tibet, a Prince named Tri Nyentsen had great ambitions. Already a
first among equals in the sparsely-populated alpine country, he married a relative of the
Maukhani Emperor, using the dowry to fund an ambitious campaign of conquest. The first
Emperor of Bod, as his Empire would become known, he used a combination of military power
and the growing religion of Buddhism to unify his people. Much like the Sahu, he was building a
state out of nothing - laying out new-founded cities such as his capital, Rhasu on an orderly grid
pattern, establishing garrison fortresses to secure key regions.
Small, and pressed between the Eftal, the Maukhani, and Qi China, the Bod Empire was
insignificant in the broader scheme of things, but it also assimilated the ideologies and cultures
that surrounded it and remade them in a distinctively Tibetan style. Tri Nyentsen's people
merged their local deities seamlessly with the Buddhist faith they adopted. They designed a
beautiful city whose architecture was a mix of north Indian and Chinese styles, and defended it
with an army that fought like the Eftal mercenaries Tri Nyentsen hired early on in his conquests.

While the Bod Empire was constrained by the simple facts of geography, it would also expand
and prosper taking its share of wealth from the Silk Road routes that brushed against its
northernmost border. It was perfectly positioned to take advantage as Eftal influence in the far
east declined and the Turks remained in a state of anarchy. What it could make of this position
would remain to be seen.

Peace in our time - the reign of Shahriyar (617-647)

In 637, the Eastern Mediterranean was again calm. Egypt was independent and secure, the
Eftal Shah ruled a vast and reunified territory (their largest to date), and the Hunno-Bulgars and
Rome had finally made peace. But under this calm exterior, divisions lingered.

The Eftal conquests had placed new strains on their government. Extensive garrisons and
fortifications were necessary to bring the newly conquered regions of Heshana's territory under
control. Compromises with local potentates such as Nanivadh, Heshana's nephew, and a
number of Arab tribes such as the Banu Kalb had to be made. Unlike in previous generations,
there was no wave of settlers who could be brought in to displace the settled population or help
to enforce Eftal unity.

However, the first twenty years of his reign, Shahriyar had presided over an uninterrupted period
of unity and prosperity. Scientific and philosophical debates, begun under Khauwashta,
continued. The preaching of Narsai of Argan had founded a small but growing ascetic
movement. In contrast to the traditional Buddhist monasteries, they eschewed the establishment
of communities and buildings, preferring to wander and preach. Narsai's followers were
Mahadevist in their beliefs, believing that escape from rebirth would come in the form of
realizing one's unity with Ahura Mazda, the uncreated spirit. They wandered the rural
countryside, frequently encountering persecution but drawing a significant following among the
poor and outcast. Their rituals revolved around ecstatic chanting, dancing, and the distinctively
Iranian-inspired touch of meditation on sacred fire. It was Narsai's innovations that allowed
Mahadevism to spread beyond the mercantile and tribal elites and become a religion of the
common Iranian.

Shahriyar however, was a Buddhist of the Sogdian school. Unlike Khauwashta he made little
attempt to hide his personal convictions. While he remained tolerant, knowing he could not
afford to act otherwise, his patronage extended purely to the growing Buddhist communities in
Gilan and central Iran. He established missions and monasteries in the traditional holdouts of
Eftal paganism (such as Syria) with mixed results. Religious debate at in his court became less
common, and ochre-robed monks were a frequent sight amongst the courtiers and ministers of
his court. Between 629 and 636, while Mihiradata was away, Shahriyar's "grand minister" was a
Sogdian monk named Shevupantuo.

Shahriyar's wife, Navaqat would be remembered as a famous poet and diplomat. She, like her
husband, was a devout Buddhist and after their marriage would form with Shevupantuo an
enduring pro-Buddhist faction at court, much to the irritation of the more secular and pragmatic
Mihiradata. Their friendly rivalry would define the politics of the era, but after Mihiradata's
shameful recall to the capital, this religious faction would retain the ear of the monarchy until
Mihiradata's death in 642.

Shahriyar had only a single son, named Avyaman. From a young age an athletic boy, a lover of
hunting and wrestling, he was a disappointment to his vegetarian mother and the intellectual,
Buddhist court, who had hoped for a more reserved, scholarly heir to the throne. However, he
was popular with the companions, who found in him a more warlike and less reserved
successor to Shahriyar. On his sixteenth birthday (638) Avyaman was formally named heir, and
shortly thereafter he toured the Empire as a whole for the first time, proving exceptionally
popular with the various Satraps he met, developing a brief but close friendship with his great-
uncle Mihiradata.

While Avyaman toured the provinces, Shahriyar was rather more isolated. Like his father, he
preferred to cultivate distance. Susa became his home. As a young man his ambitions had been
vast, but after the conquest of Syria and Palestine, he began to see how difficult conquest truly
was. A student of history, he realized that Mihiragula's attempts at conquest nearly broke the
Eftal. Instead, he resolved to be a builder, focusing the latter half of his reign on immense
prestige projects - ranging from grand monasteries and temples to humbler roads and new
irrigation systems.

Sulabi's Blunder

By 637, Sulabi Khan was back in Adrianople, much reduced. The siege of Constantinople had
drained the revenues of his state and physically exhausted the Khan. The mutiny that had
forced him to abort the siege had not really ended, either. His army, largely composed of Slavic
levies, had gone home and seemingly deserted him. Taxes, which depended on the same tribes
giving up a share of the revenue they collected, had all but stopped. Even his fellow Bulgars, the
Utigurs, were cautiously demanding additional privileges.

A large portion of the Bulgar state was recently acquired after either the death of Alboin or their
recent war against Rome. Had that territory been wealthy or easily cowed, the Bulgars might
have been able to hold it. Instead, they now ruled a vast depopulated and thoroughly pillaged
region, a region which would require investment and careful management to become profitable
to hold. The Bulgars lacked the capacity for either, especially as the Avars raided along the
Danube.
The final straw came when the Utigurs, rebuffed in their attempt to gain additional territory and
de facto independence, betrayed Sulabi to the Avar Khagan Bati Savaryan. The Bulgar state
collapsed quickly. Sulabi yielded the throne to Asparukh, his son, but both men were tarnished
by the failed siege of Constantinople and neither could address the fundamental weakness of
the Bulgar state or the opportunism of the various Slavic princes under their hegemony.

The Khagan rode south and besieged Adrianople, making alliances with prominent tribes such
as the Severi and the Antes along the way. Asparukh refused to surrender despite promises of
leniency and protection as an "ally" of the Khagan. Due to this refusal, when the city fell it was
subjected to a seven day sack and Asparukh and Sulabi were blinded, tortured and finally
executed. The much reduced Kutrigurs would be pushed out of much of their traditional land,
which was granted to Avar nobles.

In the south, various tribes would break away - the stronger ones would become regional
polities in their own right, though all these "princes" would pay tribute to the Avars. These early
"Kingdoms" of Thessaly, Epirus, the Peloponnese, and Thrace were anarchic, and though the
tribes that made up their core population had slowly transitioned away from raiding and
exploitation, they had essentially replaced it with subsistence farming and proto-feudalism.

The Romans however, were unable to capitalize on their successes. Their treaty with the
Bulgars notwithstanding, they were preoccupied, and rightly so, with the powerful Eftal state on
their borders. Constantine's campaigns had backfired - his attempt to eliminate Heshana had
unified the Eftal. Egypt to the south rebuffed his attempts at an alliance - while many among the
Coptic elite were tentatively interested, the monarchy remembered all too well that but for
Constantine's invasion, they would be in a far stronger position, and further many others among
the Copts had never forgiven the Romans for centuries of persecution.

Further, piracy in Crete had left Roman shipping imperiled, and trade with the Xasar-Sahu alone
was insufficient to keep the Roman economy going. The Eftal were now capable of trading
directly with the various peoples of the Mediterranean, without middlemen for the first time in
history, lowering the prices on the European end of the Eurasian trade network by a not
insignificant percentage. Roman attempts to interdict this trade would force the Eftal to begin
building a fleet, crewed almost exclusively by Syrians and Palestinians. Further, shortly after the
end of the truce, the Eftal would begin large-scale raiding into Anatolia once more, undoubtedly
sponsored by Shahriyar. These raids, and retaliatory Roman naval attacks from Cyprus would
lead to the resumption of war in 643.
 The 5th Eftal-Roman
War

Roman historian Isaac Kourtikes described the "long history of our wars against the
Hephthalites" as "...the slow decline of our Empire and the inexorable ascent of the Huns." He
was not wholly incorrect. While the wars were to the detriment of both powers, sapping
manpower and resources in endless back-and-forth campaigns, the Romans had generally
come off worse. Many different theories exist to explain this - the relative resiliency of the young
Eftal state, or the core of Eftal manpower being relatively undamaged by the Egyptian plague, or
superior tactics which led to a trend of Roman defeats which in turn led to erosion of territory.
Regardless, the tide of Roman defeat and Eftal victory would be complicated by the 5th Eftal-
Roman war, despite the desperation of the Romans and the power of the Eftal at their zenith.

An aging Shahriyar did not lead the Eftal armies. Indeed, he had not been among the party
arguing for war most vehemently - rather, his son Avyaman had taken up the banner of the Eftal
armies enthusiastically. Despite his lack of military experience he did have a relatively veteran
force of raiders and officers to compensate for his shortcomings as a commander. However,
Constantine was experienced, battle-hardened, and had spent almost his entire reign at war or
preparing for war. Though he was in his mid-sixties, and despite having an army only a fraction
of the size of the Eftal one, he waged an effective delaying campaign.

In spite of Constantine's best efforts, the Anatolian plateau fell with ease, but the ambitious
Prince regarded that as merely a stepping stone to greater things. Avyaman continued onwards,
disregarding the warnings of officers who had faced the Romans before. In the narrow passes
of Phyrgia, they fell into an ambush. Avyaman's companions were slaughtered nearly to a man,
as was a large contingent of Armenian troops who attempted to rescue him. The prince, fatally
wounded himself, was finally pulled from the field by a group of Eftal cavalry, and despite the
survival of the bulk of his army, the Eftal retreated in disorder.

Constantine followed their retreat, entering into Cilicia, where he found himself welcomed by the
locals. Taking the time to resupply and rest, he burst into Syria in early 644, reducing the local
strongholds and sweeping towards Edessa. Unlike his previous campaign, he aimed for
Mesopotamia - opting to split open the Eftal Empire, leaving Palestine and greater Syria as easy
targets for reinforcements and his navy to mop up. Edessa would take several months to fall,
but it did, and Constantine pressed on to Nasibin.

After news of his only son's death reached him, Shahriyar and Navaqat both fell into deep
depression. Her surviving poetry from this era takes on a darker, elegiac tone, and according to
evidence in these writings and from contemporaries, her husband wandered the vast palace
gardens aimlessly. His new grand minister, Datuvahya was forced to effectively run the affairs of
state. The annihilation of the companions, many of whom had been close friends seems to have
been an equally devastating blow to the monarchy. With Shahriyar unreachable, the husbands
of the monarch's various daughters, many of whom themselves were important tribal leaders,
began to quarrel on the matter of succession.

The Eftal army however, had recovered. This was their territory, and they knew it far better than
Constantine. Despite the fall of Nasibin, the Roman found his supply lines imperiled. As fall
came on, he was forced to commit a larger and larger force to foraging and guarding the
increasingly disrupted lines of both supply and communication. As at Antioch, his tendency to
ignore the basic fundamentals of logistics in favor of bold sweeping attacks cost him. A brilliant
defender of walls and a capable tactician, he had little understanding of the broader scope of
the war. It mattered little how deep into Mesopotamia he struck if his troops could be isolated
and destroyed.

To Constantine's credit, this would not come to pass. Shortly after the fall of Sigar, word reached
him the Eftal army, now under the command of Tistyra, the Satrap of Arbayestan, was rapidly
approaching. The Emperor fell back to Nasibin, where he found himself with little option but to
fight. The battle of Nasibin, however, is textbook example of Constantine's aggressive tactics
and their successes. Conceding both flanks early in the battle, he struck the center hard with his
disciplined infantry, cutting through towards the Eftal command. Tistyra, seeing his center
breaking, fled, and the Eftal themselves pulled back in disarray.

However, the next day, Tistyra's forces attacked Constantine's forces dawn with three columns
of heavy cavalry. While the center column was blunted and thrown back by the Roman
cataphracts, Constantine's troops took heavy casualties before they were able to repulse the
attack. That the Eftal losses were roughly equivalent was little consolation to the bloodied
Roman forces. Constantine fell back towards Cilicia, scoring one more stunning but inconclusive
victory at the Battle of Issus. In this battle he himself was wounded right at the moment of his
apparent triumph, and in the confusion of battle he was assumed dead. The army panicked and
halted their attack, failing to deal the deathblow to the Eftal army.

In spite of these successes, the Eftal were badly bloodied and shocked by this campaign. It had
been decades since their heartland had been this threatened by a foreign power, and despite
pure logistical advantages they had been forced to mobilize a large proportion of their populace
purely for an exhausting stalemate. Tistyra had little desire to press onwards into Roman Asia.
As the campaigning season of 645 came, there were rumors that the eastern satraps needed
soldiers to defend against the resurgent Turks, and further that Tistyra, who was married to
Shahriyar's third daughter, Roshana, was distrusted by many of his fellow tribal leaders - all of
whom were trying to stake the best claim to the Eftal throne should the aging Shahriyar finally
pass away. Attempting to win the favor of the Shah, Tistyra sent a portion of his most disloyal
forces east under the command of his nephew.

As spring came again, Constantine, approaching his seventies, finally died, either of
complications from his wounds or some other condition. His son Mauricius took power, but
came into an unenviable position. The Roman treasury was nearly exhausted, especially after a
naval battle in 644 saw their fleet decisively defeated and the 'Eftal' navy effectively blockade
the Mediterranean ports of the Empire. While there was little dissention in the ranks yet, he was
forced to maintain the army on a shoestring budget. Meanwhile, the Eftal Satrap of Armenia,
had, with careful bribes, incited the Alans into open rebellion. Forced to send troops into
Cappadocia to deal with this new crisis, Maurice's strategy was accordingly defensive.

A stalemate developed. Tistyra was more concerned with internal politicking than warfare, and
as such he was slow in taking advantage of the distracted Romans. It was the Eftal admiral
Shennushad who would do the most to weaken the Romans - utilizing troops provided by the
Satrap Nanivadh, he landed soldiers in Cyprus, besieging the city of Konstantiea, and helped a
force of ambitious but perhaps foolish Avar adventurers cross the Hellesponte into Lydia, where
they would wreak havoc on one of the few Roman provinces yet untouched by war.

It was not until 646 that Tistyra would finally invade the Romans once more, linking up with the
rebellious Alans and capturing Ikonion again. From there, he struck east towards Laodikea,
which he took after a two month siege. Using it as a base of operations, he pillaged Anatolia,
building up an extensive stockpile of food and valuables, the lion's share of which he would
ensure went to commanders who had personal ties to him. Dissent was growing in the ranks,
and at councils of war the other Eftal officers rightly pointed out he had little official right to be
commanding the army. He had taken command out of necessity, but perhaps it was time they
determine a new commander.

At this point, Tistyra, perhaps out of paranoia or perhaps out of legitimate concern for his life,
abandoned the army, fleeing to Mosil, which he began fortifying. Messengers were sent to Susa,
asking who should take command, but Datuvahya's attempt at neutral choice (a Persian
commander) was unsatisfying to the traditional Eftal factions within the military, who mutinied
and had the Persian assassinated. Datuvahya, as representative of the Eftal bureaucracy who
now had near-absolute power, was seen as usurper and distrusted by the rank and file as much
as by the elite.

A commander by the name of Hiramaosha was finally elected by the Eftal commanders, but the
Alans, thoroughly disturbed by the lack of cohesion within their allies' army, returned back to
their traditional homelands. Freed from the responsibility of coordinating with a rapidly
disintegrating army, they scored a minor but important victory over a small Roman force and
were able to bring Maurice to the negotiating table. For his part, Hiramaosha would advance,
besieging Sardis. The Roman army had nearly totally collapsed, exhausted by the seemingly
unending wars that they faced. Maurice was effectively confined to Constantinople and critical
shortages of both money and food ensured that his remaining mercenaries, a motley mix of
Slavs, Alans, and Xasar were openly in rebellion. A group of Xasar mercenaries would seize
Nicomedia in the autumn, and despite the destruction of the Avar bandits roaming in the vicinity
of Prousa, the Empire had all but dissolved - information was scarce, but rumor had it that local
city councils were negotiating treaties with the Eftal, surrendering on the condition that the Eftal
did not occupy them directly and that their tribute would be reasonable.

Finally, in 647, Maurice fled Constantinople, disguised as a merchant, hiding the imperial regalia
under common wares and escorted only by a small group of friends. Within a few months of
sneaking through the various Balkan kingdoms, he would make it to Florentia, where Doux
Julian, nominally his subordinate, would greet him cautiously.

In a curious twist of fate, not long after Maurice's desertion, Shahriyar would finally die. Almost
immediately, the Eftal were thrown into further chaos. The army rushed south, leaving only
token forces behind. Hiramaosha attempted to proclaim himself Shah as soon as they reached
Nasibin. Ironically, the death of the royal companions in Avyaman's foolish campaign had led to
a vacuum of legitimacy. No tribal leader had greater authority than any other, there was no clear
successor and no universally recognized body who could invest anyone with the authority
necessary to rule. Further, there was no figure to directly revolt against - no current Shah in
Susa who clearly needed to be overthrown. Datuvahya wisely chose not to claim power himself,
instead claiming that he would support Taxamaspada, a minor Eftal noble living in Tokharestan
married to the second (and, according to Datuvahya, favored) daughter of Shahriyar.
Undoubtedly Taxamaspada was chosen not for any particular virtues but because he was
believed to be tractable and was importantly for the court, a Buddhist. However, these two
qualities were far less important to the broader tribal networks, who valued kinship above all
else.

Hiramaosha lacked any real claim by marriage, focusing instead on a distant claim of relation to
Shah Akhshunwar Malka - and as such by the time his army reached Tagrit his army would be
badly weakened by desertion. The final straw was when Tistyra interdicted him, commanding a
mixed force of arab mercenaries and his own companions. Hiramaosha's army nearly dissolved
overnight, and most humiliatingly, he was taken into custody along with almost all of the men in
his immediate family, who had accompanied him on campaign.

Despite no treaty ever being signed, the Fifth Eftal-Roman war was for all intents and purposes
over. It left no clear answers in its wake but rather caused near total anarchy across the whole
of the crossroads of civilization.

[End of an era. I hope this continues to feel semi-plausible. Obviously we've gone pretty far from
the overall point of divergence (where a Persian Emperor refuses to pay his Eftal allies) but I
think the general trends are dovetailing somewhat with history as we know it. The Romans are
doing worse than OTL, but at this point the Eftal are exhausted (losing every battle and still
winning a war is super costly, even if at the end of the day you can claim to have won) and the
setup to this civil war is such that unlike the previous one, I don't see this one being resolved
simply or maybe resolved at all.]

[ The events of this

update are why we can't have nice things. My apologies for the sheer barrage of names.]

The War of Petty Kings - Societal collapse in the latter days of the Eftal Empire

The anarchy which gripped the Eftal Shahdom after 647 was at first seen by those who lived
through it as little more than another succession crisis. The Eftal were familiar with such crises -
their lack of succession law ensured that they happened with a degree of regularity. However,
unlike the previous civil wars and coups, circumstances were changing.

A wider swathe of the population was seen and saw themselves as distinctly Eftal. This larger
umbrella provided even small regions with deep wells of manpower personally connected to the
network of tribal alliances that would come to underpin society in the absence of a central state.
These new Eftal inevitably built their own palaces and adjusted to the semi-sedentary lifestyle
followed by the bulk of the traditional Eftal. Entire regions became heavily fortified, increasing
the difficulty of sweeping conquests and reducing warfare to inconclusive raiding and sieges.
Stirrups, or as the Romans called them, 'steps' were now almost universally used, increasing
the utility of cavalry and correspondingly leaving massed infantry, never the strongest arm of
Iranian armies, as an afterthought. Because even the heaviest Eftal cavalry were typically
armed with a bow, spears were considered ineffective, and the more maneuverable Eftal
horsemen could more easily remain out of range of infantry archers.

Further, this was a time of charismatic religious movements. The monk Shevupantuo, longtime
chief minister of the Eftal Shahdom had, at the news of the Shah's death fled to Syarizur, where
he counseled his local coreligionists on a distinctly Buddhist approach to Just War - preserving
peace and the dharma through necessary and regrettable bloodshed. Compassion for the
common people not only justified but indeed required an armed defense by the believers. While
his words would not necessarily increase the amount of religious violence, they are emblematic
of a general trend of violence.

Meanwhile, in Pars, Narsai of Argan's preaching had divided the locals into two rough camps.
Those who adhered to traditional religions - traditional Zoroastrianism, various Eftal and Hindu
sects, and Buddhism all found common cause against the growing authority of the rural
Mahadevists, beginning persecutions which would be opposed by the wealthy, urban mercantile
class who sympathized with their fellow Mahadevists even if they looked down on their social
class. Similar communal violence would reach a fever pitch in Mesopotamia, where the
Nestorian Christians often found themselves persecuted and excluded from an elite which rarely
shared their beliefs. However, after the failed experiment of Shah Isaiah a generation earlier,
and the bloody reprisals the Christians had endured in response, the Christian Eftal largely fell
in line - with the exception of a rebellion focused around Kashkar, which managed to adeptly
play both sides against each other and survive until 649, when the ringleaders of the rebellion
would finally make an agreement with Tistyra in exchange for relative autonomy.

The predominant power in Mesopotamia after Hiramaosha's capture was Tistyra. The Satrap of
wealthy, well-fortified Arbayestan, his abandoning the main Eftal army early had provided him
with a strong position - his military was already assembled. However, Tistyra was also cautious -
his ambition to be universal ruler was tempered by the fact that on all sides, he was surrounded
by enemies. Despite making a marriage alliance with the Satrap of Osrhoene, Ariasb, he did not
feel much safer than before. Armenia had formally rebelled under Ashot of Artashad, and the
two had begun feuding off-and-on. On all his other sides, raids and incursions were
commonplace, stymieing any attempt to take royal power for himself.

In the south, at Susa, Taxamaspada had finally arrived with a large retainer of Sogdian
cavalrymen. At first he seemed the pliant lesser noble that Datuvahya had hoped for, unskilled
in statesmanship and reliant on the bureaucracy to handle his rapidly disintegrating Empire.
However, he quickly began to assert himself as he became more comfortable, alienating the
bureaucracy and, perhaps unwisely, calling for Tistyra's removal from his Satrapy. When no
response from Mosil came, Datuvahya had little choice but to assassinate the newcomer and
appeal to the Satrap of Syarizur, Kaosha Prajana, to come and claim the throne. Ascending the
throne in 648, Kaosha was for a time hailed as a solution to the growing separatism in the Eftal
Empire - he was widely popular with the aristocracy and had a decent claim to the throne.

However, with Kaosha Prajana came a figure that Datuvahya found incredibly distasteful - the
militant monk Shevupantuo. Datuvahya had perhaps miscalculated the extent of his rival's
influence on Kaosha, and he found himself banished from the capital within a matter of weeks.

Fleeing south to the city of Argan, Datuvahya joined the newly-formed Mahadevist rebellion of
the Satrap of Pars, Tarkhsuna. Despite Kaosha Prajana's best efforts, they could not dislodge
the Mahadevists from southern Mesopotamia, despite seasonal raiding, a series of small
engagements, and a three year inconclusive siege of Sostar. A sign of the times, the city of
Khishiwan declared its independence as well, causing further chaos in an already war-torn
region and inciting Arab brigands to raid deep into the province. The population of southern
Mesopotamia, called by the Persians Asurestan, dropped to the lowest levels since the Egyptian
Plague a century prior. As the Ghatafan moved north, spreading word of their new goddess at
sword point, Arab tribes were pushed into the region causing disruptions and famine, weakening
the central authority of Kaosha Prajana even further.

Meanwhile, the region around the western and southern coasts of the Caspian sea was
relatively untouched by war. Having emerged unscathed from many previous conflicts, its
Satraps bided their time. Khalinga, the Satrap of Gilan, a famous warrior-poet known as the
"Heron of Royan" himself had an impressive lineage, related to the late Shah Huviskha as well
as some of the earliest Eftal. Gaining the allegiance of many local tribal leaders, including many
Asvha, he simply ceased paying taxes to the central government, but like many others he did
not take on a higher title, despite receiving tribute from warlords such as Syavusha the Red.

In the east, Sogdia and Xvarazm broke away, followed by the Kidarite Eftal of Kerman, who
founded their own independent state under a Shah named Vinayaditya. The central Iranian
plateau was quickly overrun by local tribal warlords fleeing instability or seeking to cause it to
their own profit. Anarchy reigned, with local warbands rising and falling rapidly, striking out and
further distracting the few centralized powers remaining from their petty grievances. Turkic tribes
began to migrate south as well, and as in the previous war all sides who could afford to used
them as mercenaries.

"Mercenaries" became an increasing fixture of this new Eftal period of warring Shahs. Tribes
recruited with promises of plunder and land would rewrite the patterns of settlement across the
Eftal world. While in many cases they would assimilate into the broader Iranian cultural sphere,
in many other regions they would retain a distinctly Turkic identity. Even among the Eftal many
tribal groups would take this opportunity to carve out greener pastures in more fertile lands long
held by their enemies.

Endemic small-scale raiding and conquest shattered the overland trade network that the Iranian
and Mesopotamian urban societies depended upon. Without the guarantee of safe transit, trade
declined and economics regressed towards subsistence. The primitive manufactories of Eftal
cities became provincial and operated on far smaller scales. Many of the larger cities shrunk
massively, with the exception of those in Sogdia, those around the Caspian, and those in the far
West, all of which were able to escape the spreading anarchy and could focus upon other
routes of trade than those imperiled by the Eftal wars. In 652, Susa was sacked by the army of
Tarkhsuna, who carried off what treasures and insignia of royal office had not already been
relocated to the city of Syarzur by Kaosha. By the time the two men would sign a treaty in 654,
the damage to royal prestige was already done. The Eftal Empire was little more than a rump
state in western Iran with no claim to universal sovereignty.

This collapse, however, was not all bad. It would result in a rise in oceangoing trade from India,
East Africa, and Hadhramut Arabia, and as silk road trade became imperiled, maritime cities
profited - with the exception of those in the Persian Gulf, whose fates were too intertwined with
the Eftal to avoid atrophy and social collapse. Nevertheless, this was a time of unprecedented
wealth and prosperity for the maritime states of the Indian ocean. One of the particular
beneficiaries was the Red Sea trade, which represented now the only safe way to bring goods
to the Mediterranean market and vice versa.

The Fall of Rome

Unlike their eastern counterparts, the Syrian Eftal saw the collapse of the Empire as a return to
business as usual. The Satrap of Syria, Akhsaman the Elder, viewed Anatolia's crumbling
defenses as an opportunity for more of the raiding that had brought him his position to begin
with. While many turned inwards, he was carving himself what was in all but name a Shahdom,
reinforcing Eftal garrisons in Asia Minor, extracting "taxes" from the Roman cities there, and
offering grants of land to any Xasar-Sahu, Bulgar, or Eftal mercenaries who were seeking a
fresh start in the region around Ikonion.

To the north, the Alans had won their own independence, and despite a series of small-scale
border clashes, lines were quickly drawn. A motley mix of Christians and pagans, the Alans
living within the Roman Empire had culturally diverged significantly from those who lived among
the Eftal and often called themselves Eftal. Retaining much of their original character from their
time on the steppe, the Alans opted for a rather decentralized form of rulership, ignoring cities
and farmland in exchange for suitable grassland for their herds. Like many other invaders, they
defined themselves as a distinct people from those they now found themselves ruling in large
numbers, and as such it remains difficult to determine the exact borders of the Alan Khanate in
this era - its ruling elite simply did not keep clear borders, though we can determine that most
cities in northern Anatolia paid them at least a token tribute.

By 648, a number of Slavic raiding parties had crossed the Hellesponte in first. At first drawn by
the prospect of easy plunder yet outside the boundaries of Eftal rule, these raiders, mostly from
the small Ezerite clan, gradually turned from plunder to outright conquest, carving themselves
out a petty Kingdom which existed entirely at the pleasure of greater powers like Akhsaman and
the Alan Khan. Roughly simultaneously, groups of Kutrigurs, feeling pressed out of their
traditional territories by the Avars, and refusing to give up their traditional nomadic lifestyle
began crossing as well, and in the absence of central power to stop them, they settled in great
numbers around Sardeis.

Many other Slavs and Bulgars would travel north and join the Shahdom of Nikaia, a small state
carved out by the Sahu mercenary commander Birhar Manas. With humble origins as a
rebellion by unpaid soldiers, it grew into conquest in accordance with "Shah" Birhar's ambitions.
Displacing the local Greek aristocracy and replacing it with loyal soldiers and adventurers from
his home country, within the first four years since his rebellion he grew astronomically, exploiting
the power vacuum and defeating one of the few remaining Roman military forces.

In 649, however, he seized upon an elaborate plan. The Emperor Maurice, he claimed, had
been captured, hiding in a monastery in Bithynia. He offered to deliver the Emperor back to
Constantinople, to the mercies of the now starving mob, led by a priest named Basil, in
exchange for a modest sum. Due to poor communication and a preponderance of rumors, few
in Constantinople knew that Maurice had escaped to Florentia. Further, he offered to help
defend the city in exchange for a series of land grants in Asia and Europe. Happy to offer
territory they did not control as a reward, a group of prominent Patricians (some of whom
perhaps hoped to ascend to the Imperial throne) and Basil both agreed to his proposal. When
his terms were agreed to, he sailed across the strait with a squadron of captured Roman ships.
Within were many of his most trusted soldiers, and at a signal, they emerged and seized the city
with only a minimal fight, opening a series of gates to allow in the main bulk of his army.
The Queen of Cities, which resisted a multi-year Bulgar siege, once the mightiest and most
impregnable city of the world, fell anticlimactically to a ruse. It had been starving, isolated from
the grain of Anatolia and without imperial taxes to provide a dole the citizens had already turned
on the bureaucracy. There were barely any defenders left, but in spite of the relative lack of
resistance, Birhar turned over the city to a nine day sack. Everything of value was taken to pay
his soldiers. Sacred relics were smashed for jewels and gold. The city was burned and her
inhabitants sold into slavery. The wealth seized was extraordinary.

The shock of Constantinople's fall would reverberate throughout the Mediterranean. "Is not the
end of the world upon us? Is Rome's fall not its harbinger? Shall Christ not soon walk among us
once more? All we are left with is pale shadows of what once was, and only God himself in final
triumph shall restore those shadows to radiant light." One prominent monk, Desidarius of
Doclea wrote several months after the sack. Apocalyptic predictions were rife. "All the seats of
Christendom save one are in the hands of unbelievers and heretics. Schismatics and
blasphemers, worshippers of the Antichrist who they call Boddo defile the temples of our God in
Constantinople itself."

In a time of limited trade and travel, the collapse of the Eftal Empire was also not well
understood or known throughout much of Europe. Rather distant rumors of the persecution of
Christianity beneath a unified horde of pagans and unbelievers became the stuff of legends,
legends which would have a dramatic effect on the shape of European religion. In Anatolia,
these movements were more immediate, and though the local governments often attempted to
suppress them, charismatic preachers and local crowds began seeing the fall of the Roman
Empire as the beginning of the end of the world in a manner far more tied to regional politics.
The role they assigned themselves was similarly more immediate, and many came to believe
that their mission was to prepare the way for Christ come again with a sense of unprecedented
immanency.

[Thanks to Fi11222 for the inspiration for the Christian reaction to the fall of Constantinople.
Next update will focus on Heshanid Egypt, Nanivadhid Palestine, and Julian. Apologies to the
lovers of the Roman Empire in its various latter incarnations.]

Here's a map:
[Notes regarding the map:

The Akhsamanid Satrapy has limited effective control over much of the Anatolian part of the
"Satrapy" - and they have no naval strength to bring islands such as Rhodes under their control.
As such their power ends at the coast. All Anatolian borders are quite porous - another map
might have almost the entire region under the control of the Alans, who have a significant home-
turf advantage, or choose not to display Birhar as holding such a large territory when he's
effectively a brigand calling himself a "Shah".

Nanivadh's Palestine and Akhsaman's Syria have borders because they're less involved in the
general anarchy, so fewer people are invading them. As such they get clear border lines. By
contrast, someone like Tistyra controls a vague region around Mosil, stretching down the Tigris
and the Euphrates, and my mapmaking skills aren't good enough to mark out every mountain
fortress that makes up the base of Kaosha's power - to the point that Susa being sacked is a
minor setback.

I have mostly restricted myself to only naming major warlords. ]

The Coasts and the

Great Lakes

As Eftal civilization imploded, many of those who lived in the Persian Gulf and could afford to do
so sought new homelands safe from war - a mass flight of artisans, merchants, and nobles.
While some would flee to India or Arabia, establishing small communities of exiles, many would
travel west instead, settling down in the country of Savahila. There the growing coastal city
states would welcome them with open arms. The city of Mzishima [Dar es Salaam] in particular
swelled, becoming the predominant metropolis of the East African coast. Simultaneously,
Indonesian and Indian migrants seeking a fortune and often an increase in social standing
began to arrive, bolstering the numbers of these cities and allowing them to rapidly expand
production of the trade goods that were their lifeblood.

This expansion would not always be easy. While many of the Cushitic ethnic groups along the
coast such as the Sabaka and the Ma'a found cooperation and trade to be beneficial, opening
themselves up to Indo-Iranian cultural influences and slowly assimilating into the foreign culture
on their borders, further inland the cattle-herding Mbisha would come into conflict with the newly
founded city of Vayubata, on the Tana river. Raiding back-and-forth along the frontier would
prove indecisive - the foreign settlers lacked the manpower and the military experience to drive
off the Mbisha, but were too well entrenched and too well fortified to be defeated themselves.

The Mbisha culture was based around a semi-pastoralist lifestyle - they raised cattle and cereal
crops in the high hill country of the Taita. They worshiped an abstract creator god, associated
with the sky, and had a society deeply stratified by age and experience as opposed to the caste
and ethnic divisions which defined the Savahila states. Unwilling to yield and being forced south
by the migration of northern Cushites as Awalastan crumbled, they were only finally driven off by
an alliance of the "Three Cities" - Vayubata, Kintradoni, and Rhapta. Organized by Citrasena, a
local merchant-prince, the Three City alliance would grow through the Seventh Century into a
confederation of all the major Savahila cities, enabling a coordinated defense against invasions
from the interior and attempts by various external factions to gain preferential trading rights.

By contrast, the neighboring highland people called the Asa welcomed trade. Despite having
little that was directly of value to the mercantile cities to the east, they felt less threatened and
as such maintained cordial relations with the Savahila - even allowing missionaries and
explorers to pass through their lands in search of rumored great kingdoms further inland. Their
primary trade was based around exchanging cattle for iron tools - their economy, like that of
many of the inland East African civilizations, was rudimentary.

Trade penetrated the southern interior only infrequently. Riverine travel was common, allowing
more advanced blacksmithing to spread inland, but in few places did a serious volume of trade
build up - beyond a few rarer commodities, most of what East Africa offered the broader
Eurasian trade networks could be found with relative ease within the coastal lowlands. Tribes
such as the Ruvu were brought under the hegemonic power of Mzishima, but beyond the
lowlands independent societies were able to continue their traditional lifestyles without any
interruption.

The south was the country of the Kw'adza and Iringa. Two Cushitic tribes, they were slowly
being threatened by the influx of Bantu along their periphery. By the seventh century, east Bantu
farming communities were scattered across the Great Lakes region - but notably concentrated
in those regions blessed with high rainfall, where the yam could still be grown. As such, the core
lands of the Cushitic pastoralists were safe - marginal by the standards of the Bantu, who were
unwilling to give up their traditional lifestyle or their proximity to the forest. However, with time
population pressures would force the Bantu further towards the coast, bringing them into conflict
with the Cushites.

But for now, the Bantu communities of [Lake Victoria] and [Lake Tanganyika] were not yet
pressured to expand. Bantu civilizations such as the Rutara, the Ganda, and the Cushitic
Takama lived and prospered around the great lake, giving rise to the myths of kingdoms in the
interior of the continent. In truth, they were kinship-oriented societies not dissimilar to those
already encountered. However, with their iron-age advancement and agricultural package, they
were able to push out local hunter-gatherers and nomadic peoples and establish sedentary
communities.

The reorientation of trade

As overland trade through much of the Middle East became impossible, the cities of Arabia and
Egypt blossomed. The goods of India and East Africa both had to be either sailed or carried by
caravans up the Red Sea, to Egyptian ports. In Heshanid Egypt, the young Basileus Heshana
made such trade easy - even low tariffs were enormously profitable for the Egyptian monarchy.
To avoid imperiling this trade, against the recommendation of many of his advisors, he chose
not to challenge his immediate rival Nanivadh, for control of Palestine, choosing instead to
maintain a yearly exchange of gifts with his "beloved cousin". While this was unpopular with the
Coptic majority, trade uninterrupted by endemic warfare would pay immensely. It was no secret
that Nanivadh had a strong fleet and a well-trained Arab-Eftal army - victory over him was by no
means assured, especially due to Heshana's lack of military expertise.

However, problems remained. With the collapse of the Roman Empire, piracy, once confined to
Crete, was able to expand across the Eastern Mediterranean. In response a Mauri expedition,
launched from Italy would capture Crete and subdue several other nests of pirates by 654. Once
this was done, Mediterranean trade blossomed for a time, but the Mauri lord of Crete, Asulil,
would gradually grow independent and begin his own policy of coastal raiding, further
destabilizing the region.

The Mauri King, Izdarasen, would be slow to respond, and his attempt to recall in 660 Asulil led
to Asulil declaring himself King of Crete. After this, Mauri trade would primarily be confined to
southern routes, avoiding the Aegean which became progressively more hostile to trade. This in
turn would have a negative effect on the Xasar-Sahu to the north, whose riverine trading
network relied on the relative security of maritime routes through the Black and Caspian seas
and stable marketplaces in the former Roman and Eftal Empires. The Sahu Shah, Vashtawar,
found state revenues declining and at least in the short term sought to supplement this with
raiding into Pannonia and Armenia - a policy which had mixed success. More successful was
his policy of paying off Asulil to ensure that trade could continue. The slave trade in particular
remained lucrative as landholders with depopulated territories sought to acquire a new labor
force.

In the Vacuum
After the fall of the Eftal Empire, atrocities were widespread. Dashkart, Tesifon, Bavel, and many
more were all sacked in the back-and-forth warfare which claimed untold thousands of lives.
Shah Tistyra's infamous commander, Nijara the White, built a pyramid of human heads outside
the city of Hulwan after it defied him for three hundred days. In Mesun, the Mahadevists, once a
peaceful sect, ironically fearing for their own lives, turned on their Christian brethren and
massacred them, selling those who survived the first bloody nights into slavery. Yet in spite of all
these atrocities, war did not take so many lives as hunger and plague.

Over the first five years of the Warlord Era, the greatest calamity to befall Mesopotamia and
large parts of Iran was the widespread abandonment of the irrigated farmland due to ceaseless
raids. As farmland was allowed to go uncultivated, famine wracked much of the region, and
forced mass migrations of regions of relative stability, which, then overburdened by refugees
were forced to ration. While the actual losses of population are difficult to estimate in any
premodern time, they can only be assumed to be immense - perhaps a fourth or a third of the
population. Further, there would be no immediate rebound, but rather a long period of
stagnation. Reduced manpower allowed bandits, both Eftal and also Arabs from the desert to
roam freely, slaughtering and stealing indiscriminately out of the picked-over husks of once
great cities.

Outside of Mesopotamia, the crisis was no less real. The flight of much of the mercantile class
from the Persian Gulf was followed by several decisive raids from Kaosha Prajana which lead to
famine and the abandonment of urban sites such as Ram-Ardashir which had been key to
Iranian trade. In spite of these successes however, Kaosha, whose authority weakened steadily
through the early 650's was finally assassinated by a retainer in 656. If our Eftal historians are to
be believed, he was killed after sleeping with the wife of this retainer.

Kaosha's death did not grant Shah Tarkhsuna of Pars and his Mahadevist partisans the victory
they wanted - almost immediately they were overrun by a migration of Asvha and Turkic
tribesmen fleeing the central Iranian plateau, and two years later, in fighting outside the marshy
floodplains of Karka, Tarkhsuna would be killed, and a new warlord, Shativash, would emerge
almost as swiftly. Unlike Tarkhsuna, however, Shativash was a traditional Iranian pagan, his
Asvha followers primarily worshippers of Anahita and Hvarna, and the Turks a mixed bag of
Tengri-worshippers and Buddhists. As such, Shativash would side with the Buddhist and more
traditional Zoroastrian population of Pars, and spent the period between 657-660 engaging in a
series of massacres against the Mahadevists, many of whom fled to Arabia or southern
Mesopotamia, outside of his reach. Narsai of Argan was martyred in 658. Without him, his
organization would splinter, with the rural bandits and radicals forming armed mobs, while the
traditional urban congregations attempted to fortify various "safe" places and stockpile grain,
aiming to wait out the crisis.

In Syarzur and Gilan, mountain monasteries, both Nestorian Christian and Buddhist, would
provide conduits for the preservation of the knowledge, both religious and scientific, that came
out of the Eftal golden age. Relatively isolated and difficult for a raiding party of cavalry to
assault, they would endure, often hiring armed guards or more rarely, training their devotees in
self-defense. After the death of Kaosha, it was a few major Buddhist monasteries in the Syarzur
region, such as the monastery of Adhur which, by allying with a loose confederacy of local Eftal
tribes such as the Oadhya and the Hitivira, began to gain secular power, repelling an invasion
by Tistyra in 661. Their impromptu coalition would become known as the Syarzur Confederation,
or the Eftal Nations. The latter is considered a poor translation, while the former is
anachronistic.

Meanwhile, Khingila declared himself a Shah, as did his ally Syavusha the Red. Together, they
were able to generally repel raiders and an invasion by the Shah of Armenia, Ashot, who
coveted the semi-independent city Naxcavan. Here, the religious tolerance and relative security
of trade and travel which had defined the Eftal era was preserved, albeit in a limited form.
Distant from the anarchy of Mesopotamia, they were able to avoid being drawn into the chaos,
promote ties between their regions, and still patronize authors, poets, and philosophers fleeing
the anarchy all around.

Even more distant, the Sogdian Shah was similarly able to avoid being drawn into war.
Fortunately for them, the Johiyava were cowed by Maukhani hegemony, and the Turks were
frequently content to pass through in search of riches and land further south. In Samarkand, a
local despot named Shanoshach was able to maintain a rough hegemony over Ferghana, Marv,
and Ustrushana and a similarly vague hold over the countless cities and castles which
comprised his own confederated kingdom. Theoretically acknowledging the sovereignty of the
Maukhani granted him the ability to in practice act with autonomy, warring and aligning with
various Turkic tribes on the frontier as he chose. In practice this directed them towards
Xvarazm, which was overrun by the Qarluq tribe in 659. By 662, with the floodgates now open,
Turkish warlord named Iltamish carved out a petty state for himself around the city of Abarsahr,
driving the local Eftal south. Another, Baghatur, would conquer much of Sakastan in 665.

These conquests would only exacerbate the pressures on the Eftal. Amidst famine and mass
migrations not seen since their initial conquest of Iran, they were forced into increasingly
desperate and violent conflicts against each other and the Turks. While the Eftal undoubtedly
suffered as a result of these wars and massacres, it must also be remembered that they were a
societal elite. The settled peasant populations and the urban artisans and merchants suffered
the brunt of regular raids and exploitation at the hands of these desperate elites, elites which
already often maintained a semi-nomadic lifestyle and were thus in far less danger than their
settled subjects.

However, after fifteen years of warfare, many factions were becoming exhausted. Claims to
superiority or sovereignty over more than a small locality were increasingly viewed with
skepticism and derision. Most of the original claimants for the throne were dead and aging, and
Eftal armies had atrophied significantly. Large military forces and field battles were rare after
650, being almost entirely replaced by raiding parties and sieges. While armed men were
ubiquitous, the resources to support them were rare, necessitating pillaging as a tool of warfare
not merely for terror or loot, but for survival.
In 663, Tistyra, whose power was on the wane, would be assassinated by Nijara the White in a
palace coup. Tistyra's chosen successor, a Nestorian Eftal named Khauwashta Taoma was
forced to flee with his retainers and family to Syria, where he would become a guest of
Akhsaman's court. Mosil would fall into the hands of Nijara, whose brutal legacy preceded him.
Three weeks into his reign, as the death toll began to mount, a group of Tistyra's retainers
assassinated him in turn and Khauwashta Taoma was able to return and become Shah of
Arbayestan. Less ambitious than his father and less bloodthirsty than Nijara, he sought peace
with his neighbors, marking the beginning of the end of almost a generation of unending
internecine war and warlordism. Bringing peace to even the territory within his nominal borders
would prove challenging, however, and on the Iranian plateau various tribes such as the Khiash
and the Panjadh would continue to feud, accumulating regional coalitions around them.

[Don't worry, there will be a new map coming after the next post, which is mostly written and
focuses on a few different rebellions, Italy, and the former Roman Empire.]

Apocalypse Now?

The various Christian apocalyptic movements which emerged in the wake of Constantinople's
fall did not emerge out of nowhere. Apocalyptic thought had its roots early in the Christian
tradition, but after so much of the Christian East was overrun, it enjoyed a revival. Beginning
with the plagues in 540, many preachers, bordering on heretical, began to whip the populace
into a frenzy of messianic fervor. While this fervor would wax and wane over the coming century,
after Constantinople's fall it burst out into the open once more.

Beginning with the writings of Desidarius of Doclea, the movement in Italy preached that the end
of times had begun - that a great Eftal warlord was coming out of the East to usher in the
beginning of the end of the world. The warlord "Birharios" who had sacked Constantinople was
his harbinger, much as Desidarius was the harbringer of Christ. When Desidarius was made to
recant his claims, he would flee his monastery and travel the countryside, preaching. His
execution in 653 would only strengthen the conviction of his disciples.

Similar movements grew in Greece and Anatolia, where the fall of Rome had been most acutely
felt. Often called Procopians, after Procopius of Sardis, the founder of the movement, they
believed similarly, only that Procopius was a sort of reincarnation of John the Baptist, come
back to usher in the new era. Despite being widely condemned as heresy, the Procopians
gained quite a following, and one which in many cases was violent, attempted to rebel against
the "pagan overlords" to whom they were subjected, especially in those places where strong
authority was scarce. While these rebellions were often quashed, the Procopians did not fear
death or the end of the world. Unlike the more peaceful Desidarian movement, the Procopians
tended to inspire violence against unbelievers and strict social codes, feeling that with the end
of the world so urgent, there was little time to repent. In response, a less strict and more
peaceful sect, the Phrygians (so named after Phyrgia, where the movement originated)
developed, but it was similarly condemned as heresy for seeing Procopius as a prophet of the
coming Apocalypse. Among the Slavs, Avars, Eftal, Alans, and other peoples who found
themselves ruling Christian populations, these movements were treated with suspicion, derision,
or bemusement, depending on the paranoia of the local rulers and the size of the apocalyptic
congregations. Obviously, these movements did little to foster assimilation on either side.

Far in the East, among the Nestorians, deliverance was considered to be imminent as well - and
not without good reason. Despite generally having a much better knowledge of the various
religions with which they shared the world, the Nestorians had suffered horribly since the
collapse of the Eftal. In a few places, such as Mosil, tolerance remained, but daily rumors and
tales of atrocities left certainty in the hearts of many, even high up in the Nestorian
establishment in Mesopotamia, that the end was nigh.

Here, various figures - all of them much closer to home - were successively cast as the
Antichrist or some harbinger of apocalypse - each acknowledged as such and then dismissed in
turn as their power weakened. However the true apocalypse was little more than mass
starvation and endemic warfare, a plight which was indiscriminate in its targeting of Christians
and "unbelievers" alike. Deliverance would have to wait. In several cities, uprisings began in the
latter days of the collapse, prepared to join the armies of Christ. However, these uprisings were
incapable of coordinating and unlike in earlier periods, lacked manpower. Despite being a
movement in which a not insubstantial number of Eftal were swept up in, after the destruction of
cities such as Tesifon by Nijara the White (one of the favorite candidates for Antichrist) it began
to lose steam in Mesopotamia, not for a lack of faith but a simple lack of available manpower.

Christians, of course, were not the only group to rebel in this time period. Many cities and
peasant communities sought to throw off the increasingly exploitative Eftal yoke for a variety of
non-religious reasons. However, generally speaking these groups, regardless of origin could not
afford to field cavalry to the same degree that the Eftal warlords could. Frequently these
rebellions turned into small battles where a disorderly mob of armed peasants would be
outmaneuvered, worn down, and overrun by more agile bands of mounted raiders. Rebellions in
this era tended to survive only with some combination of elite backing, a defensible stronghold,
and a willingness to negotiate.

A Light in the West - Florentia, 647

Having abandoned Constantinople, Emperor Maurice quickly found himself having leapt from
the frying pan into the fire. Julian's condition for allowing him to stay in Florentia was that
Maurice name Julian co-Emperor. Maurice could see where such a deal would lead him -
sooner or later he would be set aside, sent into retirement or to one of the many monasteries
that dotted Italia. Then again, if Julian wanted to throw away his life pursuing the dream of
Empire, so be it. Italy was comfortable and safe.

There was no reason not to give away a title which had caused him nothing but stress and
premature graying. Even a monastery would not be so bad. Maurice had been married once,
but his wife had died young, in childbirth. He had no desire to marry again - and at least in a
monastery he could devote himself to his studies.

Three weeks after his arrival, Maurice proclaimed Julian his Co-Emperor, and began his slow
premeditated withdrawal from public life, a withdrawal which suited him just fine. At first, Julian
treated the announcement with caution, refraining from using the title of Basileus too frequently,
or in his regular letters to the Avar Khagan. Despite his growth in power he feared, perhaps
rightly, the Avars, and further seems to have had a cordial relationship with the Khagan which he
was unwilling to jeopardize. However, the Avars were similarly unwilling to jeopardize their
relationship with Julian, who provided them generous tribute and preserved the status quo.

When Constantinople fell, Julian almost immediately began considering a campaign to reclaim
it. However, he knew well that the Avar Khagan would likely not support such an ambitious
move, and without a strong fleet or Avar support, he would never be able to strike at
Constantinople. Frustrated at the seeming logistical impossibility, he attempted to stay active,
overseeing further renovations in Florentia and marrying a Sicilian Mauri noblewoman named
Menna. While this choice angered many of the old Roman Patrician families, who hoped that he
might favor them and thus grant them further prestige and exalt them above their competitors, it
kept him aloof from their petty squabbles and strengthened ties with the various semi-
autonomous nobles to his south. Despite the growing apocalypticism and panic that gripped the
religious scene of Italy, Julian was a cautious, conservative leader. He took a moderate hand
towards the Desidarian movement, persecuting outright heresy but otherwise turning a blind eye
to their apocalyptic preaching. Privately, he undoubtedly hoped it would die down, feeling such
fervor was dangerous to the state he had designed, particularly as it often directed its anger
against the Avars who more than nominally controlled northern Italy.

Over the next ten years, Julian's reign would be remembered as a period of calm as the east
disintegrated and in Francia another round of warfare broke out between rival heirs after Clothar
II's death.

Picking over bones

The decade after the fall of Constantinople was, as already noted, one of cultural despair for the
Greek speaking peoples of the Balkans and Asia Minor. Religious visions of apocalypse and
chaos gripped the people. Constantinople lay in ruins and many assumed it would never
recover. Without the Empire, a fixture of civilization here since time immemorial, what was
there?

Birhar Manas, despite enormous wealth and decent land to settle his loyal soldiers in, was in an
uncomfortable position. As the destroyer of Constantinople he earned himself the wrath of
many. Most of the cities within his small territory had not anticipated that he would sack
Constantinople, and despite their relative weakness and his relative strength, he found himself
struggling to retain the loyalty of the Romans that made up the majority of his citizenry. He
significantly lessened the tribute he demanded from the Roman cities, knowing that the sack of
Constantinople had made him wealthy regardless and that the token submission was more
important than anything else.

To compensate for this humiliation, he sailed around the northern Aegean, playing pirate for a
time with his Sahu. In his absence, a Roman patrician named Isaac, living near Nicomedia
gathered a small number of former soldiers and, joined by increasing numbers of disaffected
locals and displaced peasants, he captured a network of towns in the Bithynian hills. When
Birhar returned from his bloody adventuring, the self-proclaimed "Shah" was forced to fight for
his life. That he ultimately won the battle and slew Isaac was little satisfaction - many of these
former soldiers melted into the hills and proved a long-term thorn in his side.

After this rebellion, Birhar became distrusting of his subordinates. He had left Constantinople
and a not insignificant garrison (including ships) in the hands of a lieutenant, Kormisosh, and
paranoia that Kormisosh would act against him distracted him for the better part of a year, while
another of his subordinates, an Avar mercenary named Umor, fanned the flames of his
suspicions. Birhar alienated more and more of his men and finally they appealed to Kormisosh
to overthrow him in truth.

Kormisosh was a more pragmatic, practical man. Like Birhar a Sahu by birth, in his youth he
had been a traveler, and he had seen much of Europe and the Middle East, fighting both for and
against the Eftal and the Romans. Finally settling in the Roman Empire, he had been quick to
opportunistically join Birhar when the Empire began to collapse. Naturally, due to his talents and
affable nature, he rose quickly to a position of subordinate command. Beneath his affability,
however, was masked a profound ruthlessness which allowed him to seize control of the petty
kingdom under the guise of restoring order.

However, in 658, as he sailed into Nicomedia and declared himself the new King (following a
swift and relatively bloodless coup) his mission seemed nigh impossible. The Sahu and their
various mercenary allies were all foreigners, outnumbered and despised by the native
population. They faced a rebellion in the hill country of Bithynia and their greatest potential
source of wealth, Constantinople, lay in ruins from which it might well never recover. And if
rumors were true, both the Avars and Alans alike were eyeing their territory.

Alans and Eftal - Anatolia Divided

The Alans ruled a large and mostly depopulated region of Asia Minor. Apart from a ring of cities
along the black sea coast that paid them tribute, they came out of the war with the least internal
issues. By offering to work with the Eftal under Akhsaman the Elder, they were able to secure
territorial concessions from the overstretched Eftal and in return supplied them with mercenaries
- a relationship not dissimilar to that which they had with the Romans.

The Alans tended to eschew large urban foundations - although several fortified palaces were
built in the westernmost parts of their territory, perhaps as a way to solidify their control. A
mixture of Christians and traditional Iranian pagans, in the wake of the Roman Empire's fall,
adherence to Nicene Christianity became less essential to advancement. Nestorian Christianity
would subsequently gain a not insubstantial following, and Alan paganism would endure as
Christianity failed to gain the official support of the Alan Khan, Celbir. Alan culture bore many
similarities to that of the early Eftal - their ornate pottery and elaborate sewn banners were
frequently decorated with scenes of horses and horsemen, and also pastoral representations of
herdsmen or gods and goddesses, frequently portrayed dancing. Unlike the Eftal, these figures
rarely bear any resemblance to Indian or Persian iconography, but more frequently bear
resemblance to late Roman images.

Akhsaman the Elder perhaps bit off more than he could chew with his sweeping spate of
conquests. He made arrangements with local orthodox religious leaders, landholders and cities,
but these arrangements were often complicated by the desire of his own people to settle this
"newly conquered" land. He lacked the soldiers to enforce order, and as a result the Kutigurs
and Slavs were able to raid areas which paid him for supposed protection. He was according
forced to spend most of his early reign riding from place to place, solving local disputes and
using military force to suppress bandits and potential rebels.

A battle against Slavic raiders left him with lingering wounds and accordingly by 660 he was an
aging man with a young (third) wife, Vitushoana. In court rumor and in fact she came to utterly
control the affairs of state, coming the closest to creating an organized census and a regular tax
rate for the various subject peoples under Akhsaman's yoke. It was she who moved the court to
the more central city of Tyana. The near-total abandonment of the city and its hinterlands played
into her decision, because it could be repopulated with Eftal and Akhsaman's retainers could be
placated with large estates of pastureland nearby. The city of Ikonion underwent similar
treatment at the hands of Vitushoana's brother Disiapata, but remained less prestigious and less
powerful because of its distance from the heartland of Syria. As a sort of counterbalance, the
"golden city" of Emesa would be granted to Akhsaman's cousin, Akhsaman the Younger as a
personal territory, bound by tribal ties to the central authority but otherwise autonomous. In
these turbulent times, Akhsaman would fortify the city and many others along the border with
Palestine, never wholly trusting Nanivadh or his successor Avyaman of Damascus. (Avyaman
was crowned co-Shah in 653, and would assume total power in 654, with Nanivadh retiring and
dying several years later.)

Like so many other opportunists, the Kutigurs did well for themselves in Anatolia. Roughly
unified under the leader Bayan Irbis, they subjugated much of Lydia and despite having only a
few thousand warriors, they were able to negotiate their submission to Akhsaman the Elder,
becoming effectively the Eftal tax collectors. It was a role they excelled in, effectively besieging
cities until they were paid, and then splitting the proceeds equitably with the Eftal, whose
effective power was confined further south and east. The Ezerite Slavs, who clung to the
coastlines, were a frequent target on their aggression as well. Neither the Slavs or the Bulgars
left much material culture in Anatolia - both were relatively few in number, and overwhelmingly
militaristic. Much of what they used was taken from the far more advanced society they ruled.
Both would often make use of Roman-made weapons and armor. Furthermore, Roman
historians after only a generation or so seem to regard the Bulgars of Asia Minor as no different
from the Eftal.

This pillage, rebellion, and general decline in urban population was really nothing new. The
population of Anatolia by 660 was at a low not seen in centuries - having never fully recovered
from the Egyptian Plague and being subsequently wracked over the next hundred years by
invasion, famine, warfare and several resurgent outbreaks of plague. However, it is a testament
to Roman society that along the west coast, the Roman cities endured. Even as the surrounding
countryside reverted back towards subsistence agriculture and pastoralism, these cities and
their environs remained both strongholds against raiding and important, if diminished economic
centers with food surpluses. Their churches, with beautiful mosaics and jewel-inlaid relics, were
never pillaged. Their public forums and marketplaces remained lively and distinctly Roman.
Perhaps most importantly the "barbarians" who claimed to rule them rarely interfered in their
daily function, preferring to simply extract tribute and move on to the next city.

[Big update! I know I packed a lot in there. As ever I welcome questions and comments and
thoughts.

The big initial period of chaos is winding down, but the aftermath will take some time to sort out.
I have to admit to being a little uncertain where to go from here - I'm not operating with much of
a plan anymore and I'll need to develop one again. I'd love to hear some suggestions on that
front, if anyone has any. (Although I reserve the right to disagree, it's not like I'm totally devoid of
plans or ideas.) And yes, the map is coming along. I just need to update it to accommodate
some last minute changes to this post. Apologies for not having it out sooner - I know I for one
would be totally lost without it.]

Kings of Hispania

Sisenand (611-632)

Prosecutor of the Jews and Arians, Sisenand's reputation through history is one of a callous
butcher, thanks in no small part to the role of the Jewish historian Matthaeus of Acci. However,
this is an unfair assessment of a reign best seen through the lens of the times in which he lived.
Sisenand's world was a changing one. The Nicene Church was growing in power and influence.
Urban development was at its nadir, and large estates dominated Hispanian agriculture.

Sisenand's attempts to divide these estates and satisfy the demands of the Nicene Church led
to communal violence, rebellion, and the dissatisfaction of the nobility upon which he depended
- all of which threatened to undermine the later years of his reign. Fortunately, due to the
general distraction of the Franks to his north and the lack of other meaningful threats, Sisenand
was able to confront these issues without fear of outside interference - and indeed the Church
was able to bankroll his hiring of Frankish and Mauri mercenaries.
By 630, the rebellions were defeated, but Sisenand himself was an aging man, wearied by war
and court intrigue. He sought to retire and yield up the Kingdom of Hispania to his son,
Amalaricus, which he did two years later, after a period where his son was given broad authority
as Doux of Tarraconensis (a territory smaller than that of the former Roman province).

Amalaricus (632-639)

Amalaricus' short reign was remarkably peaceful and prosperous. He oversaw the building of a
grand cathedral in Toledo. He was notable, however, for having grown up in a Hispania totally
ruled by the Nicene Church, and for, unlike Sisenand, using Iberian Latin almost exclusively at
court. He began minting a new line of gold coins, the Iberian Solidus, to combat the inflation his
predecessors had increasingly used to balance the Hispanian budget.

His Lord of the Palace, the Romano-Gothic noble Ardonius Iagari, dominated the affairs of state
for the majority of Amalaricus' short reign. Having grown wealthy by manipulating the land
seizures of Sisenand, he maintained his power under the new King by way of Amalaricus'
mistress, Heva. After Amalaricus grew ill and died at the age of 33 without an heir in 639, he
manipulated the council of nobles to ensure that his handsome cousin, Chinavintus, the Count
of Calabria, was named King.

Chindavintus (639-650)

Chindavintus was, shortly after his ascent to the throne faced by a threat in the form the
Basques, who sought to rebel, feeling that the Kingdom was weak and disorganized in the wake
of Chinadvintus' election. When a large group of nobles, dissatisfied by Chinadvintus' election,
and fearful of Ardonius Iagari's power over the new King, joined their rebellion, Chindavintus
proved that he was more than a puppet, satisfying their demands by sending his cousin into
exile, and defeating the Basques in a campaign which lasted until 642.

After handling the Basques, he turned around and executed some six hundred nobles for their
suspected part in the rebellion, a move which would solidify his support. He would never allow
Ardonius to return to Hispania however, and the former minister would live out his life in relative
comfort in Hippo as a guest of the Mauri King, Izdarasen.

The Avar Khaganate - Balkan Hegemony (640-670)

In the reign of Bati Savaryan, the Avar Khaganate would begin to settle down. Bati Savaryan,
unlike his predecessors, rarely left Sirmium, which became a sort of de facto capital. Managing
the complex layers of tribal loyalties he had inherited was inefficient for a mobile Khagan. With a
single hub, linked by courier riders to the rest of his expansive empire, he could rest assured
that messages would reach him in a timely manner.
The early success of the Avars had been based on their peerless, stirrup equipped cavalry, but
as stirrups spread and the Avars became overstretched, it was more through a combination of
accommodation and assimilation that they maintained their legacy. The Avar people were
always few in number, relative to the vast numbers of Slavs that they ruled. But, through the use
of settled tributaries they maintained their dominance, despite slowly becoming more and more
Slavic and less Iranian. Apart from occasional back and forth raids on the Sahu frontier, the
Avars military structure slowly began to atrophy in the decades following 650. There were few
good targets for raiding anymore - and the relatively safe business of extracting tribute allowed
the core military aristocracy to slowly lose their edge.

Unlike the Eftal, who by settling down enhanced and strengthened their dominion, for the Avars,
settling down was a paralytic. Their last major victory against the Bulgars extended their
hegemony over the entirety of Greece, bringing countless petty Slavic Kings into their orbit.
These Kings paid heavy tribute to the Avars, whose military reputation preceeded them.

The Southern Slavs and the Bulgars, however, were becoming Romanized. It was perhaps
inevitable, surrounded by history, that they would not begin to adopt the language and
architectural styles of the people they conquered. By 660, cities such as Thessaloniki were even
being restored - and these major building projects undertaken by the Slavic Kings had a
distinctly Roman style and grandeur to them. Nicene Christianity too, spread like wildfire. While
the Slavs had little interest in the apocalyptic visions of the Procopians, they sought out
Christianity as a way to bridge the gap between themselves and their Greek population. The
South Slavs were a people who had long ago left their homelands and traditional, local gods,
behind. To many it seemed logical that they should adopt the God of this new land.

King Casamir "the Great" of Thrace was famous for being the first of these converted Kings,
being baptized in 654. Unlike the disastrous attempt of Valthar, by this point his people were
already accustomed to living beside the Romans, and a series of mass baptisms followed. Local
churches were restored and in 656, Casamir would go on a pilgrimage to Rome, where he
would be awed by the beauty of the city. His example encouraged the mass conversions that
would bring most of the Slavic nobility throughout the Avar hegemony to Christianity by 670.
Further, it reinforced Casamir's position as a sort of "first among equals" in the pecking order of
Slavic kings, much to the irritation of Bati Savaryan's son, Aybat Kalga.

Aybat Kalga lacked the brotherly relationship his father had with Julian. The elderly Roman
finally passed away in 656, leaving the throne solely to his now 37 year old son, Sergius
Constantinus. Having grown up a soldier, Sergius, unlike his father, seems to have harbored
dreams of restoring the Roman Empire to its full potential. Knowing this, Aybat Kalga saw in the
spread of Christianity an attempt from Rome to undermine the unity of his Khaganate - drawing
the Slavs into the religion of the Romans was but a first step. Casamir's pilgrimage he saw as
little more than collusion amongst his various tributary vassals in a plot to overthrow the Avar
hegemony.

Accordingly, in 658 he asked Sergius to withdraw his soldiers garrisoning Liguria, granting the
region to the Utrigur Bayan clan, who he viewed as more loyal vassals. To the Isidorians,
Liguria, a wealthy region from which they extracted enormous tax revenue, was not negotiable.
Sergius refused.
Isidorian Italy

The latter years of Julian's reign, now as Emperor, proceeded as well as could be expected.
Because of his unwillingness to jeparodize the status quo, he put off his visions of reconquest
until it was too late. Early in the 650's, his sight began failing him, and soon after he was
afflicted with gout and a variety of diseases which left him increasingly more infirm. He was
forced to name his son, Sergius, co-Emperor in 651. Sergius was by all accounts an able
commander and a natural-born leader, but he and his father saw eye-to-eye on little.
Regardless, there was no other choice. The Isidorian dyansty had built its prestige on remaining
aloof from the squabbles of the Patrician families, and as such no other suitable candidate
existed.

Sergius' coronation however, represented a new system. Crowned by the Pope himself in
Rome, Sergius was granted a sort of divine legitimacy and right to rule which the Isidorians had
previously lacked. That Julian had been instrumental in choosing the Pope who did so was
quietly overlooked by the dynasty's partisans, who were quick to hail Sergius as a sort of holy
emperor. Furthermore, in a return to a more classical form, Sergius was the first Isidorian
Emperor to use the title Imperator Augustus.

The Italian Army was a potent force. Italy was populous, untroubled for the most part by raids or
warfare, capable of sustaining armies of perhaps more than thirty thousand in the field for
extended campaigns and extensive garrison forces besides. It was this full field army which
accompanied Sergius north. Aybat Kalga called up what cavalry he had on hand and met
Sergius as Patavium, where the two men had a tense meeting. Aybat Kalga was concerned, not
merely by the size of the Roman force assembled at short notice against him but by how well
equipped and disciplined it seemed, in contrast to his own motley assembly of nobles.

Feeling cornered, Aybat Kalga blustered and threatened, promising to "Burn Florentia to the
ground and use the Patriarch of Rome as a footstool." He reminded the Roman how easily his
ancestors had broken the back of the Gothic Kingdom and demanded that he be obeyed. To
these threats and provocations, Sergius remained coolly dismissive, waiting until the Khagan
was finished ranting before he left the tent. At dawn the next day, the Italian army deployed and
marched on the Avar camp, and the Khagan's soldiers retreated north, to great celebration.

But the Avars would return, two months later, with a far, far larger force, most of it mounted.
Despite several attempts to bring the Romans to battle, Sergius did not take the bait, knowing
well that time was on his side. As long as Aybat Kalga was bogged down in inconclusive
skirmishes and long sieges, he lost face and merely confirmed to his vassals and allies that Italy
was lost. Finally, frustrated and defeated, Khagan and Emperor met once more, and this time,
the Khagan, humbled, agreed to both acknowledge Sergius' independence and officially cede
the remainder of northern Italy to him.
The 6th Scroll of the Suwar

[The following is an (invented) excerpt from the Saihist holy book, the Suwar. ITTL, Saihism had
its origins in the cult of Alilat, but grew into a universal religion with the patronage of tribal
groups such as the Banu Thaqif and the Banu Ghatafan. While it had little appear outside of the
Arab cultural sphere, by the eight century there were also small communities of believers in
East Africa. The Suwar is one of several texts considered holy by the Saihists, and is attributed
to the priestess Fadia and her husband Abdulilat.]

This is true thought, written by the priestess for the benefit of all. Through true thought does one
attain the Absolute.

True thought [given] to the God is the proper path, the path which will not lead you from truth to
falsehood, as so many paths may. Alilat is the garden at the end of the path.

The God is the season and Alilat the child of seasons. What the God is, Alilat is the child of.
What the God is, Alilat is the mother of. Each mote is the God, and each mote is birthed from
Alilat.

Alilat, who is the first and is without equal, bless this verse. May your beautiful birds, your
bountiful companions shelter us and give us strength to not err...

When you pray, pray not as a polytheists do, to the multitude of idols in the crowded temple. Go
instead into the desert, into the place of silence and there turn your mind to the God.

When you pray, pray not as the Christians do, to the image of a man. Man cannot be the
compass of the God. That [role] belongs to Alilat. Go instead to some place where you can see
the vastness of the Absolute and praise the beneficence of Alilat...

When you pray, pray not as false prophets [Mahadevists?] do, to the thought of the God and not
the substance. Alilat is the substance, and to forget her is unbelief.
 Kral Darvan

With his tributaries under pressure by the growing Slavic migrations, in 623 Clothar II went east,
touring the frontier. While his mission was ostensibly to provide reassurance, he also sought to
acquaint the nobles of the Kingdom with his first (and favored) son, Charibert, and further,
through a display of Frankish military might, dissuade potential rebellions among the
Thuringians and Saxons, whose dukes resented his hegemony.
By the time Clothar II returned to Paris, he was supremely confident the eastern borders were
safe. However, within two years he would be back on the frontier, facing an invasion by Kral
(King) Darvan of the Veleti. Over the past twenty years, the Slavic tribes had been slowly
unifying, to defend against and also better persecute the low level-warfare that characterized
their borders with the Franks. But it was Darvan who finally bound the various fractured tribes
together through clever inter-tribal marriages and skill at warfare. While there are essentially no
Slavic sources from the time, account of Frankish monk Suger of Merseburg provides a factually
inaccurate but useful picture of Darvan's loose Kingdom. Religious ritual was the key to the
stability of the Kingdom, with the springtime festival of Jarilo providing an opportunity for tribal
leaders to meet in council and hear the King's proclamations. The King was in many cases
effectively a first among equals within the tribal oligarchy, but in matters of war he had absolute
authority.

The western Slavs, known to the Franks as Wends, were primarily a rural, agrarian people.
Their cities were relatively crude and small, even by the standards of "barbarian" Europe. What
urbanization they did have was based around temple locations or fortifications. Lacking
infrastructure and a central identity, their early history was characterized by internecine raiding
and relative isolation from the broader world. Their history and culture was primarily oral, though
they did have a written language which saw limited use. If their own history is to believed, it was
Kral Darvan who truly invented the Slavic civilization.

Darvan's legacy as a warrior and a semi-mythic founder of the "Wendish" peoples would be
cemented by a battle called Bautzen, where Duke Helinand of Thuringia, the Saxon Duke,
Theoderic, and a contingent of Frankish cavalry attempted to stop an expedition by the Slavs
which, while it had begun as a mere raid, had snowballed into a full-scale invasion. Helinand
and three of his sons were slain, and Saxony and Thuringia were left open. After Bautzen, the
Frankish kingdom was overrun as far as the Weser.

The Frankish Mayor of the Palace, Vedast, lead a response, but was summarily defeated in
battle near Fulda. However, by the end of the year, Darvan was forced by his own nobles to
retreat back across the Elbe. In spite of his skillful campaign, the Slavs feared for their
homesteads in their absence and had little ambitions beyond looting and taking slaves. When
Clothar II himself took the field, he was able to chase Darvan deep into his own territory, but the
brilliant tactician succeeded once more. His infantry advanced in a loose formation, harassing
the rigid units of Frankish heavy infantry and wearing them down with arrows and throwing-
spears. As the Franks impetuously charged, the Slavic infantry melted away into the forest, and
Darvan, having flanked the Frankish army and driven off their horse, charged his cavalry into
the unprepared Franks, themselves scattered in their pursuit of the lighter-equipped, faster,
Slavic troops. The Franks retreated, humiliated. Clothar was effectively forced to buy peace with
vast quantities of treasure, which Darvan distributed to his people, solidifying his position as
leader.

This description of the Slavic cavalry seems to imply that Darvan took much inspiration from the
Avars, using spear and bow equipped cavalry as the mainstay of his army.

After this defeat, Clothar's Kingdom began to break apart. The Burgundians and Saxons
rebelled and while Clothar was able to convince the Burgundian nobles to return to the fold, the
Saxons remained independent, ambushing a Frankish army sent to bring them back into the
fold. Clothar was forced to grant the nobles additional privileges, and on his death in 636, the
Frankish Empire splintered once more. His many sons ended up with their own Kingdoms, and
while Charibert, King of Neustria, was nominally first among equals, that did nothing to prevent
vicious brotherly infighting from beginning anew.

What was notable is that over the next twenty years, no single victor would become clear.
Agilbert of Austrasia would come closest, but he would die in 651, and his two sons would spell
the end of his victories by warring against each other for the throne.

While Darvan would die in 647, his son, Radem would take on the mantle of his father's legacy.
He had distinguished himself as a leader of Darvan's cavalry, a position in which he had come
to form personal relationship with the tribal leaders whose support was critical to ensuring the
peaceful transition of power. Radem would conquer the Thuringians, forcing them into
submission. However, as much of Radem's legitimacy was based upon pagan religious ritual,
the Christian Thuringians proved unreliable subjects, a problem which Radem was aware would
only grow worse with time.

Radem was an effective monarch in an era where such a thing was desperately needed to
prevent the entire makeshift Kingdom from collapsing. By confirming the makeshift alliances his
father had created and strengthening them, he ensured that the western Slavs could fight off
Avar and Frankish attacks throughout the latter half of the seventh century, and strengthened
the artificial identity that Darvan had created. However, the Kingdom was still almost entirely
based on having a strong leader at the helm - without one, Radem knew it would quickly
disintegrate. Although he intended to create a written code of laws based off of a combination of
Germanic law and Slavic traditions, he died in 663, before this could be accomplished. His son,
Czimislav, would be left to continue the statebuilding process Darvan began. Only time would
tell if he was up for the challenge.

Orthodoxy and Enlightenment in the Maukhani Empire

With the death of Visnuvadhana, his son Ammaraja took power, and would largely continue the
policies of his father - detachment from the day-to-day affairs of Empire, military expansion, and
attempts at central unification. The Johiyava dynasty remained powerful and influential -
Ammaraja surrounded himself with his mother's family, earning Ammaraja the ire of the
bureaucrats and the military, whose interests conflicted with those of the Johiyava. The final
straw was Ammaraja's creation of vast fiefs in the Punjab for the Johiyava and their vassals in
651, whose territory in Tokharestan was increasingly coming under threat and desired safer
territories. Distanced from the popular mood and surrounded by fawning courtiers, Ammaraja
had little idea how much policies which seemed simple to his sheltered position could have such
a negative impact.
The bureaucracy in the Punjab had a strong relationship with the local aristocrats and tribes
whose positions were directly threatened, and a rebellion broke out in Takasashila, seeking to
place Ammaraja's nephew, Dhruvasena in power. As a sort of local Viceroy, Dhruvasena stood
apart from the (mainly Brahmin) bureaucrats and yet had their implicit support, which proved to
be invaluable in gathering troops, especially the semi-professional military units which formed
the core of the Maukhani army.

The Johiyava, by contrast, fought much as they had a century ago, relying on their vicious Indo-
Iranian cavalry and raiding tactics. However, they found themselves outmatched and
outnumbered. The Maukhani army had adapted steppe-style cavalry tactics from the Johiyava,
countering the raiders, and once they dragged the Johiyava into a pitched battle, the kamboja
cavalry found that the enemy foot soldiers were equipped with high quality weapons and armor,
long spears and heavy bamboo longbows ideal for repulsing their charges.

Dhruvasena quickly laid siege to Purusapura and then, taking a token military force, marched
east. As he travelled he gathered a large army, and laid siege to Pataliputra. Ammaraja
surrendered, hoping for leniency, but was executed, along with much of his court. With this, the
Johiyava abandoned their fight. Purusapura was captured, and Gandhara came with it.
However, the Maukhani did not press beyond the Khyber, opting instead to fortify the pass. The
Johiyava beyond it lost much of their power to a rival clan, the Siyaposha, a border group with
Eftal and Kidarite origins who claimed, not entirely untruthfully, Kamboja ancestry. By 660, they
conquered the city of Kapisa, making it the capital of a new kingdom. Using money from the
Maukhani, they hired Turkic mercenaries to fight the remaining Johiyava holdouts, and when the
war was done in 665, they settled these Turkic soldiers on old Johiyava lands, where they would
in time become the core of the Kapisa armies.

Dhruvasena, for his part, would be a pawn of his ministers and generals. The structure of
Maukhani government had developed such that it was difficult for a monarch to exercise power.
Generally speaking, the bureaucrats and viceroys designed policy and the monarch's influence
was more abstract. Despite this weakness, Dhruvasena's reign would be massively influential.
The Maukhani empire would reach its greatest extent, solidifying its borders in Deccan and
Orissa. Further, the religious changes in Dhruvasena's reign would be long lasting.

Hinduism as developed by the guru Indrapada and promoted by Dhruvasena (and to a lesser
extent his predecessor) was nonsectarian and nondualistic. Rather than the young bhakti
movement, with its devotion to a personal god, Dhruvasena's Hinduism was based in Vedanta
philosophy, and sought to compete with Buddhism by emphasizing the pursuit of enlightenment
and the fundamental unity of the Self and Brahman. Monist Hinduism would spread like wildfire,
being able to incorporate any number of local or universal deities as not fundamentally
incompatible with its teachings.

While sectarian movements such as Mahadevism, and the bhakti sects such as Shaivism and
Vaishnavism would endure, and in the west even thrive, Hinduism on the Indian subcontinent
would gradually begin to unify. Further philosophers would expound upon the ideas presented
by the mystics of Dhruvasena's court, and while philosophical debate and disunity would remain
an essential part of the Indian character, monism was central to the Hindu worldview in the
Middle Ages, both on the subcontinent and in much of the Indianized east. The principle of
overarching unity while allowing for radical regional innovation and difference, as applied to both
government and religion, would define the era.

[In another world, with the rise of Islam and Indian feudalism, Hindu religion would become
personal and devotional. Here its tending towards the philosophical, abstract, and has the key
theme of "unity" - of self and Brahman, of the gods in their myriad incarnations, of everything in
existence. Hinduism in this timeline I think will continue to develop sharply away from its OTL
form, although many things will seem familiar. It won't be any less diverse ITTL, but the core
trends and influences are different.

The Eftal Mahadevist sect, with their Zoroastrian and Bhakti roots and need to compete with the
Abrahamaic faiths, have a lot more of that personal devotional aspect. The typical Eftal pagan
or Hindu, by contrast, mixes ecstatic rituals, gaudy festivals, and personal devotion with
Buddhist inspired philosophy and might find the religious trends of the subcontinent not
unfamiliar.]
Mauri Hegemony

King Izdarasen was the grandson of the famed Mauri Queen [FONT=&quot]Meghighda, having
succeeded his father, Ayrades in 633. The eldest son, he was widely regarded as a
disappointment, an arrogant and spoiled youth without much inclination to rule. In comparison to
his brother Takfarinas, a pious and scholarly boy, Izdarasen came off even worse. However,
after ascending to the throne in Hippo Regius, he proved not wholly incompetent. His father's
reign had left the affairs of state in good order. Trade was booming, with Mauri merchants being
a ubiquitous presence in the Mediterranean.

[/FONT] [FONT=&quot]Over the past two hundred years, North Africa had become more arid.
While its harvests were still sufficient to keep a large urban population, the Mauri found
themselves being pressed by Berbers from the desert whose societies were based in more
fragile ecosystems. The collapse of oasis civilizations such as the Garamantines had caused
overland trade to gradually dry up as well. These migrations had preoccupied Ayrades' reign,
and the dangers posed by these migrants had pushed more and more Mauri towards the
coasts, where maritime work beckoned.

[/FONT] [FONT=&quot]The Mauri "colonies" scattered across the Mediterranean provided

another outlet for those seeking an escape from marginal lands or intermittent raids. While
these had essentially ceased by the time Izdarasen had come to power, they had finally caused
the Mauri to commit to a maritime existence. Much of their farmland had become far less
productive pastureland to support migrants with a semi-nomadic lifestyle. Income from
agricultural estates was low, and the traditional tribal power-brokers, who depended on these
estates, were weaker than even, replaced by a new urban elite which allowed the monarchy to
centralize power and gain wealth from tariffs.

[/FONT] [FONT=&quot]Izdarasen's policies reinforced these trends. Overseas expeditions

became a hallmark of his reign, establishing the Mauri as far afield as Crete. The large budget
of the state was used to maintain an even larger fleet, and though the Mediterranean could not
be called a Mauri lake, with the decline of the Roman Empire it was almost exclusively policed
by the Mauri. However, to the north a new threat was growing.

[/FONT] With Emperor Sergius Constantine's reconquest of the Po Valley, the Mauri holdings in
the south, under a local doux named Takfarinas, were the next logical step, as was Sicily. While
the Isidorian Empire had a fleet, it was small and feeble compared to that of the Mauri - who
would have unquestioned naval dominance in any war. The stage was set for a war not unlike
the Punic wars almost nine hundred years ago - only this time, both sides believed themselves
to be the proper successors to the Roman Empire.

The Mauri Kings had long been rivals of the Isidorians over the issue of Sicily, which the
Isidorians saw as a symbolic "birthplace" of the dynasty, and the Mauri saw as a vital trade hub.
With an easy victory over the Avar Khagan under his belt, Sergius demanded the submission of
doux Takfarinas. When he did not receive it, he marched south to complete his dominion over
the Italian peninsula.

[I think most of the world is now caught up to roughly the 660 mark. The Darvan stuff was born
out of reading about the early western Slavs and wanting something interesting for them to do,
so I decided to give them a brilliant leader just to throw things off the course of history. Of
course, said brilliant leader is really working against history in a sense, because the Slavs lack
any of the institutions or traditions to create a strong state at this point. They're just a bunch of
tribes and trying to centralize them into an unholy sprawling leviathan kingdom is an uphill battle
- and I'm not sure how it could last much longer. An early conversion to Christianity is probably
in the cards though, I'm thinking. But it seems too early at this point.]

The Wars of Sergius

Sergius, flush from his easy victory against the Avars, marched south a year later against doux
Takfarinas of Apulia in 658. His prior successes had made him confident that this would be an
easy campaign - that like the Avars, the Mauri were overstretched and would crumble quickly in
the face of a disciplined foe.

Takfarinas would prove otherwise. The Mauri commander had a contingent of his own native
cavalry, fleet-footed and adept at harassing the larger Roman army, which for all of its strengths
had a critical lack of lightly equipped horsemen. The Isidorian infantry in the era of Sergius had
been taught to fight in close ranks, to form a sort of anvil on which to break enemy formations
with the hammer of the heavy cavalry, spearheaded by a unit of cataphracts. As such, their
outriders and baggage trains found themselves hard pressed by these skirmishers.

While this had a deleterious effect on morale and logistics, it does not seem to have been
sufficient. Furthermore, many local cities and fortified villas defected early on, and were able to
supply the Roman army. Takfarinas had not been a popular ruler, favoring Mauri settlers and
magistrates over the existing Roman population to a degree which had left them resentful. His
army was also relatively small, and reinforcements from the mainland would take some time to
arrive. As such, he opted to fall back to mountainous Calabria, abandoning his duchy entirely.
Shortly thereafter, what forces he had raised among the local population deserted him entirely,
returning home to their families.

The doux there, Iugertes, opted to simply pull back and defend Rhegium. The two leaders and
their army were quickly besieged, and while Sergius had engineers and plenty of soldiers, the
siege dragged on through the hot summer months, and finally, the Mauri King,
[FONT=&quot]Izdarasen, had sent reinforcements and begun supplying the city from the sea.
The small fleet of the Isidorian Emperors was utterly insufficient to break this supply line, and
further, they found themselves inadequate to stop sporadic raids on their ports, most notably
Pisanus and Ostia, the latter of which would never recover from the sack. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]As one year stretched into the next, the siege wore on. Well-garrisoned Rhegium
resisted all of Sergius' attempts to capture it. Fortunately, Izdarasen was also frustrated with the
slow progress of his fleet. Taking to the field himself, he landed an army near Rome, threatening
to overrun what he believed was a poorly defended city and then march north and invest
Sergius' capital. His plan was fundamentally flawed. The Isidorian Emperors maintained a large
garrison, both ceremonial and functional, in the Eternal City. They had maintained its walls at
great expense, and Rome was more than capable of resisting the Mauri attempts at a siege.
[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Frustrated, Izdarasen opted for a new plan. He took his army south, believing he
could invest Sergius' forces in turn. However, as he marched down the coast of Calabria,
Sergius, being alerted to this new threat, abandoned his siege lines in the night and marched to
meet him. Izdarasen's army would be defeated quickly - he quickly revealed himself to have
little grasp of tactics, and Sergius displayed unquestionable brilliance. Of a Mauri army of
perhaps forty to fifty thousand, almost none would be able to escape - Mauri ships waiting
offshore were able to rescue a few hundred, but the bulk of the infantry, including Izdarasen,
attempted to flee only to find their avenues of escape cut off. Thousands drowned as they were
pushed slowly back into the sea by the advancing Isidorian army, while thousands more were
captured. Izdarasen's body was not recovered. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]While certain isolated groups of cavalry were able to escape the battlefield, they
had no way of communicating their position to the Mauri fleet and were ultimately run down and
captured in the end. The siege resumed three days later, and Mauri morale was low. As word of
the defeat spread through the ranks, a group of local Italian soldiers opened the gates to the
Roman army. Both of the dukes would ultimately be ransomed, but the common Mauri soldiers
were slaughtered, their heads left on spears outside the city walls. The city itself was only
spared a sack because of the locals who opened the gates. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]In spite of this victory, the campaign itself stalled. The new Mauri King,
Takfarinas, the brother of Izdarasen, had little desire to rule. He was an ascetic with gnostic
leanings, rail-thin and prone to outbursts of hysteria. While in his youth he had been considered
a pious and godly boy, an ideal heir to the throne, middle age had turned him into a fanatic who
spurred all worldly things, including the woman he had married,
[/FONT]Tagwerramt[FONT=&quot]. His brother's councilors were forced to manage affairs of
state, and while Tagwerramt assumed an active role in management, she was not as capable as
some of the ruling queens who had come before her. It seemed Italy was lost - but for a plan
devised by Azerwal, the Mauri chancellor. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Rather than accept their losses, Azerwal proposed simply continuing as before.
Raids on Roman ports would force Sergius to spread his army thin. The ongoing embargo for
Italian trade harmed Mauri merchants, but it harmed the Italian patrician families and their
recently acquired insatiable desire for eastern luxuries far more. Between 658 and 660, the
entire Italian peninsula was effectively blockaded - had already ground to a halt, but now, even
non-Mauri merchants were dissuaded from shipping to Italy, knowing their ships could be
attacked at any moment, even in port.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]While this trade was primarily in luxuries, slaves, and other things which were
only of interest to the elite, tax revenue in Isidorian Italy was largely derived from trade. The
great landholders of Italy paid relatively small taxes on their estates, because Isidorius, after his
original conquest, had desperately needed their support. Furthermore, the Goths had not taxed
heavily, and as such the Isidorians, to maintain the loyalty of their people were unable to do so
either. These port tariffs, raising the price of already exorbitantly priced goods, were one way to
quietly extract revenue from the elites without risking rebellion or discontentment among the
people whose estates dominated the agricultural economy of Italy. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]With state revenues collapsing, Sergius was forced to levy the first major tax
upon his nobles. This was met with widespread discontentment, even after his marriage to
Antonina, the daughter of the prominent landholding family. Even this was insufficient to raise
money - Sergius debased the currency and even sought donations to the war effort, the former
of which worked but would have long-term deleterious effects. However, in the meantime, the
Mauri, feeling pressure from the merchants to reopen the Italian markets, and realizing Italy was
lost, agreed to terms in early 661. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]While the war was relatively brief, the loss of an entire army, and consequently
most of the tribal nobility who rode with the King in times of war, was one of the worst
catastrophes that could have affected the Mauri civilization. While the loss of manpower could
be absorbed by a populous region such as North Africa, the death of the tribal nobility left a
vacuum in the political organization of the Mauri state, which depended upon them for the
administration of their territories and for the defense of their frontiers. While a strong King might
have been able to help the Mauri adapt to this blow, there was no such strong King available.
Instead, there was Takfarinas - childless, despised by the nobles, and considered a heretic by
the Church.[/FONT]

The global slave trade and the Sahu

From the earliest days of their expanding dominion, chattel slavery was among the primary
economic motivators of the Sahu. There was great wealth to be had in human cargo -
particularly as the turbulence that had wracked civilization in the near east faded. Those
warriors who came out of the collapse of the Romans and Eftal as holders of vast tracts of
agricultural land had two simple choices - make it into pastureland for their horses or find people
to work their newfound fields. The clever among these new landholders would choose a
measure of both. However, massive population decline had made finding native workers
difficult.
Fortunately, the Sahu, who had long traded in slaves, were able to meet this demand. The new
landholders of the middle east had often accumulated vast amounts of wealth in plunder, and
thus were able to purchase many slaves for their new estates. While the early Sahu slave trade
had been based upon a combination of existing markets and the constant raiding of the steppe,
this new demand required expansion. The Sahu monarchs, flush with wealth, began building
fortifications up the Dnieper and Don rivers, and making pacts with the various Slavic tribes of
the region, inciting them to raid each other and take prisoners which could be shipped downriver
to markets in Tangrabad and Apaxauda, and from there to estates across the broader Eftal
world.

This influx of wealth further centralized and solidified the Sahu Shahdom's dominion over the
steppes. Rival tribes to their east could be bought off, enlisted as mercenaries. In time, many of
the Sahu fortifications would themselves swell, becoming cities not merely based around the
economics of the boom in slavery, but trade cities for amber, fur, and timber with thriving
agricultural hinterlands to support them. Persians and Greeks fleeing the instability of the south
could make a new life for themselves.

In time, these colonists, largely isolated from their mother countries, would assimilate. The
Xasar-Sahu were numerous, and their form of Buddhism, acquired from Eftal missionaries, had
a particular appeal to the Iranian peoples who settled in their territories. Even the Greeks, with a
stronger identity and many of their countrymen living among the Sahu, have been found in
certain temples to have worshipped "the Bodhisattva Christ" - often conflating saints and deities
from the various traditions that inspired them. This unique synthesis of eastern and western
thought would come to profoundly influence the Iranian culture of the Xasar-Sahu. Their
language would become peppered with Greek, Persian, and Slavic loanwords, a synthesis of
the myriad cultures with which they had come into contact.

Consolidation and Frashokereti

In Iran, the feuding between the Khiash and Panjadh tribes finally ended in 662 with the defeat
of the Panjadh. However, unlike in many of the previous wars between tribes, rather than
displace the Panjadh clans, the Khiash ruler, Vasiskha, merely demanded their submission.
Once it was obtained, the Khiash were able to quickly defeat their neighbors, establishing a sort
of confederal Empire powerful enough that he could declare himself a Shah. By 665, the Khiash
ruled a heterogenious mixture of peoples. Their many subject tribes, be they Asvha, Turks, or
Eftal often had settled in such a way that claims frequently overlapped. This was one of the
main causes that had led to the continuous raiding and violence of the past few decades, but it
would have to be resolved if the Khiash hegemony was to survive. Because the Khiash lacked
any stable bureaucracy, Vasiskha spent much of his reign traveling to these disputed territories,
attempting to resolve the strife and maintain his authority.

It was a project met with mixed success, but when it failed, the Khiash were able to sternly
persecute the aggressor. The tribes generally feared losing everything more than they desired
additional land, and as such after the first few failed raids, warfare in central Iran, previously
endemic, fell to a managable level. However, despite Vasiskha's campaign of unification, he still
controlled only a small fraction of Persia. All around him were regional states not unlike his own.
In Syarzur, Shah Syavaragula ruled a similarly fragmented dominion. Elected by the various
monasteries and confederal tribes, he was a member of the prominent Hitivira tribe. Syarzur
was mountainous and well defended, meaning that he had little to worry about in the way of
raids, but like Vasiskha, he had little bureaucracy. Taxes were difficult to levy, despite having an
abundance of literate monks at his disposal. The collapse of the Eftal-Persian bureaucracy
made rule over Syarzur adhoc at the best of times. Tribute was levied but it could not be easily
verified that each tribe was paying their fair share, and in general it was in the best interest of all
tribes to keep it that way.

By contrast, in the north government beyond the level of disorderly confederation had endured.
Shah Ashot of Armenia, Shah Khalinga, and Shah Syavusha all maintained strong governments
and a relatively uninterrupted flow of trade. However, all had seen the relative chaos that had
afflicted the south during the period of war, and none of them desired to reignite that conflict or
see their own territories subjected to such devastation. Fortunately for Khalinga, he would not
have to. Syavusha was thrown from a horse he was trying to tame in 667, and broke his neck,
dying instantly. While he had a son, the child was three years of age and his fifteen year old
daughter's sole desire was to become a Buddhist nun. Khalinga rode north, offering to be regent
for the boy. Any objections Syavusha's companions might have had were overruled by the size
of Khalinga's army. The retainers had been divided, jockeying for power and angling to marry
the daughter. Only too late did they recognize the true threat to the south.

While there seems to have been a level of altruism involved - the daughter was sent to a
monastery as she requested and the child was cared for, Khalinga effectively usurped the state
from Syavusha's companions. Because Eftal laws did not recognize any inherent right of sons
to their father's Kingdom, the regency quickly became unnecessary as Khalinga managed be
recognized as co-ruler with a few well placed "gifts" and land grants. And further, the boy ever
did become a problem, Khalinga knew he would have at least another twelve years to decide
how handle the boy-Shah.

Ashot of Armenia, seeing the danger, rallied his own retainers. The Eftal-Armenian army
however, was defeated near Naxcavan once more by the famed Heron of Royan. The battle
was swift but decisive, with the Khalinga himself leading a feigned retreat into an ambush in a
narrow mountain pass. Ashot himself was killed, and the Armenian kingdom collapsed. In its
wake, Khalinga brought many of its provinces into his orbit as satrapies under the local nobility,
promising them freedom of religion, protection, and almost total autonomy in exchange for
tribute. The north, which was primarily populated by Alans, fell under the rule of the Turko-Sahu
mercenary Balgatsin Khan, an exile from the Sahu Shahdom.

Unlike the north, where relative order prevailed, the Persian Gulf was in ruins. Shativash's rule
in Pars was far more absolute than that of most of his northern neighbors, but his attempts to
rule southern Mesopotamia were stymied by the Mahadevists and the Christians. A believer in
the traditional Iranian pagan religion when he first arrived in Pars, like many of the Eftal nobility
his worldview was heavily influenced by Indian philosophy and the tolerance of the steppe. As
such, he would never understand what was happening among his subjects.
Shativash was a warlord, and a successful won. He did not understand the despair and
millennialism among the diminished Zoroastrian population of Pars - a population which was
composed of peasants fleeing the devastation of the their homelands, and seeking safe haven
in the fortified, if ruined cities along the coast and in the mountains. Having seen their
homelands overrun by the Eftal, and the conversion of many to Buddhism, Hinduism,
Mahadevism, and Christianity, the remaining Zoroastrians were largely either of the priestly,
peasant, or menial classes. Their religion had changed greatly as well. With the decline of the
various charismatic movements that characterized the late Sasanian era and their replacement
with foreign faiths, the Zoroastrian believers had lost hope. Zoroastrians, particularly the
peasants, began believing like their Christian counterparts, that they were living in the end of
times. Indeed, due to the proximity of the two congregations, it is possible that rather than
developing organically in both religions, it was instead an idea transmitted from one to the other.

Several local peasant movements developed, aimed at putting some rebel leader into a position
of power so that he could bring about the final renovation of the world, these movements were
born out of desperation and small. The Turko-Eftal warlords who ruled Pars easily crushed
them, dealing out grisly punishments to captured rebels.

It was not these movements that would lead to the most famous "Saosyant" - rather it was
among the Mahadevists that such a figure would rise to prominence. Narsai of Argin had never
been one for apocalyptic predictions. His faith had been focused on the here and now, on
growing the congregation. However, with his death, the rudderless movement had given in to
the same apocalypticism that gripped their Christian and Zoroastrian neighbors. The various
atrocities committed by the Mahadevists were done with a panicked knowledge that the end
times were coming, that soon they would be reunited with the God of Truth. Even if they died,
their rebirth would be into the World of Light, and they would become one with the Creator,
Mahadeva-Ahuramazda.

Their chosen messiah was a charismatic twenty-three year old Eftal noble named Husrava from
Sogdia. "Located" by a disciple of Narsai's, he claimed to have been born to a virgin from the
very seed of Zoroaster (obviously, Zoroaster was actually the first Mahadevist, whose teachings
have been corrupted over time) himself. While the traditional, urban, priesthood refused to
believe his wild claims, the peasantry, even many Zoroastrians, erupted in celebration. Large
crowds, many of them armed, gathered to hear this noble preach, and the priesthood was
forced to fall into line, granting him legitimacy.

After the priesthood was usurped, Husrava effectively controlled the Mahadevists. There was no
other real authority left in southern Mesopotamia, none at least that could resist him. Husrava,
unlike the disorganized Persian rebels of previous rebellions was an aristocrat, with knowledge
of military strategy and organization. As a young man he had fought in the armies of various
tribal warlords, and he immediately set about organizing military units, hiring Arab mercenaries
to train his "Immortal Chosen". Thousands flocked to Vahman-Ardashir to serve. The renovation
of the world was coming. Soon the world entire would be reborn as they had been. The cycle of
birth and death would end, and perfect truth and justice would be brought to the world.

A lot of other people would have to die first.

Crowned in kingly radiance, Husrava rode east. Shativash treated this at first as merely another
rebellion; a view encouraged by several simultaneous rebellions within his own territory. These
were dealt with - with customary viciousness. At the battle of Rustak (670), however, he realized
his error. He faced an orderly army. They had cavalry and organized units, but also a fanatical
devotion to their holy bringer of truth, the breaker of the wheel of fate.

Many of Shativash's soldiers, realizing the extent to which they were unprepared for this battle,
deserted. Knowing that the main body of the enemy army was still peasants and still lightly
equipped, Shativash decided to charge them directly, believing his heavily-armored retainers
would punch clean through. He could see the Royal Standard of Husrava, together with icons of
the Great God in meditation, in the distance. If he could make it to those banners, pull them
down... the army might well lose heart. It had worked before, on other battlefields. It could work
here.

Shativash was captured, killed, and his body left for the vultures. His retainers died in great
numbers before they could break free of the mob that enveloped them, and even more were
captured by Husrava's Arab and Eftal cavalrymen.

[I hope this might be semi-plausible as a Mahadevist movement. Their wacky mixture of

Zoroastrianism with Shiva is difficult for me to portray convincingly. I'm thinking this will be yet
another deathblow to Zoroastrianism as a religion - while obviously it will endure in many, many
places, as a majority religion I think this might as well be it. Especially as they increasingly
embrace this guy as the savior and then he inevitably doesn't actually cause the end times. It
doesn't help that the Slavic slaves being brought in by a lot of landholders are probably going to
not choose a religion tied to ethnicity like Zoroastrianism, but rather more likely the religion of
their masters.

Up next: Afghanistan, Central Asia, Anatolia, Mosil]

Turkic migrations
and the new face of the steppe

On the Turkic Steppe, tribes such as the Basmyl and the Kimeks were moving increasingly
westwards. Hard pressed by the growing power of the Uighurs, who were more numerous than
most of their rivals, and were able to exploit that fact to drive out their opponents, particularly the
old supporters out the Ashina. Further, the Chinese Qi dynasty, seeking a power which could
secure their relatively poorly defended northern border, aligned themselves with the Uighurs,
who they saw as the likely victor in the latest round of tribal squabbles.
Placating the Uighurs with gifts and an Imperial marriage, they played a significant role in
solidifying the predominance of the Uighur Khanate. Uighur delegations were taken south, to the
Imperial capital, where they could be overawed with finery, gifts, and impressive displays of
martial prowess. Diplomacy, the young Emperor's councilors argued, was cheaper than raising
tens of thousands of fresh soldiers and attempting to control the wide open steppe with brute
force. It seems, for a time at least, that the Emperor's policies worked. The Uighurs sought to
imitate the Chinese in many respects, in 670 laying the groundwork for a centralized capital city
in imitation of Chang'an - in truth more for show than anything else, but it was a potent symbol
nonetheless.

It may have been cheaper for the Empire, but it posed threats for many others.

The Kyrgyz, under the leadership of the famed warrior Tonyuquq, formed a coalition with the
Kitai and the Tatabi to prevent the Uighur Khagan from rising to power, and while it seemed that
this would ensure the defeat of the Uighurs, both the Kitai and the Tatabi were persuaded to
betray the Kyrgyz. At Tonyuquq's war council he was struck down by the two embassies from
his supposed allies. While these ambassadors were captured and tortured to death, the Kyrgyz
without Tonyuquq's leadership preferred submission to a war they could not win.

Many other tribes chosen to flee westward. Tribes such as the Kimek and the Qarluq would
settle within the boundries of the old Eftal Empire - a risky proposition, requiring a combination
of strength and a willingness to work with the still numerous Eftal, with whom they fiercely
competed for land. Those of military age among these tribes in particular could find lucrative
employment and a chance to gain land, wealth, and status - something which drew Turks from
across the steppe. Other tribes including the Qangli and Basmyl, would settle around the Aral
Sea, preferring the security of the steppe to the lure of still wealthy Eftal Persia. Another Turkic
tribe, the Turgish, would settle in the northern Volga, becoming in time a trading partner of the
Sahu.

These tribes, by and large, subscribed to the traditional Turkic religion, venerating Tengri and an
assortment of other gods. Buddhist ideas had their place for the more philosophically inclined
but these new tribes, unlike the Gokturks were less Sinicized and without the Gokturks the
traditional religion had made a resurgence.

While many Turks would work for the Sahu, often assimilating and settling down to varying
extents, the Khirichan Turks were one exception. From 665 onwards, they would pressure the
Sahu, defeating the Shah in open battle and, between 668 and 673, extracting a heavy tribute
which would only be reversed by a Sahu victory. Challenged by a large, unified tribe for the first
time in ages, the Sahu found that settling down carried with it remarkable disadvantages. They
had fewer cavalry to call upon, and their traditional tribal loyalties had atrophied. There was little
profit in fighting the Khirichan compared to the Slavs. Many advisors in the court of the Shah
advised that continuing to provide a minor tribute to the Khirichan might work as an indefinite
strategy - perhaps they could be turned into allies, a buffer against even more warlike nations to
the east.
However, the Khirichan Khagan was simply content to bide his time, take the tribute and wait.
The question of being a buffer was to him a laughable notion.

Tibetan Empire

While disorder reigned on the steppe, the Tibetan, or Bod Empire had not been idle. Brystan
Tsenpo, the newest Emperor had reformed the administrative system. Previously independent
chieftains were brought into a centralized government ruled from Rhasu, where they were
required to foster their children and swear elaborate oaths of fealty. Thus were the various local
chieftains Brystan's grandfather Tri Nyentsen had conquered brought into the Empire and given
a direct stake in its success. Khotanese monks, pious and dignified, were brought to the capital
to educate the fostered children. While there were some objections, it became clear to most of
the local leaders early on that cooperation had greater potential rewards than the alternative,
which was dealt with harshly and without compromise.

With each oath of fealty, every local clan and its territory effectively became responsible for
maintaining one of perhaps sixty local military units, under the auspices of the central military. In
practice, these units often became cosmopolitan in origins, as soldiers from other clans, the
royal army, or mercenaries were hired to fill gaps caused by casualties, desertions, and the like.

Using the oasis city of Khotan as a staging ground for their military, the Bod Empire was able to
expand their power into the Tarim basin, taking advantage of the collapse of the Gokturks.
Hami, Turfan, Karasahr Kashgar - the cities along the silk road either desired the protection of
the Tibetans or were made to desire it with raiding. This orientation towards the north brought
great wealth to Emperor Brystan Tsenpo, but it angered the Sogdian Shah, Zhishifan and led to
numerous border clashes, most notably the battle of Balasagun (668), where the Zhishifan met
the Tibetan commander Namrisrong in six days of battle. Despite an excellent performance by
the Ferghanan cavalry, the Tibetans held their own, leading to a grudging respect between the
two men, and ultimately their nations. The Tibetans became deeply interested in acquiring
Ferghanian horses, and the Sogdians conceded Tibetan hegemony over the southern part of
the Tarim basin (with the exception of Kashgar) and much of the north.

The Tibetan Empire's sudden emergence into regional politics frightened Qi strategists, who had
long assumed that a few border forts were sufficient and that Imperial policy in Tibet could be
one of fundamental disinterest - the Tibetans posed neither threat nor opportunity to the Middle
Kingdom. However, the Tibetan conquest of Tarim (away from the feeble, independent
kingdoms who had sprung up in the wake of the Goktruks) proved quickly that the Bod Empire
was a serious threat.

After a Tibetan military incursion in 671, Emperor Yang ordered another twenty thousand
soldiers deployed to garrison the major fortresses and cities of the An-hsi Frontier Protectorate.
The effectiveness of these soldiers has been brought into question, however. The Governor-
General of An-hsi was reported as frequently complaining about their lack of discipline and
training, and the poor quality of their equipment. It would seem that the Qi still regarded other
frontiers as more critical, and their deployments represented either merely an attempt to
increase the paper strength of the garrisons or the state of Qi military training. Atrophy certainly
had been allowed to atrophy under Emperor Yang's predecessors so as to prevent a recurrence
of the circumstances which led to the founder of the dynasty, Emperor Wen, taking power - the
question must be to what extent. Certainly subsequent decades would reflect poorly on the
Chinese army, but if this was a concerted policy is unclear.

Consolidation in Anatolia and Conquest in Palestine

In 663, the death of Akhsaman the Elder led to the fracture of his territory. A small but wealthy
and populous region of southern Syria around Emesa and Apamea broke off under his cousin,
Akhsaman the Younger. From Osrhoene, the satrap Toramana, a vassal of Akhsaman's,
asserted hegemony over the remainder of northern Syria. Only the city of Laodike resisted. In
Laodike the local governor, a Christian Eftal influenced by Procopian beliefs believed that the
world would end within three months due to a series of calculations made by the monk Gabriel
of Edessa. Defending the city with a militia composed of "believers" he was only defeated after
three months passed without any sign of apocalypse, after which point most of his partisans
attempted to blend back into the general population, leaving both the governor and Gabriel of
Edessa to be executed by Toramana.

The Anatolian territories of Akhsaman's kingdom supported Disiapata who opted not to contest
Toramana's claim to Syria, despite the support of the Bulgars and many of Akhsaman's
retainers. Both powers were roughly evenly matched, and neither wanted to effectively double
their territory and expose themselves to attacks from all angles. Disiapata would move the Eftal
throne to Ikonion, where it would remain. The "Rhom Shah" as he was called would preside
over a period of stability and consolidation. The Slavs and Bulgars in the west were brought to
heel, enticed to settle down with land grants which allowed their nobility to establish large
estates, often at the expense of some of the few remaining Roman landowners.

In the north, after the death in 653 of the Alan Khan Celbir, his half-Greek son Chodainos took
the throne of the Khanate. A Nicene Christian, the Greek historians regard him favorably, as a
wise and pious man. While he did not actively persecute the pagan population of the Khanate,
which may well have been a majority, he did favor his fellow Christians for advancement. Unlike
his father, a traditionalist, he established a permanent capital for himself in Ankyra, paying for
Greek architects to construct a fortified central palace, and also to construct a beautiful basilica
opposite it, the Church of the Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia) which would become famous for its
striking blue dome and brilliantly illuminated interior.

Unlike the Alans, the Eftal of Anatolia felt less pressure to convert to Christianity. While they
were the hated target of several Procopian rebellions, they were generally adherents to the
dharmic religions to various degrees, products of the missionary efforts of Shah Shahriyar.
Despite being few in number and increasingly Romanized over time, they retained their original
religious beliefs, much to the consternation of the displaced and increasingly fanatical peasants
who made up the Procopian movement. Their preachers frequently portrayed Shah Disiapata as
an Antichrist.

Even the lingering source of instability that had been Birhar's Shahdom had been replaced with
the measured and pragmatic rule of his second-in-command Kormisosh, who took power in 658.
The ongoing low-level insurrection of Bithynia was dealt with in time with a combination of
bribes to officials sheltering the rebels and brutal reprisals every time the rebels struck.
Kormisosh, unlike Birhar, understood to some degree how to maintain a kingdom as well as
gain it. He allowed a Patriarch to be named and to hold services in Constantinople's largest
church, Megale Ekklesia. It was something of a hollow gesture - the Megale Ekklesia was a
burnt out husk, and without the funds to repair it, services were instead held in a smaller church
near the Blachernae district. The Patriarch had little prestige - his actions were mediated by
handlers appointed by Kormisosh and the church in which he gave services was small and in
the middle of Constantinople - an enormous ruin with a population of perhaps ten thousand,
perhaps a third of whom were Sahu merchants living around the Prosphorion harbor.

Kormisosh faced many foreign threats. The Alans occasionally raided into Bithynia and he
lacked the manpower to retaliate in force. Kniaz Casamir in Thracia made rumblings about
recovering Constantinople from the unbelievers, but perhaps afraid of meeting a fate like the
Bulgar Khagan, he did not strike. As such, he extended overtures to Shah Disiapata, who
offered to protect him in exchange for tribute and the rights to place a small garrison in
Constantinople and base the Rhom Shahdom's growing fleet out of the Harbor of Theodosius.
After some haggling, which saw Kormisosh gain the city of Kyzikos from the Bulgars, his terms
were accepted.

To the south, Palestine was ruled from Caesarea by a nephew of Avyaman (653-661),
Datuvahya (661-667). Unlike Heshana's kingdom, Palestine had been intentionally designed as
a sort of rump satrapy by the Eftal. Lacking the Syrian provinces from which they might recruit
loyal soldiers, the small number of Eftal who ruled were forced to strike compromises. Both
Avyaman and Datuvahya would both marry into the Arab tribal elite, and the latter would
nominally convert to Christianity, although his lack of sincerity and his general tolerance would
render this conversion meaningless in the eyes of the local clergy.

While money from Christian pilgrimage provided one major source of revenue, Datuvahya was
incapable of managing the 'satrapy' he inherited. Caught between competing factions - the local
churches, the Jews, and the Arabs, he floundered more often than not, granting sweeping
concessions to each in turn, angering all of them. Unlike Avyaman, who had adeptly played the
various religious factions against each other and reveled in their willingness to tear each other
apart rather than focus their animosity at his throne, Datuvahya merely stumbled from weakness
to weakness, and attracted the sinister attention of Emesa.

From what was now effectively his throne in the golden city of the sun, Akhsaman the Younger
opened communication with King Heshana of Egypt in 666. Datuvahya was weak, and his
kingdom could be easily partitioned with little risk. Heshana tentatively agreed, lending his fleet
and some thirty thousand troops, ten thousand of which would be deployed to capture Cyprus,
which had already been slipping from Datuvahya's grip.

Datuvahya marched south to face Heshana near the ruined town of Raphia, wholly abandoned
since Syavush's conquest of Egypt. His army was composed primarily of Arab mercenaries, and
several of his coastal cities, including the fortress-city of Gaza, had lowered their banners,
massacred their foreign garrisons and accepted Egyptian rule in his wake. The two men met
face-to-face, and Datuvahya threw himself on Heshana's mercy, appealing to their shared
religion. He would agree to sweeping terms that would have left him with a rump Satrapy under
Heshana's sovereignty, and Heshana agreed. The two men marched north on a tour of
Palestine which ended in Scythopolis, which marked the new northern boundary of Heshanid
territory.

Akhsaman the Younger arrived himself after a lengthy siege of Damascus. The two armies
celebrated together and the two Shahs met in private and after a conference, Datuvahya was
brought back to his capital of Caesarea and publicly executed to much rejoicing from the mob.

[Next post will cover the Slavs and also we'll get back to Iran to see how the Saosyant is doing.]

The bringer of truth

The earthly incarnation/representative of Shiva-Ahuramazda is said to have been the bearer of

khwarenah from the moment of his birth. Indeed it could be no other way. However, he still
needed to be crowned, a ceremony which took place in the damaged but still-impressive Eftal
capital of Susa. Crowned Shahanshah of Iran, he took a sacred vow to restore first the country
of Iran, overrun by unbelievers and false prophets, and secondly the world entire, which he
would rule as universal sovereign and bringer of truth.

It was a tall order, to say the least. Husrava had defeated Shativash and at least nominally
united the Mahadevist community behind him, and gained no small number of converts from the
Zoroastrians of Pars. His armies were swelling wildly - but they were untrained and untested,
and as they sprawled west across Pars and even further they would encounter Turkic and Eftal
warbands who they could not easily fight. Shah Vinayaditya of Kerman faced the initial brunt of
this spread eastward. The last of the Kidarite Shahs, his people had declined significantly in the
hundred years since the loss of their independence. A thoroughly Indianized people, they were a
mix of Hindus and Buddhists who spoke a language with many Sanskrit loanwords.

The leader of the disorganized mob of peasants which trekked into Kerman was one Farrokh,
an insurgent against Shativash who was able to rally a large army to his cause. However, while
he was excellent at leading chants and motivating men to follow him, he lacked tactical
knowledge. After the peasant army captured the city of Daravkirt, they stalled, forming an
enormous camp outside the city's walls. There was no easy way to feed the entire mob - it had
swollen beyond the wildest expectations of any. When Farrokh ordered that the granaries of the
city be opened to the benefit of his mob, the people inside, even those who were previously
amenable to the cause of the Saosyant, rebelled. The gates were closed, and Farrokh was
captured inside the city with a small force of his men, while the bulk languished outside the
walls, lacking any equipment to attack the city with. They pounded on the closed gates while the
defenders hurled rocks and fired arrows down at the disorderly assault.

However, this was insufficient to disperse the mob. It was only when the Shah himself arrived
with a force of Kidarite cavalry and assaulted the peasant camp that the disastrous siege of
Daravkirt became a massacre. The Shah would later claim that over a hundred thousand had
died in that battle. While the claim of a hundred thousand men has been met with skepticism by
later historians, it certainly conveys a massive defeat and the superiority of the mounted elite
against even a huge host of peasants.

The competent core of the Saosyant's army was rather smaller, and much better trained, and he
chose to strike his first blow against the rising warlord Vasiskha Khiash in 671. Vasiskha, much
like Shativash, deeply underestimated the forces arrayed against him, the "Green Banners" as
they were coming to be known. At the battle of Goyman, Vasiskha's clan, the Khiash, were
nearly annihilated. His confederation broke down almost immediately. Many fled east, seeking
the protection of the Gorkhanids or the various Turkic warlords. The Panjadh, meanwhile, joined
the Syarzur confederation under Syavaragula Hitivira.

The Nestorian Christians were old enemies of the Mahadevists, and Shah Khauwashta Taoma
of Mosil was no exception. Furthermore, he held the Sasanian capital of Tesifon, which Husrava
felt the need to liberate for political reasons. Unlike the mountainous uplands of Syarzur,
campaigning along Mesopotamia would prove to be relatively easy. Marching north along the
Tigris, his army seemed just as unstoppable as in its battle against Shativash. Cities were taken.
Dastkart, Sumra, Tagrit. At a massive battle near Huniyag-Sabhur, Shah Khauwashta Taoma
was captured, and, when brought to the walls of Mosil, he supposedly recanted his faith (quite
probably under torture, or otherwise an apocryphal tale) and pleaded with the inhabitants of the
city, including his own nephew, Akhshunwar Quba, to open the gates and be spared.

Akhshunwar Quba refused out of hand. God and Christ and the strength of the Eftal would
protect them. Mosil was well fortified, a legacy of Tistrya's extensive defensive projects. The
refugees fleeing the Shahanshah's armies had been directed north, towards Nasibin - Mosil still
had ample grain and full cisterns. For the better part of a year, Husrava would besiege Mosil
while his army melted away. The bringer of truth besieging a single city seemed far less
inspiring than the legends claimed it would be. Without easy victories and fresh plunder, the
army was whittled down to its hardened core.

But that was what Husrava planned. He addressed his now small army, hardened by the rigors
of campaigning and tested in battle.

"I never promised you it would be easy. I never promised you that those who walked beside me
on the path of truth would not be beset on all sides by the agents of darkness. I never promised
you glory or riches, nor even tears for the dying. I promised you life beyond this. I promised you
paradise. I promised you victory!

"Though it all you have remained by my side. And the God, while I meditated last night has
shown me a vision. If we assault the Gate of the false St. Elijah at dawn tomorrow, and we fight
with all our strength, we will win the city."

Or so those his partisans claimed the speech went, after the next day's assault on the Gate of
St. Elijah was a success. Mosil was subjected to a five day sack. The self-proclaimed Shah of
Shahs seemed unstoppable. His armies routinely scored incredible victories, and where once
the Mahadevists were an isolated and persecuted sect, now they were perhaps the greatest
power on the Iranian plateau. The legend of Husrava was spreading like wildfire. For the
conquered Christians of Mesopotamia, the Antichrist had a name.

With an unending series of victories under his belt, Husrava marched into Syarzur (OTL
Shahrizor) with utter confidence. The Great God had brought them victory after victory without
fail. Everywhere his ranks swelled as Zoroastrians and Mahadevists alike joined forces to drive
out the unbelievers. And there were few places the unbelievers were more numerous than
Syarzur, a region dominated by Buddhist monasteries and Eftal mystics. As he marched into the
lands of the Confederation, the monasteries hired mercenaries and in many cases the monks
themselves took up arms. While many monasteries would be overrun and burnt, many more
would survive, isolated and well defended, often difficult to reach.

In the mountainous uplands, the Green Banner armies of the Saosyant were repeatedly
harassed and ambushed. By the end of 674, the Saosyant's forces retreated, humiliated for the
first time. However, they would return with reinforcements the next year, and unlike before they
would not be turned aside. The various tribes of the Confederation one by one were driven off
their grounds, broken and made to pledge their fealty to the Shiva-Ahuramazda and his earthly
representative, Shahanshah Husrava. The fate of the great monasteries of Syarzur depended
on who captured them. Isolated bands of fanatics tended to burn and loot the monasteries, but
those taken by Husrava or Green Banner troops were simply made to pay tribute and allowed to
endure - a similar fate to the Christian monasteries in Mesopotamia after the initial massacres
subsided.

Between 669 and 675, the Mahadevists captured almost the entirety of the core of the Sasanian
regime. Husrava's Shahdom was in theory the ultimate Zoroastrian theocracy, run according to
the teachings of the various Prophets, Zoroaster, Arash, and Narsai. It was the harbinger of the
end of the world, and as such had to prepare its people for the coming apocalypse, by
instructing them in the way to salvation. In practice, however, it was very disorganized. Local
religious leaders had almost absolute power unless another, more charismatic or more
important religious leader came along. The old Persian bureaucracy lay in shambles, and
Husrava's attempts to restore it were insufficient. Taxation was sporadic and it was uncertain to
whom taxes were supposed to go. The movement ruled over countless tribes and regions, most
of whom were not Mahadevist, let alone Zoroastrian. In the east, their subjects were often
Buddhist or Hindu (following either a Bhakti or Eftal/Sogdian creed philosophy) while in the west
their subjects were primarily Christians. While much of the Iranian peasantry was Zoroastrian
still, there was little doctrinal uniformity, owing to Eftal tolerance and patronage of Buddhism
over the indigenous Iranian faith.

As such, the Mahadevist experiment stalled. The lightening conquests that had defined its early
expansion came to a halt. Husrava returned to Tesifon and attempted to establish some degree
of governance, struggling to unify his followers, and reconcile their often conflicting notions of
the Saosyant and the coming apocalypse. It was an impossible challenge, but it had to be done.

[I'd finished this part, and it had grown long so I figured I'd post it. I've got an unfinished
segment about Western Europe coming soon, and a map in the works detailing all the myriad
changes to this part of the world.

To answer your question, Bmao, yeah it's totally plausible. Indeed, its likely. Especially as the
Mauri decline they'll probably expand into the Western Mediterranean as well.]

Map. Map? Map!

You can really visualize the meteoric rise of Husrava (the Eftal version of Khosrau) and the
extent to which the whole of the east has become incredibly fractured. It'll get even worse if I
start to record individual Greek city-states in Asia Minor that have autonomy.

Also this map is helpful for showing just how surrounded the Mahadevists are really. They're
inherently enemies with just about all their neighbors and a majority of their own population
doesn't agree with their creed.
 The foundations of
a "Slavic Century"

It took roughly five years after the ascension of Knaiz Czimislav to his father's position for the
empire Darvan had built to collapse. Lacking the intimate connections to the nobility which
Radem had developed, Czimislav lacked his father's personal charm, being stadoffish,
sarcastic, and accustomed to power. As such, despite his being acknowledged as the leader of
the "Dravanid" Empire, Czimislav only had the loyalty of the Veleti, his own tribe. In 668, at the
Council of Radagast, he was formally stripped of his power by a vote, and the various tribes
went their own ways.
While this might have had disastrous effects for Slavic influence in central Europe, it did not.
Their neighbors were still distracted - the Avars were weak and struggled to contend even with
the numerous peoples settling along the Morava river and the Slovaks, both of which raided the
northern borders of the Avars at a time when the Khagan could ill afford the additional pressure.
Slavic power and influence was on the rise. As early as the 690's, the Vistulans to their north
were building ring-shaped hill-forts, establishing a permanent dominion over their territory. Some
have theorized that the aggression of their expansion and consolidation is what forced the
Slovaks to strike south into Avar territory.
The westernmost of the Slavic tribes, the Obodorites and the Sorbs, were able to maintain
relatively consistent pressure on the various Germanic tribes adjacent to them. Indeed, the
Obdorites even took to the sea, with small-scale expeditions ranging as far as Jutland. Known
as the "Saal Burnings" these events, despite consisting of raiding parties of no more than a
hundred men attacking local mead halls for slaves and what limited plunder they could drag off,
would have a profound impact on the culture of the southernmost of the early Norse peoples - or
at least plant the apocryphal seeds for a rivalry which would last for centuries. The Sorbs
meanwhile attacked the Barvarii with great frequency, under the leadership of one Prince
Godzomir. As his own prestige increased, Godzomir by the 690's was able to subdue the
Moravians and the now weakened Veleti, bringing them among other, lesser tribes, under his
newly established Sorb Empire.

To celebrate his newly established power, he added the name "Darvan" to his own as a sort of
regal title. In doing so, he implied a connection to the previous regime, hoping to win over at
least the Veleti with this gesture of deference.

In the Balkans, the stage was set for a similar period of unification. The Avar Hegemony had
been in a state of decline since their defeat by Sergius in 657. Apart from an unsuccessful
campaign against the Xasar-Sahu in 665, the Avars would remain largely at peace and with
their extensive tributary system intact, but nevertheless, successive Slavic princes had asserted
greater and greater levels of autonomy. By 670, Khagan Anakuye faced what was effectively a
confederation of Slavic princes to his south. Individually these four petty kingdoms were little
threat, but together, unified by shared religion and tired of exorbitant tribute to the Avars who
provided essentially no protection, they began seeking alternatives.

It was Prince Casamir II of Thrace who led the push. Like his father, Casamir was an ambitious
man and also a pious one. Fortunately, he lived in a time when his piety and his ambition
conveniently intersected. He and his fellow Kings, including the Khan Isaac of the Utigurs,
another recent convert, approached the Khagan of the Avars in 673, seeking a negotiated
solution. Their terms were simply a recognition of the current political situation - a reduction of
tribute to mere token levels, the return of select hostages from the Avar court, and in return
peace could be maintained. However, the Khagan took the entire party into custody, accusing
them of treason.

They were given a summary trial and each one of them was beheaded. The "Martyrdom of
Princes" as it came to be known, incensed the Christian population of the Balkans. Khagan
Anakuye had made a grave miscalculation indeed, and he would pay for it. He ordered his
vassals to elect new Princes, and, so long as there was no implicit threat of rebellion, the Kings
and their hostages would be treated with respect and dignity.

While new Princes were certainly elected, such as Theodosius of Thrace, Vladimir of
Thessaloniki, and Presian of Epirus, these new rulers would waste little time in declaring war on
the Avars. Vladimir of Thessaloniki struck south, dispatching the Kingdom of Attica (which
remained loyal to the Avars, seeking to gain territory) at the Battle of Thermopylae (675) and
then marching north to meet his fellow Princes. The Slavic armies linked up and marched
towards Sirmium, the Avar capital. The three armies, unified under the de facto command of
Theodosius, resembled the late Roman armies they had overcome. Equipped in much the same
style, but with a stronger cavalry arm and generally lighter infantry, this disciplined army was a
far cry from the Slavic warbands that had crossed Danube a century and a half ago.
The Siege of Sirmium in 675 would represent an early setback. The Avar city was defended too
well, and as Avar vassals rallied around their Khagan and the Khagan himself returned from
defeating the Utigur Khan Yoanes, Theodosius' army beat a hasty retreat south towards the
coast. Chased by the Avars, they turned and gave battle at Ulpiana, where they would score a
decisive, but costly victory.

While peace would not be signed until 677, the Avars were beaten badly. The terms were not
humiliating, but the loss of even a single Avar noble hurt a society whose elite was only a tiny
fraction of a much larger population. Henceforth the Avars would be almost entirely on the
defensive, reacting to new threats but not adapting.

The Italian Job

Emperor Sergius benefitted extraordinarily from the dynastic struggles and weakness of the
Mauri regime. As centralized authority diminished, the Mauri merchants lost their ability to
maintain their stranglehold on the Mediterranean. And while Sergius did not desire another
direct confrontation with the Mauri, he could pick away at their overseas trading posts. The city
of Marsalia [OTL Marseille] remained an important center of trade, with a thriving Mauri quarter.
Unlike so many other great cities, it had survived the collapse of the Roman Empire largely
intact, maintaining relative autonomy from the Frankish Kings, elegant bathhouses and a
thriving intellectual tradition.

Eyeing this wealth with envy, the Franco-Burgunidan King Goscelin of Burgundy, the city's
nominal sovereign dispatched a governor to replace the locally-elected magistrate of the city.
While Marsalia grudgingly accepted this, they secretly appealed to Sergius for liberation.
Sergius responded, mobilizing his famous, experienced legions and marching south into
Burgundy, "liberating" the cities along the southern coast. The people of Marsalia rose up and
executed the governor, Lothar the Fat in 664. King Goscelin raised an army of his noble
retainers and their associated levies and marched south. At the battle of Arles, the Burgundian
shield walls found themselves outmaneuvered by the more flexible Italian army and defeated.
Goscelin made peace - Sergius, worried of overstretching himself, did not press further up the
Rhone.

Marsalia was quickly assimilated into Sergius' Empire, as was all of Provence. A new Rector of
Province was appointed by Sergius, named Crescentius. Crescentius' first mandate was to
enact a reign of terror against the Mauri merchants, confiscating their stores and ships and
redistributing them to Gallo-Roman merchants favored by the state. These acts of aggression
were strongly protested by the Mauri King, but there was little that could be done.
On his return to Florentia, Sergius awarded himself a magnificent triumph. But the exaltation of
victory was not long to last. A group of his nobles sought to assassinate him and replace him
with his infant son, Valerian Constantine, whom they hoped to mold into a more pliant leader.
Their grievances were long - they felt that the Emperor had too much influence over the papacy,
which was traditionally theirs to control - they felt that the Emperor was willing to exhaust the
treasury and bankrupt them in the process, and perhaps most importantly, they felt unimportant
to the running of the regime.

The assassin was captured by the Emperor's elite bodyguards, the Xasari Guard, and reprisals
were swift. The Romano-Italian patricians, with their sprawling estates and powerful mercenary
bodyguards, were not to be trifled with. Much of rural Italy worked and lived and died on their
enormous estates, expanded by the conquests of Sergius and the expulsion of the Goths and
Slavs. However, they were also utterly incidental to the running of Sergius' army. At its core,
Sergius' military was a professional one. While patrician nobles had the potential to rise to
towering heights as officers, these men were rarely those who joined in the rebellion. Unable to
be assured that they could mutiny as one cohesive force, most officers toed the line and
followed their orders.

The Italian nobility, meanwhile, was scattered across Italy, unable to defend themselves. Like
dominoes they were beaten or made to flee one by one. The terms of their surrender involved
the confiscation of their large estates, which were broken down and divided among the upper
echelons of Sergius' officer corps. By 670, the power of the great landholders was broken for
good.

The Mahadevist Dilemma

Husrava's regime was based in apocalyptic desperation and fanaticism. His attempts to rebuild
Susa and restore the bureaucracy were mired in uncertainty. It had been too long since the Eftal
Empire - there was nothing left to build off of but dusty sallow records of better times. As
Shahanshah, Husrava's options were few. The main repositories of education and knowledge
that remained to him were Nestorian Christian and Sogdian-school Mahayana Buddhist
monasteries, both of which were untenable choices for a religiously mandated ruler. The
Zoroastrian priestly class, while educated, was unaccustomed to such administrative work and
lacked adequate records or survey skills - skills which the monks of Syarzur had been
developing during their brief period of political power.

As such, Husrava opted to do the one thing he could - sending messengers to local leaders, he
demanded that tribute be brought to him on a yearly basis. Using old Eftal records scrounged
from the ruins of Susa he attempted to determine reasonable figures and appointed legates to
go forth and bring back what they could. It was a crude system, but it was a beginning. For the
first time, loyalties were tested and proven. There were very few attempts among the
Mahadevist leaders of his movement to cheat their holy savior of his taxes. In general, their
shortfalls were due to massively reduced production and wealth in the conquered areas, rather
than betrayal. However, the Christians in particular realized quite quickly that they could exploit
this feeble tax policy. No region was more ruined than Arbayestan and Mesopotamia. It followed
then that there would be the greatest disparity between actual and expected income there, to
the point that Eftal records were useless. As such, the Christians often cheerfully turned over
paltry sums, overstating the devastation of Mesopotamia. Their Mahadevist overlords, few on
the ground, rarely had the manpower to audit these claims, and were forced to return near
empty-handed.

The Shahanshah did not claim to be a god, merely a human harbinger of the end of times.
However, it was critical for his image that he maintain some level of health and kingly image. As
such, he increasingly sequestered himself in his palace, beginning to refine his role, which
became more ceremonial as he attempted to hide any failings or frailty from his subordinates. In
the early days of his ascension it had not mattered - his reputation and unstoppable momentum
had sufficed. Now he relied more and more on ceremony and Persian conceptions of monarchy
to divert suspicions. To some degree this was unnecessary. Few in his inner circle would
question, and most of the rest would not for fear of being silenced by the majority.

After 675, it was mostly local leaders who fought to expand the Saosyant's empire. They lacked
the resources to make much of a dent. A campaign against the Khalingids was met with
disaster, as was an attempt to strike into Osrhoene which died after an abortive siege of
Nasibin. What these campaigns did do was sap manpower. Local leaders, regardless of their
fanaticism, were forced to call on Turkic mercenaries to maintain order. These mercenaries
were often unreliable, but they were numerous. Kimek and Qiriqanid warriors were willing to
fight in exchange for land grants and pay, and many would even pledge their belief in the
Saosyant if it meant additional money or a higher rank.

The necessity of these mercenaries was proved after an eastern coalition formed. The half-
Turkish half-Eftal warlord Tengin Shah brought the southern Asvha, Eftal tribes including the
Gorkhanids and Panjadh, and the Kidarites under his wing. With the growing threat of the
Mahadevists, he proved himself more than capable of defeating their armies in battle and
striking a daring raid into Siraz (680). A worshipper of Tengri and culturally Turkish, he
nevertheless represented the Eftal heritage: tolerant and cosmopolitan, he was a fierce warlord
who was comfortable either in a city or in the saddle.

As Tengin Shah grew more bold in the early 80's, the Mahadevist Green Banner armies were
assembled by Husrava. However, this mostly infantry force was augmented both by an elite
force of Eftal-style companions, armored in the cataphract style, and also by thousands of
Turkish cavalry, led by the Qarluq warlord Sulukichor, whose recent conversion to Mahadevism
had propelled him to leadership of this large mercenary contingent.

Husrava and Tengin Shah met near the town of Yazd, both aware they could not retreat. The
former had built his reputation upon being an invincible messianic figure, the latter upon being
able to defeat said invincible messianic figure. Both had cobbled together rough coalitions,
forces that were mere shadows of what their varying predecessors had commanded. For
Husrava, this would be yet another great battle of light against dark. For Tengin, this was a
battle for survival.

The first day of battle would consist of a series of duels, of which Husrava's Mahadevists came
off better. Towards the evening, Tengin's cavalry harassed the Mahadevist flanks, driving back
Sulukichor's cavalry, who seemed cautious, preserving their strength against Husrava's order
for a general engagement. The second day, battle was joined. The Asvha, who held the center
against the Green Banners, were badly bloodied, but as the sun set the battle was yet again
inconclusive. The third day at dawn the Mahadevists attacked Tengin's camp, retreating with
heavy casualties, particularly to their lightly-equipped fanatical levies who flung themselves
against the camp's walls to little effect. Later that afternoon, battle would rejoin in earnest.
Sulukichor's mercenaries, representing perhaps a quarter of the Turkish cavalry, began to
retreat from the field, sensing that the battle was lost. The other mercenaries, both Turkish,
Alan, and Eftal noticed and began to retreat themselves. However, Tengin's line, exhausted from
three days of fighting, broke and the Mahadevists spilled through the center, encouraged by
Husrava and his cataphracts. However, in the melee, Husrava was gored by a spear and struck
by several arrows. Borne from the field by his royal guards, the Saosyant remained alive but
badly bloodied. The only consolation was that Tengin could not follow up on his victory.

Sulukichor and most of the mercenaries did not return to camp that evening. Some distance
away they formed a secondary camp and held a council of war. At first, Sulukichor was blamed
for the day's events. His cowardice had ensured the Mahadevist defeat and ruined their
chances of ever receiving payment. However, when the (inaccurate) news that Husrava had
died reached the mercenary council, the tenor of the conversation shifted. One of the
mercenaries, an Eftal named Sefandiyar, captivated the assembled leaders, promising to lead
them to greatness.The mercenaries represented a large contingent of armed men in a world
that was defined by large contingents of armed men. Why should they beg for scraps from this
Eftal Shahanshah? Because he claimed to be the Saosyant? His victories had been against
feeble, divided opponents. If they acted together, perhaps one of them could be Shah. Perhaps
the Eftal Empire could be restored. By the end of the night, casks of Persian wine, liberated
from the Mahadevist camp during Sulukichor's retreat were broken open and each of the
leaders pledged for follow Sefandiyar to whatever end...

Meanwhile, many miles away, with the armed help of the Syrian Shah Toramana, and money
from the Khalingids, the Oadhya clan of Eftal rebelled in Syarzur. Lead by an influential local
patriarch named Mihiraban, they quickly gained the loyalty of the monasteries and the local
clans, and prepared to assert not merely the restoration of the Syarzur Confederation, but rather
of the Eftal Empire...

[I look forwards to seeing thoughts and questions. I think the Mahadevists had too many
enemies to prosper in the long run. Too many people who could take advantage of their state
and all their legitimacy is based in one man, and one man can all too easily be wounded taking
some heroic risk in battle...]
 [good point, good
point. Although a Papal-dominated Isidorian Empire would suffer from many of the same
problems as a militarily dominated one. But anyways, now for something completely different:
apologies for the spoilery-title.]

The Fall of the Maukhani Empire

The fifty years between 670 and 720 are regarded as the final stage of the Maukhani Empire.
While later historians would sometimes see them as a mere successor or continuation of the
Gupta era, this overlooks the distinctive trends of the Maukhani dynasty, the changes in religion,
culture, government, and warfare that would affect the entire subcontinent. Where feudalism not
wholly unlike that seen in Europe had grown with the Gupta decline, the Maukhani nipped this
feudal, regional tendency in the bud. Their artistic and architectural styles may have resembled
the Gupta, but they drew inspiration from as far afield as Indonesia and East Africa. They were
insular to some degree, isolated from the changes happening in Central Asia and Persia, but
their periphery was tightly bound to the networks of maritime Indian Ocean trade, networks that
had only grown more potent as overland trade became a risky endeavor.

The Maukhani frontier had become somewhat solidified during the reign of Dhruvasena. The
city of Vinukonda became a center of resistance, with the surrounding region of Andhra
becoming heavily fortified. Bankrolled by the wealth of Narasimhavarman Pallava, a mercantile
king whose coastal empire was heavily involved in the East Asian trade, Maharaja Vikramaditya
Yuvaraja of Vinukonda was able to serve as a buffer state of sorts. Maukhani armies were
ground down against the fortresses of Andhra and the walls of Vinukonda, and Vikramaditya's
capture of Amaravati and subsequent campaigns into the Deccan Plateau. His victory at Vengi
in 673 was perhaps the best example of his military capability, defeating a Maukhani army
perhaps three times the size of his own force.

Vikramaditya proved to be a wily commander, more than a match for the Maukhani on his home
turf. His origins are unknown - his surname Yuvaraja meaning "Son of a King" we can infer that
he was born into royalty, perhaps to some local client of the Maukhani. His regime was never
more than local, but its ability to resist the central authority projected from Pataliputra showed
the growing weakness of the Maukhani Empire and inspired others at the periphery to assert
their own independence more strongly.

With the death of Dhruvasena in 676, his son, Naravardhana took power smoothly. There were
few options for the throne that had not been eliminated in the earlier purges. Uncomfortable
amongst large groups of people and prone to bouts of spontaneous shaking and nervousness,
Naravardhana would be dominated utterly by his Brahmin prime minister, Sumalya. Sumalya,
for his part, was paralyzed not by crowds but by fear of the military, whose commanders he
feared saw themselves as petty kings in their own right. He continuously shuffled the command
structure, purging commanders who he felt had remained too long at important postings on the
frontiers, and granting these vital positions to inexperienced commanders. This would in turn
cause local polities and viceroys to look elsewhere for their defense.

The samanta system of the latter Gupta had represented a semi-feudal approach to
governance. Indeed, no small part of the reason for their collapse had been the feudatory kings
whose power eroded direct royal control. The Maukhani, in undoing that power, had reduced
many of these kings to impotent figureheads, bound by guild-councils (sangha or ayat) and the
local viceroys (uparika and vishyapati). Within their Gangetic heartlands, these kings had been
bound directly to the extended royal clan and gradually denied authority except through
ceremonial offices at court. By taking the Kings away from their territories, the guild-councils,
run by local Rajas, established their power to solve disputes at the local level. The appointed,
non-hereditary uparika who generally chosen with a degree of input from these local councils,
became arbitrators and judges who more often than not were persuaded to take a hands-off
approach to local affairs.

Semi-republican governance on the Indian subcontinent had a long tradition, dating back to
before the Maurya. This was not to say that these societies were not deeply stratified along
social and ethnic lines, but rather that the tradition of communal self-governance existed to be
drawn upon, and in many ways represents a regression to the pre-imperial era. Where the
Maukhani sought to undo the decentralization and feudalization of the latter Gupta, they instead
only defeated the feudal Kings. Decentralization was inevitable. The urban population of India
was growing once more after several centuries of marginal decline under Gupta
mismanagement. As this population of skilled urban workers grew, with it the power of the local
community. As the professional Maukhani military atrophied under Sumalya's mismanagement,
portions of the kshatriya of these communities banded together to form militarized guilds, which
would contract themselves to the uparika.

This can be seen as regression - an advanced polity collapsing along primitive, tribal lines.
However, in truth it was far more complicated than that. The sangha or ayat was not an
inherently tribal affiliation, but is indeed better seen as an alliance of local powers. Indeed, this
was a renaissance of the Indian republican tradition, repressed during the era of the Three
Empires and their various feudal interludes. Unified by shared religious and philosophical
traditions and shared local languages and customs, these sangha laid the foundation for
networks of city-states.

The uparika and vishyapati may have slowly taken on royal titles, but this royalism was based
not around their own claims to rule but the approval of the broader communities and the
assemblies of kshatriya. As Sumalya lost power, he attempted to turn the military on these
viceroys, only to find that his weakening of the military allowed the small but well-equipped
guild-armies to hold their own against his reprisals. In 684 the Adhikarana of Ayodhya, within the
traditional heartlands of the Maukhani broke away. The Ayodhyan viceroy, Hasti, led a coalition
of local cities and successfully was able to defeat the royal army in a pitched battle.
With the rebellion of Prayaga two years later in 686, the empire was effectively split in two. The
two cities dominated the Gangetic plain north of Pataliputra, denying the empire access to many
of its provinces. While the Empire would totter on for some time, reaching various
accommodations with the rebels, its fate was sealed. As various local potentates realized how
easy it was to extract concessions from their viceroys, and by extension the Maharajadhiraja
himself, rebellions became frequent. Kakushthvarma of Pratisthana in 689 established his own
kingdom on the Deccan, mixing the feudalism of South India with the communal republicanism
of the north. By allying with the coastal metropolises such as Sopara, he was able wrest control
of the valuable trade lanes, and by subjugating the local petty kings, who here on the frontier
still retained power, he established a source of vital military manpower.

With Naravadhana's somewhat suspicious death in 698, his cousin Visnuvadhana took the
throne. While Visnuvadhana lacked those aspects of Naravadhana that made him a weak king,
Visnuvadhana had been isolated, like much of the royal clan. He had never left Pataliputra, and
never would. He spent his days in luxurious palaces and gardens, meditating and speaking to
philosophers. He was a lover of beauty, an artist at heart. Sumalya encouraged these hobbies
up until he was executed by the general Amogha Karkha in 701. Amogha was determined to
restore the power of the Maukhani, but his futile wars against the cities of Bengal sapped the
strength of his armies and earned him the ire of many Buddhists, whose holy sites he did not
treat with respect.

Regardless, Amogha would stutter on for twenty more years as prime minister, until 721. As part
of a court intrigue, Visnuvadhana attempted to act against him at the urging of a collection of
lesser councilors. Ernaged by this lack of respect to his efforts to restore the empire, Amogha
would order his mercenary corps, largely foreigners with no great loyalty to the Maharajadhiraja,
to execute a coup. He massacred the royal clan in their apartments and ruled the city for a few
years until a collection of ministers assassinated him and established a greatly reduced
kingdom which consisted essentially of Pataliputra and its hinterlands.
In Gandhara, the fall of the Johiyava and the rise of the Siyaposha led to a paradigm shift in the
greater Hindu Kush and Balkh as well. Unlike the Johiyava, the Siyaposha were Turko-Eftals
who were Indianized to a moderate degree. Unlike in the interior, where local communities were
required to defend themselves, in this portion of the Maukhani frontier as the military atrophied it
was an open invitation for the Siyaposha and their Turko-Eftal retainers to take over the role of
'protectors'. Much of the Punjab was smoothly annexed with a minimum of warfare. Between
670 and 700, a few local military commanders provided only isolated resistance which had little
chance of victory.

Between the Siyaposha and the Sogdians to the north, overland trade did continue, albeit much
reduced. The early Kapisa Shahs, as the Siyaposha became known, left little sign of their
dominion. They were largely forced to repurpose Johiyava fortifications and structures, repairing
and renovating those which had fallen into disrepair, but otherwise they left no architectural
mark on their territory. Cities such as Purusapura and Takasashila which did expand in this time
period did so under the auspices of their ayat councils, in styles which seem imported from
other parts of the subcontinent rather than in any authentic Gandharan style.
Further south, the Siyaposha were met with stiff resistance. The descendents of the Saka and
Kushan satraps had never abandoned their warlike ways and fought as cavalrymen every bit
the equal of the Siyaposha, and the Gurjars of Srimal prevented their entry into the Thar desert.
Along the Indus, the Rai dynasty led by Rai Sinhasena Raja, was equally capable of defending
their river valley, resurgent in the wake of the collapse of the Maukhani. Recognizing these
borders, the Siyaposha did not push their luck overmuch. The Thar desert was marginal territory
in the estimations of the Siyaposha kings, and the Indus valley while wealthy would be a hard
fought conquest. Indeed, the majority of the strength of the Kapisa Shahs would be focused
westward, where another ambitious Turkic warlord could rise up just as easily as they had and
take what they had won.

[Thoughts on the plausibility of making India a patchwork of kingdoms underpinned by local

councils? Questions? I feel like this is one of the bigger risks I've taken so far in terms of
changing history, but it made little sense to me for the Maukhani, who fought feudalism from
nearly the beginning, to be succeeded by kingdoms that resembled those of OTL.]

The Savahila

By the death of Citrasena in the late 670's, the merchant-prince's heirs could safely say their
father was the founder of a civilization. It was not, perhaps, a traditional society. While it had
retained much of the culture of its colonial forefathers in India, Persia, and Hadhrami Arabia, it
was also deeply influenced by the native Cushites who made up the vast majority of the
population. While Savahila cities might have aesthetically retained Persian architectual styles
due to similar building materials, out in the rural regions made use of a mixture of mud brick and
stone. Merely a few miles inland, the foreigners could be seen to have little impact. While their
crops had allowed population densities unknown previously, and their religion (Buddhism,
mostly) was being spread by bright-eyed missionaries in saffron and ochre robes, if one traveled
but a little further, away from navigable rivers and the long coast, even these tokens of foreign
dominion were absent.

Most of the population, including a good number of urban-dwellers, were engaged in agriculture.
A wide variety of products - rice, sorghum, oranges, bananas, tamarind, grapes, sugar-cane,
and honey. Cattle and fish were plentiful, with the former being a symbol of status to those living
in the hinterlands. Horses and sheep also existed in some numbers. But agriculture was not
what brought foreigners to the shores of Savahila. Rather, that was the potential luxury trade
goods which could be extracted. These included slaves (typically captured in warfare), aloe,
ivory, ambergris, leopard skins, tortoiseshell, gold and iron. To the north, an incense and spice
trade developed to rival that of southern Arabia and Awalastan.

The coastal cities, even as they blended with the Bantu and Cushitic peoples found themselves
looking eastward, to India and Arabia, rather than westward. They were part of a global network
there - wealth and prosperity lay to the east, and their trade ships and manufacturing did not
benefit the peoples of the interior one iota.
Penetrating the interior remained difficult indeed. Alternatives were sought, including major
naval expeditions further south, both to find trading partners and to find additional sites for cities.
Perpetual rumors of great kingdoms inland and to the south spurred this interest. But after a few
failed naval expeditions, the cost was generally judged too exorbitant for no gain. The whole
south of the continent was sparsely peopled and the Savahila themselves were small enough in
number that the additional living space was unneeded. Further, there seemed to be no goods
available in the far south that could not be acquired much closer to home.

Those who chose to travel inland finally came to the great lakes, where rumors of great kings
and golden cities compelled them to search far and wide. What they did find was small and
disorganized by their standards, and disinterested in anything they had to offer, be it religion or
trade. The early Rutara-Ganda had large villages with a degree of social stratification rarely
found in their neighbors, but these were not cities in the Savahila imagination. These expditions
had come from Mzishima, its domed temples adorned with terracotta carvings, its bustling
marketplaces and grand apartments rising out of the waterfront like a golden hill. They had
wandered the streets of Vayubata, her avenues red from river-clay. Invariably, they would return
home disappointed.

However, by the early eighth century some tribes closer by, notably the Kw'adza and Iringa, had
begun more involved trade. While they had little to offer the sedentary cities of Savahila, they
did have two utilities - their cattle were valuable to that portion of the Savahila elite that did not
hold cows sacred, and further, their raiding against the migratory Bantu provided a source of
slaves. While the Savahila had little need for slaves, the floodplains of Mesopotamia and the
spice plantations of Awalastan did. Slaves were one good among many, but they did provide a
medium by which coinage was introduced to these tribes, thus allowing them to interact with the
Savahila markets and by extension the Indian Ocean trade network. It was only a matter of time
before ambitious merchants from the cities established inland forts from which to sell goods.

Across the water, the island of Izaoraika, still ruled by the Sakalava tribe, had begun to unify the
island more thoroughly. By laying down stone fortifications, sometimes with the insight of Arab
advisors, they were able to garrison the territories of their one-time enemies, extracting tribute
more efficiently and creating an imposing reminder of who ruled the island. Certain local tribes
were exalted above others, based on the order in which they had submitted to the Sakalava.
These tribes in turn provided the garrisons for forts far from their ancestral territories, creating a
system in which all were ruled from a distance.

Apart from a few holdouts, such as the Antaisaka and the Sihanaka, who waged low-intensity
war against the Sakalava on-and-off for the better half of the seventh century, the island was
subdued. By 700, Izaoraika had a thriving port city, Mahapura, which although often counted
among the Savahila cities had a distinctly local identity. Like the Savahila cities, it provided an
avenue for Indic and Arabic culture to enter the native consciousness. Both the South Indian
model of kingship, wherein one great king ruled a host of lesser ones, and the ideas of Tantric
Hinduism had appeal to the Izaoriaka, who saw in these ideas concepts that reinforced their
right to rule. Unlike with their traditional beliefs, these more universal ideologies could assert the
necessity of a universal ruler, seated at the heart of an intricate mandala.

The Land of Spice and Ivory

The "Missions of Heshana" claim to have converted the Makurians, who had long retained to
varying degrees their traditional faith, to Christianity as early as 670. While previously many
smaller kingdoms had been Christian, and there had been many pockets of Monophysites within
the Nubian nation, the conversion of the Makurian King marked the beginning a new era. By
700, it seems that the Makurian King, Qalidurut, had united most of ancient Nubia under his
control once more.

The Kingdom of Makuria was a curious creation. Its ruling elite looked to Rome and to Heshanid
Egypt for inspiration, adopting their manner of dress and technology such as the water-wheel
irrigation system around this time. Coptic was the language of the Church, and consequently the
language of the high elite. Their governance, however, was done in a distinctly Nubian style,
with high officials taking on some aspects of priestly dress and authority. Enormous cathedrals
such as at Dongola and Faras were built out of baked brick in the cruciform style that had
characterized their ancient pagan temples.

Aksum, to the south, was tottering on the verge of insignificance. With the unification of their
northern neighbors, trade up and down the Nile became more profitable, and their more vibrant
neighbors to the north, unmolested by Somali raids were able to reap the rewards. On sea, the
Hadhramut was still preeminent, and based on architectural finds we can see that the amount of
foreign goods dropped enormously, even in ports such as Massawa, and major cities such as
Aksum and Senafe.

With the collapse of Kaoshid Awalastan in the south, a new local power was rising in the form of
the Hawiya clan. Once a marginal tribe in even more marginal land, they had over the past
hundred years slowly clawed their way to prominence. In the absence of any central authority,
they prospered. With Axum on the decline and the Hadhramut quarreling amongst themselves,
there was little to stop them from taking Amoud in 656. With the seizure of the Aksumite cities of
Adigrat and Maqale, they put the final nail in the coffin of Axumite predominance.

Taking advantage of the bureaucracy and tributary system successfully employed by Awali
Shahs, the Hawiya simply stepped into their role. No longer just a powerful clan, they expected
to rule with a degree of absolute authority. While at first many of the Awali tribes might have
questioned that choice, the Hawiya had the backing of the Hadhramut traders whose estates
produced the spices for which Europe had an insatiable appetite. It was economics, not military
power that ensured the rise of the Hawiya. While certainly their initial victories were won by the
sword, their long term pre-eminence was designed by the deals they could make with the Arab
and Indian merchant elite.
As the Hawiya Shahdom became more solid, they slowly moved away from their traditional
roots. The language and customs of South Arabia blended with their own. The Persian styles of
Amoud became the styles of their patriarchs. The Jewish merchants, long persecuted by the
Hadhrami, brought their own mystical form of monotheism to pre-eminence. Much like the
southern cities of the Savahil, Awalastan was a melting pot for refugees and travelers. For
example, in 690, a thriving monastic community of Svetambara Jains lived adjacent to the spice
plantations of a Jewish tribe, outside of the Perso-Arab city of Amoud, where carts of ivory from
Sofala and silk from China might be offloaded.

[Good news, I found some sources to flesh out Berber North Africa!]

Berbers raiding the Mauri

Heresy had always been somewhat popular in Roman Africa - it served as a breeding ground
for dissent from Rome, and under the Mauri this continued. The more philosophically inclined
among the feudal nobility and the merchant-lords often harbored those with heterodox ideas. In
part, this can be traced to a certain bitterness among the Romans of North Africa - they disliked
having their religion defined by Rome rather than some more local city. Were there not many
patriarchates in the East? With the fall of those patriarchs to heresy and the heathen Eftal,
renewed feeling that there should be a Patriarch of Hippo or Carthage reached a fever pitch.
Furthermore, the Pope in Rome was a puppet of the Isidorians.

The monasteries of North Africa were mainly of the Cassadorian school, which, while founded in
Italy, nevertheless followed the liberal teachings of Cassordius, a man who some might have
considered a heretic himself for his approach to the Arians. Those monasteries that were not
Cassordian were often practicing what the more orthodox of the Church saw as Gnosticism.
Christian North Africa was an thorn in the side of the Roman Church, and the stage was set for
a spiritual battle between Carthage and Rome.

Even by the mid 7th century, Christianity was not widespread amongst the Berbers of the
interior. The Romanized coastal peoples did certainly extend their dominion towards the interior,
but they regarded themselves as Romans or Mauri, under the dominion of the King of
Mauritania and Africa. While these people were wealthy, powerful, and cosmopolitan, connected
intimately to the Mediterranean trading world, they were also on the decline. The climatological
shifts favored the traditional, semi-nomadic peoples of the interior. Warlike and numerous, they
were for the most part pagans, worshipping a mixture of local gods and cults.

The very climate changes which encouraged the collapse of the Garamantes, would threaten
the Mauri during a period of their greatest weakness. Under King Takfarinas the Mauri
possessions overseas would find themselves forced to choose between religion and their King.
In many cases, this was not a difficult choice. The Mauri of Sicily in particular began adopting
Roman names in this period. Factions developed within the aristocracy - and no small number
of these factions sought to overthrow the King and replace him with a different candidate.
Things reached a state of crisis when the Count of Caesarea was revealed to secretly be a
Gnostic, and Takfarinas did not act.
Azerwal, the Mauri chancellor, did not believe that the Mauri could endure a religious conflict
with Rome. Tax revenues in the interior had been on an inexorable decline for decades. Trade
was the lifeblood of the Mauri economy, and trade depended on the coastal cities and overseas
possessions - the very people most Romanized and most loyal to the Church in Rome. In 671,
he overthrew Takfarinas and sent him to a monastery, promising a new era of religious
uniformity and, in a private letter to the Pope, attempted to reassure the Papacy that he would
do "all in his power to drive out the agents of Satan who dwell among us." Marrying Queen
Tagwerramt to attempt to ensure his legitimacy, the new royal couple passed new edicts,
reaffirming the power of the state to persecute those the Church deemed heretical, and if
necessary overthrow them with violent force, as he had done.

What followed was a systematic persecution of much of the Mauri aristocracy, ostensibly for
heresy but also to ensure the loyalty of the remainder to his throne. Between the Battle of
Rhegium and this persecution, the inland Mauri were critically weakened at a time they could
not afford to be. As the desert spread, the prominent Iznagen tribe of the Awares mountains, led
by a local chief named Afalawas, began to raid into Mauri Africa. These raids culminated in the
brutal sack of Theviste in 674.

The Iznagen were but a prominent example of a broader trend. Mauretania Tingitana was wholly
lost in 682, after the Masamida tribe won the eight month siege of Tingis. The tribe of Iktamen,
led by the famous Immeghar, known to his people as "the Prophet" came to reside in
Mauretania, within striking distance of the ancient Mauri capital of Caesarea. As these tribes
moved, they did not necessarily displace the agriculturalists who remained - rather they took in
many cases land which the agriculturalists had been forced to abandon due to climactic
changes, finding these ideal for their pastoral lifestyle. Numidia itself was threatened by two
allied tribes, the Tumzabt and the Isawiyen, united by a woman named Tazdayet. Constantinia
was besieged off and on between 679 and 683, when it would finally fall.

Through all of this, the Mauri did fight back. Numerous small battles between local lords and the
Berber invaders more often than not saw the Mauri outmatched. While inland cities would often
fall if starved, coastal cities generally fell only rarely, and most of those that fell were at the far
periphery of Mauri control. Azerwal would rule until 686, when his nephew Aghilas would take
the throne. Three years into his reign, Aghilas would be killed in battle near Sufes, attempting a
punitive action against the Iznagen. Dying without an obvious successor, a group of prominent
merchant families returned to the capital and there elected one of their own, the aging Sicilian
Mauri merchant named Constans, who took the more Mauri name Amawal upon his ascension
to the throne.

Constans took a different approach to his predecessors. Instead of warring against the Berbers,
he sought to define the territories of each tribe and make peace. Through a combination of
generous arrangements and the threat of swift reprisals if those arrangements were broken, he
was able to buy his kingdom time. Urban militias were raised and he personally toured the
coastal cities, ensuring their land walls were in good shape. The tax burden on the peasantry
and landed nobility was lightened, in exchange for regular terms of military service - not merely
being levied when called but rather as constant frontier garrisons. In spite of their losses the
Mauri remained powerful, and in 693, when the Isawiyen began renewed attacks on the coastal
cities and their hinterlands, they were able to resist with relative ease.

However, many Mauri were realizing than an ocean was a safer defense than walls. A not
insignificant portion of those with the means fled to Sardinia and Sicily. This northwards shift
would weaken the claims of North Africa to deserving its own Patriarchate, and put an
anticlimactic end to the religious conflicts which had divided their society. With the collapse of
inland Mauri society, many of the monasteries that had attracted the ire of the Church were in
the hands of polytheist Berbers who had little concern for the broader world and their religious
schisms.

The Eastern
Mediterranean

After the death of Basileus Heshana II in 683, he was succeeded by his son, Timotheos
Heshana. Like his father, Timotheos had grown up in the luxurious palace of Hvarabad, tutored
by both Coptic monks and the descendents of the Arab and Eftal warriors who had conquered
Egypt. Unlike his father, however, all of his instruction was in a mixture of Greek and Coptic.
According to the biographer Anathasios of Cyrene, he struggled with Eftal and would only learn
Aramaic as a young man. At sixteen, he was betrothed and married to a woman of the Banu
Shayban, one of the Christianized Arab tribes on the frontier and an important buffer against the
growing power of the Ghatafan to the southeast and Akhsaman the Younger to the north.

Transplanted Arabs made up a not insignificant portion of the Egyptian military, especially after
the conquest of Palestine. Having resided among the Roman population of Palestine for some
time, they were largely Christian and largely Aramaic speaking. They retained their tribal
affiliations and provided a useful auxiliary force with personal, tribal loyalties to the monarchy. A
legacy of Syavush, the Heshanid line never quite forgot their historic paranoia. Hvarabad was
still very much their city, stately, decadent, and very much separate from the bustle of Alexandria
and Tamiathis. Their reliance on foreigners and their own small elite for military strength showed
a waning but still present distrust of the Copts. Even as they assimilated in dress, speech,
culture, and faith, they never stopped feeling themselves distinct from the people they ruled.

This does not seem to have been reciprocated by the Copts. Timotheos Heshana's mother was
a Copt, and when he took the throne most of his chancellery would be populated by Copts.
Whatever paranoia the royals felt, it was perhaps excessive. They had little to fear. Indeed,
Egypt was entering into a sort of golden age. The treasures of the south and east flowed
abundantly through their ports. As the era of the Mauri came to a close, Coptic traders took a
greater and greater share of these goods north to the Anatolian cities, Italy, and Francia. Egypt
and the Rhom Shahs had the only two major fleets in the eastern Mediterranean, and in 694,
they would collaborate to put an end the pirate fleets holding Crete and Rhodes. The former
was given a Coptic governor, a cousin-in-law of Heshana's, and the latter became a tributary of
the Eftal, and an Eftal garrison was established on the island near the small town of Afantou.

The construction of a proper Eftal fleet marked a change in the power of the Rhom Shah. The
islands of the Aegean, briefly independent of any power in the wake of the collapse of the
Roman Empire, were brought to heel. Shah Disiapata's power was still loose and very feudal,
but it was nevertheless growing quickly. A strategic marriage between his sister and the Alan
Khan Chodainos solidified his northern borders, and after the death of Kormisosh in 677, he
engineered it so the childless mercenary left his "Shahdom" to Disiapata.

As soon as this was discovered, the Nicomedians rebelled. Under a local patrician named
Dioscoros, they intended to restore Roman rule in Constantinople and the Empire as a whole.
Dioscoros played his hand cleverly, assuring his supporters that the Isidorians would assist
them and that the other Roman cities would rise up behind them. But Disiapata struck quickly,
riding north with his Eftal and Bulgarian forces before the Nicomedians could more than a few
local towns to their cause - the only Roman city to join was Sardis. After a three week siege,
Dioscoros and his compatriots were shown no mercy, and Sardis had its independence
revoked. Disiapata assigned one of his companions the city and its hinterlands as a personal
fief after short but vicious sack - a reminder that the Roman cities, though wealthy and
economically powerful were alone far too weak to resist the Eftal.

After the defeat of the Nicomedians, Disiapata moved his capital once more - this time to
Constantinople. Depopulated and thoroughly plundered, the costs of repairing the city would be
high, but as a symbolic gesture it was effective. Practically speaking Ikonion would remain the
heart of the kingdom, populated as it was by the majority of the Eftal in the Shahdom, and the
seat of Avyaman, his heir apparent and by 690, co-Shah. However, by holding court in the
Imperial Palace once more, even if the population of the city amounted to an Eftal garrison, a
Sahu trading post, and perhaps thirty thousand Roman citizens, Disiapata was asserting a sort
of continuation of the prestige and power of the Roman Empire. That he did so from a vast ruin
undermined that message to a certain degree.

The renovations of Constantinople, undertaken on-and-off for roughly twenty years after 680
represented a major endeavor. Restoration of the walls and the Imperial Palace took
precedence, followed by a series of fortifications along the first hill, linking to the sea walls.
These constructions were expensive and time consuming, but they gave a certain sense of
grandeur back to the Second Rome. A striking Buddhist temple was built, very much in the style
of a Roman Basilica - except for the painted iconography of the Buddha across the roof, and the
adjacent shrines to various Eftal and Sahu gods, which were in the springtime heavy with
flowers. This construction, while meaningful to the large Sahu and Eftal trade community, and
eventually to a decent number of the Bulgars and Slavs who migrated to the city, nevertheless
earned the ire of the Christians of the former Roman Empire. The unbelievers had truly
tarnished their city, where the Equal to the Apostles once ruled.
By 700, the population of the city had risen dramatically. Large portions were still in poor shape,
but healthy trade was restored and those who lived there, a cosmopolitan mixture of many
peoples, felt relatively safe behind the restored Land Walls. The city might have been a shadow
of its former splendor, but it was growing once more.

Across the straits, the three Slavic Princedoms, Thrace, Thessaloniki, and Epirus, entered into
an age of revival as well, free from Avar Hegemony. Coreligionists of their Greek population, the
latter half of the 7th century and the early decades of the eighth saw increasing homogeny
between the Slavic and Greek populations. Increased local trade between the diminished cities
and their hinterlands slowly blended regional dialects and also the Slavic and Greek languages.
Thessaloniki and Adrianople became bustling local capitals, and apart from sporadic Bulgar
raids it was a time of relative peace. The Avars, distracted to their north, did little to threaten the
safety of the Princes.

Furthermore, the Balkans became once more involved in trade on a large scale. Merchants from
Ephesus and Alexandria sailed to harbors in Thessaloniki and Corinth, Heraclea and Arta.
Those tribal leaders who had found themselves with large landholdings were able to trade
minerals, timber, and agricultural products for the foreign luxuries which they were quickly
developing a taste for. These societies were essentially feudal. Their urban areas were
atrophied fortifications with central marketplaces. These landholders were lords capable of
raising not insignificant tribal levies - a legacy of the Slavic raids of the previous century. They
acknowledged central royal authority out of obligation, loose kinship bonds, and a desire for
protection. In some ways this was not so different from the Rhom Shahdom across the water -
except in general the Rhom Shahdom drew from a more sophisticated, urban, cultural heritage
that the Slavs did not have access to, having destroyed their links to the Roman past more
thoroughly and lacking the eastern influences that the Eftal had acquired.

Eastern Promise

Sotkhri Nyentsen ascended to the Imperial Throne of Bod in 675, amid much celebration. His
father and grandfather had been brilliant leaders, the first as a unifier and the second as a
conqueror. It was a difficult legacy to live up to, and Sotkhri Nyentsen was perhaps not the man
for the job. By all accounts he was a beautiful and arrogant young man who shunned the advice
of his councilors and the growing Tibetan monastic community. He had the turbulent manner of
one born into incredible power - alternately mild and wrathful. Arbitrary, lustful, and dangerously
cunning, he ensured the disgrace and exile of his two older brothers. Perhaps obviously, he was
not well liked by the nobility, who had to live with him in Rhasu, or his wife, the Sogdian princess
Roshana.

The young Emperor's energies had to be diverted. His councilors believed that An-hsi, the
frontier was weak, and thus goaded him into organizing a military campaign against the Qi. The
Governor-General of An-hsi, Wu Dan, had failed to train his soldiers to an acceptable standard.
Many lacked adequate armor and weapons, and as such when the Bod army attacked the initial
battles were massacres. Many walled cities fell, and the Bod came within striking distance of
Chang'an itself before new armies could be levied to stem the tide. Uighur mercenaries were
called upon in great numbers to counteract the superior Tibetan cavalry, well-armored and riding
excellent Ferghanian horses.

The Qi dynasty, however, was resilient. Chang'an was too large to easily besiege, and well
garrisoned. The campaign stalled and the Emperor, growing frustrated, delegated more and
more to his general, Tritsu. Tritsu proved to be exceptionally competent. Though the Chinese
armies were too numerous to wear down through attrition, he nevertheless bloodied them badly
and forced the Qi Emperor to make an embarrassing peace. Many border cities were ceded,
and a small annual tribute was arranged - ostensibly a gift to the western barbarians.

The Bod would go on to have more campaigns. Their energies would go into a conquest of
Nanzhao (683-685) and raids into Assam (687-694). However, perhaps the greatest ramification
of these wars was not the plunder and glory Sotkhri Nyentsen sought to attain, or the conquered
peoples who contributed soldiers and tribute and solidified Tibetan power, but rather several
anonymous bureaucrats captured in the first Bod-Qi war. These prisoners would turn out to
have knowledge of papermaking techniques, techniques which would be seized upon by the
ministers of the Tibetan court, but also further disseminated from there after a group of Sogdian
merchants acquired the knowledge with a small bribe. By the early eighth century, paper could
be found in Ayodhya and Samarkand, in Kapisa and Takasashila.

With age, Sotkhri would become more moderate. An Eftal historian and Buddhist missionary
named Hravadata, who lived in Rhasu much of his adult life attributed this moderation to the
influences of Roshana and the birth of several children. In truth however, Sotkhri may have
merely became tired. His youth was spent in ceaseless activity, much of it for little gain.
Delegating to his nobles suited him, and the structure of the Tibetan state, thanks to the labors
of his ancestors, was strong enough to survive his inattention.

Alilat Triumphant

The Prophetess Fadia would die in 654, and, according to Saihist tradition it was not a tragedy
but a miracle - an ascension to oneness with the God. With her passing the religion changed
fundamentally. Without the one "pure center of revelation", as she was sometimes known, there
was no central unity, no organized hierarchy of who should claim the mantle of her holy
authority. She was by no means a sole prophet - others, including her husband Abdulilat,
claimed to receive messages from Alilat during certain states of ecstatic meditation.

The conquests of Nu'maan ibn Mundhir had politically united the northern Hejaz under Saihism,
but he was a legalist, a tribal patriarch in a very different mould from the mercantile clans of al-
Ta'if. The fanaticism of his followers and his victories attested to the utility of the religion. Rightly,
he claimed to the Commander of the Believers (Amir al-Muminin). In the south, in the city of the
goddess, the local priesthood claimed doctrinal authority, and was led by Abdulilat. He and
Fadia had been childless, but his relations, the influential and powerful Banu Thaqif were eager
to ensure their own position in whatever structure emerged out of the death of the Prophetess.
Both of these factions realized that if their community was to survive, surrounded as they were
by unbelievers, compromise would be necessary.

Nu'maan ibn Mundhir was, more than just a military leader or a religious figure, a reformer. Part
of what made his message appealing is that he brought to the mysticism of the Suwar a set of
empowering legal and societal reforms. In the example of the Prophetess Fadia and the female
priesthood of Alilat, he sought to elevate the status of women, end female infanticide and rape,
and allow women the right to divorce by the simple affirmation "I divorce you." That he enacted
these reforms with often strict and brutal commandments was merely a sign of the times. He
mandated charity among the believers, taking Fadia's message of the equality of all souls to
heart. However, as a tribal leader he did not make a clear break with his culture in many
respects - he defined masculine virtue as heroic bravery in warfare, femininity as meditative
closeness to the divine, and he saw slaves captured in war as incapable of being part of the
community of believers.

It would be Nu'maan who shaped the practical side of the religion most strongly. At the Council
of al-Ta'if, better known as the Council of the Partisans, the organization of the new faith was
solidified. Nu'maan ibn Mundhir received important concessions. His formulation of the Suwar
as a holy book oHHwas declared divinely chosen (and thus official). His position as a sort of first
among equals, or Amir, was solidified, and his son Khalid married the daughter of the Thaqif
patriarch, Hasan ibn Muttalib. In return, he conceded that he was a purely secular leader -
divinely inspired, perhaps, but secular nevertheless. "I am not a Prophet, but a humble servant
of the God and the Absolute" he told the assembled. Thereafter, the assembled tribal leaders
pledged their loyalty to Nu'maan and the Banu Ghatafan.
Beyond merely resolving this dispute of authority, another important decision was made. It was
declared incumbent upon the faithful to share their revelation. Missionaries would have to be
sent forth. Every Saihist had an obligation to share the revelations of Fadia.

These revelations, now codified, began to become a coherent set of six steps, each building
upon each other in pursuit of the Absolute. To fail in these steps was to find oneself far from the
gods in the next life. Unlike the Dharmic religions one was not incarnated again into this world
but rather into another one, the specifics of which were uncertain. Those who came close to
oneness with the would be reborn close to gods and thus live in sensual bliss, while those who
failed would exist far from the bliss of the gods, or alternately fall into oblivion depending on the
magnitude of their sins. The steps were:

Abstaining from falsehood, dishonor, theft, and violence. (except when necessary in defense of
the faith)
Giving charity and comfort to all.
Prayer and veneration to the gods and foremost among them Alilat.
Understanding of the Suwar.
Meditation to understand the Absolute.
Attain oneness with the Absolute. (Paradise)
Even those who accomplished even a few of these steps would not be so far from the abode of
the Gods. Those who accomplished all were held as figures of great holiness, and elevated by
the community to the status of "saints" - a concept adopted relatively later, certainly after the life
of Fadia. Figures such as Nu'maan would eventually receive this honor.

Even as the Saihists consolidated, the Hadhramut Kingdom to the south continued to unravel.
The Malik, Qahtan ibn Amar (651-673) had little authority outside of Shabwa. Certain cities,
such as the Christian community of Najran felt the need to express autonomy as Indian ideas
and religions such as Buddhism and Jainism drew increasingly larger numbers of devotees.
However, as they did so they became easy prey for the Saihists, who struck south with
increasing impunity. Khalid ibn Nu'maan would conquer Najran in 668, and finally, in what was a
crushing blow to the Hadhrami spice trade, Sana'a in 672. Shortly thereafter, Qahtan would be
overthrown, replaced by his son Imru, who attempted to counteract the southwards spread of
the now unified community of the believers.

The impetus for the Saihist attacks is unclear, but can possibly be traced to the Hadhrami slowly
orienting their trade once more towards maritime activity. As their caravans became less
profitable and less frequent, the Saihists were forced to go to war to gain plunder. Once they
realized the weakness and decentralization of the Hadhramut they would capitalize on these
raids.

The Hadhrami military at this point was significantly atrophied. It had never been exceptionally
powerful - the mercantile kings of South Arabia relied on control over water supplies, tariffs, and
the spice production to retain their dominance. They were not significantly militaristic, and this
explains the appeal of nonviolent creeds such as Buddhism and Jainism among the South
Arabians. Where the latter Eftal and Turks always had to reconcile their faith and the endemic
warfare in which they participated, it was easier for the urban, "civilized" Hadhrami to do so.
Saihism by contrast allowed far more justifications for war and plunder, and the people of Hejaz
had always been more warlike, needing to defend themselves against the Bedouin of the
interior.

As such, the eventual fall of the Hadhrami was not unsurprising. Khalid finally conquered them
in 687, placing a believer, a member of the Thaqif named Mansur ibn Ali on the throne.
However, over time this new dominion would be loose. So long as the Malik sent tribute and a
portion of the trade north, he was allowed to handle his affairs as he chose. While the Malik did
promote the Saihist faith, he did not persecute others for their own beliefs, seeing them as
merely on alternative paths to righteousness. As such, the Hadhramut maintained their relative
monopoly on trade in southern Arabia.

The Saihists spread north as well. The Christian tribes of the Tayy, under al-Harith ibn Yusuf,
fought hard to avoid the same fate as their southern coreligionists of languishing under a
"pagan" king. Fortunately, they were numerous and capable of mobilizing a large population and
many federate allies to war. The Saihist penetration northwards was thus continually thwarted.
While the Tayy were not urban, and indeed were rather poor, lacking any major trade routes,
they nevertheless were able to style themselves as defenders of Christendom, and cultivate a
rough alliance with the Heshanids, despite being Nestorian.

As such, the particular details of Saihism and the Suwar never reached the Eftal world or the
Mediterranean in any great numbers. Sporadic missionaries found themselves rebuffed, but
there was no mass transmission of ideas. Saihism remained a primarily Arab phenomenon, and
even within the peninsula limited in scope to some degree.

Two Years of Anarchy and Betrayal - the end of the Mahadevist moment - rise of the new
empire

After the battle, when the dead were burned or left for the birds of the air, Tengin Shah and his
picked retainers crossed the sweeping scrubland plains south of Yazd to meet with the
mercenary captains - especially the so-called Shah Sefandiyar. While Tengin might have felt
some lingering caution and uncertainty about the results of the battle, he could not help but feel
the elation of a clear victory. This was his triumph. These mercenaries would not take that credit
from him.

When he arrived at the meeting-place, two mornings after the battle, he could not have been
more baffled by the claims of the man who had named himself the leader the mercenaries -
Sefandiyar of Komis, the man who would be Shah. Sefandiyar claimed to be the descendant of
the first Shah Akhshunwar, the legendary conqueror of Iran himself. Tengin naturally was
skeptical. The Persian chronicler Farrokh claims that he derisively replied that "every horse-thief
from Edessa to Kabul" claimed ancestry from Akhshunwar. Sefandiyar, quick-witted, replied that
Heshana himself began his career as a horse-thief, and ultimately became a great conqueror.
He offered to work with Tengin - together they could carve out an empire for themselves before
the Mahadevists had a chance to recover.

Tengin, unimpressed, turned and left. Why should he share the spoils of the Mahadevist
Empire? Especially with a cabal of men who had proven themselves untrustworthy by their very
actions in the previous battle? By the time he reached his own camp, Sefandiyar's army had
broken camp and was riding north. Meanwhile, Husrava's column was trailing south, and Tengin
had dispatched Shah Vinayaditya, the leader of the Kidarite, or Red Eftal, to pursue and harass
the retreating army. An accomplished commander in his own right, and a masterful leader of
horse, Vinayaditya would ultimately catch Husrava near Belabad. The abortive battle would see
thousands of the "Green Banners" captured and Husrava himself, badly wounded and with a
spreading infection, taken into the custody of the Shah.

Rather than allow any among them to become martyrs, Vinayaditya ordered the sickly
Shahanshah paraded past a line of the captured Green Banner soldiers. When he reached the
end of his parade, he was beaten savagely before being returned to a cage. Subsequently, each
one of the captive Mahadevists was blinded except for one in a hundred, who was given the
responsibility of leading his comrades. When the self-proclaimed Saosyant passed away of his
infection three days later, the news was related to every soldier in the army and they were sent
off back towards Susa with a bare minimum of provisions.

These actions broke the will of the Mahadevists. Cities began to surrender en masse,
particularly in Pars, where a large proportion of the population were not believers in any case.
The Zoroastrians loudly denounced Husrava as false, and the Mahadevists themselves begged
for leniency and generally received it. With subsequent years, an anti-messianic faction within
the Mahadevists would gain prominence, and they would be relegated to an influential but
nevertheless fringe sect within the Middle East.

But for now, Vinayaditya had larger problems than religious factionalism. With the Mahadevists
subdued, it was his forces that effectively controlled the core of their short-lived empire. Tengin
Shah, racing to catch up, had already been bled badly in battle. Furthermore, he was suffering
mass desertions: the Asvha had left to defend their own homelands, leaving him leading mostly
his own Turkic troops, which were relatively few in number. When he finally met up with
Vinayaditya roughly a week after Belabad, Vinayaditya organized a grand banquet to celebrate
their victory. He cheerfully announced to Tengin that together, they had restored the Eftal
Shahdom. He proposed a marriage between Tengin and his daughter, that might seal their
alliance. Tengin, in good spirits and feeling triumphant in spite of his personal setbacks, agreed.
That night, however, as Tengin's soldiers became drunk, a contingent of the Eftal who had
remained sober fell on them and began a vicious, one-sided massacre.

Tengin himself fled, but most of his retainers were captured or killed, sacrificing their lives to
allow him to escape Vinayaditya's royal tent. He stumbled, wounded, through the avenues of his
camp. Because he was not in his distinctive armor but rather casually dressed, he escaped
notice for some time. He witnessed the annihilation of his army and Vinayaditya's triumph and
abandoning all hope, he took his own life.

Vinayaditya, however, had little time to enjoy the spoils of war. Sefandiyar was carving out a
kingdom for himself around the ancient city of Ahmatan in the north. Furthermore, word had
finally reached him that Syarzur was in open rebellion, led by Mihiraban Oadhya. If he had acted
quickly, he might have nipped both threats in the bud, but after arriving in Susa, the Shah of the
Red Eftal fell into a deep depression. He was wracked by guilt over his actions, and he did not
ride against either of the pretenders. Mihiraban, having gained the loyalty of Syrazur and an
alliance with Toramana of Syria, swept south. He captured Tesifon in the summer of 686, and
from there grew only more bold. The subsequent year, Mihiraban would make a secret pact with
Sulukichor, granting him and his men large tracts of Mahadevist-owned land in the south in
exchange for his allegiance, and critically, his betrayal of Sefandiyar.

The new Syarzuri army, led by Mihiraban struck directly at Ahmatan, and when Sefandiyar met
them, the betrayal happened just as planned. Sulukichor, just as at Yazd, fell back rather than
engaging, allowing a contingent of Toramana's Syrian cavalry to flank Sefandiyar and put his
army to rout. By the year's end, Ahmatan had been brought under the Syarzuri yoke. Perhaps
wisely, Mihiraban made no further use of the Turkic mercenaries, preferring to keep them on as
a garrison unit only - where Sulukichor could not betray him at a critical moment as he had done
to both his former employers.

With this, Vinayaditya was finally spurred into action. He rode west to Kaskar, from where he
planned to strike at Tesifon, retaking the ruined city which he could use as a base of operations
from which to attack Syarzur and regain the initiative. However, Tormana was waiting for him
with some ten thousand men. Vinayaditya lost his nerve and attempted to retreat, but realized
that he would need to cross the rain-swollen Tigris, now with an enemy at his back. He ordered
his forces to scatter, believing more of them would be preserved that way, but ultimately it
merely allowed the Syrians to single out the royal companions and target them in isolation from
the main body of his troops.

Vinayaditya's body was never recovered. It is believed he drowned in the Tigris, and while many
of his troops escaped, the Red Eftal would flee back to Kerman, their ambitions thwarted. In
688, Mihiraban was crowned Shah in Susa, as sole ruler of a much diminished Eftal Empire.

Mihiraban was left with a problem no different from that faced by the Mahadevists, but unlike the
Mahadevists he was able to utilize the literate Christian and Buddhist populations of his empire
in governance. Monks were called upon to train the latest generation of Imperial bureaucrats,
and for once a sense of order was restored. Relative peace prevailed from Constantinople to
Tokharestan.

Rather than the old Satrapal system, Mihiraban divided the provinces into many smaller
territories, typically centered around a single urban area or a cluster of towns. These were given
as hereditary fiefs to various aristocrats who had served with him, typically from prominent
Iranian Eftal clans. Known as Vayan,(Lords), each Vaya was responsible for raising troops in
times of war, providing taxes to the central government, and maintaining order in his territories,
being allowed in exchange a reasonable degree of autonomy in how they managed their fiefs.
Above these local lords in rank was a higher layer of nobility - the Padivayan, whose dominions
did not overlap with the Vaya, but were granted more important border territories, where they
effectively served as Marquisates with an even greater degree of autonomy.

The next five years were ones of consolidation. The Mahadevist priesthood was lucky to escape
at all the purges visited upon them - the faith was in many locations driven underground, with
many of its practitioners beginning to give devotion to other Indian or Eftal gods so as to appear
less sectarian. Those fringe sects which claimed that Husrava would be reborn were
massacred. Others would subsequently claim to be Zoroastrian, a religion which itself would
never quite recover from the trauma of the "false Saosyant" - but it would largely escape
persecution and as such would simply slowly become a minority faith in the face of the prevalent
synthesis of dharmic and Eftal beliefs.

In 694, Shah Khalinga would die. He had reached a great age and would remembered fondly by
those who chronicled his reign. However, he left an unclear succession - having never had the
heart to do away with his co-Shah, now a thirty-year old man named Freduna. His chosen heir,
Khauwashta, had the support of the majority, being middle-aged and quite capable himself, but
when Freduna refused to step down as Shah and retire to a spacious estate, tensions flared -
Mihiraban chose to intervene. Knowing Freduna had few other options, and might well die if
push came to shove against Khauwashta, the Shah offered Freduna his late father's satrapy (a
position which would effectively make him the sole Satrap in the new Eftal Empire) and
promised to deal with Khauwashta. As his options evaporated and his companions began to
abandon him, Freduna took the deal.

The subsequent invasion would be rather hard-fought. Gilan had many strong fortresses and
though Khauwashta could not bring a great army against Mihiraban, the war would take four
years of on-and-off sieges and counter-sieges before finally Khauwashta himself accepted
terms, being reduced to the rank of Padivaya.

While the Oadyan Empire certainly claimed to be inheritors of the Eftal legacy, in truth they
should rightly be regarded as something distinct. Their court culture resembled more strongly
the provincial culture of Syarzur than the high culture of the old Eftal Royals. The elite, and
almost all of the new lords were to some degree Buddhist or pagans deeply influenced by
Buddhist teachings - unlike the multitude of religions among their predecessors. All spoke the
same Syarzuri dialect and most were at least distantly bound together by blood. A much greater
portion of their population, especially within the low echelons of the military class, was Turkic
and identified as such. Nomadism and pastoralism, particularly in the east, were much more
pervasive.

The Oadyan furthermore moved the capital to Ahmatan [Hamadan, or Ecbatana] the old
Sassanid summer residence, it was renovated and new temples and palaces were built to
accommodate the royal clan. A smaller city than Susa (which remained to a large degree the
administrative center) Ahmatan became a new Piandjikent. Centrally located in comparison, it
reflected the fact that threats to the new Empire could come from essentially any direction - the
roaming tribes of the East, the more settled Eftal states of the west, or the patchwork of Alan
and Turkic warlords who ruled in Armenia.

The Succession of
Kings - Troubled States in the Christian West

The Frankish Kingdom would find it hard to reunify after its collapse in 636. The trend within the
petty kingdoms that emerged in its aftermath was one of centralization, but this merely
established local centers - Paris, Aachen, Bordeaux, Lyon - which became pre-eminent. This
was a double edged sword - benefits included it making traditional Frankish succession wars
relatively brief and more easily settled, and making vassals more easily controlled, but on the
other hand it also ensured each local ruler had a strong base of power and thus prevented any
easy reunification of the Kingdom.

Strong kings in Nuestria and Austrasia, such as the Nuestrian King Chlothar II (654-663) and his
Austrasian contemporary Reginald of Tournai (643-661) would find their ambitions to reconquer
the broader Merovingian empire thwarted time and again. Weaker kings, such as those of
Aquitaine and Burgundy, would accordingly find their dominions chipped away. Province and
Narbo were lost, to the Isidorians and Visigoths respectively. In Aquitaine in particular the Gallo-
Roman nobility, still predominant in many places, was disloyal at best or outright conspiring with
the Isidorian Rector of Provence at worst.

It would be the efforts of one man which would provide the best hope for the reunification of the
Frankish Empire. The capable and crafty Mayor Bernard of Herstal was born in 671 to the
previous Mayor of the Palace, Arnulf. By 694, he would ascend to his father's position after
Pepin's untimely death in a hunting accident, advising the Austrasian King Theoderic III (668-
705) and later his successor, Childeric III. Beginning with Theoderic, he was able to take
advantage of the Nuestrian succession crisis after the death of Reginald of Tournai's feeble and
sickly son. Proposing a unification of the two realms, he persuaded several prominent nobles to
support Theoderic's claim on Nuestria - uniting the twin crowns in 700.

However, this would not be sufficient to ensure the longevity of the newly forged united realm.
Theoderic had two sons, Childeric and Clothair, and despite Bernard's arguments and pleading,
he refused to give a lesser portion of the inheritance to Clothair, the younger, insisting that
Frankish tradition and Salic law be upheld and nearly dismissing Bernard from his post for his
impertinence. As such at Theoderic's death, Neustria passed to Clothair, and thus effectively
into the hands of a coalition of Frankish nobles who sought to preserve their power through the
disunity of the realm. Clothair was bound to powerful aristocrats such as the Doux of Soissons,
whose family he married into.

Childeric's reign was preoccupied with the Saxons, who, pressed by the Slavs to their east, in
turn often sought to cross into the fertile Rhineland. The Franks of Austrasia were nevertheless
able to mobilize well-equipped, disciplined retainers and push back these tentative attempts.
While Childeric was able to repulse the Saxons with relative ease, it ensured that Bernard's
scheming would be for naught - he would not be able to arrange any additional diplomatic coups
as significant as momentarily uniting the two greatest of the Frankish Kingdoms. Bernard was
forced to resort to military force - attempting to overthrow Clothair in 709 without success, his
campaign forced to turn back to deal with a Saxon raid on the city of Koln.

The latter half of the 7th century and the early years of the 8th thus passed with few lasting
developments. The powerful landholding nobility was able to ensure that titles and rank
remained roughly hereditary, and in return they provided the Franks their services in war. While
this era is often seen as one of the consolidation of the various kingdoms, regional identities
were still shaky at best - each group of local landholders simply preferred a local king. Against
this inertia no unifying force prevailed. The Franks faced no existential threat which might have
compelled unification, and as such they continued their internecine squabbles.

The closest to an existential threat was the Slavs, and to call them such is a gross
overestimation of their capabilities. Yes, Hill-fort settlements and shrine-towns were blossoming
across much of what earlier generations might have called Germania, it was true. But this
growth was what ensured that they would make little forwards progress. Conquest was less
important to the typical West Slavic chieftain of the era than raiding, and while they proved a
potent threat to the Bavarians, Thuringians, and others, they were incapable of overrunning the
early castles and forts of these regions and establishing permanent dominion.

The one exception to this rule was the Pyritzan Tribe, who fled into the region the Romans
called Noricum to escape raids by the the growing confederacy of the Polans. They overrun the
Barvarian and Avar settlements there and made the mountainous, easily defensible terrain there
their home. The Pyritzans would be unique for their direct contact with the Isidorian Empire. The
chief of the Pyritzans, recorded as the Dravan-Knias Drahomir had received emissaries and
missionaries from Florentia and Rome by 710. While the missionaries were rebuffed, an avenue
for trade between the Roman and West Slavic worlds was established.

The Emperor and the Magister

Imperator Sergius Constantinus would pass away in 687 at the age of 68. On his deathbed, he
could look back on a long career, most of it spent at war, dramatically improving the fortunes
and power of the Isidorians. He had every reason to be confident these successes would
continue, except for the fact that Valerian Constantine, his son, was however, only twelve years
of age. The Isidorians, unlike their some of the Roman predecessors, viewed dynasty as more
important than the state. There could be no doubt that Valerian deserved the throne, and indeed
since the age of eleven he had been co-Emperor. However, the Isidorians, much as they prized
family, had a small one. Sergius was an only child, and Valerian was one as well, not to mention
small for his age and sickly. He had wide, innocent eyes and lacked the defined, regal features
of his parents.

But there were no other imperial candidates worth the consideration. Sergius' extended family
were a host of distant cousins, many of them patricians who had fallen victim to his purges or
military officers of middling rank. Valerian would have to do. But Sergius was not so confident as
to trust that his generals would ensure his legacy. His Magister Militum, Sebastianus, was
demoted from his position and later found strangled in his bath-tub, ostensibly by his mistress.
Sebastianus' second-in-command, Anatolius, was given the new title of Regent, and allowed to
choose the new Magister Militum himself. Sergius thus died imagining that he had done all he
could to secure the new state for his dynasty.

In a sense, he had. Anatolius had little desire to take the throne directly - he judged that such a
situation would lead to popular anarchy. It was better for him, much better, to enjoy near-
absolute power for at least the next four years or so - and quite possibly beyond that. Anatolius
was something of a paranoid man - he kept his generals busy with drills and plans of invading
Sicily or the Balkans that never fully reached fruition. In 690, he oversaw the clearing of several
pirate havens along the Adriatic coast, earning the wrath of local Avar chieftains who had a
mutually beneficial relationship with the havens.
This low-scale warfare, if nothing else, helped to train and justify Anatolius' expansion of the
Isidorian Fleet. As the Mauri waned, having a strong naval presence allowed the Romans to
increase their own position at the bargaining table. However, in 692, Anatolius would step down
as Regent, and the Emperor would take command. He had not grown into an impressive adult -
indecisive and charmless among his advisors, Anatolius was capable of continuing to dominate
the reigns of state as "Praeses of Rome" a position with broad authority, effectively outside of
the traditional hierarchy of command. Anatolius would cultivate a close relationship with the
Papacy as well, giving him both secular and religious power over the Isidorian state.

In this new position, Anatolius would raise a loyal cadre of officers around him. Those
commanders who might have posed a threat found themselves surrounded by moles and
disloyal catspaws. The only organization which he could not penetrate was the Xasari
Guardsmen, the foreign-born bodyguard of horsemen which under Sergius had been a potent
military force, and under Valerian played a largely ceremonial role. As outsiders from the
political establishment, Anatolius lacked a firm understanding of how to control them. They had
a certain xenophobic camaraderie which he could not penetrate with bribes or promises, and,
naturally fearing what he could not control, he rarely visited Florentia - limiting his own power
out of a worry that the Xasari might kill him in his sleep. However, the Magister Militum was in
his pocket, and with that he could issue orders in the young Emperor's name. This would prove
critical to the future success of the Romans.

In 702, King Constans of the Mauri appealed to the Papacy for aid. It was a decision not lightly
taken. The Miknasa and Hawwara tribes were pushing north along the coastline, cutting the
Mauri off from their Tripolitanian protectorates, and pressing hard into Byzacena, one of the few
remaining breadbaskets of the Mauri Empire. After the battle of Thysdrus, (701) the Mauri lords
were unwilling to take to the field. The raids contributed to a brutal famine, one of the worst in
decades. The Mauri of Carthage were forced to import food from Egypt while mere miles away
their Berber foes feasted.

Constans, unwilling to lose everything, hoped to preserve him own position, even if it was as
some vassal-king of the Roman Emperor. His ambassador in Rome appealed to a common
Roman and Christian heritage, and begged for assistance against the Berbers. "Lest we
become a new Constantinople, and Carthage's Churches turned to black temples to heathen
idols." Constans knew full well that such a move was effectively conceding his crown to the
Emperor in Florentia, but he felt there was little other option. The Mauri King's ambassador met
with Anatolius as well, and seems to have made an impression. Even before the Papacy made
any pronouncement, Roman soldiers were already on the move. However, Anatolius' terms
were harsh. The fabulously wealthy Berber Doux of Sicily, lost his position to one of Anatolius'
nephews. Two years later, the former Doux would see much of his vast fortune confiscated on
trumped-up charges and would be forced to flee into exile.

Some twenty thousand Roman soldiers landed in Carthage in 704, under the command of a
general named Julius Paulus, a lackey of Anatolius. However, even in the initial skirmishes the
Romans found themselves outmatched. The Berbers fought in lightly-equipped, fluid formations.
They refused to be pinned down or subjected to a charge of the heavily armored Roman
cavalry. While the Romans had fought such foes before, most notably the Avars, the rough
terrain into which the Berbers retreated favored them to a degree that the Romans were
unprepared for. Eventually, the Romans were forced to spread their army across Byzacena, a
strategy which saw measured success but limited their ability to go on the offensive.

Furthermore, Constans was continually chafing under new requirements coming from Florentia.
A magistrate was permanently posted in Carthage to oversee his "client kingdom" and Roman
garrisons had been shipped to Sardinia, Corsica and the Baleares. He was acutely conscious
that he lacked the manpower even to eject the Romans from North Africa. When famine loomed
for the second year in the row, his budget shortfalls (exacerbated by the tribute demanded by
the Emperor) became acute. He was forced to borrow heavily from his own merchants. One of
his few remaining generals of any caliber, Amesianus [Amezyan], having realized that Constans
had effectively betrayed the Mauri Kingdom, began to plot against the client king. Amesianus
was one of the old Mauri aristocracy. A Christian, he did not regard himself, as many of the
urban population did, as Roman. To him, and many of the remaining Mauri warriors, the
Romans were invaders just as much as the Berbers. As such, this faction ignored the pragmatic
considerations and launched a coup in 706 while most of the Roman army was away on
campaign in the south.

Constans was murdered in the coup and the Roman soldiers within Hippo Regius were taken
into custody. Acting before word of his rebellion could spread, Amesianus marched on Carthage
and the city opened its gates to him. His soldiers rushed to the harbor and fell on the Romans
there, slaughtering the unprepared sailors. Most of the fleet stationed in Carthage was seized,
but the Roman garrison and magistrate held out in the city's fortified barracks, distracting the
Mauri efforts and giving a few ships time to escape and spread word of the rebellion.

When the news reached Julius Paulus, he pulled back out of Byzacena and fell back to
Hadrumentum. He would from there ship back to Rome, along with his army. While the Mauri
had few forces to resist him, Anatolius had become nervous at the prospect of facing both the
Berbers and the African Mauri. The Roman expedition would return home in many respects a
costly failure. Securing Sicily and the other islands might well have been accomplished without
the vast expenditure of manpower to try to rescue a failing state.

As the Berber vultures circled the corpse of the Mauri state, the tenuous trade connections
between the European and West African worlds would become ever more attenuated. It had
been the Mauri who had incentivized the limited trans-Saharan networks. Without them, the
already difficult trade became less profitable. The new Berbers lacked access to the necessary
markets and lacked the centralization to keep the networks safe. Economically they were far
closer to mere subsistence, and were as likely to raid caravans as to sponsor them.

The Growth of West Africa

[note: I often use words like "Sahel" and whatnot to provide context. Obviously in this timeline
nobody would use an Arabic word to describe the savannah between the Sahara and the "forest
zone" but it helps I think, to ground the timeline. Otherwise I'd be trying to create an authentic
Mandé word for everything, confusing you and diverting me from the purpose of what I'm
writing.]

When the Savahilan explorer and missionary Bhadraksha of Vayubata came to the hill-forts and
thatched houses of the early Rutara-Ganda civilization, his memoirs record his irritation with the
peoples he encountered very clearly. "These people lack nothing that we possess save the
knowledge and skill to build great things... furthermore, [the clans] are in a land of teeming
abundance, with many cattle and good tools, and yet they are few in number indeed. I cannot
reconcile these truths." he mused, frustrated. His travelogues are informed by an abiding sense
of disappointment - he spent his life searching for the great kingdoms of the west, spoken of in
rumors distorted and changed over the course of their transmission across a continent.

Were he to find the places he sought, where the earliest native states were growing and
evolving, he would have had to travel far indeed, far further than he might have imagined. The
Rutara-Ganda of his time were newcomers, settlers whose mastery of iron and their land was
still rudimentary at best. Furthermore, their agricultural package had not yet been enhanced by
the introduction of Eurasian crops. Luxury agricultural crops, such as African Tea, had not yet
taken root either, leaving them isolated from the broader network of trade that had begun to
benefit the Cushite tribes of the coast. It should accordingly be little shock that an explorer like
Bhadraksha would see advanced civilization as an eastern phenomenon working its way west
slowly and haltingly. The west to him was an increasingly wild, unhealthy, disease-ridden affair.

However, in the west, across the great savannah and dense forests that stretched from the
Atlantic to the Chad basin, states were developing in relative isolation from the rest of the world,
giving birth to their own, distinctly African civilization. In 600, the peoples of West Africa had
founded many urban settlements and were interlinked by trade and commerce. Settled
civilization had existed for millennia, based around the domestication of sorghum and millet.
Ironworking as well had been known for perhaps a thousand years.

When we speak of the rise of West African civilization then, we must keep in mind this legacy.
The Mandé speaking peoples of the Sahel were numerous and spread across a large region.
While some historiography attributes to the Berber (specifically Tuareg) peoples a decisive role
in the foundation of the first true "states" in the Sahel, it is also entirely possible to see these
states as a natural outcome of growing population sizes and increasing urbanization - as urban
growth reached a critical mass, it was perhaps inevitable that certain cities should surpass
others and grow in power. While certainly Taureg raids (exacerbated as desertification
increased) played some role in the trend towards unification, they should not be considered the
sole cause for unification.

The role of the army was critical, in allowing early states such as Ghana and Kanem to establish
themselves. With military force, the cities of the savannah could subdue one another.
Accordingly some of the most privileged positions in these societies were those who supported
the military apparatus - horse-breeders and blacksmiths. Beyond brute force, the kings of cities
such as Ghana and Kaw-Kaw (Gao) cloaked themselves in elaborate ceremonial dress and
expected the ritual veneration of their subjects. With this divine legitimacy they set themselves
apart from the lesser kings and potentates they had conquered. The third pillar of these early
states was the economy - in Ghana, the mining of gold and salt was controlled entirely by the
state. In the east, the Zaghawa dynasty of Kanem, taxed their trade with the Makurians,
collecting tolls from all the customary posts for merchants on the border of their territory.

Ghana was the pre-eminient state of West Africa. Founded as a city-state by the Soninike
people, it expanded to control the broader country of the Mandé, between the Senegal and
Niger rivers. With a stranglehold on river-traffic and an advanced, semi-military apparatus based
around a semi-professional caste of soldiers, its hegemony was far from loose. However, as
trade from the north sputtered in the face of the decline of the Mauri state, it retained something
of an inward focus. Much like a sort of African equivalent of China, the Ghanan Kings found the
north impenetrable and dominated by nomads, and the south densely forested and equally
impenetrable. (Although in the case of the Ghana, it was that their famous cavalry were stymied
by the forests and biting insects of the south.)

However, trade could easily penetrate such barriers. As West Africa became more interlinked,
one of the great trade partners of the Ghanans were the many peoples who developed a
mound-building civilization around the Niger region, which, owing to geography was incapable
of unifying beyond the level of city-states. These walled cities functioned according to a primitive
form of democracy, where the men ceremonially elected a ruler, or Ozo, who in turn was
invested with power and by the wandering priestly class. These civilizations tended to face few
external threats and enjoyed some level of homogeneity. Nevertheless they based their
identities not on large groups and kingdoms, as the Mandé did to a certain degree, but on
locality and tribal affiliation.

It was a densely populated and fertile region, the "second center" of West African civilization.
Unlike many of the other coastal peoples, such as those of the Gold Coast, large population
densities allowed manufacturing to take off and a vibrant material culture to provide many
opportunities for trade. While there were scattered regional capitals and commercial centers
across the forest zone, it was around the Niger that a truly interwoven network of regional cities
developed and competed for pre-eminence.

To the west were a similar but distinct people - the Yoruba, organized in a single kingdom based
around the town of Ife. While they borrowed much of their patterns of social organization and
heavy stratification from the Niger cities, owing to geography they maintained a common
language and cultural identity. Ife was a ceremonial center for divine kingship and the worship of
a common pantheon of gods - as such it exercised a rough political hegemony over its
surroundings. The Yoruba built sophisticated walled cities and created beautiful art. Their legacy
would create a template for later kingdoms within the forest zone.

These civilizations developed in relative isolation from the Eurasian trade network. As Europe,
Asia, and the East of their continent maintained relatively constant contact and a steady stream
of goods, people, and ideas, they were left out. Accordingly they would develop a uniquely
African culture, one rather dimly aware of the world beyond the Sahara. While the educated elite
Kanem and Ghana might have had some notion of what lay beyond, a notion expanded
intermittently by Taureg merchants and the network of oases and waystations which connected
Kanem to Nubia, generally they saw little to gain in contact with the world across the ocean and
the desert.

[Despite this historical isolation, I intend that West Africa will nevertheless have a major role to
play in world history going forwards. I invite speculation on that topic.

And any other topic. Questions, comments? This post took a lot of detailed research, but I might
have still gotten some things wrong - especially with the Franks, who I don't know much at all
about.]

Subcontinental
Revolutions

If one element defined the collapse of the Maukhani, it was the persistence of state officials. The
bureaucracy, standing to some degree outside of caste or perhaps as a caste all its own, did not
simply dissolve with the fall of the Empire - in many ways there was simply nowhere for it to go.
Even the newly-arisen rivals of the Maukhani, the Andhra and the Pallava, employed similar
bureaucracies and professional guild armies. The bureaucratic class would play a critical role in
helping to preserve a sense of regional unity that went beyond the local community. The
vishyapatis and their legions of local magistrates and administrators would simply choose new
masters - the sangha guilds. The village of the sangha/ayat was not a self-sufficient entity but
part of a regional network. Regional specialization, coupled local guilds seeking to maximize
production (and thus profit) saw economic growth in the villages which translated to the capacity
to support ever larger urban populations.

Like the bureaucracy, numerous local dynasties survived the collapse as well - but as the
Maukhani had spent most of their history undermining the trend of emergent monarchism, these
dynasties were essentially powerless. Early in the eighth century, these otherwise feeble
dynasties often attempted to utilize the professional soldiers left over in the wake of the
dissolution of Maukhani authority to reassert their antique rights. In some localized cases, this
worked, but generally the soldiers were not swayed by the promise of enormous, hypothetical
land grants. The professional and guild soldiers were as much part of the Imperial system as the
bureaucrats. They were accustomed to ample payment and a generally comfortable lifestyle in
peacetime, and overthrowing the system which provided that appealed to them less than its
continuance.
As such, many of these dynasties simply ceased to exist. The new Indian polities had no need
for the old feudal dynasts whose sole claim to legitimacy was based in the defunct imperial
system. What replaced them was a complex system. The Sangha, or guilds, of local cities
formed associations and councils, often called the Ayat. These Ayat were essentially legislative
bodies responsible for the governance of a city-state. It was from among their number that the
new Rajas were chosen. The Rajas were typically the head of the bureaucracy, or a powerful
military guild leader, and were responsible for day-to-day governance. Generally they ruled for
life, although it was possible that they might be overthrown by a coalition of various guilds,
especially if the military faction turned against them.

Military guilds retained their position of social predominance. Their necessity to the function of
the state, especially in the early era of the collapse, ensured that they would have significant
power in the "constitutions" of most of these early states. This power ranged from significant
representation in the Ayat to outright rule through a Raja chosen from among their ranks. It was
the existence of military guilds which allowed the rough leagues of cities to become early states,
by consolidating and expanding their territory.

Tribal groups which had long enjoyed their unmolested privileges to exist on the fringes of
Indian civilization became the first target of these nascent states. Under the Maukhani these
groups had traditionally provided young men as soldiers and otherwise been left alone to
practice rural subsistence agriculture. The new order, however, lacking the vast resources of a
universal empire, was forced to appropriate their lands. While these tribes were often numerous
outside of the most developed areas, they were unable to respond to the full power of the guilds
being turned against them. Eventually, these tribal groups would find few options remained to
them in the rural hinterlands. Many of the displaced would slowly find their way to the cities,
further swelling their populations.

The story of the eighth century in India is perhaps most aptly defined as one of agrarian and
social revolution. Subsistence agriculture was on the decline as farming became an increasingly
guild driven affair based on internal export and surplus from profit. As farming became more
organized, efficiency skyrocketed. Guilds sought to maximize agricultural produce both for profit
and to jockey for position and favors within their state. Within the context of these agricultural
guilds, what profits and benefits they gained were distributed in a shockingly egalitarian manner
- profits were reinvested or distributed by popular consensus. However, it should be noted that
these rural communities typically had little say in the broader affairs of the state and furthermore
that hierarchies were still deeply prevalent, even in Buddhist areas.

The Sangha system would reach far beyond the old Maukhani. In south India, similar structures
became increasingly popular. Tamil monarchs sought to emulate the centralization and
organization that empowered their northern neighbors, while retaining their traditional privileges.
They were often successful to a certain degree, owing to the prevalence of mercantile cities
where Sangha-style governance was already prevalent. Curiously, the system seems to have
evolved spontaneously and independently in Southeast Asia. Trade based city-states such as
Srivijaya in Sumatra and Indranokura along the banks of the Mekong seem to have worked
along similar principles, forming hegemonic semi-republican empires.

However, in India, the period of local city-states as the highest level of organization ended
rapidly. By 730, political unification began en masse. Strong cities were able to exert their
influence over weaker ones. "Kingdoms" would begin to form around powerful central cities, and
conquests became more common. These new dominions typically bore the name of their
founding city or region, and in a shocking break from the past are typically identified by such
rather than by their dynastic name. In time, dynastic names would come into more prominent
use in some regions, particularly those where some continuity of dynasty existed.
The Khirichan
By the eighth century, the Sahu Shahdom had lost many of the traits which had allowed them to
dominate the western steppes in the first place. The very social changes which would ensure
the long term survival of their ethnic group had damned their state. The transition towards
sedentary urbanism and export trade distinguished them from so many of their fellow nomadic
peoples - and yet it also left them fundamentally vulnerable. Apart from the slavers and bandits
in the west, who remained warlike out of necessity and practicality, the martial edge of the Sahu
people was on the decline. Their retainers were more accustomed to managerial roles than
warfare, and only the more traditionalist of the nobility decried this situation, blaming it on the
pacifism of Buddhism or the decadence that wealth brought. Attempts by the monarchy to rectify
this situation through the hiring of Turkish mercenaries proved costly and too little too late.

In the summer of 695, Shah Vashtawar II of the Xasar-Sahu was defeated in a major battle by
Khagan Ozmis of the Khirichan Turks. For the first time, the Turks would cross in numbers over
the Rav [Volga] rivers. They would lay siege to Apaxauda and obtain its submission. Vashtawar
would become a tributary. The Sahu, many tribes of whom were entirely sedentary by this point,
folded with remarkable swiftness. Those were had retained a larger portion of their nomadic
origins fled westward, but most would eventually be incorporated into the Khirichan
confederacy.

Ozmis Khagan was remarkably lenient in victory. The Sahu possessed great wealth, both from
their irrigated farmland in the fertile soils around Danube, and from the trade that flowed through
their cities. As a child Ozmis had been raised as a hostage with the Sahu, and possessed an
appreciation for trade and the comfortable life to be found in the wealthy, high-walled cities his
new subjects had raised out of the trackless steppe. Rather than pillaging and destroying what
he encountered, he took a long view his successors would share - the Khirichan had much to
gain from leaving the Sahu intact. In the west, the Khagan retained Sahu tribal leaders as
"Satraps", tributary to the Khagan. In the east, rule was more direct, but the greater cities were
left with a great deal of autonomy, paying extravagant tribute but managing their own affairs.

The Khirichan would breathe fresh life into the Sahu. Eager to expand their influence amongst
the Slavic tribes, they expanded northward, building an immense limestone fortress-city called
Adeshi upriver from Apaxauda, and similar fortresses along the Danube and Don. They built
regular waystations to provide safety for travelers and link the various arterial rivers which
provided the primary form of transportation for Sahu commerce. Within a generation the
Khirichan would find themselves assimilated to a large degree, adopting Sahu religion and
manner of dress. While they retained their language, the assimilation reached a point where
Roman merchants from Anatolia often had trouble distinguishing the two ethnic groups, and
would simply call both "Scythians".

The Khirichan maintained close relations with both the Oadhyan and Rhom Empires to their
south. In 703, Ozmis' heir, Ishbara married an Oadhyan princess, and both empires would
engage in significant trade. Several similar marriages between the Oadhyan and the Rhomi
cemented a sort of three-way alliance organized around preserving a rough status-quo. The
rulers of all three powers would remain in semi-regular correspondence, and by 710 the Shah of
Syria would join their ranks. Relative peace had returned to the Eftal world.

The Crossroads of Civilization - 680-720

It is perhaps not an exaggeration to call Shah Toramana of Syria the true founder of the
Oadhyan Empire. Mihiraban was the author of the rebellion, but it was Syrian warriors that
provided the manpower necessary to carve out the Empire. Accordingly, Tormana gained certain
spoils in victory from the grateful Oadhya monarch. The well-fortified city of Nasibin was ceded
to him, and Mihiraban respectfully addressed him as "elder brother" in their correspondence,
sending him elaborate "gifts" during festival seasons which amounted to repayment of the
financing Tormana had provided. His successor would continue this tradition until 696.

Syria was a sort of second Eftal heartland, away from the Iranian plateau. The original Syriac
population were almost a minority now, outnumbered by the various nomadic tribes who had
settled there over the course of Eftal history. Alans, Turks, Gaoche, Asvha, and many others had
come to their land and in time all had come to consider themselves first and foremost Eftal.
They had made the backbone of Heshana's and the vanguard of the Eftal wars with the Roman
Empire. Though relatively poor compared to many of the kingdoms around them, they had a
strong martial legacy.

The Syrian Eftal, much like those of Rhom, could be called Buddhists, but theirs was a
Buddhism heavily influenced by their traditional Iranian deities, and the worship of several Hindu
gods, typically in more central asian forms. Shiva and Kubera were some of the most popular.
The intercession of war gods such as Vraham and Mihir was also prominent, as was the Sun
god Hvar, who had several festival days throughout the year. Tir and Nahid both functioned as
fertility deities. These gods and the ceremonies associated with them played a critical role in
upholding the synthesized culture traditions of the Syrian Eftal and defining them as separate
from the Christianized Syrian subjects over which they ruled, while the Buddhist theology
provided deeper meaning and a philosophical element which otherwise would have been
lacking.

The Eftal of Syria were not an urban people. Pastoralism was common, and those who
considered themselves to be urban lived in rural castle-palaces which were little more than
fortified towns. They largely eschewed the cities, and since the passing of Akhsaman the Elder
increasingly viewed their relations to Tormana in the same feudal context as did the Oadhyans.
While this decentralized, feudal system made them difficult to conquer, it also made gathering
tax revenues difficult. The Syrian monarchy was relatively poor. Most of its subjects preferred to
contribute soldiers rather than money, and they looked with envy on their wealthier neighbors.

It would not be until roughly 710 that overland commerce began to be a significant part of the
Syrian economy. With few cities of any note, the monarchy depended on tolls garnered from
riverine trade up the Euphrates for income. As the Oadhyans remained at peace along their
western frontier, a trickle of the regions historic trade was restored, bringing a limited measure
of prosperity to a widely impoverished region.

To the south, the Emesa Shahdom was wealthy but militarily weak. Akhsaman the Younger
ruled cities such as Tyros and Damascus that had largely avoided any sacks. The city of Emesa
was still an opulent example of Syavush's legacy, golden-domed and shining, but Akhsaman
could not call on many Eftal retainers. Forced to manage a large population with only the
support of a small ruling elite, like his predecessors he turned to the Arabs for assistance. In
707, Akhsaman, an aging man, would convert to Nestorian Christianity and remarry into the
Tayy tribe. The great Sun Temples of Emesa would be turned into Churches, their iconography
smashed and replaced with images of Christ and Mary.

Akhsaman's new wife, Fatima, brought with her an implicit promise of support from the Tayy,
one which kept both the Heshanids in the south and the Syrians in the north at bay, and as the
Tayy found themselves pressured by the growing power of the Saihists, southern Syria formed a
safe haven to which many would flee. For a time, there was peace throughout the near east.
The Syrians and Emesa remained on good terms, Toramana and Akhsaman having been good
friends as children. The Heshanids did not wish to upset the status quo and potentially harm
their trade prospects, and furthermore had always maintained good relations with the Tayy.

However, when Akhsaman died in 713, the Heshanids pressed their ancestral claim on Emesa,
their one-time capital. King Timotheos Heshana denounced the Akhsamanids as usurpers and
traitors to their dynasty, who sided with Artavazda against their rightful Shah, and sent his army
north, where they encountered minimal resistance. The Monophysite population of Phoenicia
and Syria greeted them as liberators, and many of the Eftal fled north, where they were
welcomed by Toramana. After a brief siege, Emesa fell and the Heshanid Empire reached its
greatest extent since the time of Syavush.

Toramana, for his part, spent his last years worrying about the power of the Heshanids. Syria
was the last province of theirs that they did not control. However, he would pass away in 717,
leaving the throne to Avyaman Kithara, a nephew on his wife's side and a prominent landholder
who he viewed as a strong warrior and a traditionalist. His choice was clearly made out of fear
of the Heshanids, but it was viewed as an insult by his only son, Mahijada, who shortly after the
pronouncement would sail north with a group of followers, seeking his fortune among the Avars.

Consolidation and Expansion

In 680, the greater region of Armenia was divided into two Khanates. Both had emerged out of
the anarchy of the Eftal collapse, and both were an affront to the Oadhyan Empire, frequently
raiding and threatening the security of the northern border. Accordingly, after several years of
consolidation, Mihiraban went north and defeated both in turn. Balgatsin Khan, once a great
warlord, had become fat with age and ruled a territory wracked with internal rebellions. His
counterpart, the so-called "Eastern Alan Khanate" was a patchwork of tribal leaders who were
incapable of mounting a determined resistance. By 686, two years after the beginning of
Mihiraban's campaign, they were defeated and annexed. Local Armenian landholders were
elevated to Vayanates and garrisons were established in the major cities. When Mihiraban
returned south to Ahmatan, he had every reason to feel triumphant.

However, this was a high water-mark, though Mihiraban could not have known it. His campaign
against the Alans was the last major offensive campaign of the Oadhyan Empire, and the last
time he would leave his palace in Ahmatan. He would spend the next seven years of his life
wracked with an "illness of the mind" and finally would die in 693. His son, Mihiragula, would
take the throne. Young, bright, and energetic, Mihiragula would find his talents squandered by
events he had little personal control over. Turkish raids along the Eastern border preoccupied
much of his time, and his vassals proved unruly. They had followed Mihiraban unquestioningly,
but their loyalty was largely personal, and unlike Satraps, rebellious lords could not merely be
recalled to Susa as an Eftal Emperor might have done.

Throughout the Eftal world, trade bloomed once more, but it was limited compared to what had
once been. The great cities of Mesopotamia recovered only haltingly, and most of the
agricultural potential of Iran was squandered by pastoralists. Without the great urban centers of
the past, the production of domestic luxury goods was largely the province of monasteries, one
of the few institutions which maintained a continuity between the Eftal and Oadhyan eras. These
monasteries, as in Christian Europe, also provided responsibilities for the Persian learning of
the Eftal Golden Age, ensuring that history and scientific discoveries would not be entirely lost.
Accordingly, Mihiragula was a great patron of Buddhism, in a more pure form than the
synthesized teachings of the west. A vegetarian and a relatively pacifistic man, these traits did
not earn him the love even of his Buddhist vassals, many of whom paid merely lip-service to
these aspects of their religion.

Ruling until 723, Mihiragula's thirty-year reign is perhaps best remembered as a time of peace.
While those vassals on the eastern and southern borders were forced to contend with Turkish
and Arabic raids, the decentralized system if nothing else made it difficult for these raids to gain
traction. Local forces were capable of stopping most incursions, even as the state apparatus
remained small. The era was also characterized by the continued construction of great
fortifications where the tribal elite could feel safe from pillaging raiders and also any
encroachment of the monarchy upon their newly-gained privileges.

[I have to confess I'd

intended Mahijada to sort of fall off the radar after that post, but Bmao inspired me. So here's a
little history of his younger years, combined with a details about what's going on in Pannonia.]

Avars and Xasars

It is said that in the first years of his exile, the Prince Mahijada came to the city of
Constantinople. With him came many companions, perhaps fifty men in all, including his
childhood friend Narse and his bodyguard Artakhsatr. They were mostly young and warlike, the
retainers of the would be Shah. Mahijada, beloved-of-the-gods, did not match their
temperament. He was a holy and refined man, overly severe perhaps, but he had a gift for
inspiring devotion in his followers.

Hosts of the Rhom Shah, they dined in sumptuous excellence in the golden halls of the rebuilt
Imperial Palace. Disiapata, the Rhom Shah, saw in Mahijada an excellent opportunity. If he
could unseat the Syrian Shah, Rhom would have both a fresh source of manpower and a strong
buffer against any incursions from the East. However, in 718, but a few months after their
arrival, Disiapata would die and with him Mahijada's hopes of reclaiming his throne. Where
Disiapata had been bold and decisive, his son Datuvahya, though not untalented, was
indecisive and relied on his father's able councilors. A taker of the drug the Hindis called charas
and a drunkard to boot, he personally gave Mahijada little hope that Syria would ever be
recovered.

So he went north, and perhaps half of his remaining companions followed him. For those who
did not there were places in the retainer of Shah Datuvahya. For those who followed him, Avar
country beckoned, with its lush verdant valleys and sweeping yellow plains.

Under its latest ruler, Amurtay Khagan, the Avar Empire was crumbling. Xasar warlords fled over
the Carpathians to escape the Turks, and Slavs from both the north and the south raided their
borders. Langobardia had been lost. The Isidorians could strike with impunity in Dalmatia, and
the economy, always dependent on a degree of aggression from the Khaganate, had stagnated.
Furthermore, the Avar were poorly positioned to take advantage of the newly developing trade
routes. Amurtay was a capable ruler but like most of the Avar Khagans he was a traditionalist
and a warrior. His minor victories along his various frontiers were irrelevant because he could
not face all of the various threats his realm faced at once, and he had no understanding of how
to address the underlying problems.

In 721, Prince Mahijada arrived in Srem, the Avar capital (formerly Sirmium) and Amurtay
eagerly hired him on as a sort of advisor and mercenary. The Prince wasted little time in riding
east and meeting the many Xasar-Sahu chiefs who had brought their tribes into Avar territory.
While he could not speak to them except with the help of a translator, he conveyed to them his
own story. Like them, he was an exile. Like them, he longed for home but this was a land of
opportunity. They could accomplish far more working with the Khagan than against him.

Turning the nomadic tribes into an army was no easy task, but Mahijada had been groomed to
rule from a young age, and he had not forgotten those lessons in exile. Culturally the Xasar-
Sahu and Eftal had much in common, and this helped him to be accepted as a leader. Within
two years, he had bound the Xasari into a loose confederation - ostensibly mercenaries who
would serve the Khagan, and pay token tribute rather than raid. They received large grants of
land for pasture, which effectively amounted to a recognition of their new homeland. Then,
leaving Narse in Srem as an advisor, the prince led a picked group of the Xasar north against
the Slavs.
On this campaign, lasting from 724 to 726, he turned those warriors he brought north into a
disciplined army, united by shared experience rather than divided by tribal identity. Riding
against the Kniaz of the Vistulan tribe, he dealt them a crushing blow in the field and proceeded
to siege hill-fort after hill-fort, carrying off captives and wealth and obtaining the personal
submission of the Kniaz. Leaving a garrison in Wislica, their capital, under the command of his
bodyguard Artakhsatr, he rode down the length of the Vistula river, conquering the Masovians in
turn. There, on the broad plains of Masovia his cavalry were even more effective, but he
struggled to take the large and well-fortified towns into which the people retreated.

Although he had little intent to remain in the north, his victories proved his quality to the Avar
Khagan, and perhaps most importantly the quality of the Xasar. Having earned the Khagan's
trust, he would spend subsequent years at court, and as time went on his ambition to return
home was slowly forgotten. He decided he would make his legacy here, in this country. Destiny,
dharma, had chosen a different course for him.

Sklavenia

Two generations after the official independence of the Three Slavic Kingdoms, trouble was
brewing. Eprius, always the smallest and weakest of the kingdoms, had seen its nobility benefit
the least from the Mediterranean revival of trade. Apart from a few coastal cities, it was hilly,
thickly forested country which was perfect for bandits and brigands. It was in Epirus that the last
pagan holdouts remained, raiding their wealthy Thessalonian and Thracian neighbors, much to
the consternation of the Eprioite Kniaz.

Like their northern cousins, who before the coming of the Isidorian Navy had established pirate
havens in hidden coves along the Dalmatian coast, these raiders disrupted both commerce and
the settled agrarian peoples rather indiscriminately. While theoretically the local nobles should
have been responsible for settling this threat, in practice they either failed or found it easier to
simply take a cut of the plunder and look the other way as their neighbors were raided. Finally,
in 716, the situation reached the breaking point. The Langobards to the north petitioned the
Thessalonian Kniaz, Boris, to handle the situation or they would be forced to invade Epirus - a
threat which would invariably drag the entire Balkans into war on one side or the other.

Boris gathered his retainers and levies and marched into the Epiroite hills. To counter this
incursion, the raiders gathered en masse under the charismatic Gostislav, and in an ambush
destroyed or captured much of the army's baggage, before melting into the hills and local
communities. Embarrassed and frustrated, Boris ordered the torching of any local village where
"signs of unbelief" were apparent. These signs were broad and wide-ranging, and often were
merely an excuse for his soldiers to gather fresh provisions and a little loot.

The Epiroite Kniaz, Stylianus, was forced to take action. He gathered his own retainers and
linked up with Gostislav's brigands, persuading the bandits that together they could repulse the
invaders and that Gostislav and his men could become wealthy landowners in Thessalonica. He
was no fanatic, he told them, foaming at the mouth to slaughter heathens. They could keep their
old gods if they named Christ among their number. Gostislav, fearing the alternate was a two
front war he could not win, and knowing that many of his old bases of operation had been
destroyed by Prince Boris, accepted the terms reluctantly. The two armies linked up and moved
to defeat Boris. At the Battle of Ohrid (716), Gostislav's irregular bandits were incapable of
holding a line against the determined charge of Boris' heavy horse, and the battle was lost. The
Epiroite Kniaz was captured along with many of his nobles, and they were made to swear fealty
to the Thessalonian crown. All of the bandits taken alive were impaled on stakes as an example
to future rebels - one which seems to have horrified and cowed Stylianus, who returned to Arta
a broken man.

Boris' campaign had been successful beyond his wildest dreams. Knowing the Avar Khagan
was distracted, he followed up on his victory by taking both his own army and the Epiroite forces
north, capturing the Langobard capital at Dekateria in 718. The Langobard Doux, Arechis II, was
made yet another vassal. When word of this conquest reached Amurtay Khagan, who had been
in the north fighting the Sorbs, he sent a emissary south, inciting the Thracian Kniaz Casamir III
to join him. Together, they proposed to divide the Thessalonian kingdom between themselves,
with the Avars regaining Langobardia and part of Epirus, and the Thracians taking the rest.

However, from the start the alliance was deeply divided. Casamir, deeply devout as his father
and grandfather had been, refused to trust the heathen Khagan one iota. He immediately
deviated from the agreed-upon plan and instead marched directly on Thessalonia, wagering that
Boris and Amurtay would distract each other in the north until he had completed his coup de
grace. However, his wager would be wrong. In a lightening campaign Boris advanced on Srem
and the outnumbered Khagan retreated, biding his time until Casamir would arrive - but as Boris
closed in and his ally was nowhere to be found, he agreed to accept the loss of Langobardia in
exchange for a large sum to be paid in golden Roman coins and a select group of hostages,
including Boris' third son, Simeon.

Then Boris marched south and, as summer turned into autumn his force reached Thessalonia.
Casamir broke his siege and retreated north, but Boris smashed his army in a five day running
battle. Casamir fled to Adrianople and after a long siege the city was finally taken and subjected
to a brutal sack. The prince's body was never found, and with much of the leading Thracian
aristocracy dead in the wake of the siege, Boris took his time reducing their castles and villas
one after another, before apportioning them to his loyal soldiers.

When he returned to Thessalonica, he was crowned by the Bishop there as Autocrat Boris I,
Grand Prince of All Sklavenia and the Langobards.

Migration and Urbanism in the Avar "Empire"

The latter rulers of the Avar Empire have been rather dimly received by later history. As the
distinction between the broader populace of the Avars and the Slavic people they ruled
diminished, the monarchy and its associated clique looked more and more to a disappearing
Turkic heritage. As their federate vassals began to convert to Christianity, they based their
identity more and more around Tengri and their ancestors. This amounted to little more than a
reactionary holding action against demographic trends that were simply not in their favor.

The growth of cities such as Mundraga, Belgrad, and Chernagrad speak to an increasingly
Slavic civilization growing along the Danube - one which did not necessarily associate itself with
the petty kingdoms that would become Sklavenia, but nevertheless was distinct from the
diminishing semi-nomadic culture of the Avars. The Danube basin was fertile and could support
a not insignificant sedentary population. A curious assimilation would transpire as a result - a
people who called themselves Avar or Bulgar, but were largely Nicene Christians of Slavic
ancestry whose architecture and art was a blend of both styles with the Roman heritage of the
region.

Into this curious cultural breeding ground plunged thousands of Xasar-Sahu migrants fleeing the
Turks to the east. While the majority of the Xasar-Sahu would remain in their homelands and
accept their new rulers, mass displacements nevertheless occurred. Primarily Buddhist and
Iranian in origin, they were numerous enough to overwhelm the still semi-nomadic Avar
population of the Trans-Carpathians and much of the Tisza river basin. These less urban
regions were more vulnerable to their conquest, and were easily assimilated. This assimilation
was followed by a revival of the Xasar urban tradition, reflected in the establishment of cities
such as Biharabad (on the Tisza) and Shahidjan (near the ruins of Roman Aquincum).
Shahidjan in particular would prosper, owing to its critical position along the Danube.

As the Xasar settled regions which were the traditional powerbase of the monarchy, their loss
was crippling. The fact that the Avars would ultimately subdue the Xasar and persuade them to
serve as mercenaries did not solve the crisis but in fact only exacerbated it - by legitimizing and
utilizing the Xasar the Khagan essentially put the stability of his state into their hands. By
allowing them to settle and raise fortified cities in his territory, the Khagan allowed the
newcomers to entrench.

The Khagan attempted to remain aloof, embracing neither the new Xasari arrivals or his Slavic
population. But the arrival of the exiled Eftal Prince Mahijada, himself a Buddhist, would begin to
swing Amurtay Khagan's opinion in favor of the Xasari, alienating the majority of his
population...

China: 690-750

[It's important to note that China was almost totally united under the Liang dynasty lasted for
some time in this timeline, and accordingly Buddhism became an even more pervasive element
of Chinese culture, particularly in the South. As such, the gradual turn of the elite against
Buddhism which happens in this timeline is deeply divisive, moreso than any equivalent in OTL.

However, last time I wrote about China I realized the depth of my ignorance on everything Sinic.
Here's hoping this post avoids any obvious pitfalls. If not, just understand I'm not really an
expert on the subject and explain to me what I've done wrong and I can work on retconning it.]
In Chang'an, the court of the Great Qi was deeply shaken by their defeats against the Bod
Empire. That threats might have emerged out of Tibet, a poor land and sparsely peopled, was
baffling to them. That those same threats might actually overrun their western borders and come
within striking distance of the capital had seemed impossible. And yet it had happened. When
he received the news, the Emperor withdrew into solemn contemplation among his beautiful
gardens, a labyrinth of gilded courtyards designed to be a reflection of each province of his
empire in miniature. Action would have to be taken.

The Qi armies were vast, numbering hundreds of thousands of conscript soldiers around a
central core of steppe mercenaries. Maintained by what was perhaps the most efficient and
elaborate bureaucracy in the world, it seemed impossible to the scholars and clerics of the Qi
court that such a thing could happen. The Prime Minister, Wang Qinming, was forced to resign
in disgrace and retire from public service altogether, going into voluntary exile. One of the last of
the "Dharma Faction" Qinming and his allies were part of a dwindling minority of devout Chan
Buddhists at court. Henceforth the scholar-gentry would take a marked turn towards
Confucianism.

The latest Qi Emperor, Yang Sizhi (Gaozong) had presided over an era of artistic and cultural
achievement. Poetry, literature, and philosophy reached unparalleled heights - the large
educated scholarly class was extremely prolific. A patron of the Confucian philosophy to which
the majority of his court scholars ascribed, he became part of a growing movement to resist
foreign influence, a movement which only gained strength as the Tibetan and Uighur threats
became more pronounced along the frontier. As an alternative to Buddhism, Taoist schools were
promoted to the common people. While earlier Emperors had ruled according to Buddhist
precepts and as "Universal Rulers" in line with the concept of the Chakravartin was under Yang
Sizhi that the scholarly elite made a sharp turn away from Buddhism.

Whatever Yang Sizhi's personal opinion on the military (and in all probability he wished to
support it) his predecessors had created too many institutions specifically designed to hamstring
the army. The complex bureaucracy favored divisions of military commands, and he could not in
many cases overcome the institutional inertia he faced. Commanders were frequently shuffled
to new positions, and units were disarmed and disbanded after a mere three short years,
meaning that the majority of soldiers up to and including officers of medium rank had no
experience with actual combat. Higher officers were often drawn from the scholarly bureaucracy,
typically local magistrates who ideally were familiar with the areas in which they were assigned.
While this made the military an effective police force and capable of dealing with bandits and
insurrections, it crippled it in actual combat.

The warrior-aristocracy of Tibet cut through unprepared, poorly-equipped formations of Qi

soldiers with ease, and in the several times that the army was faced with incursions from the
northern Turks, it only handled these situations with overwhelming numbers. This need for
overwhelming numbers placed an extreme strain on the logistical backbone of the Qi state - a
smaller army would have needed far less food and fodder. The peasants who represented the
backbone of the economy were placed under immense strain during any time of crisis.

The mood of the Imperial court was one of siege. An attempt to regain lost ground against the
Buddhists in 730 had been met with a series of unmitigated disasters. Hundreds of thousands of
men had been lost in the mountain passes. Their ghosts would be said to linger for generations
to come, lost and far from home. The Tibetans represented by one of the many of the ways in
which the outside war was coming to China. The very mercantile economy that brought
immense prosperity to some was decried by the scholar-gentry.

The Qi economy was supported by its trade. Exports such as silk, lacquerware, and porcelain all
were traded to eager merchants from the west. While many of these goods were produced in
other parts of the world as well, the Chinese produced these goods to a standard of remarkable
quality, and few other nations could match the sheer volume of production which left their ports.
In return came spices, pearls, jewels, horses and many other luxuries from the west. The trade
of technology also spread both ways. The first chairs and stools arrived in China around this
time, and revolutionary techniques for metalworking and silversmithing were adopted from the
Indians. Tamil and Srivijayan merchants would disseminate paper and the woodblock printing
press to the world. However, these merchants also were yet another sign of the many foreign
influences at war with tradition. As such, the scholar-gentry despised this growing trade and
made several efforts to curtail it, establishing strict quota limits and heavy tariffs.

However, chief among the foreign influences loathed by this new class of scholar-gentry was
Buddhism, which had enjoyed lavish state support, ever since the Liang dynasty. The
monasteries were vast and perhaps most important tax exempt and in the eyes of the state
totally unproductive. Many were effectively fortresses in their own right, divorced from the
government around them, more opulent than the local estates. The bureaucrats saw them and
the "Thousand Temples" as sinks into which revenue was poured in generous donations.
Dissolving them would bring both purity and provide the government with much needed
revenue. The question was... how? The monasteries were critical sources of charity and aid to
the impoverished. Some even kept retainers of warriors. If persecution were to begin, it would
have to be carried out in a single stroke.

Plans were made, and distributed in sealed scrolls to the provinces. In the capital, soldiers were
gathered. Thousands of copies of the imperial proclamation were press-stamped and riders
prepared to distribute them throughout the Empire. "Is this not the creed," the documents asked,
"that abolishes the loyalty of sons to fathers, that breaks the bonds between brothers, and those
of men to the state?"

With the death of Yang Sizhi, his successor, Yang Xulun (Ruizong) took power, determined to
enact his father's will. In certain writings from his time as one Prince among many in the Imperial
court, it can be seen that he was virulently anti-buddhist from early in his life. In 743, he
dissolved the monasteries and turned the military, a fearsome organization when it came to
local enforcement of Imperial proclamations, against the temples and monasteries.
The wealth seized was astronomical. Monasteries were overturned with limited resistance, and
the wealth and treasure taken was carted back to Chang'an en masse. For a time, the
budgetary woes of the Empire seemed solved. The "great unproductive class" was sent to the
fields to become tillers of the soil. To those in power, it seemed perhaps too good to be true. And
it was.

The Great Rebellion: 748-764

The impact of Sima Zhixen's "Great Rebellion" has often been greatly exaggerated by
contemporary historians, and perhaps not without good reason. For those who survived to tell of
the war, it might well have seemed to take on apocalyptic proportions. The state was torn apart
and left vulnerable to the raids of the Uighurs and the Tibetans. Frontier provinces such as
Annam rose in rebellion and were not retaken. The Mandate of Heaven seemed lost. Most
cruelly, millions of peasants lost their lives to war and famine. The disruption of the Qi state
allowed a state of near total anarchy to develop across a huge swathe of their Empire for some
sixteen years.

The rebellion had its beginnings in the prosecution of Buddhists. While traditionally a nonviolent
sect, the religion had a history of uprisings against the state that could not be denied. Agitators
and zealots reformers such as the renegade monk Faqing (515) and militant social reformers
such as Xiang Huaigu (664) seized upon the potential of the religion to motivate others to
violence or resistance. Charismatic preachers claiming to be the Maitreya Buddha were a
phenomenon the state was well acquainted with. However, the scale of this rebellion was truly
unprecedented, and the degree to which it yoked even those without Buddhist affiliations to its
cause startled the scholar-gentry.

Two major factors contributed to the early success of the rebellion: the general dissatisfaction of
the peasant class with the frequency of conscription and exorbitant taxes, and the weakness of
the Qi army, which allowed the rebellion to spread and prosper.

Beginning in Huainan, the rebellion quickly gained the allegiance of many former monks, a large
percentage of whom had become itinerant beggars or otherwise struggled to find a position in
society. As the enigmatic figure at the center of the rebellion, Sima Zhixen cultivated a mystical
air around him, claiming powers and while he never outright assumed the mantle of the
Maitreya Buddha, he never refuted those who claimed he was more than another man. His
message was simple and compelling. It was a message of populism and reform mixed with
religious grievance. By striking against Buddhism, the monarchy warred against truth itself and
thus inherently had lost the Mandate of Heaven. It was time for another to claim that mantle.
Sima Zhixen never gave the slightest hint that his personal ambition was to take the Imperial
Throne, merely that the time of the Qi was past. The failed wars of the past half century seemed
to agree.
Armies were sent east to crush the growing ring of "brigand" control around Huainan. Drawing
troops off the northern frontier, the suppression of the rebellion was entrusted toGongsun Yajing,
a newly-promoted general who arrived at the outskirts of the city with his troops in near-total
disarray. Yajing launched a series of three attacks over the course of 748, each one a costly
failure. Ultimately, a large contingent of his soldiers would mutiny, murder him and join the
rebellion rather than participate in a fourth attack. The rebellion swelled, moving south like
wildfire. In the south Buddhism had always enjoyed the greatest popularity, a legacy of the
Liang Emperor.

Ultimately, the greatest victors of the rebellion would be the Uighurs and the Tibetans, both of
whom increased their own position at the expense of the Qi. The Tibetans themselves would
sack Chang'an in 751. The Annamese rebellion of 749 would prove an enormous bloodbath for
the southern Governor-Generals tasked with recovering it, and ultimately the Annamese would
gain their independence in 751. The Emperor would flee to Xiangzhou and the city of Chang'an
would perhaps never fully recover, although it became the Imperial capital again after peace
was signed with Tibet in 756.

The rebellion itself would end ingloriously. Sima Zhixan was assassinated for unknown reasons
in 761, and within three years his entire rebellion, perched on the verge of triumph, would
crumble inwards into infighting. Many armies switched from ideologically justified revolt to mere
pillaging of the countryside, establishing petty warlord kingdoms which rarely lasted longer than
a few months before collapsing inwards. The Buddhist factions turned against each other in
doctrinal civil war.

The main reason the Qi were able to hold out at all was a series of major military reforms. Gone
were the unreliable conscript armies, replaced with Turkic mercenaries funded by the previous
pillaging of the monasteries. Over time, these mercenaries were called upon to train a new
professional military corps out of peasant volunteers. Unlike the conscripts, which returned
home regularly, these professionals, though they might have suffered badly in their initial
engagements were able to accumulate experience in combat and ultimately become a strong
standing force. The Qi learned from their mistakes, and their new professional armies, backed
by a large foreign cavalry contingent, were far superior to the peasant mobs arrayed against
them.

By the time the final rebel stronghold of Yangzhou fell to a bloody sack in 764, the Emperor
Ruizong had extended tolerance to all faiths at the recommendation of his advisors. While the
loss of the monasteries was keenly felt in the intellectual traditions of the south, and many sects
would never fully recover, this tolerance maintained the peace, even if simmering undercurrents
of resentment remained. Taoism would grow in popularity, especially in the north and east,
where it would largely eclipse the role of Buddhism in society. The bureaucracy, shattered by the
war, was restructured into the "Six Departments" and given a mandate to work more closely with
local community leaders. Slowly but surely, the Qi would recover.
 Rise and Fall - the
Western Mediterranean at a turning point

In Florentia, the return of Great Legate [a unique Isidorian term for field commanders with broad
authority but no assigned "theatre" as a doux might have]Julius Paulus was greeted with
celebration. The army's morale, beaten down by betrayal and their "march to the sea"
skyrocketed when they returned home greeted as heroes and conquerors. Emperor Valerian
bestowed upon him tremendous accolades, and, after the death of his wife Claudia a year later
in childbirth (bearing the Emperor a sickly daughter who would not survive her third year), he
would marry the successful General's niece, Syagria.

Despite Julius Paulus' vast lack of success, his campaigns had allowed small expeditions to
seize power across all of the Mauri overseas territories. The Isidorian fleet had even captured
the bulk of the Mauri fleet, which, seeing the way the winds were blowing, defected wholesale.
However, Sicily, the real prize, lay in a sense outside of Imperial hands. Anatolius, still
predominant as Praeses of Rome and still holding the ear of the Magister Militium, Cosmas,
was able to appoint his nephew as Doux of Sicily. In his position of poorly defined and near-
absolute power, Anatolius still controlled the reins of power even despite his Emperor's middle-
age.

Anatolius, nearing seventy, could look back on a long and successful career - a massive
expansion of the Empire which had profited himself and his family immensely, and near total
dominion over a weak Emperor who had never had the strength to confront his stranglehold on
the avenues of power. However, in his old age he began to slip. He did not properly identify
Julius Paulus as the threat he was - and would not until too late. Nor did he recognize Cosmas'
betrayal until too late. One day he merely awoke to find soldiers beating down his door. His
body, and the bodies of his immediate family would never be found. The Doux of Sicily fled to
Constantinople, where he would live out a comfortable exile among the Rhom Shahs as a
mercenary commander. Julius would ascend to the rank of Doux and Cosmas would become
the new power behind the throne.

Still relatively young, able, and energetic, Cosmas turned his attention to consolidation.
Expanding the military-bureaucracy into the newly conquered territories was the first step. The
assimilation of the Mauri was aided by the fact that they considered themselves to be in large
part Roman, and many were descended from Roman settlers, speaking a intelligible dialect of
Latin. However, they nonetheless posed a threat to public order. As more and more Mauri with
means fled to Sicily, they couched their abandonment of the state in elaborate tales of atrocity.
Churches were defiled by pagan rites, and Christians were nailed to posts by their entrails or
used as target practice by Berber cavalrymen. Could anyone fault them for fleeing such
horrors? That the Berbers were in practice tolerant of Christianity and indeed not entirely
unfamiliar with the religion was irrelevant.

These Mauri would appeal to the latest Pope, Adeodatus III. A man with some Desidarian
leanings, the Papacy bought whole cloth into these tales. The Pope traveled to Florentia and
pleaded with Valerian to liberate the world from sin and restore a holy empire of the Romans.
However, Valerian himself offered only vague promises, and Cosmas, an eminently practical
man who seems to have little true religious conviction, politely but sternly informed the Pope
that his goals were impossible. The Isidorians had but a fraction of the power they would
necessarily need for such an undertaking.

The tenor of Christianity in this era began to shift once more. The apocalyptic terror of the
Desidarian and Procopians was on the wane. No great antichrist had emerged. News of the
collapse of the Eftal had began to spread. However, what replaced it, particularly among the
military classes of Francia and Rome, was a growing feeling of a religion besieged, challenged
by heresy and unbelief at every turn. Over the century, this feeling would only be exacerbated.

The true fall of the Mauri Empire can be dated to 721, when Carthage itself was sacked. Two
years previously, answering appeals by the Mauri King, the Visigoths had invaded Mauritania
and the country of the Masamida, hoping to march east and enact a grand conquest which
would give them, if nothing else, some of the spoils of the waning Empire and prevent total
Isidorian domination of the Mediterranean.

King Ermanaricus of Hispania crossed the straits unopposed with some twenty thousand men,
perhaps a quarter of them mounted. That was perhaps the sole success of his campaign. The
Masamida were led by a wily commander named Iufitrana who retreated into the hills and
mountains. While the Romano-Gothic army seized the coastline and began to march west,
cheerful at the lack of any more than token opposition, a massive Berber army, uniting almost all
the local clans, developed.

"The pagans, whose numbers cannot be described in any language, descended howling upon
us." wrote one of the survivors of the battle. "They attacked from all directions and were too
swift to allow us to close for more than brief heartbeats." The Berber forces launched hit-and-run
attacks, provoking isolated Hispanian units to charge - allowing them to become separated from
the man body of the army and cut down in detail. Few survived to limp back to the coast and the
safety of their ships. King Ermanaricus was not among them, and his death would see the
crown contested by his three brothers.

The three brothers, Rodrigus (23), Euricus (19), and Suinthila (15) were each given extensive
territories in their father's will, and each proved to be more warlike than the next. From the first
there was no hope of cooperation. Suinthila, the youngest, was nevertheless perhaps the most
aggressive, personally leading armies against Euricus, who retreated into Suebia in the north.
However, this left Suinthila vulnerable to Rodrigus, who led lightening raids from his base of
Cordoba, allowing Euricus to recover lost ground. No brother could win the decisive battle
necessary to assert his dominance without weakening himself too much and effectively handing
victory to the third. As such, the war ground on from 719 to 723, when mutual exhaustion finally
brought an end to it.
Iufitrana of the Masamida, however, had not been idle. He launched his own attacks, seaborne
raids with the help of profit-seeking Mauri adventurers. Hispania burned. While these Masamida
raids would not establish any sort of permanent foothold, they did prove the weakness of the
Goths - who were unable to stop these raiders from ranging deep inland, destroying
monasteries and villas. In 724, Rodrigus was killed in battle against a Masamida raiding party,
and within six months Suinthila was universal King of Hispania, but the damage had been done.
The young king ruled a fractured and devastated kingdom whose weakness had been shown
clearly to the world.

Against the Eftal - a Teaser for the "Great Votive War"

Everywhere are good Christians assailed. The Romans, who once were the holy bulwark of the
Christian against the blasphemer and the infidel, have fallen. The heathens hold Constantinople
cupped in the palm of their hand, and assail the righteous in Germania and Pannonia, in Moesia
and Thracia. In Africa the Berbers who have no creed and no belief defile monasteries and
force good Christians into slavery.

The Hephthalians have completely destroyed some of God's churches, and they have
committed others to the use of their savage cult. They ruin the altars with filth and defilement.
They slay Christians and pour their blood into the baptismal fonts. Uncountable is the number of
souls languishing under their cruel dominion. They are the enemies of Christ and all that is holy.

Have we forgotten too the false prophets of Egypt? The Hephthalians, whose allegiance with
the devil is clear, hide their apostasy in many guises, but no sin is more vile than the sin that
disguises itself in righteousness. They claim to be Believers, but they deny the very nature of
Christ, equivocating and burying the Word beneath blasphemy and heresy! Are they not just as
damned as the Boddean or the pagan?

And yet we do not begrudge them Jerusalem, the site of the Passion of our Lord, or Bethlehem,
where he was born to the Blessed Virgin. We give harbor to their ships and gold to their
merchants. We allow them to seduce us with the gifts of the Orient and we let them walk
amongst us as wolves in the raiment of sheep!

As Christ Himself said, 'If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his
cross and follow me.' The Cross, brothers, the very sign by which Saint Constantine himself
conquered - under it you too shall conquer! The armies of the Romans shall be turned once
again to holy purposes. Is war not just if it seeks to bring godliness to the world once more? Did
not the venerable Saint Augustine say that those who put to death wicked men have not
violated the commandment which says 'Thou shalt not kill'? Is it not even a great blessing to the
service of god to kill those who threaten his Church through their words and their acts?

You, soldiers of Rome, servants of the Emperor who is Equal-to-the-Apostles, servants of God
and His Eternal Glory, you are blessed with the opportunity to take up both cross and sword in
defense of Empire and Church. Make oaths to God, as you make oaths to the Emperor. Swear
that you shall never rest until the Hephthalians are driven to the corners of the world! Swear you
shall never rest until the Patriarchates are restored as they were in the days of Saint
Constantine the Great! Until Africa is liberated. The obligation of the faithful is reconquest and a
restoration of the holy order.

Together, as a great wave we shall, blessed by God in our efforts and assured of our victory
both now and in the eternal life to come, ensure that the Heresiarch is driven from Alexandria,
the Boddean from Constantinople, and the pagan from Carthage. Let us march unto the very
ends of the world and know that its liberation is near at hand! God wills this! Let us be his
instrument! God wills this!

Spare us the trade

of the Northmen

The Western Slavs faced no small amount of pressure from external forces. With the arrival of
the Xasar in the Pannonian basin, they found themselves in a vice of sorts - pressed by the
steppe peoples and the Franks. This threat would however provide the impetus for the formation
of larger, stable states and strong regional identities. However, unlike in prior decades it was not
the tribes most under threat which formed the backbone of these polities but rather the Polans
and Obodrites. Neither faced many direct threats, and both had been spared the brunt of
sporadic Frankish and Xasar aggression. However, the pressure upon their neighbors and the
relative safety of their heartlands allowed them to exert their power over their neighbors,
reinforced by the cultural predominance of the Obdorites, whose market-towns and temples
provided an economic and religious heart to West Slavic society.

Of these new kingdoms, the Polonian Kingdom was the far greater in size, sprawling across the
Vistula and Oder basins. However, it was also the looser organized - the Knize of Polonia was
hereditary but expected to answer to his nobles to a degree that the Dravan-Kniaz of the
Obodrites was not. Only formally established in 732, several years after the vicious raids of
Prince Mahijada, the Polonian kingdom took advantage of the widespread fear of the Xasar-
Sahu migration to bind its nobility closer, but the kingdom for many years would be almost more
of a mutual defensive alliance than a nation.

Both of these kingdoms did some small-scale trade with the broader world. Along the coast,
market-towns flourished, trading with the Geats and Balts. Entrepreneurial merchants,
Norsemen, Balt, and Slav alike built small but seaworthy ships to transport wares, making a
small but meaningful profit. These voyages, which were commonplace and routine by the
middle of the seventh century, brought to the Norse tribes a broader understanding of the world
beyond their shores, and an understanding of the wealth that lay beyond. Their Danish cousins
had raided the Obodorites in the past, but the spoils of these raids did little more than adorn a
few mead halls.

Now, the broader world became a part of the Norse consciousness, and the timing could not be
more auspicious for the Norse. The population of Scandinavia had been growing rapidly, and
this rapid growth could not be sustained. Accordingly, within many communities a strong
impetus would develop to explore and expand across Europe - a divided, warring continent filled
with opportunities for plunder and conquest. The earliest recorded "Viking" raids date to 770, on
a monastery in Northumbria. Between 780 and 790, the Obodorites along the coast would suffer
frequent attacks - their trade towns would be looted, their holy sites destroyed. These raids did
little permanent damage - oftentimes these towns would be restored within a matter of months,
often by Norse traders.

Not all contact was so violent. In 789, the Viking explorer Jorulfr the Black would sail up the
Dnieper and encounter the "Kirikan" Turks. He would return home in a ship heavy with strange
treasures - notable among them a small golden statue of the Buddha, decorative ivory horses,
and a quantity of finely made Persian swords. Another expedition would reach Asta Regia on
the Hispanian coast in 803. In 775, the city of Heithabir [Hedeby] would be founded and quickly
grow into a major trading center on the Jutland pennisula.

These great expeditions would foreshadow an era in the north which is aptly named the "Viking
Era", but for the time being, their impact was limited. Few sources from the period give any
mention to these early Norse expeditions, and Europe as a continent saw itself fundamentally
centered around the Mediterranean.

A Clash of Civilizations?

Just to the south of the Polans, the north scarcely factored in to the politics and culture of the
broader region of Pannonia, where society was at a crossroads. Some [fictional] historians of
later eras would speak of Pannonia as a place where a true clash of civilization would occur.
They describe the Xasar-Avar civilization, defined by eastern influences, pluralistic and
dominated by Indian religious thought and Sino-Turkic material culture, coming into conflict with
the Romanized Slavs, universalist and monotheist Christian. They define this as the first of
many such conflicts between Eastern and Western culture.

This theory is not wholly accurate. The Slavs and Avars by 740 were not two distinct peoples.
The Avars of Pannonia and the Morava river basin owed much of their culture to the Slavs.
Many had become largely sedentary and abandoned the nomadism these traditional scholars
attribute to them. Frequently, the difference between Slav and Avar was simply one of political
and religious allegiance - to a Christian Prince or a Pagan (or Buddhist) Khagan. The Avar
culture in many respects by this era was more homogenized than that of the Slavs, who
retained a more tribal identity. Where the name Avar had come to incorporate many peoples, the
Slavs referred to themselves by a more local identity. The Avars in particular are difficult to
define. They had Christians among their ranks, and the veneration of Christ and the Christian
God, albeit in a deeply heretical, often polytheist framework, was not unknown.

In 738, Prince Vladimir of the Pyritzans did what his father and grandfather had refused to do -
he acknowledged the growing Christian congregation within his lands and he himself converted
to Christianity, traveling on a grand pilgrimage to Rome which doubled as a chance to visit
Florentia. Awed by the luxurious splendor of the Roman capital, he bound the fate of his people
to the Romans, becoming a federate tribe. His southern cousins, the Smolyani and the Croats,
nominally under the Avar yoke, did the same in 742 and 743 respectively. For them this was
merely a recognition of a truth established far earlier by the Roman expeditions into Dalmatia,
and solidified by the threat of Xasar raids into their territory. Penetrating too deeply into the
interior and risking direct confrontation with either the Avars or the dominant Grand Principality
of Sklavenia was a risk the Romans were unwilling to take over Illyria, and as such they
governed it purely indirectly.

Even as the decade of the 730's had seen the position of the Christian Slavs vastly improved,
the Avar civilization given new life by the arrival of the Xasar. This is not to say that Amurtay
Khagan's weakness was remedied - the new strength of the Avars, which cowed the Slavs to
their north and restored Avar control along the Danube largely benefitted the Eftal Prince
Mahijada and certain Xasar chieftans, notably the "Satrap" Tonyuwar. Indeed, when Amurtay
Khagan passed away in 741, he named Tonyuwar his successor and thus the Khagan - while
some Avar clans might have been displeased, they were now outnumbered significantly by
Xasar, and most saw in Tonyuwar a strong Khagan who would benefit them as much as he
would his own people.

But before Amurtay Khagan's body had even cooled, the Slavic tribes along the Danube rose in
rebellion, appealing to the Sklavenian Autocrat, Boris, for aid. They shared a similar culture,
language, and religion with the Sklaveni to the south, and it seems that the Sklaveni had long
considered the tribes and cities of the Danube already their northern frontier in fact if not in law.
The death of Amurtay merely provided a convenient excuse and a distraction. While the Xasar
contested this, there was little they could actually do. Tonyuwar was more concerned with
maintaining his core territories - conceding the lower stretch of the Danube, a region he never
could have hoped to occupy, was an acceptable loss in his mind. He contented himself with the
knowledge that Xasari clans could now raid the territory with relative impunity.

However, within four years he would be driven to war with the Sklaveni nonetheless. The council
of Mahijada and a large faction of his vassal clans spoke in favor of such a war, arguing that it
was necessary to safeguard the Khaganate. Furthermore, they believed the Sklaveni were
disunited. The Grand Prince was an old man, and notoriously cruel - more hated than beloved.
His son, Simeon, the likely successor, was distrusted by many of the nobility after having spent
five years as a hostage in Srem. War was thus declared, and the aging Boris took the field.

The battle was a disaster for the combined Xasar-Avar army. At a place called Stipon Gate, the
Xasar fell into an ambush. The bulk of both armies never saw combat - the terrain favored a
series of small engagements - but Mahijada was killed in the fighting and Tonyuwar was lucky to
escape with his life. Boris marched northwest along the Danube until he reached Srem, which
he besieged for several weeks before conquering and leveling the city entirely, carrying off the
treasures accumulated by the Avar Khagan in their years of raiding and plunder.
As Tonyuwar rallied his forces, he knew that this could well be the end of his reign. Mahijada
had been invaluable as an advisor and a diplomat. With Srem destroyed and his army
humiliated, he had few options left. His people had fled the Khirichan, but now he turned to
them, sending an ambassador, twelve of his finest horses, and a letter begging for aid in which
addressed the young Shiqar Khagan as "Lion of the Steppe and Universal Ruler", hinting at a
willingness to submit himself and his people to the Turks in exchange for revenge upon the
Sklaveni.

Shiqar Khagan took the hint, perhaps more literally than Tonyuwar had intended. According to
the Slavic chronicles, he rode west with some twenty thousand mounted warriors. The ruin of
Srem was retaken, and Boris would die of natural causes two weeks, never awakening after a
night of heavy drinking. His army would carry on without him, now under Simeon, acclaimed
Autocrat by the nobility after a hasty funeral. However, Simeon was not able to gain the
confidence and trust of his vassals. Frustrated by this lack of respect, he determined to seek a
pitched battle with the Khirichanid horde. Shiqar was more than happy to offer battle, and after a
feigned retreat caused the Slavic cavalry to become separated from their main host in violation
of Simeon's strict orders, the Slavs were defeated badly.

The Turks swept into the Balkans proper, devastating the countryside and carrying off much
plunder. However, they were unable to translate this into any conquest. The many hill-forts and
walled cities of the region, and the numerous peasants capable and willing to take up arms
against them meant that any campaign was fundamentally one of hit-and-run. The Slavic state
would endure. Their nobles, having learned a brutal lesson about not fully supporting their
Prince, would not rebel but instead would harass the Turkic raiding parties in turn.

Tonyuwar's decision had cost him his independence. While relatively autonomous, he was
forced to offer subordination to the Khirichan. The Xasar-Avar state would survive but as a
tributary to the Turkic Khaganate. It would not recover lost territory, either along the Danube or
in Illyria.

And yet Pannonia was well positioned. If the Xasar and Turks had learned anything from their
campaign it was that there were great riches to be found in Europe. The countrysides were
dotted with monasteries and towns which were not all as defended as those in the Balkans. The
Christ-worshipping heathens who surrounded them were ripe targets for future raids.

Eastern
Mediterranean

The trends in the Eastern Mediterranean during the middle of the eighth century can be
described as a process of recovery and synthesis of traditions. Unlike in Pannonia, where the
nomadic Iranian culture met Hellenized Christianity with violence, in Rhom, because of the
undisputed dominance of the Eftal in the military sphere, the large Christian subject class was
forced to compromise. The Procopian movement gradually died out as Eftal rule became more
and more the norm. The Rhomian Shah Datuvahya spoke Greek fluently, although with a thick
Eftal accent.

Under Datuvahya's weak and hedonistic rule, the Shahdom nevertheless managed to flourish.
The mercantile cities, and major ports profited immensely from the fall of the Mauri. It was their
merchants who would dominate the seas, bringing goods from Crimea to Italy to Egypt to Africa.
The Eftal (both the Bulgar and Slavic elite were legally considered such as well) tribal
landholders along the vast inland terrain saw a population boom. Anatolia was a fertile region,
and in the absence of any major military threat, the generation spanning from 720-740 saw
enormous population expansion. This demographic shift would transform inland Anatolia and
cement the power of the Shahdom. However, it would also cause tensions with the Alans.

Starting around 735, the Alan Khagan, Samosisa began to regard Datuvahya's Shahdom as a
distinct threat to his power. Where previously the two regimes had enjoyed comfortable
relations, one of the major grievances between the two states had always been low intensity
communal violence brought on by the semi-nomadic subjects of both states. With the Eftal
population rising dramatically, this would become an even larger issue. Datuvahya's attempts to
restore relations were viewed as a final straw for a weak monarch. He was murdered by his
sister Stayidh in 738 and replaced by brother-in-law, Varshirakh Taladhna.

Varshirakh opted to resolve the border conflict with violence. A year after Datuvahya's death, in
response to an incursion by Alan raiders he declared war. At first, the war seemed over before it
had begun. The Alan capital of Ankyra was far, far too close to the border to be defended, and a
rapid attack by Varshirakh saw it fall within weeks. Khagan Samosisa fled along with whatever
family and valuables could be moved. With Ankyra taken, the Eftal took their time sacking the
city and the surrounding countryside, selling many into slavery and looting the famous Church of
Wisdom. This delay allowed time for the Alans to gather in force.

Inconclusive engagements would define the period of 739-742. It was not until Varshirakh
appealed to the mercantile cities that he was able to tip the balance in his favor, drawing up
another ten thousand citizen-soldiers. These Roman soldiers turned the tide of the battle.
Varshirakh was forced to acknowledge the utility of the vassal cities and grant them additional
privileges, but it had been worth it. The Alan Khaganate was broken in battle as Samosisa
attempted to retake Ankyra. Large portions of their territory were stripped away and given to
Eftal landholders, and the Alans were made to pay tribute to the Eftal.

To the south, Egypt saw a similar phenomenon of cultural synthesis. Distinctions between the
Hellenic and Coptic population had been gradually dissolving for some time, but into the mix
was thrust Arab and some Persian influences. Alexandria retained its status as a shocking and
cosmopolitan city, playing host to merchants from across Europe. A visitor to the enormous port
city could see Sahu traders bartering with Saihist Arabs or Savahilan travelers visiting the
famous Library (a pale shadow of its antique self but impressive nonetheless).
The Eftal elite continued to assimilate. Hvarabad [alt Fustat] was renamed Hesanopolis, and
continued to remain the Royal residence. Timotheos passed away in 731 and was succeeded
by his son Dioscoros Hesanos. His legacy would be as a builder and a reformer - making
changes in the tax policy during the famine of 727 to alleviate the burden on farmers and
redistribute the tax burden onto the mercantile class. The most enduring of his construction
projects were a series of monuments commemorating the deeds of his ancestors in a style
typically reserved for the deeds of saints and holy men. While some in the Church would see
these as blasphemous, they formed propagandistic fabricated analogies between the trials of
some of the earliest Heshanids and the trials of ancient Biblical figures which often inspired the
common people, who already saw him as a hero.

The Heshanid trade apparatus would shift somewhat in this time period - riverine trade up and
down the Nile became increasingly important as the Makurian aristocracy developed a desire
for crafted finished goods, Egyptian papyrus, and horses. This in turn would link the
Mediterranean to the Western African peoples, who for the first time were coming out of their
relative isolation and beginning to take part in global change.

Arabia and Africa

Arabia, and the Saihist community in general would spend much of the seventh century
consolidating and further defining themselves. It was a period of existential soul-searching and
charismatic movements which were born, died, and rediscovered over the course of mere
generations. An isolated and esoteric cult, their religious beliefs and vibrant displays earned
them few friends either among the iconoclastic schools of the Awha Albudhia (Arabian
Buddhism) in the south or the large Jewish population in Yemen - both of which they ruled and
would come to have a profound effect on. The Jews of Yemen in particular were willing, under
religious reformers such as Ibrahim ibn Azizur, to consider Alilat as a sort of angelic consort of
their God. This would in turn isolate a portion of the Yemeni Jews from their brethren across the
world, but it enabled the Jewish population to join the community of believers. Access to the title
of "Believer" was an enormous blessing - it elevated their role in society above that which it had
been under the Hadhramut. For the Saihists, accepting the Yemeni Jews reinforced social
cohesion and weakened any chance of them becoming a potential third column.

Another thing that would reinforce the Saihist dominion even in this period of internal definition
and redefinition was the fact that the Hadhramut hegemony was coming to an end. A
combination of climate changes and poor water use would destroy many of the great plantation
cities of the interior. The collapse of several great dams allowed crucial reservoirs to deplete
and not recover. The Hadhramut community would endure of course, but it would do so largely
as a diaspora, integrating with the Savahila. The spice trade would survive, albeit reduced.
Much of this new demand would be picked up by the Hawiya in [Somalia] within the years to
come, but in the short term the middle of the eighth century saw the price of Arabic spices rise
dramatically. The great mercantile guilds across the Indian Ocean reached new and extravagant
heights of wealth and prestige.
The new South Arabia was one of desert nomads, isolated entrepot cities, and Buddhist
monasteries. Those parts of the country which retained their fertility were limited, and this broke
the back of the landholding aristocracy. Land surveys from the time period suggest that small
farmers regained pre-eminence, growing small plots of spices and incense in addition to
growing edible crops and raising livestock.

The Hawiya to the south were on the rise, and this was only accelerated by the decline of
Arabia. The Hawiya monarchs ruled a cosmopolitan crossroads of civilizations and trade - and
this trade made the Hawiya fantastically rich. No longer would they need to raid or use brute
force or hydraulic monopolies to assert dominance - with time their tools became more refined
and subtle. Primitive but functional bureaucracies were developed, to handle tariffs, land, and
water rights. As all of these things were essential to the Hawiya society, the bureaucracy had
essentially absolute power. The tribal society that existed before crumbled in the face of their
regulation. Under Shah Varsaame II (735-758) the Hawiya enjoyed a golden age of
uninterrupted prosperity. A patron of the Awha Albudhia, Varsaame nevertheless maintained
tolerance to the large pagan, Jewish, and Saihist communities within his kingdom.

If the Hawiya were cosmopolitan, were still shockingly inward-looking in some crucial regards.
The world came to them for their goods and their prime location. Varsaame and his successors
did not need to travel beyond their splendid rural palace. They were patrons of art and science
and beautiful buildings but it was fundamentally the art, science, and monuments of other
cultures and peoples. Knowledge of the broader world and its multitude of philosophies inspired
the creation of universities, perhaps the greatest among them being the House of Wisdom in
Amoud. Staffed by Saihist priestesses, it was a temple to knowledge above all other things.
However, the Cushitic culture of the Hawiya was overwhelmed by this multitude of foreign
influences. Like many peoples of Africa in this period, the elite in particular chose to embrace
foreign thought and aesthetics over their own.

To the north of the Hawiya, the other great power of northeast Africa ruled along relatively
similar lines. Makuria was under the sway of an absolutist monarchy maintaining a firm grasp on
the Nile with the help of an intricate priesthood-bureaucracy, ostensibly Christian but with a
somewhat unorthodox pantheon of local "Saints". Very much inspired by Heshanid Egypt, they
had the same preoccupation with monumental building and opulent displays of wealth. Theirs
was a fertile and prosperous kingdom, capable of asserting hegemony over what remained of
Axum and the other petty kingdoms to their south. However, their contact with the Hawiya was
limited - evidenced by only rare exchanges of goods and few reported travelers. Both states
remained at each other's peripheries and had little interest in changing that.

The Makurian Kingdom was only adventurous when it came to the west. The first Coptic
missionaries reached Kanem in 734, where they were received politely but cautiously by the
Kings there. Trade with this broader world was facilitated through intermediaries - chief among
them the Daju tribe of [Darfur]. As the trickle of foreign trade mostly consisted of rare caravans
tracking along river courses on great roundabouts, peoples such as the Daju provided welcome
respite for weary travelers and a chance to acquire fresh provisions.
For these first explorers, the world beyond their knowledge must have seemed vast. In the
marketplaces of Kanem they could hear fascinating stories of wondrous golden kingdoms far to
the west and great cities in the utter south. But travel was dangerous to those who did not know
the land intimately. Feuds between local potentates were commonplace in the nearby area, and
this lack of central control meant that bandits with access to horses could ride down caravans
with contemptuous ease and take their precious cargo. Only large expeditions had a guarantee
of safety, and those with spare money to pay bribes. The Kings of Kanem claimed divine
supremacy over a vast area but in practice their supremacy was limited and their protection was
not extended to these bright-eyed missionaries from the north. Though they would make some
converts, most expeditions would turn back at Lake Chad, their camels nevertheless heavy-
laden with Ghanan gold.

The first explorers from Savahila would arrive shortly thereafter, in 758. Theirs was a longer,
even more perilous journey, up the great lakes and many of the same rivers along which the
Makurian missions traveled. Decimated by disease and raids along their route, these Savahilan
traders still brought back tales of the advanced and wealthy civilizations that lay in the west.
Their words would inspire maritime voyages, seeking the same western kingdoms by what
might be an easier route. These voyages would be numerous and well-sponsored, but few
would reach their destination, though several would find useful harbors along the southern coast
of Africa - harbors that would in due time eventually become resupply ports. The first successful
navigation would occur in 788. Inspired by a desire to find the "Gold Cities", the Malik of
Mzishima outfitted a fleet of five "great ships" under the command of legendary navigator
Shiraya Raosata. Only two of these ships would return, but they would locate the city of Tekrur,
the capital of a people who called themselves Fula.

The spread of the Savahila inward reached roughly its maximum extent in 750. As a civilization
they were simply too dependent on coasts and rivers to stretch deep into the interior. Their
isolated inland forts came under the rule of the growing Sahs of the Kwadza, the predominant
people in the southwest. The Kwadza had simply been the first and most successful at utilizing
their trade connections and turning them into practical advantage over their rivals and
neighbors, seizing the most fertile territory and the best grazing grounds with iron weapons and
armor. Their "conquests" would however mark a hard limit on the Savahila expansion - at times
Mzishima attempted to recover their inland forts but this was ultimately a futile endeavor.

To the north, by 800 the Rutara-Ganda civilization had begun to develop sophisticated urban
settlements with thousands of inhabitants. They dominated the "Four Coasts" of Lake Nyanza
[Victoria] and significant trade and missionary contact is evidenced by finds of Arabian incense
and Savahilan pottery in the homes of local elites.

To the southeast, on the "Island of the Moon" the Izaoraika society in the eighth century entered
into what historians call the "Mandala Era". The feudal, tribal patchwork that had dominated the
island since the arrival of the first austronesian settlers gave way to a centralized state. The last
holdouts of the tribal system, the Antaisaka and the Sihanaka were conquered by 720.
Hindicization continued apace - a limited selection of Hindu gods were merged with traditional
deities, and the framework of Tantric philosophy continued to be in vogue among the elite,
although there are some questions about how deeply it penetrated the lower classes, who
remained largely polytheist and traditionalist.

The Izaoraika monarchy, the Sakalavaraja, would turn outwards for their first time in its history.
During the long reign of King Rajasoanalamira 724-767, the Izaoraika turned to large-scale
shipbuilding themselves, copying Savahilan and Indian designs, finding particular favor with the
twin-hulled Tamil craft which perhaps reminded them of their own vessels. As the population
grew, unchecked by the twin evils of raiding and crops unsuited to their environment which had
historically held it back, the Izaoraika would seek their fortunes elsewhere. Bands of young
Izaoraika would set sail for Arabia and the Persian Gulf as mercenaries, traders, and settlers.
The more adventurous would establish coastal communities along the coast of East Africa,
attempting to repeat the Savahilan successes.

[I know I'm covering a lot in these posts and not always in a lot of detail. If anyone has any
questions or wants me to expand upon a topic, I'm always happy to do so.

Also, any commentary on the plausibility of this all? It seems to be ancient Arab ships were
sufficiently impressive for the task, but it is perhaps a bit of a stretch. I may choose to retcon this
if people think I've gone to far. Keep in mind that these contacts are famous because they're the
first but that doesn't inherently imply an age of discovery or anything radical like that. I expect
that contact over the sea will be sporadic and rare.]

Oadhya - the fading

star of the latter Eftal

By 720, few in the Oadhyan Empire could remember any other system. Those who could
recalled only the apocalyptic anarchy of the "false Saosyant" and the years of division and
endemic warfare beforehand. The Oadhyan Empire was safe and prosperous by comparison.
However, it had many crippling flaws which only grew worse after Mihiragula's death in 723.

Firstly, urban growth was limited by the unique Eftal feudal system, which saw much arable land
simply used as pasture. That land which was not used as such was often used for cash crops
(wine and cotton among other commodities) by the local grandees - agricultural surplus
remained at the low levels merely necessary to support slave plantations staffed by imported
Slavic and East African labor. In the Gulf, most cities remained small trading ports built around
previous harbors, designed to funnel goods east and west.

Secondly, the feudal system, while resilient against outside threats, was ineffective at building
the power of the crown to such a degree as to support large-scale projects. The great vayan
landholders and the monasteries of the north did not collect taxes for the crown - they paid
tribute, and this tribute could often be merely token. Oversight was limited, as it was the vayans
and their extended families who provided the military arm of the government, and the
monasteries who provided the bureaucracy. No King could escape their grasp.

Thirdly, incoherent policy on the frontiers. While the vayans often were tractable, the greater
padivayans often considered themselves kings in their own right. The padivayans of Nasibin
and Mosil for example in 732 responded to a border incursion from Syrian Eftal raiders with
violence despite promises from the crown that it would not be met with reprisal, weakening the
integrity of their crown. The padivayans were then able to negotiate their punishment down to a
mere slap on the wrist.

Mihiragula's death saw his cousin Vankavadh take power in what less charitable sources refer
to as a palace coup engineered by local aristocrats. He proceeded to squander the limited
resources of state on grand festivals and decadent parties. More charitable sources would see
Vankavadh as someone attempting to right the course of the Oadhyan Empire before it was too
late. His ostentatious displays of wealth were necessary to keep his vassals in line - carefully
arranged generosity combined with veiled threats. His coup was to prevent a weaker candidate
for the throne from gaining it at the behest of the greater lords. He would maintain the
"International System" of the Late Eftal Era, keeping in regular diplomatic contact with his peers
to the west and marrying a Khirichan princess.

However, he would meet a grisly death in 734 in battle against the Banu Tayy. Christian Arabs,
fleeing the ever bolder raids of the Saihists, had overrun several of his southern lords. Calling
his retainers together, and levying those lords who were nearby, he rode south. Attempting to
relieve the siege of Zabai, he attacked the Tayy siege lines and was repulsed. Panicking, he
ordered a retreat which turned into a rout. In the chaos he fell from his horse and was kicked in
the head, never to rise. Leaving no heir and a wide selection of possible candidates, the
Oadhyan lords raced towards the capital to have their say in the succession. Unlike in the Eftal
Empire, where only the close retainers would be assumed to have a say (in such a situation
where no clear candidate existed) for the Oadhyan lords, all of them were retainers of equal
standing to the King's personal companions. Succession disputes meant riding to the capital in
force.

The Council of Ahmatan, as their meeting became known, would last for two weeks. An early
frontrunner, Mihiradata, was found to have a crippling stutter he had hid by virtue of infrequent
appearances, all of which were heavily rehearsed. He lost the support of his followers and
turned up dead in his bedroom the next day. Accusations flew but no culprit was determined.
Sataspa the Vayan of Xhunan, growing weary of the lack of progress finally took action to end
the madness. He arranged with a small cabal of his fellow lords to seize the palace and lock the
lords in until a suitable candidate had been chosen. After a failed attempt by the Eftal lords to
break out, they caved and chose Rasam Oadhya as their leader by a narrow plurality. Sataspa
allowed the lords to leave, but the Vayan of Pelapata, angered by Sataspa's actions and smug
satisfaction at having broken the deadlock gathered several of his brothers to his side and beat
Sataspa with a cudgel. Rasam's command to stop the fighting was finally heeded, but the
damage had been done - already the young Shah appeared weak and Sataspa would
henceforth be known as "the Golden Toothed."

The rest of Rasam's reign would be no more impressive. Large sections of the Euphrates were
lost to certain Tayy lords, who paid tribute and theoretically merely rented the land from the
Shah, but in truth were its sole masters now. In the East, an ambitious Turko-Sogdian warlord
named Aghatsagh was carving out a Khanate for himself, and many of the eastern vassals paid
tribute to him just as they did to Ahmatan and the Oadhyan crown.

Central Asia - Rise of the "Turkic Sikander"

Little is known of Aghatsagh Shah or his origins. One of the many Persianized Turks who lived
on the periphery of the Eftal world, he distinguished himself in the mold of similar successful
warlords before him, by raiding his neighbors and simply being better at it than they were.
Eventually, his victories turned to outright conquest, and he proved adept at that as well. In 721,
at the age of twenty, he captured Harev [Herat] from the Kapisa Shahs, who had long regarded
such cities as the absolute border of their dominions. Unlike so many conquerors before him, he
was quick to turn from raiding to taxes. Charismatic and brave, he energized the polyglot
warriors beneath him into a capable fighting force. Tribal affiliations mattered little so long as
one could fight. With each success, his defeated enemies were incorporated into his ranks.

In 724, he defeated the Gorkhanid Eftal, once a tributary of the Oadhyans. Their Shah was
made to ritually submit himself. Other scattered Eftal satraps in Sakastan were defeated by 726,
again earning the wrath of the Kapisa Shahs, who finally saw the threat for what it was.
However, the Kapisa had entered decline themselves, being but a shadow of the Johiyava.
Unlike the great estates and large armies the Johiyava could call upon from within India, the
Kapisa found themselves hamstrung by their dependence on the Ganarajyas (guild republics) of
the Punjab for additional manpower. Furthermore, they had not endeared themselves to all the
Kamboja, many of whom had preferred the patronage of their fellow tribesmen to the Eftal
Siyaposha tribe. As such, the two great military reserves of the Kapisa Shahdom deserted them
in their time of need. The guilds, for their part, rebelled after a council speech by the influential
orator Dahrasena Soneta, whose writings became the foundational treatises upon which the
Gandharan Republic would be based.

Faced with so many threats, Aghatsagh's triumph was almost to be expected. After two years of
campaigning, many of the great mountain fortresses had fallen. Kapisa itself was sacked, and
the seat of power in its region began to shift north towards Balkh once more, although the city of
Kabul also became influential.

Unlike the Kapisa, Aghatsagh did not for the time being choose to press into India. Tales of the
powerful Gandharans and their armies convinced him to bide his time. Furthermore, he had a
large and roughly-held together Empire to manage. As a Shah over many different peoples, he
found himself constantly having to shift roles to adapt. He could no longer be a mere tribal
warlord - he had to be a Shah. He could no longer be a conqueror, he had to find capable
administrators. He could no longer be a pagan, he had to pay at least lip service to the multitude
of gods and creeds worshipped by his peoples. It helped that he was multilingual - speaking
Eastern Eftal, Sogdian, Turkish, and Gandharan with equal fluency. Later in life he would
become an avid reader as well.

Aghatsagh was deeply concerned with his legacy. He drew from the inspiration of conquerors
he read about such as Heshana and Alexander the Great. The key, he decided, was to bind the
conquered peoples together with blood. In this project he was only partially successful. He
himself would marry the daughter of the former Kapisa Shah, Anakhitvandha. More successful
was his policy of otherwise letting the disparate peoples of his empire more or less govern
themselves. As long as taxes were paid there was little to fear. Like the Kapisa before him, the
core of his military was primarily Turkic, but unlike the Kapisa this core was few enough in
number that Aghatsagh could employ and assimilate plenty of other peoples into his army.

In 731, the Sogdian Shah, fearing the growing Empire to their south, declared war as well. Their
defeat was swift, and the Shah found himself reduced to a mere tributary by 732. This tributary
status would generally be the fate of the northern peoples he encountered - here Aghatsagh
respected the general autonomy of the steppes. He did not try to govern them as directly -
preferring a light hand and tribute in kind.

By the ascension of Rasam Oadhya to the Eftal throne, Aghatsagh ruled an empire greater than
any of the petty Turkic warlords who had come before him. He commanded a truly impressive
force, the crown jewel of which was fifty war elephants - a gift from the Gandharan republics. In
time, perhaps he would turn those elephants back on the prince-assemblies of Gandhara. Or
maybe he would march west and reunite the Eftal Empire. He had many options.

The Lion of Herat

Fresh from previous victories, Aghatsagh envisioned a grand conquest of India. Huge armies
were rallied, and the provinces stripped to bare minimal garrisons. Every soldier would be
necessary. However, this was also when the Oadhyans decided to attack. Rasam Oadhya,
eager to secure his grip on the throne by vanquishing the Eastern threat, led his foremost
retainers and some twenty thousand men towards Herat. Aghatsagh, cursing fate, led his army
west instead.

Rasam was defeated swiftly. The Eftal Shah panicked at the unexpected size of the forces
arrayed against them and the army as a whole attempted to fall back, but Aghatsagh shadowed
him relentlessly. In a bold move, Aghatsagh left behind the bulk of his army and all of his foot,
taking only the swift Turkic cavalry which had won his earliest victories. He harassed the Eftal
columns, making them think that his forces were far greater, slowing them to a crawl. Finally, on
an anonymous hilltop lost to history, Rasam made a final stand - his horses exhausted and his
men thirsty, his troops circled their wagons and attempted to fortify the high ground. The Turks
circled them, and the next day the main body of the Aghatsaghid army arrived, bringing fresh
supplies and arrows. The Eftal were unable to use their own cavalry to its fullest extent, and
their attempts to sally forth were met with disaster.

Finally, after two more days, the Turkic army attacked the defenses, and the exhausted Eftal
army surrendered. The nobility was ransomed for enormous sums, and the common soldiers
were sold into slavery. The Shah himself was treated with respect and dignity, as an honored
guest not a prisoner, but when he attempted to escape along with a group of his companions he
was beaten and lashed to a pole for three days without food or water until he begged for mercy.
Aghatsagh's army, having many noble captives, found only limited strong defenses. Unlike the
fortresses of Europe, many of which were becoming impressive indeed, the typical Eftal palace-
fort was designed to defend against mere raiders. Few posed serious obstacles to Aghatsagh,
and by mid-autumn he arrived at Ahmatan, which opened its gates to him.

The Shah, weakened by the various ordeals he had been subjected to, was made to sign a
humiliating peace. He was effectively a vassal of Aghatsagh, and several of his own greatest
vassals were directly made tributaries to his conqueror - a man who many called "the Lion of
Herat" after his latest victories. The Shah would remain in Persia for another two years (until
735), touring the countryside. The "Turkic Indenture" as Rasam's humiliation became known,
would become infamous throughout the Eftal world.

However, Aghatsagh was nowhere near done. Now, his victory finally ensured, he turned to the
nascent Gandharan republic. The army which descended from his mountain fortresses on
Purusapura won every battle with almost contemptuous ease - hardened by years of fighting
and commanded by a tactical genius and a master of deception, the guild-soldiers found
themselves simply outmatched. However, they were also numerous and the Gandharans,
motivated by Dahrasena Soneta, refused to even consider surrender unless Aghatsagh
recognized their councils and guilds. Impressed by the stubbornness of the Gandharans, and
often merciful in victory, Aghatsagh agreed. He even spared the great universities and cities of
the region even a token sack.

However, this even-handedness aggravated his soldiers, who had been promised plunder.
Magnanimous victory was all well and good for the Shah's interests, they argued, but for the
common warrior travelling many miles from home, material reward was necessary. As such,
they pressured Aghatsagh into sailing down the Indus into the country of the Rai dynasty. Ruled
by King Rai Sahasi, the Rai had successfully resisted the Siyaposha with the help of the
Gurjars, but recently this alliance had been strained. Isolated, they put up a valiant fight but
were destroyed in battle at Sanahpur. The Rai dynasty was wiped out to a man and their cities
pillaged. Aghatsagh carved grants of land out of the river valley, and divided the cities into small
provinces, which he granted to those who had performed well in the campaign.

In 737, Aghatsagh struck south against the "land of the five rivers" but here he was met with
mounting frustration. The Ganarajya of Sakala resisted far longer than he expected, and
brought allies - the small guild-republics of Madra and Trigarta sent reinforcements. While he
ultimately won, and brought much of the Punjab under his control, it was at great cost. He
deemed striking any further inland impossible, and finally turned back. The far-famed Lion of
Herat remained undefeated, and it was perhaps only Aghatsagh who truly knew how close he
came to defeat.

Another reason for choosing to turn back after 737 was that the Syrians were proving an
increasingly dangerous threat in the west. After seeing the Oadhyan's defeat, Shah Avyaman
Kithara began launching attacks further and further into Mesopotamia, turning several border
lords openly against Rasam and thus by extension Aghatsagh. Leading his forces west to
counter this new threat, signs of age and stress began to show. The Lion of Herat was still only
middle-aged, but the stress of campaign and his wounds had taken their toll on him. He still
inspired great devotion in his polyglot soldiers, but it was in the evolving corps of officers who he
placed most of his trust in this campaign.

The Aghatsaghid army fought the Syrians to a draw, and finally Avyaman agreed to an
exchange of hostages and peace. The critical fortress cities of Nasibin and Dariy were handed
over to the Syrians, and peace was concluded in the west. The Shah of Syria married his son,
Hvarmei to one of Aghatsagh's many daughters, Culpan, and the two men entered into an
uneasy but practical alliance. Not long after, Aghatsagh returned to Herat. He named his son,
Korshad Lasgara, co-Shah in the Eftal tradition, and settled down to rule.

However, within two years he became restless. Tales had reached him of the weakness of the
Qi dynasty, and he began to plan a massive overland invasion of China, involving some
hundred thousand men, perhaps a third of them mounted, and over a thousand war elephants.
Ignoring the logistical difficulties of such an endeavor, especially for a military establishment
which had lost much of the lightness and mobility which had made its earliest victories possible,
the plan was short on details as to how such an army would propose to take Chang'an or press
into the vast heartland of a vaster empire. Perhaps fortunately for his legacy, Aghatsagh would
die before he could undertake such a venture, in 740.

The Terror of Europe (in brief)

The twenty years before the Great Raids seemed to bode well for the future of Christian Europe.
Cities were growing and wealth was on the rise, especially in Italy. The Berbers to the south
were relatively quiet. Trade, although nowhere near what it had once been, now flowed once
more into North Africa. The first tentative tales of golden kingdoms across great seas of sand
were seeping north. For once, the trend seemed to be in favor of unification as well, rather than
fragmentation.

In Florentia, Emperor Valerian would pass away in 736, succeeded by his son Isidorius Petrus
Constantius. Isidorius was by all accounts a humble and devout man, raised at the periphery of
the Imperial court out of his mother's fear of the influence of the military men who controlled
Isidorian affairs to so great a degree. Upon his ascension, Isidorius found that his lack of military
expertise ensured he would simply not be respected by the professional military bureaucracy
whose control over the state was absolute.
Rather, one man was perhaps the undisputed master of ever-shrinking Christian Europe. The
Magister Militium, Cosmas, had successfully expanded Roman power across the Mediterranean
and into the Balkans. Unlike his predecessors, who had been conservative, or the Pope who still
looked East, Cosmas believed he could restore a Western Empire. The Frankish kingdoms were
deadlocked - apart from brief and bloody feuds they were inward looking. The Hispanians were
still reeling from their humiliation at the hands of the Berbers. Furthermore, the Hispanian
monarch, Suinthila had proved incapable of siring a male child. His nobles were restless, and
Cosmas saw nothing but opportunity.

The Roman attempt to conquer Hispania was born out of a comedy of errors. Cosmas' attempt
to subtly suggest a union between the two crowns was taken entirely the wrong way. His
attempts to interfere in the growing succession crisis were seen as belligerent, and Suinthila,
tiring of Roman interference declared war, and marched from Narbo into Provence. Having
spent his youth fighting for his crown, Suinthila was no stranger to pitched battles. While
Cosmas struck a hasty alliance with the Aquitainian King, nearly doubling the forces available to
him, Suinthila easily outmaneuvered Cosmas and defeated him in 737, leading to the Magister's
death. The Emperor was quick to make peace, but the Empire was humiliated. Their
opportunities squandered, they could only look with terror as Suinthila turned his attentions
north, defeating the Frankish King of Aquitaine and restoring his dynasty's control of southern
Gaul.

Meanwhile, the Franks, frightened by this new display of power from Hispania, began to rally
around the King of Austrasia, Clovis, who as a young man had quickly defeated his brothers and
expanded his dominion into the territory of the Saxons. They could not see that the Visigothic
dominion was a paper tiger, strong only because of the various weaknesses of their enemies,
and doomed to crumble once more the moment Suithila died. Unfortunately for the Franks
however, Suithila would not be quick to die. He would finally die in 745, with rumors of poisoning
abounding, and in the broader context of history he could not have picked a worse time to die.
His sons-in-law divided the sprawling territory between themselves, and one by one they would
be conquered by the Franks to their north.

745, was the year that the Khirichan realized the wealth of Europe. Compared to the Slavic
tribes to their north, Europe was ripe for looting. It would not be long after that Kuluj Ishbara
Shiqarogul, third son of the Khirichanid Khagan, would launch the first raid on Europe. Striking
hard into the Balkans with a small force, he would carry back vast quantities of treasure from
raids on rural estates. This in turn would only encourage more raiders and greater targets.
Travelling light, his raiders were able to avoid concentrated field armies and local fortifications
and wreak untold havoc. When his foes did manage to bring him to battle, they invariably lost.
Isidorius was defeated in 749, and Northern Italy was opened to the Khirichan. From there,
Spain and Southern France became targets as well.

Later raids between 753-759 would target primarily northern Europe, circling through Barvaria
into Gaul, but in 763 a major raid, organized independently by a group of Xasar-Sahu warlords,
managed to sack Meilanum (Milan) itself after a small party gained access to a sally port during
the night. Each successful raid spawned imitators, and the few major defeats were counteracted
by an abundance of victories. These raids would in turn allow the Khirichan and Xasar to truly
establish themselves in the Carpathian basin. Utilizing their homeland as a base for raids, all of
Europe was open to attack. Reprisals from Rome were limited - Isidorius concentrated on
fortifying key entrances into Italy - which had some success, but did little to impress the military,
which demanded answers. Finally, in traditional Roman fashion, Isidorius would be overthrown
by his Magister Militium, Severus, in 768. His small family would be executed or forced into exile
as well. The Isidorian dynasty came to an end, but the Roman Empire would not.

That same year, the Romans lost their Balkan territories and clients once and for all. Kuluj
Ishbara turned from raiding to outright conquest, taking Illyria by storm and then proceeding
south into Sklavenia. His raiders, hardened by their many victories, defeated Grand Prince
Samuel and wrested Moesia and much of Epirus away from the Sklavenians.

The Great Raids had left Europe in a state of panic. For a generation their defenses had been
shown to be vastly inadequate. Pagan brigands had ravaged deep into the heartland of western
Christendom unopposed. Now, Kuluj Ishbara had carved out yet another heathen kingdom in
Christian lands. It was unacceptable. Rumors that Kuluj, the Xasars under Shah Nanaivanta,
and the Rhom Shah had formed a triumvirate alliance to conquer Rome itself spread like
wildfire. The Sklaveni begged the Pope for aid. The Franks unified with remarkable speed, given
their early factitiousness. Clovis accomplished what his predecessors had barely dreamed of - a
unified Francian "Empire." In the wake of so many raids and upheavals, he promised to be a
Defender of the Faith. One apocryphal story relates him traveling to Rome and swearing a
sacred vow to restore the Holy Places and the Church entirely.

The stage was set for the Great Votive War.

[Stay tuned. Next post will cover in detail the rise of Clovis the Great (same time frame as this
post) and his alliance with Emperor Severus. From there I plan to take a lot of time to focus on
the buildup to the Votive War, the war itself, and aftermath.

Europe in this time period is not my strong suit. I welcome questions and comments. Kuluj
Ishbara's raids are based on the Hungarian raids of OTL.]

The Rise of Clovis

the Great

Clovis Magnus was as much lucky as he was skilled. He had the great fortune to be born a King
in a Europe that for the first time feared not merely for Christendom abroad but its own
existence. In his youth tales of the "Carican Turk" (a term which here included Eftal, Xasar-
Sahu, and Turk alike) reached the court at Aachen. When their raids began in 745, Clovis had
just ascended the throne, defeating his brother Carl and uniting Austrasia. The next two
decades would see unprecedented reversals for European armies as they were outmatched
time and again by the Turkic cavalry. The aristocrats of the countryside lived in fear of lightening
raids, as did the common people. All old certainties had been extinguished as if overnight.

The Turks provoked fear, but it was the unification of the Hispanian and Aquitainian Kingdoms
was the prospect that allowed Clovis to gain control of Neustria in 748 and subjugate the King of
Burgundy in 554. From there, the other Frankish Kings quickly fell in line. As the Turks proved
capable of raiding Bavaria, Thuringia, and Swabia, these duchies all folded back into a Kingdom
of the Franks. By 560, all except Aquitaine was reunited - and that would come. Throughout the
60's, Clovis defeated the Hispanian warlords one by one, pressing as far south as Barcelona
and ultimately making his border at the Ebro. King Unulius of Hispania, was killed in battle at
Bayonne in 764, and his four surviving sons would be made dukes of the Hispanian "provinces"
- Baetica, Lusitania, Suebia, and Carthaginensis, each subordinate to the King of the Franks.

What enabled these lightening conquests was the remarkable centralization of the new Frankish
state. The nobles now were for the first time willing to cede power to the central administration,
and frequently colluded with the same administration. This change saw the birth of the Palantine
Magnates, an order of aristocrats bound to the palace who acted as viceroys over broad
territories rather than kings. Required to spend a portion of their time in the capital and serve as
bodyguards in times of war, these Magnates were accordingly prevented from establishing
kingly privileges over their new dominions.

The Frankish army was drawn from two major sources. The reliable standing army consisted of
the noble "retainers" - well-equipped, well-disciplined aristocratic soldiers. However, for major
campaigns a large levy could be called up. While traditionally this levy applied only to certain
regions and cities where the King had a legal right to do so, the levy was reformed under Clovis
Magnus, becoming a universal right of the monarchy and certain of the Palantine Magnates.
The Franks did not make widespread use of cavalry - compared to the Romans their horse were
few in number, although the horsemen of their army were heavily armored and armed. Their
traditional style of warfare involved bristling shield walls of infantry.

Religion played no small role in the organization of the new state. Ecclesiastical lands
represented a not insignificant portion of the Frankish estate system, and as Clovis' power grew,
his status as the most prominent Christian monarch grew accordingly. A pious and reverent
image helped him to show his rule over almost all of Western Europe as not mere ambition but
rather a divinely mandate. He began referring to himself as "Defender of the Faith" and "Equal
to the Apostles" in his proclamations, and reportedly travelled to Rome on several occasions to
meet with the Pope, Adrian I. What was crucial, however, was that Clovis never went so far as
to claim any pretension to Imperial prestige. He was a monarch, and perhaps the greatest
monarch, but he was not Roman Emperor - even when Severus took power out of the hands of
the Isidorians, Clovis acknowledged the Emperor as legitimate after Severus' confirmation by
the Senate and Roman Army.

Despite all this, Clovis knew well that his state would not long last without an external enemy,
and for both personal and political reasons he felt it unwise to choose the Roman Empire as that
foe. His state had been forged in many ways because of the Carican Turk, and thus it seemed
only appropriate to continue his war against them. That the Roman Empire, Pope, and
Sklavonian Empire all thought the same was only a benefit. In 771, the first call went forth for
the armed populace of Europe to paint the Red Cross upon their shields and go forth to Holy
War.

The Great Votive War

Historians are rightly fascinated by the Great Votive War, as it marks a major turning-point in the
history of Europe and the world. Wars had of course been fought over religion before. The latter
Eastern Roman Emperors couched their wars in the rhetoric of Saint Augustine's "Just War" and
in an ideology that can be perhaps seen as proto-Desidarian. However, the concept of
"Devotional" or "Votive War" represented a transition in ideology, an expansion of the Just War
theology. Active warfare against the heathens was now, in rhetoric of Pope Adrian I, incumbent
upon Christendom. The defense of Christianity and Christian holy places was an obligation for
all who were capable of doing so. The armed strength of Europe should not, as it had for
centuries, turn against each other but rather against their common enemies now howling at the
gate. Everywhere pagans ruled Christian land. In Africa, in Asia, in Europe the armies of Christ
were being driven back.

Votive War, or war fought as part of a solemn vow to God, was a blessed affair, a way of
obtaining divine favor and absolving sins. Just as the warrior-kings of the Old Testament or
Constantine the Great undertook wars sanctioned by God, so too could contemporary Kings
and Emperors. The Papacy called on all Christians to turn against the Heathen, and the
response was tremendous. With the sanction of Emperor Severus and King Clovis, the armed
might of Europe began to assemble as a single, unified force.

...At least in theory. At its core, the Great Votive War is perhaps best understood as a state-
sponsored war and religious alliance. The leaders of the Votive War were Clovis and Severus -
there can be no doubt of that. A common goal existed for both leaders - to conquer the heathens
and alleviate the stresses on their empires brought about by raiding. Both leaders also sought to
distract their populace from internal issues of legitimacy and focus their nobility and armies on
an external foe. The Votive War would quickly be perverted into a tool of secular conquest. All
illusions of holy objectives were shattered early on by Severus' Generals, who proved to have
their own radically different ambitions.

If the Votive Armies assembled to cries of "God Wills It!" they still obeyed the clear
organizational lines of their respective military hierarchies. Volunteers and poor soldiers flocked
to the levied armies and often created disordered and heavily armed mobs, but the average
Roman soldier was a paid professional and the average Frankish soldier was fulfilling an oath of
legal obligation to serve. Religion served as a motivating and inspirational factor, but it did not
inherently explain why the bulk of the Votive soldiers were there. The disorderly mobs and
warbands that descended from Carantania into Pannonia and were subsequently slaughtered
en masse by the Xasar, later dubbed the "Army of the Vulgar Votives" were merely a symptom
of the religious fanaticism that gripped Europe in this era.

The expense and logistics of this army were truly impressive. Tens of thousands of Franks
travelled through Italy (with some level of escort) to Aquileia where they were barracked at great
expense to the Roman State. Granaries were emptied. The Roman soldiers who marshaled
grew restless as they waited for yet more Frankish troops to arrive, and, as food stores began to
run intermittently low, riots and small skirmishes broke out between Frankish lords and the
Roman troops. Priests and Roman officers struggled to remind the armies why they were
gathered, and that the true enemy lay beyond.

Finally, in mid-Spring of 774, Clovis arrived with his own retainer, and the armies began their
march. The Roman force was commanded by Nicolus Ioannis, Severus' Magister Militium. The
Roman Emperor choosing to remain in Florentia caused some tension between the two camps.
The Franks were uncertain why the Emperor would not personally attend, fearing some sort of
scheme. Distrust had mounted over the course of the several-month long buildup to war and as
the armies descended into Pannonia it reached a fever pitch. Nicolus wanted to turn south into
the Balkans and defeat Kuluj personally, while the Franks envisioned a march along the Danube
towards Constantinople, defeating the Xasars along the way.

Ultimately, the two armies would split over this debate. The Franks would march on Srem, and
the Romans would move south, liberating the Slavs and enjoying a relatively easy campaign
while they restored their Balkan territories.

Unbeknownst to Nicolus until it was too late, Kuluj Ishbara had fled north to the Xasar court with
his army. The Avar and Xasar Shah, Nanaivanta, put aside his differences with Kuluj, and had
persuaded the Turkic Prince to call on his father for aid and abandon his own conquests in favor
of a mutual defense. If the Franks were defeated here, Nanaivanta argued, they would never
again contemplate such an invasion and the rewards could be astronomical. However, unlike
Christian Europe, while the Xasar and Turks might have had an alliance, common religion
provided little motivation. The rulers of the steppe peoples saw themselves as secular lords, and
the only commonality in their beliefs was a Buddhist philosophy which did not provide the level
of shared identity that the Christian rulers were able to utilize. Perhaps because of this, the
Rhom Shah, Varshirakh did not even recognize that he was every bit as threatened as the
Xasar and Turks. He refused to send anything but token aid until it was far too late, for fear of
angering the Sklaveni.

While the Romans swept East without resistance, meeting the Sklavenian Autocrat at
Thessaloniki and striking an alliance, the Franks became bogged down quickly. The Carican
armies were too light and too mobile for them to face. However, as the combined Xasar-Turkic
alliance gathered more and more forces, Kuluj became arrogant and decided to directly attack
the Franks. At the Battle of Sisak, the Turks learned a brutal lesson. The Frankish shield walls
simply did not break. Forming a large square formation, with archers in the center, the Franks
smashed the charging Turks time and again, refusing to yield and using their long spears to
counter the Turkic charges. Despite becoming totally surrounded, Clovis held his ground, and,
as the Turks became exhausted he ordered a single cavalry charge with his heavy horse. Shah
Nanaivanta countered the charge but at the cost of most of the Xasar companions and he
himself was grievously wounded. While the Shah would recover, the Xasar retreated to Srem,
which would fall several months later.

The Franks however, in keeping with the rough plan decided ahead of time, could not commit to
turning north to finish off the Xasar but rather continued along the Danube, through friendly
Christian territory. Clovis sent a portion of his forces north under one of his Count-Palatines,
Berthaire. Berthaire was a veteran of many campaigns but his forces lacked a strong cavalry
element. At the battle of Morisena he suffered a brutal defeat against the wily Kuluj Ishbara and
retreated to Srem, which would become besieged.

For the main body of the Frankish army, supplies began to run low. As they marched down the
Danube, they turned against the Slavs there and began to pillage openly, justifying their
atrocities by saying that the Slavs were hardly true Christians, and observed strange rites that
could only be pagan devil-worship. As word of these atrocities spread southwards, the Romans
and Sklaveni became increasingly at odds. Tense messages were exchanged between Clovis,
who could not rein in his men, and Nicolus, who feared losing the Sklaveni as allies and thus
provisions to his own men. The two Votive armies prepared to meet at Adrianopolis, but Autocrat
Samuel I, disgusted with the Frankish atrocities declared he would carry on no further. Rumor
spread that he was considering an alliance with Varshirakh, who was a known quantity and
enjoyed good relations with the Sklaveni. Angered by Samuel's refusal and worried by the
rumors, Nicolus acted swiftly. He invited the Sklaveni Autocrat to a banquet with many retainers,
and promised to make a full apology. However, once the Sklaveni arrived, they were taken
hostage. The Sklaveni army was quickly disarmed and made to march south under guard.
Weakened by their many defeats against the Turks, the Sklaveni were too few to refuse, and the
Roman Legate Cyracius Ricio marched south with a token force and occupied Thessaloniki.
While Samuel retained his throne, his position was now deeply uncertain - a prisoner in his own
palace, he lived now at the mercy of a distant Emperor.

Severus himself was shocked by these developments, but he wasted little time. He dispatched
another five thousand soldiers, stripping bare the garrisons of southern Italy to round out the
force. Roughly half soldiers marched to reinforce Berthaire in Srem, and they succeeded in
breaking the siege. Berthaire was now free to consolidate and push back, although 775 would
see mostly inconclusive skirmishes. The Franks rarely advanced beyond the Danube in force.
The other half of this force sailed to Thessaloniki, and bolstered Cyracius' position there.

As the new year dawned, the Franco-Roman army arrived at Constantinople. Its walls repaired
and well-defended, several sporadic assaults in the early spring saw massive casualties for the
attackers. Varshirakh had prepared well. The aging Shah had a large fleet and a well-supplied
city. Knowing well the atrocities that had been perpetrated already by the Votive Army, he did not
dare to consider negotiation. The Votive Army grew frustrated beneath the walls. Their fortunes
would change when the Roman navy, massively expanded under the later Isidorian Emperors,
secured a massive victory in the Bosphorus. Much of the Rhom fleet was crewed by Christians
from the city-states of Asia Minor, and these elements mutinied when they learned of the Votive
War's purpose. Those ships that remained loyal were bottled up in the Golden Horn and
Constantinople was surrounded. However even still Varshirakh refused to surrender. The army
outside his walls was too vast - he knew this. It had devastated the countryside to feed itself and
now it was starving faster than the Eftal inside the walls.

Nicolus, knowing this cold arithmetic well, decided to leave only a small force besieging
Constantinople and cross the Hellesponte. Coastal Anatolia was rich and fertile - it could feed
the army. Clovis cautiously agreed with the plan, although he himself would remain. Having
seen the city, the King had become fascinated with it. He seemed eager to deny the Romans
the prize, and he falsely believed that Varshirakh was on the verge of surrender.

The cities of Asia Minor rose up en masse. The Eftal hinterlands, rich with agricultural estates,
were pillaged and the Eftal landlords and grandees driven out. Lesser Frankish lords would
often find regions and carve them out as personal fiefs, and when local Roman authorities tried
to evict them the response was violent. Even the Rhom Eftal were at a loss in the face of this
mass incursion. Ikonya fell rapidly and the Eftal fled into Syria en masse. Battles at Amorion and
Sozopolis saw Frankish and Severian Roman victories respectively against the Rhom Eftal
lords, whose tactics were effectively countered by a now experienced Votive Army.

As impressive as these sprawling conquests were, they left uncertainty and chaos in their wake.
The Frankish Empire was distant, and the Frankish nobles were inspired by loot and religious
fanaticism. By contrast the Romans were more immediate and often more practical (though no
less fanatical). But both wanted some portion of the spoils of war, even before the war ended. A
Hispanian warlord was busy carving out a territory for himself around the town of Myra, and with
the tacit approval of Emperor Severus, Berthaire founded the Frankish duchy of Srem. The
Sklaveni kingdom needed to be handled, and the new conquests in Anatolia distributed.
Furthermore, even as both sides made the first shaky steps towards consolidation,
Constantinople remained untaken and belligerently defiant. An Eftal commander named
Kurshanam, commonly called "the Bandit Shah" was operating from a base near Amaseia and
waging effective guerilla war against any Roman forces nearby, having gained the allegiance of
many Alans.

Then, there was a still greater concern. The rank and file soldier had no conception of the
distances involved, but a desire to reach Jerusalem had grown prevalent. If the Franks and
Romans together had retaken so much of the Roman Empire, why stop here? Jerusalem lay
within their reach, must it not? Would God not enable them to continue their triumphs?

Even some of the greater nobility were caught up in the fervor. A group of Roman commanders,
lead by a charismatic Legate named Majorian swore an oath not to rest until they had restored
the entire Empire under God. They broke off from the main body of Nicolus' force and marched
south towards the Cilician gates. They were followed by the mighty Duke of Burgundia, Tescelin,
and the Palatine Theodard of Aachen. Nicolus himself was waylaid by a fever and would not
leave Iconium for any reason, even as his army disintegrated into warring factions and began to
clash openly with the Frankish troops.

As word of all this began to reach Clovis, the Frankish King began to despair. His holy quest
had seemed to glorious when it had all began, but it was increasingly sullied by the schemes of
men and material gain. A war to drive back the heathens had become a war to restore the
Roman Empire had become a war to carve out petty fiefdoms out of the ruins. In his despair he
personally lead one final assault on the walls of Constantinople. Finally his soldiers made it over
the walls in several places, in conjunction from assistance by Severian warships mounted with
high castles. Bitter street-to-street fighting ensued, and portions of the city were devastated
once more. King Clovis was on the cusp of victory when a lone Eftal archer on a rooftop shot
him in the eye, killing him instantly.

The Franks, badly bloodied, fought to pull their King's body from the carnage and lost many
men in the attempt. Constantinople remained in Eftal hands. The Votive War would enter its
second phase - one where the great rulers who had been its authors would lose control of their
creation entirely.

Aghatsaghid

Like the Oadhyans, the Aghatsaghid can also be considered in many ways the successor to the
Eftal state. Like the Eftal their regime originated in the mountains of the Hindu Kush, and it
borrowed its culture and legal codes more from the Eftal imperial sensibilities than from the
feudal precedents of the Oadhya dynasty. Aghatsagh's religion is unclear, and indeed he seems
to have had few convictions in that regard. His son Korshad Lasgara, however, seems to have
converted to his wife's monist, nondualistic sect of Hinduism. Having married the daughter of an
important Sibipuran potentate so as to endear himself to the his guild subjects, Korshad
Lasgara spent most of his early life warring and governing in the Punjab, learning vital lessons
about governance.

At his father's death, the Co-Shah faced few internal threats close at hand. Riding to Herat to
accept his father's seat, he had the implicit loyalty of his retainers. The threats came from the
West. No sooner had Aghatsagh's body cooled than the Oadhya rose up in rebellion with the
backing of a not insignificant number of greater lords. The Aghatsaghid response, when it came,
was brutal. By attacking the seats of the vayan, the Oadhya were forced to divide their forces
and rush to counter the Aghatsaghid attacks. Pars fell in early 741, followed by Huzestan later
the same year. As the next campaigning season came on, Korshad rode north, defeating the
Oadhya first at Xwast and then again at Nihawand. He captured Ahmatan and executed the
whole of the Oadhya family, sending a stark message about the perils of rebellion.

With this victory, the short-lived Oadhyan Empire was truly undone. Their primary legacy would
be the patchwork feudal system overlaid across Iran, and ending the period of bloody feuding
which had preceded them. However, the Eftal era was rapidly coming to a close, and in many
senses it was a victim of its own successes. The umbrella of Eftal had become too broad to
develop a coherent identity around. Tribal lines accordingly had developed, and it was these
that would significantly weaken the Eftal capacity to resist. The period of unified Eftal Empire
was a distant memory now, and manifestly failed as a rallying cry against the various invaders of
the east. As Ahmatan became the seat of a Turkish viceroy, the Eftal increasingly found
themselves accepting the foreign dominion as little different than being ruled by a different tribe.
And in their own way, the Aghatsaghids had embraced a distinctly Indo-Eftal heritage.

The next step in Korshad's plan to pacify the west would be driving the Banu Tayy from such
cities as Ambar and Anat. In the old tradition of conquerors across the East, he employed a
mixture of strategies. Resistance was met with brutality, but those tribal patriarchs who
surrendered quickly were retained as vayans within the feudal system he had inherited from the
Oadhya.

In the twenty years of his reign, Korshad had little opportunity to spend any of them in his Indian
provinces. Consistently frustrated by affairs in the West, with tribal conflicts and attempts to
rebuild the vast devastated tracts of Mesopotamia, the Shah left the guild republics of the East
to their own devices. This benign neglect translated into a relatively peaceful and untroubled
region. While the west stubbornly resisted attempts at reform and regime change, India
remained largely untouched. The only issues were in southern Sindh, where the annihilation of
the Rai dynasty had left the transplanted Turko-Eftal landlords ruling large tracts of land, and
without local expertise, these grandees often administered their new estates poorly.

Towards the end of his reign, he clashed with the Syrian Eftal over the status of Nasibin. The
major fortress-city was a lynchpin of any successful defense of Mesopotamia, and though
Aghatsagh had given it away in exchange for peace, Korshad refused to acknowledge the sale.
In 757, the Aghatsaghid army mounted a full scale invasion of Syria under the command of the
Kamboja general Kharshida. The war was costly. Despite initial victories in the field such as at
Karrai and Zeugma, the warlike Syrian Eftal refused to surrender. The war dragged on for four
indecisive years, transitioning slowly to a guerilla campaign. Kharshida attempted to starve the
Eftal out by annihilating their herds and driving them into poor pastureland, but the Rhom
Shahdom provided shelter for these displaced tribes, allowing them to mount hit and run attacks
on the Aghatsaghid supply lines.

Unwilling to risk war with the Rhom Eftal, peace was finally signed. The Syrian Eftal were made
into a series of small vassal states, but they retained a level of autonomy and were allowed to
resettle their territory.

After Korshad's death in 761, his daughter's husband Tarkhsigh Arslan took power. Unlike
Korshad, Tarkhsigh saw the future of the Empire as being located in India. He had accompanied
Korshad on most of his campaigns, and saw India as the true heartland and great prize. Early in
his reign, he would develop a reputation as a patron of the arts and sciences, encouraging
learned men from the monasteries of Syarzur and Gandhara to travel to Herat and debate. He
established the first printing presses throughout his kingdom, so as to be able to distribute royal
decrees quickly. A system of riders would take the initial printings to regional hubs, where they
would be copied or amended and then sent on to the next lowest level of government and so
on.

He also cultivated a close friendship with the aging orator Dahrasena of Taksashila, and seems
to have been intrigued but suspicious of the republicanism of Gandhara. It is Tarkhsigh Arslan
who was primarily responsible for the preservation of Dahrasena's works on government and
philosophy, which a less enlightened ruler might have destroyed as subversive of his regime.

Unlike Korshad, Tarkhsigh was loathe to travel west. He remained largely ignorant of
developments in Syria and beyond, focusing on the rising power of the Surasena Ganarajya
along the Yamuna river. Having conquered Indraprastha, the Surasena ambitions had expanded
to involve cultivating buffer states along the eastern Punjab. In 765, Tarkhsigh moved to crush
these buffer states, but was defeated in a series of campaigns over the next seven years.
Humiliated, he was unable to take the cities of Jalandhara or Sagala, which remained a thorn in
his side.

Thereafter, Tarkhsigh would attempt to be peaceful. Much as the councils of Surasena might
dream, Mathura, though wealthy and populous, was not strong enough to exert direct force into
the Punjab. An invasion by the Kimek Turks in 774 was dealt with by local governors without
even calling on the central government. All in all, there were no immediate threats to the
Aghatsaghids... until the Votive War came.

The Votive War - Anarchy and Aftermath

The descent of the Votive War into anarchy was perhaps not unexpected by those with
foresight. Clovis had relied on personal force of will to keep his lords and retainers in check. The
Romans acted with more coordination, but they too fell victim to the fanaticism and opportunism
that reigned supreme after Clovis' death and the brief incapacitation of Nicolus Ioannis by fever.
As the Magister's health recovered, he found that large portions of his army were in open
mutiny, spurred on by fanatical motivations.

The Legate Majorian had departed with a full five thousand Roman soldiers, and much of the
Frankish force had departed with him. Those who had not were busy cutting the Rhom
Shahdom into personal fiefs, ignoring promises Nicolus had personally made to Roman cities to
protect them from pillage and brigandage. These cities were often walled and thus difficult for
the roving Frankish warbands to capture, but some did fall. When rumors of Clovis' death
reached the main army, Nicolus sent riders under his trusted subordinate Emanulis to inform a
nearby Frankish force in Mokissos under the command of Count Aigulf of Augsburg. Some sort
of misunderstanding developed and the Count murdered Emanulis with an axe. Two Roman
cavalrymen fled the scene and reported the news, at which point Nicolus attempted to take the
remaining Frankish forces in Iconium into custody.

However, the Franks were wary. They had seen Nicolus betray the Sklaveni and a rumor that
the Romans had caused Clovis' death was sweeping the army. Pitched battles began in
Iconium, with the Romans controlling the citadel, barracks, and a large part of the walls, and the
Franks holding the marketplace and most of the city proper. They dragged carts into the streets
to form impromptu barricades and responded to Roman attacks with contemptuous ease before
pulling out of the city and marching west, perhaps meaning to return home.

While the Romans and Franks tore their alliance apart with astonishing quickness, the Votive
War, in more than a few senses, carried on. Majorian, along with perhaps ten thousand mixed
Roman and Frankish soldiers, marched through the Cilician gates into the Aghatsaghid
Shahdom. While Majorian knew the politics of the region and attempted to reach out to the local
Vayan and gain an escort on their "pilgrimage" many of his own soldiers and all of the Franks
saw this as consorting with the heathen and began pillaging Cilicia with reckless abandon.
Several engagements occurred, which saw the Eftal repulsed and what remained of the Votive
Army continue their march. En route, they continued their pillaging, taking losses to Eftal raids
and attrition, but remaining undefeated. As the summer came to a close, they bypassed Antioch
and came to to Heshanid ruled Apameia.

The local military governor, Thomas of Byblos, was a Monophysite, but he was willing to parlay.
After determining that this motley and exhausted force were ostensibly little more than an armed
pilgrimage, he cautiously determined that they could be allowed to progress south under escort.
If they truly desired nothing more than to see the place of Christ's death and resurrection, who
was he to deny that to them? However, it was not long before the fact of the "Coptic Heresy"
was realized by the rank and file. A council was held were several lower-ranking officers
approach their commanders and lords. One of them, a young man by the name of Cheldric,
claimed to have a vision wherein God called upon Duke Tescelin to restore his Holy Kingdom
over Jerusalem. The Monophysites were no different from the Eftal. They smeared filth and lies
over the name of God and deserved death all the same. Majorian agreed, and the Votives
turned on their escorts and massacred them, before turning south towards Emesa, whose walls
had fallen into disrepair, and putting it to sack.

It took the Heshanids too long to react, and when they did it was uncoordinated. While the
Votive soldiers might have considered it a miracle, the truth is simply that the Heshanid military
had atrophied over the past several generations of relative peace. Several disastrous defeats
and failed ambushes later, they realized they had no hope of containing this mob, or the several
armed bands of stragglers which followed it in the following months. Thomas of Byblos was
himself killed in battle with one of these bands. When the Votives reached Jerusalem, the city,
fearing the worst, opened its gates to them. This did not stop a general massacre of
"unbelievers" and a vicious sack.

After the end of the bloody pilgrimage, many Franks began to realize that returning home was
no simple prospect. The Heshanids controlled the sea and all the coastal ports. If they went
their separate ways, none would ever see Europe again. A council was convened once more,
and Majorian promised that every man among them could be a landholder if only they trusted
and followed him. God did not call them to return home, he called them to fight for a holy
purpose, to purge the heretics and unbelievers. Merely coming to Jerusalem was not enough -
they must become its defenders.

The subsequent conquest of the Levant was unprecedented in its brutality, even by the
standards of Eftal raids in past centuries. However, in the end, Tescelin crowned himself King of
Jerusalem, Majorian became his "Mayor of the Palace" and Theodard of Aachen became Duke
of Syria.

In the north, Cilicia had been almost entirely "liberated" by Count Aigulf. Because of its minimal
remaining Christian population, nearly all of which were Nestorian, this liberation was little more
than outright genocide. However, Aigulf was not alone in his aims. Many of the Frankish forces
in Anatolia realized a simple reality - the Romans were the only power with the capacity to bring
them home, and the Romans under Magister Nicolus had betrayed the sacred oaths of the
Votive War. In the meantime, it was every man for himself. Each soldier should do as he felt
God required of him. For many, that involved carving out a petty kingdom. Many, especially the
Counts Palantine, realized there was nothing waiting for them at home. There was no guarantee
even that Clovis' Empire would not crumble once word reached it of his death. Best to cut their
losses and keep fighting the heathens.

Some, such as DukeBerthaire, had remarkable success with this policy. He ruled most of the
Danube, and many of the Roman soldiers lent to him by Emperor Severus followed him in
exchange for land grants - far more than they could expect from the Emperor. Another great
victor was Sigebert of Nantes, a bodyguard and Palatine of Clovis' who led a follow-up attack on
Constantinople after Clovis' death. The beleaguered city finally fell, and Sigebert was merciless
in his revenge. After taking the city he left it in the hands of a small garrison and marched on
Adrianopolis, conquering it as well.

Perhaps the most successful however, was the Count Palatine Helinand, whose conquests
would go on to form the "Holy Kingdom of Asia" - he was uniquely able to convince cities such
as Nicomedia to align themselves with him rather than the Romans through charm and deft
political maneuvering. However, he also earned the animosity of Nicolus through his actions.
The Roman commander had been fighting Eftal holdouts around Sardis when he discovered
that Helinand was calling himself "King of Asia" - immediately he turned to dispatch the newest
threat but was defeated by Helinand's Frankish cavalry, and forced to limp back to the coast.

Severus was left reacting far too slowly to the news. He ordered Nicolus to fall back and defend
the Balkans, but the orders were never received, and even if they were, Nicolus' army was
heavily atrophied and suffering from very low morale, having been turned away from its
ostensible holy purpose. Legate Cyracius Ricio in Thessaloniki was effectively in sole command
of pacifying the entire Balkans with a pittance of a military force. He was forced to negotiate with
local Slavic lords, most of whom were currently his hostages. His demands were simple.
Assistance would see them retain their rank and position in the new Roman government.
Refusal would leave them imprisoned in Thessaloniki or killed. It was a stopgap measure, but it
was mostly successful. Despite only having token forces, the Romans were able to maintain
loose control over a vast territory - those parts of it which were not carved out into Frankish
kingdoms.

The Eftal themselves suffered badly - the loss of Constantinople and much of Asia Minor put an
end to their short lived preeminence in the eastern Mediterranean. Even the "Bandit" Shahdom,
although ruled by Kurshanam, a Buddhist, was in large part populated by Alan Christians who
resisted Frankish dominion of their homelands. If there was any victor among the conquered
peoples of the Great Votive War, it was the Roman cities of coastal Asia Minor. Most of these
cities were spared any major pillage, and almost all enjoyed almost total autonomy under
Christian rule once again.

As the marital strength of Europe was expended conquering Asia, Clovis' death left a power
vacuum which would be filled by his only (legitimate) son, Theuderic. However, news of the
great eastern conquests reached distant Aachen only sporadically and often with a great many
inaccuracies. Somehow, the notion that Clovis had been killed by the Romans became the
predominant narrative - a narrative exacerbated by reports of Roman-Frankish clashes across
Asia and the Balkans. Theuderic's councilors urged him to go to war with Severus, and
Theuderic did so, marching south with his remaining retainers and what levies could be drawn
up at short notice.

Severus met him near the city of Arles with a force of some ten thousand disciplined Roman
troops and his famed Xasari guard. The Franks were more numerous but generally of far inferior
quality, and it showed. While the Frankish riders and elite house troops survived almost entirely,
the levied forces broke and fled. Severus swept north into Burgundy, and, after meeting with the
Gallo-Roman aristocracy of Aquitaine, managed to incite a rebellion there. Theuderic was forced
to rush across his territory, putting down rebellions, including one by his bastard brother which
temporarily seized Paris.

Another map is coming soon.

Aghatsaghid
Society and Culture - an Overview

The seventh century saw by its end the complete destruction of the last surviving Eftal state, the
Rhom Shahdom.[1] The end of the Eftal era is typically marked by this event, the fall of
Constantinople. In a few brief decades the Eftal, both as a social class and an ethnic group had
gone from pre-eminent to marginalized. A Turkic dynasty held sway across most of the
traditional Middle-East, and Frankish and Roman kings and generals ruled all the rest.

As a military caste, the Eftal would continue to serve their purpose across the Iranian plateau
and the river valleys of Syria, two regions that they had profoundly transformed by their
presence. Even the Turkish settlement which became more prominent in this era was
insufficient to displace them. Of course, these Eftal often regarded themselves by local tribal
identities - the continuation of a trend that had begun ever since the collapse of the Eftal
Empire. In time, the word Eftal, or "Ifthal", became increasing identified with the concept of "an
Iranian horseman" rather than the original strict ethnic definition. In much of the Aghatsaghid
Shahdom, these Ifthal horsemen provided a valuable auxiliary force and an integral part of the
local aristocracy, regardless of their background.

The Aghatsaghid Shahs and their bureaucrats saw enormous potential in many of the old
territories of the Eftal Empire. Mesopotamia in particular, long devastated, had undergone
radical demographic shifts since its time under Sasanian rule. The Assyrian Christian population
which had been predominant in Arbayestan was markedly diminished, forming only a minority in
their traditional homeland. Much of the length of the Euphrates was so consistently raided by
Arab tribes such as the Banu Tayy as to be depopulated. The great cities of Asorestan had been
neglected by the Eftal and massacred by the armies of the Soasyant Husrava - and all the
efforts of the Oadhyans to restore them had essentially involved partitioning their lands among
their kin to rule as landlords. They had brought in Slavic and African slave laborers to work
plantations growing cash crops and the like but this had not greatly arrested the decline of the
region.

However, credit should not wholly go to the Aghatsaghid dynasts for the restoration of
Mesopotamia under their reign. Various mountain tribes, living a semi-nomadic lifestyle on the
periphery of Mesopotamia would at this point come into prominence. Called the Khardi[2], they
had long existed in Southern Armenia and the region around Lake Urmia, and had a unique
Iranian culture and language, and their own pagan religion which took in elements of
Zoroastrianism and Christianity. Like the later Eftal, with whom they had many similarities and
were often mistaken by contemporaries, they identified more by their own local tribal groups
than by any broader category. It was these people who would resettle Arbayestan and northern
Asorestan, with the patronage of the Aghatsaghid Turks. The Aghatsaghids recognized that by
elevating the Khardi, they could gain an ally in their attempts to retain control over the
Mesopotamian region. The Tigris, between Tesiphon in the south and Kephas in the north was
by 800 firmly a Khardish river.

Southern Mesopotamia, or Mesan, was a different story. This was the old heartland of the
Mahadevists, and they retained some measure of their old strength here in spite of repeated
persecutions and an official repudiation of the Saosyant. However, unlike their predecessors the
Aghatsaghids saw little reason to continue these persecutions and accordingly were tolerant of
the Mahadevist congregation.

In general though, the Aghatsaghid empire was a Buddhist one. The Eftal patronage of Hindu
philosophies had led to a situation where the traditional Iranic religions had been largely
supplanted, meaning that from Sugd to Syarzur the population was majority Buddhist. While this
was largely Mahayana Buddhism, it is important to mark it as distinct from the Buddhism of East
Asia - the Buddhism of Iran was known, even to people of the Aghatsaghid era, as "Sogdian
Buddhism" to distinguish it from the practices of other regions. This name itself is something of a
misnomer. It is unclear if Sogdian Buddhism truly developed in Sogdiana. Regardless, it was a
Buddhism developed for a distinctly Iranian audience. It retained deities and traditions familiar to
the Eftal warlords and Sogdian merchants who patronized it. The veneration of a large pantheon
of deities facilitated its rapid spread through the Iranian world. Even among the Turks it found a
foothold, as it gave special veneration to Tangra.[3]

This was the still-developing religion encountered by the Franks and Romans who overran the
Rhom Shahdom, and their massacres and persecutions would drive the Eftal of Rhom east,
back to their traditional homeland of Syria. Accordingly it should be little surprise that the two
faiths would ultimately set themselves at odds with one another. Unlike traditional Buddhism,
Sogdian-style Buddhism was far more martial in character - it retained warlike deities whose
addition to a Buddhist framework cast them as inferior to the enlightened ones, but still
necessary and powerful figures who could grant victory in battle. While no equivalent to the
doctrine of Votive War developed, the Eftal Buddhists nevertheless were able to use aspects of
their faith as a rallying cry against the invading Christians.

Particularly under Tarkhsigh Arslan, a scientific revival of sorts would also occur across the new
empire. Ideas preserved by monasteries from the Eftal Golden Age were brought back into the
light along with the latest Hindu and Chinese discoveries. Once more, the Middle East would
become a new crossroads of civilization, combining ideas and innovations in radical new forms.
However chaos and warfare in Asia Minor and the Balkans prevented these ideas from
penetrating the Latin West, at least for the time being.[4] One school of thought, being largely
Hellenophilic, argues that the Frankish incursions were yet another deathblow to the intellectual
and cultural tradition of the Greek East, just as the Eftal incursions had been. Another would be
that the Roman and Frankish reconquests would simply contribute to the cultural mixing of the
middle east, bringing a new, distinctly Germanic influence to Asia much as the Sahu trade
routes brought a Slavic one. In reality, the truth is likely a mixture of these two options.

[1] The Heshanids, though Eftal in origin, should be considered thoroughly native by this point,
and ethnically were as much an Arab dynasty as an Eftal one.

[2] Kurds, done in a way to (sloppily) reflect the linguistic shifts the Eftal have brought about.

[3] Eftal/Sahu version of Tengri, which they worshipped only sporadically but the Turkish gave a
key place to in the pantheon.

[4] I can envision perhaps a largely discredited alternate-future sociologist who might argue that
the Latin West has "Bloody Borders" as part of a grand narrative of the "clash of civilizations".
No other culture, after all, was "bloodthirsty and fanatical" enough to come up with a concept of
holy warfare.

[Something else I almost posted with the rest of the above post but I decided to do it this way for
the sake of length. I admit much of it is a rehashing of stuff discussed in prior posts but posts
like these are good at least for me to help ground what's going on. Also a mild Kurdwank occurs
as northwestern Iranian nomads move into Mesopotamia, displacing the remaining indigenous
inhabitants. This may have been done for the delicious irony of having a Turkish dynasty be the
great patrons of the Kurds. ]

The Viking Era

The start of the Viking Era in Western Europe is traditionally dated to the raid on the young
monastery of Mount Saint Michael in France in 789. However, in truth it had been ongoing for
some time. The Vikings were if nothing else opportunists - the relative weakness of Eastern
Europe invited many early raids. Trading ports were taken, sacked, and sometimes retained by
the northmen. The Pomeranians and Obodorites suffered perhaps the worst, but also gained
the earliest reprieve - by the dawn of the ninth century, the Vikings were primarily going further
afield.

The first Viking raid on Anglo-Saxon England was the sack of Streanœhealh (Whitby) in 785.
The divided kingdoms of the Pentarchy made easy prey for their longships. Seizing islands off
the coast such as the Hebrides (822) and the Orkneys (810), they gained an excellent base
from which to launch intensified and larger-scale raids on Scotland and Ireland as well. In
Ireland the Viking impact was particularly strong, with them establishing or conquering cities
such as Vedrafjordr and Dyflin.[1] These cities would become both colonies and trade hubs - an
outlet for people who had little awaiting them back home and no reason not to migrate to a more
temperate country where opportunity abounded.

In the east, other colonies were established. Most prominent among these was the "kingdom" of
Gardveldi, carved out of the dominions of the northern Slavs. The early kingdom was little more
than riverine trade posts and small hill forts - a level of development not distinct from the Slavic
peoples they conquered - but Gardveldi would grow at a much more rapid rate than other Norse
colonies in the west. Trade with the Khirichanid Turks to their south brought previously unknown
luxuries north along the network of rivers. While the Great Votive War had constricted trade to
some degree, the flow of goods quickly bounced back to its pre-war levels - the Frankish and
Roman conquerors would have been foolish not to allow their people and the Sahu to continue
their immensely profitable trade.

As in so many other periods of history this new burst of trade, whether it was spurred on
perhaps by the swift-river vessels designed by the Norse, or perhaps just the emergence of a
new market, also caused ideas and culture to spread. The Norse of Gardveldi quickly adopted
Slavic customs and culture where it suited them, but more enduringly, the first Buddhist
missionaries from the Xasar-Sahu would visit Gardveldi in this time. It is from them we have the
most accurate accounts of the region, but though these earliest missionaries were greeted with
curiosity and respect, they seem to have made little headway in converting any but the lowest-
status members of society.

If the Norse were more receptive to these foreign ideas than the indigenous Slavic inhabitants,
we should not be too surprised. Though Slavic tribes often collaborated with the Khirichan and
the Sahu, this never developed into a very positive relationship. The Slavs saw the Khirichan as
raiders and slavers from the south, an experience that the Norse never shared. To them the
entire world was filled with opportunity. When Sahu missionaries brought them tales of golden
cities far to the south, these tales would spread like wildfire and merely entice further
expeditions of both exploration and plunder.

As certain [fake] theorists have claimed,[2] perhaps the best way to understand the Norse
civilization is by contrasting it to the other great civilization of Europe - Latin Christendom, a
term that can also encompass the Irish and Germans and all others it ultimately assimilated. In
the past century, the Latin world had become increasingly insular and militant. The siege
mentality it suffered would only grow as the Norsemen began to raid its shores. The Roman
Empire it had known was destroyed not once but twice, and it had perhaps never truly
recovered from the cultural shock of its loss. The traditional way which it had spread its borders
and faith was peaceful - relying on the strength of its culture and traditions, it had assimilated
those who meant to conquer it and even beyond. However, the Eftal conquests had perhaps
unconsciously made Latin civilization doubt that strategy - the Eftal had not easily been
assimilated. If they had been Romanized it was only minimally. The retreat into militarism and
holy war can be seen as a broader sign of a civilization losing faith in its own identity.

By contrast the Norse civilization was adventurous and mercantile. It had little past to look back
on beyond the mythic. They were forward-thinking, innovative, and curiously democratic. If they
lacked centralization or complex state apparatuses, these traits seemed to favor their wandering
mentality. Their religious and cultural tradition was equally ancient, if not as universalist. What
was more, the centralized states of the south, Francia and Rome, were no more prepared to
deal with the Norse raids and conquests than the more decentralized and tribal civilizations of
the north. The infrastructure and armed strength that might have allowed Latin civilization to
mount a defense against the Norsemen was massively atrophied and what remained was
squandered in massive backwards-looking expeditions against the Eftal. When the Latin
civilization encountered the Norse it did not do so with the same spirit that allowed it to subsume
the barbarians of past centuries but rather with a militant rage all the more visible for its total
impotency.

There are certainly some good points to this theory - the Latin world was weakened
fundamentally, and it does certainly seem to have been unsure of itself in the wake of the Eftal.
But this theory discounts demographic shifts and climate patterns which played an equally
significant role. The expanding Norse population ensured that both civilization would come into
conflict. Technological advantages in shipbuilding and navigation ensured that the Norse would
outmatch the Latin civilizations in many critical respects, and the damage done to their
civilization by Turkic raids and their own infighting would likely play a larger role than any lack of
spirit.

India - the revolution spreads outwards

The social revolution begun in the early half of the eighth century would spread and further
entrench in its latter half. The massive urban centers of India dominated society. Armed clashes
between these centers and the rural peoples as well as armed clashes between polities both
declined significantly as borders became stable. The equal-kingdoms, as they were known,
began to establish a system of embassies and regular correspondence. Treaties regulating
trade and defining borders were important to ending the anarchy that had followed the collapse
of the Maukhani.

While the guild system had ensured population growth, it could not always ensure employment.
Accordingly, people were often forced to seek opportunities elsewhere. Some of the few
continually growing professions were mercantile or colonial ventures. Overseas merchant
communities, which had existed for centuries saw the increased demand among the growing
Indian population for foreign (especially Chinese) goods and accordingly needed to massive
expand their enterprises. As more and more people demanded Arabian spices, African ivory,[3]
or Chinese porcelain, these trading communities became essential, and grew rapidly.

For the first time, cities that could properly be described as colonies began to develop along the
Persian Gulf and Southeast Asia. These colonies had generally speaking only limited political
ties to their motherland, typically being founded as the project of guilds working in concert. They
attracted primarily those of more heterodox beliefs, those unconcerned with caste or those
whose caste was low, due to lingering superstitions about crossing the "black water." The
exception was those migrants from South India, who disregarded the superstitions entirely, and
Buddhists, who represented a large percentage of the population to begin with.

Ports along the coast of [Burma] developed to faciliate trade with the Indianized Pyu polities of
the Irawaddi valley - a key overland route to China during those times that the Uighur-raided silk
road became untenable. Cities such as Sudhammapura and Pulapali would grow into major port
towns and useful entrepots for connecting India to the massive Srivajiyan Empire to the south.
In turn, the establishment of these colonies would help unify the southern Pyu. The powerful
city-state of Kusimanagara was able to spread its loose hegemony northwards, stabilizing the
region and helping to facilitate trade.

At the invitation of the albudhist tribe known as Al-Azd, a group of Gujarati guild-merchants
settled the small but prosperous port town of Musqata [literally "Anchorage"], known for its
important natural harbor. The subsequent influx of Gujarati settlers would allow the Al-Azd to
defeat Mezun, the traditional Eftal-dominated port of the region. However, by the time of the
ninth century, the two most populous destinations for those seeking a better life and prosperity
were the Hawiya Kingdom and the cities of Savahila. This expanding diaspora of colonists and
traders would rewrite the demographics of the western Indian Ocean forever.

Like the Norse in northern Europe, maritime technology and unchecked population expansion
combined to ensure regional dominance. However, unlike the Norse, the Indian expansion was
rarely violent. Outside of small-scale border clashes and the semi-regular tribal warfare the
Savahila found themselves entangled in, it was a relatively peaceful expansion. Furthermore,
unlike the Norse, there was no one even roughly-unified Indian culture. The Gujarati colonists
differed substantially from the Tamil who migrated to Sumatra, or the Tamralipti guilds who were
the primary inhabitants of the Burmese colonies. Despite the hegemonizing effects of three
successive universal Indian Empires, the languages and cultures of these peoples were drifting
rapidly apart. Sanskrit as a lingua franca was a declining language of the intellectual elites. If
anything, the guilds exacerbated this sentiment, emphasizing local and ethnic ties over any sort
of universal imperial tendency.

[1] Feel free to think of the situation on the British isles as not too fundamentally different to
OTL.
[2] What follows is me trying to do a more "old fashioned" sounding analysis of the two cultures.
Let's not necessarily take it as gospel.
[3] It's a curious and apparently actually true fact that there does seem to have been a market
for African ivory in India.

[It's a short update cause I'm strapped for time. But I hope it sheds some light on the alt-Viking
era and what's going on India, which I've been neglecting horribly recently in my recent narrow
focus on the Votive War.]

Kurdish civilization

The sudden emergence of the Khardi or Kurds into the Mesopotamian river valleys upended the
traditional balance of power. Under the Eftal, they had been nomadic people used as auxiliaries,
notable mostly for refusing to assimilate into the broader category of Eftal, where so many other
indigenous nomadic peoples did. This strong identity, based along tribal lines and a long
heritage that perhaps traced back to the ancient Medes, allowed those Kurds which migrated
out of their traditional upland homes to retain their culture and indeed assimilate or drive out
those whose lands they seized.

The Kurdish people worshiped an ethnic religion that has been called by various names through
history but here will be called Yazdatism. A mixture of Buddhist and traditional pagan beliefs,
there were many superficial resemblances to the Eftal faith, such as a worship of Mithra.
However, Mithra in Yazdatism was a solar deity, and accompanied by a wide pantheon of
Yazdata, or divinities, and angels known as Bodisav who came to earth in human form to
provide divine instruction. Among historical Bodisavs could be counted teachers such as Christ,
Mani, and Buddha. For the Yazdati, there was no afterlife, merely endless reincarnation until the
end of the world, at which point it was unclear what might happen.

Unlike the Buddhists, the Yazdatis rejected monasticism and asceticism in favor of vibrant,
jubilant celebration. They had a semblance of an organized priesthood, and as they became
more urban this would grow, but in many respects the religion was merely passed down by
community leaders. Comparisons to Saihism have been drawn by some historians - this was a
faith of a distinct ethnic group which took in the accumulated influences of the cultures around
them and mixed it with their own distinctive traditions.
The Kurdish "invasions" are a confusing subject from a historical perspective. Much doubt has
been shed over the level of communal violence which took place in the early years. While
certain Christian and a few surviving Mahadevist writers have characterized it as an active
invasion, sponsored by the Aghatsaghids after a dispute between the Christian vayan of Mosil
and the Aghatsaghid viceroyNenifara, other documents seem to claim it was a relatively
peaceful migration, with outbreaks of violence mostly being sporadic attempts to drive local
lords off fertile land. Either way, by the ninth century the majority of Mesopotamia was in Kurdish
hands.

Within another decade, Mesun would fall in an indisputably violent series of attacks which were
lightly but not too strongly condemned by the Aghatsaghid administration. Shortly thereafter,
battles with the Tayy clan would see almost all of the Euphrates fall as well. The Tayy
themselves would cease to exist as an independent power not long thereafter, ensuring that the
Nestorian resistance to Saihism would falter in the north over time.

It seems obvious that the Aghatsaghids of Herat had little clue what they had unleashed in
Mesopotamia, but they also seem to have been largely apathetic to the developments as a
whole. Certainly the Aghatsaghids were military powerful, commanding large forces of Turkic
and Ifthal cavalry which could have been deployed quite rapidly to quash the early Kurds.
However, Mesopotamia was considered peripheral by the India-focused rulership of Tarkhsigh
Arslan, who would rule until 796 before being succeeded by his young son Suryagha, whose
affairs were managed by a regency council of his father's close companions. These companions
largely had estates in Sindh and greater Iran, and as such were unconcerned with a few Eftal
and Assyrian potentates in a devastated river valley being pushed out, or the subsequent wars
against the Arabs.

Two main coalitions of the new Kurds had developed by roughly 805, one northern, one
southern. The northern one was organized by Serxwevan Mughriyani, officially made Padivayan
of Mosil in the same year. The southern coalition, based around Tesiphon, was less official. Its
leader, Merxhas Rojdarza, based his own power structure around the traditional tribal ties of his
people, allowing various friends and relations to take the lordships and legal titles of the region.
It was Rojdarza who continually attacked the Tayy and the Mahadevists, ensuring his legacy
through land grants to loyal followers - land grants which had to be authorized by the
Aghatsaghids but invariably were in exchange for token gifts.

By 807, Suragha had reached adulthood and the mood in Herat had turned in favor of some
level of intervention. Aghatsaghid garrisons were established, particularly in northern
Mesopotamia and Syria, the notion being to keep a watch on the Kurds. But this was too little
too late. The Kurds had already gained most of what they wanted, and if anything the
Aghatsaghid garrisons merely served to prevent any reprisals by their neighbors. Henceforth the
Kurds would choose to work with their nominal overlords, seeing the Aghatsaghid system as
bringing welcome stability to the region.

Bandit Shahs and the Votivists Besieged

The Rhom Eftal had been on the cusp of truly considering themselves different from the Eftal of
Syria or Iran when the Votive War broke out. Christianity was, by some measures, on the rise,
especially after the conquest of the Alan Khaganate. Their version of Buddhism was itself willing
to consider Christ some sort of western Bodhisattva, but much of that changed when the
Romans and Franks launched an all out war to recover the lost east.

Kurshanam, the "Bandit Shah" was the sole inheritor of the Rhom Eftal legacy, and through
force of will and personal connections he was able to rally the surviving Rhomians and loyalists.
Unlike those previous Shahs, his territory was essentially confined to Amaseia and the Pontic
coast, a rump state of Alan tribesmen and refugee Eftal warriors. Much of this small state's
revenue came from state-sanctioned raids against the newly established Votive kingdoms, with
which Kurshanam maintained a constant state of war. The Roman population of Asia was
treated with the same brutality as the invaders, due to the Eftal viewing them as traitors.

However, for all his thoughtless viciousness, Kurshanam lacked the numbers to effectively turn
the tide against the Votive kings. Kurshanam's raids alienated the Roman population even
further, something the Franks were quick to exploit. Most of Anatolia seemed permanently lost.
In 788, Kurshanam would die peacefully in his bed, despairing that the legacy of his people was
gone. His successor, Maimarkh, was not any kin to him but rather another successful raider, and
one with a broader view of politics. Knowing that his predecessors actions had served more to
alienate that to help, Maimarkh appealed to the Aghatsaghids for aid. In 791, the local Viceroy of
Syria would be dispatched with some twenty thousand soldiers, largely Eftal.

The Aghatsaghids had not been afraid to exploit the successes of the Votive war over the past
decade. They had chipped away at the Kingdom of Jerusalem while it was distracted fighting
the Heshanids in the south, seizing cities such as Emesa and Tripolis for their own empire while
the young Emperor Alexandros Heshana tightened the noose around the remaining warlords.
However, actively invading Asia Minor was another thing entirely - it represented a direct assault
on the Votivists, and something that might well encourage another holy war.

If Maimarkh assumed that the Viceroy of Syria, Majar, would act to restore the Rhom Shahdom,
he was terribly mistaken. Majar spent the opening years of his war destroying Aigulf's County of
Cilicia, before targeting the "Duchy of Mysa" and overrunning it with similar swiftness. The King
of Asia, taken off-guard, gathered his forces and marched south, fighting an inconclusive battle
at Ikonion which led to a siege of the city by the Aghatsaghid army and the Franks pulling back,
harassing the Aghatsaghids were capable. Maimarkh himself marched south to link up with the
Aghatsaghids at Ikonion, but upon arrival he found his advice and soldiers were almost
unwelcome. Majar had his own ambitions, it seemed - ambitions that Maimarkh was able to
construe as neither in the favor of Shah Tarkhsigh or himself in letters sent to Herat.

Hoping for a more pliable replacement, Maimarkh launched an elaborate intrigue against his
ostensible ally, ensuring Majar would be recalled Herat and subsequently executed. However,
his replacement was Tarkhsigh Arslan's capable nephew, Korkuta. Maimarkh attempted a
similar scheme, only to be discovered and sent home after a tense standoff in the allied camp.
Ultimately, he had succeeded only in alienating his only possible ally, and Korkuta was more
than willing to make peace with Asia on favorable terms so long as they agreed to respect
Aghatsaghid territory.

The Kingdom of Asia would endure, in no small part because of Roman reinforcements from the
Asian cities. Repeated Aghatsaghid campaigns under Korkuta brought them no territory beyond
the Cilician gates, and if anything served to unify the Kingdom. King Helinand was able to retain
the allegiance of his warriors, in no small part because even the lowest among them was now
far wealthier than they might have dreamed of being serving Frankish kings back home. Asiana,
as it became known, was one of the few of the Votive Kingdoms to endure.

Jerusalem met its rather inevitable end in 793. After the death of two of its major leaders in
battle, only Majorian remained, taking the title of "Defender of the Holy Sepulcher" and leading
the hopeless siege against his fellow Christians led by Alexandros Heshanid. The poor
reputation of the Kingdom as traitors to the initial cause, and its rapid collapse into anarchy and
eventual conquest would leave a bitter taste in the mouth of Christendom. It should be little
surprise that enthusiasm for a renewed Votive war dropped rapidly.

In general, the greatest weakness of the Votive war was its unsustainability. Without a constant
supply of reinforcements from the West, most of the lesser duchies simply could not hold out. A
case in point is Srem, which collapsed after the death of Berthaire in 798 and was quickly
reabsorbed into the Xasar-Avar Khaganate. These historical footnotes would leave little impact
on their associated regions beyond devastation and a period of relative anarchy. And yet not all
of these kingdoms would fall, and those that survived would change history.

The Duchy of Thrace survived the Xasar reprisals in no small part because controlling even the
depopulated ruin of Constantinople was a valuable prize - a key fortification whose harbor and
walls represented critical strategic assets. Sigebert of Nantes, the self-proclaimed Duke of
Thrace, restored much of the damage to the city, although he was unable to help its population
recover at anything but a halting pace. However, Constantinople remained the seat of the
Patriarchate (albeit now subordinate to Rome) and this granted Sigebert an important source of
legitimacy. Alone of the surviving Frankish leaders, he held the potent symbolism of having
regained Constantinople, the city that was once perhaps the true heart of Christendom.

However, Sigebert would not be able to hold out forever. Both the Romans and Turks would
make various attacks on the city in his lifetime, and though he was wily and more than capable
of repulsing his attacks, his manpower was worn thin by constant raids from the Xasars and a
lack of reinforcements from Francia. By 800, he was dying and still childless, and his foes
circled like vultures. The latest Khirichan Khagan eyed Constantinople with increasing avarice,
and the Romans would not be above making a move to seize the city of the world's desire from
him. In a shocking move, Sigebert bequeathed what remained of his territory to his old rival,
King Helinand, so as to keep Constantinople in Frankish hands.
Tibet and Qi
The past fifty years of the Bod Empire are best understood as a time of entrenchment,
stabilization, and consolidation. The whirlwind conquests of earlier generations had given way to
a system that intended to endure. Tribute flowed from peripheral kingdoms such as Nanzhao to
the Emperor of Bod in Rhasa. The silk road cities brought treasure and magnificent horses up to
the high mountain palaces. The Great Qi, for all their legendary strength sent them tribute as
well, either willingly or at spear-point.

While stern-faced monks with crimson robes might have reminded their lord and king that all
things were transitory, and death, like life, was just another part of the wheel of samsara, the
sublime Emperor Sotkhri Tsenpo sought the advice of shamans and mystics, dreaming of ways
to live forever, to become the divinity he knew in his heart he was. These scholars and
alchemists came to Rhasa with vile-smelling powders. One in particular should be noted: made
from saltpeter, honey, and sulfur, it was a recipe learned in China. These alchemists taught their
Emperor many ways of preserving his vital force, and yet in the end Sotkhri Tsenpo was no
more immortal than his predecessors. His son, Chatri Tsenpo Tridarma learned from the pride of
his father and did not concern himself with such frivolous things. The foreign holy men were an
affront to his court. He banished them.

These travelers took their strange powders and herbs elsewhere, to Sogd and Uighuristan, to
India and China. Sometimes they were lucky, and their experiments were patronized. Mostly
they would fall into obscurity unless they could find some particularly gullible local potentate.
Their story however, is one that would have ramifications that would eventually echo across the
world.

There were hard limits to how far the Bod Empire could stretch, especially as the Qi Empire
began to revive itself after 764. The Bod Empire's population was limited, their governance
dependant on the prestige and supposed invincibility of the Empire's armies. When faced
against an enemy such as the Qi, this invincibility seemed more truth than legend. The era of
easily beaten conscript armies had come to an end, however. The new armies were disciplined
and professional. If they lacked an abundance of quality horses they made up for it with fine
archery and men drilled in long pike formations.

Tibetan raids against the Qi dynasty became infrequent after these reforms. While Qi armies still
feared to fight the Tibetans on their own turf, they had grown more bold in asserting their own
borders. They might have become bolder still, and crushed the upjumped Tibetans and carried
the Emperor and his treasures away from Rhasa, but there was a greater, even more warlike
threat on their borders.

The Uighur Khaganate dominated the eastern steppe. The first truly powerful threat from the
steppes since the apogee of the Gokturks, the Uighur society was literate and complex. They
built cities and Vajrayana Buddhist communities, uniting their subject peoples with a shared
religious and cultural identity. Rituals in which all their vassals were mandated to attend
reinforced the preeminence of the Khagan. The Khagan, Qutlugh Kol, ruled by 762 a vast
dominion, stretching from Sogdia to the land of the Jurchens, from the cold deep forests of
Siberia to the coast of Bohai Sea.
Standard Qi policy was to buy the Uighurs off. Some raids were inevitable - there would always
be tribes who needed to risk raiding and generally the Qi could not afford the sort of massive
campaign it would take to break the Uighurs. Cooperation was cheaper and saved countless
peasant lives - an important thing indeed the wake of Sima Zhixen's rebellion.

The Qi still lived in the shadow of Sima Zhixen. Emperor Jingzong (788-803) who had grown up
during the bloody excesses of the rebellion knew full well that luck had saved the Qi dynasty as
much as any reform of strength of arms. It only took another young, disillusioned and
charismatic visionary to throw the entire system into bloody anarchy. Another "Maitreya Buddha"
could ruin all that his ancestors had built once more. The Mandate of Heaven seemed imperiled
after the great rebellion, and he would find himself struggling to restore a sense of legitimacy to
the Qi as the trends which had led to the first rebellion began to reassert themselves.

The new professional armies of the Qi dynasty had been based on the training of foreigners -
mercenaries, largely from Sogdia and the Uighurs, but from as far afield as the Rhom Shahdom.
With the training complete, the anti-mercenary sentiment of the Qi dynasty pushed back against
these reforms and left the professional armies without these mercenary auxiliaries. Most of the
mercenaries would enter into the service of the Uighur Khagan, who offered generous payment.
Accordingly, rather than foreign born commanders, command returned by 790 to the hands of a
new generation of scholar bureaucrats with little practical experience. The officers beneath them
had plenty of experience and training, but it was these officers that the state feared.

The Qi dynasty, in most other contexts, would have been quickly a footnote in the annals of
history. But China was vast, economically prosperous, and densely populated. Accordingly, they
could survive while still utilizing policies which would have damned most other polities. However,
in the aftermath of the rebellion, the economic prosperity and dense population were limited.
Attempts at reform failed to address the underlying structural issues. The Liang had succeeded
because they were cosmopolitan and willing to change, unlike the rigid Qi, who consistently
refused to learn from the past and rolled back their reforms out of the abiding paranoia their
dynasty never seemed capable of shaking off.

It should accordingly be no wonder that by the dawn of the ninth century the Qi would seem
vulnerable and weak to their neighbors. The very mercenaries who had served with the Qi were
quick to counsel their new masters to war. And while the Uighurs were one concern, and a
critical one, another major threat was emerging to the south in the form of the Tai people of
[FONT=&quot]Guangxi. A curious melting pot culture shaped by both Sinic and Indian
influences, the Tai represented one of the many vassal peoples of southern China whose
connection to the Empire had always been loose. With the decline of the Qi, they and others
would see an unprecedented opportunity to break free. [/FONT]

The Western Steppes: Turkestan and the Oghuz

Roughly speaking, Western Turkestan was united under the Oghuz Khaganate. Based around
the Aral Sea and Syr Darya, they were one of many powerful tribes which had fled west in the
wake of Uighur ascension. Other powerful tribes such as the Basmyl, Karluks, and Kimeks gave
them token submission, owing primarily to their geographic position and numbers. This limited
unification of the Turkestani steppes was more arranged on cultural and religious lines than any
centralization. The important cult of the Amitabha Buddha, Tengri-worship, and a common
linguistic family gave a sense of common identity and perhaps most importantly allowed
outsiders to view the peoples of the steppe as a monolithic whole.

Indeed to speak of the Oghuz as a single polity is perhaps a misunderstanding. Local tribal
rulers, called Yabghu, had remarkable autonomy in how they conducted their relations with
other clans and polities. Raiders and small clans would often travel south to seek employment
or plunder from the Aghatsaghid Shahs. This slow migration allowed the Iranian civilization time
to slowly assimilate these newcomers, although the cultural shift was by no means a one-way
street. Turkic loanwords and customs began to infuse themselves into the Eftal-Iranian culture.
The Oghuz themselves would by the beginning of the ninth century be very Iranian in dress and
customs. The presence of many Xvarazmi and Sogdians within their territory only enforced this
transition and assimilation.

Attempts by the Aghatsaghids to establish fortified outposts into Turkestan were largely failures.
The Oghuz and most other tribes were willing to give the Aghatsaghids a wide berth, generally
speaking, and from time to time token tribute. However they did not tolerate Aghatsaghid
incursions and generally speaking were more than capable of ensuring that such outposts fell.
Despite the continual trickle of young men south, the Oghuz were more than capable of
defending themselves, even from new threats such as the Bajinak.

The origins of the Bajinak Khanate are, like the origins of most steppe peoples, relatively
shrouded in mystery. What is known is that after fleeing the expansion of the Uighurs they came
into contact first with the Quban and next with the Oghuz, both of whom were capable of
chasing the Bajinak off but not subduing them. From there, the Bajinak would travel north.
Unlike many of the other tribes of the region they had limited contact with Iranic peoples and
limited opportunities to assimilate. As such their culture was a more "pure" Turkic when the
Bajinak arrived in the Volga basin. However it would not remain that way for long. Like the Avars
and many others before them, their interactions with the Slavic peoples they encountered would
form a sort of melting pot and lead to the creation of a distinct identity, neither wholly Slavic nor
Turkic.

By the dawn of the ninth century, however, the majority of the steppe and Iranian plateau could
broadly be described as a heterogeneous civilization nevertheless linked by a common part
Eftal-Iranian and part Turkic culture. Large scale military campaigns between the various polities
of the steppe and the Aghatsaghids were rare, owing to the lack of centralization of the steppe
peoples and the lack of interest on the part of the sprawling Aghatsaghid Shahdom.
 Frankly my dear, I
don't give a damn

King Theuderic had the misfortune to inherit a sprawling state built upon loose foundations, and
this issue would preoccupy his early reign. Stretching from Hispania to Saxony, this "Greater
Francia" that was his father's making was perhaps more accurately described as a rough union
of the various Romanized Germanic peoples who had brought down the western half of the first
Roman Empire. However, what legitimacy he had had been won by his father at sword-point,
and brute military force would be necessary to maintain his state. Though the core of his army
was centralized and professional, the legacy of Clovis' reforms and the great estates of central
Francia, Theuderic also depended on the various ranking nobles, the Dukes who were
effectively lesser Kings and the Counts who, though not hereditary, nevertheless possessed
extraordinary power. Beneath these mighty figures were the lesser nobility, divided into the
Frankish fief-holding landlords (or "riders") who lacked hereditary title to their lands, and the
hereditary estates of Roman origin, largely preserved throughout Aquitaine and Hispania. While
the Frankish "rider" was assured that his sons would almost certainly follow in his footsteps, he
was never tied to the land in the same way that his Gallo-Roman counterpart was. He was tied
to the crown and to his lord or King, and this goes a long way to explain the number of Frankish
aristocrats that travelled East - they sought more permanent wealth and had little to lose back
home.

However, the Gallo-Romans, a class which also includes many Franks and Goths who found
themselves with similarly hereditary and ancient estates, lacked this sense of loyalty, and as the
Franks streamed East, many of these Romans saw opportunities. Rebellions wracked the
south, and Theuderic spent little of his reign at peace. These rebellions however were
uncoordinated, and saw the large-scale decline of the traditional aristocracy in favor of these
new "riders" who were granted mass holdings carved out of the newly conquered estates.

By the time that the situation began to settle down around the turn of the century, the Pope in
Rome was making new appeals to the unity of the Universal Church against the heathens. The
loss of Jerusalem in 793 saw renewed calls for Votive Soldiers to take up arms, but Theuderic
was himself a cynical man, and refused the call, which he saw as yet another attempt by the
Papacy to enrich Rome at the cost of his own Empire. Despite condemnation by local bishops
and holy men, few Franks went east, and those who did largely went as mercenaries in the
Roman armies. Those with little to lose and everything to gain had already gone East in the first
waves and stayed there. Those who returned from the Votive War had gained little and were
unlikely to desire another protracted conflict in the East. Furthermore, Frankish manpower was
low. Theuderic made extensive use of small, elite, mounted forces. The tactics his advisors
taught him had been learned in battle against the Avar-Xasars and similar steppe foes, and the
Franks shifted further and further away from their infantry-based shield walls in favor of heavy or
medium horse as the decisive factor in warfare.

Meanwhile, to their south, the Roman Empire found itself massively overstretched. Roman Asia
in particular was practically autonomous, with the local cities there unwilling to negotiate away
the privileges they had gained under the Eftal for any price. The resurgent Xasar, after defeating
the Duchy of Srem had begun to raid into the Balkans once more. The Roman armies were
atrophied by constant campaigning, and despite, or perhaps due to, their professional nature,
fresh reinforcements were difficult to come by. The military-bureaucratic system cultivated by the
Isidorians had been ideal for defending Italia and some peripheral territories, but it fell apart
when it came to securing the newly doubled territory. This massive expansion strained the
Imperial treasury to the breaking point. Needing money and manpower, Severus sought to
extract both from Asia, sending large garrisons to the local cities and appointing strict
magistrates who ensured levies and taxes flowed back to the capital.

Emperor Severus was in many ways a victim of his own successes. Just as he found it difficult
to govern his new conquests he found it difficult to shake the image of himself as a usurper. He
was convinced that a decent number of his high ranking officers secretly despised him, and he
knew that the Slavic lords of the Balkans definitely did. When the Emperor died in 803, despite
his advanced age, it was not hard to suspect foul play, and those closest to the Emperor
definitely did so, turning on each other rapidly. Severus had but a single son and several sons-
in-law, but "coincidentally" by the time his body was cooling the young son was dead and the
eldest of the sons-in-law, the Legate Valerian, was the prime suspect. The Magister Militium,
Asterius, moved to have Valerian arrested, but the wily Legate escaped. Fleeing with a cabal of
loyal officers and as much of the royal treasury as he could load onto a boat, Valerian escaped
to the Balkans where he sought to raise an army with the help of a group of influential local
magistrates. The Roman cities of Asia, meanwhile, realized that Severus' death was an
excellent opportunity to renegotiate their position. In the Kingdom of Asia, King Helinand had
recently passed away, succeeded by his son Mansuetus. Mansuetus was seen as a temperate,
reasonable man, and the Roman cities sent delegates to Nicomedia, where during a three week
council the cities managed to extract many concessions in exchange for swearing fealty to the
Frankish King of Asia. Shortly thereafter, these same delegates, as part of the pre-arranged
agreement, proclaimed Mansuetus Emperor to the cheering of his retainers and soldiers.
Crossing the straits, they met with the Patriarch of Constantinople at the Chapel of St. Maria
and Mansuetus was officially crowned as "Emperor of the Romans". Meanwhile, back in
Florentia, Magister Asterius set aside his wife with Papal blessing and married Severus'
youngest daughter, Theodora, thirteen years old, seeking to enhance his own dynastic
legitimacy in a bid to be proclaimed Emperor. Asterius, however, was not popular with the rank
and file. He had not fought in the Votive War and his promotion to the position was largely seen
as a consequence of his political ability but as his ties to Severus. It was only with the spreading
stories of a Frankish "Emperor" in the East that Asterius finally took action, being enthroned in a
majestic ceremony. The Pope condemned the new Frankish Emperor as illegitimate and in
return the Patriarch of Constantinople condemned the Pope as a puppet. Emperor Mansuetus
was the bulwark of Europe against the heathens! The usurpers of the West were the true
illegitimate ones, the Severian dynasty being no more than upjumped farmers from Illyria and
Asterius himself was committing an act of adultery by marrying into it.

Valerian, proclaimed Emperor by his troops, found himself in the worst position of any of the
Imperial claimants. He was dependent on the Slavic aristocracy, who had little love for him, and
had mostly understrength units under his command. Furthermore, the resurgent Xasars looked
greedily on his territories, which included several exposed stretches of the Danube. However,
despite his weakness, no-one acted against him. Mansuetus was preoccupied with the
Aghatsaghids and the remaining Eftal, and Asterius faced a rebellion in Sicily among the
remaining Mauri merchant-princes which lasted four years between 811-815. As such, he had
the better part of two decades to secure his position. Hiring Turkish and Bulgar mercenaries to
his cause, by 820 he felt safe enough to invade Italy in force. Asterius fell back in the face of this
new threat, raising fresh forces and knowing that Italy would be a tough nut to crack in the
interim. Without a fleet of his own, Valerian had no way of taking Ravenna, and he squandered
several years reducing the cities of the Po valley. By the time he was ready to march on
Florentia, Asterius was ready. He let Valerian encircle the well-fortified and well-provisioned city
and then enveloped Valerian in turn. Valerian, with the help of his mercenaries managed to fight
his way out of the encirclement, but it was a close-run thing indeed. He suffered a minor wound
and later that year in 821, he would pass away, his army largely disintegrating and turning to
banditry until Asterius finally restored order to the Balkans in 824.

The Frankish Kingdom itself chose to sit out this massive succession crisis. Theuderic for the
first time found his Empire relatively calm. The Slavic marches were quiet, and for the first time
no nobles hinted at rebellion. Theuderic could rest in Paris for the first time in decades. And
indeed, the Franks had their own crisis brewing. Theuderic was growing older, and he had four
sons - inevitably, it seemed, his kingdom would be divided upon his death. Unwilling to see this
happen, in 807 he adopted a more Roman style system of succession - naming his eldest son,
Clovis, Co-King, and granting the others Palatine titles - ensuring that they would be kept close
to crown. Going forwards, this would prevent the anarchic succession practices that historically
had ensured the collapse of any large Frankish Kingdom.

North Africa - the Free People

It was not until 800 that the trade routes between the Mediterranean world and North Africa truly
began to recover from the collapse of the Mauri. It was not that the Berber people did not
understand the value of trade, but climate shifts and urban decline made the sort of bulk trade
that would be genuinely profitable difficult. Merchants operating on East-West trade lanes could
move bulk products to a degree which the Berbers simply could not - dependent as they were
upon attenuate trade lanes manned by Taureg caravans.

The gold, spices, and ivory of Ghana would however ultimately begin to trickle northwards,
catching the attention of the Latin world. Rumors of golden kingdoms and shimmering palaces
of solid gold spread like wildfire. Africa beyond the great desert became a land of mystery and
magic in the collective imagination of the Christian world. However, it was also unreachable.
Few travelers crossed the great desert due to the extraordinary number of middlemen
facilitating the trade - countless local Amazigh and Tuareg tribes stood between the iron
kingdoms of the continent and the ambitious Mediterranean merchants.
These tribes did not develop the same central cohesion that had characterized their Mauri
predecessors. Where the Mauri embraced the legacy of the Roman Empire, the Berber
successor states tended to repudiate this legacy in favor of their own mythic heritage.
Accordingly they did not form major polities, creating at best loose alliances when it was
expedient to do so. In the far west, the Masamida were perhaps the most united of the tribes,
and then only because such unity was required to effectively raid Iberia.

The religious makeup of the region favored paganism. The Nicene Church in Africa had always
been somewhat schismatic and perhaps less organized than many of its counterparts - heretical
tendencies here were part of a broad historic trend. As such with the collapse of centralized
Mauri authority the Church fell into relative anarchy as well. The heretical gnostic ideas of
organizations such as the "Tinanians" divided the Church and encouraged various sects to flee
into the wilderness and isolate themselves rather than actively proselytize. The indigenous
Jewish populations (including many Jews who had fled from Spain) had more success, gaining
converts among some local clans, but this too was a limited phenomenon. Local cults retained
their strength. Prominent gods such as Idir, the living god, and Gurzil, a warrior deity, might have
enjoyed some universal appeal, but generally speaking day-to-day veneration was confined to
local spirits and minor deities associated with landmarks. The one commonality between tribes
was the worship of celestial bodies, especially the Sun.

The Berbers however kept few written records. What we do know of them comes mostly from
the Christian communities huddled along the coast, and these communities had a conflicted
relationship with their neighbors. On one hand the Berbers maintained the great trade routes
across the continent - on the other hand they had destroyed the Mauri civilization and with it
much of the region's historic prosperity. The Berbers also left little in terms of a visible legacy.
Architecturally they either maintained Mauri buildings or left uninspiring but functional fortified
towns. They lacked the capacity or interest in the construction of massive projects. They
however did leave many elaborate finished goods - ornate polished beads, gold and iron
jewelry, intricately carved furniture, proof of an advanced and technically skilled culture.

It is a matter of some historical curiosity why the Berber invaders never assimilated as so many
other peoples did. Most of their immediate neighbors lived in the shadow of the Roman Empire -
Roman was almost a byword for prestige and power. The Mauri, the Italians, even some Eftal...
many disparate peoples considered themselves Roman or the inheritors of Roman glory. It is
easy to cast the Berber disdain for that tradition as provincialism or barbarism. However, those
peoples who brought down the Mauri had never been even at the periphery of the Roman world.
Its heritage was irrelevant to them, and their main association with it was the Mauri. The divided,
squabbling Christian religion of Africa was not as impressive or influential as the unified Latin
Church whose emissaries the Western Slavs would encounter.

Accordingly, the growth of Christianity among the Amazigh people would be a slow process,
prone to syncretic tendencies. Churches where Christ is represented as haloed by the radiant
sun were not uncommon. Libyan deities became angels, and the polytheism of the Berbers
endured despite regular missionary and mercantile adventures into the North African interior.

The Periphery of the

Latin World

"Alone among the nations of Germania stand the Saxons. They acknowledge neither Christ nor
the Frankish King, and all their borders are bloody." So wrote the Frankish monk Tescelin of
Aires in 812. With its borders reduced to the natural lines of the Elbe, Weser, and Eider rivers,
the Saxon people primarily defined themselves by their isolation. A pagan Germanic people
surrounded on all fronts, their bonds of kinship and ethnic identity were strengthened by a sort
of siege mentality. The Saxons and Franks engaged in raiding which never truly abated, even
when they were incorporated into the Frankish Kingdom.

Despite the occasional lip service paid to Christianity by the Saxon rulers, and a not insignificant
number of converts among the common people, the Saxon polity remained a tribal
confederation based around the role of King as a pagan priest. The holy Sanctuary of Irminsul
formed a sort of spiritual heart of the nascent nation, more than any particular royal hall or urban
center. Irminsul, to look at it was little more than a pillar of oak - but it stood for the world tree
upon which Wuotan the wyrm-slayer, the father of language, hung for nine days and nine nights,
and it was here that sacrifices were done in emulation of the gallows-god's suffering.

Ritual sacrifice and regular festival days promoted unity and common identity among the
aristocracy and freemen. Despite the lack of many of the systems which characterized
"advanced" states, these strong bonds of identity ensured that the Saxons would endure
repeated Frankish and Slavic attacks.

Even still, it was not as if the Franks could not have destroyed the Saxons with their tremendous
resources. Rather, the Frankish Kings lacked the will to engage in what would undoubtedly be a
protracted campaign in the thick forests and marshes of Saxony for little gain. In the short term it
was more expedient just to fortify the marches. Rulers such as Clovis and Theuderic had too
many distractions and ambitions to turn north and stomp out the Saxon threat. Even at the local
level, the lords who might have dreamed of bringing Christ to the Saxons with fire and sword
dreamed instead of Constantinople and Jerusalem. This only began to change by about 810-
820, when the next generation of Frankish aristocrats, raised on stories of the Votive War more
glorious than its reality, began seeking their own Votive War.

They found it in Saxony. In 814, Palatine Audoneus led several thousand soldiers on an
expedition to "end the idolatry of the Saxons and bring them into the light of our Lord." Opposing
him was the veteran war-leaderErcanfrid, who rallied his kinsmen in defense of Saxony. Such
punitive invasions had occurred historically, but never with such single-minded dedication.
Traditionally, the Franks would strike deep into Saxony, do damage, and then retreat once more.
Instead, Audoneus remained, acting as a conqueror, assigning grants of land and hastily
erecting fortifications. This drew Ercanfrid into outright battle against him, and here Audoneus
was defeated - fleeing with the bulk of his forces back across the Elbe.
But this was the beginning of the end. Ercanfrid was unable to retake the forts Audoneus had
ordered built, and when the royal army arrived three years later with King Clovis at its head,
they were able to continue their plan. The next five years were spent establishing castles with
Frankish lords over the Saxons. Irminsul was burnt to the ground and Ercanfrid and his kinsmen
fled into exile, leading to the rapid submission of the remaining Saxon nobles families - who
knew that surrender and conversion would see them able to retain their lands as hereditary
lords. Ercanfrid, for his part, would flee north, first to ring-walled Heithabir and then later to the
lands of the Geats.

Tales of the fall of the Saxons spread east quickly. The Western Slavs and Saxons had been old
enemies, but if the Franks were turning eastward and were again animated by Votivist zeal, then
the Slavs desperately needed to unite. Hasty alliances were struck, marriages agreed to. Priests
burnt offerings and sifted through the ashes for omens. In the end, a leader named Slavomir
was appointed Dravan (sometimes referred to as King or Emperor) of a confederation of all the
Polabian tribes - an unprecedented alliance but one which fit the mood of the Slavic elite.
Chosen from the relatively small tribe of the Circipani, Slavomir could not personally call on
large retainers or many allies. He was a choice which did not threaten any of the existing
powers such as the Veleti or the Obodrites.

At first, the confederation would be weak, and patchwork - a network of voluntarily tribal
alliances which was neither contiguous or powerful. Many of the initial founders had seen the
Dravan more as a spiritual or cultural figure than a military leader, but they soon would change
their opinions. In 823, when Gamalher, the Duke of Thuringia raided the burgeoning hill-town of
Brenna. The alliance quickly gained members and soon Slavomir's ceremonial kingship became
truly powerful. The Sorbs joined shortly thereafter, forming what the Franks described as a "High
Kingdom of the Wends" and the Slavs would ultimately call Veletia.

As the border wars between Slavs and Franks began to rise in intensity once more, the more
southern of the Western Slavs could not help but be drawn in. As raids on the Czechs and
Slovenians began to increase, the Moravians under Kniaz Rastislav became local hegemons,
uniting the southernmost of the West Slavic tribes under their thumb.

By 830, the Western Slavic polities in general were becoming more centralized and more
complex. Certain well defended fortress-cities, or gords had risen to prominence, and these in
turn ruled over lesser fortress-cities scattered across the countryside. Linked to each other by
kinship bonds and oaths of loyalty, these localities placed themselves into rough hierarchies.
Early legal codes were being formatted, based off of a combination of tradition and Roman law.
The Slavic proto-states lacked their own domestic coinage, being primarily agrarian barter-
based economies which made some use of foreign currency. Foreign coins were particularly
commonplace in the gords, where specialized manufacturing was becoming increasingly
commonplace. This rudimentary village industry would transform Slavic society. As these states
became more complex in their organizational patterns, religious and cultural legitimacy began to
diminish in favor of a proto-feudal system of "alliance."
Much of the foreign influence on these early states came from the looming shadow of the
Romans or Franks. Slavic protofeudalism emulated both the Roman "federate" system which
had returned in force after the conquest of the South Slavs, and also the Frankish magistrate-
lords with their complex bonds of loyalty. Religious sites and sacred groves became increasingly
less important to the social cohesion of the state - but they maintained their importance to
religious rituals even as Christianization became widespread. The holy sites of the Slavs,
groves to Perun and Svarog and countless others were frequently recontextualized into folklore
and preserved. The image of the old red-bearded wanderer with a shining axe was a potent one
in the mythology of the Western Slavs, and would endure long after Perun himself lost his
primacy.

Strong Iranian and Avar influences can be also seen in the material culture of the Morava and
Polanes, and Norse culture and loanwords penetrated Wendish civilization to a great degree. As
Pannonia embraced its Irano-Turkish heritage the Slavic peoples there were largely subsumed.
Elsewhere however, the Iranian culture had less impact. They, like the Slavs were relative
newcomers, strangers whose language, gods, and culture were all still trying to adapt to a
foreign land. A cabal of wandering Sarvastivada monks from Syarzur established "the Great
Refuge" in the Carpathian mountains sometime around 805. It was from this point of origin that
Avar-Xasari Buddhism, like the "Sogdian School" would begin to become its own formalized and
distinct religious tradition.

Latin Christian and Xasari Buddhist missionaries vied for influence in the courts of the Slavic
princes. Unlike the great theological debates of the Eftal, these were less lofty and more
pragmatic. Both the Christians and Buddhists had strong material incentives in gaining converts
- creating coreligionists meant the possibility of trade and alliances. However, the Christians had
critical advantages in this "contest" - they were more numerous and more zealous in their
preaching. Their faith seemed at its root to appeal better to the Slavic peoples, and quite
possibly worked better as a unifying force. By contrast, the main advantage of Buddhism, its
adaptability, was less true of the Xasari-influenced Buddhism, with its elaborate pantheon of
Iranian and Turkish deities.

Among the Vistulans and the Masovians, where the Avar and Xasar presence had always been
the strongest, Buddhist missionaries enjoyed widespread successes. Elsewhere, however,
Christianity seemed far more popular. King Rastislav's son Moymir of Moravia would convert to
Christianity in 842. Of the Western Slavs, the only people to convert wholesale to Buddhism
were the Polanes. In general, however, we must hold all accounts of these conversions to be
somewhat suspect. Archeological evidence shows that the important holy sites of the Slavic
faith were in no way abandoned, and especially in Moravia constant edicts against idolatry
seem to have gone rather unenforced.

Despite the multitude of foreign influences, the traditions, mythology, and culture of the Slavs
remained strong and almost totally isolated from the hearts of both Iranian and Latin civilization.
Paying lip-service to Christ and the Buddha became commonplace among the elites, but the
actual religious situation was complex and if anything syncretic.

[political map]

[religious map]

Savahila and Africa

By the ninth century, the Savahila (or coastal) peoples seem to have begun undergoing radical
shifts in demographics once more. The migration of Persian and Arab traders had largely
abated - the political shifts in Iran and Arabia ensured that mass exodus was neither profitable
nor tenable. Rather, the new migrants were primarily Gujarati and Keralaputran, and they
brought with them circa 780 a new plant - oryza sativa, or asian rice. While much of the great
coast was unsuitable for rice production, parts undeniably were - and this small-scale production
allowed rice and knowledge of rice cultivation to be transmitted to inland tribes of Bantu, where
it would take off with astonishing rapidity.

Rice cultivation would change everything for these inland peoples, whose agriculture had
previously largely relied on less efficient staples such as sorghum and yam. The arrival of citrus
fruits such as oranges and lemons would have a positive effect on the health of these peoples
as well. The East African Bantu were uniquely posed to take advantage of a water-intensive
crop such as rice - their civilization had largely grown around the rainiest parts of the continent,
where fear of the tsetse fly kept the cattle-herding Cushites at bay.

This population growth would spur Bantu expansion, driving the more pastoralist Cushites
towards the coast and highlands. Those who remained were quickly assimilated into the
growing centralized polities of the Great Lakes. Bantu urban centers grew into the thousands,
and increasing specialization of crafts can be noted - the emergence of an urban artisan class
and technically proficient blacksmiths meant that for the first time the Savahila cities had a
strong incentive to trade with these emergent Bantu kingdoms.

There is a dearth of information about the early kingdoms of the great lakes. What information
we do have is shrouded in myth and legend. The earliest chronicles blend mythic gods and
historical rulers, and conflating the two is dangerous to our understanding of the region. Kings
such as the legendary Isaza or Ruhanga likely never truly lived, but the stories associated with
them provide telling details about the civilizations that grew up in the shadow of the great coast
cities.

The greatest of these early kingdoms was the Ganda, rivaled only by the Tagama to the south.
Settling on the northern banks of the great lakes, these two polities can be safely considered
"first among equals" in the patchwork series of kinship-based chiefdoms that formed the early
Great Lakes civilizations. The myth of the universalist Banyoro Empire seems to have been
invented out of whole cloth - there is no mention of it in the records of the Savahila cities, and it
can easily be explained as a myth to provide legitimacy to the local rulers of the region. Stories
such as that of the great king Ndahura who abandoned his crown and possessions to travel to
the east however, hint at some of the earliest impacts of the Hindi world on the Great Lakes. It
was an easy transition for Ndahura to become a god providing comfort to ascetics.

On the coast, migrant populations were reshaping their societies. Hindu rituals were used to set
the these newcomers apart from the established generations and the indigenous. These
newcomers, familiar with the sangha communities and seeking a similar sort of identity in this
new country founded exclusive societies, generally based around heterodox versions of formal
religious observances and a personal relationship with a given deity, usually an aspect or avatar
of Vishnu or Shakti. These exclusive 'secret' societies grew into prominence rapidly, perhaps
hinting that their exclusivity was not as strict as some surviving texts might claim, and that
prominent members of society were easily inducted so long as they brought their support to the
group.

These societies began to involve themselves in trade as well. Many of the Keralaputran
migrants in particular were of lower caste and accordingly found work wherever they could. With
agriculture largely the province of the indigenous Cushites, they turned the maritime
professions, particularly pearl diving and fishing. The first true sangha of the "great long coast"
had been born.

It was a time of growth and expansion. The mud-brick port city of Syamavela was founded off
the shore of Mzishima, on an island long considered marginal for human habitation. It would
rapidly rise in prominence, with major stone manufactories being constructed by 830. Unlike its
predecessors and mother-city across the strait, Syamavela was operated by a ruling ayat, and
the theoretical equality of those in the guilds were recognized. A distance inland, up the wide
lazy Rhesan [Rufiji] river, a small trading post which serviced the Iringa people grew into the
polyglot city of Svarnapura.

Sailing the Middle-World

(circa 830)

The Prince Janaharidama had made quite a stir in Hesanapolis. He had travelled north along
the Red Sea, stopping at Berenike for the sake of rest and provisions while they waited for the
winds to change. From there he and his chosen companions had come to the city of Clysma,
dingy and clogged with men in strange and complicated robes. The air smelled of salt, fish, and
excrement. Navigating labyrinthine streets, the Prince-Ambassador finally found his way to the
local governor's palace. The governor, a boisterous yet pale man with a squared beard and
ruddy cheeks, claimed to have never heard of Izaoriaka, or even the Isle of the Moon. Finally, at
the word Sakalava his eyes lit up with recognition.

The Prince-Ambassador was forced to speak with a translator, a weather-worn merchant who
changed the strange tongue to Arabic, a language that most locals at least spoke passably. The
governor found another translator, one fluent in Greek as well, and hosted the Prince for seven
days before they were allowed under escort to travel north to Hesanapolis and to meet with the
Basileus Alexandros.

The Imperial Palace was a sight to behold. Janaharidama had always thought that the palace in
which he spent his boyhood, great Renivohitra, was magnificent. It had ornate gardens,
beautiful engravings, statues of dancing gods in ecstasy. But it was nothing compared to this -
the very world of the Basileus seemed golden. The lofty domes! The golden trees! He stared
wide-eyed, before remembering to adopt a more serene disposition. Perhaps the Arab traders
from far Hadhramut were correct - perhaps they did truly live at the edge of the world. If they
did, then this truly was its heart.

On the day of his audience, Janaharidama approached the Emperor, the Equal-to-the-Apostles
(he did not know what that last word meant, but his translator assured him it meant something
like Priest) and bowed appropriately. Seated on a silver bench dressed in purple robes and
gloves, the Emperor Alexandros seemed to be the least impressive part of the whole display.
His face was lined with age and he seemed thin, with a faint hint of a repressed stutter that was
audible over the meticulous work of the translator. Not a holy man after all, neither saint nor
mystic nor god.

Still, Janaharidama treated him with due respect. The ceremonies passed in a whirlwind and
soon the two men found themselves looking out over the palace-city together, seated in the
Emperor's terraced garden. Wine was brought to them, a fine Gallic vintage imported over the
inner sea.

They spoke for several hours together, and despite the difficulties of translation, Janaharidama
found himself building a rapport with his counterpart. Several times the Emperor asked
Janaharidama if he came to seek religious insight, and each time Janaharidama rebuffed him.
They had gurus and wisemen aplenty on his isle. They knew of every single time that God
incarnated into human flesh, the Emperor need not fear on that regard.

Finally, the Emperor pried the true reason for his visit from him. "I seek," Janaharidama
admitted, "a route to the golden country to the west. I have heard rumors that your merchants
know of its location, and I desire to look upon it for myself."

"It is a dangerous road." The Emperor cautioned. "Down the flood-swollen Nile and across the
southern desert. The men of the south are savage. It is perhaps best that you remain here. If it
is gold your kingdom seeks we have that in great quantities here."

Janahiradama nodded, and pressed his case. However soon his meeting came to a close, and
he was no closer to gaining Imperial permission to travel south than when he had begun. The
Emperor guarded his secrets closely, cloaking them in warnings about wicked kings and horrific
diseases. God punished the region, the Emperor said, for some unspecified ancient crime.
Janahiradama left Hesanapolis disappointed. He would have to find another route.

[I tried a short narrative piece just for fun. If you guys like it, I might do a few more, perhaps
covering the Norse world?]

The Wrath of the

Northmen continues

To a contemporary Frankish observer, the "Viking" storm might have seemed to come as a
direct response to the invasion of Saxony. Indeed, it would not be hard to link the mast exodus
of Saxons north beyond the Danavirki and the subsequent Anarchy of Heithabir[1], where Saxon
brigands, Danes, and a Frankish army under the Palatine Audoneus clashed and gave birth to a
perfect storm of sorts.

The true events of the Anarchy are relatively unknown, shrouded by its almost mythic status.
Audoneus seems to have been acting relatively independently, drawn by the wealth and
importance of Heithabir and holding a mandate to bring Ercanfrid, former King of the Saxons
back in chains, or with his head on a spear. The Franks feared a scenario in which Ercanfrid
returned and raised his countrymen in rebellion, and perhaps rightly so. However, Audoneus
seems to have been drawn into a quagmire almost immediately, barely escaping an ambush by
Slavs. Shortly thereafter, at least according to Danish accounts, he allied himself with a
traitorous group of Saxons and assaulted Heithabir, being repulsed only after the timely arrival
of the King of Jutland, Hrolfr.

Paring away the glorious single-combats and scheming villains, history seems to point to a
simpler narrative. Heithabir, in trouble after an influx of Saxon refugees and facing routine
Frankish raids, turned to the local Jute chieftains and their Slavic neighbors for assistance.
Retaliatory raids undoubtedly occurred - Heithabir had a great many ships and was in many
senses a dingy armed camp simply waiting to set sail in search of plunder. By 825, the
floodgates had burst. As warriors returned to Heithabir with tales of plunder and victory, they
inspired their peers across Scandinavia.

Already the Norse were having great successes on the British isles - now they expanded their
horizons. Ships sailed as far as Hispania in search of plunder - and soon even further. The
Frankish King, Clovis, was ill prepared to deal with this new threat. After his brutal campaigns in
Saxony his strength was in many ways spent. Contemporary chroniclers speak of him being
haunted by demons only he could see, the ghosts of fallen men - comrades and foes alike from
the brutal campaigns. He spoke in tones alternately gloomy and manic of the burning halls and
the screaming of women. The Frankish monarchy had built a kingdom however, where the King
could not afford weakness. Centralization had transformed the state into a potent offensive
force, but on the defensive, as it was now, it was ill-prepared. The concentration of power in
Paris left the periphery weak. The sole exception to this rule was the Slavic marches, which
were wholly irrelevant to a seaborne menace such as the Vikings.

Attacks on the northern coast, in Armorica and Hispania led to widespread panic. The same
chroniclers who mourned the soul of their trauma-haunted king speak of the demonic scourge of
the Northmen, whose raids sketched across the countryside, leaving ruin and terror in their
wake.

A Viking warlord named Arinhaldr, perhaps related to a Danish King of the same name whose
existence cannot be directly proven, led an attack on Paris in 838 of which there is substantial
record. Spurred on by the realization of the relative weakness and exhaustion of the Franks,
and also knowing that Imbert the White, Clovis' Mayor of the Palace, had travelled to Provence
with a large army due to growing tensions between the Romans and the Franks, Arinhaldr sailed
up the Siene in force. Having previously struck cities such as Antwerp, Arinhaldr was a veteran
of such combats, and here once more he proved his quality.

With some hundred longboats and perhaps up to five thousand men, Arinhaldr invested Paris
itself. The swiftness of his arrival prompted panic. Forces were hastily marshaled, but the
outnumbered Franks, led by a weak monarch, were quickly smashed in a two day battle. Clovis
himself was captured and ransomed, but many of his common soldiers were not so lucky - the
Vikings hung many of their prisoners as human sacrifices. The ransom of the King himself,
however, paled in comparison to the ransom of the city. These events had a profound impact on
the Prince Lothair, who was forced to oversee the ransom. By the time a large army could
arrive, hastily drawn up by nearby nobles, the monarchy was already humiliated and the Vikings
already fleeing.

By the end of the year, Clovis would be overthrown and his son would smoothly take power,
promising his nobles revenge. He would not have to wait long. Arinhaldr struck south towards
Hamburg, and the great terror of the Franks seemed made real - the liberation of the Saxons.
Arinhaldr would be defeated this time, after a surprise attack by the Franks at dawn prevented
his men from preparing for battle. In the hasty retreat to the boats he was struck down and
Lothair would be able to hail this victory as the vengeance the Frankish aristocracy craved.

The Last Eftal

Emperor Mansuetus was not slow to take advantage of his new position. Despite his Frankish
blood and his relative illegitimacy, neither Valerian nor Asterius could afford to make an enemy
of him. Controlling Constantinople and otherwise having the Aegean (and a powerful fleet)
between him and his enemies, he sought to expand his power not into the west but rather by
going east.

His motivations were more complex than mere power, or even ending a constant threat to his
security posed by the Eftal - even if the rump Rhom Shahdom was a thorn in his side. Simply, to
gain Imperial title and legitimacy he had been forced to make embarrassing compromises. The
cities simply had too much power - his control over them was rough and his economy depended
to some degree on their willingness to "lend" money to the Empire. He had to find a way to
make his Empire profitable, and the prospect of vast fiefs carved out of Eftal Asia Minor and
Syria would be one such way.

So, marshalling his military might, in 813 he marched after a minimal provocation into Eftal Asia.
The Rhom Shahdom had seen better days. 6 years ago the Christian Alans had risen against
the small Buddhist ruling class, and although Shah Asunwar had survived it was a close-run
affair and had depleted the manpower of the Rhom Eftal. Mansuetus won a quick victory and
besieged Amaseia, the Rhom capital. The Alans once again rose in rebellion and Asunwar died
fighting in the streets, his body never recovered. His legacy however, would endure in several
posthumous epic poems. Though Asunwar perhaps did not deserve it and was himself of
humble birth, he became memorialized as the last of the Eftal Shahs. With the sack of Amaseia,
the last Eftal nation fell. The Alans themselves clung to a portion of the Black Sea coast, and
finally after two years of low-intensity warfare, Mansuetus allowed them to retain their
independence.

Mansuetus, however, had further ambitions. Having fulfilled his initial goals, he allowed his
victorious army no rest before turning on the Aghatsaghids. Well-read, Mansuetus was aware of
Alexander, and saw in himself the potential for a Christian imitation of the same.[2] This
personal obsession would shape history. Mansuetus seems to have genuinely believed he could
be a liberator of Eastern Christendom and stretch his empire to the Indus.

At his disposal was an army far inferior numerically to that commanded by Megas Alexandros.
His picked elite cavalry could call upon a good number of their own retainers, and he
undoubtedly had mercenaries - Bulgars and Slavs were commonplace. The professional armies
of the Asian cities provided disciplined infantry, typically spear-armed. However the combined
force was perhaps twenty to fifteen thousand, and the Frankish contingent was small indeed.
While the mercenaries and retainers could be expected to remain in the field roughly indefinitely,
levies would slowly melt away over the course of a long campaign.

Still, Mansuetus was charismatic and popular. He commanded the loyalty of his men, and paid
them amply in plunder and promises of land. He was no slouch when it came to logistics, carting
an enormous baggage train over the Cilician gates, preparing for any eventuality. Leaving his
brother Carolus (the "King of Galatia") behind in Constantinople as regent and Co-Emperor, he
invaded in 816.

The attack it seems took the Aghatsaghids by surprise. Suryagha, the Shah of Shahs in distant
Herat, did not seem to grasp the magnitude of the invasion at first, and perhaps not without
reason - the local Viceroy of Syria, Kuluj Mihiragula Vaya assured him that all was under control.
The Syrians alone could raise some twenty thousand men, many mounted. They had high-
walled cities and knew the terrain intimately. Had they not been the scourge of the false
Romans in the Levant and Egypt? Had their country not been the grave of untold thousands of
Votivists? "Let this new Frankish king come," Kuluj said in his letter to Herat, "let him come and
taste the steel of the Ifthal. We will give him and his men a great pyre when the battle is done."

The two armies would meet near Anazarbos. The Franks had over the years learned many anti-
cavalry tactics, designed to counteract the swift light cavalrymen they encountered. They had
transformed their rigidity into an asset, learning to avoid falling for feigned retreats and standing
their ground against a foe that could flank them with ease. After an exasperating day of battle
with little progress, Kuluj Mihiragula took a Frankish arrow to the neck and died. The Franks,
sensing the disorder of their foes, launched a full charge and swept the Syrians from the field.
The Franks however, would not profit greatly from this victory.

Syria was a country dotted with fortifications. Even cities such as Antioch, long past their glory
still had high walls and soldiers defending them. Choosing to march on Edessa, Mansuetus
became bogged down before even reaching Zeugma. If he did not reduce each fortification, it
could serve as a base to harry his supply lines. If he did, his progress was painfully slow.
Desertions became commonplace, but deserters frequently found their fate was to be captured
by any one of the forces shadowing the army and sold into slavery.

Frustrated, Mansuetus turned north, towards Melitene, a nearby friendly base where he could
winter. The next year, he struck into Armenia, where he was greeted as a liberator by the
Armenian Christian lords. They offered to assist him in his conquests, and feeling confident, he
marched through the rough and mountainous but nevertheless friendly territory. This time, he
would make much better progress. An Armenian rebellion seems to have been in the works for
some time, and the local Turkish Padivayan was rapidly overthrown.

Shah Suryagha, however, had not been idle. After learning of Kuluj Mihiragula's defeat, he
assembled a force of perhaps sixty to eighty thousand men, much of which was mounted.
Accompanying the army was a corps of perhaps a thousand elephants from Sind. Rallying the
army at the city of Syarzur, he commanded a truly polyglot force. The bulk of it was Turkish and
Gandharan, but it contained almost equally significant Iranian, Eftal and Kurdish contingents -
and they marched north to find Mansuetus.

The Frankish Emperor still felt confident going into 817. If his army's strength had been sapped
by Syria, it was refreshed by Armenian rebels, many of whom were strikingly well equipped.
However, he feared a field engagement with Suryagha's vastly superior force. Fleeing out of
Adurbadagan, pursued by the local army, he found himself nearly forced to fight Suryagha at a
disadvantage several times. The Turkish Shah proved remarkably capable as a leader, in spite
of the large and unwieldy force at his command.

As Emperor Mansuetus retreated into Armenia however, the Armenian nobility presented him
with an ultimatum. They knew their rebellion was dependent on being able to retain control of
the cities, and that reprisals would be likely quite brutal if their country were to fall back into
Aghatsaghid hands. They demanded that he fight. To his credit, although Mansuetus was forced
to cave to this demand, he chose a battlefield near the town of Hadamakert where his own men
were able to deploy with their flanks anchored by slopes and uneven terrain. Suryagha was
willing to concede this advantage, counting on pure numbers to win the day.

Mansuetus, it is said, awoke the day of the battle in an uncommonly jubilant mood. Alexandros,
his hero, had triumphed against far worse odds than this. He would do the same, he declared.
His plan, however, was perhaps not as inspired as those of his heroes. He would rely on the
difficult terrain stalling the Aghatsaghid assaults on his flanks long enough for his cavalry to
strike for the royal standard at the heart of the Aghatsaghid line. In several prior skirmishes, and
the battle of Anazarbos, the Frankish knights had proved their total dominance over the Iranian
infantry, utilizing long spears and heavy armor as part of an overwhelming charge.

Suryagha, for his part, played a battle of deception. He sent a unit of his Turkish cavalrymen,
recruited from the bandits and nomads of his steppe frontier, around on a secret path revealed
to him by a local shepherd while his main army stalled and harassed the Franks. This group
waited in ambush until the battle was joined, and then set fire to the Franco-Roman camp,
causing panic. As Suryagha saw the Frankish cavalry forming up roughly in the center of their
line, he gave permission to the commanders of his own center (composed largely of light and
irregular troops) to break and flee. While his Kurdish and Iranian auxiliaries pinned the Frankish
flanks, the cavalry was led by their own momentum deep into the center of the Aghatsaghid
army. It was at this point that the trap was sprung. The elephants, stationed off-center behind
the main line of the army, charged into the cavalry, causing horses to bolt and panic.
Simultaneously, units stationed behind his center entered the fray as well.

Badly mauled, the Frankish cavalry retreated. Their flanks were holding (and indeed had badly
bloodied the Aghatsaghids) but they had left much of their nobility to the mercy of the
Aghatsaghids, and now, seeing the fires rising to the rear, knew that they were surrounded.
Mansuetus' less motivated troops began to retreat, but in doing so they allowed themselves to
be utterly overwhelmed. The Armenian and Frankish nobility attempted to fight their way out, but
the battle turned into a rout and a series of isolated last stands.

Mansuetus himself would be slain in battle, as would most of his Armenian allies. However,
while this battle would be deeply demoralizing to the Franks, it would prove inspirational to the
Armenians. The few nobles who had risen in rebellion would become martyrs. The Armenian
rebellion had begun.

[1] As it was called in the sparse Frankish accounts. The more lengthy Danish accounts are
considered typically less factual and more fanciful, exaggerating numbers and events to create
the "Ring-wall Saga" - so named for the latter (and anachronistic) additions to the walls of
Heithabir.

[2] Other theories, perhaps more charitable, suggest that the Aghatsaghids were supporting the
Rhom Shahdom and that it made political sense for Mansuetus to strike against his foes before
they attacked him first.

Guilds, Gurjurs, and

the Srivijayan Leviathan

As the ninth century rolled on, the Gangetic plain remained crowded with rival powers, roughly
incapable of breaking the stalemate they created. Alliance networks, based on mutual self-
interest and similar local identities and traditions began to form, deadlocking the cities and
towns of the Ganges valley. In the center of this cluster, the guild armies began to atrophy
somewhat. Due to the armed nature of the early revolution, the guilds had accumulated massive
ceremonial and effective power, and with the relative peace of the post-revolution era, standing
armies had gradually disappeared, leaving the guilds as the sole military forces of the state in
many cases.

If these cities and sangha claimed the names of ancient kingdoms, it was in many ways an
illusion - these were states centered around the city. The merchants who were their lifeblood
may have recognized the critical importance of the agrarian hinterlands, but they viewed them
as peripheral to true prosperity - which came through manufacturing. The greater of these
powers, formed the kingdoms of Magada, Vrji, Kosala, and Kanykakubja (Kannauj) became
known as the Pancharajya - and regularly exchanged hostages and embassies between each
other.

Military cooperation between these powers, however, was rare save in times of great
emergency. When the equal-kingdom of Vanga went to war with the city of Pundranagara, an
ally and tributary of the Magadan government, the others quietly supported Vanga as a
counterweight to the traditional power and prestige of the Magadans. The war, lasting between
826-834, dragged on without conclusion due to this covert support. Growing frustrated, the
Magadan government sought out decisive engagements such as the Battle of Jamuna River
and yet in spite of these triumphs could not prevail. The warrior-guilds on both sides were
acutely conscious of the necessity of preserving their manpower, and thus their privileged
position in society. If a guild was ruined, the carefully constructed balance might be upset.
Accordingly, both sides used great caution and finally, to the frustration of the Vanga as well as
the Pundranagara, the war ended effectively in a draw.

Henceforth, the mercantile and agrarian guilds, no small portion of society, would find
themselves at odds with the military guilds, which had rapidly consolidated their positions as
ceremonial defenders of society with few meaningful responsibilities. Attempts by the broader
ayat-councils to chip away at their entrenched power had to tread carefully. In many cases this
was rectified by various sangha hiring armed Turkic, Gurjar, or Nepalese mercenaries -
ostensibly to secure their defenses against foreign powers, but practically speaking to rebalance
the power dynamic in such a way that the military guilds did not have a monopoly on power.

In some cases, this was entirely unnecessary.Surasena, the westernmost of the Gangetic
republics, could easily match the power of many members of the Pancharajya. Controlling vital
trade and manufacturing hubs such as Indraprastha and Mathura, it represented the buffer
between the Aghatsaghid empire and the rest of the subcontinent. Accordingly, its guilds did not
have a chance to atrophy. The Raja of Surasena, (an elected military and religious position)
Saktivarma kept the guilds at a high state of readiness, and in Surasena the rural populace was
drilled for military readiness as well. In 821, Saktivarma tested the borders of the overstretched
Aghatsaghid Empire, striking hard into the Punjab.

In this campaign, the Gurjar general Guhasena would earn his famous reputation, defeating two
Aghatsaghid armies and taking the prominent cities of Jalandhara and Sagala. In the south, a
general rebellion emerged, starting with the Buddhist clergy of the region and progressing like
wildfire until the city of Arorkot was taken and the local garrison was in full retreat. Preoccupied
with the Armenian rebellion and subsequent campaigns of the Kurdish general
HweremanMughriyani, the Padivayan of Mosil, the Aghatsaghid Shahs were on the back foot.
The great Perso-Turkic state seemed on the verge of being reduced to a rump centered around
Afghanistan and Persia, and they lacked the resources to fight for all of it.
However, Surasena's mighty campaign would begin to run out of momentum by 824. Clashes
with rebel Sindhis had not endeared them to that portion of the population, and their Gurjar
federates, including Guhasena, were becoming increasingly difficult to appease. Meanwhile, the
Gandharans would fight with renewed vigor to against the Surasenas, who they saw as
occupiers and conquerors no different than the Turks. After a five month siege of Taksashila,
Raja Saktivarma retreated south, his army depleted.

On the rest of the subcontinent, the great powers were primarily coastal and mercantile. The
eastern coast played host to two republics - Andhra andTrikalinga (Orissa) were locked in a
rivalry with each other and the Tamil dynasty of the Chola, who had eclipsed their local rivals
through an embracing of the guild system combined with strong land management policies
echoing the reforms of the north. The western coast saw fewer great powers, but the Gurjar
republic of Surastra retained prominence, as did the Kuntala dynasty in Karnataka.

Further east, the great Srivijayan Empire was effectively the sole hegemony of a vast territory
stretching from the Pyu cities to the Sulu archipelago. While it had some young rivals, such as
the rising Cambodian republic of Indranokura, its fleets, both military and mercantile were
unmatched. The whole of overseas trade with China was forced to pass through its waters, and
this along with the Empire's own vast natural resources made it the pre-eminent trade power.
Their naval technology was impressive, a mixture of Indian and Austronesian designs.

Srivijayan dominion was generally light, however. Where they conquered, they left client states
and tributaries, organized at the local level. However, they were responsible for the further
spread and entrenchment of their Indianized culture across South Asia and even into Southern
China, where the Tai people proved receptive to their influences. A major Srivijayan mission at
Guangzhou maintained trade with the Qi dynasty even during the height of the Great Rebellion
of Sima Zhixen.

The greatest change to Srivijaya in the ninth century was the arrival of the foreign guild
communities. Effectively colonies on Srivijayan soil, the government of the great trading power
for the first time faced a serious existential threat - and smoothly co-opted it. By offering official
government sponsorship to the guilds, and clearly regulating them simultaneously, they allowed
the guilds to work for the benefit of their metropolises while also extracting tariffs.

As middlemen between China and India's insatiable desire for each other's goods, the
Srivijayan Empire was ideally poised to become fabulously wealthy, and they did. However, that
wealth inherently attracted the jealousy and suspicion of rivals. So long as the Srivijayans could
maintain an outward veneer of strength and prestige, their position would go unchallenged.
However, like the Sakalava in Izaoraika, they were in truth merely the first among equals -
surrounded by peoples who dreamed of usurping their position.

The Cape of Storms

The first settlers of Cape Watya, as it became known, were hardly its first inhabitants, but you
would not have known it by their histories. The stone-age peoples, both hunters and pastoralists
who the earliest settlers displaced were few in number, and a few crudely-armed warriors would
not displace the marching tide of history. The struggles of the indigenous Khoikhoi went largely
unrecorded, and they left scant archeological evidence. Perhaps on the Great Lakes, where the
Kings of the High Country ruled, the indigenous peoples could fight against the coming tide of
the Easterners, but not here.

The Izaoriaka's first colonies on the Cape were almost incidental - the stranding of several great
expeditions seeking the land of gold that had so captured the popular imagination of the already
dramatically overpopulated island represented the first colonies. Most of these expeditions
crumbled rapidly, lacking all but the most basic knowledge of agriculture and being
unaccustomed to the climate and terrain, but one survived. Well-armed mariners fell upon
several indigenous Khoikhoi villages after an earlier violent encounter on the beach. They took
slaves and cattle, forcing the locals to teach them how to survive while they waited for the next
expedition.

By the time they again sighted the white-sailed ships in the bay, the Izaoriaka were prospering
in this new land. Young men and adventurers, they had little waiting for them back home. By
contrast this was a land of abundant game, and plentiful "barbarians" to be taken as slaves and
wives. The expansion from this point forwards was rapid. Savahila and Izaoriaka alike streamed
across the water in search of opportunity. By 860, there were many small towns - mostly
hugging the coast, but a few had begun bravely trekking inland.

The organization of these first colonies was loose. Theoretically the Izaoriakan monarchy might
have claimed to rule, but in truth they merely funneled any who wanted to leave onto the boats
and turned the other way. As such the first settlements on Cape Watya were mostly anarchic, in
contrast to the more ordered but still semiautonomous Izaoriaka colonies further north. Roughly,
all Izaoriakan settlements emulated the tribal hierarchies of the homeland - members important
tribes such as the Merina naturally held more precedence in overseas as well.
[FONT=&quot]They would become the new ruling elite, or[/FONT][FONT=&quot]Randryan,
dominating individual towns which generally were forced[/FONT] to operate with little prospect
of direct support from the homeland. This above all drove these new colonies to drive into the
mainland - gathering expansive territory for agriculture and settlement, quite unlike the Savahila
who had little interest in settling beyond their bountiful coasts.

Changing of the
Guard

In the aftermath of Emperor Mansuetus' eastern debacle, his brother Carolus and the surviving
nobility feared for their power and position. Constantinople was safe, perhaps, but Anatolia was
cut open, its Franco-Roman aristocracy dead, its borders ill-defended compared to a power that
could raise perhaps a hundred thousand soldiers for an invasion of Asia Minor. Carolus was
quick to seek audience with the Aghatsaghid Shah Suryagha, sending his nephew (also named
Karl) to the Shah's court on bended knee to seek peace.

Aghatsaghid terms were harsh, but to the panicked Frankish nobles quite reasonable. They
demanded mostly the recognition of pre-war borders and a vast sum in tribute. The Frankish
Basileus bit his tongue and accepted the terms. In truth, the Aghatsaghids had every interest in
striking hard into Asia Minor and putting an end to the Frankish thorn in their side, but such an
expedition was impossible. The Armenian rebellion was rising in strength. While the traditional
aristocracy of Armenia was weakened by the Turkic and Eftal settlers who had made the
mountain country their home over the past several hundred years, the Armenian identity had
endured under occupation. Defined by their Christian faith and common language, the uprising
of the Armenian people carried with it what some scholars have identified as a sort of proto-
nationalistic urge.

Aghatsaghid attempts to recover Armenia had a tendency to backfire horribly. Battles such as at
Sarhavan (819) were effectively one-sided ambushes which crushed the Shah's prestige and
the myth of Aghatsaghid power in the far west. Herat was far away, and the complicity of local
powers such as the Kurds and Eftal were necessary to maintain royal authority. Unfortunately,
both the Kurds and Eftal took this opportunity to join the Armenians in separate rebellions.

It was the Kurdish rebellion which proved the most devastating. In a moment, the vast revenues
of Mesopotamia were ripped away from Herat and gathered instead to Mosil.
HweremanMughriyani, a cavalry officer who had worked his way through the ranks of the Ifthal
became the architect of the rebellion, gaining the allegiance of the local Kurdish vayan-lords.
Drawing much of Syria into his fold as well, with promises of loot and victory, he almost
overnight (821-826) managed to rewrite the borders of the near east. At first, the "Kurdish"
rebellion depended on many other groups. Assimilation of the Assyrians in particular had been
met with questionable success. However, as the rebellion gathered steam these groups found
themselves marginalized or outright attacked by Eftal and Kurdish communities. Mesopotamia
was fast on a path to becoming a Kurdish valley. After the battle of Ghilkart in 823, Hwereman
proclaimed himself Shah of Xvarvaran[1] and Ifthalistan[2] and after three more years of
inconclusive fighting the Aghatsaghids, worn down, would accept his claims. To say that
Suryagha had lost his primacy was an understatement. The loss of Sindh, Mesopotamia, Syria,
and Armenia all within the course of a decade was a major humiliation, and one which would
prove fatal. The Shah returned to Herat in 828 a reduced and exhausted man, one whose
legacy of victories against the Franks were utterly overshadowed. In 829, he visited the
declining but still important city of Takasashila, where he was greeting with a general riot. The
Gandharans did not forgive the lack of protection they had received from their Aghatsaghid
overlords. Rather, they were deeply bitter. Tensions were exacerbated by the reaction of
Suryagha's Turkic retainers, who slaughtered the aggressive crowds and turned a bad situation
into an outright bloodbath.

Retreating from the city, advised by his councilors to return only after the situation had been
stabilized and the ayat brought under control, Suryagha was killed by a group of rebellious
soldiers whose loyalty and motivations are unclear. His son, Sebukabaya, was considered weak
and easily manipulated, having suffered a fall in his early life that left his mind frail. A Prime
Minister named Ughe quickly consolidated power, bringing the Shah's killers to justice (although
it seems probably they were in his employ) and focusing on eliminating rivals - namely military
commanders who he felt posed a threat. These purges were swift, but many did escape them.
Notably,the commander of a major garrison in Persia survived and rebelled, causing no end of
chaos until 832, when he was finally captured and killed. In Gandhara, the local Turkic
commanders refused as one to return to Herat. Their local commander, General Akbugha
sensed the way the tide was turning and gained the protection of the Purusapura Ayat. Unwilling
or unable to directly confront the might of Gandhara, which undoubtedly would have rallied
around Purusapura, Ughe negotiated instead, allowing Akbugha and his confederates to retain
their ranks and positions.

Under Ughe, the Turkic aristocracy of Persia became more entrenched, but also more
Persianized. Herat in the reign of Sebukabaya took on a distinctly Afghano-Persian culture, with
the Indian influences of previous rulers being diminished as Gandhara and the rest of Hindustan
slipped from the Aghatsaghid orbit. The loss of a huge western territory also spurred
consolidation of what was otherwise a massively overstretched regime.

Land reform and inheritance reform were the two major legacies of Ughe's administration. As
Prime Minister he limited the power of the ambitious padivayan on the frontiers, seeing them as
threats to his own power. He redefined borders in many places, creating a second tier of vayan
who lacked the ability to transfer their titles to their sons - raising up grandees and Ifthal officers
to fill these positions. With a caste of officers loyal to Herat and owing the crown everything, he
was able to prevent further ethnic revolts in Persia. Only in Gandhara was his influence limited -
the Ganasangha checked him at every turn and eventually Ughe gave up fighting them, allowing
the Republics to exist in a state of benign neglect.

In 833, Sebukabaya marriedNenifara, an Persian Eftal "princess" who historians reveal as being
none too pleased with her ambitious father's choice in husband. In time, Nenifara would grow
into a power to rival Ughe, using her unassailable station as Queen and close access to her
husband to weaken Ughe's station without providing him enough justification to launch a coup,
causing the paranoid prime minister no small amount of stress. In time, the Queen's faction
would surpass even this fear - while she had little power in the provinces, in Herat the Queen
was a power to be reckoned with, and she would outlive Ughe, who died from his heavy drinking
in 841.

The Country of the Swan-Road Rivers

The Khirichan Turks and Sahu cultures were thoroughly blended by 830. Urbanization along the
Dnieper and Don rivers continued apace - the growth of these urban sites was coupled with
irrigation to a scale previously unseen, even before the Khirichan conquest. However, much like
in the Syr Darya valley, the hinterlands of these cities were vulnerable to nomadic raiders and
thus by necessity were symbiotically linked to the nomadic or seminomadic populations at their
periphery. Economic growth and trade, spurred on by connections to the growing Norse
Kingdom of Gardveldi, would promote an urban artisanal class that resented this symbiosis -
seeing the Turks and nomadic Sahu as parasites.

However, whatever the cause of this resentment, there was little to be done. The Khirichan
Khans, led by Khagan Shiqar Ishbaroglu Sevuqharslan [3] were at the height of their prestige
and power. The expanded royal residency, several miles upriver from Tangrabad became known
as (New) Pianjiqand, referencing the ancient Eftal capital - a site which was at this point more of
a legend than anything else. Famous for its decadent pleasure gardens and stately apartments
for visitors, the name "Pianjikand" became a synonym for hedonistic paganism in Europe. Later
additions to the legend, such as a magical river of milk and labyrinthine caverns "measureless to
man" inside which the Khagan's enemies were imprisoned are utterly unsubstantiated myths.

The Khirichan dominion stretched more roughly over Pannonia as well. In the aftermath of the
Votive War and various campaigns, the Avar and Xasar Khanate finally expired, being replaced
with local warlords who used the backing of the Khirichan to assert legitimacy and sponsor raids
into the Balkans. Wishing to assert their power over the region, the Khirichan constructed
monuments and elaborate Buddhist temples (in the distinctive Perso-Roman style of the Sahu)
around the local urban centers. The Xasar cities ofBiharabad and Shahidjan became major
Khirichan garrison-towns, with local Satraps answerable to the Khagan in distant Pianjiqand.

There was little shared identity between the far flung peoples of the Pannonian plain and the
Turks of the lower Volga. Even with Khirichan strength maintaining the entire apparatus,
autonomy and emphasis on common religion was the order of the day. While the Buddhism of
the Turks, Sahu, and Pannonians all differed significantly, common rituals were mandated to
attempt to tie these disparate peoples together. The Iranian dialect of the Sahu, long suffused
with loanwords from a hundred different languages was propagated as a lingua franca for trade
from the Black Sea to Gardaveldi, from Apaxauda to Italia.

The magnificence of Pianjiqand was a major factor in the prestige of the Khirichan, and indeed
is cited by Viking explorers as a reason for many conversions to Buddhism. Seeing the beauty
and magnificence of the Khirichan palace, and the vigor and martial strength of its people
(especially compared to the ruined, faded glory of Latin Constantinople to the south) inspired
these wanderers. Many became mercenaries in the Khirichan court as well, forming a small elite
unit of horse-mounted Northmen trained as lancers and, in dire need, foot axemen.

[1] an Eftal term for Mesopotamia believed to have Sasanian origins.

[2] This one is less clear, but it seems to refer to the region roughly from Mosil to Edessa, or
possibly larger - furthermore some historians[who?] have claimed that the term is an
anachronism[citation needed]

[3] Commonly known in Europe as Sebouk Arslan (Beloved Lion)

 The world of the
Red Sea

The reign of Basileus Alexandros Heshana (803-834) was a relatively uneventful one. As the
latest scion of a long and glorious dynasty whose position was essentially unchallenged, the
latest Heshanid Emperor was engaged primarily as a mediator of court intrigues. A somewhat
shy man who was uncomfortable leadership, in a weaker regime he might have quickly been
cast aside or made into a puppet. However, the Heshanids had ruled the Nile as their personal
fief for two centuries now. They had maneuvered themselves into the same sort of grandeur as
the Roman Emperors of Constantinople once enjoyed, and though they did not claim that title
for themselves, they did call themselves "Equal-to-the-Apostles" and rule through a version of
divine right.

Even in weakness, Alexandros Heshana was untouchable, insulated from the crass affairs of
the world. While various ministers, perhaps most notably Thomas of Alexandria, would rise and
fall over the course of his twenty-nine year reign, the center around which they orbited was
undeniably the monarchy. However, Alexandros was not the sort of man to take advantage of
the weakness of his enemies. As the Aghatsaghid Shahdom crumbled around him, he did not
order an invasion of Syria, despite the urgings of his council. His reasoning was twofold - first
and foremost, the Heshanid monarchy tended to be expected to command military expeditions
of a certain magnitude themselves. Despite a talented officer corps and capable generals,
Alexandros' presence would be expected. Secondly, the Saihists of Arabia had been gaining
strength along the border - raids into Palestine were becoming commonplace.

This "new paganism" as the Alexandrine philosophical establishment was known to call it, did
not pose an existential threat to the Christian Greco-Coptic civilization along the Nile. Numerous
though the Saihists may have been, their religion was ethnic - it was popular within a certain
cultural context, and even that context was limited, as evidenced by the number of unconverted
Jews, Christians, and Buddhists living within their territory. What Saihism did however grant was
a sense of community and a unifying impetus which had, over the past century brought
essentially the entire population of northern Arabia under one banner. Without the ability to fight
amongst themselves anymore (wars between the "believer kings" were banned under strict
penalty) the Saihists turned outwards.

In the Kurds of Xvarvaran and Ifthalistan, they found a vibrant, warlike people unified by their
own common language and faith. However to the west they found easier targets - Syria and
Palestine. The fact that both these regions had large Arab populations was only an additional
incentive. As raids intensified, they achieved broad successes. Isolated garrisons were
destroyed attempting to interdict Saihist raids.

Around this time, the Saihist leader, theAmir al-Muminin Abdulilat ibn Uthman, captured the city
of Bostra in 832. The capable Saihist tribal leader Umar ibn Katir struck as far as Gaza before
being repulsed two years later. However, because the northern Saihists remained warlike, they
began to have a sort of schism with their peaceful southern cousins. Al-Ta'if was at its core a
mercantile city prosperous largely for its important position on the trade routes. Here, the
impetus to raid was significantly lessened, and those who desired plunder accordingly travelled
north to seek it out among the unbelievers. Those who remained accordingly were allowed to
trade in unprecedented safety and security. Heshanid-garrisoned cities such as Phoinikon and
Berenike never came under attack, because they were vital parts of the trade routes the Saihist
priestesses had a vested interest in maintaining.

Southern Saihism never had to define itself against any competitor religions. Insulated from its
main hypothetical rival Christianity, it shared south Arabia only with Judaism and Buddhism,
neither of which had, in their Arabian incarnations, a strong missionary focus. With the latter
faith, it even came to a rough concord - certain ideas Buddhism and Saihism often completed
each other rather nicely. Religious debate and peaceful cultural exchange became the order of
the day.

Further south still, the Hawiya Kingdom was entering into a golden age of power and intellectual
achievement. Between the dawn of the ninth century and its midpoint, they fought a series of
three wars with Aksum, each one expanding their own power and ultimately reducing the
highland tribes to a cluster of feeble tributaries with garrison-towns and Hawiyan colonies.
These conquests however would vastly overextend the Hawiya. As much as certain ambitious
grandees and administrators might have dreamed of watering their horses in the Nile, Makuria
was simply too distant and the Hawiya already at the extreme end of their logistical capacity.

Hawiya conquests were primarily motivated by a need to gain better agricultural land. An influx
of migrants (or perhaps more accurately colonists) from Gujarat and Arabia had swollen their
cities immensely and famine loomed. By seizing the fertile highlands, the Hawiya were able to
extort tributes in foodstuffs. However, the Hawiya could not have understood the reason for their
victories. Merely a century ago, Aksum had been a capable regional power in its own right, with
many tributaries and the power to contest the hinterlands with the Awalastan. As with south
Yemen, climate changes beyond the power of the government to reverse or withstand had led to
their decline. Soil erosion led to more and more marginal cropland becoming depopulated, and
the subsequent rise in power of pastoralist peoples such as the Hawiya and the Oud. In turn,
this pastoralist exploitation further degraded the agricultural output of the land and created a
vicious and destructive cycle.

The arrival in central Aksum of pastoralist proto-Somali colonists at the bidding of the Hawiya
would spread this problem to the highlands, resulting in further agricultural collapse and in turn
would necessitate further conquests of sedentary peoples. Because the coastal territory was
primarily used for the production of profitable spices (with significantly smaller water
requirements) by settled migrant populations, famine was a continually looming specter, and
one that the Hawiya had little power to meaningfully combat. Their unsustainable lifestyle paved
the seeds for the destruction of Aksumite civilization and simultaneously their own collapse.

But for now only the most far-sighted administrators could see these problems on the horizon.
The spice trade had made the Hawiya elite enormously wealthy, and the Hawiya were great
patrons of art and culture. Surrounding themselves with beauty, the latest Maliks of Awalastan
patronized some of the greatest religious and scientific philosophers of their generation. Most of
this knowledge would spread along trade routes, and accordingly not be forgotten. Advances in
astronomy, algebra, and medicine lost since the Eftal Golden Age would be rediscovered and
spread up the Red Sea to Alexandria and across the ocean to Savahila and Arabia.

The great tragedy was how quickly it would all come to ruin. The Hawiya themselves would not
disappear - they were too powerful and their hydraulic control too firmly asserted by a complex
bureaucratic hierarchy. However, famine would leave their great plantations depopulated and
allow the desert to swallow much of Awalastan. Cities would shrink into fortified camps defined
by a central palace, temples, and a university. Those minor ports which were not useful as
entrepots would often be abandoned. This collapse would reverberate through the Red Sea -
even by 850, the Heshanid economy was feeling the strain. The prices of spice, incense, and
other luxuries rose as northern Savahila cities such as Tiravasi became the new center of
production for many of these formerly Arab crops.

[Next post will probably go to Africa and cover the recent developments in the newly expanded
and consolidated Roman Empire.]

West Africa from

700-850

It is common among historians to view West Africa through the context of the North African
Berber civilizations with which they had increasing contact through the eighth century. Elements
of various Berber tribes had begun moving south, utilizing camels to cross the great desert in
increasing numbers. These early trade lanes would grow rapidly, spurring the genesis of oasis
communities. Cities such as Sijilmasa, Teghaza, and Audaghust became important hubs and
independent polities in their own right - linked by their critical importance as way stations but
otherwise autonomous from the decentralized Berbers to their north.

Two tribes, the Iznagen and the Hawwata would ultimately come to dominate the northern ends
of these trade lanes through sheer numbers, displacing the Tuaregs. Those with little to lose
often left their native tribal lands and joined up as caravan hands or guards, riding southwest to
the great city of Tafilalt to sign on and make their journey across the wide desert. Further south
the Tuaregs remained pre-eminent. Although they were Berbers like the Iznagen, their religion,
language, and social structure were all distinct, taking on influences from Ghana to the south
and the hard necessity of their homelands, which were far more marginal than the rich
pastureland of the Mediterranean world.

The city-state empire of Ghana remained predominant across a broad swathe of the Niger river
valley. While armies of iron-armed horsemen had carved out the Ghana Empire, what
maintained it was salt, slaves, and gold. By their stranglehold on tariffs levied from the
importation of northern goods and their ability to control brigandage and caravan-raiders, Ghana
moved from a military hegemony to a proper state. They conducted river tolls and censuses,
and levied taxes and corvee-style labor on their people. Administration was done in a modified
version of the Berber script. Where this was not sufficient, the King relied on strict etiquette and
elaborate ritual to separate himself from the common people as an almost divine figure.

Empires such as Gao and Takrur imitated these practices. Curiously, the West African notion of
sovereignty was far looser and more pluralistic than the standard of Mediterranean states.
Accordingly, the Ghanan and Gao empires frequently overlapped in their claims - something
which led to sporadic border-wars in which relatively little was at stake. These wars more than
anything allowed both powers to maintain military readiness and prevent their soldier classes
from falling into sloth. These West African states also had a clear grasp of economics - while
they were dependent on Berber trade in salt, the Ghanan kings hoarded gold in vast quantities,
keeping the price from depressing and keeping it out of the market. From there, the salt they
gathered was traded to the entirety of West Africa in what was effectively a royal monopoly
owned by Ghana.

The first Christian and Gnostic missionaries arrived sometime after the beginning of the ninth
century, but unlike in Kanem, where the King cautiously and nominally was willing to embrace
Christ, the rulers of cities such as Ghana, Gao, and Takrur had far too much of their power
invested in traditional Mande religion, which granted them divine legitimacy. That the Berbers
themselves were either pagans or syncretic Christians at best was the final straw - there was no
economic incentive to abandon their traditional gods.

To the south, in the rising commonality of iron tools and the explosion of the blacksmith class as
a distinct social group from the artisan class enabled mass brush-clearing and in turn
agricultural surpluses such as never before. Kingdoms such as Akan, Taruga, and Benin
underwent a wave of urbanization unseen in prior generations, and with this came mass
production and specialization of labor. Professional artisans provided in turn a surplus of trade
goods and allowed the Nigerian kingdoms to connect themselves to the growing trade network
across Western Africa.

Foremost of the beneficiaries of this urbanization and interconnectedness was Ukwu, on the
Niger-Chadda confluence. The Yoruba, their neighbors, by 750 were suffering from regularly
exacerbated communal rivalries which had long reduced Ife to a ceremonial capital and little
more. Their hierarchal social structure concentrated all wealth and power in the hands of a few
tribal elites, who in turn militarized their city-states in an attempt to retain this power. Yoruba
power politics became a zero-sum game, and ultimately these rivalries allowed the Ukwu to step
in and subjugate the Yoruba cities one by one. As the Yoruba declined the Ukwu rose in
prominence and became hegemony over the walled cities of the Yoruba. Taking lessons from
the Yoruba, the Ukwu Empire maintained the same lofty religious and cultural separation of the
ruling elite, and although they allowed the pseudo-democratic title-taking practices to persist
among their subjects, kingship became a semi-divine and hereditary rank.

There is no native record of the arrival of the first Savahila merchants in either Takrur or Benin.
Accordingly this had led some historians to assume that the earliest Mzishima expeditions are
either fraudulent or exaggerated. After all, the Izaoriaka, who were arguably better mariners in
general did not travel far past Cape Watya, especially after gold and diamonds were discovered
on the Cape. The historical record consists entirely of the self-aggrandizing records of Savahila
ayat-ministers whose tales might well have been retroactively embellished with true details.

However, even if these early expeditions failed or are the invention of later generations, Cape
Watya did provide a jumping-off point for a later series of expeditions beginning in 830. Of these
there is more record. Ukwu oral histories record the arrival of the "Southern People" and based
on other factors in these histories it can be deduced that they refer to the later expeditions from
Savahila. While the impact of these adventurers was minimal, as tales of the Southern People
spread, they further expanded the worldview of the average West African. Increasingly there
was a notion among the educated that the world was vast - no longer was Ghana considered a
center of the world around which so much revolved. Painful as it might have been for the Kings
of Ghana, they understood that they were but one power among many.

The Kings of Ghana would accordingly begin exploration of their own, sending emissaries north
to the Berber homelands and east beyond Kanem.

Rome in the reign of Asterius and Giorgius

"The seat of the true Emperor," Nicolus of Tarentum wrote of Florentia in 823, "is the most well-
ordered city in the world. You would be forgiven if you mistook it for an armed camp on some
frontier. Everywhere are uniformed officials and armed men in ranged in ranks." Florentia,
ordered and defined by the military bureaucracy of the Empire however, had already entered a
sort of decline by the time of Nicolus' visit. The Imperial bureaucracy which had sufficed to
manage northern Italy in the era of the Isidorians had grown unwieldy and vast. The units
stationed in the city were primarily palace guards whose day to day readiness was terrible
compared to the troops on the frontier.

Asterius had won Imperial title through force of arms as Magister Militum, but he was cut of a
different sort of cloth than many previous officers. He owed his rank to his ability to play politics
and cultivate positive relationship. If the Roman bureaucracy was meritocratic it was also deeply
corrupt. Patronage had seen Asterius rise rapidly, gaining and dispensing favors until with
Severus' death he had been able to seize power. Most of all, Asterius was keen on reducing the
power of provincial Legates, most of whom distrusted him. He created additional layers of
bureaucracy, refusing to concentrate power. His Magisters were a series of lackeys with
uninspiring records, and he stuffed the bureaucracy with sycophantic yes-men.

Two years after his marriage to the young Theodora, she produced a son, Giorgius Constans,
and a three years later two daughters, Flavia and Irena, of which neither would grow to
adulthood. Giorgius as well was unhealthy, prone to bouts of fever. But the dynasty was secure.
Theodora would continue to bear children, of which only one other, also named Flavia, would
grow to adulthood. Asterius was deeply concerned with his legacy. Severus' inability to provide a
clear succession had been his undoing, and Asterius had a feeling that Giorgius would be every
bit as unpopular with the army as he was.

To subvert any such weakness, in the year 818, Giorgius was made co-Emperor at the
unprecedentedly young age of thirteen. As a young man, Giorgius proved more healthy than in
his childhood, but being groomed for the Purple had left him a rather unpleasant person and a
feeble leader, steeped in his father's paranoia and utterly devoid of the military credentials the
Roman establishment expected. When Asterius passed away unexpectedly in 831, Giorgius
was left in sole command of the Empire. The bureaucracy had for some time, even as it was
undercut by Asterius, provided for the maintenance of the Empire.

Giorgius managed to alienate many key figures within quick succession. Imbert the White, the
Frankish Mayor of the Palace, became convinced after a state visit to Florentia that the Romans
intended to go to war with Francia. Giorgius distrusted the Slavic lords in the Balkans, not
realizing that their support was a key and oft-overlooked counterweight to the power of the
military establishment. He expected the Pope to operate at his pleasure, and quickly managed
to turn the clergy of Rome against him as well.

However, there was simply no-one to replace him. His sister Flavia had gone into monastic life,
perhaps to escape the influence of her parents, and the Legates and Magistrates from which
pretender Emperors typically emerged had been heavily hamstrung by Asterius. For obvious
reasons, this weakening of the frontier military was dangerous. The Khirichan and Xasar were
once again resurgent, having weathered the storm of the Votive Wars. While they did not
immediately return to their former ambitions of raiding all Europe, they proved that the Roman
frontier from Makedonia to Illyria was deeply porous. Inept Roman Legates struggled to reign in
the Turkic brigands who struck as far south as Thermopylae - a retaliatory invasion in 837 was
defeated outside the gates of Srem. A mountain of Roman skulls was set outside the city.

In what would be a disastrous threat to the Romans, this incursion convinced the young Khagan
Sebouk Arslan of the Roman threat. He sent emissaries to Florentia demanding tribute in
compensation for the "damage" their army had inflicted, promising war if they did not accept his
demands. Giorgius, afraid to look weak in front of his military men and confident in the Roman
legions, refused his demands outright and ordered the ambassador executed.
The Romans were utterly unprepared for the coming storm. The army which rode south was not
a simple horde of nomadic raiders, bent on destruction and banditry, but rather a complete force
with a lengthy siege train. Sebouk Arslan struck south and defeated two full Roman armies in
successive battles at Naissus and Salona. After these rapid victories, he turned south and
sacked Thessalonica, Larissa, Skoupus, and Dyrrachium.

With the crisis reaching a fever pitch, Giorgius was forced to march out with yet a third army,
drawn mostly from the troops guarding the Frankish border, where tensions had been high until
very recently (the Franks recently had marched north to deal with a Viking army attacking
Paris). Sebouk Arslan lured this latest army into one of his famous feigned retreats before
surrounding and massacring it. Capturing the Roman camp, he emerged victorious with many
trophies, including many holy relics - a splinter of the True Cross, and what was supposedly the
Holy Lance, carried into battle by the devout Romans. Giorgius, depending on the account
either was slain in battle or barely escaped, only to be murdered by his own guardsmen.

It is not for no reason that 838 is considered one of the darkest years for Western Christendom.
The historians and scholars of the time found themselves asking what sins had been so great
as to see Rome humiliated and Paris sacked. Everywhere pagans seemed dominant. By the
end of the year, Sebouk Arslan was camped in Utinum, planning to invade Italy itself in the next
campaigning season. Given that he clearly had demonstrated the logistical capacity to besiege
and take walled cities, fear was rampant among the Romans. Word of the Emperor's death
prompted the Extraordinary Magistrate of Sicily, a man named Sebastianus Jovinus, a Mauri by
birth, to ride north with a company of soldiers and, shortly after meeting with the Pope be
crowned Emperor and named Defender of Christendom.

Sebastianus did not rest. He regained contact with scattered Roman commands and the Slavic
federates in the Balkans and rallied his surviving armies to prepare to repulse the Turks.
However, the Romans were simply too weak to resist the Turks in the field. Falling back to
Florentia, Sebastianus prepared for a siege which never came. Sebouk Arslan circumvented the
city and marched directly on Rome, hoping to draw the Romans into the field by threatening the
holy city and defeat them in a field battle. His previous successes in sieges had depended upon
the Romans having been humiliated in the field first.

Italy was a region largely spared the horrors of raiding armies and pillage. As such it was a rich
land, and the defenses of the region were often in poor condition. Even Rome was ill-prepared
for the coming assault. Despite a heroic defense, the city was plundered and set alight. The
Pope and most of the clergy had escaped beforehand, but the destruction of the city was a
potent symbolic blow to the power of the Roman Empire. For the remainder of the year, the
Khirichan armies would rampage across Italy before finally withdrawing back to Utinum.

The following year, Sebastianus would agree to pay tribute to the Turks in exchange for the
Khirichan withdrawl. Sebouk Arslan's invasion had proved the weakness of the Roman Empire,
but little more. If the Khagan had meant to make permanent conquests, he was frustrated in that
endeavor. It was a relatively simple thing to raid and even to take cities - but the broader
strategic realities were simply against the Turks. No matter how capable their armies were or
how well led, they were operating far from home and primarily were motivated by the prospect
of plunder. Sustainable conquest would have involved garrisons and the occupation of a vast
hostile territory that regarded them as pagans and devils.

However, the damage to the Roman Empire was real and very much crippling. Only time would
tell if they could recover.

[I confess I introduced something of a random element to decide how effective Sebouk Arslan
(you may remember him as
[FONT=&quot]Khagan Shiqar Ishbaroglu Sevuqharslan) would be on his campaign. Turns out
he is a tactical genius and the Romans were doomed from the beginning. But the likelihood of
the Xasar, let alone the Turks, making major inroads into the Balkans seems slight.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The wars between the Christian world and everyone else have a feeling like a
pendulum to me. Christendom was getting hammered by the Eftal and then the Votivists swept
them away. Now the Turks go rampaging through Europe once again.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Next post will touch on the Slavs and something else that I have yet to determine.
] [/FONT]

The birth of the

western Slavic states

The ninth century was a time of increasing centralization for the western Slavic peoples. The
tribal identities which had characterized their governments up until this time remained important
but slowly lost precedence in favor of strong central authority which was more capable of
responding to incursions by the Christian Germanic dukes.

The most well-documented of these central authorities was the King of Great Moravia, Moymir
(Saint Moymir the Great) Ascending the throne in 840, within two years he personally converted
to Christianity, establishing Bishoprics in both Nitra and Praha. Accordingly, his life has been the
subject of many legends and exaggerations, relating to the famous riverine baptism of his
nobles and his many wars against the pagans of his own kingdom. What we can learn from
these legends is that his Christianization policies were met with strong internal resistance.
Becoming a Christian lessened the pressure from the west but it threatened on many occasions
to tear the young kingdom of Moravia apart entirely.

Moravia was organized, in contrast to the Wendish or Polish kingdoms, in imitation of her
Frankish neighbors. The Kral of Moravia was called by the German princes a "Duke" and his
retainers worked in a similar style to the magisters and palatine counts of the Frankish realm.
However, if Moymir was a patron of Christendom, he did not employ these magistrates in the
persecution of the old Slavic religion - quite the opposite, indeed. The forest temples and holy
sites of their faith were preserved and untarnished for at least several more decades, before
slowly mounting social pressure from a growing population of genuine converts saw the majority
of the sites abandoned and traditional rituals replaced by Christian practices.

Mostly, the Moravian state is understood by way of its diplomatic ties to the Christian world. A
royal marriage with the Duke of Bavaria, an acknowledgement of its (nominal) subordination to
the Frankish King. We have scant historical records. As the frontier of Latin Christendom moved
east, communities of Cassiodorian monks would establish communities in the vast hinterlands
of Moravia, providing some of the clearest views of the Moravian society in transition. The
fortified hill-towns were gradually pushing their boundaries - suburban communities gathered
outside the traditional walls and established rough palisade barriers on the low terrain beyond
their houses. In time, monasteries and churches would become equally important centers of
communities.

To the east of Moravia, on the broad plains of Polans, a different sort of consolidation was taking
place, based not around Christianity but Buddhism. Since at least the 800s, there had been
small but influential Buddhist communities on the Vistula river - the religion had some four
decades to synthesize with local beliefs and customs before King Czcibor of Polans united the
"people of the plains" under his own banner. In some senses, Slavic Buddhism was a purer
version of the Hinayana creed that had gained early popularity on the Vistula. Brought directly
by travelling monks and missionaries, it did not carry as much of the baggage of Iranian
paganism, and where it did, it was quick to draw comparisons between Iranian deities and the
local Slavic ones. Buddhism, like Christianity, provided a social glue to unite local tribes into a
larger framework.

Unlike Moymir, Czcibor conquered his kingdom at sword-point. It was only after the last of these
conquests, in 853, that he began to promote Buddhism. Stone monuments from the time period
speak of the edicts of the "Emperor and champion of the dharma" and describe the Czcibor's
"universal rule" - a true revolution in the language used to describe Kings. Czcibor seems to
have repudiated offensive war shortly after his conversion. Conveniently he had already
conquered a vast empire, and settling down to manage it was perhaps a prudent action.

Alone of the Western Slavs, the Wendish, or Veleti Kingdom, did not abandon its traditional
religion or social structure. It could not afford to - the Wendish king had less authority than his
counterparts in Poland or Moravia. His authority directly stemmed from the Slavic priesthood
and the rituals which preserved the social unity of his people. Furthermore, among the Veleti
there was no single potent tribe which could establish a dominant or hegemonic role. The Veleti
"High King" was chosen from a weak tribe, theCircipani. He could only act with the complicity of
one or more of the greater tribes - meaning he could generally only act when the entire
confederal system came under direct existential threat.

Existential threats were rare. The almost total annihilation of the pagan Saxons had shocked the
Veleti, but the Franks quickly became more distracted with affairs in the south and the routine
threat of the Norsemen. Invading the deep forests was widely considered unprofitable and
pointless - border raiding would continue but it would never escalate far beyond that.

The Wendish religion, however, was under threat regardless. Christian missionaries gained
some converts, especially among border communities pragmatically hoping that conversion
would spare them future Frankish raids. And yet the greatest threat was not these missionaries
or pragmatism but simply the slow divorce between the ritualistic, formal political religion
developing among the tribal elite and the folk religion of the common people. Over the decades
since the founding of Veletia as a confederal kingdom, the people began to feel increasingly
disconnected from the major shrines, which became political power-brokers, and drawn more
towards localized folk observances. Individual communities became more and more distinct
from any broad identity as "Wends" or even their larger tribal affiliations.
While their neighbors were bound together, the Wends slowly drifted apart.

India - the revolution continues

If the Guild Era began in the north, along the rich lands of the Ganges, it was the south which
harnessed its full potential. Generally speaking, south India was less densely populated and
less inherently productive than the wealthy Indo-Gangetic plain. Accordingly, it had more room
to grow and develop as it moved from tenant farming and the pseudo-feudal land structures of
the late Imperial era into the guild organized systems that followed. By giving the local
populations a direct stake in the development of the land and the communal resources to
properly develop it, production increased significantly. The vast expansion of agricultural
production freed up more land for cash crops such as spices and cotton the latter of which
fuelled a large-scale urban textile industry.

With these innovations, the power of urban manufactory guilds increased rapidly. The remaining
monarchies of the region found themselves increasingly under the sway of these guilds, and
attempts by the Rajas to assert their independence from their ostensible subjects often resulted
in the establishment of further guild republics.

In the waning era of the Maukhani Empire, the Yuvaraja dynasty ofVinukonda was able to assert
their independence, but the times were simply unsuited to the sort of imperial pretensions the
Yuvaraja dynasty offered. Under the latter Andhran Maharaja Vikramaditya (778-801) the
Andhran monarchy attempted to conquer the republican city-states of Trikalinga only to exhaust
themselves utterly and become deeply indebted to the very trading guilds who they had
attempted to rule. After Vikramaditya's death, Andhra's rapid transition into a Ganarajya-style
republic was almost inevitable.

Vikramaditya's replacement was an orator and poet by the name of Hasti, a member of the
brahmin administrative class whose persistence in Andhra allowed the "Andhran revolution" as
later ideologues would describe it to effectively be little more than a palace coup with few
immediate social changes. The social and economic revolution of later decades should not be
falsely assumed to have begun with Hasti's ascension, even if he did quickly develop a
reputation as a reformer. After Hasti died in 817, he was replaced with Jayasimha, the son of
Visnuvarma, a warrior-guild general, a choice undoubtedly inspired by renewed warfare with
Trikalinga.

On the Deccan plateau, the rise of urban polities was far more limited. Instead a new sort of
empire emerged, one founded by a group of exiled Gurjar tribesmen. Called the Chandratreya
Empire after its founding dynasty, it was centered around the old city of Pratisthana. Despite the
relatively poor soil of the Deccan, it was exceptionally mineral rich, and the local guilds
accordingly became exceptionally wealthy off of mining and the associated artisanal industries.
Unlike on the Ganges, military guilds here did not form autonomously but rather were local
militias, and accordingly the state did not fall into the trap of relying on these guilds but rather
preserved its own professional mercenary armies without guild allegiance.

The Chandratreya Empire, as with all post-imperial polities, had its powers limited by the
republican institutions of the guilds. In many senses, later historians have often considered it
more of a mercantile alliance than an empire at all. In Gujarat, the city of Bharuch, which by 800
was the largest port in the world, was a federate of the Empire - and yet also considered a part
of the Ganarajya of Surastra, and simultaneously a potent city-state in its own right. To the
southwest, the Kuntala dynasty ruled as nominal vassals and allies of the Chandratreya, and yet
often made policy decisions independently of their supposed overlords in Pratisthana.

When the Aghatsaghids were driven from the subcontinent, no region suffered more than Sindh.
Local violence against the Turko-Iranian landlord class was brutal and uncompromising, and left
a power vacuum with none to fill it. Unlike the generally pluralistic Indian religious world, Sindh
was and firmly Buddhist - but the Buddhist clergy, despite their instrumental role in organizing
the rebellion, rapidly lost control of it as they condemned the excesses and violence.

Sindh accordingly did not remain independent for long. Akadadeva Dauwa, one of the many
Gurjar warlords living in the marginal territory of the Thar led, according to legend, some
seventy men to Mulasthanapura (Multan) and seized the city by stealth, allowing his nearby
tribe to capture the surrounding land and turn overnight from herders to conquerors. From there
his conquests snowballed down the Indus. By 830, the Dauwa ruled all of Sindh. Their legacy
was as patrons of international trade, expanding the river-ports that linked the Indus valley to
the wider world. Infrastructure development, long neglected by the Aghatsaghids was a priority
of the Dauwa, who sought to, through enormous public works, win the loyalty of their subjects
and prove that they were more than another foreign occupier.

The religious geography of the subcontinent was largely inherited from the nondualistic and
monistic scholars patronized by the Maukhani. This universalist Hinduism remained a common
trend in the new and pluralistic post-Imperial India. The idea of all gods and souls as aspects of
a singular, impersonal divine truth (Brahman) allowed the priestly classes to compete with
Buddhism. By linking their complex theologies to the devotional cultic movements, the Hindu
priestly classes appealed to the common man and the intellectual classes alike. However
Buddhism was a force to be reckoned with. Many powerful guilds patronized Buddhist
monasteries and for those at the bottom of the social spectrum, the egalitarian aspects of
Buddhism had far more appeal.

It is difficult to speak broadly of the Indian religions. The sheer multiplicity of belief systems and
schools of thought only became more complex and interlinked throughout this era, as travel and
trade allowed the communication of ideas. Even without touching on Hindu-inspired religions
such as Bhakti which had their origins on the subcontinent but became popular mostly in Africa,
the web of competing and complimentary philosophies is difficult to unravel.
Despite the regionalization of politics, the relative interconnection of the subcontinent ensured
that regional trends in religion still had a global audience. Competing guilds still maintained their
local cults, but these local cults were understood to be part of a broader framework. By the end
of the eighth century and the dawn of the post-imperial era many new religious texts had been
compiled. Called the Dharmasukta, they built on the accumulated mysticism of the Upanishads
and the rituals of Brahamanic Hinduism to create the groundwork of what would eventually be
considered "modern" Hinduism. The deification of the Buddha as an aspect of Vishnu was but
one part of this new synthesis.

[I confess to not being an expert on the Dharmic religions, but this post was long overdue.
Essentially what happened was that the Bhakti movements didn't catch on and Puranas were
never written because of the very different past couple centuries and the Maukhani trying to
make a universal umbrella version of Hinduism underwritten by a monist ideology. These ideas
stuck and were eventually compiled into texts called the Dharmasukta.

By the post Imperial era, regionalism in religion becomes more commonplace, but it's largely
done within the framework of the Dharmasukta rather than the Puranas. Competing with
Buddhism rather than Islam means that there's no future for personal devotional religion, and so
the Bhakti movement is largely a bunch of exiles who eventually move to East Africa, where it
turns out to be a lot more appealing.

Theoretically you could also consider the Mahadevists an early Bhakti offshoot, but nobody
does because they're basically Indianized Zoroastrians and by 800 they don't exist anymore as
a meaningful movement.]
 The reign of the
Beloved Lion

Khagan Shiqar Ishbaroglu Sevuqharslan, better known as Sebouk Arslan, should have retired
from Utinum feeling accomplished. The Romans had been humiliated, a mere insult having
become the pretext for bringing the Empire to its knees in a manner not seen since the Avar
dominion over the Isidorians. However, Sebouk Arslan was restless by nature. His early victory
over the Romans had served to give him confidence in his capabilities as a leader, and led him
to believe he was capable of even greater feats.

Opportunities would soon present themselves. Many powers had been watching as Emperor
Carolus struggled to piece together the substantially weakened Empire that was his brother's
legacy. The Franks of Asiana were few on the ground at the best of times - but Mansuetus'
death and the loss of most of their best men put their very survival into question. As part of his
program to restore the fortunes of his empire (and enrich the mercantile cities upon which he
depended) Carolus began levying a heavy toll upon trade that passed through the Bosporus
without a certain seal, which was of course distributed only to certain trading ventures with
Imperial patronage. It was, in many respects, a brilliant plan. The merchants of the Asian cities
had to vie for Imperial favor and simultaneously came to enjoy an enormous advantage over
other powers seeking to trade on the Black Sea.

Sahu merchants operating out of the port cities of the Crimea were incensed. The toll made
their own trade ventures almost unprofitable, and allowed Asiatic Roman merchants to begin
edging their way into the riverine trade. After they presented their grievances to the Khagan,
Sebouk Arslan with customary swiftness raised an army and marched south into Thrace,
pillaging en route. When he arrived at Constantinople, he demanded that Carolus exempt his
merchants from the toll. The Emperor, knowing that good relations with the Khirichan were an
integral part of the mercantile economy of his nation, was almost willing to concede, when
Sebouk Arslan suddenly added the clause that the Emperor reimburse the Sahu merchants for
their economic losses, and furthermore pay the associated costs of the Turkish "campaign" into
Thrace. Any hope for compromise collapsed at once, more or less as the Turkish Khagan had
wanted from the beginning. Even if the walls of Constantinople made this war a stalemate, he
could likely get the more reasonable terms he'd proposed at first - war was not profitable for
trade either.

Sebouk Arslan was confident of victory, but Constantinople, even with walls in moderate
disrepair was still a tough nut to crack - and well fortified. The Frankish Emperors had built a
fortified keep in the Blachernae district, an area once considered the weakest section of the
walls. Even with the city shrunken and depopulated it boasted a decent number of citizens
willing to come to its defense against a pagan horde. Furthermore the Franks had at least five
thousand of their own men in the city, and more would sail in as the days went on. Capable of
reinforcing and resupplying the city from the sea, the Franks had little reason to fear Sebouk
Arslan's overwhelmingly mounted army.
With news of Sebouk Arslan's invasion, those Eftal still remaining in Anatolia rose up in rebellion
against Carolus. They were relatively few in number compared to the days of the Rhom
Shahdom - much of the best pastureland and estates had obviously been confiscated, and their
population was accordingly diminished. But especially in the east, where many had fled into the
hill-country, a general rebellion began. Carolus left Constantinople in the hands of his Master of
the Palace, the Roman Ioannes Mourtzouphlos and crossed into Asia at the head of a
significant army. Carolus' abandonment of Constantinople was an understandable
miscalculation of the dangers - an Eftal rebellion in the heartland of his empire posed more of a
threat than an army outside impressively well-defended Constantinople.

In his absence, the defenders realized that the Khagan, contrary to expectations, had come
prepared for the defenses of Constantinople. The Sahu had, at his instruction, been building a
proper navy for several years now - yet another indication that an assault against
Constantinople was a long-premeditated endeavor rather than the justified failure of trade and
negotiation that the Turkic Khagan tried to present it as. This fleet sailed into the Bosporus after
the first uneventful months of siege wore on, trapping the Franks in their own city. Attempts by
the Roman navy to break the blockade were unsuccessful - the maritime tradition of the Crimea
was strong, and their ships were well made with fine timber from Gardaveldi. After several
months, rationing became severe.
While Carolus ultimately faced little threat from the scattered Eftal rebels, driving them back
further into the hill country, the noose tightened around Constantinople. After a pitched naval
battle the Roman fleets were driven into disarray and suffered terrible losses. Carolus, returning
west found himself denied the ability to cross the straits and return to the besieged city - instead
he was forced to land further south and march inland. In a field battle, however, he was utterly
out of his element. The Khirichan Turks inflicted horrific losses on the Romans near the ruins of
the Anastasian Wall and finally, humiliated, Carolus was forced to come to terms or risk losing
Constantinople outright.

For his part, Sebouk Arslan had little desire to directly assault Constantinople. The city was a
prize, and strategically located, but even in disrepair its defenses could still humiliate him, and if
he miscalculated he might lose his strong position. He had already demonstrated his ability to
bring Asiana to heel, and his terms were harsh. Sebouk Arslan still demanded heavy tribute and
now expected the formal submission of the Emperor as well. Carolus, fearing his own power
was on the decline, nearly agreed, but the Roman cities refused to allow him to do so. If the
Emperor surrendered here, what would stop the Khirichan from returning in but a few years and
wreaking fresh havoc?

Instead, the delegates from these cities made a coalition with the great Frankish landowners
and proposed an alternative, raising money for a fresh fleet and army. Many of the Eftal who
had long fought the Empire on its frontiers were now hired as mercenaries and promised land
grants if they served well.

As negotiations stalled, Sebouk Arslan completed a mining project which brought down a large
section of the walls. After three previous bloody failures, this success allowed his soldiers to
stream into Constantinople and slaughter the remaining defenders. Ioannes Mourtzouphlos was
captured, as were many nobles who were later ransomed. With the fall of his capital, Carolus
was cut off from the mainland and surrounded from land and sea near Heraclea. Without the
council of his lords and cities to bolster his resolve, and not knowing of any forthcoming rescue,
he surrendered as the Khirichan drew up siege lines for what would assuredly be a slaughter.

The Roman army surrendered their arms and armor and was allowed to sail back in disgrace.
Carolus agreed to a heavy tribute and many other terms, but on his arrival home, he was
murdered. The exact circumstances are unclear - foul play is suspected, as many had much to
gain from ending the line of Frankish Emperors, whose reign had largely been ineffectual.

Asiana was poised to undergo massive changes. Defeated in its foreign wars and uncertain of
its place in the world, it would not again take on Imperial pretensions. The succession of foreign
rulers whose alien languages and rites had dominated since the fall of Eastern Roman Empire
could be ended. Of course there were still the Frankish marcher lords and Eftal pastoralists, but
both of these peoples could be co-opted, and perhaps in time, civilized. It would merely take a
strong leader to do so.

Gardaveldi

Far to the north, those Norsemen who sought a better life across the sea were drawn, in the
main, to two places: the British Isles, where the Pentarchy and the Celts struggled to stem the
growing Viking tide, and Gardaveldi, the land of the walled cities. Gardaveldi was a land of
opportunity - the native Slavs of the Ilmen were overrun early on by the sheer volume of Norse
adventurers and brigands. But in the wake of these rough men came another wave - traders,
settlers, farmers. It was these people who would create the distinctive Slavo-Nordic culture of
Gardaveldi. It was the settled kings of these small but growing townships who would also
embrace the teachings of Boddo, brought north by the peoples of the Swan-Road. Beginning
with the conversion of the King of Smaleskja, the practices spread north rapidly. By 854, the
High King of Holmgard himself, Halfdan the son of Hrolf, entertained Buddhist monks and
scholars in his halls. The poetry of the Northmen took on distinctly foreign elements, and
blended them to the point that no bhikku in the serene monastery-cities of the Vanga might have
recognized them as the same creed.

Although distant and philosophically far removed from the world of the Norse, Buddhism had a
strong appeal to the Norse of Gardaveldi, a people who were generally curious about foreign
concepts to begin with - clearly evident from their rapid adoption of Slavic architectural and
artistic forms. If it were not for written history, there would be little evidence for the mass
settlement that occurred. It was but a small change, comparatively, to add but a single additional
semi-divine figure to the pantheon, and it provided an ideological justification for increased
centralization of power by the High King - the new Buddhist religious mandate to rule justly
worked within the context of the current monarchy.
Gardaveldi however, would not be easily unified. The harsh climate and lack of any centralized
order to the waves of colonization ensured that local leaders would emerge and find it easy to
retain control over their own regional concerns. Kings were numerous and could command
small warbands nevertheless sufficient to ensure their own autonomy. While the Holmgard
monarchy had the power to rule the Swan-road, they lacked the strength to assert control over
the hinterlands without risking an alliance of many petty rulers against them.

Unification was a slow process, nowhere near complete until roughly 860, when a King by the
name of Arnmundr finally proclaimed himself the Wheel-Ruler (a corruption of Chakravartin) of
Gardaveldi. With the bloody work of conquest done, he found himself ruler of an armed camp.
Countless subjugated lords beneath him each had their own private armies, loyal to nothing
beyond their local community, and these lords, Arnmundr knew would be more than willing to fall
on each other again at a moment's notice. Accordingly, much of his reign was spent trying to
mediate disputes and establish standardized laws - the Royal Laws, which superseded local
common law. In these endeavors he was partially successful. More successfully, he encouraged
his people to expend their martial strength on those beyond the bounds of his dominion,
allowing Gardaveldi to sprawl southwards towards the Khirichan.

Torrathur, son of Arnmundr, was the first of the Gardaveldi kings to war directly against the
Turks, at least according to the Gardaveldi. Leading an expedition south down the Swan-road,
his raiding party was utterly outmatched against the swift steppe horsemen of his rivals.
Henceforth, peace would remain the general state of affairs between the two powers. Despite
small-scale raiding on both sides, both polities remained more invested in the riverine trade than
warfare.

Kurds

The foundation of Greater Xvarvaran would represent the beginnings of a native Iranian
renaissance against the Turkic power of the Aghatsaghids. However, the Khardi, despite their
dominant position in Mesopotamia faced many challenges, not the least of which came from
their Eftal subjects. Despite their common origins and similar culture, the assimilation of the
Eftal centuries ago had left them with antique Sasanian prejudices regarding the Khardi, and it
was a bitter pill to swallow that so much of Ifthalistan was conquered by a people who had long
been regarded as utterly marginal. The incorporation of the Eftal into the administration and the
relative autonomy of Eftal grandees sweetened the deal to some degree, but according to most
contemporary histories, the Eftal remained resentful but impotent.

The Mughriyani dynasty was founded as an act of rebellion by the Padivayan of Mosil, and
accordingly it had a strong central military from its inception, effectively a local continuation of
the semi-feudal army structure which had long served Turkic masters. The Aghatsaghid-trained
bureaucracy of the region in time fell into line and simply came to serve new masters, as did the
Ifthal cavalry. During the early rebellion and for much of the reign of Hwereman Mughriyani, the
first Shah, the various Khardi tribes actually took shockingly little part in the campaigns - the
Khardi were notoriously disunited, a legacy of their hill-tribe origins. While they could be relied
upon to defend their local territory and commit acts of horrific violence against Aghatsaghid
loyalists both real and imagined, they were of limited utility in a concerted campaign. It would
only be with time and the centralizing influence of the Mosil monarchy that they would be
reformed into an effective fighting force capable of extended campaigning.

The Persian Gulf in particular suffered during the rebellion. Under the Eftal, the region had been
a nexus of foreign trade and local manufacturing. The region had never recovered after the
collapse of its Eftal patrons, becoming first a hotbed of sectarian Mahadevism, and, in the wake
of the Kurdish invasions, a ruin. Husrava Mughriyani, Hwereman's eldest son, would do his best
to repair the region, establishing royally sponsored cities includingChermera and Dasinivat
along the coastal deltas of the Tigris and Euphrates. A slow, halting recovery would begin,
spurred by royal patronage and by investment by small Indian and Arab merchant communities.

Hwereman would have three sons in total, Husrava, Rojdav, and Merxhas. While there was
never any doubt that the eldest would inherit, the younger sons would be granted lands and
titles, a significant change from the Eftal manner of succession, wherein royal brothers were
expected to serve at the pleasure of their Shah and were given no inherent special privilege.
This system of succession would encourage Xvarvaran to expand its borders through warfare -
each son competing to carve out as large of a domain as possible to inherit - but it would also
lead to instability. Within three years of Hwereman's death, Rojdav would be murdered and
Merxhas and Husrava would enjoy rough parity in strength, the former ruling Ifthalistan, and the
latter Xvarvaran.

The Yazdati religion in this period was first codified. Collected documents reveal a wide variety
of local folk beliefs with few commonalities. The veneration of pseudo-divine figures such as
Buddha and Jesus was commonplace, but these deities were interpreted drastically different.
Mihir was alternately a human hero-deity or the incarnation of the Sun or represented as a
peacock. The planets were either simple celestial bodies or deities themselves, carved of black
stone in beautiful abstraction. Reincarnation was commonly assumed, but other sects assumed
that the righteous would become one with the god, while others believed that could not happen
until the end of days, when the Maitreya Buddha would return with the Bodhisattva Masih
[Christ] at his right hand.

Creating standardized belief was seen by the Mosil Shahs as a way to unify the realm, however
it was in many senses a hopeless ambition. The Mosil codices, as they became known, took too
much inspiration from the the Hinayana Buddhism of the local Eftal in an attempt to appease
them, and was widely rejected by the Kurds, who felt more affinity to traditional Iranian
paganism. Later written religious texts would not evolve for a hundred years, and in the interim
Yazdatism would remain a deeply regional religion. And yet Yazdatism survived, and indeed
grew wildly, because of its broad umbrella. In Egypt certain sects were seen merely as heretical
Christianity, although the majority were more aptly called outright paganism.

[Just a short update covering some peoples I've not paid enjoy attention to. Hope everyone
enjoys the continuing Kurdwank!
Using Yazdatism (which is probably not a term that should exist in this timeline) is just my
concession to not being terribly clever at coming up with allohistorical names. I think TTL's
Kurdish "pagan" religion (here a mix of folk Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Buddhism, rather
than being deeply inspired by Islam) is a plausible evolution. The hill tribes that would become
the Khardi after all were largely ignored by the Eftal, who were too busy applying Sasanian-era
prejudices towards those on the periphery of their dominions to bother using them as anything
other than occasional mercenaries.

Economically, the region is seriously under performing compared to our history, when the Middle
East was becoming an economic center of the world. The Mughriyani dynasty represent
perhaps the first dynasty with the capacity and interest to turn that around. So stay tuned!]

The Cider Cape

There were diamonds and gold in the hills and waters of Cape Watya, if one knew where to
look. It was then a bountiful country, and its treasures lay scattered shallowly across the
surface. If they lay deeper still, that was for now immaterial. The indigenous peoples lacked the
capacity and numbers to exploit even the most evident sources of mineral wealth in the manner
of the Randryan.

These early mining communities were exploitative in the extreme, based upon a rapidly-
diminishing pool of slave laborers drawn from the Khoisan natives. The prospect of quick profits
drew the Randryan "nobility" to accumulate vast interior tracts that they had little capacity to
hold and little desire to develop meaningfully. As surface deposits diminished and the labor-
force died, it seemed that the Izaoriakan colonial experiment was coming to a close. The
Izaoriaka impact on the interior was confined largely to unsanitary shanty-towns and
fundamentally flawed attempts at agriculture in a land which was broadly hostile to their futile
efforts to import their modified version of the Austronesian agricultural package.

It is the Watyan folk hero Duihari who is credited with the introduction of wheat to the Cape.
Almost nothing is known of Duihari as a historical figure - if he can even be said to have existed
is a matter of some debate. A Randryan noble, he seems to have merged in time with a variety
of local myths and legends, becoming a cultural hero associated with the moon. In time, the
Izaoriaka would deify him.

Regardless of the legend, the emergence of Duihari as a beneficent provider of seeds and
agricultural fortune represents a series of major societal changes. The collapse of the slave-
based mining system, several large scale famines, and the desperate introduction of "northern"
crops from India and Persia all revolutionized life on Cape Watya. Around 870, large-scale
wheat farming took off along the western coast and spread progressively inland, clinging to
those regions with reliable rainfall. Agricultural surplus was carried by horses along trade
highways to the interior mines, ensuring their sustainability.
Many indigenous plants would also come into greater significance. Sorghum farming, adapted
from the natives, and the drinking of "redbush water" (rooibos) was attested by travelers by the
early tenth century. Fruits such as red milkwood and native apples were cultivated in large
quantities as well. The famous Watyan cider, although not created in its distinctive form for
several centuries, almost certainly had its start in these early years. Not without reason would
Watya ultimately become known to many countries as the "Cider Cape."

For the ever-increasing trickle of ships which sought to round the cape and explore further up
the long coast, Watya would remain the final "civilized" port of call. It was for this reason, more
than any other, that the Izaoriaka fought tooth and nail to retain control over their colony. Their
local viceroys however, effectively tribal chiefs bound in the same mandala pattern of
governance as those chiefs at home, enjoyed broad autonomy. Much of what allowed the
Sakalavaraja to maintain dominance at home was an effective monopoly on force. Local
chieftains could be cowed by clear assurances that defection meant death. Overseas, that
power seemed distant and diminished indeed, especially when travel between Cape and Island
was still unreliable and difficult at the best of times.

In practice, the Izaoriaka gained little from holding Cape Watya. Their biggest success was
finding a constructive outlet for a population that otherwise might have turned to raiding, either
internally or externally. The mass exoduses of the ninth century created in their wake a
remarkably cohesive society, and a prosperous one - both at home and, in some cases, for a
privileged elite, abroad.

Asiana in the "Middle Ages"

With the passing of the Eastern Roman Empire, continuous and stable governance over
Anatolia become been a rarity indeed. Central authority was manifestly unlikely to be constant
or consistent in its application of law or taxation, and starting with the Rhom Shahdom,
successive waves of invaders governed according to their own policies, offering relatively little
protection to those who fell outside of their base of support. Certain powers, namely the
"Roman" cities clustered around the coastal periphery of the Aegean, were capable of defending
their own territories and even contributing to a common defense, but these were largely isolated
situations.

With the collapse of the short lived Franco-Roman Empire (a sort of last gasp of the Votive
movement) and the general weakening of the Frankish nobility, what remained was a patchwork
of radically different societies. Urban Roman merchants felt little commonality with their
landholding Frankish neighbors, and even less with the Rhom Eftal, a designation which broadly
included the Alan peoples of Anatolia as well. However, it is a testament to the legacy of Roman
civilization and the mutual exhaustion of all parties that rather than a rapid devolution into
factionalism and bloodshed, the aftermath of the Franco-Roman Empire was relatively peaceful.

The Roman city-states were willing to acknowledge their dependence on the foodstuffs of the
Frankish landholders and a growing desire to hire Eftal mercenaries. They were willing to make
agreements - not to be subordinate to either of these foreign invaders, but rather to work with
them. The greater coastal cities had become prosperous - those who could not be made to see
the logic in their treaties were often bought or bullied into line by Eftal soldiers hired with Roman
capital. What emerged were rough leagues and petty kingdoms bound into perpetual alliances.

One of the most potent of these coalitions was the "Hypatate of Samos", which was ruled by a
coalition of consuls ("hypatoi" in Greek) from Ephesos, Phokaia, and Smyrne, three cities which
had prospered through the lenient trade policies of the Rhom Shahdom and betrayed the Eftal
with alacrity when a the Votivist armies arrived. Similar governments would emerge to their
north and south - the Republic of Nikaia and the Hypatate of Kibyra, along the southern coast.
Shortly after the death of Carolus and the dissolution of the Franco-Roman Empire, a series of
short conflicts erupted between these cities and the various Frankish "kings" in Galatia and
Cappadocia. Aided by several prominent Frankish landholders, these kings propped up a
pretender named Duke Audomar, attempting to maintain the continuity of their Empire, or at
least restore the even shorter-lived Kingdom of Asiana.

Neither side had the strength to enforce their will, until the Hypatoi of Samos made a pact with
the hill-tribes of the Ikonion Eftal, recruiting several hundred well-equipped mercenary cavalry to
their cause and altering the balance of power. While many of the Eftal were still pagan or
heretical Christians at best, the Roman Hypatoi weighed their options and found that
pragmatism in this situation was the clear choice. They traded with such barbarians on a regular
basis anyways, and from the Sahu were well-acquainted with their philosophies.

With the aid of the Eftal, Duke Audomar's supporters were harassed and beaten down. The King
of Cappadocia was captured and tortured to death, a series of events which briefly led to an
Christian Eftal Shahdom of Cappadocia which lasted from 846-850 before it's ruler was killed in
a border raid and a Roman landowner took control as Hypatos. This consular model was
imitated in many places. Despite differences in implementation (succession law ranged from the
pseudo-democratic to hereditary) and a lack of central authority, the petty states of Asiana
largely subdued and co-opted the Frankish power structures that had dominated them since the
Votive War.

However, after these initial bouts of warfare, Frank and Eftal alike found themselves assimilating
rapidly into the new regimes. Both peoples were allowed to live much as they always had, so
long as taxes and tribute were paid regularly to the Roman cities which now dominated the
Anatolian peninsula. Accordingly, the culture of Asiana would become something unique. Greek
would take on Iranian and Germanic loanwords. For a brief period, wide shouldered Eftal gowns
became fashionable among the Roman elite - a passing fad to be sure, but indicative of the
changes which would create Medieval Asiana. The Eftal gradually Christianized almost entirely,
with what the Romans called "Buddha worship" largely a secret phenomenon by the end of the
century.

No single powerful figure would emerge as a conqueror or unifier.Ioannes Mourtzouphlos, one-

time Mayor of the Palace, became consul in Nicomedia for the remainder of his life, but his
claim to legitimacy was not couched in the language of imperial restoration but rather the same
particularistic, regional language of his counterparts. Basil of Aphrodisias, an orator who came
to power in Ephesos, showed perhaps the most promise of unifying the various Asian cities into
a single order during his tenure in office (860-867) but he was murdered in a palace coup
orchestrated by his Eftal guardsmen, after which point his successor, Demetrios Kamatera, half-
Eftal a military man reigned as Despot for half a decade before being "persuaded" to retire to a
lavish Aegean villa rather than face open war from the allied cities.

Women in many of these merchant cities could sometimes, through familial connections,
remarkable authority. Eudokia Sgouros, matriarch of the influential Sgouros mercantile family,
was ruler in all but name of Attaleia for nearly her entire life (868-891) before her children
squandered her fortune. The Sgouros family, and its many offshoots, remained a powerful
aristocratic and mercantile force in the politics of the Hypatate of Kibyra for decades to come.

Asiana was able to survive, thrive, and unify because it faced minimal threats. The Anatolian
plateau was relatively safe from raiders, perhaps for the first time in centuries. With the Khardi
struggling to assert their own dominion, and the specter of Sebouk Arslan finally distracted,
Anatolia was actually a relatively easily-defended region. Bordered by the ocean from many
sides, and mountainous to the east, it was able to resist the last gasps of the mobile raiding
culture of the Eftals.

The migration era, for better or worse, was winding down in the east. The successive waves of
Iranian and Turkic nomads whose movements had, beginning with the Vandals and Huns,
prompted a century-spanning, empire-toppling avalanche of movement, was finally drawing to
an exhausted close. The traditional Roman Empire was in ruins. In its place was a collection of
city states and a series of diminished, feudal empires claiming in their own provincial way the
same traditional legitimacy. For European historians, the end of this eastward push is seen as
the beginning of the "Middle Ages", and the conflict between the cultures of Northern and
Southern Europe.

For Indian and Chinese historians, the distinction is less apt. For China, the coming era was
considered merely the second part of the Qi dynasty, characterized by titanic wars against the
Uighur Empire and the decline of Tibetan hegemony in the west. For India, this era was a mere
prelude to the radical social and economic transformations to come, and accordingly is often
overlooked except as a starting point for many technological innovations which would come out
of university cities such as Takasashila and theVanga.

The Aghatsaghids
and the Bod Empire

With the death of the Aghatsaghid Prime Minister, Ughe, to overdrinking, Shah Sebukabaya fell
entirely under the control of his Eftal wife Nenifara and her councilors. However, this new ruling
cabal faced extraordinary challenges - foremost of which was the near-total dissolution of their
empire into warring successor states, most of which were outright hostile. While none of these
powers posed an immediate threat, Aghatsaghid policy was forced to consider all her neighbors
as circling vultures - there were few opportunities for safety and security. Nenifara's attempts to
defend against the growing power of Xvarvaran to the west led to neglect in the east. Oghuz
Turks raided across the border with increasing frequency and finally, the wealthy Ganasangha
of Gandhara were finally allowed to slip from the fold in law as well as in fact in 851.

Two years later, Sebukabaya, suffering from one of his recurring fits, stumbled off a balcony to
his death. The feeble Shah had several possible heirs: his own son Aghatsagh, who seemed
healthy enough but was young and sheltered, or a capable and popular nephew by the name of
Keyquvadh. Nenifara preferred her own son, and a regent of her choosing, but among the
Turkic warlords who comprised her husband's vassals and retainers Keyquvadh was widely
preferred. After negotiating a compromise pact, where both young men were named co-Shah,
Nenifara through certain intrigues persuaded Keyquvadh to march East and fight the Tibetans,
who recently had been levying heavy tariffs upon silk road trade to fund their on-and-off wars
against the Qi. Among court gossips, it is said that Nenifara offered the young Shah the charms
of her body, which even in her middle age were said to be significant. The truth is unclear - but it
does not seem difficult to assume that Keyquvadh would have plenty of incentive regardless to
fight a campaign against what seemed to be a relatively weak foe and so win glory and prestige
back for his declining kingdom, and himself. Furthermore, all posthumous slander of Nenifara
must be taken with a grain of salt, given her ultimate downfall.

The Bod Emperor, Sotri Tsen, was the latest in a series of warlike Bod Emperors who had
somewhat checked the growing power of the latter Qi. However, he operated with limited
resources - fundamentally constrained by the small population and poor finances of his
kingdom. His latest tariffs had been an effort to alleviate the latter issue. However, Rhasa was
far from this frontier, and terrain was difficult. By the time his troops would arrive, the
Aghatsaghid invasion was already dealt with. The defense of Kashgar, the closest city along the
silk road to the Aghatsaghid Empire, fell to a clever local commander named Tritsu Sangyal.
Raised as a hostage in Rhasa, he had shown excellent skill in battle against the Qi - the sort of
skill which the Bod Empire could not afford to overlook. His rise had been meteoric, and in
another era, in a state with greater resources he might have become known as a great
conqueror. However, in this life he was a mere footnote in history.

Sangyal, commanding but a few thousand soldiers, did not contest the high mountain passes
where the Aghatsaghids might have expected battle, but rather allowed them down onto the
plains and into a false sense of security. He even permitted them to take Kashgar, and march
onwards the kingdom of Yarkand, a vassal state of the Bod. Keyquvadh left a garrison in
Kashgar to maintain his lines of supply and marched onwards, only to find Sangyal cut those
same lines of supply, retaking Kashgar and posting forces in the alpine passes which connected
the Tarim basin to Ferghana.

As attrition took its toll, Sangyal wore down the Aghatsaghid force with continued raids.
Keyquvadh's force was largely mounted, and war horses needed large amounts of fodder -
fodder which depended upon being able to access local suppliers or carry it across the
mountains from more fertile country. The degradation of his army was rapid. As pitched
skirmishes with the Yarkandi army forced him back into Sangyal's waiting trap, there was
nothing the Aghatsaghid Shah could do.

The annihilation of a whole Aghatsaghid army was a costly gambit for Nenifara, but one which
assured her son, Aghatsagh, would ascend to the throne as a sole ruler. Peace was quickly
made with the Bod Empire in exchange not for gold but several thousand fine horses. Nenifara,
for her part, would retain power for another five years, before her son came to power in his own
right and had her executed on trumped-up charges - a necessity if he was ever to emerge from
her shadow, but one which earned him a certain bloodthirsty reputation he would never quite
shake.

As a Turko-Iranian Empire, the Aghatsaghid state would endure. If it never regained the power it
had after its legendary rise to power, it remained an important regional state with large armies
and a strong, albeit feudal, economic base. Herat remained an important center of art and
culture, and as the Oghuz settled around the Aral sea, the land that was once Xvarazm became
known as Turkestan, and paid tribute to their mighty southern neighbors. The Xvarvaran
Shahdom and the Armenian Kingdom to the west posed little direct threat, because in times of
crisis they could always be played off each other. Both feared their immediate "infidel" neighbor
more than the exhausted behemoth to their east.

Shah Aghatsagh would have a long but tyrannical reign. Until 903, he would have absolute
power over the Aghatsaghid state, gradually and tactfully eroding the power of the vayan lords
and their grandees until they were little more than sub-provincial governors, lesser satraps of a
sort. He would not be popular, but he would continue the work of Ughe, bringing his wayward
Turkic lords to heel and creating a strong, centralized dynastic state. However, he had limited
successes in adventuring and conquest - a single attempted invasion of India was a massive
disaster, and otherwise his realm was generally at peace. When his son Tarkhsigh Arslan took
power, he inherited a strong state with a full treasury - one of the first Aghatsaghids to do so in a
long time.

Centrifugal Tendencies in the Eastern Mandala

Srivijaya was perhaps most of all a victim of its own success.

Its hegemony was not disputed, of course. Even Indranokura, the great guild-city on the rain-
swollen Mekong, or Angkor Thom[1], could not challenge it at sea. What the Srivijaya
sometimes lacked in ground forces, they made up for in clever alliances, playing the city-states
of Dvaravati against the Khmer, the Champa against the Tai of the southern Qi. Srivijayan
merchants and merchant colonies were a ubiquitous feature of maritime trade and dominated
said trade utterly.

However, Srivijayan was not necessarily a clear identity.[2] From its inception, it was a network
of alliances, Maharajas and rajas coordinating with lesser tribal chiefs. These alliances slowly
transformed into trade ties, and these trade ties in turn became vehicles for the central
government to gather tax revenue which in turn strengthened the central government and
created a self-reinforcing cycle. Taxation and tariffs allowed the construction of massive temples
and royal complexes as prestige projects. These temples in turn provided a system for
spreading the monarchy's Hindu-Buddhist doctrines and promoting a somewhat standardized
culture.

However, the massive influx of merchants from Chola and Vanga in starting in the ninth century
complicated matters. These merchants brought untraditional religious and social ideas which
threw the old order into chaos. Native merchants began organizing themselves and demanding
representation in the affairs of state, spurred on by the notions of sangha brought by their Indian
coreligionists. Sangha here took on a deeply spiritual connotation - as participants in the
"mandala" which governed southeast Asian political life, was it not right that their guidance
should inform the Maharaja's policies?

Ultimately, these proto-republicans found their more dangerous notions largely quashed.
Srivijayan hegemony allowed for a remarkable degree of autonomy, and this autonomy
continued so long as various local merchant elites did not seek to rise above their station. It
would still be Srivijayan bureaucrats and tax collectors overseeing naval traffic through
entrepots and keeping the records. It would still be Srivijayan advisors who had the Maharaja's
ear. The Javanese and Malays were subjects. They had their own princes and chiefs. [3]

Particularist tendencies took a curious route in the vast archipelago. These local princes and
merchants, finding it difficult to compete against the monopolies and tariff power enjoyed by the
Srivijayan monarchy, chose instead to compete against their fellow locals. Investment from
merchants as distant as South India and Arabia spurred new colonization attempts. The
mandala system expanded as these local rulers sought to put other local rulers even further
below them, and in turn spur trade which benefitted them more directly.

If the Maharajas of Srivijaya saw this as a threat, they also saw it as an excellent opportunity. If
their vassals competed to outdo one another in prestige projects and useless exploratory
voyages across the great ocean, they also made practical trade alliances with local tribes,
bringing them into the fold and organizing large scale resource extraction from what were
previously marginal territories. The Srivijayan monarchy was only enriched by these endeavors.

The danger of course, was that these competitions among local princes would not remain local
for long. The Javanese of Medang had grown from an inland agricultural power into a serious
rival of Srivijaya, and had begun enticing tributaries of the Maharaja into the arms of the
Silendra dynasty. Between 870 and 900, massive wars were fought across the fertile terrain of
Java. Ultimately, the Silendra would be defeated, and they would flee further east, their
homelands divided into a series of crippled vassal kingdoms paying harsh indemnities.
However, before their ultimate defeat they proved that the Srivijayan hegemony was not
invincible. Their wars proved exceptionally costly for a nation that was forced to rely on the
contributions of its subject states to prosecute long-term war - each army raised for the Srivijaya
represented a burning of political capital and a weakening of the regime - all for broad swathes
of inland territory that resented their brutal victory and provided little prospect for long-term
wealth.

If the Silendra dynasty had been annihilated, perhaps the cost might have been justified. But it
was not, merely exiled. And this example showed others, down the road, that rebellion was not
inherently futile. Other moments of weakness would come, and if they were ready, they could
exploit them...

[1] Better known as Yasodharapurait rose roughly contemporaneously with Indranokura, but
would only dispute it's metropolis' pre-eminence in the early twelfth century.

[2] Certain modern academics dispute this claim.

[3] Chiefs who often were married into the Srivijayan monarchy and were totally bound to it, of
course.

Map Notes:
Much of this map of Alt-Africa circa 900 AD, of course, is speculative or invented wholesale by
me. What follows are some miscellaneous notes.

The Hawiya Empire's rise has seen the concentration of urbanization along the coast and along
an altogether different pattern than history. Axum, weakened by the incursions of Nilotic peoples
from the north and the pagan Hawiya and other proto-Somali peoples from the east is all but
collapsed as a major urban polity. The center of African Christendom has accordingly moved
north, towards Makura.

The Ganda Kingdom, though relatively populous and centrally organized compared to its
competitors, and quite strong indeed compared to the relatively less martial coastal Savahila, is
a loose tribal oligarchy organized around a central ritual kings. Power is concentrated in the
hands of local patriarchs, and its cities are small indeed, and typically unwalled.

The Tsaibwe "cities" are even smaller - no more than a few thousand. These cities are
surrounded by smaller townships, creating sprawling suburban areas which can protect each
other by virtue of their proximity. The Tsaibwe have not been mentioned yet in the story, but they
are an alt-Zimbabwe who has benefited from earlier and more sustained contact with foreigners.
Cattle are wealth, and accordingly cattle-raids are frequent. Concentration of a few horses in the
hands of the established elite has ensured their marital dominance. Iron and gold working are
the most prestigious cottage industry, but clay wares and textiles both have distinct artisan
classes involved in their production.

In Eat Africa Maa are a Nilotic people, the Ma'a are Cushitic. Confusing, I know. ITTL, the Ma'a
have been one of the biggest beneficiaries of trade with the Savahila, and have assimilated a
lot. The Maa and Garree are Nilotic peoples part of a broader exodus of tribes fleeing the
expansion of the Hawiya Empire. In time this exodus will have some impact on the ethnic and
cultural makeup of the Ganda Kingdom as well.

Arabia does have plenty of notable cities, but they fall outside the scope of this map, and so I
didn't bother adding them. Otherwise, blank spots in the map represent not a lack of human
habitation but an ignorance on the part of the Savahila as to who lives there.

I think it's worth noting here the sheer scale of some of these African states, in land mass if not
necessarily in population density. Ghana, from this perspective, is huge!

The End of the

Migrations and the Rise of Europe

Sebouk Arslan, having celebrated his conquest of Constantinople in 843 with several months of
victory games, had little desire to remain idle much longer. With Asiana in a state of collapse, he
had been denied the ability to extract resources directly from a central government - and
crossing the Hellesponte into Asia was a risky proposition for an army which relied heavily on
nomadic vassals. Tying down the army on such a protracted foreign invasion far from home was
a dangerous proposition.

The motley assortment of Xasar and Khirichan horsemen in Sebouk Arslan's employ wanted to
rest, to return home and enjoy their plunder. Despite the charisma and capacity of their leader,
he was unable to prevent their dispersal.

Those historians who chronicled Sebouk Arslan's reign were generally unfavorable to him. This
is unsurprising, given the fact that his wars primarily devastated civilized countries with larger
populations of literate scholars. However, of those who were favorable or at least neutral, most
spoke alternately of the decadence of the Turkic court at Pianjiqand or Sebouk Arslan's jealousy
of the civilized states at the periphery of his regime. While some of this must be taken with a
grain of salt, and considered the self-aggrandizement of a people who wished to extol their own
"civilized Christian virtues" in contrast to the "great pagan king," it also carries with it a ring of
truth. Sebouk Arslan was an energetic, ceaseless campaigner who found himself forced to
operate future campaigns with limited forces. For the next few years, he would only be able to
call on a mere fraction of his available soldiers at a time.

This limited force was sufficient, perhaps, to drive back the Bajinaq, a people which had been
for some time massing on the eastern border, and conduct raids into the Balkans between 846
and 852, but little more. However, even these limited raids on the Balkans had a profound effect
on the broken and exhausted remnants of the Isidorian Empire. Local Slavic lords only gained
further autonomy, in many cases ruling as Dukes in their own right over petty fiefdoms which
could provide a measure of security against the endless threat of horsemen from the East.

In 852, the Roman Emperor Sebastianus, exhausted with paying exacting tribute to the Turks,
attempted to reduce the amount significantly. However, despite his attempted reforms and
rebuilding the defenses of Rome and several other cities, he was unprepared. The Khirichan
horde descended into Italy once more, arriving at Florentia after an abortive battle at Utica.

Florentia's fall was perhaps inevitable, against such odds, but it marked a defeat from which the
Severian Roman Empire would not recover. The sack of the city destroyed records and indeed
the entire bureaucratic apparatus of the Empire was decapitated, to say nothing of the immense
human loss and the incredible amount of treasure removed from the city. Certain, less reliable
Frankish sources have claimed that Sebouk Arslan named himself a sort of "heathen Roman
Emperor" in the wake of his victory. Even if this was true, Sebouk Arslan's conquests were
limited, as before, by simple logistics. He was forcing his state to act in a manner which was
against their nature, in many respects. Raiding on an enormous scale was one thing - outright
conquest of Italia was unthinkable. The only permanent conquests of Sebouk Arslan's reign
would be a small strip of Thrace.

From a broader historical perspective, the year 838 is often considered the true darkest year of
European Christendom, but an excellent case could be made for 852 as well. The Italian Roman
state that was Isidorius' legacy would not be the saviors of Europe. Since the 6th century they
had stood as the Roman state of the West, and had indeed outlived their Eastern counterpart. It
was in Italy, if nowhere else, that the classical heritage of the West had been preserved - and its
collapse perhaps represented the final, anticlimactic, end of classical Mediterranean civilization.
What would emerge in its wake was fundamentally a blend of Roman and Germanic traditions
and a shifting of European power northwards.

The difference between 838 and 852 is the condition of the Frankish Empire, which had
improved massively. By 854, the Frankish King Aloysius had been invited into Italy, at the behest
of the Papacy. The next five years would be spent fighting pretender Emperors, including the
wily Julian Alunnis, whose defense of Sicily led to a protracted and bloody campaign for the
Franks. The destruction of the Roman Empire led not to anarchy and chaos but rather for the
first time in centuries, the total unification Western Europe under a single imperial banner.
Aloysius was crowned "Imperator Augustus" by the Pope in 858, at the culmination of his
successful Italian conquests.

While the Franks moved from strength to strength, Sebouk Arslan began campaigning
extensively in Sklavenia. Driving the border line of Slavic settlement south, his Balkan
campaigns freed up additional good lands for settlement by the Xasar and Bulgar tribes. The
Slavs were forced from the Danube, and Sebouk Arslan left a trail of devastation and plunder in
his wake, taking many slaves and slaughtering perhaps hundreds of thousands. These victories
would grant him everlasting infamy as a butcher in the history of the Southern Slavs. However,
attempts to penetrate into the hills and woodlands of Macedonia and Epirus were met with far
less success. The Princes and Dukes of the Sklaveni formed a loose coalition and managed to
win several battles against smaller Turkic forces. The terrain was unsuited to the Turkish style of
warfare, and it was populated with many fortified castles and high-walled cities.

In the early 860's, Sebouk Arslan began planning his next great campaign. Despite having what
was undeniably one of the greatest military records of any of his contemporaries, and having
expanded the power and position of his people greatly, he was discontent. The Franks had
claimed Italy - a prize Sebouk Arslan believed should still be his. His next campaign would be, in
the words of one Roman historian "a great test of his own heathen gods against the last
defenders of Christ, and he was assured that he would emerge triumphant and in doing so
destroy the great cathedrals and replace them with savage temples to his own grandeur." His
plan was an imitation of the great campaigns of Kuluj Ishbara, who had marched into Francia by
way of the Po valley. However, unlike Kuluj Ishbara, his dream had far less chance of success.
Kuluj Ishbara's victories had depended on a small, mobile force and the total disorganization of
Western Europe. With Europe united under a single, capable Emperor, and Sebouk Arslan's
army being a huge, unwieldy force with columns of infantry and a vast siege train, the plan
seemed doomed to failure from the beginning.

And yet Sebouk Arslan had proved his tactical genius time and again. It is an open question if
he might have triumphed - or at the least done untold damage to Europe before being defeated.
Or perhaps, as many believe, he had bought into the legends of his own grandeur and would
have led his people to ruin. Regardless, Sebouk Arslan died in 862. His ambitions would go
unfulfilled.

His brother and heir, Shiqar Kuluj, would not share his siblings martial ambitions. Raised as a
hostage with a local Xasari tribe, Shiqar Kuluj spent the treasure accumulated by his father on
lavish building programmers, done in the grandiose Helleno-Iranian style so beloved by the
Sahu. Huge monumental temples and public forums were the legacy of Shiqar Kuluj's short
reign. Having seen the difficulties his brother had in raising revenue for the state, Shiqar made
several attempts to develop a stronger bureaucracy, but he had no examples with which to
work. Accordingly, the bureaucracy he dreamed of would for later generations be considered
little more than a glorified courier service, and tax revenues would remain remarkably low. Of
the vast wealth of the Sahu merchants, little would ever see the inside of a Pianjiqand coffer.

When he passed in 873, it was his son Sevuqharslan Kulujogul [1] who took power. His reign
would be preoccupied with the migration of the Ak-Bajinak, sometimes called the Kankas. While
the majority of the Bajinak had settled along the rich lands of the Volga, their population quickly
outgrew the infertile lands of the Volga, and "every third son among them decided to make a
great southward exodus, to find a new and prosperous country where winter was mild, and they
might raise their herds in ease and luxury."

The Ak-Bajinak moved south along the Volga until they came to Sahu country, and from there
they offered to pledge their fealty to Sevuqharslan Khagan, in exchange for land in the
temperate west. However Sevuqharslan met their embassy with an army of his own, refusing to
cede territory that had been promised to his Xasari and Bulgar vassals. Furthermore, the Ak-
Bajinak migration was effectively little more than an armed camp, with few women and children -
it is easy to see how the Khirichan were threatened. What was to stop them from looting with
impunity once they were in the fertile, settled Danubian heartland?

The location of the battle between the Ak-Bajinak, led by a warlord named Kubrat, and
Sevuqharslan is unclear. What is clear is that Sevuqharslan suffered a massive reversal, leaving
much of the east open to Bajinak raiding as they moved south, living off the land.
Sevuqharslan's forces were reduced to shadowing the Bajinak and attempting to mitigate the
damage they caused. This was partially successful - by the end of 875, the Ak-Bajinak were
finding themselves overmatched by larger, better-equipped Khirichan forces. Forced to flee,
they made their way through the Caucasus, into the valley of Ardan. There, they would wreak
havoc for several years, sustaining themselves on a steady diet of plunder. The weakened
Aghatsaghid forces were incapable of stopping them, and after a disastrous battle near Partav,
the Armenians found themselves on the defensive as well. The region they plundered had long
been safe from the various Eftal civil wars and Turkish incursions, defended from the steppe by
high mountains - accordingly it was quite wealthy and wildly unprepared for the ruin inflicted
upon it by the Turks.

The Ak-Bajinak found this rich land into which they rode the perfect new homeland. The
mountains made it defensible, and the fertile valleys meant that they would never go hungry
again. Within a generation they had lost much of their previous nomadic inclination, establishing
themselves as a sedentary aristocracy. Iranian rapidly became the courtly language of their
nation, and they began to armor their horses and fight in the manner of the Eftal.

[1] Known as Sebouk Arslan II in Europe, often called the "younger lion"

Sindi

One of the more curious historical footnotes of the era is a series of mass migrations of the
itinerant people known as the Sinti into Persia from India. Originating somewhere in the Punjab,
the Sinti were originally among those farmers and tradesmen displaced by the rise of the guilds.
Picking up their families and professions, they began to wander, offering their skills to local
villages and banding together for mutual protection from robbers and local governments. These
bands slowly found themselves less and less welcome as the guild system stabilized and the
increasingly interconnected and regulated economies of the subcontinent left them few options.

So the Sindi began to migrate north, across the porous borders of the declining Aghatsaghid
Shahdom. Their migration was slow, sporadic and halting, but by the tenth century they
represented a not insignificant minority in Iran. From there, they would continue northwards,
settling in Asiana and further afield in the lands of the Bulgars and Xasar. They would lose much
of their culture in the process, assimilating into Iranian society, but they would contribute
numerous loanwords and distinctive north Indian genetics to Eastern Europe. Various folk Hindu
religious ideas, brought north across enormous distances, would slowly become the basis for
many folk tales, even among the Christianized Sindi of Asiana.

Frankish Empire

By the end of the short reign of Lothair, King of the Franks, in 849, a casual observer would be
forgiven for assuming that the Frankish state was coming to an end. On the periphery, the
tendency towards decentralization was being exacerbated by Viking and Wendish raids. Local
Dukes and Marchers were turning Europe into an armed camp, not necessarily in pursuit of their
own autonomy but out of fear of the "wrath of the northmen" from which there was no
deliverance but extensive fortification. The state was forced to concede increasing privileges to
these border-lords, both out of a desire to maintain the integrity of the frontier and also because
these border-lords were well-equipped and often had the power to rival the central government.

However, Lothair was savvy. Even as he invested extraordinary power in the border Duchies, he
was quick to play the Palatines and lesser grandees against them - knowing that the former had
a vested interest in the strength of the monarchy and the latter had little power to oppose him.
New codes of law were drafted to govern the relations of vassals and kings. Dukes were forced
to provide tribute or armed retainers to local Legates and Palatine lords, ostensibly for the
purposes of defending their own borders. In practice, this meant a class of aristocrats who were
tied more to royal officials than to their notional overlords.
Measures such as this would ensure that when Lothair's younger brother Aloysius came to the
throne in 850, the new King (and soon to be Emperor) would have the power to raise a strong
central army and engage in a protracted campaign across Italy.

As Emperor, Aloysius was able to avoid, or perhaps ignore, some of the issues which plagued
Lothair's reign. Constant campaigning in Italy allowed him to forge close bonds with nobles
called up to serve, and his absence from the court meant the border lords could enjoy relative
autonomy in practice. After his final victory over the pretender Emperor Julian Alunnis, he rode
north to Rome, where he oversaw a series of renovations and most importantly began the
construction of a fortified imperial residence several miles from the city, which was ostensibly to
be his new palace. In practice, it was usually the residence of the Imperial Legate[1] and
Imperial visits to Rome were rare indeed.

Paris and Aachen were the more traditional seats of the Emperor - closer to the dangerous
northwestern border marches and the traditional Frankish heartlands. Apart from a brief stay in
Medilano[2], Aloysius clearly saw the conquest of Italy as an opportunistic gesture, no matter
how much he couched it in the Votive rhetoric of defending Christendom.[3] Opportunism in
general defined his reign. As the Wendish Confederation began to crumble, he was quick to
exploit the wedges and begin encroaching, ordering the construction of new fortresses within
disputed borderlands often regarded as Wendish territory, and after the murder of several
missionaries in 861, he escalated to full-out war.

The Frankish army which marched against the Wends was small by the standards of the titanic
force which had invaded Italy - but it was battle hardened, comprised of many of the veterans of
that campaign, and by contrast the Wends were quite isolated. The Moravian elite had been
Christian for a generation, and in order to save themselves, they acknowledged in the most
tentative terms the Imperial sovereignty of Aloysius, while opportunistically raiding northwards
and capturing many Wendish fort-towns.

The ease with which the Franks destroyed much of Wendish civilization should not come as too
great of a surprise. Many of the greater tribes, such as the Veleti, had never truly assimilated
into the broader "Wendish" identity. They were quick to bend the knee to the Franks and accept
baptism, and so be spared. Other tribes, such as the Heveli, refused to surrender and were
simply destroyed. The Franks had ample logistical support from their newfound subjects to
prosecute protracted sieges of the hill-fort settlements which marked the area.

Another key to long-term Frankish victory was the annihilation of the traditional priesthood. As
the keepers of cultural traditions and memories, the priesthood also had a strong political role in
the Confederation. By massacring priests as "witches" and destroying pagan shrines, the
Franks broke the spirit of the Wends entirely. The Obodrites and many of the trading ports along
the black sea, curiously, survived and remained semi-independent for some time as tributaries,
but they represented an exception, rather than a rule. In general, the devastation done to the
region was significant. Entire tribes were wiped out, and the land given over to Frankish settlers.
Patterns of settlement change distinctly after the mid ninth century - archeological finds in many
places begin to reflect a Germanic sensibility without any sign of transition of assimilation.[4]

If the Frankish borders were stained with blood, their general approach to governance could be
summed up as benign neglect. Soldiers from as far away as Spain were sometimes called to
fulfill feudal obligations and fight in wars in Italy and Germany, but this was relatively
uncommon. Hispania was still splintered into a patchwork of petty duchies. Compared to
Francia, both Hispania and Aquitaine were scarcely martial. Norse raids were rare, although as
word spread that the regions were easy pickings, increasingly viking raiders would travel the
extra distance, using bases in Ireland and Orkney as stopping-off points.

In general, the Western Mediterranean coast was peaceful, prosperous, and well-governed.
(Excluding Italy) Local magistrates here had more authority than they did among more
Germanic peoples to the north - and the local nobility were more inclined to keep decadent but
(relatively) indefensible villas than well-built stone castles. Trends of fortification which had been
emerging during the migration era continued, but these fortifications were nowhere near as
significant and retainers in this region were frequently undermanned.

Aloysius, and the Imperial administration as a whole, tended to focus on the problems before
them and ignore all others. As the number and quality of troops raised from their southern, more
Romanized provinces became less and less, they simply began requesting taxes or ignoring the
region all together. Besides, Italy was the new frontier in any case, and it was exceptionally
improbable that another great horse lord would force his way through into the soft underbelly of
the Empire once more. Retainers in the south were also not totally incapable - there are records
of unsuspecting raiders finding themselves overmatched by the grandees of Hispania or
southern Francia.

This was also a time of artistic flourishing. Frankish nobles had for the past hundred years or so
been exposed to a wide variety of Roman art and architecture.[5] They had been impressed,
and this led to a sort of revival of Isidorian styles - the thick walls and angular symmetry of
Romanesque Frankish architecture in some places gave way to the more airy and domed
Isidorian style. Poetry, done in the everyday Romance languages, became a pass-time of
literate sections of the elite. Particularly in the wealthy courts of Hispania, literary expression
flourished. Numerous poems survive from the era, covering a wide range of topics, but primarily
the focus is on courtly drama and idyllic rural scenes of country life. Aristocratic authors such as
Hadriano of Odiel, writer of the famous poem Song of the Lily won local fame through their
writings, although they would do little to improve the general reputation of the Hispanians as a
decadent and unmartial people.

[1] A new position, created by Aloysius, the Imperial Legate was supposedly a viceroy of sorts.
However, in time the various Italian duchies carved out by the Emperor would slowly drift away,
and the Imperial Legate had few official powers with which to rein them in.

[2] Milan
[3] This opportunism would not endear the Frankish Empire to the Papacy. Where the Isidorians
and their successors had cultivated a close and practical relationship with the Pope (who by this
point was effectively the sole patriarch of the Church with any prestige) the Franks had an
antagonistic relationship. The Pope would in time manage to establish himself as a secular
power as well as a spiritual one, but that's a story for another day.

[4] This is not to say many did not assimilate. Over the course of some five years of
campaigning, many Slavic tribes were forcibly incorporated into the Frankish fold.

[5] Sometimes because they plundered it. Such is life in the "dark ages".

Africa

Late ninth-century North Africa and Libya was a fiercely competitive place. Those clans which
moved quickest to secure the trans-Saharan trade routes enjoyed spectacular wealth and
influence relative to those who were excluded from this system of custom tariffs and
transportation. Where certain tribes such as the Masamida and Iznagen profited immensely,
many others, particularly those on the outside of the close-knit Berber social circles were forced
to turn to caravan raiding. As the Masamida and Iznagen turned their not insubstantial
resources to stopping these raids, the raiders in turn sought shelter with poorer clans, offering a
cut of the wealth in exchange for protection.

The greatest escalation of this trend is perhaps the warlord Izilmasen striking at Hippo itself in
864. Leading a group of some sixty men over the walls in the cover of darkness, he and his
comrades in arms slaughtered the guards and opened the gates for a larger force of brigands
waiting nearby. At the appointed signal Izilmasen's men rushed through the gate and soon the
city was ablaze. A massive trading hub, Hippo swiftly recovered, but the incident left a mark.
The Iznagen patriarch, Itir, who had signed an agreement with the Mauri of Hippo obliging him
to protect the city, was humiliated.

Itir called up his allies and began a two year long manhunt for Izilmasen, finally cornering him
and his motley band in the desert after successfully driving them from their safe shelter among a
branch of the Tumzabt. However, despite Izilmasen's grisly execution and the vicious torture
and mutilation of his men, the raid had proved that the great patriarchs of the Imazighen could
not always defend their subjects - and also the relative defenselessness of the coastal Mauri,
whose civilization was in terminal decline.

The once-great monastic communities of Africa began to collapse as well. For some time they
had preserved themselves based on trends of detachment and retreat from the secular world.
While most Mauri had fled abroad to Sicily and other Mediterranean islands, many also turned
inwards and sought these religious communities, which traditionally were respected by the
heathens. However, increasing violence on the frontiers rendered travel between monasteries
increasingly unsafe. Furthermore, as the prominent Amazigh tribes began to increase caravan
protections, raiders began to look for easier targets - wealthy, defenseless monasteries were a
prime example. Groups such as the Tinanian sect would be almost entirely wiped out. [1]
Christianity lost most of its remaining footholds, being relegated to a few coastal cities.

In response to these growing challenges to their dominance, the patriarchs of the Iznagen,
Masamida, and the leaders of several other prominent clans including the Isawiyen all sought to
create out of whole cloth their own kingly pretensions. However, they did their best to avoid
attaching to their own rulership the Romanized traditions of the Mauri. They refused to adopt
Roman terms such as Rex or Doux, choosing instead the indigenous term Agllid (plural Igldan)
and giving it additional legitimacy by attaching to their kings epithets relating to local deities
such as "Chosen of Idir" or "Slave toMaqurtam." In a singular rare occasion, the Agllid of an
eastern branch of the Hawwara, Ilayetmas, took the title "Chosen of Christ" - however this
decision does not seem to reflect a large-scale conversion of his people, merely a personal
decision, perhaps due to his proximity to the mighty Heshanid state.

These new kings became hegemons in their own right. The Mauri cities of the coast found their
autonomy once again curtailed, and those who had supported brigands and raiders in the past
were by 880 either turning over those they had once sheltered and prostrating themselves
before their new monarchs, or fleeing into increasing marginal lands. For the Berbers of North
Africa, centralization was a slow process but it saw rewards. Increased law and order meant
that trade would continue to increase, which would have a strong positive impact on the growth
of the Sahelian states.

[1] A Gnostic sect I've touched on before. Consider them as rather like the Cathars but in their
north African incarnation there is more of an emphasis on monastic, communal living. Many of
their ideas however, survived, and were transported safely to southern Italy by fleeing Mauri,
where they would inspire a whole new generation of heretical preachers.

The Long March

Egypt in the ninth century had opportunities for expansion and continued economic dominance,
but was largely unable to exploit them due to major challenges. Basileus Shenoute Heshanos,
(834-847) was primarily preoccupied with a series of local famines - and despite implementing
strict controls on the price of grain, revolts broke out, particularly in the south where the foreign-
influenced dynasty was least popular. The Saihists continually pressed inwards, seeking to
settle the more fertile Levantine lands. Under a series of capable commanders, or Amirs, they
managed to wreak havoc, much as they had under Shenoute's predecessors. Retaliatory strikes
were generally swallowed whole by the desert.

Shenoute, largely due to these blunders, nearly lost his throne in 845 to a coup, engineered by
a group of native Coptic army Legates with the backing of the Alexandrine patriarch. However, if
there was one thing Shenoute possessed it was an ability to watch his back, cultivated by the
frequently deadly court politics of the Heshanid state. The officers were arrested and the
Patriarch pardoned but placed under close surveillance - he would die mysteriously several
months later.

Shenoute for his part would be persuaded the following year of the importance of leading a
personal expedition against the Saihists. The plan was ambitious - an overland march
supported by an expanded Egyptian Red Sea Fleet and many merchant ships heavily laden
with foodstuffs. The goal was to take Al-Taif and demonstrate clearly the weakness of the Saihist
"state." In collaboration with the Buddhist population of Hadhramut, who deeply resented their
subordinate status, they would wreak havoc, sack the city, and gain control of the Red Sea for
Egypt directly - eliminating the middleman who grew so impossibly rich off their Indian ocean
trade.

As the expedition set off, it immediately came under frequent attacks. The Ghatafanid Amirs, led
by the capable tactician Abdulilat ibn Uthman, shadowed the army on its march inland,
harassing it lightly. It would be a journey of some six hundred miles over the desert. Even with
the navy shadowing the army's march and providing water and grain, attrition was inevitable.
Their first goal was to reach Yenbu, a small fertile oasis town which could be a springboard for
further expeditions deeper into the interior.

However, they would not even make it this far. The Egyptian navy had assumed that they would
not be overmatched by the Saihists - but their naval dominance had never truly been
challenged. A fleet dispatched from Aden, including several fireships, set a large portion of the
Egyptian navy alight, destroyed much-needed supplies, and sank or captured almost all of the
warships. Shenoute needed to continue his march, however - he could not turn back - they had
come too far, and retreat would mean certain death - they could not repeat the past month of
marching without provisions, with the enemy so near and their own lack of local guides with
knowledge of where to dig for water. They had to march onwards.

Yenbu was their only hope - a few days march south. If they could make it, they could survive.
The heat would claim thousands. The army's horses were the first to die of thirst or be killed.
Shenoute himself walked, hoping to set a positive example and be seen to suffer with his men,
but morale dropped rapidly as men began to suffer for their thirst. Men caught fighting over the
remaining rations of water were executed swiftly.

And then the Arabian cavalry came on hard and swift, descending from the foothills and striking
with relative impunity. Yenbu was still many miles off, and the Egyptian army had, in its
exhaustion become stretched out over a great distance. The slaughter was immense. Those
who surrendered were shipped into slavery. Those who refused to surrender were killed.
Shenoute himself was captured alive, paraded through Al-Taif and then strangled and
decapitated.

Alexandros Heshanos, regent in his father's absence, would receive the Emperor's head. A
huge army had been annihilated in the deserts thanks to what could only be described as a
series of immense tactical blunders. As word spread of this defeat, Egypt's weakness became
clear. Syrian Eftal raided south, sacking Emesa without fear of reprisal. The Arabians returned
north and now threatened Jerusalem itself - a city which meant nothing to the pagan Saihists
but everything to the under-strength Egyptian armies tasked to defend it.

The Sons of the Goddess

Saihism had emerged as a reaction to growing criticisms of traditional Arabian polytheism, and a
response to the invasive Christian and Jewish traditions which were becoming vogue among a
small but growing middle class of Arabian traders. By adapting Eastern traditions popularized by
Hindu traders, the Arabs had been able to keep their gods, calling them beautiful birds and the
companions of Alilat, the supreme god.

However, in the two centuries since the birth of Saihism (roughly dated from the circa 650
standardization and codification of the Suwar) the religion had struggled to maintain relevance.
Modern threats to the orthodoxy of the faith came in the form of ecstatic Albudhist rituals or
exiled Bhakti mystics from Savahila. Christianity in the Middle East was on the decline - most of
the immediate neighbors of Arabia practiced Buddhism and various Iranian inspired mystery
cults.

Furthermore, growing maritime trade had left Al-Taif increasingly irrelevant economically -
diminishing the power of any single organization to control religious orthodoxy. And even the
Albudhists in the south were willing to at least give lip-service to the Suwar, treating it as an
inspired text rather like the Upanishads rather than a singular holy revelation. Like
Zoroastrianism before it, Saihism struggled not with direct competition but rather with gradual
assimilation.

And yet military victory over the Egyptian army at Yenbu would provide Saihism a breath of
fresh air. The Goddess had proved her power. The Saihists, and Abdulilat ibn Uthman, would
move from strength to strength - for a time. In 849, they would sack Jerusalem, destroying many
relics so as to prove their power. However, Alexandros was more capable than his late father,
and won an indecisive victory at Lake Tiberias, repulsing the Saihists, and shoring up the
Empire. Despite ceding Emesa, Damascus, and several other cities to the Syrian Padivayan,
the borders were again relatively secure.

Saihism was also threatened in the south. King Gul Cawil of Hawiya made a treaty with Egypt -
the Hawiya desperately needed the food imports due to recent famines. Granting special trading
privileges to Coptic merchants, he effectively allowed them to bypass the Arabs altogether.
Increasingly, the Saihists were surrounded and isolated. The Hadhramut had thrown off their
Saihist Malik and raised a Buddhist nobleman to the throne.

In 863, a Hadhrami army would sack Al-Taif, accomplishing Shenoute's ambition. Little record
survives of the event, but it would not be the end of Saihism, or of Alilat. Despite the collapse of
the traditional priesthood, clans such as the Ghatafan would ensure that Saihism did not die.
Under Katir ibn Abdulilat, the Ghatafan would finally claim the title Malik over the broad expanse
of the Hejaz. In time, the Ghatafan like many others would claim to be a part of the broader
Albudhist community, but like most of their brethren, their traditional gods and legends would be
preserved by way of the Suwar.

True Saihism would survive, of course. Isolated communities of Saihists would endure for
centuries to come, in the territory of the Hawiya and across the Hejaz and the interior deserts.
Musqat would maintain a large Saihist community, although in time this community would
become deeply heterodox.

The growing weakness of the Saihists also led to a resurgence of the Abrahamic faiths in
Arabia. The large Jewish population of Aden continued to grow, and Judaism remained a
substantial minority faith among the Hawiya as well. Gul Cawil, and his successor Samakabe
were both patrons of Judaism, although both refrained from personally converting, so as to not
anger their polyglot populations, and the large traditional pagan elements who were the
backbone of their military forces. Christianity, in its Monophysite Egyptian incarnation, once
again made inroads into Arabia as well, and the Saihists lacked the strength or inclination to
persecute it.

I know I was bound

on a wind-shaken tree,
nine whole nights, nine whole days,
with a spear wounded, to Odin offered,
myself to myself; I felt no pain
on that tree, of which no one knows
from what source it springs.
Bread no one gave me, nor a horn of drink,
so inward I peered,
until my wailing ceased,
until I learnt true awakening,
until nine truths I grasped,
then stepped down thence.
- The Words of the Wanderer, Anonymous (first written circa 1100 AD)

The Saxon Shore

Britain of the "Middle Ages" was a disunited country, splintered into many warring states. The
dominant Saxons were divided into numerous states known to historians as the Pentarchy:
Mercia, Wessex, Essex, Northumbria, and Anglia. To the East, the Welsh remained
independent, as did the Picts and the Celts of Alt Clut. Lesser kingdoms rose and fell with
astonishing regularity, and indeed the term Pentarchy itself has begun to fall out of favor as an
inaccurate descriptor - however for the purposes of this brief history, it accurately defines the
five major players vying for supremacy across what was far and away the wealthiest part of the
isles.
None of these kingdoms would ultimately achieve the supremacy they craved. Viking raids
along what the Romans had called the "Saxon Shore" had become a part of life - but Viking
armies, bent on colonization, would upend the old paradigm. Continental Europe was becoming
increasingly hostile and well-defended against their raids, but England lacked the necessary
resources to embark on similar programs of fortification, and were too preoccupied with local
matters to recognize the existential threat until it was far too late.

Unlike in the great plains and windswept forests of the East, however, the native Anglo-Saxon
population could not simply disappear deeper into the countryside if they took umbrage with
Norse encroachment. New land was less available - to a greater degree, coexistence was
necessary. Viking settlements at places like Jorvik and Torksey were directly adjacent to Anglo-
Saxons burhs and conflict was frequent.

Led by the far-famed Einar the Black, the Danes in particular wreaked havoc across the isles.
While the Norwegians carved out petty kingdoms in the north, it was Danish warriors who took
on the wealthy Anglo-Saxon world, taking advantage of internecine wars between the local
Pentarchs. In a pattern that would become familiar elsewhere in the world, Danish warriors
served as mercenaries, often in exchange for treasure or land. Then, regardless of whether they
were properly paid, the Danes would frequently expand their position at the expense of the
locals, causing anarchy and weakening popular trust in the ability of the Saxon kings to defend
their people.

Finally, Jorvik became itself an independent power, having swallowed much of Northumbria.
Einar the Black named himself King, and his ambitions would quickly outstretch his capacity.
Marching south he defeated Oswin, the King of Mercia, at Leicester. After a brief siege, he gave
the town and its surrounding lands to his son Ragnar and moved quickly onwards. However,
Aella, King of Wessex, with all the men of his house and the fyrd, intercepted him and fought a
bloody battle. Aided by Harthacnute "Stonebreaker" Ivarsson and a small but capable band of
mercenaries, Aella triumphed. Einar was killed in the thick of the fighting.

However, Einar's campaigns were little more than a violent beginning to a war nowhere near
finished. His death only inspired his sons to bloody vengeance. The following wars would last
nearly until the end of the century, and at their conclusion, the mercenary Harthacnute was the
last man standing. After Aella's death he had become one of several regents for his young son
Aedelwine, and finally, as the tide of the Danes became overwhelming he betrayed the young
King and became himself ring-giver, backed by his loyal company of hardened warriors. The fall
of Wessex is dated roughly to 890, and it marks the end of the era of Saxon hegemony.

With the fall of Wessex, the Pentarchy ceased to exist. The new era would be known as the
Danelaw. Roughly, the lands of the Angles and Saxons were divided into three kingdoms - one
centered on Jorvik, another on Leicester, and a last on Winchester, each ruled by a petty Danish
monarch. Beneath these three kingdoms existed lesser lords and those who had carved out
their own small dominions, such as around Kent and East Anglia.
If a man seeks an example,
Let him look to Jarilo
Whose steps are blossoming fields
Whose body is as sea-foam
Born and died and born anew
In the flowering of youth
This too is the world
The god then is as the world is
And you are as the god is
Born to die and rise unknowing
- Samon of Wolin, 1084-1138

Polonia

King Czcibor ultimately would achieve an almost mythic status as the founder of the Polish
nation. However, unlike many of his contemporaries who have slipped into legend, we have
remarkably accurate records of his conquests and his actions. Early in his reign he was a patron
of itinerant bhikkus from the country of the Xasar, and these learned monks would write his
histories. Unlike the monks who lived among the Gardaveldi, they were in closer proximity to
their own people and own monasteries, and frequently journeyed between the two. Accordingly,
far fewer of the visitors to Poznan 'went native.'

The portrait of Czcibor we have received from these monks is one of a driven and energetic
man who fought tooth and nail to overcome the tribal loyalties of his people and unify them
under a single banner. He inherited a deeply divided, loose confederation of warring tribes, but
Polish society was changing. The larger of the gords had grown into proper cities, overflowing
the fort-walls and becoming local hubs of commerce and manufacturing. The development of
these cities was itself a stressor on tribal loyalty: these communities of urban artisans and
merchants tended to share common interests which were often at odds with the rural
landholders. They expected representation in the regional tribal councils which decided matters
of law, but frequently were denied access to these councils.

Furthermore, while the central tribes of the Polish plains were perhaps not the most populous or
wealthy, Czcibor, rightly or not is credited with military reforms which would make them
unbeatable. By training his warriors to fight in mounted formations in the style of the Avars or
Xasar, his cavalry were able to outmaneuver and defeat their neighbors in any pitched
engagement. Each defeated tribe was effectively dissolved into the greater nation, their lands
broken up and divided amongst the victors. Plunder acquired from their conquests slowly turned
the levied armies of Poznan into a force that was capable of remaining in the field indefinitely for
pay - an almost professional fighting force, stripped of clan allegiances and dependent on the
state for land grants.

Cities such as Wratislavia, Krakow, and Wolin would become major supporters of Czcibor in
time, because unlike their local kings he was willing to negotiate with them independently, and
treat them as entities unto themselves. As major centers of commerce they in turn became
major sources of revenue, enabling policies of centralization modeled off the Frankish system.
Magistrates from Poznan were dispatched to the outlying territories of the Kingdom, which was
not divided along tribal lines but rather into provinces.

As time went on, Czcibor destroyed any notion of polyarchy amongst the Polonian tribes,
reducing striking against local councils and by extension the power of the priesthood, whose
presence and promise of divine blessing granted legitimacy to the proto-republicanism of the
West Slavs. An autocrat by nature, Czcibor would become committed to curtailing the power of
the priests, and fortunately this interest aligned with the interests of the monks in his court...
Thus even the detailed records kept by Buddhist missionaries hint at cynical, secular motives for
Czcibor's endorsement of Buddhism, as much as they praise him as a champion of the dharma.
Those who donated to the new foreign monks received royal favor, particularly if they did so to
the exclusion of the traditional 'pagan' priesthood.

[So, here we go. It's not as in depth as I'd like, mostly because I was struggling with writer's
block. I tried to compromise by providing some poems. The first is based pretty obviously off of
OTL Odin, but perhaps reflects changes that might seep through Norse society as a whole in
this timeline. The latter is meant as an excerpt from a Polish sutra of some sort.

Apologies for the shortness. If people have specific questions I'll do my best to answer them, as
I have a clearer picture in my head of these two parts of the world than I think I managed to
convey here. Maybe I'll even work the answers into an edited copy of this post.]

Alternate
Linguistics - a brief update:

[It's been at least a century or two since I discussed the split of the Eftal languages. So here
goes another post on that... and more.]

The Eastern Eftal dialect survived the Turkish invasion and conquest with much of its prestige
and position in society intact. Aghatsagh Shah himself spoke the Eftal language as well as his
own native Turkish, and demographic shifts across most of the Iranian plateau prevented any
revival of Middle Persian among the elite. The Eftal language provided a clear bridge between
the vast array of languages spoken by the peoples of Central Asia and the central Eftal state in
whose shadow all steppe empires lived. The White Huns had left their mark upon Iran, for better
or worse, and the Iranian people had long ago accepted that notion.

However, over the course of the eighth and ninth centuries, the Eftal language largely
disappeared. The Aghatsaghid court began to speak Iranian, and ultimately is considered a
Turko-Iranian dynasty by most historians, rather than a Hepthalo-Turkic dynasty as it might have
been by those who experienced its rule. These changes stem not from any major social
upheaval but rather the fact that the Eftal language had thoroughly permeated and mixed with
Iranian over the past several centuries, to the point that beyond regional dialects, there was little
distinguishing the two. The language of the Aghatsaghid court might have been a bit more
formal than the language of a peasant in Pars, but the educated and literate had adopted the
Sogdian script used by Eastern Eftal and by the tenth century there is no functional reason to
differentiate between the two languages. The Eftal had already long since considered
themselves Iranian, and while ruled by the Turks this notion merely increased. The word Ifthal
came roughly to mean "cavalryman" and the distinct Eftal identity gradually blended with the
Iranians as the Turkic ruling class rarely discriminated between the two.

By contrast, the Western Eftal dialect would in time splinter into "Syrian Eftal" and "Rhom Eftal" -
the latter of which would eventually die out and intermix with the dialects of Asiana, and the
former of which would become the language of Syria over time, supplanting Aramaic.

In Western Europe, Classical Latin remained the language of religion, writing, law, and
bureaucracy, however, it was by the 9th century entirely incomprehensible to the common
people. Local dialects, mostly without formal written forms were spoken by both the common
people and increasingly the aristocracy. These regional dialects in turn drifted rapidly towards
mutual unintelligibility. As the Frankish state was effectively divided into many small petty
kingdoms, or Duchies, and as the average person would rarely travel any great distance from
the estate upon which they lived, languages drifted apart with astonishing speed. However,
because any educated individual could use classical Latin as a lingua franca[1], there was little
incentive to encourage any standardization amongst the common people.

In Italy, regionalization of dialects occurred more slowly but even the Isidorians, who promoted a
more modern form of Latin as the language of the state, struggled to keep the various regions of
their Empire from becoming divorced from one another. Limited trade and commerce allowed
the region around Florentia to speak a language entirely different from that which was spoken in
Rome, which in turn was different from the Mauri-influenced dialect of Sicily.

It was only in the ninth century that the first vulgar texts were written. In Spain, a vast peninsula
relatively detached from the broader Franco-Latin world, the vulgate[2] language of the Cordoba
region was first used to write poetry and short works of fiction. This would prove an inspiration to
the broader literate population. While their languages frequently lacked clear written forms, the
Latin alphabet was easily adapted, and by using vulgate languages, authors and artists could
reach a far broader audience than the relatively narrow clique of priests and bureaucrats who
could read Latin.

As the Frankish Empire entered into its decline, the distinctions and regionalization provoked by
the emergence of vulgate languages would only increase, and the vulgate languages would rise
in prestige, providing a vehicle for proto-nationalistic tendencies. While the purpose of Latin
would endure, especially as a language of diplomacy and administration, the role of the early
vulgate languages should not be overlooked - they provided the earliest regional identities as
they drifted further and further away from mutual intelligibility.
While the West adopted the various vulgate dialects, Eastern Europe spoke a separate family of
Greek-descended languages known as the "Rhomance Languages." These tongues made
heavy use of Slavic and Iranian loanwords. Only in Western Asia Minor was anything like a
'pure' successor of Roman-era Greek maintained, and even there Eftal and Slavic influences
could be felt. Ironically, a dialect of Coptic would become the lingua franca for merchants across
much of the Mediterranean, owing the dominance of Egyptian merchants over trade.

[1] The term lingua franca will probably not exist in this timeline. Apologies for the... allo-
anachronism?

[2] Similarly, vulgate has a somewhat different meaning here.

[Salvador: I thought nine was a symbolic number for the Norse, that's why I picked it. Didn't
know it was symbolic for Buddhism as well - that's a fortuitous coincidence! And Odin hanging
himself on a tree in pursuit of knowledge is one of the more potent images in OTL Norse
mythology, in my opinion. Adding additional symbolism is almost cheap, but I think reflects the
mindset of TTL's Norse.

Everyone: here's a quick post on languages. One of the toughest things for me has been getting
the names of characters and places in this timeline to feel realistic, considering often they
should be written in languages that never existed in our timeline. Hence we get places like
Medilano instead of Milan and Ionnis and Hadriano as popular names. The naming in this
timeline has to reflect a reduced Germanic influence on Western Europe, while still sounding
like a plausible evolution of Latin.

And I thought coming up with pseudo-Iranian names for the Eftal was hard! ]

The Post-Imperial
Era and the Rise of the Goshthi

The Pancharajya, or five kingdoms alliance of Magada, Vrji, Kosala, and Kanykakubja, was
unique in its power among the equal-kingdom states of the subcontinent. However, unlike the
typical scenario of the past thousand years, where dynasty after dynasty rose out the Indo-
Gangetic plain and enjoyed fleeting hegemonic dominion over a vast territory, the Pancharajya
was hamstrung by internal factors. Despite presiding over an era unquestionable economic
growth and technological innovation, as well as a massive swathe of reurbanization, the states
of the Pancharajya confederacy were unable to harness their powers for aggressive outwards
expansion - focused as they were on internal matters. The latter half of the ninth century saw a
swing in power back towards the landed Brahmin elite and the Maukhani-era scholar-
bureaucratic class, facilitated by a trend which would become known as the goshthi movement.

The goshthi movement was on the surface nothing more than gatherings of the learned for the
purpose of debating and critiquing art and poetry, but in practice it evolved into conversations
about politics and policy. Roughly speaking, they could be divided into two classes: learned,
literate bureaucrats, and Brahmin landholders who felt excluded from the broader mercantile
guild system; the goshthi movement became an attempt by the priestly and administrative
classes to regain control of the rudder of their states from the guilds, and either control the Ayat
themselves or have a significantly greater say in its decision making.

By and large, the goshthi meetings were cloaked in innuendo and metaphor, and thus were
overlooked until they had gained significant power. Bureaucrats had access to vast resources,
and as the best-educated members of society had the ability to disseminate and argue their
cases well. By allying themselves with marginalized groups, such as itinerant farmers and
poorer sangha who had been left out of the great revolutionary changes in social organization,
they represented a significant element of society which could not be overlooked.

Their language of revolution could not come at a better time. Bengali legal scholars including
Aparaka and Kulluka wrote extensively in this era, advocating for empowering the state to
legislate with impunity on a wide variety of social systems such as marriage and inheritance,
long seen as matters settled by tradition or local custom. However with the power of the guilds
rapidly expanding, the guild organizations had often come to dominate the interpretation of the
law, basing their decisions on the antique law which governed the sreni of the pre-Mauryan era,
and frequently favoring the interests of their own collective against the interests of society as a
whole or indeed the individual.

These texts were complimented by the famous treatises of Jimutashvara, were a series of
sanskrit language texts which argue for a restoration of the antique rights of the monarchy as a
defender and unifier of the state, but simultaneously laid out the responsibilities of the raja to his
people. Among his requirements for a good king were bravery, charity, and physical beauty. It is
notable that the king's status as a performer of sacred rituals, a relic of the Vedic era
encouraged by the Maukhani, is absent from his requests. While there were few monarchies left
along the Ganges or in Vanga [Bengal] (many rulers called themselves merely Viceroy or Prime
Minister) the language had a strong effect on those who romanticized the era of great kings.

The growth of the goshthi movement was dangerous to the guild-armies. In Kannauj, brutal
street fighting broke out between the local goshthi organizations, their nepalese mercenaries,
and the soldier-guilds. While this was an isolated incident, the guilds saw the writing on the wall
and gradually stepped back. Many ganarajya instituted new constitutions in this time period -
constitutions which formed the basis of new relations between armies and states. In many
cases the soldier-guilds had vast estates in any case - they did not relinquish their immense
economic power even if they abandoned certain political privileges that had allowed them to
dominate the states.

The latter half of the ninth century and the earliest decades of the tenth were a phase of ironing
out the rules by which the Ayats and Maharajas would function, and generally expanding the
power of the state. In the Pancharajya, for the first time a greater Ayat was constructed, formed
from the Prime Ministers of each of the lesser kingdoms, with the capital rotating every five
years between a series of major cities. Individual guilds were no longer able to function with
absolute power, nor confiscate lands at their pleasure - the state reasserted their right to
distribute land and perhaps most importantly was able to clear many of the countless tax
exemptions which had accumulated over the centuries, exemptions which once defeated
allowed the bureaucracy even greater authority.

As a compromise to this new taxation policy, the rights and statuses of urban guilds and villages
alike were standardized, codified, and written down in single clearly-organized codes. The
state's obligation to communal defense was counterbalanced by the right to demand special
tariffs in times of war. The guilds had the right to freely trade with any party not ranked as an
enemy of the state. Tenant farmers were granted the right to organize their own sangha, despite
not directly holding the land upon which they worked, and have a voice in the Ayat.

Until 964, the Pancharajya would be dominated by the power of the goshthi faction and their
rough coalition. However, their distrust and opposition to the guild soldiery would represent a
massive rift in the heart of society. If that wasn't divisive enough, the coalition would further be
shaken to its core by a series of controversies. The brahmin faction was inherently conservative,
and relatively orthodox in their interpretation of Hinduism - they rejected the more overt Buddhist
teachings, and clung to their caste prohibitions - an unpopular stance among the bureaucrats
and their backers, including the tribal mercenary armies. By contrast many of the bureaucrats
were educated by Buddhist universities or other heterodox institutions - and in this way aligned
more to the ideology of the mercantile guilds than the priestly landholders.

The "Rebellion of the Kshatriya Sreni" was an attempted coup in 890 against the rule of Prime
MinisterDevarata - and while it was defeated by the swift intervention of the mercenary guards,
the warriors guilds were simply too important to be removed - they still consisted of the majority
of the military backbone, and Devarata and his contemporaries feared giving their mercenaries
too much latitude, lest the mercenaries in turn form associations and begin to exercise political
power. They did not allow their hired soldiers to settle or retire in the Pancharajya and would but
a generation later be using the guild warriors in a major war against Surasena.

After a brief period of technological stagnation during the Maukhani era, new advances in
science and philosophy began once more in earnest, patronized by the guilds and the newly
strengthened states. The wealthy had strong social incentives to show their piety by donating to
monasteries and universities. Buddhist monasteries such as Sanchi and Nalanda were among
those at the forefront of a new era of scientific revolution. While much of their early work had
relatively few practical applications, it was born out of the work of the early Gupta golden age.
Mathematics and science flourished. Monks charted the movements of the stars and even
developed an early form of calculus. One of the first tangible results of these mathematic
innovations was better record keeping.

Of note is the famed polymath Meikanda, a young bureaucrat from the Vanga who would
publish some of the most accurate treatises on anatomy to date, building on the ancient
traditions of the subcontinent.
A few notable practical inventions occurred as well in the ninth century. Technological
innovations from the east spread west into the Punjab and south into the dry highlands. Local
guilds build water-wheels, wells and pumps (including a hand-cranked version of the
Archimedes screw), turning once barren regions of the Thar and the Deccan plateau into green,
vital agricultural land which could support even larger populations. For manufacturories, the
crank and connecting rod was invented sometime around 910 - while it had existed since
Roman times, its rediscovery and use as a water-powered tool in manufacturing of textiles
among other things was revolutionary. Perhaps most fascinatingly, the first primitive metal-
stamp printing occurred in a university in Gandhara - and yet failed to achieve mass appeal. The
process seemed too slow, and the innovations to make it work quickly and effectively were still
several centuries out. It was mostly used for proclamations or other such things which could be
quickly printed onto paper en masse and distributed to messengers.

In the south, where monarchy still flourished, the reaction to the growth of the guilds was less
extreme. Monarchs continued to give themselves grand titles. Local dynasties such as the
Cheras and Hoysalas began calling their monarch "The Crown Jewel of the Kshatriyas." At
Arinjaya Chera's (841-865)funeral he was proclaimed 'Equal-of-Indra' and 'Sun King' and,
perhaps most absurdly, given the limits of his dominion and his status as a federate of the
greater Chola Empire, 'Unparalleled Ruler.'

The Chola only exercised dominion over a small portion of their greater empire, [a region
corresponding roughly to OTL-Tanjavur] and the in the rest their vassals were given relative
latitude to act as they pleased. Records of cattle-raids and literature glorifying intermittent wars
between rival communities was not uncommon. The juxtaposition between rural life under a
feudal dynasty and urban life along the coast or in a major manufacturing city was immense.
The guild-organized, semi-republican cities were practically states in their own right, with the
legitimacy, wealth, and mercenary armies to maintain total autonomy from their petty lords - the
cities were subject only to the Chola, who carefully played the various factions of their society
against one another to prevent from losing their careful grip on power.

The Chola appear to have feuded with the great Chandratreya Empire to their north, perhaps
the only of the "post-imperial empires" to deserve the grandiose titles that the rajas of the south
heaped upon themselves. The Deccan-based Maharajadhirajas had direct royal control over
many prosperous mines and manufactories and unlike the Pancharajya accordingly had a form
of state revenue that wasn't dependent on taxation - and thus were able to build a strong,
sprawling state with a powerful, professional army.

However, their attempts to expand into Trikalinga and the broader Chola dominion were fraught
with failure. Despite their qualitative advantage in military quality, their southern rivals were
wealthy and had a home-turf advantage while the Chandratreya exhausted themselves in vast,
often futile campaigns. However, in 883, the brilliant and warlike Chandratreya emperor
Adityavarma led an awe-inspiring campaign against the Chola, destroying them in a massive
battle at the town of Uralyur. His use of massed archers behind crude portable wooden
fortifications to blunt enemy charges was not innovative, but would foreshadow the eventual
gunpowder wars of the Indian subcontinent.

Despite his victories, and temporarily bringing the Chola to their knees, he was unable to be
anything more than another layer of power overtop of the already existing heirarchy, and when
later in life he retired from the throne to become a Jain mystic, the Chola joined a coalition with
many of the southern dynasties and forced his young son Nayivarma out of their traditional
territory.

The Indus valley after the withdraw and humiliation of the Aghatsaghid Empire would only
recover slowly. The Turkish estate system had left the region relatively devastated due to poor
land management and the frequent border wars and rebellions had left the population of the
region at an uncommon low. The Dauwa dynasty worked extensively to rebuild and repair, but
they themselves were foreigners, Gurjar dynasts who had imported wholesale many clans of
their own people to serve as a ruling class. Of the Aghatsaghid possessions, only Gandhara, the
jewel in the crown of the Aghatsaghid Empire, had survived to some degree intact, and it would
serve as a bastion of sorts, fortifying the passes and protecting India from a resurgent
Aghatsaghid dynasty.

The Gandharans would develop a reputation as a warlike, martial people for their successful
defense of the northern frontier, but they were also called by contemporary poets the 'garden of
the north'. Here, in the high mountains, the Gandharan ayat councils would commission the
construction of beautiful stupas and temples, and as one of the ancient seats of Buddhist
scholarship, it quickly became revered once more for its intellectual traditions. Innovative canal
projects allowed rich harvests even in the alpine regions, and in the latter half of the ninth
century Buddhist art and philosophy enjoyed a renaissance of sorts.

Kyauske Empire

Power among the Pyu city states, clustered along the trade highway of the Irawaddi valley, was
concentrated in the south, along the coast, where ports such as Sudhammapura hosted
delegations from the mercantile guilds of Trikalinga and Vanga. Little else can be proven
reliably, as the records of the southern cities disregarded events to their north, focusing on long
annals describing the virtues of their kings. What follows has the typical embellishments of a
legendary founding story.

In 890, a king by the name of Kyansittha took power in Kyauske, a city of the upper Irawaddi,
which was then a poorer and depopulated region compared to the south whose people were
seen as little more than barbarians caught up in an endless cycle of raids and counter-raids.
Kyansittha was an intelligent man, and according to legend, he sought the advice of a traveling
monk from far Gandhara. This monk told Kyansittha of the great weirs and canals which had
made his own arid highlands lush and verdant, and helped the King to commission such
constructions in his own realm.
Overnight much of the wasteland of Kyauske was made fertile and the people rejoiced. Their
numbers swelled, and many people came to their lands to work. Kysansittha's son Sithu would,
in 923, ascend to the throne and lead an ambitious series of conquests, nearly uniting the river
valley. By 927, only Sudhammapura remained independent. King Sithu was a capable general,
one with a genuine gift for uniting peoples. He had many consorts, chief among them a Queen
Yazadewi, who was a legendary beauty.

After his great conquests, he set about introducing his father's land reforms across his new
kingdom, and like his father he borrowed liberally from outside influences. His rule was
legitimized in the style of a southern Hindu monarch, with the implication that he himself was a
divine incarnation of Visnu. He commissioned many new monasteries and public gathering-
places in the style of the Dvaravati confederation, and he sent one of his daughters to marry into
Indranokuran royalty.

It is roughly in 930 that our narrative becomes informed by more than just legend -
Sudhammapura would come under attack by Sithu and provide the basis for an epic novel
called the 'Tale of the Great Siege', written by the polymath Meikanda, who at the age of thirty
travelled to the city and saved many lives through his experimental surgeries.

The siege would continue, off and on, for six long years. Sudhammapura was impossibly
wealthy and powerful, able to retain several guild armies, who, promised extensive land in the
new empire should they triumph, fought with uncustomary viciousness. However, Sithu had his
father's veteran force of semi-professional retainers and well-drilled levies, experts in the
longbow. Neither side could score a decisive victory, and by 936 the outnumbered defenders
had been driven from the outlying fortifications and a proper siege of the city commenced. Sithu
had also deployed a fleet, and was able to truly begin to starve the city.

When the King of Sudhammapura, Anawrahta, realized that the battle was lost, he came before
Sithu and knelt before the great king. Meikanda himself claims to have been there, recording
their final dialogue. Begging the pardon of the King of Kyauske, Anawrahta submitted himself
and begged for his people to be spared, but Sithu was not so merciful. As the guild armies
buckled at long last and the walls fell, Sithu ordered the city sacked.

The "once bright city of markets and golden temples" was nearly levelled, with a few exceptions
- the monasteries, temples, and those who took shelter in them were spared, as was any man
capable of reading and writing. Meikanda himself was spared, as were many other foreign
merchants, most of whom would be allowed to return to their home countries.

The rise of Kyauske and the Great Siege might well have been forgotten as another incident of
history and another classic of Indian literature, but for one thing: the famed surgeon-cum-
novelist describes flaming spears used to great effect in the heat of the battle, disheartening the
Kyauske levies and inciting them to rout in several battles. These flaming spears are described
mostly through metaphor, but it is clear that they represent an early sort of firepowder weapon -
an impure formula that produced a slow-burning and mostly psychological effect, but firepowder
nonetheless.

The Triumph of the

Incarnated Holy King

After Sima Zhixen's rebellion, the Qi military slowly declined in quality - although it would never
reach the paranoia-induced state weakness of the early Qi army. Besides the turbulent Bod
Empire frontier, mercenaries were gradually phased out, but a professional force remained, and
was supported in large part by the purchase of horses from the northwestern steppe peoples -
particularly prized were the fine horses of the Ferghana valley. Horses were traded for luxury
goods in great quantities, allowing the Qi to maintain a vital cavalry arm on their northern
borders.

However, an unpleasant and by no means minor side-effect of the horse trade was the
increasing arrogance of the Uighur merchants in China. It led to numerous conflicts and, among
the officials as well as the people, it left a lasting dislike of what they saw as greedy barbarians.
The Uighurs realized they were the middle-men through which all horse-trade came, and began
charging absurd prices for increasingly poor-quality horses. By bribing local magistrates they
could see inferior products through inspections for a net profit, and the Qi army suffered for it.

The Uighur had little respect for the Chinese - while the Gokturks had in many ways idolized
their settled neighbors to the south, and the early Uighurs had followed suit, this trend reversed
remarkably in the ninth century. The Uighur Khagan Bayanchur (815-844) abandoned much of
the Chinese trappings of his predecessors, encouraged by a popular notion of the Chinese as
weak and the Uighurs as inheritors of Turko-Eftal-Sogdian traditions rather than Chinese ones.
As much as the Uighur merchants and embassies idolized the comfort and luxury of Qi China,
enjoying silks and fine finished goods, the artistic and cultural world of the Uighur Khaganate
was in large part based on the concept of "buyan" - or the imitation and reproduction of Indo-
Iranian culture, an ideology which saw practical expression in thousands of beautiful frescos
and sutras patronized by prominent Uighurs. The importance of Buddhism was emphasized by
the title Idiqut, or "Holy Ruler" which the Uighur Khagans took on in addition to their traditional
titles. Indo-Iranian deities were worshipped over any traditional deities and culturally the Uighur
could easily be considered part of the Iranian world. A god, Xormusta, that can be identified as a
synthesis of Indra, Tengri, and Ormazd was central to the Uighur pantheon.

This, combined with the apparent greed and strong cultural divisions, created a massive division
between Qi China and the Uighurs. Chinese culture was in many ways anathema to the Uighur
society - and this would ultimately lead to clashes and escalating violence. The Uighur desire for
luxury goods and a standard of living akin to the elite landholders and scholar-bureaucrats at
the peak of Chinese society would ultimately turn their state towards brigandage and eventually,
with signs of weakness, towards open warfare against the Qi.
In 863, Khagan Eletmish, Bayanchur's son, received an impressive offer from the Qi Emperor,
Renzong. His son Inantengin had recently come of age, and the Qi sought to marry off an
imperial princess to the young prince, hoping to cement a closer bond between the two powers.
An impressive dowry would be arranged, and a grand ceremony, and in exchange, the
Emperor's officials sought to end the exploitative trade practices and minor raiding which vexed
their northern frontier.

Eletmish, according to contemporary Chinese historians, mocked and humiliated the embassy
and demanded some two hundred thousand bolts of silk, a half a million tael tribute of silver and
a large quantity of other fine goods. He implied that marrying his son to a Qi princess was a
favor to the royal family, which had a surfeit of "parasitic mouths, grasping and good for little
else." And finally, he forced the court officials to "dance for him in the manner of servants or
serving girls, and when their humiliation was finished he repeated his demands and said 'thou
may expect our embassy in a month's time.'" There were however, literate individuals in the
Uighur capital at the time, and they offer a conflicting argument - that Inantengin was promised
already to a Khitan woman, and Eltemish viewed the Khitan as both a superior alliance and also
a "race" which produced "women more capable in the matters of survival and keeping of
finances." Accordingly, he mocked the Chinese proposal and demanded absurd tribute as a way
of gauging their true intentions.

It is unclear which of these statements is true, however, when the Uighur embassy arrived in
Chang'an the following month, it numbered several thousand men and was by all accounts a
boisterous display of outrageous impropriety (by the standards of the Qi court) and decadence.
The Qi foisted gifts on the prominent members of the delegation and attempted to overawe the
northern barbarians into submission but in doing so only whetted the Uighur appetite for luxury.
Finally, the Uighur embassy was rejected and one of their top diplomats arrested and executed
for an uncertain impropriety.

The Qi wasted no time in preparing for war. Large garrisons in the southern provinces were
stripped to their lowest levels in a century and huge armies were assembled. The plan was
simple - the Uighurs were going to attack sooner or later - that much was clear. Accordingly, the
Qi decided they would march on Ordubaliq, the Uighur capital, and level it, more an attempt to
humiliate the Uighurs than to inflict lasting damage. If Ordubaliq fell, it would show a clear sign
of the weakness of the Uighurs and it was expected many of their allies would desert.

However, the massive stockpiling of supplies, fodder, and even arms which were necessary for
such a venture took time, and the Uighurs it seems had been preparing to invade from before
they even sent the embassy. Zhang Huan, the bureaucrat-general in charge of the expedition,
was tasked instead with defending the Empire from the northern invaders. Meanwhile, a second
major army was formed under his rival Guo Yaoshi, and tasked with defending Hebei from the
Khitan, coordinating with the Governor-General of You, who maintained a strong mercenary
army in his province.
Guo Yaoshi, thanks in no small part to the Governor-General, was able to arrange an excellent
defense. While the Khitan raids were damaging, they were incapable of penetrating deep or
gathering much plunder. Meanwhile, Zhang Huan was under increasing pressure to do
something about the Uighur army, which was numerous and advancing rapidly towards the
capital. Fearing for his position if he continued to "show cowardice", Zhang Huan abandoned a
semi-successful delaying tactic and his previous strategy of wearing down the Uighur columns
through attrition, was forced to pull his armies back from their role in supporting the prefectural
cities and concentrate his forces for a decisive field battle.

The field battle, of course, never came. Many cities in the north were sacked, and the following
year in 864, Zhang Huan was forced to change tactics yet again and march north, a march that
he and his army never returned from. The capital was left almost defenseless -a dangerous
position for a city of perhaps half a million people[1]. Mass panic and flight began. The Emperor,
as during Sima Zhixen's rebellion, fled, this time downriver to Bianzhou.

The mass exodus was disastrous, in that it prevented any coordinated defense of the city as a
mob of refugees surged in every direction, often forced to resort to looting when meager food
supplies became stretched thin. Morale among the remaining soldiers plummeted and many
deserted and turned either to brigandage or sought to return home to their families. Chang'an
fell the following year. Guo Yaoshi was recalled to Bianzhou and tasked with overall command
of the war effort, in recognition of his previous efforts. The Prime Minister meanwhile made
overtures to the Khitan, hoping to turn them against the Uighur, without success.

Despite Guo Yaoshi's best efforts, the following years would see the disruption and loss of most
of the north. Emperor Renzong was killed and his son, Huizong, took power for a few short
months before being overthrown by Guo Yaoshi, who feared that the young Emperor, known for
outbursts of extreme wrath, would punish him severely for their continued losses. Some
members of the Imperial family escaped, and Guo Yaoshi hesitated to claim the Imperial title for
himself - he did not have such ambitions and instead sought a member of the Imperial family to
be puppet. However, his coup led to massive rebellions and numerous governor-generals and
local officials declaring independence. A massive peasant rebellion erupted in Xuanshe. Called
the Red Standard Rebellion, its origins are unclear but its motives seem to have rapidly shifted
from a protestation of taxation and harsh local officials as fleeing deserter soldiers joined its
ranks and turned it into a vicious brigand army which had all but total control over the province
by 866.

Eltemish Khagan, for his part, had succeeded quite beyond his wildest dreams. North of the
Yellow River there was no meaningful opposition to his armies (after the fall of You to the Khitan
in 866) and he controlled what was the traditional heartland of China. Marching south on
Bianzhou, he sacked that city in 867, and Guo Yaoshi was captured and humiliated by his
soldiers. Upon hearing of this, Eltemish, according to legend, ordered Yaoshi brought before
him. He issued the General a formal apology and then laughingly ordered him executed.
However, Eltemish would never travel beyond the Huai river. Across the now leaderless empire,
he lacked any legitimacy or authority save what he could demand with force of arms. However,
force of arms was one thing that he did not lack. His subjects worshipped him as god incarnate,
Xormusta himself born into the flesh of man to lead the Uighurs to the establishment of a holy
regime, and he rewarded them handsomely with silks and treasure. Those of even middling
rank frequently were given authority over vast tracts of land with ostensibly huge incomes, and
while this sense of enduring triumph lasted Eltemish would be revered.

The Uighurs would call the state they formed the "Jaylaqar Dynasty" (Yaoluoge) - a name which
they used long before coming into possession of northern China. Their Chinese subjects would
often refer to it as "Bei Guo" or northern kingdom.

While their new dominion was vast, they quickly learned that ruling a country was far more
difficult than conquering it. The collapse of the Qi had left the south a patchwork of warring
states and the north was little better. The Uighurs themselves were divided - many wished to
live as rural aristocrats and conquerors off the spoils of their new dominions, and left the steppe
to settle newly-founded garrison towns. Many more wished to retain their traditional way of life,
and the divide between these two groups was not slow in forming. Within five years of the
conquest, the Uighur government was forced to create the "Tripartite Code" which created three
legal systems - one for the steppe peoples, one for the transplanted Uighur ruling class, and
one for everyone else.

Rebellions were common. The Uighur government was deeply exploitative at first and took its
time in switching away from state revenues based on plunder. The Uighurs had little regard for
Chinese traditional religion and culture, alienating their subjects by their refusal to assimilate or
compromise. As the Chinese had turned largely away from Buddhism in favor of native
philosophies such as Taoism, Confucianism, and their own folk religions, religiously motivated
rebellions were not infrequent.

[1] It was home to perhaps twice that number prior to the Bod sack, but it never truly recovered.
Cities such as Bianzhou and Huainan had grown tremendously in this era.

[China will be continued in the next post, bringing them up into the 'future'. Thoughts and
comments? I know, I know, I like letting steppe peoples conquer everything. It's becoming a
habit.

I wanted to do something "different" with China, rather than allowing their history to be a series
of alt-dynasties, in a similar way I tried to arrange something very different for Indian history.
This is my set-up for that. ]

Northern China

In the primordial legends of the Kitai people, Yaol Tuyubayan, Khan of the Kitai, was descended
from the Sun itself. Regardless of the veracity of this outlandish claim, his star certainly would
burn brightest on the steppe after the mass migration of the Uighur people southwards. The
Yaol dynasty were somewhat more Sinicized than their Uighur cousins, and although they had
married into the Jaylaqar Dynasty, and were its nominal subjects, in practice they controlled
their own confederation, including the Ishih and Shiwei tribes, the latter of which were
themselves of Uighur blood. Those among their civilization who were literate used the Uighur
script to write their own language.

Accordingly, they had remarkable strength and also the trust of the Uighurs, who believed that
the Yaol were loyal subjects without ambitions of their own. Accordingly, they actively
encouraged the Kitai to assume greater authority on the steppe, and provide a shield against
the peoples of Manchuria. Yaol Tuyubayan had been stymied in his attempts to sweep south
against the province of You, despite large resources and his own capable but uninspired military
acumen, by the clever schemes of Guo Yaoshi. However, with the collapse of the Qi regime, the
Kitai benefitted immensely. The province of You and parts of Heibei were given to the Kitai to
govern, as the overstretched Uighurs desperately needed the support of their allies.

Yaol Tuyubayan rose from strength to strength in the court of the Jaylaqar, being named after
his victory in You the Satrap or Duke of that country and lavished with great gifts, arousing the
anger of Eltemish's half-brother and viceroy, the Yabgu Hala, who had remained in Ordubeliq
and saw firsthand the encroachment of the Kitan.

However, for the time being that anger would come to nothing. Hala had few options to make his
discontent known, for Eltemish was greatly popular among his tribe, and had found himself
believing the glorious epithets that his people lauded on him, that he was a god incarnate and
the sovereign of all the rivers and streams beneath the clear blue sky. Settling in to rulership
was distasteful to him, however. Even when he had made his residence in Ordubeliq, Eltemish
had been accustomed to frequent movement and had rarely remained in the same part of his
domain for more than a month. The notion of establishing himself in a single Chinese city and
ruling as the North King was inconceivable to him.

Eltemish, having wrested most of northern China from its traditional rulers desired nothing more
than a return to the old times, of sending embassies and making outrageous demands and
watching the wealth pour northwards.

Furthermore, a mere four years after the conquest, a series of bitter winters drove his people
ever more southwards. Yabgu Hala persuaded his half-brother to issue a series of decrees
confiscating vast tracts of land in the north from their present owners, to allow his own people to
settle it. Many Chinese landholders were stripped of their possessions without ceremony and
their resentment of the new Uighur overlords only grew. Eltemish had only halfheartedly
adopted the bureaucratic system of the Qi, and primarily used it as a machine of state
oppression of the peasants, making increasingly impossible demands on the surviving
bureaucracy but otherwise treating the long history and culture of conquered China with a
casual disdain. The bureaucracy was turned, effectively, into a method of extracting wealth from
native manufacturing and trade and distributing it amongst the unproductive aristocratic class.
The Uighur who settled the garrison cities, however, were generally not as incompetent or cruel
as their central government would suggest. The settled or semi-settled life was not unknown to
many of those who made up the first wave of migrants, and as such as a new aristocracy and
occupying force they tended to be relatively fair, if socially and culturally distinct from their
neighbors. Despite the common conception of the Uighur settlers as barbarians, many adapted
quickly to the settled life and began learning the local language. It would be perhaps a decade
before laws were passed banning the Uighurs from adopting Chinese dress and certain Chinese
customs, and these would be only poorly enforced.

Rebellions were commonplace, however. The garrison towns were often immediate targets, as
were bureaucratic offices at the village level. The bureaucracy now operated as agents of the
northern king, and as such hatred for the scholar-bureaucrats among the peasantry grew
rapidly. Attempts to regulate the activities of Daoist monks and other folk preachers tended to
backfire and only spread their creeds faster. In this era, many intellectuals and native Chinese
with means fled the north, either to the Goryeo Kingdom or to the war-torn south, depending on
proximity.

These rebellions were rarely successful. Most rose up too quickly, without garnering more than
local support and accordingly were forced into rough country to eke out a living as bandits or
slaughtered as an example to others. Ironically, the one successful rebellion would come from
the north. Eltemish was growing old. The "god incarnate" had been showing increasingly erratic
behavior and his popularity was lessened. His victories were long past, and though he had long
favored Hala to succeed him, he changed his mind after a particularly vicious argument and
chose his son, Inantengin.

It was a second freezing winter and subsequent famine on the steppe, in 876, that forced
matters to the breaking point. Yaol Tuyubayan, now an elderly man, had several ambitious sons,
and he sent them forth into the Uighur lands to raid, sensing their weakness and knowing his
own more temperate lands had largely been spared the brutal famine. Betraying his alliance, he
sacked Ordubeliq. Hala led what was effectively a mass of refugees southwards, and upon
meeting his brother, Eltemish flew into a rage. Hala, Eltemish claimed, was responsible for their
defeat and the Kitan betrayal.

Hala refused to accept any punishment, and pitched fighting broke out between the royal troops
and the fleeing Uighur clans, which were, once all stragglers were accounted for, a large portion
of those in the north, and indeed all those who had not chosen submission to the Kitai. The
settled Uighurs had become soft, it is said, and offered a poor fight, but ultimately Hala would
lead many of their people westward, into country subject to the Bod, where his people would
thrive as mercenaries and warriors. Many still would carry on even further west, and signs of
their distinctive culture can be seen as far west as the Caspian.

The remainder of these refugees demanded settlement rights, which Eltemish was forced to
grant, carving out new garrison towns and reallocating land across the north. When his father
died two years later, in 878, Inantengin would lead an indecisive war against the Kitai,
recovering much of the old Uighur empire and allowing the refugees to reclaim their old
homeland. However, the damage was done. Uighur prestige dropped to a low ebb, and by 900,
when Inantengin died, their state seemed to be tottering on the brink of collapse.

False Idols and the Kurdish Empire

With the rise to power of Tarkhsigh Arslan in 903, after the tyrannical but nonetheless
centralizing reign of his father Aghatsagh, the Aghatsaghid Empire seemed perhaps poised for a
return to some of its former prominence. However, little could be further from the truth.

The slow territorial decline of the Aghatsaghid Empire had seen the growth of religious turmoil,
simmering under the surface. Buddhism was the majority religion in the Aghatsaghid dominion,
particularly among the urban populations and those of Turkish or Eftal ancestry. Baharas, or
Buddhist temples and monasteries, were ubiquitous, and though the fire-temples endured
among the rural population, their "low church" Zoroastrian faith had become very much
enmeshed with the Buddhist tradition. The syncretic faith that emerged gradually lost its
distinctions with Sogdian Buddhism to the point that by the tenth century the distinction was
largely immaterial, though undoubtedly meaningful to those who observed the Zoroastrian faith.

The "Sogdian" Buddhism patronized and popularized by the Eftal remained the dominant form
of Buddhism in Iran, and subscribed for the most part to the broader Mahayana tradition. A large
pantheon of Indo-Iranian divinities existed and often competed with Arhats and Bodhisattvas for
the affection of lay devotees. Most of these deities had some tangential connection to Buddhism
- Mihir, for example, had been gradually recast as a defender of the religious community and a
god of enlightened inspiration.

However, the decline of the Aghatsaghid state, much like the decline of the Eftal state several
centuries earlier, brought about new uncertainties for the rural peasant community. Turkish
raids, launched by both the Bajinak rulers of Azerbaijan and the Oghuz on the steppes left the
countryside unsafe, despite the best efforts of the Aghatsaghid armies.

These uncertainties were compounded by a new religious movement, called the Nowbahar, or
new temple faction. Beginning with the writings of an Ifthal-Iranian monk named Narseh circa
905, it spread rapidly and gained meteoric support among the lay community, and slowly among
the more inertia-ridden monastic community as well. The Nowbahar movement began as a tract
speaking against the luxury and excess in which the "pagan temple priests" lived. The Eftal had
long given generously to temples and had special cultural prohibitions against harming them,
even if they were not of their faith. The Turks had largely adopted these same prohibitions, and
accordingly temples throughout post-Eftal history were likely to endure any raids or violence
unscathed, with rare exceptions.

Pagan temples accordingly made an easy target - theirs priests tended to have a privileged
position in society, and their temples tended to be opulent and laden with riches stockpiled
during raids. In many senses during times of uncertainty the pagan temples became banks of a
sort - places where wealth could often be kept safe.

Narseh's writings also condemned the over focus on gods. The worship of gods, he claimed,
were a distraction from the pursuit of enlightenment, and more often the worship of them was a
trick or a ruse designed to leave mankind in accursed ignorance. Were the Bodhisattvas
insufficient? Worship of the gods would drive a person away from the pursuit of nirvana. When a
man sacrificed to a god, he told the god his desires, and prayed that they would be fulfilled. The
gods thus kept men in cruel and subtle chains of suffering.

The movement rapidly lost sight of its original author, as other monks took to writing similar
polemics and incited mobs to frequently loot and destroy the "temples of deceit and ignorance."
Despite the fact that this was not Narseh's intention, and later in life he wrote often condemning
all who would resort to violence, he was ultimately blamed, arrested, and executed by the local
Aghatsaghid Vayan. This would make a martyr of him, and exacerbate tensions.

Finally, Tarksigh Arslan intervened, holding a great religious debate in Kabul, in which the
Sogdian school side came off looking worse, not the least because the debate was rigged in
their favor in such a way as became obvious and humiliated the Shah as host. The Nowbahar
only gained prestige, rallying around a new figure, a scholar by the name of Vankavadh of
Darai, a rhetorical firebrand who lacked Narseh's moderation of tone. Tarksigh Arslan was finally
forced in 926 to accommodate Vankavadh, coming to terms with the radical preacher and
abandoning his patronage of many traditional temples, and ordering the destruction of several
particular offenders.

While the Nowbahar movement consolidated its hold over the hearts and minds of the Buddhist
community, it faced strong opposition from the rural Zoroastrian peasants, whose fire temples
were the heart of their communities, and many of the Ifthal landholders whose culture prohibited
the desecration of holy sites both true and false. Rightly, they pointed out that many Buddhist
monasteries and stupas were equally decadent and ornate, and yet those were passed over,
and many Bodhisattvas were worshipped in ways hardly distinct from their worship of Mihir and
Ohrmazd. Violence broke out as the Ifthal, despite frequently being Buddhists, found
themselves allied with the folk Zoroastrians to defend traditional sites of worship.

Into this breakdown of order came Husrava "the Great" Mughriyani (907-938) - the man who
transformed the Kurdish state into an empire to rival that of the Aghatsaghids. Named after his
less impressive father, he united the fracturing Kurdish states from Mosil, and then proceeded to
conquer Syria after a series of brutal wars. After the destruction of the Padivayanate, he turned
his attention eastward, to the crumbling Aghatsaghid Empire, where a cabal of Ifthal landowners
invited him to restore order.

The first campaign was a disaster, but the Kurds learned from their defeat, learning to emulate
the Turkish tactics which had outmatched them. Five years later another Kurdish invasion
wrested most of western Iran from Turkish control. In 956, they would conquer Pars and
Gurgan, and in 967, reduce the Aghatsaghids to their Afghani holdings. Husrava and his son
Merxhas would over the course of their lives wage five great wars against the Aghatsaghids,
with the help of the general Mitradharma, a half-Kurdish half-Eftal commander who finally took
Kabul in 984. Merxhas would marry Mitradharma to his only child, a daughter, and it would be
the general turned Shah who would first take the title of Padishah, or great king.

At first, the Kurds ruled largely through garrisoning soldiers - however, this was untenable in
their clan based society, where soldiers expected to either return home and be rewarded at the
end of any lengthy period of service. However, [as we will see], many of these soldiers had no
home to return to. The Kurdish rulers in the Eftal style accordingly offered to grants of land to
Kurdish and Ifthal veterans. The provinces were ruled by Satraps with local ties to the region
and the Vayan system was abolished.

Like the Uighurs, the Kurds were a small culturally and religiously distinct ethnic group which
found themselves in control of a large, heterogeneous empire which largely shared neither their
language or religion. Unlike the Uighurs, the Kurds largely assimilated. Under Mitradharma, the
Mughriyani dynasty claimed that they were merely a native Iranian dynasty with (totally
fraudulent) ties to the Achaemenids. The Nowbahar movement had to some degree died down
in its militancy by the ascension of Mitradharma, but one of the first acts of his reign was to sack
several monasteries that were hotbeds of Nowbahar sentiment. As his wife and children
worshiped the polytheist Yazdati gods, Mitradharma, though he himself was a Buddhist, could
not allow their persecution to continue, and took harsh measures which pushed the Nowbahars
underground.

[Next post covers southern China and also goes into more detail about the explosive Kurdish
conquests and governance and the legacy of the Nowbahar movement. But I wanted to get this
up first, to give a general overview of what happened and because I think that the Kurdish
conquest of Iran will contrast nicely with the Uighur conquest of China.]

The Tai Migrations

and the Southern States

The political situation in China south of the Huai did not immediately settle down, but clear
divisions and independent polities emerged quickly. The strong bureaucracy that was the Qi
dynasty's enduring legacy had large decentralized provincial bureaus, and these departments
were utilized by local governor-generals to maintain order and establish their own petty
kingdoms.

Most of the Yangzte came under the dominion of a state called the Chu Kingdom, and initially
the Chu seemed to be a strong enough power that all China, or at least the south, would quickly
be reunited. However, this was not to be the case. A people who in later decades would become
known as the Hakka[1], northerners fleeing the Uighurs, would settle along much of the Yangzte
and cause chaos and sporadic outbursts of inter-communal violence as they fought the locals
for land rights. Peasant rebellions became commonplace, and the Chu struggled to maintain
any sort of dominance. Anarchy ruled and many bandit warlords began to establish themselves,
particularly in the Sichuan highlands, where the Chu dominion was weakest. Many of these
bandit groups it seems received aid from the Tibetan Empire, who enjoyed the lack of any
strong rival and sought to leave the Chu as weakened and divided as possible while also
ensuring that the bandits kept looking inwards and did not stray too far West.

Another governor-general based state was the Wu Kingdom, which ruled the former Qi province
of Jiangnan. It benefitted from its coastal position and rule of many major cities who did trade
with the Srivijayans. Large foreign mercantile populations provided critical economic support.
Under the East King Li Fei, the Wu became prosperous, but they were militarily weak. They
skirmishes on the Huai and Yangtze were inconclusive and like the Qi before them they were
crippled by a poor military. The one campaign in which they did enjoy moderate successes was
the repulse of the Red Standard Rebellion, chasing it south and inland, into the less-developed
Gan river regions south of the Yangtze, in the former Qi province of Jiangnanxidao.

The Red Standard started as a collection of former military veterans and bandits, peasant
armies without a meaningful cause. However, slowly they changed in organization, centralizing
under the Sino-Turkish mercenary commander Anxi Yanyan, a logistical genius who organized
the scattered retreat of the Red Standard. Anxi Yanyan was himself a Manichaean, a child of
one of the many isolated steppe communities who maintained the "Religion of Light" despite its
precipitous decline in recent centuries. Modern scholars have suggested that Anxi was perhaps
inspired by the communal cultural tradition of the Mazdak or perhaps the Indian guild system -
but in any case, he began to organize his soldiers into the leaders of a society of communes.
Those who belonged to a Red Standard commune were expected to share all things and have
no possessions not held in common. Admittance to the commune was strict - men who had
fought in the Red Standard armies and their male children were the sole members, with women
treated as property and all those outside of this small clique considered to be nothing more than
subjects.

Many have argued that it is a clear sign of the damage that the Uighur invasion did to Chinese
culture that a movement such as the Red Standard, which had little precedent in classical
Chinese civilization, managed to enjoy such wild successes. However, others have pointed out
that the Red Standard, with its harsh discipline and absolute communalism was influenced by
certain trends in the military culture of the late Qi, where the career soldiers beneath the
bureaucrat-generals held their supervisors in contempt.

In the far south, the Tai people followed the course of Annam several decades prior and broke
away. The Tai were themselves somewhat unique. While they had Sinicized, the Qi dynasty
called them “southern barbarians” and “wild dogs” and held them in low regard. Far from the
heartland of China, the Tai accordingly were largely ignored. While their coast had several major
trading posts, even these posts where far from the arterial course of the great rivers that ran
through China. They had converted by and large to Buddhism, abandoning the traditional
animism of their forefathers in the Liang dynasty.
With the collapse of the Qi, the Tai avenged themselves on their oppressors, destroying the
postal routes and government bureaucracy which had long oppressed them. At first the rebellion
was little more than any number of peasant rebellions across China, but it soon gained a distinct
identity. Local leaders banded together around a figure named Huang Qian, who established the
Southern Kingdom by rallying the support of the Tai people and conquering most of Guangxi
and Guangdong.

However, the Tai state was in many senses little more than a tribal coalition. While the South
King adopted Chinese styles, the Tai themselves were never truly Sinicized, and indeed a
somewhat insular people. Economically they were dependent upon the northern, urban
colonists, and their state was thus built on a relatively shaky foundation. Only time would tell if
they would endure.

[1] Meaning roughly 'guest families', these people have no relation to the Hakka of OTL, who in
this timeline have been butterflied out of existence, but similarly they are Han immigrants.

The Kurds build an empire

The Kurdish population, after their migration to Asoristan, experience a massive population
boom. Long a marginal, pastoral people, their leaders and even many of those who had
previously had little or nothing became wealthy beyond their wildest dreams. They intermarried
with the Asorig and the Iranians who dwelled in the great valley and soon their numbers, to
quote the Shahnama (Book of Kings) “were uncountable beneath the river of the sky.”

Huge families with many children led to a surfeit of landless sons who could expect little
inheritance. As often happens in such situations, brigandage and raiding seemed increasingly
viable for such outcasts – and indeed were somewhat traditional among the ancient Khardi.
Having lived outside Eftal and Turkish law for centuries they were unaccustomed to being ruled
directly, and raiding had always been an acceptable way of gaining resources for the clan. It
was Shah Husrava who would recognize this problem and find a way to mold the Khardi into a
truly effective fighting force. Rather than the core of Ifthal and Turkish mercenaries who had
long been the basis of the Xvarvarani army, Husrava was the first to utilize an actual Khardi field
army, disciplined and trained and recruited from among these young men who otherwise had
few prospects.

However, as such an army swelled wildly beyond their biggest expectations, Husrava realized
that war was necessary. Waging all-out war against his brother Kings, he brought them down
one by one and then turned outwards, striking at Syria and Iran. His army was disciplined and
professional by the standards of the time – thanks in no small part to Ifthal officers with a long
history of warfare, and several defeats early in Husrava’s career which tempered his troops.

While the traditional Khardi tribesman fought mostly as lightly equipped, bow armed cavalry,
Husrava introduced disciplined foot archers (whose front rank carried long spears or stakes)
and a well-armored infantry force modelled off of some of the latter Eftal experiments with
professional foot-soldiers, where the front rank was sheeted in mail and all carried heavy spears
and kite-shields. Furthermore, he made the core of his army a heavily armored group of cavalry
whom he called the “Immortals” – a force which would become war-winning in time, much as the
cudgel-armed Eftal cavalry had. They were trained to fight with bows, the overarm spear, and
spiked maces.
Of course, the Khardi victories would have been impossible if not for the rise of the Nowbahar,
and the sectarian Ohrmazdist and Mihirist movements[2] that rose in response to the
iconoclastic Nowbahar. With the power of the temples under direct threat, the Aghatsaghid state
was weakened and thus easy prey for the Khardi.

Khardi dominion, which would expand to include Armenia and Azerbijan by 978, and much of
Cappadocia by 994, was ensured by their practice of settling garrison towns, much like the
Uighurs had centuries before. Finding common cause with the god-worshippers against the
Nowbahar, they were able to gain a measure of popular support as well. Under the Padishah
Mitradharma, the Nowbahar were forced underground – however many of their kind would flee
north to the Khirichan and others would continue to preach in secret, a fact which would alienate
the Khardi from the monastery communities which had remained at the center of Eftal and
Aghatsaghid cultural life.

Mitradharma also was at times willing to compromise with outsiders, such as allowing a Bajinak
Turkish satrap to rule in Azerbijan and a Monophysite Christian to rule Armenia. In general, the
Khardi had a better relationship with the remaining Christians under their rule than the
Aghatsaghids had been able to maintain – Christ was considered an incarnate god in the
complex synthesized theology of the Khardi as well, and while the Christians did not necessarily
return the same tolerance they were shown, Khardi rule could at times prove relatively light.

During the latter years of Mitradharma’s reign, particularly the Siege of Nyssa[3], we also have
our first depiction of a Khardi army that had utilized firepowder, the technique of which had been
learnt from the Avagana people of Balkh, who had been subjugated several decades before, but
whose warrior-guilds made extensive use of a “sticky fire” in battle.[4] Of particular note is an
attempt to sap the walls using a great concentration of the powder, and while this attempt
notably failed, it made “such a demonic sound and vision that it seemed all the armies of hell
had come into concordant with the pagan Mitradarmes.”

[2] Later names given by historians, the Iranian god-worshipping movements were not well-
organized in contrast to the Nowbahar, and never rallied around a single identity. The most
famous of these was a rebel army led by Adurbayan, an Eftal warlord whose folk religious
teachings echoed the apocalyptic, gnostic formula of the Mahadevists and the latter Mazdakists.
These armed insurrections largely prevented the utter dominance of the Nowbahar, however
they led to the utter destabilization of the Aghatsaghid state.

[3] The capital of the Asian state of Cappadocia.

[4] Avagana are a polyglot people, who alternately claim to be descendants of the Eftal and
Kamboja and other “Tokhari” peoples. An alternative theory states that they are older still than
that, and are an Iranic people indigenous to the region now eponymously known as
Avaganistan. Either way, it was their people who introduced firepowder in various forms to the
"crossroads of civilization" having gained it from their proximity to the subcontinent, where
firepowder spears had become commonplace and firepowder in a diluted form had begun being
used in a variety of festivals.

Commerce and
Christ

With the rise of the Khardi, the ports of southern Mesopotamia grew once more, and trade
began to flow in volumes not seen since the Eftal golden age. Some of the greatest
beneficiaries would be the pearl divers of the Bahrain and the merchants of Mezun and the
rapidly expanding city-state of Hatta. However, increased wealth bred sectarian conflict. Much of
the trade in Hatta was run by foreign guilds, Indians from Sindh and Bharukaccha. However, the
pearl-diving and artisanal communities were largely Nestorian, with large Christian
congregations in cities such as Al-Dair and Muharraq.

The Nestorian population in Bahrain had survived and indeed grown despite the relative decline
of their faith in many parts of the world. While the Eftal persecuted Christians viciously in the
aftermath of their own collapse, this had been but a foretaste of the violence done by radical
elements of the Nowbahar cult. Christians were god-worshippers of the highest order, denying
the dharma entirely, and for that many radical lay preachers turned angry mobs against the
ancient churches of the Nestorian faith, whose communities had survived countless upheavals
and regime changes. Many Nestorians with the means to do so fled to the southern coast of the
Persian gulf, which, as the Eftal regime declined, became a safe harbor for them. Muharraq
itself became a seat of the Church of the East, becoming the seat of the Ecclesiastical Province
of Dilmun.

These newcomers arrived with few prospects and quickly overcrowded the region. Furthermore,
they blamed the Buddhist Indians who they encountered for their hardships, often refusing to
see the difference between the iconoclastic Nowbahar movement and the spectrum of dharmic
religions practiced by Gurjar merchants in Hatta. Yet a third faction existed as well, the
traditional rulers of the province – an Iranian-influenced Aramaic-speaking Arab ruling class who
felt trapped between the Indian guilds who provided their link to the outside world and the
Nestorian faith of the common people and artisans.

In 923, the situation would be escalated with violence for the first time. A mob of Nestorian
refugees attacked members of a Bharuchi Sreni and killed several. Retaliation by guild-paid
mercenaries, a motley mix of Saihist pagans and Zoroastrians from the interior, was vicious and
went far beyond what the Arab rulers could consider proportional. The mercenaries were
banished from the city and a fine assessed on the Bharuchi merchant guild, and the matter was
considered settled by most. The money raised from the fine went to paying to settle a number of
refugees in the prosperous inland oasis town of Haggar.

However, the merchants appealed to the Ayat of Bharukaccha which in turn appealed to the
local Chandratreya appointed-viceroy. The guilds offered the state a cut of the profits in
perpetuity in exchange for state support. An armed fleet of some twenty warships set sail the
following year, on what was otherwise a simple prestige expedition to assert Chandratreya
power over the Persian Gulf and the former Hadhramut hegemony. However, they were also
tasked with ensuring the safety of the Muharraqi merchant guilds. Word spread rapidly of their
advance, and the Muharraq appealed to Hatta, their patron-city, whose rulers felt obligated to
come to Hatta’s aid, but were powerless to defeat Bharukaccha’s military forces.

Instead, negotiation would be the order of the day. The Bharuchi fleet wished to avoid an all-out
military confrontation so far from home, and in territory that was considered the Aghatsaghid
Shahdom’s backyard, and Hatta knew that in a fight the Bharuchi could lay waste to their
outlying villages and provinces. While the actual details of the negotiation are lost to history,
what is clear is that both sides walked away with their honor somewhat satisfied, but the
merchant guilds won an important victory, consolidating their monopoly on the pearl trade and
regulating the prices at which pearl divers could sell.

Such conflicts must be viewed in a proto-imperialist lens. Outfitting a fleet of large warships for a
prestige cruise around the western Indian Ocean was not, on paper, an economically profitable
decision. Muharraq was a wealthy city, but only in pearls and dates, and the incense and spices
of Arabia largely moved west, not east. However, the broader message of Chandratreya
hegemony allowed them to negotiate from a position of strength and consolidate the position of
their merchants relative to other, less naval-focused powers such as the Aghatsaghids, who in
their decline were unwilling or unable to challenge the Chandratreya at sea. Despite the
logistical difficulties and distances involved, the vassal-cities of a Deccan based dynasty were
able to threaten and control the politics of their Arabian counterparts.

Meanwhile, on the shores of another part of the Indian Ocean, the Hawiya were faced with a
dilemma. King Nefekabe presided over a declining state. Agricultural changes and erosion had
seen the agricultural production of his state decline immensely. Ethiopia, once a breadbasket,
was wracked by routine famine and old Aksum itself was left as nothing more than a ruin. The
great plantation estates which made up the backbone of the Hawiyan hydraulic despotism were
gutted and their cities shrunk. Patronage for the arts and philosophy began to dry up – however,
Hawiyan contributions to these fields would not be forgotten. Cities such as Zela were
entrepots, and even if the civilization which spawned them was declining, they remained
relevant and allowed the diffusion of Hawiyan thought – bold philosophies that mixed Jainist and
Christian teachings, and saw the birth of Hawiyan Jewish mysticism in the texts of Simon of
Harar.
Like many of their neighbors, it was tempting to drift into the Egyptian sphere of influence, and
indeed there were few alternatives. The Savahila cities were individually wealthy but many of
them were distant and in general they were preoccupied with the politics of the interior and their
own petty squabbles. India was far away and the Hadhrami were a shadow of their former
selves. Tiravazi, one of the northernmost Savahila states, was viewed as a fierce rival in any
case – Tiravasi had escaped much of the environmental degradation and was ascendant even
as the Hawiya struggled.

King Nefekabe’s son, Semakabe, would see the loss of the city of Adulis to rebellion. While he
was distracted with the rising power of the Ouds clan in the south, Adulis broke away and
despite negotiations retained a large degree of autonomy. Under a local clan leader, Geveryi
Elmidua, Adulis was able to claim independence and provide an alternative to the standardized
Hawiya customs system. Local Egyptian potentates in Berenike and Iotabe were quick to
provide monetary support to Elmidua, who converted to Christianity in 912, hoping to gain
broader Egyptian support. He adopted the Coptic language as his courtly language and gave
preferential treatment to Egyptian merchant vessels, undermining the Hawiyan attempts to
remain independent.

Hawiya still did not, however, collapse entirely. The monarchy was reduced to a rump state
around the city of Gidaya. Semakabe would be assassinated in 927, and his brother, Cawil,
would take power. The Kingdom of Gidaya, as this new, diminished Hawiya Empire became
known, was militarily weak and bound to the coast. Without control over the interior, tribalism
reigned. The decline of the Hawiya would also become an era of increased sectarianism – the
Hawiya policy of avoiding religious favoritism was abandoned as their subject tribes were
frequently swayed away from paganism and towards Christianity or Judaism.

To the north, the warlike Zanafij tribe exploited the division in Adulis and her Hawiya overlords,
coming into confederal rulership over the hinterlands between Makuria and the Hawiya. The
Zanafij were a pastoralist people, like many of the tribes under the Hawiya yoke, and their rise
merely exacerbated the already unstable ecological situation. Meanwhile, in the southeast, a
warlord by the name of Giram rose to power, claiming descent from Solomon. While he was of
Ouds extraction, through this and a general assimilation into Ethiopian culture he became
Negus of Shoa. A strong promoter of Christianity, Giram used the role of the Ethiopian church to
gain the loyalty and devotion of his subjects, campaigning against the pagan Hawiya and
Somali tribes to the south and the Jewish Zanafij to the north.

With the fall of the pagan Hawiya, Egypt rose to fill the vacuum. With Saihism on the decline as
well, Christian missionaries made new headway in gaining the conversion of local potentates.
However, this new dominance was perhaps not the coup it might have appeared to be on paper
– the very climatological shifts that allowed Egypt to come to dominate the Red Sea also
ensured that its former competitors had far less to offer than they had in past centuries. Across
Ethiopia, urban sites contracted or declined to fractions of their previous size. A Jainist
missionary visiting the region in 943, described the landscape as “a great wasteland” dotted with
religious communities and semipastoralist tribal groups. Despite the rise of the Giramid
Kingdom in the south and other isolated resurgences of sedentary agriculture later in the
century, the center of power on the East Coast would continue its inexorable shift southwards.

The High Round and

the Great Lakes

At the center of Tsaibwean political and social life was the High Round, an immense roughstone
citadel which went through several periods of expansion, most notably between 910 and 920.
Like most of its contemporaries, it was built on a mound consisting of centuries of deposits from
prior settlements – attesting to a truly ancient pattern of habitation on the same site. However, it
dwarfed its contemporaries – thick walls perhaps eight meters in height and two meters in width
at their base.

Containing brick granaries and a large palace capable of sheltering many retainers and
servants, the High Round represented a growing trend of wealth consolidation among the cattle-
herding Bantu of Tsaibwe. Rich village headsmen grew richer, and began to aggregate
additional herds under their control. Almost from the first, the Tsaibwe people had a clear notion
of property rights and strict penalties for their violation, and their culture quickly deviated from
the broader Bantu civilization. The agricultural package they utilized was fundamentally
different, and had more in common with the temperate agriculture of the Watya cape. Cattle
herding as well was marginal at best in many parts of the Bantu world, but was of critical
importance to the Tsaibwe culture – as emphasized by Tsaibwean epics such as “The Raid of
Ganhataundi” and their primordial religion, where carven cattle-totems played a significant role.

The accumulation of cattle as a tangible asset was quickly augmented by the accumulation of
other more symbolic forms of wealth – glassware from as far away as Syria, gold jewelry,
precious gems, and spices. While small private retainer-armies could be raised with the promise
of food, a roof, and some training in arms, ceremonial treasures and cattle began encouraging
many to seek the protection of local potentates and allowed the establishment of a quasi-feudal
system where local chiefs functioned not merely as traditional arbitrators of justice and inter-clan
disputes but now also as petty kings not unlike the “ring-givers” of Anglo-Dansk tradition.

At the top of this elaborate totem pole of loyalty stood the Chief of Tsaibwe, (the first of whom
was the legendary Chivarwa Nzhou) who by right of conquest dominated a truly vast territory in
a loose and decentralized union. One of the few things which enforced the great sprawl of the
Tsaibwe empire, which otherwise might have easily succumb to rebellion, was that the Nzhou
dynasty were one of the first to make widespread use of cavalry. In both monolithic reliefs and
stele dated to the late eleventh century, the victories of horse-mounted warriors are celebrated
in highly stylized graven images. Ritual images of the hunt are particularly popular as well in
these depictions, and archeological evidence suggests that even the royal cattle-herdsmen
were by the end of the century outfitted at least in part with horses.

Horse-mounted caravans tracked northwest from Tangasirabh, a coastal city state populated by
a motley mix of Izaoriakan, Tamil, and Arab merchants. Enjoying de facto independence from its
motherland, Tangasirabh grew rapidly under a policy of benign neglect and cooperation with the
local coastal tribes, with whom it organized mutually beneficial trade deals. Most of the coastal
peoples, despite being in large part cattle herders themselves, lacked quality sources of metal
that the inland Tsaibwe peoples enjoyed.

The Tsaibwe did a great trade in imported luxuries, and in return added fuel to the fire of the
gold trade, supplying vast quantities of the metal. To meet foreign demand for gold (as well as
copper, iron, and pelts) certain lords among the Tsaibwe peoples posed to take advantage of
this demand instituted a sort of corvee system. However, this should not be considered to be a
radical overhaul of the Tsaibwe society, and labor-taxation (and taxation in general) did not
become major facets of Tsaibwe society. The basic pattern of life in Iron-Age Tsaibwe was that
of the subsistence farmer who, with his extended family, worked cultivated land directly owned
by him and kept a small herd of cattle and other assorted livestock. The development of larger
urban centers sustained by sharecroppers and defended by mounted retainers was a
development which did not impact the lifestyle of the average rural agriculturalist and, due to the
laissez faire attitude of his notional rulers, would not for some time. And yet it would be foolish to
ignore the development of centralized rule and the first halting steps towards urbanization as
anything less than a paradigm shift.

The tenth century is known primarily for the Indianization of the Savahila peoples, and also
marks the beginning of the development of regional identities. The newcomers from
Bharukaccha and Kannada called in their own language the whole of the Savahila country
words which ultimately were corrupted in the Savahila tongue into “Kapudesa” or “Pazudesada”
– meaning black and west country respectively. These terms stuck, and Savahila, a corruption
of the Arab word for coast, began to fall out of favor. While historians still referred to the
“Savahila cities” it became an increasing anachronism as the cities began to assert their own
distinctive cultures, shaped by the varying immigrant communities and local tribes which
comprised their populations.

The “Kapudesa era” is characterized by the spread of the guild system and its increasing
interconnectedness with the Sreni of India. Despite the large travel times and associated risks,
links and alliances were nevertheless popular, and the politics of India came to exert a large
impact on the Savahila. Trade continued to grow, and although the availability of gold,
particularly in the hands of the Sakalava monarchy and aristocracy, was driving a curious and
never-before-seen trade imbalance and a dangerous inflationary trend, for foreign guild
merchants this was nothing but a boon whose long-term economic consequences were difficult
to predict.

The Kw’adza, a Cushitic people who dominated the highlands and the Wembere river region
were forming increasingly complex polities, absorbing fellow tribes such as the Sirikwa into their
hegemony. Advanced irrigation and cultivation techniques, learned from the Savahila, allowed
for a population boom and the displacement of hunter-gatherers and the previously advancing
Bantu tribes such as the Takama. Their tribal leaders, known as Sahs, (perhaps a corruption of
the Iranian Shah) were first unified by a semi-legendary king, Jirata, sometime in the late ninth
century. The extent of this unification is difficult to determine, and unlike the Tsaibwe, the
Cushitic peoples did not build large fortified palaces to the same scale, nor did their rulers leave
impressive monuments. Most records of the reign of Jirata conflict – perhaps implying the
existence of several kings named Jirata across the tenth century.

Jirata, like some of his predecessors, waged war against their neighbors who also traded with
the Mzishima, bringing the Ma’a and the Ruvu into his sphere of influence as tributaries – but it
seems that he had little ambition to attack the city of Mzishima or its more coastal allies. The
Mzishima forts seem to have gone unmolested – there are no records or evidence of any major
attacks against them. Jirata and his successors were clever. The easterners were wealthy and
numerous, even if they did cling to the coastlines. Jirata and his people did not make great use
of horses – the tsetse fly was too great a threat in many parts of their hegemony. Rather, their
warriors were generally equipped with throwing spears and hand axes, and their nobility went
into battle in leather and scale armor. This armor, along with innovative tactics and large-scale
population growth, particularly along the rivers, changed the power dynamic.

At once concerned and fascinated by this new possible threat, Mzishima entered into a tight
league of alliance with her neighbors, laying the foundation for the later Kapudesa Equal-
Kingdom. However, the Savahilans did not come to blows with the Kw’adza. Rather, a “Sah
Jirata” sometime around 950, according to Savahilan history, ‘accepted the great god Ishvara as
the manifestation of truth.’ Hinduism among the Mzishima, as with the rest of Savahila, was
deeply influenced by both the ecstatic and meditative form of the religion practiced among the
Izaoriaka and also a variety of devotional sects which had largely fallen out of favor on the
Hindu mainland.

Emphasizing a personal relationship with a single deity often called Ishvara, the devotional
movements had come into conflict with pluralistic and nondualistic philosophies dominant on the
subcontinent, with their dizzyingly vast pantheons and Buddhist-inspired teachings. Accordingly,
they had fled to the Western Country, where they found many eager converts and sympathizers
among the Zoroastrians and Arabian pagans as well as their own countrymen – and eventually
the peoples of the interior.

Devotionalism was a profoundly appealing religion to a ruler seeking to unify a people under a
single monarch. Just as the old gods were revealed to be aspects of the new, so were old chiefs
revealed to be aspects of the new king. While it is impossible to measure the spread of the new
religion, many of its practitioners left the comfort of the coastal cities and journeyed inland. For
the Kw’adza, it was an era of religious fervor and social upheaval.

Meanwhile, further inland and to the north, the Ganda Kingdom simultaneously had its own
mythic king (or Abakama) Murindwa, about whom even less is known. From the Bakopi clan, he
failed to establish a dynasty before being overthrown by his advisor, a commoner named
Iasaza, but he established the capital of Kakiziba on the shores of Lake Nyanza, and, according
to oral tradition, many other cities, of which little actual evidence exists. The urban settlements
of the Ganda kingdom were large compared to their neighbors, but numbered at most in the
thousands. Traditionally, local extended families linked themselves to other extended families
through ceremonial brothership, creating larger clans with leaders chosen by the patriarchs of
constituent families. These clans defined the lands in which they lived – literally, with the territory
of Busiita run by the Basiita family and so on. Urbanization had changed that notion. City-
dwelling Kings amassed power to themselves independently of these antique structures.

That Iasaza, a commoner with no particular patrimony, was able to become King is a perfect
example. He was known to the soldiers and clan leaders whose support he depended upon,
and the institution of kingship was able to transcend clan affiliation. However, this does not
mean that it transcended politics – the clan leaders on Iasaza’s death were able to choose an
heir from among his children, ignoring his interests. Still, despite migrations by the Maa people
[not to be confused with the Ma’a] and the Takama, the peoples of Nyanza were able to see off
these invaders and retain their culture, which blended some Cushitic elements with the Bantu
majority of the region. The Ganda culture was a resilient one, and by late tenth century that they
began imitating the irrigation systems of their southern neighbors. Sizable stone buildings
emerged, large meeting-halls and princely palaces, along with granaries and marketplaces.

Religious buildings, however, were absent. Religion was a matter of tradition and ancestor-
worship, and unlike the Kw’adza, the Ganda repudiated the Devotionalist missionaries who
braved disease and hardship to reach their interior country. Ruhanga, their supreme god, was
an absent figure who was not due direct worship. The Buddhist monks who they occasionally
encountered in their travels presented a more compelling set of ideas, and one which integrated
to a greater degree with their existing faith. However, unlike in Eurasia, the Buddhist
missionaries, primarily Arab, found Ganda a more inhospitable place to remain and preach, and
accordingly were few and far between. The highlands to the south were a more ideal climate,
but there monotheism already had a foothold and the Buddhists won few disciples.

The Mzishima Script

With the blossoming of the trading cities of the African coast, there was also a blossoming of the
city-dwelling classes. The first of these was the merchants. Early contact with Persian and Arab
merchants led to the fragmentary use of Semitic numerals in record-keeping along with a variety
of native-derived tally systems. However, with the rise of the merchant guilds of India, which
settled large numbers of farmers and artisans on the Eastern Coast, native merchants would
have more developed examples of record-keeping systems closer at hand, and would soon be
competing, and often out-competing, the foreign merchants by adopting their organizational
methods.

One of these was the Pachima Script [1]. This script was a variant of the scripts prevailing in
Kannada and Telugu cities at the time, which were themselves ultimately derived from the
Brahmi script of northern India. This script, like all Indian scripts, was an abugida, where vowels
(except for the implied default "a" vowel) were marked on consonants with diacritics to form
syllabic symbols. Learning this script allowed easy communication and drawing of agreements
with Indian merchants in their own languages, and soon inheritance records and state annals
too would be kept in this script. However, this script's letter inventory was not a perfect fit for the
Savahila tongue, lacking in particular symbols to distinguish nasalized consonants (mza vs za,
for example).

The Savahila tongue was itself a peculiar beast. The majority of the cities' populations were
descended from Cushitic and Bantu peoples, while successive waves of first Arab, then Perso-
Indian immigrants made up a large minority and most of the ruling classes. A dialect of Kannada
was the standard for communication among most of these cities for some time. However, this
melting pot of very distinct languages (Kannada relies exclusively on suffixes for grammar while
Bantu languages rely on prefixes, just for one example) eventually produced a more-widely
spoken vernacular, which would come to be regarded as the Savahila tongue. The conflicting
inflectional systems of each language caused a sort of simplification of the grammar - word
meaning became extremely dependent on word order and most aspects of grammatical case,
noun class, and gender were lost. The vocabulary for many basic words for daily life was a mix
of Bantu and Cushitic, combined with heavy admixtures of loanwords from Kannada, and to a
lesser degree, Arabic. This creole's character could vary a bit from city to city; northern cities like
Vayabuta tended toward Cushitic/Arabic flavored dialects, while southern cities like Mzishima
favored more Bantu/Kannada influence; but a standardized word order and key common words
kept the language intelligible between most regions. As Mzishima was far and away the largest
trading city, its tongue became standard for traders all along the Savahila Coast and would itself
be the tongue dubbed "Savahila" or "Kapudesigaru" in foreign accounts.

However, the language of daily life was not the language of official communication. With
proselytizing Hindu missionaries and priests sent to the foreign quarters of Savahila cities,
Sanskrit came along for the ride. As the ancient language of India, it was widely used as a
liturgical language but was simultaneously written in a variety of local scripts; in the Black
Lands, imported books in the Grantha[2] script of Southern India predominated in this period.
With the rise of a native Savahilan priestly and intellectual class, they too would learn Sanskrit
and with it, its associated script.

For a time, the correspondence between the Savahila cities would be conducted solely in
Sanskrit, though written in the commonly understood Pachima script [3]. The ancient tongue
had been meticulously studied and analyzed by Hindu scholars and was widely considered in
the Indian influenced sphere to be the most perfect and expressive language in the world, which
lent its users some prestige. However, with the rise of the Ishvara school of Hinduism, the shine
of Sanskrit was somewhat tarnished, as it was associated with subcontinetal schools
simultaneously perceived as "too conservative" and "too permissive". The Savahila creole was
increasingly used along with Sanskrit to compose devotional poetry to Ishvara, whose verbose,
rhapsodizing style became a popular literary form at this time and would frequently be recited
during ecstatic dances. Accordingly, the limitations of the Pachima script were increasingly
recognized.

As the coastal cities came under increasing threat from the inland empires, savvy rulers sought
to build stronger ties among them. Accordingly, the King of Mzishima, Paramashvara [4],
commissioned the then-unknown scholar Fahamo to create a rational script for the Savahila
tongue. The resultant Mzishima script was adapted from the stylized variant of the Pachima
script that had become dominant at the time, but incorporated additional letters to represent
sounds that were not present in Indian tongues, such as the "f" and "o" sounds in Fahamo's own
name. The resulting script, with innovations such as underscoring to link consonant clusters,
became standard for all official correspondence and private business in the Mzishiman League
and Fahamo would immediately a develop a reputation that would only be the start of a famous
career to come...[5]

His less famous patron would, however, help guarantee Fahamo would have a legacy across
the Black Lands; the occasion was used by Paramashvara to codify the city's unwritten
constitution into a formalized written one (which just so happened to place his extended family
in a better standing in certain major office inheritance issues), engraved in the new script on an
obelisk in the city center. The script was soon adopted in the second-largest city, Vayabuta, as
the more Arabic-influenced population there had never had quite as much appreciation for
Indian culture, and would see increasing use in the remaining Savahila cities as well. As the
script was also well-suited to other languages of the Coast, a variant known as Lekavao ("new
writing") soon became popular among the Izaorika as well. Adoption was much slower among
the inland peoples, however. Not only were the inland polities less developed overall and
therefore less in need of a script generally, but their languages were also predominantly tonal
Bantu languages, and the Mzishima script was itself imperfect for representing this. The scripts
which would later become common in the interior would correct for this with an extensive set of
diacritics, but this would be a development that would come much later... The predecessing
Pachima script, however, would not actually die out, but would continue to see use for centuries
in increasingly stylized forms as Sanskrit's liturgical script in the Black Lands.

And, some pictures of the full script and selected words written in it. Starred characters are
invented ones not present in the original old Kannada.

[1] Derived from the Kannada word for "West".

[2] A real script, commonly used among the people of South India in liturgy.

[3] As was common elsewhere in the Indianized sphere, like SE Asia.

[4] Sanskrit for "Great Ishvara".

[5] I envision Fahamo as something of a polymath Archimedes-type, this culture's first.

The City and the

Vihara
The city of Narayanaksherta was founded on the northern bank of the river Godavari where it
met the sea. Settled and planned by the Andhran guilds on top of an existing urban formation
whose name is lost to history, its position at the mouth of a great river invariably allowed it to
become wealthy off of tolls and eventually to prosper as a hub of manufacturing. By 915, what
had once been a small Brahmin dominated village had become a major guild center with a large
degree of autonomy from the rest of the Andhran Equal-Kingdom. The Viceroy of
Narayanaksherta enjoyed a meteoric rise in power with the fortunes of his regime, a rise that did
not go unnoticed. Soon the Maharaja of Andhra (a largely ceremonial and military position
chosen from among prominent ayat patriarchs) turned on Naranda, the Uparika of
Narayanaksherta.

Vengipura, the royal seat and the seat of the guild councils, was far less opportunely placed to
take advantage of the economic changes happening in Andhra. The old guard who did not
embrace this new city on the Godavari – a motley assortment of landowning elites, Brahmin,
and the warrior-guilds – were felt threatened by its new power. However, for some time they
merely fumed in silence. Vengipura was old, and prestigious, the very heart of the region. Long
renowned as a cultural center and home to many beautiful temples and libraries, it was only with
the departure of the renowned artist Dayarama, a symbolic blow to the city’s prestige, that the
guilds and Vengipuran gentry united as one and took action.

Frustrated, the guilds of Vengipura decided to demand an increased tax from Narayanaksherta,
a tax which they intended to appropriate for projects to serve their own capital and its environs.
However, in an impassioned speech, Uparika Naranda brought the local administrations of
many other cities, such as Addanki and stone cut Orukalla onto his side – appealing to
particularist tendencies within the regional councils. The power to tax, he argued, was an aspect
of royal authority. But royal authority was not merely in the hands of the King, but every official
beneath the King who was effectively a representation of that authority as well. Just as a man’s
head could not turn on his arm and destroy it, neither too could the King turn on his arms and
seek to destroy them. And furthermore, the body of royal authority was a fundamentally unified
thing. There could be no disparities in taxation – whatever one portion of the body suffered, all
parts must suffer equally. The details of Naranda’s speech are lost, but a summation remains,
and it would become known as Naradvaka, an ideology of radical particularism which would
undermine the authority of the state to a large degree.

His arguments swayed the majority of the council and forced the Vengipuran “Royalist” faction
to abandon their designs. Unlike in the north, there was never an Andhran equivalent of the
goshthi movement – power remained directly concentrated in the hands of communities.
However, where the goshthi of the north encouraged centralization and a strengthening of royal
power, the Andhrans, under Naranda, diluted royal power into irrelevance through ideology.
Indeed, it is perhaps erroneous to speak of an Andhran Kingdom. Vengipura represented a seat
of formal power and the atrophied post-Maukhani bureaucracy. However, Narayanaksherta
became the economic capital, bringing into its orbit the port city of Vishakapatnam to its north
and the inland city of Vinukonda.
This rough coalition often found itself in a cold war with Vengipura, especially as Vinukonda
itself had ancient pedigree as a capital under the Pallava kings and one of the few fortress-cities
of the region never to fall under Maukhani control. While outright war was avoided, the guild-
armies of Vengipura were not above occasional raids or illegal “tax collecting” along the
Godavari.

In earlier times this situation might have resulted in outside intervention, but the Andhrans were
fortunate. The great titans to their west were locked in their own conflict. The Chandratreya and
the Chola had their own proxy wars and contests in the Deccan to attend to. Only the country of
Utkaladesha [Odisha] remained as a threat. Sometimes known as the Trikalinga Republic, the
name had increasingly fallen out of fashion because of local sentiments encouraged by local
artists and poets of the goshthi movement. Writing in their native language, these poets
emphasized their unique heritage. As with many regions of India, the culture of Utkaladesha
was distinct, with its own dance, canon of literature, and religion, a notable feature being the
worship of the tribal deity Jagannath as “Lord of the Universe.”

However, Utkaladesha had their own concerns and internal strife. The ideas of the
Pancharajya’s goshthi movement had been spread by wandering teachers and holy men from
Vijayapura in the north, and as it had along the cities of the Ganges, the goshthi movement
challenged the authority of the guilds. The texts of Aparaka, the famous legal scholar[1], were
disseminated among the monks of Pushpagiri. However, where the Gangetic goshthi had
enjoyed the support of a long-established bureaucracy and various state apparatuses
endangered by the guilds, in Utkaladesha the guilds had primarily threatened the indigenous,
unassimilated tribes of the region.

Since the expansion of guild power had begun in earnest, the tribal societies had been
devastated by guild land reform and many had been forced to move to the cities. However, they
had retained a distinct identity and many had turned to the Jagannath temples which dotted the
region for economic and spiritual support. The greatest of these tribes, the Kondha, would by
the dawn of the tenth century be almost entirely converted.[2]

It was through the network of the Jagannath cultic temples that the Kondha Rebellions, as they
became known, would be organized. In 911, a six-year war between Utkaladesha and
Vijayapura came to an end. With the help of the Pancharajya, Vijayapura and the famous Gurjar
mercenary general Sarabha won an impressive victory over the disorganized armies of
Utkaladesha and forced them to sign a humiliating peace treaty. While the war itself was an on-
and-off affair, prosecuted by an Utkaladeshi administration that feared losing recently acquired
trade rights in Vanga, it led to considerable unrest as peasants were levied from the countryside
to fill out depleted armies and the final defeat saw the burden of the indemnity placed
disproportionately upon the marginalized communities who were poorly represented in the Ayat.

Four years later, the first of Kondha Rebellions would break out – riots in cities overwhelmed the
guild armies, still not wholly recovered from the war. Irregular bands of rebels in the deeply
forested interior regions wreaked havoc and the Utkala regime found themselves struggling.
While the guilds knew that the Jagannath temples were at least complicit in the rebellion, many
among the guilds were devout followers as well, or at least feared the public reaction should
they appear to persecute the faith.

The rebellion was only just brought under control, and none of the underlying issues were
addressed. The guilds still controlled the government and denied the common people any
representation in the Ayat, using their legislative powers to maintain control and accrue further
land for themselves at the expense of traditional tribal confederacies. Smaller rebellions would
break out in 927 and 941, but the fourth, in 947, would be another uprising on a similar scale to
the first. Indravarma, the Maharaja of Utkala, would be killed in battle against rebels in the
interior, and the state would collapse into relative anarchy for a period.

The rebellion of 947 represented an existential threat to the guilds. Reduced to a smattering of
cities on the coasts, they bit their tongues and appealed to the Chola monarchs for aid, striking
treaties which left them deeply indebted to the southern dynasty. The following year, as
campaign season came on, the tide turned. The guilds now possessed large mercenary armies,
composed of soldiers from as far away as Izaoriaka. They armed their soldiers with fire spears,
and hired the son of their famous adversary Sarabha to command their armies. Named
Vijayaditya, he popularized a revolutionary defensive formation which destroyed the less
organized rebel armies.

The first rank of soldiers carried conventional spears and large wooden shields. If the enemy
were to charge, they would crouch while the second braced with fire-spears over their
shoulders. As their foes drew close, or perhaps even engaged with the first rank, the second
rank would ignite their spears and respond with a blast of shrapnel[3] and flame.

Impressive revolutions in military technology aside, the ultimate guild victory was a hollow one.
Despite near-total triumph, they finally recognized that further rebellions were inevitable without
compromise. Key tribal leaders and members of the Jagannath priesthood were invited into the
Great Ayat. While much of the credit for this eventual compromise must go to the Kondha, it is
worth noting that the thirty years of rebellion saw slow cultural changes as well. The guilds were
largely Buddhist, and many of the prominent Buddhist viharas such as Pushpagiri unashamedly
embraced the goshthi movement, leading to a change in the common perception of how guilds
should interact with the people, one which eventually translated into policy.

[1] From the previous post about the Goshthi movement.

[2] No, converted isn’t really the best word, given the fact that this is the dharmic religious
tradition and even alt-Jagannath worship is a remarkably pluralistic thing with loose rules about
conversion. However, it’s the easiest way to express what I’m trying to say.

[3] Vijayaditya’s writings on his campaign and descriptions of the fire-spears correspond to the
work of the polymath Meikanda, who described the evolution of the fire-spear from a terror
weapon to a device which hurled nails and splinters of metal at close range. This is effectively
the precursor to the hand-cannon, the first depictions of which come from Gandhara circa 1020,
where they were used as a way of negating superior numbers of elephant cavalry employed by
the Dauwa Maharajas. The invention of the hand cannon would truly change warfare, although it
would be another hundred years before gunpowder weapons saw widespread introduction on
the battlefield. There is some debate as to whether or not the hand-cannon is actually a Chinese
invention based on a fire-spear brought back by the traveling Buddhist monk Sima Kuang - a
debate fostered by inaccuracies in the depiction of the Gandharan cannons, and far more
detailed Chinese histories of their use against the Kitai roughly contemporaneously.

[I'm impressed that I created such a monster completely by accident, Hobelhouse!

Next post will move entirely around the world.]

Also, a guest post on

writing in Eastern Europe!

The Khirichan Script and the lands of the Rus

The Khirichan, while theoretically Turkish, reflected a melting pot of steppe peoples; this was
illustrated by the fact that the main language used in the Khagan's realm was Sahu, an Iranic
dialect. One legacy of the Khaganate's diverse origins shone through in its writing system. The
Turkish peoples had always had a closer relationship with the northern peoples of Central Asia
than the more southerly ones like those who would fall under the Eftal Shahdom; accordingly,
they had been converted to Buddhism through contact with the Tocharians, an Indo-European
people who controlled the northern half of the Tarim Basin in close alliance with the Tibetans [1].
Thus, their religious texts tended to be predominately written in the Tocharian script, a far-flung
derivative of the Brahmi script of India. This script would be adopted in record-keeping as Sahu
mercantile interests expanded and the Turko-Iranian culture settled down into proper cities.
Eventually, a descendant of this Tocharian script, which included a few extra letters derived from
Turkish runes [2], would become standard in the Khagan's realm.

Inevitably this meant that peoples in the Khirichan sphere would soon adopt this script as well.
The Xasars were among the first, though literacy itself was lightly spread in Pannonia due to the
general devastation wrought during the Votive Wars and subsequent Khirichan reconquest.
North and East, Slavic tribes inhabited the great forests. Many had assimilated to the
Gardaveldi, but they were far too numerous to be completely absorbed by the Norse. The
Byalarus and the Chernarus [3] in particular would be brought into the Khirichan sphere,
syncretizing the Slavic religion with elements of Buddhist and Tengri thought. Soon their rulers
would even be styling themselves "Khan" (with deference to the Great Khagan in Pianjikand, of
course). A Rus holy man known as Bod Yivan is credited with adapting the Khirichan script to
the Rus' language, though it seems likely he merely popularized a pre-existing transliteration, as
works in multiple systems of transliteration have been discovered from the era prior to the rapid
spread of the Yivanic system.
The unknown inventor of the Brahmi script must have had little idea that the descendants of the
writing system he invented would one day be used at both the northernmost and southernmost
parts of the world...

The March of Latin and the Western Slavs

With the conversion of Moravia to Catholicism, an adaptation of the Latin Alphabet for the
Moravian language had been devised by Saint Hadrian[4], missionary at the court of the
Moravian king. This script resembled the standard Latin alphabet used in the Frankish Empire,
with a few modified letters to express the distinctive sounds not present in western languages.
As the languages of the Western Slavs were rather similar, especially at this earlier date, the
system was quickly adopted by other Slavic peoples in the area as well. The Latin alphabet
would be popular among the Wends and Pomeranians, and even among the Poles the attempt
by King Czresimir, son of Czcibor, to promote a Khirichan-derived script alongside the Buddhist
religion was a dismal failure; even Buddhist works would be written and translated into the
Hadrianic Latin script in this period. The gravitational pull of Western culture was too strong; if
Slavs wanted to read works of scholarship or philosophy, they would be far more likely to obtain
copies from the libraries of Aachen, Medilano[5], or Bernau [6] rather than from the far-flung
centers of Buddhist scholarship.

[1]OTL the Tocharians disappeared by the 8th century but here it seems likely they'd stick
around.
[2]The Sahu are Iranian in origin but the Turkish influence is rather heavy.
[3] OTL proto-Belarusians/Ruthenians and proto-South Great Russians respectively. I imagine
northern Great Russians are gravitating more towards the Norse.
[4]TTL's equivalent of Saints Cyril and Methodius. I envision the orthography of Moravian would
look something between that of German and Polish. Old Church Slavonic is never devised due
to the body blows Greek culture has taken TTL.
[5]Milan
[6]Brno, capital of Moravia

A New Ispana

Perhaps no construction emphasizes the wealth and splendor of Frankish Hispania than the
terraced gardens of the Palace of Lions. Architectural styles in the south embraced the Isidorian
innovations, divorcing themselves from the heavy Romanesques of earlier eras. The standard of
living among the landed gentry was very high indeed – Hispania, or as it was increasingly called
in the local dialect, Ispana, was one of the wealthiest regions of western Europe.

However, all was in turmoil beneath the surface. Emperor Alyosius passed away in 886, and the
title of Emperor passed to his son, Alyosius II. However, a proper coronation would necessitate
a massive armed pilgrimage of sorts to Rome.[1] To distract and appease the other potential
claimant, Aloysius gifted the title King of Hispania to his half-brother, Thierico, much to the anger
of the grandees, who rightfully assumed that a new, local, monarch would mean increased
meddling in their affairs.

On top of all this, Thierico would quickly prove to be a tyrannical and unpleasant ruler. He
confiscated several estates in central Ispana, on which he built the Palace of Lions. Greater
even than the royal residences in Aachen and Rome, the Palace of Lions became a boondoggle
project which drained the royal coffers. Coincidentally, several important figures in the Ispanian
administration were arrested on charges of corruption and only escaped trial by making
elaborate formal apologies and providing significant sums of money under the table. However,
in 902, the Palace of Lions was finally complete, and the grandees of the realm were called to
gather and celebrate its completion with a spectacular royal feast.

According to legend, the Feast of the Palace is when all of Thierico’s real troubles began. A
large party of grandees had long been discontent with his heavy-handedness and overbearing
dominion. However, during the feast, Thierico’s son Pepin the Golden, was caught in the midst
of an affair with the wife of the Duke of Valentia. The Duke, in a fit of rage, murdered Pepin and
subsequently fled the Palace with his retainers. Despite the notional legality of murdering a man
in such conditions, especially with witnesses who could attest to the truth of the matter, Thierico
called for the Duke to stand trial, and sent armed retainers to bring him before the court.

The Duke was ultimately captured and tried and ordered to pay an exorbitant blood-price, a
matter which reminded the Ispanian grandees of Thierico’s previous excesses and avarice.
Thereafter, the Ispanian monarchy lost the allegiance of most of their nobles – aristocrats
across the country began refusing to pay taxes or support the monarch. For a time, King
Thierico’s power did not extend beyond the Palace grounds. An unwanted monarch, he
struggled to gain the loyalty of his supposed vassals. By 904, he would acquire for himself a few
ambitious supporters, sufficient that he could start arresting and confiscating the property of
those who defied him.

This move merely led to a state of de facto war, with bands of armed retainers clashing across
the countryside. Thierico appealed to his brother the Emperor for support, but Aloysius II
ignored his appeals. Aloysius II was incredibly paranoid and deeply preoccupied. It would not be
until 910 and the ascension of Aloysius III that Thierico would receive any support – mostly
because the situation had continued to deteriorate beyond what the Emperor in Aachen could
accept.

For the next twenty years, a low intensity conflict would rage across Ispana, attracting royal
attention at times but generally flying under the radar. Both the Royalist and Ducalist factions,
however, finding their own retainers to be of generally poor quality, began hiring Berber
mercenaries. At first, it seemed like a perfect plan. As kingdoms coalesced in North Africa,
armed camps of Berbers seeking asylum and safety from the long arm of their own regional
kings became increasingly common. Caravan raiders and marginalized tribes alike found their
world increasingly precarious, and found that war-torn Ispana offered the best opportunity for
them to not abandon their warlike lifestyle.

However, these Berber armies were frequently little more than brutal raiders with little regard for
sides or “the honorable conduct of war” – as one Ispanian writer and aristocrat put it. Over the
next twenty years, the rich countryside would be plundered during three major conflicts, and the
ranks of the Franco-Ispanian nobility would be thinned by war and attrition. Berber soldiers
began settling, often unofficially, in the region, taking local land and wives from among the
Ispanian population.

Recognizing the anarchy in Ispana, the Frankish army under Aloysius III was deployed on three
separate occasions to support his uncle. Each time, it encountered almost no resistance. The
Berber armies would melt away into the countryside, the Ispanian nobles would claim innocence
or ignorance, and the frustrated Emperor would be compelled to return home empty-handed,
frustrated by the feuding on his doorstep. The most successful campaign, in 916, however,
would see the Emperor finally bring to trial and ultimately execution several major nobles on
charges of treason. Finally, with the Concordant of Cordoba in 918, the warring ended. A council
of grandees was created to safeguard the rights of the nobility, and the monarchy was
maintained with more limited powers. No-one was satisfied, but mutual exhaustion compelled
peace, and Thierico’s death the next year would solidifying that peace. His infant son Aloysius
Posthumous would be enthroned as king and his father’s most staunch enemies would be
among his regents.

But the bloodshed had just begun. The Berbers refused to simply return home. Many had
cultivated lives and land among this new home of theirs, and few had anything awaiting them in
Africa. At worst many could expect execution, and at best they would have to return to a life of
marginal herding or caravan escorting. They represented a warrior class numbering in the
thousands, heavily armed and for the first time without employ. The Ispanian aristocracy made a
fatal miscalculation by attempting to force the matter – they lacked the ability to enforce their
proclamations and their armies turned on them in 923, led by a woman named Tazengat.

Tazengat remains perhaps the most enigmatic figure of the era. A female Berber mercenary
captain, she in particular earned the ire of the nobles under whom she served, leading to a wide
range of rumors and slanders cultivated against her, most notably that she was in an incestuous
relationship with her brother and that through this relationship she somehow gained the powers
of pagan witchcraft.

Whatever the truth, Tazengat was quick to join the rebellion of 923, and emerged as a potent
and charismatic leader whose swift military victories allowed a slave’s daughter to become the
de facto ruler of much of Tarraconensis. Along with her brother Aleset, she won a major victory
at Nasconia against Emperor Aloysius III. While it was a hard-fought battle, the Frankish army
was exhausted from a rapid march south and on the muddy field they became bogged down
and less maneuverable than the light Berber troops, who defeated them in detail.
A member of the Hawwaya tribe, Tazengat remained a devotee of the Berber god Idir,
something which appealed to the rank and file of Berbers but alienated the Ispano-Roman
people and ultimately undermined any respect she might have been able to gain from them.
Successful Berber captains typically embraced Christ and in doing so were far more acceptable
as retainers and bodyguards for Spanish lords, and ultimately as grandees and landholders in
their own right.

However, in the interim, Tazengat moved from strength to strength. It was said that she captured
the town of Girona with only two hundred men, and myths of her invincibility grew. She bathed in
the blood of pigs and took part in satanic orgies with her soldiers. Every day she drank the
venom of a poisonous snake so that her very blood became death to whoever might shed it.
The legends grew more elaborate and more horrifying.

The Dukes of Ispana gathered together their armies and raised fresh forces from among the
Berbers of the south, including a company of two thousand light cavalrymen led by the
charismatic and capable warlord Azenqad, a fugitive bandit-king fleeing the Masamida
hegemony. Much to the pleasure of the Dukes, Azenqad was more than willing to show favor to
Christianity and indeed allow the mass-baptism of his men. With Tarraconensis and Valentia
both devastated by fighting, it was land from these two regions which the Ispanian Dukes
offered as payment to the Berber forces under their command.

Tazengat’s lack of support would be her undoing. Pursued from the south and eventually from
the north by Aquitanian nobles – particularly the Doux of Toulouse and his famous heavy
cavalry, she waged asymmetric warfare across the Pyrenees, staging mountain ambushes and
protracted sieges. In the end, she would be defeated. Her brother was, in a notably grisly series
of events, captured, tortured half to death, impaled, burnt, and then finally decapitated. However
Tazengat’s body would never be recovered or identified, leading to her becoming a folk tale and
children’s bogeyman for centuries to come.

The economic consequences of several decades of off-and-on warfare were significant.

Peasants lost a significant portion of their autonomy and rights as they sought increased
protection, while at the same time many major noble estates were destroyed, leaving small
nobles in previously marginal regions perhaps the greatest beneficiaries. Fortification projects
became commonplace, with city walls undergoing repair and expansion, and castles replacing
villas across Ispana. Overall, the Ispanian peninsula came to resemble the rest of Europe to a
greater degree.

Culturally, the Royalist-Ducalist war marked the end of a golden age of artistic achievement in
vernacular. Monastic art continued apace, but the pastoral, idealistic poetry of the landed gentry
was strangled in its crib, and what would follow was profoundly influenced by the decades of
anarchy and disorder. Art, music, and literature all focused on the fragility of human life and the
fact of mortality – some of the greatest works of the era focus on trying to reconcile Christian
teachings with the trauma and violence of the civil war.
[1] This will be covered in a later post.
A Land Ignored

Kapudesa funded maritime missions to circumvent Africa stopped entirely by the first decade of
the 10th century. Quite simply, there was no justification or funding for such elaborate voyages.
The Kings of the Savahila had new threats and opportunities far closer to home – Tsaibwe and
Ganda were far more immediate, and far more profitable. Even Izaoriaka, who had found the
settling of Watya to be an enormous boon, saw little reason to go up the disease-ridden coast in
search of gold. As far as they were concerned, they stood in the country of gold and diamonds
already. At tremendous human cost to the disorganized native inhabitants, the Randryan
aristocracy extracted vast quantities of the precious stones, enough to drive the value down and
give Izaoriaka yet another epithet – the diamond isle.

For those who came too late to engage in profitable mining, there was still great expanses of
fertile land – huge territories inhabited only by primitive agriculturalists whose violent
displacement was inevitable against armed and armored Watyan slavers on horseback. Issues
of legality and ownership which occasionally bothered the Savahila in their own colonial
expansion were ignored. Land claims, the general consensus went, were a matter of dispute
between equals. Once dispersed, the natives lost their lands which often became plantations for
cider-apples and a domesticated strain of the ‘medicinal’ herb redbush.

In short, there was no motivation to go beyond. By sea, to the immediate north of the “honey
cider cape” lay an arid coastal plain populated by San hunter-gatherers. Overland there was
nothing but desert for many miles. When the arid plains finally gave way, they gave way to
dense tropical forest and the specter of disease. The Bantu peoples of the Congo River basin
had assembled small, disunited village polities which lacked interest in maritime matters and
equally critically were unaware of any opportunities beyond their shores. If they had indeed
made any contact with the Watya or the Savahila[1], they could not offer safe harbor or any
organized system of provisioning ships – any major population centers were concentrated
inland, along the Lualaba River. Beyond there, there was no centralized power capable of
reacting to outside context events, and the people of the Lualaba had only a faint notion of what
lay to their east, and were broadly ignorant of the Congo basin.

However, although for all intents and purposes Western Africa stopped existing in the collective
awareness of the east, its contact with the west was only growing. A trickle of trade and visitors
would still come overland, up past Ganda and making use of Daju caravans to reach Kanem,
but these visitors were extraordinary and rarely motivated by financial reward. For some, it was
the chance to teach the Devotionalist Hinduism or Buddhism they practiced. For others, it was a
simple matter of exploration and discovery – an ambition that would cost no small number their
lives.

Old Gods and New Secrets

A traveler to Ghana in the middle to late years of the ninth century would have found it a city
seemingly at its prime. A Mauri merchant, Isenrases[2] who visited in 860 characterized it as a
town of bustling marketplaces and urban sprawl, lavish palaces and sacred gardens. He spoke
of the Cisse Kings as being venerated like gods, and groves built within the city where
sorcerers[3] lived. Speaking of the monarchy, he described the luxury of the court like such:

"The King adorns himself like a woman wearing necklaces round his neck and bracelets on his
forearms and he puts on a high cap decorated with gold and wrapped in a turban of fine cotton.
He holds an audience in a domed pavilion around which stand ten horses covered with gold-
embroidered materials…and on his right, are the sons of the vassal kings of his country,
wearing splendid garments and their hair plaited with gold. At the door of the pavilion are dogs
of excellent pedigree. Round their necks they wear collars of gold and silver, studded with a
number of balls of the same metals."

However, Ghana was in the process of losing its absolute control over the trade that had made it
rich. As horses became more and more commonplace, the edge provided to the Soninke by
their cavalry superiority diminished. Increasingly, other cities, such as Djenne, Kugha, Takrur,
and Gao opened their doors to Taureg merchant caravans, and established their own relations
with the gold-producing regions to the south. The extent to which this was a violent transition is
uncertain. What is certain is that the Ghanan monopoly, once compromised, would never be
restored. As soon as cities realized that they could undercut the Cisse monarchy’s prices and
get away with it, they did so and the Taureg profited immensely from the new competition.

One notable transition in urban life, both along the sweeping arc of the Niger and otherwise,
was the building of major walled settlements. Even the great city of Ghana itself had begun as a
sort of unofficial meeting-place, but new defensive concerns prompted a spate of fortification.
Without the assurance of Ghanan hegemony, settlements could not afford to move with
changes in trade patterns, and local leaders needed a single, centralized seat of power. Of
these new cities, Gao was perhaps the greatest rival, and by the dawn of the tenth century it
was at least the size of Ghana.

Meanwhile, to the east, the Kanem Empire, with its capital at Nijimi, had built a strong
relationship with two of the less settled peoples nearby – the northern Hawwara of Libya, and
the eastern Daju. Neither of these groups were truly centralized states – while the Hawwara had
monarchs, their power did not stretch far beyond the Mediterranean coasts, and the Daju were
organized into collections of extended familial groups. However, Christianity, of the Coptic form
worshipped in Egypt, had gained a potent foothold among the Daju – a people often employed
by the Coptic Makurians as guides and escorts through the desert. By contrast, while there were
some converts among the Hawwara, they found it easier to do business without the burden of
conversion, and generally maintained their traditional gods and avoided proselytism.

The Kanem monarchs, or Mais, had long cultivated an image of their own divinity and were
worried about the influence of the “northern missionaries” who came with the Daju. However, for
a long time they did not act against them for fear of upsetting the flow wealth that concentrated
in their hands. Matters would only come to a head in 874, when an Coptic Christian missionary
reported that the monarch gathered all who lived beneath his protection to him and demanded
that they “prostrate themselves before their King and God and make obeisance to a collection of
idols. Those Christians that refused were slaughtered in great numbers and the Daju made to
flee the city.” It seems that many Hawwara fled as well, fearing that their safe conduct was no
longer assured. While we have only Christian records of the event, it does seem that some sort
of systematic persecution occurred, and descriptions of the zoomorphic idols paraded through
the cities match to some degree archeological finds in the region.

With this blow against the Christian Daju, the Kanem Empire found itself somewhat imperiled. It
did not, as sometimes is assumed, rule over a homogenous group but rather over “many
nations alike” and thus only a small portion of the population could be called upon to go to war
in the name of the Mai. However, with the hope of restoring the trade networks, Mai Kakarah led
his cavalry into the uneven country of the Daju, devastating many villages and obtaining the
submission of many more. Much of Daju country was brought into the Kanem Empire, and
magistrates were placed over it. In spite of these victories, trade volume would not increase
substantially. The Kanem cavalry were more than capable of outmatching any local foe, but they
could not compel the Makurians to trade with them, and after the “Martyrdom of Nijimi” the
Makurians even discussed the notion of sending an army through Daju territories to attack
Kanem itself – a notion quickly dismissed after the distances involved were considered.

In general, Makuria could survive the loss of a trade route. They had other sources of mercantile
wealth, and a sufficiently centralized government that a loose embargo could easily be upheld.
Kanem, however, suffered. The monarchy had lost significant prestige and underground
Christian communities still survived more or less intact. Roughly fifty years later, in 926, the Mai
of Kanem would be overthrown by a man named Selma, a Christian and a Berber[4] who
proclaimed himself “Apostle” and conquered Nijimi after the defection of most of the Kanem
army.

Kanem Christianity was quite syncretic, synthesizing ideas and practices from a wide range of
sources – mostly their own animism, but also possibly Ishvara-worshipping missionaries from
the southern routes, and perhaps most importantly the egotism of Selma. Indeed, Mai Selma,
after taking power, declared himself a reincarnation of John the Baptist, born to deliver the new
Christ into the world. Given the precipitous economic decline of the Kanem state, his rhetoric
was not immediately dismissed by all. Even after Selma’s death and the rise of the Akurid
dynasty, millennialism would remain a foundation of Kanem Christianity, a deeply heterodox
institution.

Selma, however, was not the only religious reformer of the era. By the middle of the tenth
century, Christianity was known across the Sahel region. Despite a limited number of
practitioners, it nevertheless was viewed as an exotic foreign faith of great interest to the
learned – perhaps as much for its repudiation of the divine Ghanan kingship as anything else. In
the city of Gao, a Jeli poet-historian named Nakhato had begun preaching a revolutionary new
religion. For most of the history of Mande religion, the Supreme Being had been an abstraction,
far removed from daily life. The worship of ancestors, lesser gods, and the institution of the
monarchy had predominated. However, Nakhato would preach a radical new philosophy.

The organization Nakhato created was in many senses a mystery cult. New devotees had to
proceed through a series of initiation rituals and secret rites designed to promote community
and bring his new faithful closer to an understanding of the Supreme Being through any one of a
variety of human or animal “aspects”. The Supreme Being, or Ngala-Nyama, was now given
direct worship, and considered to abide in all things, being the essence of the tere (soul) and the
lesser gods who were his servants.

The religion at first had little appeal outside the urban communities of Gao, but over the course
of the century it would spread, particularly because as a secret cult it had a strong appeal to
those who wished to subvert Ghanan hegemony. Further, ambitious local leaders who wished to
embrace the cult did not need to entirely abandon their support of more traditional religious
societies – the Ngala-Nyama worshippers were more than willing to embrace those.

[1] It is unclear if they did so, or if the only people they made contact with were the Ukwu.

[2] The “Mauri merchant” is actually a text from Al-Bakri, a tenth century Arab traveler quoted in
the “Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History.”

[3] Either members of an indigenous priesthood, or perhaps the traveling historians and poets
known as “jeli.”

[4] According to some accounts. However, the word for Berber was occasionally used by those
who visited Kanem to refer to any pastoralist tribesman.

The Ten Thousand Families of the Steppe

The bitter famine of 876 had a negative impact on peoples other than the Uighur. The Kipchak,
residing on the westernmost borders of the Uighur hegemony, would migrate south through
Turkestan, seeking better pastures and richer lands. However they were stymied in their
western trajectory by the Oghuz, and instead were forced to turn south towards the Tarim basin.
Passing from their traditional homelands into the arid countryside, they were forced to adopt an
aggressive stance towards those they encountered to sustain themselves. Almost from their
arrival, they found that the region was also suffering from drought, and their herds continued to
die as they progressed southwards.

The city-states of the region had long been under the hegemony of the Bod Empire, but Tibetan
power had atrophied, and there are records of various Tocharian cities paying tribute to avoid
attacks by the Kipchak. This is not to say that the Kipchak migration was peaceful – there are
also records of several monasteries and towns coming under attack, although these records
may well have served a propagandistic role and been designed to inflame hatred against the
Kipchaks. Without the Bod to ensure their protection, the Kipchak Khaganate, and their “Ten
Thousand Families” were more than capable of passing through the region with impunity.

The Kipchak Khaganate, however, did not remain long. By 910 they were once again on the
move. Their rule over the Tarim Basin seems to have been light and parasitic – farmers were in
some regions displaced and taxes levied, but overall they governed with a gentle hand and
merely sustained themselves off the largesse of the region before moving on to richer lands.
The reason cannot be known for sure, but it can be speculated – the wealth of India was
immense, and lay but a few mountain passes away. Furthermore, it is reported that the herds of
the Kipchak and their traditional way of life had never wholly recovered from the damage of 876.
While they refused to settle down themselves, the benefits were becoming increasing obvious.

Despite the difficulty of the journey, the Kipchak Khagan, Shequi, sent several of his sons and
retainers to scout the country beyond the Tibetan country of Ladvag. Bod garrisons had once
manned the passes, but their fortifications had fallen into disrepair – in no small part thanks to
Tibetan soldiers being reassigned to the eastern frontier. What these early scouts found was
opportunity – and beyond the great mountains, legendary wealth. Gandhara was vibrant and
prosperous, a power in its own right and (relatively) newly freed from the Aghatsaghid yoke.

When Shequi’s sons returned to him according to a record kept by the Chinese historian Huien,
a mendicant visiting the Kashgari court, they said: “Great Khagan our father, this is a good land
that lies before us. From the high peaks that grasp at Blue Heaven to the fields of the valleys it
is a country enameled in silver and gold. If you but stretch out your arm the whole country shall
be its shadow.”

The youngest of the sons, however, and the one beloved by Shequi the most, cautioned against
the venture. He warned that it would not be easy, and that they might find themselves too
weakened to rule even in victory. The cities of Gandhara were old, and age brought them
strength and long experience. These people had broken the back of the Herati Aghatsaghids –
an empire without peer. Caution should be their watchword. However, he was outmatched by
his elder brothers. The Silk Road was all but broken, and the wealth coming West from the
Northern Kingdom was a pittance. They could never grow truly rich lording over the petty cities
of the Tarim.

In 911, Shequi led an expedition in force into Gandhara, and although he gained the allegiance
of several mountain clans, and managed to bring his army across the pass without incident, the
Gandharans had an entire year to prepare, and plenty of advance warning from loyal allies
among the local rulers. The ensuing battle would occur in an unidentified place known to history
only as Nainsukh. What we do know, from the history, is that neither side was able to bring but a
fraction of their full forces to battle. Shequi had been forced into the uncomfortable position
where retreat would mean an abandonment of the campaign entirely, and the Gandharans had
nothing to lose by simply waiting him out. They made to construct ramparts blocking a nearby
pass, and Shequi was forced to attack in force with his most heavily armored men –
dismounted, against their custom.
The Gandharan commander, Sankarwarma Bitihrota, a guild-captain of great renown,
personally lead the defense, and fighting was vicious. Arrows littered the hillside and
Sankarwarma and his men held at great cost – however later that afternoon, when Shequi made
yet another attempt to breach the lines, the entire unit, excepting the captain and his
bodyguards, had been replaced entirely. In this fashion, both sides fought a piecemeal battle for
the better part of the day, before a scout found an alternate route, and Shequi moved half his
force off early the next morning, aiming to encircle the Gandharan army.

This might even have worked, except a group of locals had laid an ambush against the
vanguard of the flanking army – thinking it a small force and knowing that the loot in horses and
armor alone could make them rich. The vanguard, thinking they were attacked by a far greater
force retreated, and stalled. Not knowing the terrain and finding themselves hampered by still
semi-dark conditions and rough ground, they delayed the better part of the day.

Sankarwarma, oblivious to the flanking attempt for the time being, counter-attacked the
Kipchaks, eventually overrunning their formations and driving them in disorder towards a fast-
moving river, where their retreat became a compromised disaster. Shequi himself was captured
and the army disintegrated shortly thereafter. By the time the vanguard arrived, they
encountered a formed-up rearguard, now bearing their own Khagan’s banners as captive
trophies. Sankarwarma displayed these tokens of his victory and offered to allow the remainder
of the Kipchak army to return home unmolested – if they agreed to pay the ransom for their
father the Khagan.

The Khagan’s sons agreed, but the humiliation was great, and their numbers were heavily
reduced. Although the Kipchak dominion was not broken, they would begin assimilating,
adopting Buddhism and the Iranian language of their subjects. Within a few generations, they
had all but vanished as an independent people.

Imperator Aloysius
II

The death of Emperor Aloysius I in 886 had been long anticipated by those close to the court,
and in all likelihood the Emperor himself. Indeed, he left clear instructions to his son, both for the
funeral and the manner in which Aloysius II’s rivals were to be dealt with. Thierico was to be
effectively exiled to Spain, where Aloysius anticipated the strong aristocracy there would quickly
rob him of any meaningful power and leave him as an ineffectual figurehead.[1] Jehanne,
another half-brother, had a hunting accident which left him paralyzed shortly after Aloysius’
death, an accident too well-timed to be entirely coincidental.

Aloysius II, for his part, was instructed to march south with a large force of retainers. Italy was a
loose addition to the Frankish Empire, overseen by a largely autonomous “Legate” and a variety
of powerful Dukes. A display of Frankish military might, the late Emperor felt, would be
necessary to remind the Italian Dukes that their masters in Aachen were not so far away after
all. The display would be combined with an enormous royal coronation ceremony to mirror
Aloysius I’s ceremony – the Pope himself would crown the Emperor, and all would be done.

The Severian Emperors before them had also enjoyed papal coronations – it had been an
added tool to gain legitimacy and authority. However, the Severian Emperors had also been but
a short ride from the Papal residence in Rome. Aachen was a different matter. As the young
Aloysius conducted his royal tour of the peninsula, he was well-received, however a Papal
envoy informed him that were the coronation to proceed as planned, Aloysius would have to
make certain promises. Otherwise the Pope felt it well within his rights to refuse to crown the
Emperor – a humiliation that would not be quickly forgotten.

To stall, Aloysius substantially lengthened his journey, traveling down the Po valley, stopping in
every fort and city he encountered, speaking at length to each dignitary or lord he encountered.

Pope Paul II’s requests were not wholly unreasonable. He had not gotten along well at all with
the Imperial Legate, and wished to have a say in the appointment of that office. He wanted
Aloysius II to promise a Votive War against the Khirichan Turks, and he wanted an expansion of
privileges for certain cities such as Amalfi and Pisa which were aligned politically with the
Papacy against the influence of the major landed Duchies. However, Aloysius II had little desire
to concede even a single point – knowing that to do so would simply invite greater concessions
by his predecessors. He was a deeply paranoid and untrusting man.

Instead, Aloysius took it upon himself to politically isolate the Papacy. Stopping in Pisa, he met
with the local Comte and emerged betrothed to his daughter, Antonia, in a surprise
announcement which ensured the Comte would mediate with the Pope and after a series of
backroom negotiations, Pope Paul II would agree to the coronation without any official
conditions.[2] Aloysius II was privately relieved for more reasons that one. He was not a martial
man and the idea of a Votive War disturbed him. He knew his history well enough to see how
easily the prior Votive War had spiraled out of control. He replaced the Imperial Legate with a
more tractable man from his own court, and set off north again feeling relatively safe for the first
time in his entire life.

The twenty four year reign of Aloysius II would be notable primarily for court intrigues and a
period of relative respite from Viking raids. His neglect of Ispana however, remains a major
black mark on his legacy. Allowing mercenaries both Berber and Anglo-Danish to run roughshod
over some of his wealthiest territories while not lifting a finger to aid his half-brother was
perhaps one of his greatest mistakes. Aloysius II would begin, a few years after his coronation,
to descend into deep paranoia once more, suspecting his children and retainers of continually
conspiring against him.

However, Aloysius’ reign would also see prosperity. He offered his approval to a group of Sicilian
Mauri nobles and the Duke of Napoli to mount a very successful naval expedition to Sklavenia.
Urban life in Southern France and Italy reached new heights of wealth, and cities along the
coast began to expand. His Mayor of the Palace, Hadriano, oversaw several major building
projects which enhanced the prestige of Aachen as a capital, including the University of St.
Boniface, which would become a major center of learning in Europe.

The decline of Spain also saw a corresponding rise in the prominence of Germania. The lands
beyond the Rhine had long been considered little more than the broader Imperial frontier,
insulation to keep safe the heartlands of Western Europe. However, over the past century,
Germania had grown. Her towns, churches and monasteries rivaled those of France, and the
“Four Duchies” had become powers in their own right. Swabia, Bavaria, Franconia, and
Thuringia were interlinked by aristocratic marriages and a culture which had not Latinized to the
same extent as the Franks of Paris. It was German settlers who colonized Veletia and
Pomerania, and German missionaries who integrated the Duchy of Saxony and founded its
cities and towns.

A distinctly German identity began to take hold, signified by the descriptor “Great Austrasia” or
the country of the “Teutones.” In contrast, Frankish Emperors were increasingly Romanophilic,
ruling with an Imperial title in a city which they consciously designed to resemble the cities of
Italy in general and Florentia in particular. While this cultural schism would not have immediate
ramifications, it marked the beginning of a greater and greater divergence between Western
Christendom and Eastern, Germanic Christendom.

[1] One of Emperor Aloysius I’s few major missteps.

[2] For added historical context, it’s worth noting that most latter historians consider the Papacy
in the Post-Severian era to have been captured by various Greek and Italian commercial
interests, represented by the elected lords of major cities. The Papacy was supported by lavish
donations of land and money made by these organizations and in turn the Popes were always
relatively pliant.

[The latter reign of Aloysius III will be covered by a later post, since it will involve events in other
regions, notably Sklavenia and Polonia.]

The Old Gods and the New

The Danish King Harald Halfdansson converted to Christianity in 934, as part of a deal with
Aloysius III’s master of the palace, Jehanne of Worms. A pretender to the Danish throne, exiled
by his brother-in-law, Sweyn Stone-eyes, he claimed to find religion while languishing in the city
of Bremen, plotting his triumphant return. Conveniently, this decision won him an almost
immediate audience with the Master of the Palace and then large sums of money to hire a
mercenary army. Later embellishments of the story involve a story suspiciously similar to that of
Constantine, where a cross appeared flaming in the sky and a voice like a waterfall told him that
only through God would he reclaim his throne.

Harald Halfdansson took Jelling, the royal hall, the following summer. Almost immediately he
toned down his Christianity, quietly allowing missionaries into Denmark but maintaining the
traditional religious rites which were the bedrock of Danish Kingship. A happy compromise of
sorts, Harald’s choice would satisfy the overwhelming majority of traditional pagans and also lay
the groundwork for the mass conversion of the Danish Kingdom.

Part of the reason for Denmark’s rapid conversion was the sheer number of familial, social, and
mercantile connections between the Anglo-Danish and their home country. Those Danish
Vikings who settled in Denmark converted with astonishing rapidity, marrying into Christian
families and converting at least on the surface to Christianity. Accordingly, roughly a generation
later, the native Danish people’s view of Christianity had softened significantly. They had grown
accustomed to living amongst Christians and missionaries from the south were becoming an
increasing fact of life. Supposed miracles, such as German missionaries stepping over hot coals
unharmed and surviving other ordeals provided the religion with legitimacy as well.

In Norway, meanwhile, the King Sigurd Haakonsson led a similar Christianization effort. Having
converted during his time in Alt Clut, his new religious convictions were met with similar passive
acceptance. He did not gain a large quantity of new converts, but he did not lose his power and
the arrival en masse of German missionaries spelled the beginning of the end for traditional
beliefs.

And yet, even as political elites across Denmark and Norway adopted Christianity, and the
Anglo-Danish kingdoms embraced it wholeheartedly, the raiding and adventuring spirit of the
Vikings did not diminish. By 910, most of the arable land on Island had been claimed. In 930,
the first settlement on Greenland would be founded.

However, one of the settlements with the greatest future ramifications was that of the Viking
navigator Torbjorn, who settled on the Canary Islands in 923, trading with the small agricultural
population he found there and eventually inviting several other groups to arrive and displace the
natives. There, he would build a temple to Boddo and Odin out of rough stone, and, according
to a later runestone, he instructed the natives and his own people alike in the proper manner of
worship.

Elsewhere, the Norse religion as it had been re-interpreted by the Gardaveldi had spread as
well. Merchants and adventurers who had lived under the Wheel-Ruler came back to Sweden
and Denmark with their own radical reinterpretations of many Norse myths. While tales of the
wizard or god known as Boddo were persecuted harshly in Denmark (at the advice of the
Germans, whose own experiences with Buddhists tended to involve Khirichan raiders) in
Sweden and Geatland they caught hold. By the end of the tenth century, only the Svea Rike had
not endorsed Christianity. Despite a growing Christian population, monks and poets from the
Wheel-Ruler of Gardaveldi were welcomed by the court.

[The absurdity of Viking Buddhists settling the Canary Islands was too great to pass up.]

South Slavs
Aloysius III would spend much of his reign invested in the Balkans. The defense of Italy was a
primary concern of his, with the Khirichan Khagans resurgent under Shiqar Kulujogul[1] he took
it upon himself to raise a series of major fortifications along the Isonzo River and the Julian Alps,
leaving them in the control of the newly-invested “Count of the Casari Frontier” – a title which
came with an incredibly generous royal stipend and an honor guard of five hundred Anglo-
Danish mercenaries.

However, the Frankish policy would not be entirely defensive, largely because of a
miscalculation on the part of Aloysius II, who had authorized the successful campaigns of
Valenian, the Duke of Napoli. The Duke had in 905 mounted a major campaign to wrest the
region from the local cities and princes who made up its constantly shifting patchwork
boundaries. Against all odds, Valenian seized the Peloponnese and the Heptanese, but his
campaign, conducted on the shoestring budget of a single Duchy, had stalled after that. Despite
later contributions from the Duke of Apulia, a disastrous battle near Athens had spelled the end
of offensive campaigning. Fortification and entrenchment became the order of the day.
Fortunately, the Sklavenians were not unified, and Valenian faced only a few piecemeal
attempts to retake his new-won territories.

However, fearing future Frankish campaigns and the rise of Khagan Shiqar Kulujogul to the
north, the Sklavenians unified in 921 under Kniaz Simeon Dravan, the Prince of Moesia, a
famous warlord with years of experience fighting the Xasar on the frontiers. According to his
contemporaries, despite being little more than first-among-equals in Sklavenia, Simeon through
sheer force of will commanded the Sklavenians with absolute authority. He ordered the
construction of a massive navy and in 924 he besieged Corinth, a town whose fortifications had
been massively expanded by Duke Valenian’s son Constani. Despite plenty of engineers and
resources, Simeon made slow progress in the siege.

Aloysius III, hearing of the attack, took a novel approach. Sending an embassy to the Khagan
Shiqar, he brokered an alliance of convenience. Shiqar would be given free rein to assert his
dominion over the Danube basin and Dalmatia if he wished, without Frankish interference.
Aloysius pledged a truce of twenty years, and even offered to seal the pact with a betrothal
alliance between his son and the Khagan’s daughter. The latter offer was rejected, but the
former was accepted. Shiqar struck hard into Moesia, destroying Simeon’s base of support,
while a Franco-Italian fleet landed a large army north of Simeon’s and, wiping away the
Sklavenian rearguard, the Palatine Ebroin blocked Simeon’s route up the isthmus while the
Sklavenian fleet was bottled up at Thessaloniki by the Khirichan navy.

Simeon quickly came to terms, seeking to avoid an even greater disaster. However, this sign of
weakness ensured his final demise. He was murdered by his fellow Princes shortly after signing
a treaty which ceded Attica to the Frankish Empire. A new Prince was placed in overall control,
Petar of Eprios.

Khirichan control in Thrace expanded significantly, and they rampaged up and down the Danube
basin, wresting it fully from the Slavic settlers there. And yet ultimately their victories were
somewhat hollow. Sklavenia was a warlike country, with countless fortified hill-settlements and,
after the disaster at Corinth, had no unified army to defeat in the field. Warfare in the hills of the
Balkans was a battle of raid and counter raid, and ultimately the Khirichan tired of the indecisive
fighting and began to make peace with the local Slavic despots. After finding certain tribes were
very much willing to concede and accept Khirichan overlordship, a domino effect began where
other princes were either compelled to join Petar totally or surrender alone.

Sensing the way the tide was turning, the Franks joined in the peacemaking process. Aloysius
III left Italy for Aachen, and the Imperial Legate, Julian, did not share his enthusiasm for the
campaign. He saw Petar’s kingdom as a potential buffer between the newly acquired Frankish
territories and the far greater threat of the Khirichan, whom Aloysius had done nothing but
empower.

Many of the Illyrian Slavs, particularly the prominent tribe of the Croats, became vassals of the
Khirichan. The remainder, under Petar, formed the Kingdom of Sklavenia, notionally under the
protection of the Franks. To their south, Attica, Euboea, and the Peloponnese were now
Frankish territories under the newly-minted Duchy of Great Achaea. In practice, the “Duchy” was
primarily run by Greek and Mauri merchant families.

Under Duke Constani, himself of Italio-Greek heritage, Great Achaea became effectively a
Frankish appendage of the Asian city-states. Cities such as Athens, Nauplia, and Corinth were
rebuilt and became home to resettled Greco-Mauri populations who themselves would adopt the
Hypatoi system of governance under the Duchy’s overall authority. Constanti would engage in
something of an independent foreign policy, despite being subject to the Frankish Empire. His
alliance with the city of Samos, for example, as a counterbalance to the growing power of
Nikaia, was not in alignment with Frankish policy (such as it was) in the Aegean.

West Slavs

Poland and Moravia in the tenth century would come under substantial stresses from the west.
For Poland, these stresses were ultimately greater, primarily due to its relative isolation.
Christendom was rapidly growing. Where once it had been besieged, Christianity and Europe
alike seemed to find new vitality, artistically, culturally, and politically. The unified Frankish
Empire was a sort of hydra – its many heads pushed outwards in a wide variety of directions,
and ultimately when it did suffer a defeat (such as in Spain) it was overshadowed by the
numerous victories it enjoyed.

The era was one of expansion. The German people moved eastward into the Elbe basin,
displacing Slavic tribes there in many cases, and over the course of the century largely
assimilating those who remained. Those who fled were welcomed by the Polonians, who under
King Czresimir had positioned themselves as the last defenders of the old gods and the old
ways. However, at the same time, Czresimir actively welcomed Buddhist missionaries from far
afield, promoting the foreign religion and co-opting the sacred sites and deities of the Slavic
faith. It is a testament to the desperation of the Slavs that he managed to simultaneously take
on the dual roles of a missionary king and a defender of traditional society. There was simply
nowhere else to turn for those who opposed the spread of German Christianity. [2]

Czresimir was diplomatically isolated. By 920 he had alienated the Franco-German nobility by
his attacks on German settlers on the Elbe, and although the Baltic and Belarusian tribes to his
east were relatively peaceful, they lacked the resources or inclination to support him. For them,
the Frankish menace was a far-off story. The conversion of the Danish King to Christianity in
934 meant that his proposed marriage alliance with Sewyn Stone-eyes collapsed almost
overnight and Sewyn’s subsequent murder ensured that there would be no hope of a return to
the old ways. Denmark slid into the Frankish sphere much as Moravia had.

Moravia, for its part, was similarly awash in German settlers, who made significant expansions
from their traditional homesteads along the Danube and pressed towards the interior. However
in Moravia, compromises could be made. Local Bishops played a large role in directing German
settlement towards less-populated areas and away from the major centers of Moravian
settlement. Settlers were made to swear oaths of loyalty to the local nobility or the Moravian
King.[3] These oaths were generally communal, not individual. While German settlement into
Polonian territory was frequently a matter of individuals motivated by a common goal, the
German expansion in the Moravian hinterlands was much better organized. Moravian Bishops,
in conjunction with royal writs, were allowed to settle the Germans in certain plots of land, the
“Free Burghs” and by settling in these communities the Germans agreed to obey the ordinances
of the town, which included a mayoral oath of loyalty to the monarchy or a prominent landholder
in the region. Through this system, the Moravian kingdom was actually strengthened – but also
Germanized.

For the Polish, the Khirichan represented a possible hope of security. Khagan Shiqar Kulujogul
was a powerful neighbor, and the Turks were old enemies of the Franks. Sebouk Arslan was still
a name that the old men of Francia recollected with terror, after all. An alliance with the
Khaganate would fundamentally shift the balance of power. However under Shiqar Kulujogul the
Khaganate had entered into a sort of detente with the Franks. The envoys which had negotiated
the division of Sklavenia continued to travel back and forth between Pianjiqand and Aachen,
and a regular correspondence between the two leaders culminated in a meeting on the neutral
ground of the Isonzo in 937. Aloysius III and Shiqar Kulujogul enjoyed a sort of mutual respect,
and much to the anger of those who might have dreamed of a new Votive war and the
destruction of the Boddo worshippers, the two men were content to renew their informal
arrangement.

In exchange for a free hand in the Hypatate of Nikaia, where Sahu trading interests were being
threatened, the Khirichan agreed not to align with Poland, so long as Czresimir was not directly
overthrown. When word of these arrangements became common knowledge, many among the
nobility and clergy were deeply troubled. The Khirichan were the ancient enemy, after all, and
any notion of cooperation with them incensed the devout. They should be the target of a new
Votive War, not the allies of the Frankish Emperor himself! The Imperial Legate in Rome was
particularly angered, travelling to Aachen personally to resign from his position before retiring to
his estate. His replacement, chosen with input from the Papacy, was no less hostile to the
notion.

Between 940 and 960, the German dukes fought several wars against the Polonians, often with
the help of Moravia. Czresimir’s successor, Czresimir II, fought well. The Polish cavalry proved
their quality time and again against the German shieldwalls – however when the last war came
to an end in 962, the Elbe was well and truly lost to the Polonians. In the end peace broke out
by mutual exhaustion, and the Polonians were still standing. Six decades of pressure by
German settlers had finally ended, and their culture and religion would survive.[4] The Franco-
Germans agreed to stop sending missionaries across the border and the depopulation of the
borderlands ensured that the demographic pressures brought on by the German migration
would abate to a large degree.

[1] Born as a third son of the previous Khagan, Shiqar’s path to rulership was based in the
support of the settled Sahu mercantile nobility rather than the warlike clans. Despite, or perhaps
because of this, he became an aggressive and martial monarch who spent almost none of his
reign in the palaces at Pianjiqand. His elders brothers meanwhile, were virtual prisoners within
the palace, something which would become customary. In fact, “leaving the palace” became an
idiom among the Turks, used to describe someone who breaks with tradition or offends their
elders.

[2] Like how Sogdian Buddhism co-opted numerous Hindu deities, or the Khirichan Buddhists
found a place for Tangra and other Iranian deities in their pantheons, Polish Buddhism
incorporated the local deities as well. Jarilo in particular became an imperfect metaphor for
reincarnation and the cyclical nature of the world. Polish Buddhism, however, is particularly
noteworthy for its regionalist tendencies. Where ultimately Iranian and Turkish Buddhism had
strong movements seeking greater orthodoxy (most notably the Nowbahar), the isolation of
Polish Buddhism lead it to essentially be a form of indigenous polytheism which had taken on
Buddhist characteristics.

[3] Mojmir the Golden, named for his beard rather than any particular extravagance of his reign.

[4] Or so would go the narrative of a Polonian nationalist, probably. In truth, the heavily Buddhist
flavored paganism of Poland was pretty distinct from what had come before. Also the survival of
“Slavic” paganism through the tenth century has a lot to do with the fact that Christianity became
associated with the religion of Germanic invaders.

Sindh and Gurjarana

The Dauwa Maharajas were in a unique position alone among the Indian polities of the tenth
century, because they had not been forced to adapt. In many senses, Sindh benefitted from the
technological advancements of the subcontinent without facing the social upheavals. Caste and
social position, the two great drivers of unrest and uncertainty across the subcontinent were
largely irrelevant to the relatively long reign of Maharaja Ratnadeva Dauwa (903-942). With
geographic barriers separating the Dauwa state from the Pancharajya and the Chandatreya
Empire alike, they were relatively safe from foreign expansion – unlike similar powers in Malava
who found themselves drawn into proxy conflicts in the orbit of the great powers.

The Dauwa, however, were similar to their fellow the subcontinental polities in many other
regards. The hiring of mercenary soldiers to fill out their ranks, a Goshthi-era trend, was seen
amongst the Dauwa as well, who recruited not merely Gurjars, but Avghan and Balochi soldiers
as well to provide garrisons and front-line soldiers. There is some evidence of of Ifthal cavalry
as well, however their numbers were significantly smaller, given the Sindhi antipathy towards
Ifthal and Turk alike. The Dauwa, lacking the strong guild-structures that could have otherwise
provided a backbone of elite native soldiers, became almost entirely dependent on mercenaries.
[1]

The Dauwa government was organized much like their military. Hired outsiders performed the
administrative tasks of the state, and in general there was little tangible advancement for those
of Sindh birth. In many senses, the Dauwa regime felt almost colonial – establishing a caste of
outsiders out of a fundamental distrust of a conquered people. Considering their original claim to
be liberators, the ultimate result was almost tragic, a bizarre twist of fate. Without the
counterbalance of the guilds, the bureaucracy was allowed near absolute power to direct land
management, tariffs, and the like, something which angered the Sindhi and Gurjar landowners
and foreign merchants alike.

It was an unstable system, but one without viable alternatives. No major riots or rebellions
erupted, despite a degree of dissatisfaction. There was no avenue for the masses to gain
power. It should be remembered that in those places across India where agricultural guilds or
small-scale landholders had representation, it was not due to their own efforts, generally, but to
the efforts of one side or the other in some greater conflict who wished to mobilize the common
people to their own ends. In an autocracy such as the Dauwa monarchy, there was no
motivation to assist these people, and accordingly widespread inequality existed at an even
greater level than in the rest of the subcontinent.

The mercantile class of Sindh was small as well. A significant amount of the country’s
commercial activity ended up either in the hands of foreign guilds or mismanaged by corrupt
state officials. While the monarchs were undoubtedly aware of this problem, the Dauwa lacked a
clear understanding of how to combat it. In many senses, they never forgot their origins as
conquerors and warlords. The institutions they constructed were designed to resolve problems
of administration but were almost always shortsighted and frequently overlapped with other
institutions, creating a bureaucratic nightmare not dissimilar to that which afflicted the late
Maukhani.

Meanwhile, from the Thar desert to the region of Matsya was in relative anarchy. Gurjar princes
had come to power across the whole of the region, save for in cities such as Ujjayini and Vidisa,
where the Chandatreya exerted very loose hegemony through local proxies. Their rise from one
of many pastoral peoples to the ultimate rulers of a vast, if depopulated region, has long been a
puzzling one. While there are many theories, and their historical rise to power is explicable due
to the general anarchy follow the collapse of the Maukhani, one of the more prominent theories
is that the Gurjar identity was co-opted by other groups, such as the Jats and the Ahirs.

The honorific title of Gurjarendra became a potent symbol of semi-feudal authority, prompting
groups to seek to affiliate themselves with the Gurjar, which in turn only strengthened the power
of what had once been a marginal identity group languishing under Saka or Gupta rule. Groups
like the Chandela clan of Khajuravahaka, which refused to assimilate into this new paradigm,
instead chose the more tangible protection of guild affiliation and ultimately the protection of the
Pancharajya. The Gurjar identity became one of stubborn independence – an irony, considering
their role in the mercenaries of countless armies.

[1] One of the great ironies of history is that the Indus valley region, originally a great center of
Indian republicanism, would also play host to a series of foreign absolutist regimes, of which the
Dauwa were but the latest incarnation.

Narrative Interlude:
the Nowbahar in the Reign of Mitradharma

Both conqueror
And vanquished
Are as shadows in the dawn
Are as dew in the desert
Are as bolts of lightening
So too is this world
-Last words of the martyr Narseh (apocryphal)

Taghavar was not a siege but an extermination.

There were horsemen outside their walls, and their drumbeats echoed through the cavernous
Vault of Holy Knowledge. The soldiers, led by a stern Turk with a scarred face, had come
against the defenses twice, men sheeted in scale bearing rams and ladders. When night fell,
their fires burned in the distance and the valley was alight like the night sky with stars. Every
dawn the defenders prayed for liberation. They prayed that one morning they might awake and
see the accursed blue banners thrown down and their attackers dispersed.

Every morning they were inevitably disappointed.

Taghavar was an old place, a monastery built in the ancient era of the Eftal, during the reign of
Mihiragula who warred against the Rhom. Its thick walls of mortared stone had held against the
horrors of the Egyptian plague and the depredations of the Mahadevists. But then the Eftal had
always respected holy places, seeing them as oases in the desert to be preserved at all costs.
The Khardi had no such respect.
The defenders were partisans of the martyred arhat Narseh, and they were fewer with each
failed attack. Artakhser, their leader, knew this well. Too many of their number where monks,
sworn to nonviolence. Too many of their number were peasants, armed with rudimentary tools
and unarmored. They had held Taghavar as much because of the impatience of their foe as any
skill with arms.

Artakhser, for his part, was no fanatic. He had been a god-worshipper himself, in a time far
removed from this one. The Nowbahar meant nothing to him. But he was an Eftal of the
Panjidar clan. This place was holy. And the Padishah Mitradharma wanted to murder all within
and torch it to the ground. It was his duty as one of the Panjidar to defend it. He’d gathered all
he could. Twenty of his wife Anahid’s kinsmen, half-Arabs from Syria. Six men he’d fought with
in Balkh. He’d ridden from village to village, asking those he found to lay down their plows and
take up arms defend the monks of Taghavar.

And somehow, impossibly, they had followed him.

Zaratuxsht, his brother in law, kept the morning watch with some Sogdian merchant whose
name he’d never learned. Artakhser met him on the Tower of the Eagle, and Zaratuxsht clapped
him on the shoulder with a mailed hand.

“Did you sleep well?” Zaratuxsht asked, white teeth cut to a rare grin.

“Not at all.” Artakhser replied with a weary sigh. He was not a young man, and yet he found
himself not quite ready to die.

“A shame. I think they will mount another assault today. They were preparing in the predawn
light, making wicker shields wrapped in hide to defend their battering ram. It would have been
better if you were rested.”

“It would have.”

“Then again, it is no matter, truly. I suppose tired men die just as naturally as rested ones.” He
laughed hoarsely. “Tell the monks, brother. They should prepare themselves. If any among them
are willing to fight, tell them to go to the main doors.”

Artakhser hurried down the stairs. All of them had known from the beginning this defense was
impossible. All of them had known that they cast away their lives. And yet from the Tower of the
Eagle, he had begun to realize the truth of that statement. If anything the Khardi army had
swelled in numbers. As he crossed the central courtyard, he could hear the clamor of war. The
incessant drumbeat had begun again, wild and ecstatic.

The Khardi were advancing. He knew it. It seemed pointless to inform the monks. Most of what
he had felt towards them was frustration, anger at their unwillingness to take up arms. He could
not fathom why they would die for a cause they would not fight for. Instead, he rode to the main
gate of the compound, a stout wooden door reinforced with metal slats and ringed by graven
reliefs. His fellow veterans were waiting. Rostram, who’d taken an arrow in the siege of Herat.
Espendiyor, who saved his life twice in Syarzur. Jemshir, a hulking giant of a man whose lance
had never missed on the charge.

These were the people he wanted to be with in the end. “I spoke to my brother Zarsha.” He said
softly. “Apparently… we’re outnumbered.”

His companions laughed, drawing the attention of the other defenders. Then, together, in
silence, they waited for the end. They waited for the ram to come forwards and punch through
the gate, and when the hole was widened Jamshir hurled a javelin through, striking the first
Khardi warrior in the clavicle.

“Toe to the line, boys!” Rostram called as the gate came crashing open. Men were thrown aside
and the mail-armored Khardi charged forwards, spearpoints shining in the early morning sun. It
was incredible, Artaksher though, how they seemed to move as a single wave, like an
avalanche of steel. He waded into the melee, striking indiscriminately until his sword was
knocked from his hand. A spear caught him in the ribs but it did not break his armor and even as
it drove the breath from him he pushed past it and grabbed the owner and wrenched him to the
earth, grappling for a knife at his belt. He felt the hot breath of the Khardi warrior as he brought
the knife up, punching aside a steel-rimmed shield to bring the blade into the man’s throat.

Even as he rose the world became impossibly bright and sharp with sudden pain. He had been
stabbed beneath the arm, and he sank against the weight of the impact. And then as suddenly
as it had come it was gone and he looked about, the world a blur of motion. Supine and
bleeding, the Khardi paid him no heed in their haste. They rushed onwards, around him. He
could not see any of his friends. The fighting, it seemed, was already over.

He knew that it would not take them long to find the sanctuary in which the monks remained, nor
long at all to batter in whatever rudimentary defenses had been arranged. He knew also that the
Khardi would leave no survivors. There would be no record of Taghavar, nor their defense. And
he still wasn't quite ready for death. He thought of Anahid, and their home by the great river. All
long gone.

So much bloodshed over icons. If he’d been able to move, he might have shook his head. The
pain was beginning to subside, and the world grew dark.

A Look to the North

The changes taking place in Transuralic Asia [Eastern Europe] during the tenth century would
be some of the most profound and transformative in the region’s history. In the deep forests and
across the windswept plains, the Slavic peoples were unifying – but around a culture that was
fundamentally alien to them.
The two Hanates, that of the Black Rusichi and the White Rusichi, were called by a name
adopted from the Gardaveldi, who referred to the indigenous peoples universally as
“Rothsmenn” or “those who row” on account of the importance of riverine transport to their
civilization. Despite their adoption of the Slavicized Khirichan word Han to describe their ruler,
the Rusichi must not be mistaken for steppe nomads. Much like their western cousins, the
Rusichi civilization was built around fortified settlements, or grads. These isolated pockets of
civilization were typically built along the major trade arteries of the region, and were separated
from each other by vast tracts of relatively uncultivated land.

The development of the Hanates began in earnest roughly at the same time as the Khirichan-
Sahu slave trade stopped almost entirely. The Khardi, eschewing planation agriculture in
Mesopotamia in favor of small-scale cultivation, simply lacked the demand for slaves that had
slowly diminished during Aghatsaghid rule in any case. Furthermore, the expansion of naval
trade in the south meant mass demand for timber, and the growth of Asia Minor’s population
after centuries of stagnation meant a new demand for grain. The slave trade became a smaller
scale enterprise, and the north, long a breadbasket, became an even larger one, particularly in
the Sahu ruled south.

Buddhism also spread like wildfire, and unlike in Poland, the Rusichi adopted a far purer form of
the religion. Some of the missionaries who interacted with the Rusichi were exiles of the
Nowbahar movement, and accordingly deities received less emphasis, and many of the more
traditional ones were denounced outright as the Buddhist priesthood gained power. Only certain
deities survived. A synthesis of the Mithra and Svarog was one of the chief surviving deities,
while Tangra was equated with the minor god Stribog and thus took a less important role.
Certain deities, such as Rod and Perun, who feature heavily in early East Slavic rituals and
writings, found their cults diminished immensely, to the point that they were ultimately cast as
enemies of the Buddha who sought to maintain their power through mankind’s ignorance.

The groundwork for these fundamental changes had been laid for centuries. Those who
became powerful within the Hanates were those who had long been complicit with the Khirichan
dominance of the region, and Buddhism was their religion, and a way to ensure that the favor of
the Khagan did not switch to a different petty ruler. Mithra had a wide appeal in his traditional
Persian incarnation as a god of war and fire, a protector of hearth and home in the long, cold
night. One of the first of the “Dharma Hans” or the earliest royal patrons of Buddha even took
the ceremonial name Mitraslav, or Glorious Mithra.

The Hans were above all else city-builders. Cities such as Cernigov in the east and Sviatapolk
in the west became large and rich off trade, and with the growth of these significant urban
regions came increased autonomy from the Khirichan, who began to see their longtime subjects
increasingly as equals. Cross-border raids and tokens of tribute stopped.

Meanwhile, to the north, the Gardaveldi under Arnmundr, were undergoing a similar cultural and
religious transformation, but one moderated by the continued arrival of fresh colonists from
Scandinavia. While even among their subject peoples the Slavic gods had largely fallen by the
wayside, and the yellow robed poet-monks of the court enjoyed great favoritism, new believers
in the old Norse Gods still arrived frequently, and they refreshed the oral traditions of the Norse.
Unlike amongst the Rusichi, where many traditional gods slowly shifted into folk tales and
legends over the next three or four centuries, continued contact with Scandinavia would have a
profound effect on the Gardaveldi. Especially among those who gradually moved East as their
homelands Christianized, there was a necessity to preserving traditions. In time, most of these
traditionalists would convert as well, however they would ensure that the chief gods of the Norse
pantheon endured, if in an adulterate form. Odin, for example, was recast as a figure whose
ordeal on the Ash Tree was a profound moment of enlightenment in Buddhist language.

The Gardaveldi continued to expand in this era. Many Norse colonists had settled in territories
once belonging to the Livonians, weakening the coast-dwellers and leading to the rise of the
Latgalian tribe, whose rise in turn sparked conflicts with the Lithuanians along the Daugava
river. While historical details are spotty, it appears the Latgalians won a major victory, and were
able to turn north and attack the Norse in concert with the now subdued Livonians in 946. The
Gardaveldi King Arnmundr in turn launched punitive raids against the Latgalians, securing a
broad coastal territory and founding the city of Darmagard on the Livonian coast. [OTL
Haapsalu]

The Gardaveldi also had a profound impact on the politics and culture of their homelands.
Buddhist missionaries would find relative safety to preach in Sweden, although their audience
was never as substantial. However, commerce between the two kingdoms led to alliance and
close relations. When the Danes moved against Sweden in the Northern Votive War (982-987)
Gardaveldi would come to their aid. Wheel-ruler Arnmundr’s son Bjarnhedinn would fight
alongside the Swedish King Solmundr the Blue-Black at the 983 battle of Skara against the
Danes. Fighting the Danish King Eirk Haraldson, the war was waged over the fate of Geatland,
and would be immortalized in a series of epic poems by the Anglo-Danish author Torbjorn.

In the eyes of some revisionist historians with a more religious bent, the Northern Votive War
can be seen as a proxy war in a clash of civilizations, a battle to decide the spiritual fate of the
north. In the eyes of others, it represents a new and more martial phase of the Christianization
of Scandinavia, part of a continuous cycle of cultural exchange and war. However, Torbjorn’s
account tells a different story, involving a murdered Christian missionary and a sordid drama
involving King Erik’s daughter and a Geatish Jarl. Whatever the case, the battle of Skara was
fought primarily by pagan Norse. The ostensible religious affiliations of the rulers aside,
Scandinavia was very much a pagan country. Frankish holy mercenaries and Gardaveldi aside,
most who participated in the battle seem to have seen it as a secular conflict for territory and
plunder.

The Northern Votive War ended in a white peace with mutual exhaustion and simmering hostility
remaining. Across Scandinavia, the battle lines of a complex and multifaceted conflict were
drawn, and both sides entrenched. However, the end of war meant a resumption of trade
(although many would assert that the war never stopped trade). Outright conversion to either
Buddhism or Christianity was as much a personal choice as it was a political one. Those who
had to interact with either the Danish monarchy or the Franco-Germans frequently saw great
benefit in conversion, but they needed to be flexible, and willing to associate with traditional
pagans nonetheless if they were to trade with Sweden or the Geats. Furthermore, as German
colonists came to dominate the Baltic coast, even some among the Geats converted to
Christianity at least notionally, in the pursuit of favorable trading privileges. Buddhism,
meanwhile, was a way to gain favor with the Gardaveldi, who controlled the European end of an
extensive trade route with the eastern world. Rare luxury goods travelled thousands of miles to
reach Sweden, but this hardship often only inflated their value.

A Khagan with Foresight

After the Council of the Isonzo in 937, Shiqar Kulujogul had a free hand to do as he pleased in
the Hypatate of Nikaia, and many assurances more valuable than that. He could feel relatively
confident that the Franks would be distracted for the foreseeable future, and that gave him
precious time. The Westerners were numerous, and convinced that their god had given the
entire world over to them. He was not so blind to the rumors which reached his ears that their
high priest in distant Rome had been calling for war. Aloysius III was a gift – a sensible
pragmatist who played the game of politics well.

That the Polish would ultimately survive the Franco-German onslaught was an accident of
history. The Khirichan Khagan would gladly have sacrificed them entirely. Where Sebouk Arslan
had been a brilliant commander of men and tactician Shiqar Kulujogul was an administrator and
a strategist, whose personal journals reveal a sophisticated understanding of the bigger picture.
Sebouk Arslan had always trusted in the strength of his cavalry and his sacrifices to the gods.
Even when he made strategically clever decisions, such as retaking Konstantikhert
(Constantinople), they were done out of a need to keep winning, to keep expanding at all costs.

He had then been succeeded by a spate of uninspiring warlords. Shiqar Kulujogul, however,
was an educated man, who according to his own boasts spoke twelve languages, including
Rhomaniki and Frankish. He knew that Europe was effectively divided into two great empires –
his and the Frankish Empire, and of the two, the Frankish Empire was far and away greater. It
was more unified, more populous, better organized, and wealthier. Furthermore, Aloysius III had
showed an interest in the Balkans, one which would invariably lead to a clash, likely over some
damn fool thing. One of his sons would have to fight to preserve their hegemony, in all
likelihood.

So Shiqar Kulujogul made allies, binding two of his many daughters to the crown princes of the
Rusichi. In 939, he invaded Nikaia, transporting a huge army across the Hellesponte and
besieging the city. After three months the Hypatos submitted, followed shortly thereafter by the
Hypatos of Nicomedia. The treaties Shiqar Kulujogul signed were primarily focused on securing
trade rights for Sahu merchants, however they also included key aspects of political submission.
Permanent Khirichan embassies were established, changing the traditional policy of sending
envoys, and key hostages were taken from major families to be raised in the Khirichan palace.
Khirichan casualties had been light, so before returning home, the Khagan fabricated a
diplomatic slight by the Pontic League and invaded it as well, riding along the coast. Here, there
were small but significant Sahu merchant communities which had existed since late Roman
times, and it was these groups that the Khagan elevated after a stunning victory in the Battle of
Amastris (940) which ensured the submission of a wide territory from Herakleia to Trapezous.
Furthermore, he established military garrisons in the major cities and carved out land grants for
the construction of Turkish settlements along the northern coast of Asia Minor. Those who would
travel were a mix of migrating Qangli Turks, Bajinak, and Sahu, and while their numbers would
be far fewer than the Khagan had imagined, they played a key role in allowing the Khirichan to
maintain their control of the region, as did the token submission of the Alan Khan.

After his return, Shiqar had sufficient military credentials to begin overhauling the army. The
Xasar, Rumana, and Bulgar peoples in his empire were largely settled and agricultural in the
tenth century, but their military contributions were raised primarily from a diminishing herder
class who traditionally supplied mounted warriors. Local monks and nobles were tasked with
performing a census and establishing levies which could be raised in times of crisis, a system
perhaps modelled off of that of the Franks. Meanwhile, further from the frontier, the Khirichan
and Sahu systems remained unchanged – the former were divided into clans expected to
answer the Khagan’s call to war, and the latter were generally exempt, with the exception of the
major landholders, who fought regardless.

Shiqar Khagan oversaw building projects as well. The critical cities of Biharabad [otl Zagreb]
and Shahidjan [Budapest] received extensive repairs to their walls, which for Shahidjan involved
the construction of a double circuit of walls, the inner one significantly higher and topped with
engines of war. In general Shiqar avoided prestige projects in favor of strategic fortifications and
the construction of a newer, larger naval arsenal in Tangrabad. However, the latter years of his
reign were spent in Konstantikhert overseeing the resettlement of the city and the rebuilding of
the Rhom Shahdom era palace, which he christened Nowitaxta, or “New Throne.”

In 956, however, with Constantinople burgeoning and the Khirichan growing in strength and
power, Aloysius III died, and Shiqar Kulujogul gathered his five sons to a council in the newly
finished Nowitaxta.

Aloysius III had almost no luck with heirs. His eponymous firstborn died at the age of five, and
Thierico, the secondborn, died at the age of sixteen. For a time it seemed that his only daughter,
Matilda, and her husband, the Count of Toulouse Majorian would take power. Most were
satisfied with this notion. Majorian was young, handsome, and popular with all who met him,
although few would have called him wise or intelligent. However, in 932, Aloysius’ wife gave
birth to another son, who despite being sickly and unlikely to live, would ultimately survive.
Aloysius IV would ascend to the throne at the age of 24. Even at a young age he had a
reputation for bookish temperance and a certain sternness. He disdained frivolity and was
widely unpopular on account of a stutter. In short, he was everything Majorian was not.
On his traditional campaign into Italy for the coronation, he seems to have had a sort of “Road
to Damascus” moment. A cynic in his youth, the pilgrimage to Rome changed him. Aloysius IV,
surrounded by his nobles and newly-crowned by the Pope, declared that he would wage a
Votive War to reclaim Constantinople from the Khirichan.

Notes:
-The Berber language is split into dialects
-Aramaic and Frisian are present, as is Avar in hilly and mountainous parts of the Xasar lands
-Reworked the Balkans to reflect the actual mountain ranges and hills there
-I decided the Suevan dialect carried too far south so Luchitano has been added to represent a
dialect that probably doesn't have any historical equivalent.
-Breton has been pruned back and a color to represent Angevin, a western langue d'oil mutually
intelligible with TTL French, has been added.
-The Gautlandic language has been added.
-"Englisc" has been added to represent the conservative West Country holdouts whose way of
speaking hasn't been extensively changed by the Norse occupation.
-An Egyptian Greek dialect, Kuptiki, has been added. Note this doesn't refer to OTL Coptic but
comes from the Greek word for Egypt, Kuptos.
The Second Votive
War

To the Great Khagan Shiqar Kulujogul, the Universal Ruler, the Unconquered Lion: By the
Guardians of the Eight Directions and Great Tangra know that we shall endure in this place with
its high walls until they are crimson with the blood of those who are false and we can no longer
raise our arms in opposition.

Our position is good, the cisterns deep, the granaries full. By your forethought and beneficence
we shall hold this city and if by treachery or force of arms we are overwhelmed the Keep shall
not be taken and they shall be forestalled here.

May this missive find you in good health, and may its bearer, my beloved brother, describe to
you the situation in greater detail.

-Disiabat son of Sulukichor, commander of the Biharabad Garrison

The Second Votive War (959) had many advantages over the first, but perhaps the greatest was
the unification of most of Europe under a single monarch. Aloyisus IV, after his coronation, had
essentially the total support of his people and lords. Messages announcing the coming war
spread across Christendom like wildfire in the wake of the young Emperor’s coronation and the
armed nobility of Europe responded with great enthusiasm – and so too did the common
people. The cities of the Italian coast, old enemies of the Khirichan, sent massed town levies of
infantry who were equipped to a remarkably high standard. The Germans also came en masse
– few peoples had the same Votivist zeal after the long decades of war with the Polish. The
Spanish and Aquitanians tended to provide the smallest contingents, with the exception of the
Duke of Toulouse, who joined the war with an ostentatiously equipped contingent of heavy
cavalry and his own urban levies.

The Second Votive War was more organized from the beginning, and the logistics were no
exception. The entire realm came together to fill massive granaries on the Isonzo, hopefully
allowing the army to remain in the field and connected to a line of supply near indefinitely.
Several newly-minted Count Palatines were given executive authority over supply and
appointed large staffs to see the project done, and vast estates in the Balkans were promised in
reward.

The allied fleets were also assembled off the coast of Attica, a force numbering hundreds of war
galleys. Their goal would be, at the appointed time to cut Constantinople off from the sea and
enable a proper siege. Constantinople was essentially the sole goal of the Second Votive War.
There was never any notion of going beyond it. The Votivist knights swore sacred oaths to
retake the city, and Jerusalem was never mentioned – in no small part because Aloysius IV
sought the assistance of Heshanid Egypt, promising trade deals and leeway to expand their
power in the Aegean in exchange for naval support which never materialized. The Heshanids
had troubles of their own, and lacked the religious fervor of the Franks.

Meanwhile, the Khirichan had two whole years to prepare. Aloysius’ declaration and the proper
build-up and calling of vassals took time – especially as the monarch personally toured the
realm extensively beforehand. However, by the time the granaries were being built and the
armies assembled, Shiqar Kulujogul was on his deathbed. He had five sons, the eldest among
them Kaikaus Arslan and Kaikuluj Ishbara, a striking pair of twins who took command of the
army, while Kuluj Tangrasah remained in Pianjiqand, overseeing the homeland and the two
youngest (from the Khagan’s second wife), Sutluq and Ishbara remained by their father’s side.

Aloysius IV almost immediately found himself forced to confront a lack of actual martial
experience. He was well-read, and well-versed in the theory of military strategy, however its
stark reality was a new and shocking thing to him. Accordingly, he made complex plans which
rarely survived contact with the subordinates implementing them, let alone the enemy. His
opening two-pronged assault into Xasar territory was one such plan. Ostensibly, a largely
German army under Dietrich, the Duke of Bavaria, was to depart from Linz and put pressure on
the Xasar from the north, while the main body of the army marched on the key city of Biharabad
[near OTL Zagreb], the lynchpin of any march on Constantinople. Negotiations Aloysius had
conducted with the Grand Prince of Sklavenia, Petar I, had assured him that if Biharabad fell,
and Aloysius conducted to him certain noble hostages to vouch for his good intentions, the
Sklavenians would join the Votive War.

Petar, however, had little desire to aid his fellow Christians. It was a Frankish Duke who had
undermined his Kingdom, with the help of Aloysius’ father. After receiving the hostages he
cautiously stalled on providing even meagre assistance, and provided all he knew of the
Frankish plans to the Khagan in Konstantikert, while hoping that Biharabad would not fall.

The Khirichan, learning of the Frankish plan (and learning of its many deficiencies) played a
long game. They did not stop the Franks from besieging Biharabad, and instead harassed the
besiegers and refused to be brought to battle while buying time for their allies to the north to
assemble. The twin Hanates sent many thousands of men, and even Gardaveldi sent a token
contingent of heavy lancers. Biharabad was not a huge city, but it was a well defended one, and
the Franks were stalled outside its gates. Aloysius IV’s fleet accordingly remained in Attica
unused and the Frankish army helplessly watched as the Khirichan army swelled in the
distance.

Meanwhile, Kaikuluj Ishbara took the fight to Dietrich. Gathering the forces of several local
Xasar Satraps and linking up with the Rusichi, he forced an engagement with the German army.
In this battle, the Khirichan were in many ways outmatched. Long years of warring against the
mobile Polish cavalry had taught the Franks highly effective strategies for blunting cavalry
charges, and when the Khirichan harassed at a distance, German archers retaliated while
hiding behind great wooden shields to reload. Ultimately, the battle was inconclusive, but the
Germans halted their advance and withdrew into their own territory.

With the German threat forestalled, Kaikuluj was able to ride south in force and threaten the
Frankish host from the north. Operating in conjunction with a much larger but less mobile force
commanded by Kaikaus Arslan, Kaikuluj harassed Frankish supply lines and prevented them
from effectively foraging. However, just as things seemed their most desperate and rationing
became severe, the Frankish army broke through the walls of Biharabad and put the city to
sack. Simultaneously, a harassing feint by Kaikuluj was repulsed along the Isonzo river.

It would be the sole Frankish victory of the Second Votive War. Biharabad was torched and
devastated, but with its granaries and cisterns not yet diminished, the Franks were resupplied
and what was more, they had a base of operations in the Balkans. The Slavic vassals of the
Khirichan rose up in great numbers, but much to Prince Petar’s disappointment, they did not join
Sklavenia. The Croats in particular aligned themselves with the Franks, and the Sklavenian ruler
was forced to bite his tongue and cooperate even with the knowledge that many of the Frankish
gains he might have a claim to could just as easily be given to the Croatian nobles.

After the fall of Biharabad, the Frankish nobility largely assumed they would have an easy
march to Constantinople. The Khirichan would not pursue them deep into Sklavenian territory,
and their lines of supply could be easily maintained until they reached Thrace. Then, the
Khirichan would let them besiege the city and attempt a similar harassing campaign as at
Biharabad. The war would be for better or worse decided at Constantinople.

However, the Khirichan instead arrayed for a pitched battle, goading Aloysius into a disastrous
engagement. The Rusichi in particular had fine heavy lancers and strong axe-bearing infantry
who cut a swathe through the Frankish shield walls. The Khirichan cavalry for their part nearly
encircled their Frankish opponents and Aloysius’ army barely escaped annihilation by a valiant
rearguard action led by the Franco-Mauri Palatine Guisef of Agirgent.

Next year, however, fortunes would favor the Franks. The Rhomans of the Pontic coast rose in
rebellion over the winter and massacred some of the Sahu garrisons in a series of brutal street-
fights. The remaining Sahu were hard-pressed to maintain their control of the countryside,
despite hiring Alan mercenaries to augment their ranks. They appealed to the Khagan for aid,
but received almost nothing – several Oghuz clans were moving in the east, trying to utilize the
distraction of the great Khaganate to gain good pastureland in the west. Pianjiqand’s attentions
were now distracted on two fronts, and the Khirichan war effort floundered.

Next year, a united Frankish army besieged Constantinople with less resistance. The weaker
Sahu navy was bottled up in the harbor and the city was properly cut off from resupply. Just as
things began to seem their most grim, Shiqar Kulujogul passed away. While his sons continued
the defense the open question of who was to become Khagan was deferred, at least ostensibly.
Within the walls however, Prince Ishbara died under mysterious circumstances, and Sutluq, his
younger brother, began acting increasingly like a sole ruler. To his credit, he was very capable at
managing the defense and rationing food reserves, and the populace lived in relative comfort
while the external besiegers suffered a harsh plague which would last until 961, leaving many
thousands of dead and granting blessed reprieve to the defenders.

As the year wore on, the situation in the east was only becoming more desperate. Many of the
Turkish clans had united under a warlord named Chagri Yabgu, and were pressing across the
Rav-Itil in force, aided by certain clans of the Bajinak who nursed a long grudge against the
Khirichan. The bulk of the Khirichan returned home to defend their homelands. In the absence
of the Princes, it was Han Yasenmir of the White Rus who led the defense in a council with
some of the greater Xasar Satraps, and this played a key role in undermining the credibility of
the Khirichan empire. The eastern nations had all remained under the Turkic yoke because it
had been seen as their only hope for resisting the Franks. However, even in the absence of the
Khirichan, the Rus led an effective defense of the Xasar territories, and by the end of the
campaign season were were camped outside the walls of Hadrankert, threatening the Frankish
siege.

This was a small blessing for the Khirichan, however. Despite a victory in the east against
Chagri, his coalition remained unified and when Kaikaus Arslan returned west with few
reinforcements beyond his personal honor guard and some Sahu levies, he was not treated with
the proper respect due to a Khirichan Prince, but rather one as a collection of allies.
Furthermore, he could not publicly object because Yasenmir was his brother in law and thus in a
sense part of the royal clan himself.

961 would open with the battle of Constantinople – a disaster for Aloysius, who was forced to
fight a running retreat from the city. His army was decimated and upon arrival in Slavic territory,
their Sklavenian “allies” betrayed them, slaughtering many more and capturing the Emperor.
The Sklavenian troops had avoided significant casualties in the siege or the subsequent battles,
largely by the design of Petar and his secret Khirichan allies, and thus were fresh and able to
massacre the exhausted and disorganized Frankish troops.

Many would escape, of course. Prince Petar lacked the manpower to destroy an army as vast
as Aloysius had deployed, but he did manage quite effectively to decapitate it. Duke Majorian
took control almost immediately and led its shattered remnants into Croat territory. However, the
Votive War was over. It fell to Majorian to negotiate its conclusion, and the humiliating
abandonment of essentially every Frankish conquest west of the Isonzo. Negotiations with
Petar, however, would go slightly differently. According to rumor, the Grand Prince offered the
Emperor’s safe return in exchange for a massive ransom and the Duchy of Great Achaea.
However, while the historical record is spotty and contradictory, it seems that Majorian ensured
the breakdown of negotiations and merely waited ou the eventual death of the Emperor due to
injuries sustained in captivity. With Aloysius IV out of the way, Majorian was presumptive
Emperor of the entire Frankish Kingdom.

Aftermath in the
East
The First Votive War was a wild success which ultimately had little staying power. Votivist states
were established across the Mediterranean and they collapsed almost as quickly. However, the
Second Votive War would be a spectacular failure with incalculable long-term ramifications for
both of the two massive Empires which faced off across the Balkans. Despite the lack of major
territorial changes, the weaknesses of both powers had been clearly revealed.

But a few short years after the Votive War, the Khirichan would be thrown into a massive
succession crisis. Kaikaus Arslan, the eldest twin and most obvious heir to the throne, took
power almost immediately after the conclusion of the war, and received promises of allegiance
from most of the major Satraps and Viceroys of the Khirichan empire. However, out of a sense
of fairness, he allowed his younger brother Kaikuluj to stand as co-ruler. Meanwhile, he
appointed his half-brother Sutluq the Ikhshad [King] of Konstantikert and allowed his other
surviving half-brother Tangrasah to take the title of prime minister.

In his familial generosity, Kaikaus had positioned many of the most obvious threats to his reign
in positions of incredible power. However, in many ways he had no choice. Kaikuluj in particular
had the loyalty of many clan chiefs and satraps, and thus could raise a significant army of his
own. Co-rulership had temporarily placated him, and allowed Kaikaus to gather most of the
prominent governors and clan leaders together in Pianjiqand for a ceremonial coronation. Once
they had all assembled, Kaikaus held a massive banquet, aiming to get Kaikuluj’s supporters
drunk on fine Rhomian wines and then, once they were incapable of resistance, arrest his
brother’s most prominent supporters and execute them on trumped-up charges so as to remind
Kaikuluj where power lay in the Khirichan Shahdom.

However, midway through the banquet, Kaikaus received word that Tangrasah’s carriage had
been ambushed en route and the prime minister had been murdered and left to die in the
streets. The Khagan felt that his control of the situation was slipping, and as he looked about he
realized that Kaikuluj’s partisans were drinking only moderately and frequently refusing refills.
Furthermore, most of them were armed. Fearing for his life and deciding that his plan had been
discovered, he fled the palace and made for Tangrabad on the Itil, where he had many allies.

Thus the anarchy at Pianjiqand began in 968. While Kaikuluj never made to claim the title of
Khagan for himself, he ruled in the palace and Kaikaus remained at Tangrabad. Both men
frequently issued contradictory instructions to their vassals, and for a time the Khirichan turned
inwards as the two brothers sought allies. It is unclear why neither struck decisively against the
other. Familial love or a desire to not upset the precarious balance of power have both been
proposed as reasons, but in any case they both simply waited for the other to make the first
move. To further solidify his position, Kaikaus also remarried to a prominent Rus noble princess,
hoping to win over the Chernarusichi Han Boddomil to his side.

Kaikuluj, for his part, tried to cultivate a friendship with Han Yasenmir of the Belarusichi.
Yasenmir had barely-concealed imperial ambitions of his own and had long regarded Kaikaus
with derision, thinking him arrogant and cowardly. The White Rus had been on the rise for
several generations as well, expanding at the expense of the Poles and the Wheel-Rulers to
their north. Yasenmir might have sought the Khaganate himself (being married into the royal
family as he was) except he knew keenly that Sahu chauvinism towards the Rus would prevent
him from being considered as a serious candidate.

The Anarchy would continue until 974, when Kaikaus died in battle against Chagri Yabgu and
his brother Yaqut, whose reunified Oghuz coalition rode across the Itil and crushed him in a
hasty engagement. News of Kaikaus’ death allowed Kaikuluj to take power as sole Khagan. His
reign however, would be a short one: he had underestimated a key player in the ongoing drama.
Ever since the death of Ishbara and the ascent of Sutluq to honorary kingship, the youngest of
the brothers had been quietly working his way through the ranks, until now, as one of the two
remaining sons of Shiqar Kulujogul, he was in a position as effective second in command of the
entire Empire. With the help of the Xasar satrap Khormises, he ensured that Kaikuluj’s follow-up
campaign against Chagri Yabgu was a failure. The Black Rus under Boddomil and the majority
of the Xasar cavalry deserted the field leaving Kaikuluj and the royal vanguard isolated and in a
place to be massacred. Sutluq distinguished himself in the fighting retreat which followed, and
handpicked the regency council which took power for Kaikuluj’s infant son. Within the year that
infant son had expired, Sutluq had betrothed himself to Kaikuluj’s wife and took power.

However, Sutluq’s treachery had caught up to him. Most of those who made up his
administration could guess to some degree at his vicious and unseemly rise to power. He had
few true allies, and before he could even be properly named Khagan he was assassinated by
Kaikuluj’s widow on their wedding night, who cheerfully took the blame and received the lenient
punishment of being sent to a monastery by Khormises and the two Rus Hans who had served
as judges.

There were plenty of members of the royal clan left alive, of course. Choosing a ruler should not
have been difficult, but there was little agreement on how it should be done, and Chagri Yabgu
would not be defeated until 976. The Second Anarchy would be characterized as the period
between 975 and 986, nearly eleven years in which seven different puppet nobles were
elevated to the Khaganate and subsequently removed.

The consequences would be immense. Khormises’ eponymous son would take power and be
acclaimed by greater Xasar satraps as Shah, breaking away from the Khirichan and taking over
a sprawling Balkan empire. The Hanates would become properly independent polities with no
allegiance to Pianjiqand. The palace itself would be sacked no less than four times. By 1000,
the Sahu would be driven out of Asia Minor and Konstantikert would be a legally independent
city ruled by a council of Sahu merchants.

Khirichan hegemony effectively died after the second anarchy, despite the rise to power of the
half-Sahu Khagan Seboukildar in 986. Despite rebuilding Pianjiqand and throwing off the
shackles of foreign dominion, he was unable to bring the Xasar or the Rus back under control.
Furthermore, he was from a family of sedentary Sahu landholders whose connection to the
royal clan was tenuous at best, meaning that the Khirichan Empire is often considered to have
ended with his ascension, which marks the rise of the Kundajid dynasty, named after
Seboukildar’s father Kundaj Manarogul, a second cousin of Kaikuluj Khagan.

Aftermath in the West

Majorian, for his part, had perhaps the shakiest legitimacy of any Frankish Emperor. Belonging
to a new dynasty and having come to power under somewhat suspicious circumstances, it was
a miracle that he managed to build an enduring legacy and indeed die peacefully in his sleep in
the year 978. He would go down in history as the founder of a new dynasty, called de Toulouse.
However, as a ruler he was poor. Charming but not intelligent, popular but illegitimate, he was
forced to frequently compromise with nobles. Paris played host to several “Great Assemblies” of
the grandees of the realm, and the nobility asserted rights they had not enjoyed since the pre-
imperial era. The lords of wealthy and distant regions such as Franconia, Bavaria, Italy, and
southern Hispania gained new autonomy, while even the landholders of the central region were
able to see their lesser sons ennobled as Palatines.

They royal treasury sagged under the weight of these new lordships and their associated
salaries. The royal levy rolls were deeply weakened by the Votive War and several petty
conflicts in Italy between local cities, and the Frankish Empire reached perhaps its lowest ebb in
history. However, it is a credit to the institution that separatism did not enter the thoughts of its
nobles. They might have exploited Majorian’s illegitimacy to claw back power, but even the
Berber aristocrats of eastern Spain viewed power as descending from the Emperor and Papacy,
and these two axes of secular and religious power respectively continued to dominate the
political and social life of the Franks.

In 973, but a few years before his death, Majorian would retire from the strain of ruling, moving
to the Imperial villa outside of Rome, where he felt the warm weather would benefit his health.
When the air there did not agree with him, he travelled to Medilano and died several months
later. However, this pre-emptive trip to Italy made the matter of coronation far easier for his son,
who would be crowned Aloysius V with far less incident than traditionally accompanied a
Frankish Imperial coronation.

It was Aloysius who had to deal with resurgent threats in the Balkans. Xasar raids against the
Croats necessitated several punitive expeditions, all of which failed to achieve any more than
the far larger Second Votive War. In 985, he fought Simon II, the Sklavenian Grand Prince, for
Achaea with more success, but an abortive siege of Thessaloniki proved that the Frankish army
was in abysmal shape. Quarreling nobles and poor quality levies ensured that the expeditions of
previous eras were simply impossible. Two decades of peace following the debacle of the
Second Votive War meant that the Frankish armies had truly reached a low ebb.

However, it is worth noting that despite the poor track record of royal armies in this era, local
forces seem to have had increasing effectiveness at combatting Viking raids, which declined in
number in any case during this era. The newly Christian Northmen had very different ideas
about how to extract wealth from the Franks – mercenaries and honorguards formed from
among the Anglo-Dansk in particular play an increasing role in the politics and feuds of the late
tenth century Frankish Empire.

These Anglo-Dansk adventurers returned home with tales of the palatial splendor of cities such
as Aachen, Neapoli, Cordoba, and Arles. They brought Frankish songs and ballads back, and
built their halls to imitate the style of their southern neighbors. Frankish loanwords penetrated
the language of the Norse as well, especially when it came to previously unfamiliar religious and
legal concepts. The name Aloysius even enjoyed a brief fad amongst the Anglo-Dansk.

It was two of these adventurers, Bjarni Ragnarssen and his brother Solveig, who discovered a
new continent across the wind-blown ice. Exiled when Solveig refused to worship an icon of
Christ, they sailed from Skotland to Hvitland [Greenland], and eventually, seeking a rumored
land far to the west, they set sail even further, landing for the first time in 988 on an island they
called Mikilaland, the great country for it seemed abundant, virginal, and rich compared to
Hvitland’s icy wastes. Summer there was in comparison mild, and there was timber aplenty to
repair their ships.

Solveig, who had quarreled with his brother, chose to remain behind with a group of seemingly
peaceable natives, and when Bjarni returned two years later, he had an interpreter. From the
natives they were able to trade and establish the first permanent settlements on Mikilaland.
While the Mikilaland settlements would ultimately die, the notion of a country across the great
ocean would remain, and because of Bjarni, who ultimately returned to Europe with tales of this
country, Mikilaland would enter into the consciousness of monks and princes alike, a land of
exaggerated legends not unlike those which surrounded the orient.

By the eleventh century, it was also known to the prospering Norse settlement on the Canary
Islands.

Faith and
Fanaticism in the early Iranshahr

The Khardi in the early eleventh century found themselves in an uncomfortable position. Most of
their population believed, in one way or another, in the message of the Buddha. However, the
problem was very much that none could agree on the proper manner in which to do so. Early
persecutions of the Nowbahar movement eventually began to give way. The very persecutions
which had been so effective at silencing the fanatical mobs of temple looters had given rise to a
more insidious, intellectual movement.

Attacking temples of peaceful monks became increasingly unpalatable, especially for the Ifthal,
who since the early days of their Empire had generally held religious sites to be inviolate. Even
if that custom had begun somewhat cynically, it now very much kept the martial aristocracy of
the Iranshahr from uniting behind Mitradharma. This was a dangerous position to be in – the
Khardi were thin on the ground outside of their base of power in Mesopotamia, and technically
Mitradharma was as much Ifthal as he was one of them. Ultimately, the Padishah was forced to
end his persecutions of the Nowbahar.

Fortunately for Shah Mitradharma, few would remember the legacy of his persecutions. Like
many conquering heroes, his legacy was one of martial achievements. It would be his children
who would inherit the mess he left behind. Anushiruwan, Mitradharma’s son and heir would be
remembered largely as a divisive figure. He believed strongly in the polytheist Khardi gods of his
mother, and in general his faith was seen as provincial and limited. His advisors urged him to
treat with the Nowbahar and visit a temple to Shiva or Ohrmazd, but his attempts to seem
multicultural generally seemed insincere instead – a dangerous position for a man at the top of
a vast, multiethnic empire. The manner in which the ancient Eftal kings had ruled seemed
unlikely to work in the sectarian era they had left in their wake.

Anushiruwan was assassinated in 1014 by a member of an ecstatic sect called the Homihina, a
notorious group of ecstatic deity-worshipping Iranian dancers and mystics who found the Shah’s
attempts to reach out to the Nowbahar threatening.

The roots of the Homihina stretched back almost to the era the Oadhyan Eftal, but unlike most
of their contemporaries they had not been prominent or political. Largely they were small groups
of the urban middle-class who gathered in secret to dance and take certain psychoactive drugs.
Even the rise of the Nowbahar had not impacted them significantly until 978, when the first anti-
Homihina tract was published by a Nowbahar preacher who had once been a member of the
cult. Suddenly the Homihina were feared and hated, and the group became militant in response.

The Homihina owed much to the early Mahadevists, and indeed revered Husrava Shah as a
martyr whose attempt to restore the world did not make him the prophesized Saosyant but
rather a herald who dreamed of bringing the Saosyant to life through pre-emptive struggle. The
Khardi Shahs needed to be led to the proper path and used as a tool to create a true universal
Empire which the Saosyant could rule over. However, in general their appeal was far more
limited than the Mahadevists, since they grew out of a more prosperous era – and as such they
remained a violent and isolated sect which by 1020 was pushed almost entirely underground.
However, there was something universal in their appeal: since the era of the Eftal, the Iranian
people had been subjects, and what was more their attempts to rise up had largely been
destroyed by outsiders – Turks and nomads.

Artaxser, Anushiruwan’s son and heir, took power in 1014 after the assassination of his father,
and unlike his father he sought to utilize the religious anger and fanaticism that had been a facet
of Iranian cultural life ever since the fall of the Eftal Empire. He cast himself as a truly Iranian
ruler, and did it in a synthesis of Buddhist and Iranian terms. He would be a Universal Ruler, a
Chakravarti King whose reign would bring about true justice.

Despite the political and religious turmoil which had wracked the Aghatsaghids and the early
Iranshahr, Mitradharma’s dynasty was militarily strong. Their Ifthal and Turkic mercenaries cared
little what propaganda the Khardi used to motivate their own people, and were more than happy
to go to war and gain plunder and land. The Khardi still had a vast population of young men who
were more than happy to be settled as military garrisons if it meant the same plunder and land.
The Nowbahar, meanwhile, were enthused at the prospect of a war against Christians, knowing
that true enlightenment could only be spread if idolater states were destroyed, and Christians
were the worst sorts of idolaters, because unlike polytheists they didn’t even acknowledge the
Buddha.

For the first time in history, a sort of eastern equivalent of the Votivist sentiment existed.
Historians have long argued if it was an organic development brought about by internal changes
in the culture of ancient Iran, or a development inspired (like the Nowbahar themselves
perhaps) by prolonged contact with the West. Either way, for the first time, the Iranshahr would
wage a holy war of their own.

Egypt in the Tenth Century

Their target, ironically, was Egypt, a country with whom the Khardi had long enjoyed mutually
beneficial relations. The latter Heshanid monarchs were primarily focused on Africa and Arabia,
from which the sources of all their wealth flowed. Since the fall of the Padivayanate of Syria in
924, the new Kurdish rulers had largely maintained friendly relations with their neighbors to the
southwest, and forbid the Syrian Eftal from raiding into Egypt.

The Heshanid state was becoming increasingly maritime in its focus. It had no illusions about
taking Syria from the Eftal in any case, and indeed would have been harmed by damaging the
overland trade routes between Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean. Instead, it focused on
gaining allies among the former Saihist regions of Arabia, sending missionaries who frequently
came back with positive results. These allies provided a critical source of cavalry to a state
which otherwise was generally becoming increasingly militarily weak. Reforms of the military
had drifted away from the Roman-inspired model of the early Heshanids, which mixed
disciplined, flexible infantry forces with well-trained Eftal cavalry. Increasingly, this had been
replaced with a more affordable system of local levies which left the Heshanids ill-equipped to
handle any existential threat, but were more than sufficient for border patrols. Combined with
several disastrous military interventions in Arabia, the Heshanid Shahs soured on military
affairs.

This changed during the reign of Timotheos Heshanos (943-958) who faced a full-scale Berber
invasion of Cyrene led by a warlord named Misibsin in 954. After the near loss of the Libyan
frontier, Timotheos created a series of new frontier governors with extraordinary power to
maintain professional frontier armies. However, within a generation of Timotheos’ premature
death, these frontier governors would largely be replaced by the corrupt lackeys of the latest
Emperor Alexandros. Misibsin, defeated but undaunted, raised a new army and succeeded in
wresting Cyrene out of Egyptian hands, naming himself Agillid, or King, of the region. However,
Misibsin was crafty, and willing to show nominal submission to the Emperor in Heliopolis and
pay a tax if it meant he could keep his new won territory.
In 1016, Egypt was as rich as it had ever been. Misibsin’s son, Igider, even represented a
friendly trade connection to the Berbers of Africa, and had even nominally converted to
Christianity, despite not enforcing the faith on his kinsmen or nobles. Trade flowed up the Red
Sea and much of the wealth of the Savahila and India came with it in the form of tariffs.

However, it was also an easy target for a vast and rapidly expanding empire. Padishah Artaxser
assembled an army of some sixty thousand men, perhaps a third of them mounted. When he
mounted his invasion, he rolled over Egyptian Syria and Palestine rapidly, destroying isolated
garrisons. He paused briefly in Emesa, taking time to dedicate a new temple to the solar aspect
of Mitra, and proceeded southwards, besieging Askalon and then marching on Gaza. It fell to
Kaiqalagh, a Turko-Ifthal mercenary general, to capture Jerusalem, almost as an afterthought of
a well-orchestrated and devastating campaign.

It was only when Artaxser reached Gaza that he was met with resistance from the Heshanid
Basileus Syavos Chrysostomos and an army largely composed of Arab mercenaries. While the
Coptic Christians had no interest in Votive War, their campaign was designed around
reconquering Jerusalem and driving out the Khardi. Syavos earned his epithet by giving an
impassioned speech to the assembled army at Tamiathis, bringing many of his captains to tears
with his exhortations to recapture the sacred city.

The battle was fought on the plains of Gaza, and almost immediately it seemed that the Khardi
had the upper hand. Berxwedan, the Shah’s brother, commanded the left flank and the bulk of
the cavalry, and outmatched the Arab mercenaries on the Egyptian right. The main body of the
Khardi infantry were under the command of Rojkhat, a Khardi viceroy with years of experience
on the steppe frontier, but he was a cavalry commander by trade, and struggled to push back
the Egyptian infantry, who despite generally being of low quality were motivated by religious
zeal every bit as much as their Iranian counterparts. The battle lasted the better part of the day,
but in the end Berxwedan’s cavalry returned and crashed into the rear of the Egyptian army,
scattering it.

This was a disaster from which the Heshanid dynasty could not recover. Heliopolis, their historic
palace city, was on the East bank of the Nile, and the Khardi did not even have to cross the river
to take it. Once it fell, organized resistance crumbled as well.

Despite the ease of their triumph, the Khardi faced a significant problem. Unlike Syavush
centuries prior, they could in no way claim to be liberators. The Heshanids were considered by
the common people a thoroughly native dynasty, sharing their religion, language, and culture
despite their now distant origins on the Central Asian steppe. As Syavos Heshanid fled south to
Makuria, the hearts of his people went with him. The Khardi were foreign invaders with a
religious mandate backing their justification for war. They had little understanding of the region
they had conquered, and much of Egypt remained unpacified.

It would be a long war yet.

[Alas, poor Heshanids. The great Kurdwank marches on... for now. Stay tuned.]

Egypt in the 11th

Century

The Khardi conquest of Egypt was declared achieved long before they had effective control over
the sprawling territory. Evidence points to the mass seizure of river-boats by Iranian troops to
allow travel up and down the Nile. Alexandria itself was besieged and did not fall until the
subsequent year, but by 1018 Artaxser ruled everything from the Nile delta to Syene – at least
notionally.

By 1019, Artaxser had returned to Susa, where he was aiming to rebuild the “ancient capital.” In
one of the strange twists of history, the Kurdish nomads who had conquered Mesopotamia
generally had a narrow view of their own past. While the Mitradharmid dynasty traced their
lineage back to mythological ancient Shahs, they had only a foggy understanding of the
Sasanian dynasty or the Arascids before them. In general, history began when they settled
Mesopotamia less than two centuries previously – all else took on the cast of antique legend.
Accordingly, Susa was the eternal capital of any Iranian Empire, and Tesiphon and other historic
centers of power were poorly regarded as mere provincial seats.

After leaving Egypt, Artaxser left it in the hands of Prince Berxwedan, his brother, who was
allowed to rule it with the title of Shah. He took with him a large portion of the army, ordering
Rojkhat to launch a punitive expedition against the Arabs. The Arab tribes of Syria and Palestine
were old allies of the Heshanids, and with the decline of Saihism, they made easy allies with
interior tribes such as the Tayy and waged guerilla war against the Khardi. Doctrinal differences
were for the moment forgotten in the face of the overwhelming threat posed by the Iranian
armies. While Jerusalem had fallen to pagans before, never had there been such a disruption of
pilgrimage or a desecration of holy places. Word of this violence would ultimately spread as far
as the Frankish lands.

Berxwedan was an unpopular ruler, to say the least. In Heliopolis, the seat of the Royal Palace,
he enjoyed near absolute license to do as he pleased – the population of the city was small and
primarily existed to serve the bureaucratic needs of the state. However, he could not govern and
pacify Egypt by remaining in a single isolated palace city. He travelled to Alexandria and
according to contemporary Coptic chronicles, he carried out pagan sacrifices in the churches
and allowed his soldiers to loot the richly decorated interiors. In the words of the monk Cyril of
Memphis, he “burnt alive twelve horses to honor Ohrmazd and Virhrm, and spread the blood of
babes in the baptismal font.” Despite the obvious exaggeration, it seems obvious that
Berxwedan had no regard for the Alexandrine populace and when they broke out in rioting, he
ordered his troops the massacre the protestors.

The people of Alexandria, and Egypt in general, were not particularly warlike. The Heshanids
had never relied on Coptic peasants for anything more than garrisons and preventing civil
insurrections, allowing them to take the field only in major campaigns and then preferring to
utilize Arabs and Syrians, who they viewed as more martial races. Accordingly there was little
knowledge of warfare among the Egyptians.

During the rebellions of 1019-1024, the Egyptian forces time and again had poor discipline, poor
equipment, and limited training. They put their faith in religious conviction, believing they could
not fail if their cause was righteous. Alas, God favored the side with the lance-armed heavy
cavalry whose horses were barded with scale and lamellar. Furthermore, the geography of
Egypt made guerilla warfare difficult. The Khardi army gained control of the Nile and major
cities, and then with almost contemptuous ease proceeded from village to village slaughtering
any resistance. That the rebellion lasted some five years is a testament to the fanaticism of the
resistance even in spite of massive material disadvantages.

It was Rojkhat, ironically, who struggled, despite being a kinder and more accommodating figure
in the eyes of the locals. Despite being notionally a member of the Nowbahar, he was a
personally tolerant figure who refused to allow his personal austerity to dictate the beliefs of his
subjects. He reversed prohibitions on pilgrimage and allowed the Christians to carry out the
religious services in peace. However, on the battlefield he found himself struggling. The rough
terrain of Palestine saw some portion of his vanguard caught in an ambush and henceforth he
found that the Arabs were a dangerous foe, who knew the countryside and knew where to drill
for water. His own advantages were minimal, and he had few allies – but an ample supply of
reinforcements with which to wear down the Arab partisans. In desperation he also made an
alliance with surviving Saihist tribesmen, gaining guides that allowed him to pursue the enemy
deep into their own territory – only to awaken one cool desert morning to find the guides
departed and Arab soldiers all around. On some anonymous outcropping, the Khardi forces
barely fought their way out of the ambush and limped back to Palestine.

Syavos, meanwhile, had fled to Makuria, where he pleaded with the Emperor Zacharias for aid.
However, it was slow in coming. The Makurian army was engaged primarily in the south, fighting
bandits in the wake of the Hawiyan collapse. The Jewish warlords of Zanafij were a more potent
and immediate threat to Makuria. Further, Zacharias imposed certain demands – namely, he
wanted to reverse the relationship between Egypt and Makuria, where Makuria was the lesser
partner and dependent on Egypt for the confirmation of Bishops. Syavos found any terms that
would leave him a vassal to his southern counterpart intolerable, and was unable to put aside
his pride for several years. Though he was treated as an honored guest, he was not permitted
to leave the palace, and finally this confinement wore him thin and he acceded to Zacharias’
demands. Even then, however, aid did not come. The two men signed a treaty of sorts, but
deciding the timetable was the luxury of the Makurians.

Other Egyptians looked to hope from Agillid Igider of Cyrene, but the young King rebuffed their
pleas. He was now free entirely from the tributary yoke of the Heshanids, and a small,
halfhearted attempt by Berxwedan to bring him to heel was rebuffed. Inscriptions on stele from
Igider’s reign seem to indicate a heterodox approach to Christianity, where the Berbers refused
to stop worshipping their traditional gods, but cheerfully included Jesus and the Christian God
amongst their pantheons. Coins bore the stamp of “Khrist Idir” a sort of syncretic deity first
recorded in 1012, who began to gain a widespread following in 1026 after Igider’s brother
Izarasen took power.

The [Persian] Crisis of the 11th Century[1]

What greater perversion of the Darma can there be than Arthasher the son of Anisherivana who
is the breaker of idols and sets himself among the number of the gods? The hour of the Mithra
Bodda is nigh upon us, and may we all be saved from ignorance and despair.
-11th century manuscript recovered from an Azerbijani temple

Stand and know you stand before the ultimate, the great God and Lord, the ultimate divinity of
all divinities, the ultimate controlling principle of all controlling powers.

Lord of the becoming world, the principle that is invoked and worshipped through the name of
Zurvan has itself no notion or faculty; nor has it anything that it must do.

No natural thing or artifice is God’s equal or superior. God cannot take the form of any bodily
thing. Meditate then upon this.
-Text found in the Iranian city of Ram

The religious and ethnic conflicts which defined Iran since the fall of the Eftal eventually gave
way to something new and altogether more unified. It was a bloody, but perhaps inevitable,
process. Ironically, it was the Khardi, a people who were mostly “pagans” in the most classical
sense of the term, who would bring about the reforms necessary to end the sectarian violence
between the great factions of Iranian society. Religious sects such as the Homihna and the
Nowbahar, the latter Mahadevists and the rising cult of Virhrm-Ohrmazd all clashed at times
with the polytheist Buddhism that was by now the mainstream, majority religion of Iran, to say
nothing of the communal violence afflicted on the remaining Christian communities of Armenia
and Asoristan. The common Iranians resented the privileged status of Turks and Eftal within the
Ifthal mercenary system, and all comers resented the Khardi for settling amongst them and
building new garrison cities, and perhaps above all for conquering them.

The Yazdati beliefs of the Khardi themselves fell somewhere between the “mystery cult”
movements popularized by Bakhti refugees and Zoroastrian holy men and the lay Buddhism of
the common Eftal and Iranian. Accordingly, they were distrusted by all – neither strange enough
to be exotic and not familiar enough to be trusted, their detractors whispered of the “perversion
of religion” while cheerfully ignoring the fact that their own religion would have been
unrecognizable to a Sasanian nobleman or even an Eftal tribesman from but a few centuries
ago.

Despite this distrust, the Khardi were innovators determined to maintain their hold on power.
They had carved an empire that stretched from Sogdia to Cappadocia, effectively restoring the
Eftal Empire at its height in a way not even equaled by the Aghatsaghids, who had relied heavily
on viceroys and tributary princes to accomplish a similar feat. However, unlike the Eftal, the
Mitradharmid dynasty could not depend on the relative tolerance of their subjects. Furthermore,
despite their relatively small numbers, the Nowbahar enjoyed a disproportionate voice which
showed every sign of growing stronger and more resolute in the face of persecution.

The groundwork for Artaxser’s religious reforms would be laid even during his first major
campaign into Egypt. From the moment of his ascension to the Imperial bench he claimed to be
a Chakravarti and the bringer of universal justice – weaving the Buddhist conception of
monarchy with language and rhetoric not unfamiliar to any of the more Iranianized sects
including the new Mahadevist movements. The Iranshahr was not going to deny divinities
entirely, but many of the Iranian mystery cults had themselves always had an iconoclastic
streak, preferring to represent God as fire or an absence in their art. He equated the Yazdati
deities with their equivalents in Eftal and Iranian mythology, a practice which was relatively easy
given the widespread intermixing of Khardi and their subjects.

Artaxser avoided open persecution in favor of covert persecution and propaganda. Forcing
prominent Nowbahar preachers to publicly recant their testimony through less than savory
means and give favorable accounts of his reign was a particular favored tactic of his. He minted
coins where his own image was absent, replaced with an icon of the throne and the Buddha on
one side and a stylistic symbol representing Ohrmazd or Mitra on the reverse. Thanks to the
long propagation of Indian religious thought over the centuries, the merger and equating of gods
was something that most people were familiar with. Various philosophical and religious tracts
even argued for something akin to monotheism or pantheism – influenced by the pantheistic
tendencies which had been in vogue across the subcontinent in the wake of the Maukhani. The
struggle, as ever, was incorporating the nontheistic tendencies of Buddhism, and this was where
the vicious Nowbahar reaction diverged with the moderate repudiations of traditional western
Buddhism.[2]

Artaxser established himself as an almost divine figure, but notably refused to take this in an
explicitly Buddhist route. The victories of the Khardi and his dynasty in particular, his
propaganda claimed, were because they were rightful rulers of Iran, descended from the mythic
Askanid dynasty, and thus their rule was in accordance with truth and the spread of universal
justice and enlightenment to all. Abandoned stupa and temples across Iran but especially in
Avghanistan were renovated and claimed to be evidence of the ancient Askanid dynasty’s
patronage of the Buddha.

In this manner, Artaxser, more than any of his predecessors, laid the ideological groundwork for
the survival and continuance of the Khardi state. As a conqueror and ruler alike he developed a
cult of personality around himself and his dynasty which ensured its endurance. By skirting
close to claiming the title of something like the Maitreya Buddha or a Saosyant but without
openly taking any such title and indeed actively repudiating these notions, he managed to
appropriate the rhetoric of a messianic redeemer and tread a delicate middle path between
those who wished to smash idols and end god-worship, and those for whom the Buddha was
just another aspect of a vast pantheon of gods.
Those Nowbahar who refused to be silenced fled in no small numbers to southern Arabia and
among the Savahila. The former embraced them for their iconoclasm and the latter were
remarkably tolerant. In general, however, the Khardi Iranshahr lost little. They patronized any
intellectual willing to write positively about their regime, and co-opted many others with subtle
applications of force, which allowed their narrative to overpower the dissenting voices. Other
mystery cultists and radicals fled north, seeking the Sahu country, or east into India, where their
mysticism was sometimes embraced.

It is worth noting that certain regions required different policies. Ferghana, Sogd, and Avghana
all were more deeply Hindu in their religious observances, and accordingly were not deeply
penetrated by Nowbahar sympathies. Furthermore, they were sufficiently peripheral that their
satraps were allowed to issue currency which differed in style (if not in weight or specifications)
from the royal currency. These coins frequently feature depictions of Hindu and Iranian deities
as human beings, and their temples did not undergo the iconoclastic transformation that afflicted
the west. Imperial policy was frequently one of benign neglect, so long as taxes were collected
and garrisons respected. However, stele commemorating Artaxser’s reign can nevertheless be
found across these regions, so Imperial rule was never quite as light as Aghatsaghid dominion
over large parts of Persia and Mesopotamia was.

[1] Obviously the Persians wouldn’t have called it that. Also there’s another big crisis in the 11th
century that will involve a major setback to the Indian “Republican” tradition, so I wanted to
clarify. Spoilers!

[2] Iranian/Sogdian Buddhism of course allows for plenty of traditional deities and like most of
the western Buddhist traditions is quite heretical. However it refuses to acknowledge or concern
itself with an overall deity or a creator deity, seeing both as heretical. Even after Artaxser’s
reforms, the notion of a universal deity should not be confused with a creator deity – the
universe is both eternal and cyclical in their conception.

The Berber states

before the Age of Discovery

The increasing centralization of the Berber kingdoms came to a close in the mid-tenth century,
as a sort of rough equilibrium was reached between the Igladan monarchs and their vassal
clans. It was a time of prosperity and trade, with the overland routes between Ghana and the
Berber coast taking in ever-increasing volumes of goods.

The Mauri mercantile class remained distinct from Berber society as a whole. As Christians who
spoke a Romance language, they had little difficult traveling through Europe, and as a people
who had many cultural similarities with the inland Berbers, they had little difficulty blending into
and intermarrying with prominent Berber families. Nicene religious observance, however, was a
tricky subject for the Mauri. Over the centuries North Africa had gained a reputation for being a
den of heretics and pagans alike, and this was not lessened by the willingness of the Mauri to
worship other gods alongside the traditional Christian pantheon, at least publicly and for political
gain. The Bishops of North Africa wrote frequent letters to the Pope begging for liberation, but
their pleas tended to fall on deaf ears. The Dukes and magistrates of Italy and Southern France
grew fat on African trade, and had no desire to see it imperiled by war. Besides, the specter of
the Khirichan still loomed heavily over Europe, and the Berbers were more a source of
mercenaries than a threat.

In addition to the swelling frequency of Mediterranean trade and their critical trans-Saharan
connections, the Masamida also made contact with the Norse settlements on the islands that
the Mauri called Niguara and the natives had begun to call Andiland [Canary Islands] in their
own tongue. While the volume of trade itself was relatively small, the Mauri sailors provided
critical knowledge of advanced agricultural techniques and in return learned much about
oceanic travel and the world to their south. In time, a small Berber population would also settle
on the Niguara isles, contributing to the truly distinctive ethnic makeup of the small Atlantic
kingdom.

From the Andilanders, the Masamida learned of the Fula kingdom far to the south, where the
Norse traded for timber and iron, and travelled even as far as the Kingdom of Akan, seeking an
alternative source for ivory and gold with mixed successes. These expeditions could be
incredibly lucrative, but they also posed greater risks than the reliable Taureg caravans. Still, by
eliminating the middleman, certain merchants among the Masamida became incredibly wealthy,
and improved ship design allowed journeys across the ocean to become increasingly safe and
reliable.

As centralized monarchies, the Berber states were generally well linked together by trade and
familial alliances. Despite notional borders, nomadic groups frequently crossed these
boundaries and kinship and vassal obligations more than territorial lines defined these
kingdoms. Cities, towns, and sedentary peoples knew which regime they were a part of by their
ties and treaties rather than lines on a map. Accordingly it is difficult to define clear boundaries
on the Berber states until several centuries later. However, this was the era in which single royal
capitals began to develop, rather than the monarchy moving from city to city.

Centralization also meant attempts by the Berber kings to unify religious sentiments. Local gods
and ancestor worship were too much a part of Berber life and culture to be expunged (as seen
by the general failure of Mauri missionary activities) but coins and monuments increasingly
reference the Cyrenican deity Idir Karst or Idir Christ, an indigenous messianic figure who
increasingly became a chief divinity. Several local prophetesses to this new syncretic deity are
also recorded as emerging in the first twenty years of the 11th century. While worship of Idir
dates back to Greco-Roman times, when he was equated with Apollo or Serapis, Idir Karst
seems to have been worshiped as one of a number of messianic gods who incarnated upon
earth in human form - borrowing liberally from Ghanese and Judeo-Christian traditions. Where
Isau Karst [Jesus] was worshiped as well, the two were frequently contrasted, with the Idir
taking on elements of a conquering hero and a redeemer of Isau, whose mission was halted by
the treachery of the Jews.
The Religious Backdrop of Europe

Another major influence of North Africa upon Europe in the 10th century, besides the profusion
of mercenaries was the Tinanian heresy. Almost entirely annihilated in its native land, the
Tinanians had a long and esoteric history. Descended from Manichaean preachers exiled by the
Eftal of Syria, Tinanian mysticism emphasized retreat from worldly affairs and a dualistic world
in which material things were a source of true evil. Among the commercial wealth and splendor
of Italy and Southern France, Tinanian preaching had a real appeal, both to those who felt guilt
for their material success and those who had failed to achieve the same. It was the Mauri of
Sicily who brought the teachings to a broader European audience, bolstered by a new wave of
refugees who fled from the centralizing efforts of the Igladan [Kings] of North Africa.

By the 11th century, Tinanism had a large, primarily urban, following across Italy and France. In
general, the 11th century for Europe would be one of religious turmoil and this would be no
exception. Folk Desidarianism also enjoyed a resurgence as the rural population began to see
heresy everywhere. Burnings and persecutions became commonplace in many places, despite
calls from moderate orders such as the Cassadorians for calm. Catholicism in general was
unprepared to deal with these new threats to the established orthodoxy, both the existential
danger posed by heresy and the subtler danger to order and good governance posed by the
mob violence of Desidarian preachers. The existing order seemed everywhere imperiled, and
for once the threat was not the looming threat of a steppe Khagan but rather from inside.

In 1004, the Imperial Legate, a Tuscan grandee by the name of Julian de Florentia decided to
side with the Desidarians against the Tinanian threat. Mass arrests were held, and a literal
witch-hunt of sorts lasted for three years before Legate Julian was recalled to Aachen to face
censure for his actions. The aging Aloysius V, however, was torn. On one hand it was important
to persecute heresy in all its forms, and yet on the other hand, many of the suspected heretics
were simply wealthy figures targeted by corrupt local magistrates. He suspected Julian de
Florentia, as a landholding grandee, was simply trying to expand the power and prestige of
himself and his friends at the expense of anyone who could possibly be linked to heresy.
Furthermore, he feared another situation akin to Spain, a long civil conflict which could leave
lasting scars on one of the most prosperous parts of his dominion.

So when Julian was recalled, he replaced him with his nephew Goscelin, who he expected to
have more control over. And while he did indeed have Goscelin’s obedience, the new Legate
the Papacy found themselves often at odds. Goscelin was a plodding, meticulous man whose
temperament was poorly suited to managing the vast number of vassals and obligations that the
Legate of Italy had to balance. Furthermore, Aloysius V was now too ill to travel from Aachen,
and he decided to delay any resolution of the matter until the coronation campaign of his son,
who would be crowned as Aloysius VI in 1009.

Even as the Imperial administration was distracted by affairs in the south, new problems with
internal unification became increasingly apparent in Germany, where the nobility took advantage
of Aloysius V’s infirmity. Under Frankish succession laws, which by now were relatively universal
across the Empire, the firstborn son inherited all titles. Traditionally, the blow to the younger
sons was softened by handing out titles and offices to lesser nobles. However, under Emperor
Majorian, the list of offices and titles had swollen to enormous sizes. Once a method for the
state to assert power over the nobility, it had become a way for lesser nobility to gain a sort of
royal dole. The Imperial apparatus was swollen with effectively useless figures who expected
estates and salaries.

This might not have been a problem in an expanding Empire such as in earlier days, or if the
Frankish Empire had the energy for a new Votive War to carve out a region in which to expand.
But in Aloysius V’s Europe, expansion was dominated by German landholders and freemen,
and even that had mostly stalled. The obvious solution was to encourage religious life as an
alternative to entitlement. However, the second sons of Dukes had little interest in retiring to
some anonymous monastery, and expected powerful Bishoprics or the office of Abbot at some
important location. At first, this benefitted the Church as well – they could negotiate high prices
for such preferential treatment. This practice was not without precedent, but the scale was
notable. Previously, there had been more prestige in royal office, but with royal offices drying up,
Dukes became deeply invested in who they could… invest.

Thus began the Investiture Controversy. The Church and Empire had rarely quarreled outright.
Apart from the traditional succession campaigns to Rome, there had been a general
understanding that Church interests would be respected and that appointments high church
offices, since they sometimes commanded vast temporal wealth, would be confirmed by both
Church and local government – a practice dating back to the Isidorians. While this was an ideal
not always held to, there were rarely major conflicts. However, with expansive new Church titles
being regularly created in the early 11th century, the Emperor asserted that it was his right, and
his right alone, to confirm Church appointments. The local German dukes asserted that they
should be considered, as all local rulers had been consulted before the quasi-unification of
Christendom under the Emperor.

The Church was torn. The Pope supported the Emperor, but many of the clergy across Europe,
including the powerful Benedictine and Cassadorian orders, did not. Simony enriched them, and
local simony was generally more profitable than Imperial negotiations, and was resolved
quicker. As tempers flared, no easy resolution was in sight. The death of the Pope in 1005
further complicated matters, as Julian, the Imperial Legate, had a strong say in the choice of the
next Pope, and leaned on the Curia to keep a Pope friendly to Imperial interests in general and
the interests of the Italian nobility in particular. He got his wish with Pope Innocent I.

Furthermore, the German dukes had an even greater list of grievances. The Italian aristocracy,
they felt, had far too much influence. Why did every Emperor tour Italy, when their armies were
the vanguard of Christendom, and their sacrifices kept all Europe safe? Why did they have to
travel to Aachen to be heard when every Emperor met with the Dukes of Italy in their own
courts? Why did so many Frankish kings marry into the families of Italian landholders?
As the Dukes met and discussed the issues even more, tempers flared. Radical notions were
suggested. The patriarchs of old were lost to the infidel hordes. Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem,
Constantinople – all were once again in heathen hands and even when they had not been they
had been held by heretics. God consistently punished the Christian faithful of the East for their
compromises and submission to the Boddo-worshipping devils. Should there not be new
Patriarchates, representing the new seats of Christendom? And from the west, many Frankish
delegations joined the German chorus. They too had been alienated, despite sacrificing their
blood against the Norse. Why should they not receive the right to appoint their own kin to
Church offices if those offices fell within their lands? Italy after all was a den of heresy. Good,
local, Frankish Christians were in no short supply, why should they have to risk a Tinanist
Bishop?

Battle lines across Europe were drawn the de Toulouse dynasty faced its first real challenge.
Aloysius V would do almost nothing to stop the controversy from spreading, and indeed he
would fuel the fire with angry and borderline paranoid responses to those Dukes who petitioned
him.

The East in
summary

China in the 10th century struggled against the current as long as it could. The Northern
Kingdom, under the rule of a new Khagan Eltemish, struggled actively to resist Chinese and
Kitai influences, but was simply incapable of doing so. The Kitai in particular retained their
traditional autonomy, and Eltemish was forced to act the part of a Chinese Emperor so as to
quell peasant uprisings. The great weight of Han history and tradition was in many senses too
powerful. Surrounded by the antique splendor of past dynasties, governing from a Qi palace, it
was in a sense inevitable that Eltemish would forget his origins. He assigned posthumous
names to his ancestors and began calling himself Xuanzong.

However, these changes did not endear him to the Uighur nomads who were his true base of
support, or the garrisons across the country who he depended upon to maintain order.
Eltemish/Xuanzong was forced out in a palace coup in 943, and replaced by Inanbayan, his
younger brother. The royal children and the royal consorts were sent into exile and waylaid by
“bandits” en route. None survived. Eltemish himself was rather more lucky, being sent to a
Buddhist monastery and allowed to live out his days there – kept around as a threat of sorts to
Inanbayan that he too was utterly replaceable.

The coup which overthrew Eltemish, however, was backed by both Uighur clans and the Kitai.
Much like how the Uighurs had once travelled to the Qi court and extracted humiliating deals
with them, these clans and the Kitai did the same, taking from the capital exorbitant tributes in
kind, enriching themselves and their consorts while treating the royal court as effectively captive
to their interests.
For the next three decades, Inanbayan ruled as a puppet. The tax revenues of the Empire were
signed away to certain clans, and the Kitai in particular gained important military governorships
across the Uighur Empire. Inanbayan’s son Inantengin succeeded him in 978, and with this
succession the Kitai gained total control over the North Kingdom. Inantengin was married to a
Kitai princess and utterly controlled by her. Yaol Ambayan Tainzou, the Kitai Khan, was invested
with the title “Prime Minister of the Book Agency” an inconspicuous office which agglomerated to
itself total control of the state apparatuses. By 1012, Yaol Abaoji, Ambayan’s grandson, took
power directly in yet another palace coup.

The Kitai by this point had long enjoyed near absolute control over government, and the Uighurs
had become accustomed to their role as mercenaries and protectors of that control. By playing
the long game, Ambayan had ensured that the prestige of the Jaylaqar dynasty could fade
naturally and the Uighur clans within the Empire would come to accept their new position. The
Book Agency’s Third Section was instrumental in hunting down remaining members of the
Jaylaqar dynasty, but because of almost a century of weakness and frequent palace coups, the
Jaylaqar scions found few safe havens.

One of these havens was among the Tocharians, where several Jaylaqar pretenders would
reside in the Tarim basin, trying to gather supporters and Kipchak mercenaries for a campaign
which would never fully materialize. Ultimately, their dream of overthrowing Northern Kingdom
and restoring their prestige never materialized.

In the south of China, neither the Chu nor the Wu successfully managed to create a united front
against the Uighur Khaganate. The closest they came was a 957 invasion launched by the Chu
which was only narrowly defeated by the Uighurs, but after this defeat, both polities found
themselves largely on the defensive. The Chu built fortifications along the Han Shui river, the
better to defend their territories in Sichuan from the north. Further, the Chu cultivated an alliance
with the Bod Empire to defend their eastern flank, a treaty which allowed trade in Ferghana
horses and western goods in exchange for a semi-regular tribute to Rhasa.

The Wu had also turned inwards, and the “East King” Li Fei (Suzong) managed several major
victories against the Red Standards but he was unable to fully eradicate them. Unlike prior
peasant rebellions, which had used Taoism or Buddhism as their ideology, the Manichaeist
worldview of the Red Standards accommodated with far less mental gymnastics and a black
and white world where the foes of the movement were literal devils and the allies of the
movement literal “harmonious spirits” or angels. Anxi Yanyan’s death only made him a martyr,
torn down by the powers of evil and disorder.

While the latter Red Standards were little more than vicious bandits, they were bandits with a
cause who neither gave nor asked for quarter, and as such represented a perpetual thorn in the
side of both the Wu and the Tai.

However, the Wu dynasty, despite its struggles in the south, also experienced a golden age of
innovation and achievement between 980-1020. Under King Li Lun (Ruizong), patronage of the
arts and magnificent Buddhist temples reached a fever pitch. The Wu also invested heavily in
their oceangoing navy, seeing it as an important third flank in their on and off wars with the Kitai.
Using lodestone divination needles submerged in water, the Wu fleet was one of the first to
utilize the compass, starting roughly in 1015. Within fifty years, commercial sailors were making
use of the technology and it had spread to Srivijaya and Japan. This technology, combined with
fire-rockets imported from Vanga, allowed the Wu to score major naval victories against the
Kitai.

The Wu had few allies, however. The Chu resented their mercantile prosperity and their
stranglehold on the mouth of the Yangtze. Abortive attempts to align themselves with the
wealthy Baekje Kingdom, the sole power of their eponymous peninsula, had failed after the Kitai
intervened. Kitai dominion over Manchuria meant that in 966 they had been able to send an
army with contemptuous ease to encircle Ungjin and demand the submission of the Baekje
King. Since that point the Baekje had maintained only a weak token army and sent yearly tribute
to the Uighur-Kitai Empire. Despite their submission however, Baekje prospered. Many Chinese
intellectuals had fled to the peninsula after the Uighur conquest, and accordingly the past
century had been one of increasing sinicization but also wondrous art and the introduction of a
sprawling but effective bureaucracy modelled off of that of the Qi.

Accordingly, the Wu were left rather diplomatically isolated – just strong enough to repulse
occasional northern invasions, but not strong enough to reunify China under their sovereignty.

[Updates on the Tai will be lumped in with Southeast Asia more generally, since that is the group
they identify more with, and that part of OTL China will not be considered as properly Chinese
ITTL.

If people have any questions, please ask. East Asia is not my specialty, so its a part of the world
that I understand gets covered in relatively more vague posts. Bear with me on that. If people
have specific parts of East Asia that they'd like to see covered in more depth, please let me
know. If people have any interest in guest posts on East Asia, that's one of the areas I think I
could really benefit from a more knowledgeable person's assistance.]

The Monsoon
Alliance

The 9th and 10th centuries were for Southeast Asian polities a time of demographic and
urban expansion. The concentration of state power allowed for the construction of enormous
and enduring temple complexes. Nowhere was this phenomenon more evident than at the heart
of Khmer civilization, great Indranokura and her rival and ally, Yasodharapurait, often called
Angkor Thom or simply Angkor.

While it may be somewhat obvious to say that climate shaped the development of
Khmer civilization, the monsoon system which gave its people life and food presented unique
challenges. Much of the immense rainfall which blankets the region comes during a very
specific wet season, and harnessing this season was the perennial challenge of those who
wished to prosper on the banks of the Mekong. Due to their predictable patterns, the monsoon
allowed sustainable agriculture and aquaculture to flourish – and the state perfected it. Mass
engineering projects, particularly the construction of canals known as baray, allowed the guilds
of Angkor and Indranokura to prosper to unprecedented degrees. Large-scale urbanization to
remarkable levels became a hallmark of Khmer civilization.

The hydrological system reached its peak in the late tenth century, providing clean water
to the sprawling interlinked system of cities which comprised Indranokura. Run by an indigenous
version of the Ayat council system, Indranokuran governance was a byzantine and chaotic
system at the best of times. Unlike in India, the guilds here had relatively limited authority –
many merchants, craftsmen, and other groups were private individuals, and social mobility
although limited was unprecedented for the time. However, the Ayat seats were effectively
hereditary, and the monarch was more than a ceremonial figure or a glorified prime minister but
a vital religious and political leader. Besides the Ayat, the main seat of power was the temple
complex. Local cults syncretized their deities, adopting Hindu names and the overarching
religious philosophies as necessary and in turn were granted secular power by local elites eager
to use religion to validate their reign.

Part of the reason for the stuttering failure of mercantile guilds to gain control was the
collapse of Qi China, which had profound effects on the economy of the entire region. While
trade would recover within a century or so, its collapse during a time of political consolidation
ensured the domination of religious figures and landholders rather than merchants.
Yasodharapurait and Indranokura first signed an alliance in 874. Despite a war three years later,
the alliance would be restored, and in union with the city of Vyadhapura, the “Triple Alliance” or
Khmer Empire was formed. The Indranokuran Maharaja was notionally placed at the head of
the entire system, a symbolic and yet vital link which bound the three cities together through
regular visits between all three cities.

While the system might have had some flaws, the demographic advantages of the
Khmer in general and the economic and political advantages of the Alliance in particular were
overwhelming. Victory after victory was commemorated on temples and monuments to the glory
of a series of world conquering Great Kings. Only the Champa dynasty of Vijayapura, shielded
as they were by terrain and the Dvaravati city states, strong enough to fight back and form their
own coalitions, resisted the centralizing power of Indranokura, and it was Indranokura that
emerged as paramount member of the Alliance. By 933, when the terms of the treaty were
renegotiated in favor of the Indranokuran Ayats, it was clear where true power lay. Henceforth,
most temple dedications were in honor of the Maharaja, rather than local government.

Royal power before the 933 treaty was in many senses secular. The monarch had
emerged from a local prominent family, and that family had gradually codified their powers
within the framework of a Hindu state. However, after that date, the monarch increasingly
became referred to as the devaraja, and sought to connect themselves with various Hindu
deities as an incarnation of the divine to grant themselves additional legitimacy and prestige.
Despite the centralizing tendencies, the Khmer were a loose and somewhat hegemonic empire.
Geography and the uneasy nature of their union meant that symbolic dominion was often more
important than actual dominion, and these local governors and councils who watched their
names be erased from history in favor of the glorious conquests of a distant despot could rest
easy knowing that their actual tangible power was far more difficult to wrest away.

The Khmer Empire did however pose a direct threat to the Srivijaya. By 900, Srivijaya
was exhausted, having fought the Silendra dynasty and their partisans to a bloody standstill
across Java. Interruptions in Chinese trade and the increasing independence of Srivijayas
notional protectorates and partners had rocked the mighty city-state to the core. Local rulers
sought their own power-bases, as the Silendra had, and the example set by the Silendra was
that it was possible to rebel and at least for a while get away with it. Any punitive victory won by
the Srivijayan Empire was rendered hollow by the Silendra dynasty’s escape further east. Word
reached the Maharaja’s court that the Silendra exiles now lived in splendid luxury far away, and
were no worse for their exile.

The Khmer Empire was one of the more obvious threats. More powerful than any other
notional partner of the Srivijaya, the Khmer threat prompted the Srivijaya to begin working with
the Dvaravati Raja Narapatisimhavarman providing money and great stockpiles of arms to
counterbalance the Khmer and keep them preoccupied. With these generous gifts,
Narapatisimhavarman encouraged certain Tai tribes to migrate into the Khorat Basin, distracting
the Khmer and leading to several campaigns between 945-955. However, the Tai by and large
saw better opportunities to their northeast, and in 957, those who remained, known as the Isan,
signed a treaty acknowledging the primacy of Indranokura.

In 960, the Maharaja made a pact with the northern Mon city of Haripunjaya and their
king, Chakafadiraj, further isolating the Dvaravati and cutting off their northern overland trade.
Slowly, cities began to turn away from the Dvaravati and seek Khmer protection, protection
which came with generally lenient terms and was closer to alliance than outright subjugation.
However, the core of the Dvaravati kingdom, centered on Nakhon Pathon, refused to submit.
Bolstered by a large Srivijayan army (said to number a hundred thousand men and ten
thousand elephants) and lead by Sangramadhanan, the son of the famous general Dharmasetu
and husband of the Imperial princess Devitanajaya. Sangramadhanan had earned his position
thanks to his father’s impressive campaigns against the Silendrans, and though he had inherited
his father’s tactical genius he lacked sufficient tact to endear himself to Narapatisimhavarman
and indeed had a lofty and overbearing manner which alienated the Dvaravati nobility.

The Khmer invasion, when it came, was well-poised to take advantage of this division in
the ranks. While what happened is unclear, it seems that the Srivijayan army was broken
independently in a massive battle. Trophies from the victory adorned the walls of Indranokura
for the next decade, and Sangramadhanan himself was captured and later executed. The
Khmer army defeated Dvaravati roughly a month later and the Khmer enjoyed near total
hegemony over Southeast Asia. The rag-tag remainder of the Srivijayan army was evacuated by
sea and shortly after this period the city of Chaiya on the Malay peninsula underwent a massive
fortification project.

News of this defeat caused a spate of rebellions. The Raja of Kadaram on the peninsula
aligned himself with Indranokura, subverting the Srivijayan control of the region. One of the
dynasts who had replaced the Silendra, Devasimha Dharmaja launched a successful rebellion
on Java. Srivijayan power structures had always been lose and now they were utterly broken.
The center of political power in the region would shift rapidly. Cities on the straits would acquire
direct influence and Java, far more densely populated than Sumatra, would rise to hegemonic
status.

A sign of growing Srivijayan weakness can be seen in the 1018 expedition by an

Utkaladeshan navy which brought the once mighty city-state to ruin. Despite holding on as at
least a notional hegemon, after that date, political power shifted irrevocably north and east. The
city of Temasek on the Malay peninsula negotiated a favorable trade treaty with the
Utkaladeshan fleet and henceforth would assume Srivijaya’s position and influence in the region
in alliance with the city of Kadaram.

The 11th century was the zenith of the Khmer. Despite increasing strain on the hydraulic
systems which enabled their supremacy, Khmer culture and hegemony was unquestionably
dominant across a vast region. With the decline of Srivijaya and its fracturing into rival city-
states, the Khmer, despite being a primarily land-based power could afford to play kingmakers
of sorts, funneling funds to their favored allies and conspiring to bring down those who opposed
them.

From the Tarim to

Sugd - independent states and the rise of the Khardi

As with many areas of the world isolated from regular rainfall and oceanic influence, the
fortunes of the Tarim basin states were dependent on water and water supply. Throughout its
history, the city-states there have despite sporadic ascents and descents in prosperity controlled
by the fickle supply of life-giving water nevertheless always benefitted from their remarkable
position at the crossroads of east and west. Chinese travelers to the region as early as the
Liang dynasty spoke of a remarkable seat of scholarship, art, and perhaps most remarkably
enormous agricultural wealth. Travelers recorded “short haired women dancing in ochre
turbans” and “a country of pomegranates and apricots, peaches and wheat.”

The native people were a mixture of Saka and Tocharian natives, and possessed a long and
antique history which until the coming of the Kipchak was relatively undisturbed by outside
threats. Part of the broader cultural Indosphere, they had absorbed Buddhism and Hindu
religion from Gandhara. They had been dominated of course by a succession of foreign
dynasties, most notably the Eftal and the Bod Empires, but the hand of both of these powers
was exceptionally light, and those who tried to strengthen their dominion over the vast and arid
country often met with defeat, as did the Aghatsaghids. The Eftal made little effort to enforce
Sogdian Buddhism on them, and the Tibetan peoples who came to the great oasis cities were
frequently converted to the Sarvastivadin school which was popular in the region.

Civilization in the Tarim basin exists in a rough horseshoe of sorts around a vast and arid center
in which no life is possible. Despite this remarkable aridity, several major kingdoms, based
around oasis cities, had survived in varying states since the 3rd century. Perhaps the greatest of
these was Khotan or Hvamna, a long-suffering vassal of the Bod Empire whose rule by the
Viasha dynasty was never in doubt even as the Viasha bowed to tax collectors and
administrators from far Rhasa. Despite being reduced to figurehead vassals and sending their
children as hostages to the Imperial court, the Viasha retained the covert allegiance of many
notables, and in 931 broke from the Bod Empire permanently.

In 876, the arrival of Kipchak refugees in the Turfan oasis region would upset the delicate
balance of steppe life. At the time, certain oases were actually overflowing, a crisis which
damaged critical irrigation canals and left many Tocharian cities vulnerable to the carefully
mediated threats and intimidation of the Kipchak. However, the Kipchak presence itself was
wholly unsustainable – as we have seen, they were incapable of supporting their herds and
ultimately continued to move southwards until they met their end in Gandhara.

By 940, there was essentially no sign of the Kipchak people as an independent civilization. Their
notional hegemony might have endured beyond their defeats in India, but if it did, it was not for
long. The Tarim basin indeed would continue to cultivate a reputation as a place which
swallowed up invaders – several Bod dynasty invasions to reconquer the Hvamna kingdom
were repulsed between 930 and 950, and indeed the Hvamna kingdom was never assimilated
or annexed by the Kipchak, whose westward journey avoided their power. While Kipchak ethnic
markers remained a part of the Tarim basin civilization, they were unable to survive the
transition from nomadic to sedentary people – the rapid shock proved fatal.

As the Tarim basin recovered from invasions and the water crisis, there was a fresh blossoming
of Buddhist philosophy and missionary activity. The writing of the Red-Gold Sutras, and the
Book of Received Awareness represent significant literary and cultural achievements of the era.
Monks travelled as far East as the Fujiwara Regency in Japan and as far West as the Xasar
Shahdom, where their teachings were translated and propagated. Their teachings represented
a “purer” philosophy, closer to the historical roots of the religion, and in general were treated
with a mix of xenophilic reverence by some and suspicion by traditional priestly elites in
particular.

For all their prestige and wealth, Hvamna, Kashgar, and the other powers of the Tarim basin had
difficulty asserting hard power beyond their own cities. One of the few exceptions would prove
to be the Khardi wars of the 11th century, where they supported the Ferghana kingdom of
Khujand against encroachment from the west. Hvamna mercenaries would fight in these wars
and bring back from them some of the first handguns, where they became a curiosity which was
studied in detail in several manuals published in Khotan.
Just to the west, the Ferghana valley represented another region relatively untouched by the
changes happening in the wider world, and spared also significant raids from the steppes by
nature of its geographic isolation. However, it remained a trade lane, and a significant source of
high-quality horses for foreign rulers wishing to make an impression. Ruled since the fall of the
Aghatsaghids by a petty dynasty known as the Mihirkulids or the Khujand Shahdom, the
Ferghana valley was dominated by a mixture of Indo-Iranian peoples of which the Eftal were no
small percentage, although their dynasty called themselves Saka. In 986, after a Khardi raid, the
capital was moved from Khujand into the valley, to Akhsikat. In the reign of Shah Indradata,
fortifications were built across the valley, and the Shahs were ultimately able to keep their title
and pay a small tribute to the distant Eranshahr.

Ferghana was thus able to preserve its unique culture and material traditions. Selling red
lacquerware and horses and maintaining their key position on vital trade routes despite Khardi
pressure was not easy, especially as the Khardi began their resettlement projects and
resistance to Khardi rule on the steppes began to grow. Alliances between the Ferghanans and
petty satraps in Khuttal and Chach were necessary to preserve their independence, and as time
wore on it was increasingly a matter of when, not if, the hammer would fall against these satraps
and thus by extension Akhsikat. The royal court feared quite reasonably that if the Khardi ever
became distracted in their conquests of the west and turned their attention back east, Ferghana
and her petty allies, the Mihirkulid kingdom would almost certainly be annexed. Fortunately for
Indradata however, rapidly changing circumstances would ensure that scenario would not come
to pass.

Meanwhile, to the north of the Khardi Empire lay the great Oghuz Khaganate. With their seat of
power in Khorasem, the Oghuz were a force to be reckoned with, if for no other reason than
their center of gravity lay far closer to Sugd and many other newly-conquered provinces. To
compete with this local threat, the Khardi were forced to cooperate with the remaining
Aghatsaghid elites, who had settled and fortified the vast frontier against Oghuz raids. As fellow
Turks, these Aghatsaghid grandees had a familiarity with steppe warfare which the Iranian
armies lacked, and backed by the generous support of wealthy Khardi provinces along the
interior, the balance of power shifted in favor of the Khardi.

This was only a temporary shift. Various officials in Susa[1] recognized that Khardi rule along
the vast steppe frontier depended upon settlement. Khardi, especially former soldiers, were
offered large landholdings for themselves and their families. However, there were two major
problems with this policy which have often been overlooked by those who describe how the
land-grant system allowed Khardi dominion to endure across a wide swathe of the east and
contributed to the homogenization of culture in a way which was ultimately favorable to the
stability of the region. The first is that it alienated the Aghatsaghid elites, meaning that when the
Oghuz Turks invaded the Khardi in 1022, it was at the invitation of Aghatsaghid nobles and said
nobles defected en masse, fearing the confiscation of their vast estates. The second is that
these policies would indirectly lead to the loss of Sogd and the rise of the Mihirkulid dynasty to
renewed prominence. It is often forgotten that for a brief moment the Khardi actually held Sugd
directly and might, had they been more willing to compromise, have retained it indefinitely.
Instead, all they did was alienate and terrify their subjects by committing wholly to a project
which would only see long-term results.

The Gandharan Equal-Kingdoms also had every reason to be nervous about the rise of the
Khardi. Aghatsaghid rule was a memory but it was not a distant enough one for comfort, and
with the fall of Kabul in 984, the Gandharans were once more staring down a titanic Asian power
whose borders fell far too close to Purushapura. They too would embark on the construction of
a series of fortifications, and send ambassadors to the Oghuz Khaganate seeking an alliance.
The Gandharans would make potent allies. They benefitted from a professional military based in
the recruitment of hill tribes from the foothills of the Himalayas and the traditional heavily-
equipped guild cavalry, and had a brilliant strategist in the form of the Gandharan commander
Vallabha Kalasha. If they had been able to coordinate better with the Oghuz Khagan, the Khardi
might have been pushed out of Central Asia altogether. But instead the various powers would
attack piecemeal and be defeated one by one.

Distracted by the Dauwa to their south, it was not until 1029 that the Gandharan army would
attack Kabul, and they would immediately struggle to gain a foothold. The local Afghan tribes
were torn between collusion with the Iranians and aiding the Gandharans. Promises of
independence and autonomy swayed many Afghan groups to join their side, and vicious
intertribal battles in the mountains and valleys around Kabul preoccupied the Gandharans –
preventing meaningful advance, especially as the Tokhari “sun-worshipping clans”[2] aligned
themselves with the Khardi in exchange for promises of lands in Gandhara. Two years later, the
Gandharans made a white peace without having gained any territory. This border clash is mostly
notable for the proliferation of firepowder weapons, including some of the first primitive
handguns, first used as an anti-elephant weapon but a few years prior against the Dauwa. The
Gandharans turned firepowder against the walls of Kabul, using massed volleys of shrapnel
fired from siege towers at close range to clear the walls. Despite their ultimate failure to take the
city, these weapons made a distinct impression on the defenders, and over time were copied
and refined.

By contrast, the Oghuz invasion in 1022, led by the Khagan Tughrul Yavuldar, was a much
greater success initially. Tughrul did not have the allegiance of all of the “twelve tribes” that
traditionally made up the Oghuz hegemony, but he did have the backing of several of the
strongest, including the Kinek, the Imur, and the Afsar, as well as an alliance with Ferghana and
her satrapal allies. His ace in the hole, however, was convincing the Salir Turks, who had come
under pressure from the East, to migrate into Sugd in great numbers, ensuring they would come
under attack by representatives of the Iranshahr. From there it was easy to motivate a large
portion of his confederation to follow him into battle.

The Khardi forces were light on the ground and frequently betrayed by their Aghatsaghid
auxiliaries. Sugd was lost almost immediately, and Tughrul wasted little time fortifying the Iron
Gates and leading raids as far south as Balkh. By the time significant Khardi reinforcements
could be deployed, the Shah of Balkh, Mihirevanda, had been slain along with almost an entire
army of twenty thousand. This defeat inspired the Padishah’s direct attention, and Artaxser sent
as large of an army north under his cousin Surkhab as he could, given the large commitment of
men to Palestine and Egypt.

Surkhab, however, proved to be utterly incompetent, and while that might have been remedied
by veteran subordinates who knew how to creatively interpret poor orders and salvage his
atrocious campaign, most of these veterans were absent. Only one officer in his army
distinguished himself notably, and that was Sepandiar, an Iranian who claimed descent from
both the Oadhya and the Aspahbadh house from Sassanian times. As Surkhab blundered into a
feigned retreat which saw much of his army destroyed, Sepandiar distinguished himself in spite
of the debacle, turning a disaster into a stalemate.

Artaxser dispatched a fresh army under Sepandiar in 1023, and the Iranian proved his quality as
much on the battlefield as by turning some of the lesser Turkic tribes against Tughrul, causing
the Khagan to turn back and ride north to deal with the rebellion. Sensing victory, the Shah
encouraged Sepandiar to march north and retake Sogd, but Sepandiar instead entered into
negotiations with several of the clans while Tughrul was away – offering them Sogd in exchange
for an alliance. Sepandiar felt that he had the loyalty of his troops, and that his successful
campaign would inspire them to turn on Artaxser and proclaim him Shah.

The clans turned on Tughrul and ensured his defeat against the rebels, at which point Qutalmish
Afsar became Khagan and the Yavuldar were almost entirely annihilated. Once his power was
secure, Qutalmish expected to march on Susa with Sepandiar and replace the Mitradharmid
dynasty, and he hoped that Sepandiar’s victory would of course mean more concessions to the
tribes which had granted him power. But it was not to be. Sepandiar underestimated the degree
to which the Khardi revered Artaxser, and overestimated the clout of his own noble background,
and was simply arrested by his subordinates after declaring himself Shah.

Qutamish Afsar was the only true victor of the conflict. He arranged the division of Sugd
between his vassal tribes and had managed to elevate his clan to the Khaganate. The Khardi,
exhausted and seeking to consolidate their position in the east, allowed him to retain Tughrul’s
conquests and were more concerned with prosecuting Sepandiar and any potential allies he
had within the army. After 1030, the powers who ruled Central Asia were increasingly forced to
accommodate the Khardi presence.

[1] Indicative of Khardi attempts to create a civilian bureaucracy. However, they would never
wholly be able to shake their clannish origins. The bureaucracy was very much a nepotistic
organization at its upper levels, with local talent finding an invisible ceiling arresting any
particularly capable individual in his tracks.

[2] It is unclear what group this refers to, but it is worth noting that many of the prominent tribal
groups who aligned with the Iranians in Afghanistan were actually Turkic. Unlike along the
steppe frontier, here the Khardi settlement was substantially lighter.
 The Isle of the Moon
and the Cape of Cider Trees

The ruling grandees, or Randryan, of Watya became increasingly entrenched as the tenth
century continued. While they had begun as mere local strongmen with land claims and
retainers to back up their rights, they transformed themselves into a permanent, entrenched
aristocracy. Their diverse agricultural package, a sprawling mixture of European, Asian, and
African fruits, grains, and livestock allowed a level of prosperity unknown on the crowded Isle of
the Moon. Those who enjoyed Randryan privileges ornamented themselves lavishly with gold
and diamonds and enjoyed long, healthy lives. Cape Watya’s bustling port cities accommodated
travelers from as far afield as Egypt and Srivijaya. Ankarmena, the greatest of these ports, grew
rapidly. Kapudesan engineers were hired by the local nobility to create sewage systems and a
series of public bath-houses in 954, hinting at what was becoming a sprawling and filthy
metropolis. Ankarmena, unlike many of the Savahila cities, was unwalled and indeed utterly
undefended, a mercantile town without any fears. Accordingly, it was not a dense city at all –
there was nothing to limit the creation of dozens of successful suburbs such as Sivatanana,
which grew up around a nearby harbor and a temple of ecstatic Hindu mendicants.

One of the biggest changes in Watya society, however, was the elite no longer using their
newfound wealth to return to Izaoriaka. After the initial burst of these flighty opportunists, it
became increasingly difficult to buy privilege in the Sakalava court. The current of gold itself
reduced the value of precious metals and diamonds significantly, with widespread economic
impacts that would reverberate across the globe. Instead, the Watyan aristocracy formed the
Mahasanga, an enormous guild of sorts available to any landholding man who met certain
requirements – namely the ability to buy membership and pay annually into the guild.

The Mahasanga quickly garnered more power than the weak Izaoriakan viceroy, negotiating
with the local Sakalava Prince Randamasalega from a position of marked strength.
Randamasalega, despite his reputation as a weak and ineffective governor, was actually quite
astute. He realized that there was no way to maintain strict Izaoriaka dominance over the Watya
Cape – by 973, when the Mahasanga began agitating for independence, the Watya were quite
simply too numerous and Izaoriaka too far. His main goals instead were to preserve the
remaining Izaoriaka colonies and to ensure that the government would always profit from
Watya.

The final terms of the Mahasanga’s independence were complex, but boiled down to this: the
Randryan would remain forever within the mandala of the Emperor, but in practice the
Mahasanga was given authority over all the Cape save where lands had been given to Temples
or treaties had been struck with the natives.[1] All Watyan trade would pass through the
Izaoriaka-governed entrepot city of Ramamida, situated on the Savahila coast, and no ship
sailing a guild flag would pass Ramamida going north. Any ship caught doing so forfeited their
cargo.
Thus, war was averted and the Mahasanga grew to dominate political life across the Cape. By
the turn of the millennium, the Mahasanga had its own armies of significant size – and used
them extensively to expand its influence against the indigenous peoples. The clan, that
paramount marker of social standing back home in Izaoriaka, meant little on the Cape. Rather,
what mattered was guild affiliation and wealth. A small farmer of no particular status and his
extended family might migrate out into the wilderness and carve out their own settlement. That
settlement might attract migrants and in doing so expand as these new tenants cultivated the
land – allowing the original farmer to gain membership in the guild. As such, the Mahasanga
was remarkably egalitarian.

By contrast, Izaoriaka had totally stagnated. Those with the means to do so sought transport to
Watya. Those who could not pay their way sold themselves into a sort of debt-slavery which
would not extend to their family members. They were assured tenancy on a farm or mining
community (the latter being the fate of many unfortunate souls who couldn’t read their own
contracts) and after working off a “contract of indenture” they were granted their own plot of land
and some money. In this way, Watya continued to grow and prosper, but Izaoriaka declined. The
mass emigration of nobles and commoners alike left gaps in the island’s carefully constructed
mandala society. Whole clans were uprooted and conflicts began to emerge where once society
had seemed impossibly stable. The divine guidance of the Sakalava monarchy ensured peace
and harmony. Their kings were golden and splendid, living incarnations of Visnu. To each
person was assigned a place, a spot in the celestial harmony of things. Mass exodus led to
disharmony because many who had long accepted their place at the bottom or middle of the
social system and would have been content for karma to reward them in the next life were now
opportunistically seizing vacated lands.

However, Izaoriaka by the eleventh century lacked any sense of martial spirit. The warlike clans
of the ancient past were thoroughly declawed by centuries of peace. Riots and rebellions were
rare, and the interlocking framework of ritual hostage taking that had survived for centuries had
ensured that the nobility could act with unified purpose against unarmed peasants if an uprising
did come to pass. The hostage and ward system which had ensured peace had broken down
perhaps a century earlier, becoming primarily symbolic. Hostages were frequently allowed
extended visits home and the Sakalava monarchy turned a blind eye to the affairs of their
nobles, becoming complacent in their power. The rebellion would begin when the members of
the Antandroi, a clan of the arid south, began to seize more prosperous lands from their
traditional rivals the Antambahoaka, who, as one of the “maritime peoples” had seen their
strength sapped by emigration.

Endemic warfare and the collapse of the monarchy followed by 1019. Ironically, the lack of
strong military forces exacerbated the violence. Standardized armies with clear loyalties might
have prevented much of the brutality and bloodshed. Instead, clan leaders rallied fickle mobs of
supporters to attack neighboring strongholds and the pillaging across the island was
indiscriminate.
The Iazorana dynasty of the Antemoro clan ultimately emerged on top. Unlike the feudal
Sakalava, their power was based in the fanatic devotion of their followers, and they were
essentially populist theocrats. Led by a local Raja named Andriaserabe who claimed divinity, the
Antemoro conquered the coasts and reasserted control over the city of Ramamida, negotiating
a treaty with the Watya “guild” to ensure that the Sakalava privileges still applied to them. Unlike
the Izaoriaka, however, their dominion over the interior was light. They might have ruled the old
“long valleys” of the Sakalava but the highland clans refused to accept Andriaserabe’s divine
inspiration and rallied around a traditional “mandala” king named Andriasampi. Andriasampi
ruled most of the island in time, but without the western coast and the overseas links, his realm
was comparatively poor and isolated.

Andriaserabe’s religion by all accounts was the monotheistic bhakti faith of the Ishvara
worshippers radically modified and adapted into an Izaoriakan context. His sole innovation was
placing himself as monarch at the center of the faith. His interpretation of dreams and omens
provided divine guidance, and he dismissed the complex Tantric traditions of the island as an
inferior way of attaining moksha compared to simply shouting “Hail, hail, the Great God!” He
claimed that those who died in battle fighting for him would have their karmic sins wiped away
and that they would be granted divinity in a world of pure ecstatic bliss. While widely dismissed
by the temples, aristocrats, religious scholars of the island, Andriaserabe’s cult caught on
among the illiterate peasant class for whom the legends of the island seemed insufficient in the
wake of mass social collapse. The peasants of the highland, however, despite having a veneer
of Tantric Hinduism, still clung to their ancestor-worshipping traditions and were accordingly less
vulnerable to a faith that actively dismissed the antique rituals of the island.

[1] A rarity – by the end of the tenth century the indigenous peoples had been pushed entirely
into the highlands and beyond the OTL Orange River. Large guild communities existed even
further inland, as in the early days of the Watya settlement, birthrates were enormous and land
was freely available so long as you didn’t mind getting your hands dirty.

The Fair and Noble Ones – The Baltic Littoral at the turn of the millennium

The ancient Baltic peoples, like their Slavic neighbors, were mostly settled agriculturalists,
growing wheat, rye, and flax, raising cattle, sheep, and horses. In coming centuries they would
become known for their production of honey and sweet fermented beverages made with the
same, but for now their apiaries were individual and most trade was intercommunal and local.
Unlike the Slavs, however, they eschewed tight-knit, dense communities and the “gord” in favor
of a sprawl of individual farms and homesteads belonging to kin-groups. Hill-towns were
comparatively rare, although local aristocrats would certainly build fortifications for the protection
of the locality in the event of a raid.

They worshipped gods which had evolved little since the earliest Indo-European settlers, and
the Lithuanians in particular showed the same sort of conservativism in their linguistics, which
were largely untainted by loanwords or significant shifts from the first peoples who had come to
the Baltic region centuries ago. Dievas was first among their gods, the “Highest” and the
“Eternal” and represented both the pale sky and the core of the universe itself. Other significant
gods included an earth mother, Zemesmate, and a zeus-like god of thunder named Perkunas.

The Baltic tribes lacked significant centralization, and instead cast their lot in with strong local
rulers who outfitted local freemen with horses and weapons to protect the community.
Internecine conflict was frequent, and when raids occurred whole villages would take shelter
within nearby fortifications. Battles between competing local warlords ensured that no stable
political organization really had developed.

Less populated and less organized than their more potent neighbors, the Balts were occasional
victims of Viking raids but never had anything of sufficient value to see their lands colonized.
Gardaveldi in the late ninth century pushed into Estonia, and runestones from the region credit
the Wheel-Rulers with undoing the menace posed by “the pirates and brigands of this country”
which, combined with records from Sweden and Gotland point to a cycle of raid and counter-
raid between the Norse and Estonians only broken in the tenth century. Gardaveldi in general
pushed against the Baltic periphery, seeking to establish control over the long north-south trade
routes which connected the Near East to the Scandinavian world. In this they were successful,
but they never made an effort to penetrate the core of the Baltic littoral.

Protected by the swords of the Polonians, the Baltic world was not exposed to Christendom
either in its peaceable mercantile form or its warlike Votivist form. While Poles fought and died
to reach the Pure Heaven of the Jarylo Bodda, neither their strange local “Buddhism” or the
more orthodox Buddhism of the Sahu was known before the eleventh century among the Balts.
While the Byalarusian Hans of Svayatapolk were busy building stupas on the sites of ancient
holy groves, and in the process erasing much of the culture of their people in favor of the
received knowledge of the East, the Balts preserved their own quite unintentionally by their
sheer isolation. It would not be until the middle of the eleventh century that the first Buddhist
missionaries from the south would visit Lithuanian princes. The religion, however, failed to gain
significant traction – it was equated with the conquering armies of the Wheel-Ruler and
accordingly treated suspicion, gaining ground mostly with those of low status who had little to
lose and much to gain in terms of community by embracing the foreign faith and the Buddha.

The first Buddhist monastery in the Baltic would be built at Ikskile [Riga] in 1084, but the religion
would not appeal to more than minority – particularly traders and those who had contact with the
outside world.

Gardaveldi

The exceptionally long reign of Arnmundr, the sister-son of Bjarnheidenn, is the defining feature
of eleventh century Gardaveldi. Taking the throne at the age of 11, he ruled fifty-three years,
from 997 to 1050. Over the course of his reign, the first intellectual flowering of Norse paganism
as a distinct faith would begin. The school of Darmahujr would begin its development with the
writings of Adalradir of Holmgard and Sialfi Vedersson – some of the first books produced by the
Gardaveldi tradition. While Sialfi primarily wrote a chronology of Armnundr’s reign, it is far more
useful as an instructional guide for righteous living than as an accurate history of the times.
Adalradir on the other hand both compiled traditional Norse myths and explained their relevance
to Buddhism, as well as translating many Buddhist texts into Norse.

Arnmundr in his reign as Wheel-Ruler[1] was not a very expansionist ruler. His main campaigns
were to remind the Balts that he controlled the trade lanes of the north. In general he ignored
the conflicts of the Scandinavian world, welcoming refugees from the Votive Wars of the north
but not participating in them. He spent several years of his reign overseeing the construction of
Darmagard as a major port city, but it never truly surpassed Mikla Niragard [OTL St. Petersburg]
as a trading center due to its isolation from the major riverine arteries of Transuralic Asia.[2]

The Gardaveldi state in the eleventh century continued trends established several centuries
prior – the urban population of Norse traders buoyed the traditional culture of the Norse
homesteader as opposed to the Slavic peoples of the region. The Slavic-influenced dialect of
Gardaveldi Norse was the language of religion, law, and art. Accordingly, the culture of the
gords continued to perish against this influx, and assimilation was very much the order of the
day. The culture of the Ilmen Slavs was almost entirely eliminated and by the twelfth century the
Rus were defined as those people living outside of the Wheel-Realm.

The governance of the Wheel-Realm was not particularly despotic. In the Norse tradition, the
greater names within the realm gathered in assembly semi-regularly to debate and drink – a
social tradition which brought significant unity to the Gardaveldi aristocracy. The Wheel-Ruler
was first among equals in some senses, although the jarls did not often dare to contradict
decrees given on the throne, even if they might argue or fight with him in the throes of drunken
anger. It was critical to the legitimacy of the monarch that he be personable, strong, and capable
– and if he lacked these qualities, a more popular son might be chosen for the royal title and the
remaining heirs given lands according to their quality and their service to the state. It was in this
way that Arnmundr, despite being a nephew, had gained the throne – Bjarnheidenn, despite
being fierce in battle and an excellent king, was rumored to be a cuckhold and accordingly his
sons were widely disdained as bastards despite an absence of any definitive proof. Under
Arnmundr, they were sent away as hostages to the Hanates, where they lived out their lives
without attaining any sort of glory which might have allowed them to threaten the new royal
house.

[1] It’s overdue that I have a translated version of this word. Maybe Hvelskati?

[2] I might have mentioned this, but the eastern border of Europe in this timeline is traditionally
drawn according to the frontiers of Germanic Christendom and not the Urals.

Kanem – the Holy

City on the Lake

Kanem under the Akirid dynasty seemed as if it might even stabilize itself, but that period of
calm barely lasted a generation. The Akiri built their dynasty on weak foundations; the declining
settled tribes such as the Dabir and Kunkuna were their primary allies. These were the tribes
that their successors would denounce as “pagans” and “idolaters” and there is no lack of
evidence to corroborate that notion. Despite the messianic reign of Selma, at best a thin veneer
of the religion had been plastered over local customs. The divinity of the monarchy had been
briefly replaced with the notion of the monarchy as an Apostle of God, but under the Akirids that
shifted back once more.

Christianity, travelling from the Coptic Egyptian courts, brought increased literacy and
connections with the outer world. Learned men would acquire written Bibles from Egypt and
host readings and scholarly debates, and out of this grew a fanatical group who called
themselves the Dalai, or Students. At first, the Students were disorganized. They took Christian
names in Coptic and formed mobs to tear down icons and “false temples.” But in time, the
power of the Students would grow, and they would form something of a paradoxical organization
– at once a learned administrative class and a violent force for compelling the mob.

For the Kanem, the new religion came at a time of intense social disruption. For much of its
early history, Kanem had existed in a bountiful wet period – but around the middle of the ninth
century that began to change. First came political pressures from an outside world which had
previously been extremely remote – Berber movements south and Christian missionaries. But
by the dawn of the tenth century, these had transformed into environmental pressures. The
contraction of farmland gave way to arid and semi-nomadic raiders who had all the fanaticism of
new converts to an ancient religion. Two clans in particular, the Kay and the Koukuma, would
take up the banner with alacrity, aligning themselves with the growing power of the Students
against the ruling dynasty.

The world of the Kay and the Students was one which seemed as if it was ending. In ancient
times, the Mai of Kanem had ruled as living Gods. Now that had been proven false, and the
great lake and the rivers that fed it were drying up at an unprecedented rate, forcing many to
abandon agriculture. The material culture of the whole Lake Chad region, famed for its pottery
and elaborate textiles, declined precipitously in this era. Urban centers alternately swelled and
shrank depending on the river’s beneficence, forcing whole tribes to migrate. The dread specter
of famine loomed over the countryside. Raids and small scale wars were accordingly frequent,
and by 920 the Akirid dynasty did not have control outside of their capital city.

In earlier times, this loss of control might have been survivable, but the Akiri lacked the prestige
of their greater predecessors. Accordingly, it was inevitable that the rural clans would rise
against them. The Kay justified their rebellion by calling Mai Hume Akiri decadent and corrupt.
They claimed that he sought to restore the old idols and indeed worshipped them in secret.
According to their propaganda, he kept a harem of mistresses and profaned the sacred altars of
Kanem’s churches in secret.

The Kay enjoyed immense military successes which, without the benefit of historical context,
seem almost miraculous. Their calls for austerity and unity were popular among a world turned
upside down by internecine war and societal collapse. Their army was augmented by Berber
mercenaries from the oasis of Kawar, who in time largely converted to the strict Christianity of
their new masters. The Kay seized Kanem itself sometime between 926 and 930, when records
kept by the Akirid dynasty cease and reportedly, the Magomi clan took power in the city. A
people whose history was deeply interconnected with the region in any case, the Magomi ruled
for a time, but according to most histories (which inevitably were biased towards the Kay) their
Queen-Mother sought for her son the title of Mai and wished that he would rule as a God in the
traditional manner. Accordingly, the Kay rose up once more and defeated the Magomi. This
time, instead of placing another clan on the throne, they took power directly, calling themselves
the Holy Kings.

The first Kay ruler, Dunama, was also a reformer. He utilized the literate population for more
than just recitations of the Bible – he build a complex tax code and corvee system. His victories
had brought him a base population of educated slaves whose talents were turned to
administering the country he had conquered. The wealth of Kanem largely came from
manufacturing and trading finished goods, salt, and copper north along the Kawar or Djadu
roads, and accordingly Dunama required meticulous records of those transactions. He issued
small golden coins stamped with the sign of the cross and his name on the reverse, and
required that only his new currency could be spent in the city’s marketplaces. Those who did not
have it were forced to convert their own money to this local equivalent for a fee.

By 934, the Kay ruled all of old Kanem. By 940, they had turned their conquests into a base
from which to launch holy war. Beyond the rhetoric and propaganda which survives, the
motivation for the Kay holy wars seems quite clear. Controlling the northeastern rim of Lake
Chad, the Kay hoped to expand their dominion over the west and thus gain a firmer hold on the
Berber trade routes. Furthermore, any conquest would net them a valuable source of slaves,
which could be traded for Berber horses and camels. Logistically, Kanem lacked the capacity to
truly control the northern trade routes. Kawar oasis in particular lay beyond the pale of what they
could easily conquer, and the caravan paths that tracked across the Libyan desert could reach
Air and the Niger river every bit as easily as they reached Kanem. Accordingly, their wars were
primarily directed towards the west and south, striking against the poorer, regional rivals who
lacked the geographic security of the Kawar oasis.

Dunama’s son, Iakobas lead the wars against Kanem’s southern rivals, and with the help of a
learned scribe he compiled a great account of his conquests. His descriptions have a fatalistic
quality to them, that of a victorious conqueror who sees his victories as inevitable – and perhaps
they were. From the Berbers of Cyrene, the Kanem cavalry adopted new tactics, in particular
the use of the long, heavy lance to disrupt massed formations of infantry. On open ground,
these brutal charges proved devastating to the Bornu cavalry, who fought with shorter spears
and throwing javelins.

First, Iakobas struck against the “great residence of the Bornu of Yao, who hold among their
vassals the Tatala and the Ngalma.” He describes the destruction of its temples and thousands
of slaves being taken from the city. Further campaigns down the Kamadugu river saw the sack
of Diakam and “twelve lesser towns” whose peoples were similarly treated without mercy. His
victorious cavalry crushed all in their path until ultimately he ends his chronicle with an
afterthought:

“When the waters of Ngadde receeded I made war upon the Kagha who dwelled along the river.
For seven years, seven months, and seven days I warred against them, until they were broken
and made to accept the Lord who is God of Israel and Egypt. Their idols were destroyed in a
great fire, proving their weakness against the Almighty, who cannot be destroyed. Those who
refused to set aside their devils were burned or impaled. To the glory of God, few chose that
option, and a great number of men and women were baptized and then sold into slavery.”

By the eleventh century, Kanem was once again regional hegemon, but in a very different
manner than the mercantile hegemony of earlier centuries. The “great residences” of the south,
which had been coming into their own along the fertile rivers which fed Lake Chad, were broken.
The Kay and other Christian tribes were moving into the region as well, an inevitable
consequence of the desertification of the north. In many respects, their new state was simply a
well-regulated army which lived parasitically off the spoils of the still-prosperous south.

Ghana and the Hausa

The 10th century saw the ranks of Ghana’s rivals grow, and her hegemony finally break. It was,
in some ways, inevitable. Across the well-watered Sahel cities were growing, necessitating the
construction of walled suburbs and allowing increased division of labor. The agriculturalist
element of the population was diminishing and a new urban world based in the manufacturing of
finished goods was being supported on its back.

However, the growing aridity which pitched Kanem into ruin had its impact on West Africa as
well. Even as cities were growing huge along the Senegal and Niger watersheds, elsewhere,
particularly further to the north, urban settlements were regressing into more mobile camps as
people turned to pastoralism. Those who remained settled were forced to rely on increasingly
more elaborate forms of agriculture – deeper wells and more complex works of irrigation.
However, they transmitted this knowledge southwards and soon even the peoples privileged by
easy water were able to bring in greater yields of crops than previously.

Ghana however, was on the brink of collapse. Roving bands of Taureg bandits caused a
shocking contraction in the trade economy, one which was accompanied by the rise of the city-
state kingdom of Niani immediately to the south. A dagger pointed at the very heart of Ghana,
the ruling elders of Niani refused to submit themselves, and between 930 and 950 won several
battles including most notably the Battle of Mahina in 936, where the Ghanan cavalry elite took
grievous losses. One in every three noble horsemen were slain and henceforth Ghana was
primarily reactive – struggling against the coalition of Gao and Djenne to the east and Niani to
the south.

The wars of the great Mande cities were often deeply personal. To maintain their hegemony, the
original Ghanan conquerors had utilized intermarriage between notable families, one which
ensured that the battles that brought down Ghana were often family affairs, conflicts between
nephews and cousins. Unlike Kanem, however, religion was rarely a motivator for bloodshed,
apart from the ritual harvest sacrifices of cattle. Tereism, as the Teacher Nakhato’s religion
became known, was an important tool for subverting the divine hierarchy of the Ghanan
kingdom, but it did not advocate violence and in many ways was a philosophical cousin of the
indigenous beliefs of many ethnic groups. Tereism also served as a way for the aristocracy to
separate themselves from the common people. As a religion with many mystery elements, it
became a mark of pride for the civilized elites of Gao to be inducted high into the society.

As Ghana’s wars in the late tenth century were simply political jockeying for position, the stakes
were never as high as they were around Lake Chad. Even the most bloodthirsty wars were
primarily a matter for the mounted elites to dispute in pitched battles rather than with outright
massacres and genocide. To a degree, the Soninke in particular made war into a ritualistic
expression – battles were frequently indecisive and without significant casualties. Sporadic
peasant rebellions in the same era, meanwhile, or actions against raiders, were brutal and
uncompromising, pointing to an intentional limiting of casualties among the interrelated
aristocracies of western Africa.

Along the western coasts, meanwhile, a unique cultural exchange was happening. The spiral
patterns beloved by the indigenous people of the Canaries began appearing on Takruri
merchandise in the tenth century, and the Niumi and Fulani people took to the seas. At first, they
primarily made their way north on Mauri and Norse expeditions, but those who travelled
returned and with their shipbuilding knowledge, local villages began to build larger ships in
emulation of the oceangoing cargo ships of both civilizations.

Takrur in particular had potential. Over the tenth century the city blossomed with maritime
environs – the beginnings of a safe harbor on the Senegal River. As the African coast (above a
certain line correlating with diseases to which even the hybridized Norse of the isles had no
immunity) became connected to the outside world, commercial enterprises began to circumvent
the Tauregs and the Berbers of the interior entirely.

Some of our first records of the Hausa people come from the court of Ghana, where Berber
historians wrote that “many are the peoples who have been drawn to their culture and
abandoned their own tongues and histories.” According to these historians, the Hausa came
from the great desert and moved into their Central African homeland as it became increasingly
arid – a plausible hypothesis, although one that has been debated by other modern historians,
who asserted that the Hausa migration was a movement of people fleeing the Kanem holy wars.

The Sarkunan, or Kings of the Hausa, were reportedly seven in number, and according to
legend and archeological finds were prolific builders of cities. Throughout northern Nigeria their
cities sprung up almost spontaneously throughout the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
Traditionally, these cities were based on small local communities which in turn were organized
into larger and larger blocs of people. At the highest level these communities were ruled by a
village chief, who in turn was ruled by the chief of the “country”, who in turn was subordinate to
the Sarkin, or King. Kings and chiefs alike were sacred, and their performance in elaborate
religious rituals defined their power.

The galadima, or Vizier, was the head of the King’s household and was typically an educated
slave – as was most of the bureaucracy of the Hausa states. Building off the example of the
Mande kingdoms to the west, the Hausa cities were typically well ordered and governed. Trade
was the lifeblood of these kingdoms; the Hausa were well situated between all the great states
of Africa. To the south lay the populous cities of the Ukwu Empire, to the West, Gao, and to the
north the Taureg traders. The wealth of the West African world filtered through their cities, and
as it did so it could be taxed.

On Heathens

From Hermann of Koln’s famous eleventh century treatise On Heathens:

In the East, those who are not of the Christian faith call themselves Brazaic[1] and worship
many gods. To them, as to the Romans of old, the greatest of these deities is Jove, who in their
tongue is called Tangras. The Chirican make their grandest sacrifices to Jove, and every year
their King takes five hundred mounted men and rides on a grand hunt, the purpose of which is
to capture all manner of game for this sacrifice.

But the cornerstone of the Barzaic faith is not lofty Jove or any of the other demons who they
worship, but a false prophet by the name of Boddo, who is idolized beyond the measure of their
gods.[2] Boddo it is said was a prince in his own country, who, after hearing the blessed gospel
became enraged and was determined to pervert it to his own ends, lest his subjects be turned to
the worship of the Lord. It is said that he bound himself to a tree, and in doing so became
possessed by demons who granted him the power to speak in many languages, and he went
and preached among the monstrous peoples of the East.

Boddo is the architect of all the woes of the Eastern Christian, whose heresy was insufficient to
earn them a reprieve from his servants. Instead the great warlord Mirgul and his sons[3],
swayed by the teachings of the false one, made war on Rome and ultimately would bring down
Constantinople itself. Oh what woe for the patriarchal sees of our great faith, that so many of
them should fall into the hands of vicious idolaters and heathens!

[1] from the Khotanese word for the transcendent Buddha, Barza or Barslya. In this timeline,
Brasayasna is a common umbrella term in the Iranian language for all the different schools of
Buddhism which are worshiped in the West, and certain Hindu philosophies as well.

[2] While Christians of the Near East were often much more familiar with the religions of their
foes, knowledge of Buddhism in Western Europe was spotty at best. Still, he gets some things
right.
[3] A reference to Mihirgula, one of the more famous of the Eftal Shahs. A more obscure
reference and a sign of the diffusion of information, given that usually the “Chirican” were
blamed for most of Christendom’s woes, including the fall of the Roman Empire.

Japan in the
Fujiwara Regency

At the turn of the Millennium, the far-flung Fujiawara clan had control over the court in Kyoto.
Holding the title of Kampaku, or regent, they monopolized control over the affairs of state,
enthroning and dethroning Emperors at will. Mitchitaka kept control both by agglomerating vast
estates into his personal control and the control of his vassals and allies, and by ensuring that
the Empress was always a daughter or niece of his. Despite a rapid succession of Emperors,
the Fujiwara power behind the throne remained a constant. The shoen estates ruled by the
Fujiwara and many monasteries acquired legal exemptions from taxes and indeed certain
Imperial laws they found less than appealing.

Fujiwara no Mitchitaka, the Regent, ruled until 1017, at which point he yielded control of the
reigns of state to his son Tadamichi. Tadamichi, like his predecessors, presided over a trend of
increased decentralization and the rise of powerful family institutions to legalized prominence.
Clans were allowed to govern their own territories with relative autonomy, and Tadamichi
allowed decentralization to increase so long as it meant that he could maintain his stranglehold
on power in Kyoto. The Fujiwara, along with other prominent clans such as the Taira and
Minamoto, owed their power to a new caste of warriors known as Bushi or Samurai. Upper class
warriors and landholders, the samurai served as private military forces for the major families
and allowed them to maintain control independent of imperial decree.

However, other powerful factions in the country opposed the growth of independent armies.
Starting with the reign of Mitchitaka’s great-grandfather Fusasaki, large numbers of Han
Chinese intellectuals and scholars had fled China. These learned men generally travelled to
Korea, but a large percentage also reached Japan, where the majority entered into the
monasteries. Those who did not pursue the monastic life, however, had given new strength to
the bureaucratic institutions of the Heian Emperors and thus by extension the Fujiwara. These
bureaucrats were not respected by many of the Fujiwara, and accordingly had limited power to
prevent the decay of central institutions.[1] However, over time these bureaucrats would ensure
that the tax system did not totally collapse, preventing the rise of feudalism from becoming total.
The average landholder accordingly still paid taxes and still considered himself a subject of the
Heian Emperor.

The great monasteries, such as the school of Tendai, also benefitted from the arrival of Chinese
intellectuals. Accordingly, in this era many of the major schools, including the more esoteric
Shingon school, split into “Ancient” and “Reformed” sects. The old bases of power such as the
Mount Koya monastery rejected the foreign wisdom of the Chinese philosophers in favor of a
more “authentic” religion, ignoring the fact that their faith was largely imported from the mainland
in any case. The reformed schools became major allies of the bureaucratic administration.
Known as the Insei, or Cloistered Administration, certain monasteries worked to reign in the
excesses of the major noble families, forming a loose coalition which checked but did not
outright threaten the dominance of the Fujiwara. At times, the Fujiwara even cooperated with the
insei monasteries, realizing that their bushi vassals did indeed require a counterbalance, and
fearing the rising power of the Taira. More typically however, they made use of bushi
bureaucrats who lacked the religious ties which made the insei dangerous.

Japan in this era was exceptionally isolated by the standards of most other advanced Eurasian
polities. While Srivijaya traders did from time to time reach the southern part of the isle, trade
and commerce was relatively limited. The past several centuries had seen a regression in the
country’s economy, as currency became less common and the average peasant diminished into
poverty. A relatively small and aristocratic elite prospered through the system of warrior or
temple patronage, but for the average person the late Heian era was a time of lawlessness and
political uncertainty. There were no Japanese embassies to foreign countries, and overall the
country, particularly the elite, turned inwards.

[1] From the perspective of this timeline. Compared to OTL, the central government is much
stronger, if utterly a puppet of the Fujiwara.

Hwaet, the Ring-

Breaking Danes: Angland and Skotland

Of the British Isles, Angland in particular enjoyed a sort of golden age under the Danish yoke.
Firstly, it helped that said Danish yoke was exceedingly light, and that the Danes were cheerfully
willing to intermarry and live beside their Saxon and Briton subjects. Secondly, when the heirs of
Harthacnute united Angland they brought with them a time of peace and prosperity. Many of the
battles on the Welsh frontier were little more than glorified cattle raids and were treated with little
more than derision by the court in Winchester. The crowns of Angland and Skotland
intermarried, frequently as well, and in general territorial expansion came second to foreign
raiding and mercenary work.

Those who returned from such adventuring brought back foreign wealth, styles, and ideas to
enrich the beer halls of their new Kingdom. Winchester’s great Assembly Hall itself was
decorated with jewels and gold from as far away as Carthage and Konstantikert.

Besides general calm, the rise of the South in prominence was the other major trend of the two
centuries in which Angland came to be supreme on the British Isles. It was perhaps inevitable –
a matter of geography. The south was richer, more populous, and more connected to the
beating heart of the European world. From southern Angland sailed the mercenaries who would
return battle-hardened with new knowledge and tales of the lands beyond the channel. Leicester
and Jorvik could make no such claims, and thus were subordinated to Winchester under King
Sweyn Thunderer – who even before their conquest had been calling himself King of Angland.
The Anglo-Dansk and their northern counterparts on Skotland and the Isles maintained the
seafaring traditions of their illustrious ancestors. They set sail on the Whale-Road, becoming
mariners and traders par excellence. Indeed, Anglo-Dansk ships had more contact with the
peoples of West Africa than the Franks in the early era of contact between Africa and Europe.
Despite their susceptibility to disease and the perils involved, many risked the journey, knowing
that there was much gold and salt to be found. Many more, especially more established
communities of adventurers, preferred to seek out safer adventures close to home. Wars in
Anatolia and the Polish frontier attracted many warriors “going Viking.”

The Khardi Empire in the West

The devastation of Egypt in the early eleventh century should not be underestimated. By all
contemporary accounts, the damage done was severe: both in terms of human lives and the
enormous damage done to the canals and irrigation networks which sustained the bounty of the
Nile. Berxwedan, the Satrap of Egypt, was both brother and friend to Artaxser, and as a member
of the royal family he could do no wrong even after his elder brother’s passing. He ruled as a
despotic King, and his ordinances were brutal and designed to break the will of a proud,
independent people with a long history. Huge numbers of rebels were executed, their families
and villages sold into slavery and made to undergo forced marched through the Gaza desert
which only a fraction survived. The wealth of merchants and nobles was universally confiscated
to pay soldiers.

Berxwedan’ short sighted policies would have long-term ramifications. While Mesopotamia
blossomed under the enthusiastic stewardship of small Khardi landholders and local farms,
Egypt suffered horribly. The country was divided into vast estates run by people without even
basic knowledge of farming – nomadic mercenaries who were acutely aware of how
outnumbered they were by their subjects. And yet more important, perhaps, than this
devastation was the economic toll that the capture of Egypt would have on Europe. The grain
shipments of Egypt, which were crucial to the substantial urban societies of Italy and Anatolia,
were cut off for perhaps five years. When they resumed, they were intermittent and far fewer
than before – revolts and chaos in the interior prevented substantial trade, and the merchant
houses and guilds of Egypt were largely destroyed. New relations had to be cultivated with
Khardi interlopers seeking to make quick profits off of their conquest.

Furthermore, for the first time since the Roman Empire, the Eastern Mediterranean lay in the
hands of a single unified power. There was no longer even a heretical Christian state with which
to trade if one wanted the luxuries of the orient – the Khardi were the only option, and clever
administrators back in Susa, well aware of this fact, raised significant tariffs on these goods.
Almost overnight, Mediterranean trade contracted and the economic certainties which had
allowed the flourishing of interconnected urban societies across Spain, Italy, Africa and Asia
alike collapsed. Many urban centers stopped growing or, in the case of Asia, contracted
significantly.
Fear and uncertainty for this new era gripped Europe. Pilgrimage too was as difficult as it had
been in the early days of the Eftal. The weak grip of the Khardi on Palestine meant that travelers
either had to pay exorbitant fees or risk banditry if they wished to visit Jerusalem. While the loss
of Jerusalem to heathens had happened before, it had not occurred in recent memory – and
thus the shock was to many a fresh blow. A new generation grew up believing that once again
the end times were upon them. The Khardi seemed an imminent threat to the very safety of
Europe. Merchants brought back exaggerated tales of atrocities and the conversion of
Jerusalem’s churches to pagan temples. While there is no evidence that the latter occurred,
atrocities were commonplace. The Khardi armies were by no means exhausted either –
Mesopotamia and Syria provided a substantial well of manpower and incursions into Asiana
increased as the century wore on.

If the Khardi were in reality very far from Europe, they were much closer to the Asian leagues.
Ghorshid, the Satrap of Kilikia, attacked Ikonion several times between 1020 and 1030, each
time only barely being repulsed. Ironically, the Ikonian army was primarily Christianized Eftal,
and thus while the conflict was often called the “War of the Asian Votives” in practice it
resembled an inter-tribal conflict – raid and counter raid with few significant engagements or
sieges.

Ghorshid himself was an interesting figure about whom there are many conflicting stories.
According to the Greek historians of the time, he had been born in Kappadocia, and taken as a
slave during the siege of Nyssa. (His birth name is sometimes given as Isaac) From there he
impressed his captors with his literacy and noble bearing, and was adopted into an Eftal family.
Some sources call him a Christian Eftal from beyond the Kilikian Gates, others say that he
repudiated Christ after being enslaved or was born a pagan. Whatever the case, through
capable leadership he managed to become the bitterest enemy of the Hypatate of Ikonion.

When Artaxser I died in 1033, his son Mitradarma II took power. An energetic and enthusiastic
young man, Mitradarma felt the need to assert his strong leadership in the face of an
increasingly powerful bureaucracy with ties to many important landholding tribes in
Mesopotamia. Almost immediately after being crowned, Mitradarma determined to invade
Anatolia, and Ghorshid was assigned to lead the vanguard of this invasion force up through
Kappadocia and into Asia proper.

Although he was ambitious and proud, Mitradarma did not have the force of will to unite the
powerful Satraps and tribal potentates of his country the way his father did. The lofty grandeur
which Artaxser had surrounded himself with actually worked to Mitradarma’s disadvantage – he
was unable to form personal relationships with the men under his authority. Powerful figures
such as Seneqerim Artsruni, the Satrap of Armenia, and Surxab Haraviya, Satrap of Syria, had
little regard for Mitradarma. Both of them could claim ancient and prestigious ancestry – in the
case of the Artsruni, back to the Assyrian Empire. They saw through the façade of grandeur
which Artaxser had carefully constructed around his dynasty and knew them for the upjumped
clansmen and mercenaries they had been in the era before the conquests of Mitradarma’s
grandfather and namesake.
Accordingly, the invasion, launched in 1035, was a debacle. Seneqerim arrived late, with a mere
fraction of the soldiers he had been requested to bring. Most of those who he did bring were
Bajinak mercenaries who barely followed orders and frequently rode off to loot. Seeing which
way the wind was blowing, he left the army a mere three months into the campaign ostensibly to
comfort a concubine unexpectedly taken ill. Once he arrived at home, he began gathering a
proper army of Ifthal veterans and Armenian hillmen to his ranks – perhaps expecting to have to
fight the Khardi in due time. The Syrian Ifthal, meanwhile, angered at Seneqerim’s
abandonment, began to feel that the Khardi distrusted them as well. Accordingly, Surxab
Haraviya did not commit them fully when a battle was fought at Mokissos – hanging back until
the fight was almost decided and causing heavy casualties among the Khardi foot which could
have easily been prevented. Enraged, Mitradarma confronted him and stripped him of his rank –
something which would see mass desertions among the Syrian Ifthal.

In spite of these troubles, the Khardi juggernaut was simply too powerful to be defeated. Their
army was huge, and composed of some of the finest light cavalry in the world, backed by
massive numbers of archers. In a triumph for Iranian military engineering, primitive cannons
even saw use at the siege of Ikonion, and when the city fell, few were surprised. Mitradarma,
however, did not get to bask in his victory. He unexpectedly fell ill and died a mere week after
his twentieth birthday, several months after his conquest of Ikonion. Serfarrokh, his younger
brother by five years, was the only obvious candidate to succeed him. He took the throne in
1036, and though he ruled without a regent, important families (including the Haraviya) would
dominate his reign.

In the interim, on his deathbed Mitradarma received word that Nikaia and the League of Samos
had put aside their differences, and formed an alliance with Galatia and Pontos. The League of
Asiana was thus born, and the Nikaian leader was named Protohypatos, or first of the Consuls.
It was an alliance of fear and necessity, an alliance only possible because of the sudden decline
of Asiana. Furthermore, the Protohypatos, Niketas Pegarios, had been given broad authority to
levy taxes and raise men under the new treaty – authority which most wise men of the alliance
realized would quickly become monarchical.

Niketas wasted no time. He raised what forces he could, augmenting them with Anglo-Dansk
and Frankish mercenaries. Like Ikonion, he declared that his battle against the Khardi would be
a Votive War. Unlike the Eftal of Ikonion, it seems that he actually meant it.

Trade and Technology – the “Indian Revolution” continues

From the perspective of outsiders, particularly those in Arabia and West Africa, the period
beginning in the eleventh century is often considered one of Bharukacchi, and thus by
extension, Chandratreyan, hegemony. However, this is not entirely accurate. On the
subcontinent itself, there were a large number of notable ports. Even locally, Bharukaccha had
two major rivals, Suryapura and Khambhayat. The latter of these was an ancient city, dating
back to the time of the Ptolemies. However, Khambhayat had the misfortune of not being well-
situated to take advantage of the profitable Deccan overland and riverine trade, but rather being
best situated to export bulk quantities of wheat, iron, horses, and other less valuable
commodities from the dry uplands in which it was situated. While this was undoubtedly valuable,
it bought Khambhayat a reputation as a poor and less prestigious city which the metropolis
would struggle to shake for several centuries, until its harbor would silt up and the city would be
largely abandoned.

Bharukaccha, by contrast, had major overseas connections. Its guilds excelled at using the
implicit threat of the City’s naval dominance to extort, bully, and cajole others into partnerships,
and despite largely being an entrepot with relatively little production of its own (Suryapura was a
major textile site, for example) it gradually evolved into a key financial center. “Bharuch, where
only ships and gold are made” wrote one Gurjar lord, upon seeing the city’s marketplaces.

To those in India, however, Bharukaccha was very much the second city of Indian commerce.
The island of Sri Lanka held its greatest rival, Mahatittha. Ruled by the Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka
was one of the greatest mercantile centers in the world, producing all manner of luxury goods
and serving as a vital entrepot and financial hub.

Where north India had brought the world the concepts of the Equal-Kingdom and the Ayat after
the fall of the Maukhani, it was south India that turned the guilds from simple alliances, social
clubs, and trading partnerships into a financial system that would revolutionize the modern
world. Guilds which existed purely as moneylending and banking institutions became more
prevalent and more prestigious throughout the eleventh century. Adesha, or “papers of credit” –
marked with special seals to prove their authenticity, were used to safely carry vast sums of
money between various institutions with nothing more than a sheet of carefully printed paper
sealed by wax.

Finance changed mercantile trade across India. One Sri Lankan banking family in particular, the
Kashyapani, became exceedingly wealthy. While nominally subjects (and financiers) of the
ruling Anuradhapuran monarchy, they negotiated private treaties with guilds and nations,
establishing their operation across the coastal subcontinent. Wherever Indian merchant craft
went, the Kashyapani operated – as far afield as China and the Watya cape. While certain
mercantile groups, such as the Nestorian Christians of Koilon, refused to engage with this new
system, usury in Hindu and Buddhist religious practice had long been a relative matter, and was
frequently only prohibited to certain high caste individuals who refused to engage with
commerce in any sense. Substantial economic opportunities abounded for those who were able
to pool money for loans or insurance societies.

However, the march of progress was not even or absolute. The Indo-Gangetic plain in particular
saw a regression towards monarchy and autocracy with the rise of the Uparika Anapota
Durjaya, a leader whose policies would significantly curtail the autonomy of the once great
Pancharajyan guilds and lead to a brief period of imperial resurgence.

[And that’s a story for another post.

Apologies for leaving a lot of stuff hanging in this post - the Khardi-Asiana wars and the general
collapse of Mediterranean trade, as I've hinted, is setting up how Frankish and Anglish
navigators will take matters into their own hands and start exploring. I just ran out of time to
explore the rest of the Indian subcontinent.]

Despots and Rajas

Compared to the commercial towns of the coasts, the Ganges basin was not a site of great
innovations in the tenth century, and indeed saw some level of decline. While the Tamil
corporations expanded under the beneficence of the Chola and the arrangements of the
nagaram cities, the Ganges saw no corresponding economic growth. Tribal land confiscation
and the growth of large estates were both coming to an end, and while the manufactories and
trading centers of the coasts were increasingly competitive, there was little opportunities for
further growth. The cities of the Gangetic plain were already swollen with people – great
teeming metropolises shipping vast quantities of cargo downriver. The stagnation they
experienced was one of efficiencies.

As some have theorized that the relative weakness of Sinic civilization allowed southeast asia to
grow into its own, so too did the weakness of the Pancharajya allow its nearby rivals and
competitors to prosper. Vanga in particular saw growth. When the Pancharajya descended into
anarchy, their own manufactories were forced to pick up the resulting strain. When trade lanes
were disrupted, as they sometimes were, it feel to the Vangans and Assamese guilds to provide
the finished goods and foodstuffs. Necessity prompted innovation. The guilds hired on new
unskilled laborers to staff monstrous new manufactories.

It is best not to think of the Pancharajya as a strong state. Despite its advantages in sheer
population and economic power, the divisions which ran through Pancharajya society were
strong. Landholders, temples, and important guilds alike all maintained private armies. The
abolition of institutions such as separate guild courts and the reassertion of central authority
based out of Pataliputra had merely left the entire country on the brink of civil war. In the
Pancharajya, the monarchist tracts written several decades previously began to gain traction
once more, as guilds and armies alike saw the goshthi bureaucrats as a worrying combination
of incompetent and dangerous – not to mention allied with the sprawling temple estates against
their influence. Where once the guilds had repudiated the very notion of Kingship, preferring to
take direct power into their own hands, they began to see that the bureaucrats could only be
counterbalanced by the same strong central authority that they had traditionally advocated for.

Anapota Durjaya had his origins as a priest’s son, who through favoritism gained a position in
the bureaucracy – first as a scribe, and later as a chief record-keeper for the courts. Given his
position, he should have turned towards the goshthi, but he was born in an era where many
powerful guilds were being dismantled by the bureaucracy, their assets seized by government
officials to enhance private estates or in lavish donations to the temples. This corruption
angered Anapota, and accordingly he resigned his position and sought a position in politics –
which he gained, ironically, with the support of a temple faction. Once in the Ayat, however, he
played a subtle game – accumulating power to lackeys and supporters who owed him personal
favors. Many historians condemn this as hypocrisy, but it may have simply been an astute
understanding that politics in Kannauj depended on such strategies.

Ultimately, he was able to win a seat in the great council at Pataliputra, and shortly thereafter
accumulate titles and ranks.

The guilds realized that Anapota was unique. He opposed the goshthi while being from outside
the corporate structure. He had the support of a wide range of landholders and his own private
soldiery. They threw their support behind him in exchange for favors and influence, hoping that
in the upcoming elections he might be named Uparika or perhaps would head a Ministry. In
Anapota they saw a chance to undo half a century of humiliations at the hands of the
bureaucratic-temple alliance. Harita Sumanatha, a Brahmin and a prominent speaker in the Ayat
in favor of the goshthi, gave a powerful oration against the rise of Anapota Durjaya and his
faction. However, in a narrow vote, Anapota was appointed Uparika in the year 1019.

Anapota only had a tentative grasp on power. The loose coalition which had brought him into
office was already fracturing, and he had made many impossible promises of land and title to
various factions in order to achieve his position. But he was an astute politician. He went to his
principle backers and claimed that the rewards they had been promised were impossible without
more of his people in the Ayat. Accordingly, he requested that a vote be held to create hundreds
of additional seats – that he could stack the field with his own partisans. While it was a motion of
questionable legality, he went to Harita Sumanatha, won the famed orator to his side by
promising the temple faction a third of the newly created seats. Hundreds of recently-founded
temples would be invested with formal privileges in the Ayat system.

What they did not realize is that by the time the motion had passed, Anapota was able to stack
the Ayat with people who owed nothing except to him. He became impossible to remove from
power. Shortly thereafter, he staged an attack on his person by mercenaries who “confessed” to
working with the prominent Trilinga Goshthi society, and he utilized the ensuing outrage to carry
out mass arrests of “traitors” and “dissidents” who sought to weaken his position. Harita was
forced to flee to Vanga. Most of his enemies were exceedingly wealthy landholders and those
who coincidentally had long voted against him – their removal turned the Ayat further into a
rubber-stamp organization. Whenever private individuals were arrested or exiled, Anapota also
made sure to buy up their private armies – swelling his own forces and paying for them out of
the state treasury. Effectively the state now had two armies – the official guild forces which
notionally were in service to the five confederal cities of the Pancharajya, and his own
paramilitary forces.

By this point, Anapota was thinking not of the corruption of the bureaucrats but of his own
monarchal ambitions. Next, he turned on the powerful trading guilds, revoking antique privileges
and charters with the same impunity that the bureaucratic faction had. His own base of support
had dwindled, of course. The newly privileged landholders, however, their estates made up of
confiscated land, supported him wholeheartedly. As he played a devout and selfless man, the
temples, Hindu and Buddhist alike, tolerated him, and the bureaucracy was toothless and
packed with sycophants after his purges. The only force that remained capable of fighting him
was the guild armies, and those were divided.

The guild armies of the Pancharajya were not the armies of the late Maukhani era. Their role
had increasingly become that of a glorified police force. In foreign campaigns they had a poor
record at best, in no small part because the Pancharajya simply had no rivals worthy of the
name and thus there was little motivation to be anything more than a passable field army.
However, as an aristocratic martial elite who had trained since childhood in the arts of war and
could afford all the finest arms and armor, this weakness was more out of a desire to avoid
unnecessary loss of life than true incompetence.

Anapota played off this aversion to open battle. He promised the army that life would remain
essentially as it was while at the same time forming his own army, a mix of the newly entitled
landholders and a professional army based around a corps of mercenaries paid out of the stolen
treasury. Soon, the guild armies found themselves outmaneuvered and his forces stormed their
barracks and palaces, torching them and capturing many unprepared guild soldiers who
assumed that Anapota would not act while negotiations were still ongoing.

Now sole ruler, Anapota gradually gathered to himself the trappings of monarchy, but he did not
go so far as to claim Kingship outright. To do so would invite a whole host of additional
responsibilities both religious and otherwise which he preferred to leave in the hands of
officeholders and the temples. By the year 1021, he had absolute power, and would hold it for
fifteen years. He was a particularly lucky sort of tyrant, all things considered. The particular form
of autocracy which he practiced lacked formal trappings of any sort, and after crushing his major
enemies he took exacting pains to be as inoffensive as possible while promising vicious
reprisals to those who opposed him.

It took a generation for the system to wholly collapse, but the cracks were showing long
beforehand. The Chandela clan of Khajuravahaka joined the Chandratreya dynasty, whose
power rose as they expanded their hegemony to the very borders of the Pancharajya. They
made alliances with the cities and temples of Vanga, taking advantage of the total distraction of
the five cities to gain power at their expense.

In 1032, this lead to war. Anapota launched vicious attacks against the Vanga, capturing many
cities along the flooded length of the Ganges and using his riverine fleet to great effect. Then he
marched south, subduing the Chandela Kingdom until in 1034 he was defeated at the battle of
the Son river by a massive Chandratreya army. The Jharkhand region, long oppressed and
partitioned by temples and guilds alike, rose up as well, massacring Pancharajya garrisons. It
would fall into Utkaladesha’s sphere of influence.

It would only take two more years for Anapota’s regime to collapse, but in that time he managed
to pass away in his sleep and in doing so die peacefully. However, his body received no honors
and was ultimately left for the buzzards by a confused and mutinying army. Anapota did nothing
to ensure a successful dynasty or legacy for himself, and with his death the whole Ganges was
in near anarchy. So many of the traditional power structures had been neutered. So many proud
establishments were broken and useless in the aftermath of the Uparika’s reign of terror.

The Ayat was a near useless institution at this point, and the guilds and bureaucrats were
neutered. One of the few forces that could keep order were the mercenary soldiers hired by
Anapota, and indeed as soon as the period of anarchy ended, a “barbarian” king from the
mountains named Vijaykama Kirata rose out of obscurity. Leading a small cohort of
mercenaries, he claimed himself Raja of Kosala, permanently breaking the Pancharajya. With
only four kingdoms remaining, the central Ayat in Pataliputra was disbanded and Magadha’s
chancellor, Achyuta, was named King. The southern cities fell under the dominion of the
southern Maharaja Vishnumitra Chandela, and Panchala came to be ruled as a republic under
the mystic Minanatha. In general, while Ayats and guilds remained a part of life, monarchies
under military strongmen became the order of the day, a situation that would last until the end of
the century.

India

Gandhara – centered around Purusapura, the wealthy “city of men”, Gandhara is a country of
stunning mountains and valleys. While nominally a republic (or more accurately an equal-
kingdom) after repulsing a full-scale Kipchak invasion in 911, the Bitihrota family has maintained
off and on dominance over the state – turning the position of “Prime Minister” into an almost
hereditary office. Gandharan politicians have a reputation throughout India and Iran for being
clannish and nepotistic, one which has led to the common innuendo “In the Gandharan manner”
being used to describe any sort of corrupt family politics.

Gandhara’s less than enviable position at the very gates of the subcontinent has forced them to
maintain one of the finest armies in the region. The Gandharan councils can raise hundreds of
war elephants and tens of thousands of guild-warriors augmented by Afghan and Turkic tribal
auxiliaries. Over time, these Turko-Afghan warriors, called Sahputi, have gained increasing
authority at the expense of the guilds. Their knowledge of the hilly country of Afghanistan has
proved invaluable in countering ambitious Khardi Satraps, and although they cannot hold
political office, the Sahputi have become a military caste in their own right, settled across the the
frontier.

At the dawn of the 12th century, Gandhara is a wealthy and proudly independent country. After
centuries of Aghatsaghid rule, they have finally become prosperous in their own right, building
enormous hydraulic works to maintain alpine rice fields and enormous, decadent temples and
stupa across the mountainsides of their equal-kingdom.

Sindh – With the collapse of the Dauwa regime in 1057, Sindh was left in a short-lived state of
anarchy. Gandhara proved too weak and disinterested to fix the power vacuum their wars had
created. After crushing the last Dauwa monarch in pitched battle, they simply abandoned the
country to its own devices. What emerged in the aftermath was a curious hybrid state based on
Multan. Alternately called Sindh or Trigarta, this new kingdom was founded by a local warlord
named Sansar Chand and by 1082 had reunited Sindh under his authority.

Sansar Chand tore down the Dauwa state bureaucracy and expelled the foreign mercenaries
entirely. A pious and devout man, he gave most of the conquered estates to local community
temples, founding sangha wherever he went. The new Sindh is accordingly a sort of theocratic
merchant republic, albeit one with a powerful dynasty at its head.

Chandratreya Empire – In 1100, the Chandratreya Empire is quite possibly the richest and most
powerful empire in the world. While it has had a series of royal capitals, such as rock-cut
Elapura and Manyakheta, it is the coastal cities of this vast decentralized Empire where true
power lies. Ruled by a Great King of Kings, the Chandratreya have never embraced the concept
or structure of the equal-kingdoms which are so commonplace in post-Revolution India. While
guilds and republican city-states abound along the coastal regions, their heartland in the
Deccan is an agglomeration of directly administered royal territory and companies, and the
periphery of their state is guarded by numerous vassal kings.

The royal councilors and adminstrators are often drawn from guild ranks, but the Chandratreya
keep their own army, drawn from their vassals and their own professional forces. They distrust
armed guilds and prefer to force the merchant guilds to use their soldiers and navy rather than
allowing them to keep private forces. This in particular has kept the Chandratreya state from
becoming subsumed to the interests of powerful financial factions. Ruling a vast portion of the
subcontinent, the collapse of the Pancharajya has left Maharaja Sharva Chandratreya the most
powerful man in India, a power broker in the conflicts between the Gangetic kingdoms.
However, some whisper that his Jain minister Kannara holds real power, or that he is nothing
more than a hedonistic lout madly obsessed with his wife Vijarma.

Chandratreya society, unlike large parts of medieval India, has unprecedented social mobility.
The “Sixteen Castes” are all capable of owning land and property, and while certain rules and
customs dictate their place in religious observances, in day to day commerce or the civil service
people can rise from exceptionally lowly origins to positions of high rank. The language of the
court and learned men is increasingly the vernacular Kannada language, and in this sense the
Chandratreya have encouraged regionalism of a sort.

Chola – the Chola are first among equals in the great patchwork of south Indian dynasties,
ruling over the Pallava, Hoysala and others. Innovators in the field of finance and commerce,
their nagaram corporations have influence far and wide. In 1100, they are ruled by Virarajendra
Chola, an ambitious ruler who has done much to expand Chola influence over Andhra at the
expense of the mighty northern Chandratreya.

The Chola regime has never faced the sorts of difficulties experienced by their northern
counterparts. In the south, Equal-Kingdoms are a strange and unwelcome notion. The guilds
have prospered in no small part because they lack direct political ambitions, and accordingly
spend their energy outwards rather than on self-defeating quests at internal authority. The Chola
do not have an Ayat of their own, although traditionally the large corporations have always had
the ear of the monarch.

Utkaladesha – after the rebellion of 947, Utkaladesha began to slip into the Chola orbit. Her
guilds were prosperous but not so rich that they could avoid being bought out or subverted by
powerful Tamil and Vangali organizations. Accordingly, although Utkaladesha remains an equal-
kingdom of no little importance, the goshthi faction which dominates in the Ayat is in many
senses a puppet to powerful foreign influences. This has not prevented Utkaladesha from
expanding into the tribal areas to the north, land seizures which have granted the bureaucratic
scholar-gentry more power.

Andhra – Another vassal of the Chola, the Andhran city of Narayanaksherta is now the capital of
Andhra, having eclipsed the ancient site of Vinukonda. Narayanaksherta is now the seat of Ayat
and answers directly to the Chola monarch. A puppet King has been placed on the throne of
Andhra, belonging to the inconsequential Arinjaya Kalapalar, a rubber-stamp for the actions of
the Ayat and the Chola guilds.

However, Andhra has become a country divided. Vengipura, the proud ancient capital remains
in the hands of the landholding guilds and is an equal-kingdom of its own under the rule of a
“viceroy” named Siyata Khottiga. Khottiga’s Vengipuran holdings have become an armed camp
of sorts. Since 1080, he has embarked on a substantial program of fortification, shoring up the
walls of Vengipura and establishing the Ayat at a new fortified palace-hall cut into a nearby hill.
This fortified palace is said to have sufficient granaries and cisterns to survive for five years if
besieged, and to be connected by underground tunnels to the city itself.

While open war has been rare lately, Narayanaksherta has been buying up immense quantities
of firepowder and Arabian horses, and according to rumor they hope to destroy Vengipura.
However, they dare not move without the backing of the Chola, because Vengipura has a
powerful patron in the form of the local Chandratreya Uparika.

Magadha – The famous birthplace of empires survived Anapota’s reign relatively intact. A seat
of culture, philosophy, and technological innovation since the Gupta era, Magadha is now once
more an independent kingdom under Kaivarta Soumitri, the son of a former general of Achyuta
who rose to power after the death of the latter man in 1062. Pataliputra remains one of the
largest cities on the subcontinent, comparable in population to most of its great rivals and yet far
more prestigious. A “city clotted with palaces” in the words of the Chinese adventurer Zhao Li,
Pataliputra is also home to some of the greatest Buddhist monasteries in the world.

Day to day management of Magadha is the province of local Ayat councils – Magadha remains
an equal-kingdom in that sense. However executive authority is wholly concentrated in the
various adopted princes of the Soumitri dynasty, who have broad purview to act extrajudicially.
The general populace has no recourse other than appealing directly to the monarch, a
complicated process which can only be done through the Ayat. Magadha has fought three wars
with the city of Tamralipta, the last of which conquered the city and brought much of Vanga
under Magadhan control. Notably, Kaivarta Soumitri is an atheist, a member of a latter Carvaka
sect which holds that nothing exists which cannot be observed. This has won him little love from
the great universities and monasteries of his kingdom.

Kosala – The Kirata dynasty rules Kosala as an effectively feudal state, having conquered an
outsized realm far beyond the traditional boundaries of Kosala. Ayodhya, an ancient and
powerful city, serves as their capital, and their kingdom is one of the strongest and wealthiest of
the Pancharajya successor states. The Kirata, being a Nepalese warrior clan from the
mountains, have brought a certain martial spirit to their kingdom that their rivals typically lack.
They are fortress-builders and have used these fortresses to turn themselves into a landed
aristocracy not so different from the feudal retainers of Europe or Japan.

Hiring mercenaries from as far afield as the Sahputs of Afghanistan, they have won battle after
battle against the guild armies of Magadha and Panchala. Their military tactics, however, are
beginning to look outdated in a world where any peasant can be trained to hold a fire-spear or a
hand-cannon. Furthermore, their rival guilds have begun adapting tactically, as well as hiring
more freely and expanding their numbers immensely. The battle of Kampilya in 1099 is a perfect
example of the decline of the Kosala – the Panchala guilds took cover behind quickly erected
wooden ramparts and decimated a Kirata charge with firespears and their famed longbows.

Panchala – Republican tradition is preserved among Panchala, a league of cities sometimes

called the Three Kingdoms. Here, as in Surasena, the Ayats have remained dominant, and they
elect viceroys and ministers rather than kings. Panchala has been on the rise for the past
several generations, as their guild armies have adapted, hiring thousands of fresh soldiers and
importing large numbers of horses from Iran. Lately they have been winning battle after battle,
reducing the Kirata and the republic of Surasena in the process.

Surasena – Centered on the holy Yamuna river, Surasena is a deeply religious country, one with
a reputation for mysticism. Having lost many wars against Panchala, it is also an unstable one,
ruled by a succession of petty despots. Mathura, its capital, is a place under effective mob rule,
and many educated people have called for a union with Panchala, and a restoration of the
Pancharajya, under which the people prospered.

Pajcanada – The Country of the Five Rivers, which the Iranians called Panjab, is assuredly one
of the most long-suffering of the Indian states. It has long been a land of petty kingdoms, foreign
conquerors, and most recently Gandharan dominion. However, in 1046,the city of Lohawar
broke free of the Gandharan yoke and has pressed Gandhara back towards the mountains,
gaining control of the Sutlej and Ravi rivers. Pajcanada, ruled by the native Panwarawat
dynasty, does not have the prestige of many of its rivals. They are seen as upstarts and rebels,
tillers of the soil whose country sits wedged between far greater powers.

Lohawar itself has grown substantially in the past thirty years, expanding to cope with the
exigencies of the large kingdom it now finds itself ruling. In contrast to the Gandharans, whose
regime is increasingly preoccupied with threats from the West, it exists in relative safety – most
of Pajcanada’s neighbors are distracted and weak.

Vrji – a long suffering buffer state between the Kirata of Kosala and the Soumitri of Magadha,
Vrji has had her borders systematically disrespected over the last seventy years to the point that
her Ayat barely controls any territory outside of the city of Vaisali. Currently, the Vrji Ayat pays
heavy tribute to the Kirata, and her walls are manned by Kirata soldiers.

Arabia

Aden – The “beautiful sails” of South Arabia all come to dock in Aden. The children of Himyar
still dwell in the town which has existed since the dawn of time itself, but Aden is a cosmopolitan
and peninsular city now. Jains and Buddhists live among Jews and Pagans, and there is a
thriving Egyptian and Indian community.

South Arabia looks to Africa and the East for wealth and opportunity. The collapse of the Hawiya
has forced them to seek close relations with the people of Pazudesada along the Savahila
coast. From Africa and the Isle of the Moon come the Zanj slaves who work the spice
plantations of the interior, where changing environmental conditions have allowed some
reservoirs to finally replenish.

The Malik of Aden is himself a Jew, but his sect is peculiar, accepting reincarnation as part of his
God’s plan. And while the Malik may answer to the Hadhrami, he does so only begrudgingly,
dreaming of the day when the world’s oldest city might one day throw off its shackles and
spread its wings.

Hadhramut – The Hadhramut once were the greatest merchants in the world, and they are
acutely aware of this fact. Nowdays, of course, they are not the greatest merchants in the world.
If any in Arabia claim that title, it is the prosperous cities of the Gulf or perhaps Aden to the
southwest. However, they do still have some prestige. Their desert monasteries are the center
of Buddhism in Arabia, and they still do excellent trade with Asia. Hadhrami sailors are
considered some of the best in the world, even if their ship designs have adopted Chinese and
Indian innovations, and their ships are more often than not owned by Adeni aristocrats or
Bharukacchan guilds.

Al-Taif - Arabia has had something of a crisis of identity since the collapse of Saihism. While its
adherents saw the dawn of the Saihist movement and the revelations of their prophetess as a
great and transformative moment in Arab history, the benefit of hindsight has placed the Saihist
cult among the great religious upheavals in the wake of Eftal collapse.

Al-Taif remains the greatest city in the Hejaz, a region which as it has ever been is deeply
divided. Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and pagans live side by side – here the great conflicts are
between tribal groups. Identity is based on kinship, and with the fracturing of the community of
believers, Saihism is no more compelling than any other cult. With the fall of Saihism, many of
the protections for women that it allowed have gradually begun to roll back. Divorce has become
a trickier matter, particularly among the growing minority of Christian converts.

An old Arabic saying says “Prophethood is cheap. Conviction is costly.” Nowhere is that more
true than the Hejaz, where many have claimed the mantle of divine inspiration, to speak for
Buddha or Christ or any number of pagan deities. However, if prophethood is cheap, it is also
appealing. The overland trade routes themselves have become far less valuable in recent
years. Warfare between tribal groups is endemic, and people seek inspiration and escape
where they can.

The cities of the Gulf – Mazun and Dilmun are the chief potentates of the Gulf, but all of the
many city-states of the region are loosely aligned around a single inescapable fact – they owe
their very existence to the mercy of the Khardi and Bharukaccha, and should either of those two
mighty patrons turn against them they would cease to be with remarkable swiftness.

However, Arabia remains a port of escape for the Nestorian Asorig populations who were
capable of fleeing Mesopotamia. Accordingly, eastern Arabia is filled with Christians and
Zoroastrians, far in excess of any other religious group, even if these outsiders do often pray at
the temples of the Fisher-God and other traditional pagan shrines for the political benefits.

In almost every sense, these are weak powers, but they perform a vital role as mercantile
stopovers and a source of rare pearls.

North Africa

Masamida – North Africa’s states and territorial borders are effectively calcified. Warfare
between the Berber kingdoms is for the first time in centuries extremely rare. The Agilld of
Masamida and his peers see themselves as a sort of confederation of brother tribes. Those who
have opposed this harmonious union have generally suffered for it.

Masamida is the most prosperous of the Berber states, having a direct route across the Sahara
both overland and by sea. The three main trade goods that come across the desert are salt,
gold, and slaves, but all manner of goods travel across the desert and enterprising clans have
made them rich beyond their wildest dreams.

The Masamida themselves have begun moving beyond the kinship-based trappings of tribal
society and towards a more centralized monarchy, as have the other Berber tribes. By 1100 this
is a process well under way. The Agilld rules with near absolute authority, and while the army is
still called up in accordance with old tribal customs, the practice of recruiting and maintaining
“slave soldiers” is growing – armies of black warriors directly employed by the state and freed
after a contract of twenty years.

Iktamen – If Masamida is the most prosperous, the Iktamen are perhaps the weakest. Despite
what should be a strong position, they have been cut out of the overland trade by an alliance
between the Masamida and many prominent Taureg clans. Accordingly they only get a fraction
of the trade revenue of their supposed “brothers” to the west.

Iktamen accordingly has a reputation for being a land of brigands and raiders, wild and unruly
mercenaries and pirates. The Agilld rules out of the city of Icosi but his power is distinctly
limited. He does not have a private slave army to support his ambitions, but instead tries to
strike corrupt bargains with local raider-clans. Icosi itself has a well-deserved reputation as a
den of sin, inequity, and piracy. To quote the Italian traveler, womanizer, and (eventually)
mercenary Niccolo Cosca, who travelled there in 1089, it is “a canker sore on the mouth of our
mother sea; to revisit time and again gives pleasure but only increases one’s later suffering.”

Iswaiyen – The Agilld of Iswaiyen is married to the sister of the Iznagen king, and accordingly
the two realms in 1100 are incredibly closely allied. The notion of “brother kings” here is not a
fiction but rather a potent reality. Iswaiyen has a reputation for being a land of magicians and
strange gods – it boasts incredibly light Mauri settlement, in no small part because it suffered
the most from the decline of African agriculture several centuries back. Accordingly there are
few Christians in the whole of Iswaiyen, and the Iswaiyeni themselves are almost universally
pagans.

Iznagen – The Mauri themselves hailed from the western part of North Africa, but you would not
know it now. Nowdays, those who have not packed their bags and sailed to Christendom live in
Carthago and its environs. Accordingly, the Iznagen rule a surprisingly urban and Christian
realm, and the only state which is at all comparable in power with the Masamida. Despite their
distance and the presence of two potent buffer states, the Iznagen have a sort of friendly rivalry
with the Masamida.

In Carthago, coins pay tribute to holy Isau, son of God, but outside the suburban sprawl of the
city, and even in rival cities such as Hifo and Buna, local gods predominated, often worshiped
alongside the Christian God or as angels or saints.

Hawwaya – Unlike their western counterparts, the Hawwaya have no one King, and have not for
a century and a half. Their realm, the sprawling expanse of Libya and its many oasis states, is
fractured into rival clans. Water here is life, as agriculture is extremely limited.

Hawwaya has a reputation for lawless anarchy even greater than that of the Iktamen, but it also
controls the trade routes between North Africa and Kanem. By the death of Dunama Kay, they
had splintered into a variety of independent oasis cities each under their own king. Despite
some consolidation among the magistrates of coastal cities, generally the Hawwaya have
remained a tribal group in chaos – at once too poor and too violent to worry about directly
annexing.

Christianity has made significant inroads among the Hawwaya as well, although it is as often as
not the apocalyptic heresy of the Kanem Students. Dalai Christianity, as it is commonly known,
is the faith of desert raiders and bandits who see themselves as bringing purity to the
unbelievers, and accordingly can justify any atrocity. Because of the Dalai, if for no other
reason, most traders prefer to travel along the safe trade lanes kept by Taureg merchants.

Cyrene – In 1068, Cyrene was brought under the control of the Iranian Empire by the Khardi
general Jehatmihra Kakavand, bringing an abrupt end to the short-lived Igiderid dynasty.
Kakavand’s nephew Farrokh was installed as the new Shah of the region, and given a small
garrison force with which to maintain order. By 1097, however, most of the garrison was recalled
to deal with a full-scale Makurian invasion of Egypt, and an Igiderid pretender, Amanar, returned
at the head of a column of bandits, executing Farrokh Kakavand and restoring his family’s
control over the region.

Amanar has become a near-messianic folk hero in recent times. While it is impossible to prove if
he is actually a relation of the original Igiderids, he has certainly been welcomed as one. After
the failure of the Makurian invasion, he has begun amassing soldiers, including many Votivists
from Europe and Dalai from among the Hawwaya, as part of his ambition to reconquer Egypt for
Christianity.

Whether or not he will be able to do so remains to be seen.

The Votives of the 11th Century

Protohypatos Niketas found himself in a deceptively strong position. As the Khardi fell into
internal squabbling, a cousin of Seneqerim Artsruni, the Armenian Satrap, had been left in
command of Ikonion. Seneqerim’s cousin, Amasi Mardir, who actually proved to be a capable
tactician – but one who could not command the loyalty of the Ifthal or indeed any of the Khardi
aristocracy, owing to his low birth. Mitradarma had blundered by thinking that the Khardi
leadership would support Amasi after his death, and Serfarrokh, now the Padishah, blundered in
not removing him from command and replacing him with a better-liked captain.

Niketas was able to reach out to the western world for support and arms. In particular, this
meant soliciting the assistance of men such as the famed Italian mercenary general Stefano
Cosca[1], captain of the Red Hand Company, and Sven Twosnakes, an Anglo-Dansk captain
with a company of axe-wielding mercenaries. Volunteers streamed in from Europe as well,
sewing crosses onto their clothes and painting their shields with the Chi Rho. Altogether, he was
able to assemble quite the impressive army – perhaps fifty thousand men at its peak.

It should be no surprise that the Protohypatos won victory after victory. Ikonion was retaken in a
whirlwind campaign. The Khardi were caught flat-footed, and Shah Artaxser II, young and
isolated in his capital, surrounded by flatterers and schemers, was not the man to rescue their
Empire after the disasters which followed. His response was tepid and mostly involved sending
weak generals piecemeal for the Asian armies to annihilate.

Niketas, meanwhile, went from strength to strength. In 1040 he personally oversaw the
annexation of Alania, and shortly thereafter after a triumphal march through Nikaia he was
proclaimed Basileus by his soldiers in what was undoubtedly a premeditated event designed to
have the appearance of spontaneous acclamation. The various Hypatoi at first refused to
acknowledge Niketas as a King, and Niketas himself refused the title out of false humility and a
desire to maintain his political position. However, after another successful campaign, striking
deep into Syria, briefly capturing Emesa, and threatening Khardi control over Palestine, the
Hypatoi could not resist. They placed a crown on his head and once that was done, Asia would
never be the same.

In deference to the Franks, who were at least notional allies of his Votive War, Niketas refused
to take the title “Emperor of the Romans” calling himself “Emperor in Asia” instead. However the
symbolism was clear enough. Once again there was an Emperor in the East. Asia, however
disunited it might be beneath the surface, was once again a force to be reckoned with. In 1042,
the Iranians made peace with Asia, paying a single indemnity and acknowledging borders which
allowed them to retain control of Kappadocia, Cilicia, and Armenia. Many of the Votive rank-and-
file were shocked by the treaty. Had they not once come so perilously close to recapturing
Jerusalem itself? Had they not beaten the heathen at every turn?

They had, but they were also broke. Extorting money from the Iranians was actually the only
way Niketas could pay the massive debts Nikaia and he himself had accumulated waging the
war. Even as Emperor, his state suffered from deep divisions. After the first few years, Samos,
no longer under direct threat, had begun minimizing its tribute, claiming poor harvests and
disrupted trade. Others had followed suit, and despite his political dominance he was forced to
swallow his tongue and accept a sort of defeat.

A second major campaign which is often associated with the Votive Wars was the immense but
ultimately pointless battle of the Cataract, wherein the Makurian army was destroyed in a failed
invasion of Egypt during the reign of the Khardi Shah Artaxser IV.

The increasing weakeness and regionalism of the Khardi Empire hinted at dissolution, but at the
same time, the Empire proved shockingly resilient. Even as they gained further power, the
prominent generals and satraps of the western and eastern frontiers alike resisted outside
incursions. In 1076, a Turkic army led by the Imur clan was defeated. In 1083, the Afghan
rebellion ended in a mediated peace that kept Baktria as part of the Empire.

The Iranshah would not be so easily destroyed, whatever the ambitions of their lean and hungry
neighbors. Ultimately their collapse would be internal – over the course of the twelfth century an
increasingly isolated and feeble succession of Padishahs began handing out monarchial titles
like candy. Their final destruction would be a very prolonged process, but even in this early
period events like the Imur war hinted at fundamental weaknesses and a porous eastern border
which was not rectified by isolated garrison-towns.

[1] Stefano Cosca is perhaps most famous as the father of Niccolo Cosca, writer of adolescent
accounts of life as a caravan guard in North Africa and particularly well-knownfor his role as an
adventurer in the New World. However, for a brief period in his early thirties he commanded a
mercenary company in the Asiatic Votives, experience that would prove vital to his later career
and would ensure that his prodigal son had a wide range of contacts across the Mediterranean,
and sufficient finances to go adventuring.

Central and East

Asia

Oghuz Khaganate – Often better known as the Afsar Khaganate, the Oghuz Khaganate is a
confederation of Turkic peoples that stretches from the Kitai Empire in the East to Kundajid and
Iran in the West. Loosely united and dominated by the interests of the twelve tribes, all of which
can claim relation to the broader Oghuz ethnic group, the Oghuz Khanagate is not exactly a
strong state. The Afsar rule by consensus and many young men leave their clans to become
mercenaries for the Xasar or the Ifthal, which is becoming an increasing problem in preserving
the strength of their confederates. Even when these men return, as they sometimes do, laden
with treasury and tall tales of victories over the mail-clad western princes, they bring with them
disruptive ideas and foreign brides, often causing chaos. Times are changing for the Oghuz.

They have many vassals, particularly in the east – most notably the Naiman, Merkit, and Jalayr
clans who together form the “three blood loyal” a coalition which at times has rejected the rule of
the Turks and tried to establish for themselves a Mongol Confederation. In 1087 they were
defeated at the battle of the Onon River, and since then have not had the same strength they
once did. Now they are mostly content to provide a frontier against Jurchen and Kitai raiding
parties.

However, the Onon River and its associated campaign demonstrated the weakness of the Afsar
even in victory – as the Khagan proved incapable of restraining his subordinates and vassals.
The more the Afsar settle along the rivers of Xvarasm and seek to centralize, the weaker their
hegemony becomes – and by 1100 they are very much a settled tribe, with capital cities and
great palaces. Reconciling this society and the past century of luxury with the hard life of a
nomadic Khaganate is never an easy task. It was the Khirichan who came closest to doing so,
but ultimately their model has proven tough to replicate on the more open steppe of Central
Asia.

Kitai (Yaol Dynasty) – by the standards of Chinese dynasties, there is a sense of unprecedented
arrogance in the Kitai. Successors to the Uighur Khaganate, they have been far more willing to
compromise both culturally and politically with the Han majority and in doing so have created a
stable empire.

The Kitai are a Buddhist regime which like many of their steppe cousins incorporates syncretic
elements of traditional religion. Accordingly, they have granted unprecedented power to the
Buddhist temples, a paradigm shift from the persecutions of the Qi. Instead it is the Taoist
“mystery cults” which are persecuted, considered a threat and a source of resentment. Clothes
and symbols which are part of traditional Chinese religion have been banned outright, allowing
the government to easily target those who do not obey their decrees.
Tianzuo of the Yaol is the current Emperor, and he resides in the Great Palace at Kaifeng. There
he is surrounded by beautiful songbirds and gardens measureless to man. From the north come
Jurchen and Uighur potentates to pay tribute to him, and he no longer calls himself “North King”
but, as his father before him, considers himself Emperor.

Despite all their palatial grandeur, the Yaol have some critical weaknesses. They have not been
able to gain the merest foothold in the Tarim Basin. In 1081 a joint alliance of the Viasha and the
Turfan were able to repel a Yaol invasion. Furthermore, the two major Yangtze states of Wu and
Chu remain stubbornly independent and beyond their control, despite the best efforts of the
Emperor.

Wu – The Wu kingdom is a major center of manufacturing, controlling most of the ports along
the eastern coast of China and the mouth of the Yangtze. It is from Wu that most finished goods
come, particularly the famed lacquerware which has made many a merchant wealthy. With the
destruction of the Red Standard army, Wu has become something a prosperous, if traditionalist
realm.

The Wu army is vastly inferior to that of its Kitai rivals – and indeed the survival of the Wu can
be traced more to defensive strategy and a denante with Chu which has ensured they need not
fear a two-front war.

Chu – After defeating Tibet, Chu has had few successes worthy of the name. A succession of
generals have ruled Chu since that day. Unlike the Wu, Chu has become a very martial state,
holding defensible mountainous uplands in excess and fortifying them well. Unlike Wu it has
less to fear from the Kitai, but the Yaol dynasty is still the overriding defensive concern, and
according Chu has never moved against Wu – maintaining the rough stalemate into the 12th
century.

Buddhism is popular in Chu as well, but the people of Chu are very traditional – a mixture of the
Hakka exiles from the north and a variety of indigenous peoples including the diverse ethnic
groups of the mountainous Yunnan region. Each valley and mountain is said to keep its own
rituals and culture, all separate from the Han influenced court rituals at Chengdu

Tai – The Tai are a curious people, deeply influenced by Hindu traders and merchants from
Srivijaya as well as the Sinic settler population with which they coexist. To the Chinese their
realm is either called the South Kingdom or the Daiya.

The ruler of the “South Kingdom” is an ambitious conquer named Xaysetta or Gaozong. Unlike
his northern counterparts, the Tai rule more along the lines of the tribal mandala system used by
the Khmer and others. There is a feudal sensibility to their rule as well – fortified villas are
commonplace along the hills of the south, and they control the mountainous river valleys which
define the geography of the region.
Tibet – In 1035, the Bod Empire finally collapsed. Despite a long-standing alliance between the
Chu and the Bod, their pact collapsed due to border struggles, and after a series of major
battles in which it seemed the Bod might triumph, Rhasa was sacked by a Chu army. The Bod
Emperor was carried back to the Chu capital and the Empire was left in utter disarray.

Since that time, Tibet has been a nation in disarray. Local temples and tribal patriarchs control
her mountains and valleys. Artistically and philosophically, it is a nation in retreat, uncertain of its
new place in the world. The Buddhist sects which predominate teach utter detachment from the
material world, and encourage many of the finest thinkers and teachers to isolate themselves in
distant monastic communities. Suffering, after all, is the nature of things. The Empire is gone.
There is no glory any longer, and the great halls of Rhasa lie barren and ash-filled. The splendor
of Kings is transitory.

What is there now for the children of Bod?

-
Those east of Sindh
and west of Chandratreya are small kingdoms. Akin to the Rajputs of our own history, really,
mixed Gurjar and Turko-Afghan soldiers serving local princes. Relatively low infrastructure and
development, in no small part because the region isn't great for agriculture. However Jharkhand
and that whole big "bushland" region is even more primitive, tribal villages and even I think
some indigenous hunter-gatherer communities still (although those are imperiled as per OTL).

The Dali Kingdom in this timeline was first a vassal of the Bod Empire and at this point is now a
vassal of Chu. (I did mention it probably 400 years ago or so but it kind of slipped under the
radar after that, unfortunately.) Dali is itself relatively advanced, if decentralized owing to the
mountainous nature of Yunnan.

The northern Arabs are divided between the Saihist holdouts in the north around Ha'il and Al-
Jawf. They've declined substantially. There's also (Christian) Arab tribes in the Sinai, the Banu
Qaylah and the Banu Amela, who both trace their ancestry back to the Sabaeans and more
recently were allies of the Heshanids. They have survived by fighting the Khardi in the desert
quite successfully. They're both Monophysite. There are also Nestorian tribes - the Banu
Numyar in particular around Bostra and the Banu 'Abs and Hanifa are Nestorian protectorates
near Mesopotamia, serving a similar role to the ancient Banu Lakhm, but more nomadic.
Tadmur once was ruled by the Ghatafan, but they were driven out by Syrian Arabo-Eftal
peoples. Up around there is a petty Kingdom of Tadmur, which pays tribute to the Satrap of
Syria. It's rulers are pagan-Buddhist, overseeing a large Nestorian population.
-
Since Eftal times,
relief and painted icons have both been major parts of the architecture of the near east. That
alone would mark this ATL near east as fundamentally different to traveler from OTL.
Pure stone buildings are considered ugly and are frequently painted, covered in stucco, or for
the wealthy, covered in elaborate facades. The interiors of palaces and temples have many
domes, columns, and archways, and in that sense at least resemble Islamic architecture. There
is a fascination with geography and infinitely repeating patterns, however these patterns are
more likely to be directly representational, or be crowned by a devotional icon of a deity or the
Buddha. (In Nowbahar art, however, the Buddha is represented by absence, using such
symbols as a tree, a stone, or a gout of flame to indicate his presence. The former comes from
Indian tradition, the latter two from the Buddhists of the Arabian peninsula.) Beautiful art of
course does not need to be religious in nature, and the houses of the rich might be adorned with
endless patterns of swooping swans or dancing women.

The Khardi themselves, when they build major constructions, somewhat slavishly imitate older
patterns. Theirs has not been a very artistically innovative era, as to no small degree they look
back on the glories of the Eftal era. There is also a new sense of conservatism brought by the
rise of the Nowbahar. Where Aghatsaghid art imitated the loose and hedonistic morality of the
time (or so the Nowbahar would say) Khardi era art is often more serious and less self-aware.
Their architecture prefers plain, rectangular forms. Even Nowbahar stupas and temples tend to
be built as very functional complexes - although there is an emergent faction within the
Nowbahar themselves that seeks to separate this sort of denial of pleasure from the denial of
deities and embraces beauty and joy to a much greater degree.

The East Slavs, especially the Rus, are very much considered distinct from Europe. (Gardaveldi
on the other hand is a bit of a weird exception) Their script is actually a (heavily) modified
version of the Tocharian script, which has now come very, very far from home. Hobelhouse
made a post on it a while back. Their culture has taken on many Iranian and Sahu elements -
including sometimes Iranian names and festivals. However, Slavic gods and supernatural folk
creatures remain, although often time local monks try to convince people to edit some sort of
Buddhist lesson into them, with varying levels of success. Lay people eat meat and drink
alcohol, but monasteries are typically vegetarian and monks abstain from drinking alcohol. One
curious feature of their society is that many monks will spend a period of time surviving alone in
the forest - this is considered a particularly holy calling, but is unusual in the community-oriented
monasticism of the Buddhist south. Those who return from the forest are considered to have
unique religious insight. While women are broadly considered inferior to men in the secular
sphere, they are often considered spiritually equal, especially nuns.

In terms of government, there are a lot of differences, as might be expected. The Rus aren't
themselves feudal. Their government structure is essentially absolute monarchy dominated by
the Han/King and enforced by the retainers of the Han. However, they've also been influenced
by steppe traditions, and accordingly there's a sense that the king only rules by the consent of
his retainers. While there is only very limited bureaucracy, carried out by the monks, retainers
are often empowered to sit as judges and rulers in town councils and by doing so the king's
authority is maintained. A weak king might see his son passed up for succession, or be outright
overthrown. Unlike the Gardaveldi to the north, kings are not seen as gift-givers in Rus society,
and indeed are expected to dress with a certain degree of modesty - not overshadowing their
retainers despite their greater rank and authority. The monarchy directly owns a significant
amount of property - the centralization of the Rus was often a bloody thing indeed, and when
rivals were defeated their fortifications and halls were taken from them and garrisoned, allowing
the early Rus to take slaves and tribute directly without needing to launch another campaign
next year.

Rusichi architecture is very similar to that of OTL. Their religious buildings and palaces eschew
a Byzantine sensibility in favor of a mixture of Iranian and local styles. Their stupas are typically
tall, thin towers whose domes rise to a tight point. (Similar but distinct from OTL's onion dome.)
Important buildings are made of white stone, but mostly brick and wood are the common
building materials of the Rusichi.

In short, the various Rus cultures are shifting away from anything recognizable, but maybe
would still be familiar to an OTL person from the same time period in some regards. One of the
biggest difference is the absence of mass baptisms and conversions. The arrival of Buddhism
has been much more subtle. Although it now permeates life to a significant degree, for the
average Rusichi there is more continuity between the pagan past and the Buddhist present than
an OTL Russian might have experienced when Christianity became the official religion. It may
be worth considering Japan, where folk traditions persisted alongside Buddhism - although
obviously there are huge differences.
-
The Life of Presbyter
Savus is a work of 12th century epic poetry which concerns itself with the life of a great pious
Christian king of the east, and his wars against the pagan Samirgulla. Savus is portrayed as the
paragon of European kingship – wise, noble, just and above all pious. Skilled in arms and
trusting of his companions, he is betrayed by his wife Ieva, who secretly keeps “demonic idols”
and does black magic to ensure Savus’ defeat in battle.

Samirgulla, who is king of the “Sun City”, presides over a world of debauched sacrifice and
unspeakable violence. His palace is at once described as a sensual paradise and a evil,
scheming place filled with villainous councilors, and he is only capable of victories over Savus
through trickery and sheer weight of numbers. Savus’ men, who are often equated with Syrians
or Hellenes, are overrun by the cavalry of the east. His own soldiers fight “shield to shield” –
evoking not the martial style of Frankish cavalry but rather the martial style of the wooded Polish
frontier – speaking to the author’s education and travels but obviously not to historical accuracy.

The Apology of the Dancer isan early work of Iranian prose, thought to have been written by an
Afghani aristocrat, Vartingin sometime in the late 11th or early 12th century. It was poorly
regarded at the time, given that most notable writings at the time consumed for pleasure were
done in complex poetic styles mirroring the fashions and fads of distant local courts. However, it
would develop a following of sorts after being translated into Pajcanadan vernacular by a
Takasashilan monk, and would eventually spread across India in various languages – despite
never achieving recognition in its homeland. To the Indian audiences, this was the story of an
exotic, strange land far beyond anything they might recognize. To the Afghan audiences who
read it in the original vernacular, it was a fanciful tale with bizarre twists of plot and terrible
prose.

It tells the story of a bored aristocrat who does not lack for possessions, but lusts after a
beautiful dancing-girl in his employ and her continuous refusals of him. Finally, he wins her heart
through persistence and a series of opulent gifts. The last gift, some two hundred Ferghanian
horses, elevates her enormously above her station. However, almost immediately he suspects
her of sleeping with another man, an earnest stableboy named Ravakh who does not seek to
buy her affections but rather loves her simply and without reservation.

The protagonist hunts down Ravakh and challenges him to a duel. When the stableboy is
inevitably overmatched and killed, the eponymous dancer, Anahita, gives a long monologue
which forces the aristocrat to see the error of his ways. She then apologizes for her
unfaithfulness, but in a moment of radical progressiveness (for the time) points out that Vartingin
continued to sleep with his own wife. Vartingin is befuddled by these remarks and moves to
strike her, but she is carried away by an immense stork and goes to dwell in the habitation of the
gods. Vartingin curses his tragic flaws and starves to death a month later.

The Death of Suzaku is a famous Japanese novel of the mid 12th century. Detailing courtly life
in the Fujiwara period, it deals with the ambitious social climber Suzaku and his intrigues with
monks. Written by the second generation descendent of Chinese refugees, it provides a
stunning and accurate look at courtly life in Japan, and when Suzaku is ultimately forced to flee
for five years to China and then Srivijaya, it details those countries’ politics, climate, and
architecture in exquisite detail.

The first third of the book is written as political intrigue – Suzaku, a low Bushi, arrives in the
Imperial court and by hasty studying manages not to fatally embarrass himself in the first few
months. However, eventually his social inexperience catches up with him, and he angers
important officials. Forced to work with the Insei monks who control power behind the scenes,
he survives and becomes a dangerous power in his own right, even marrying into the novel’s
thinly-veiled analogue of the Fujiwara family.

Then he is forced into exile when he loses his usefulness to the Insei, and he travels the world
with his wife and a small retinue of loyal friends. This portion takes on the style of a travelogue,
and while insightful is widely considered to be the poorest section. Suzaku encounters minimal
hardship and, quite truthfully to his status and the time period, is a distinguished guest from a
mystical and little known country who is treated with respect and reverence. It often attempts a
certain form of referential comedy which due to context is lost on modern audiences who are not
well versed in the period.

The third section chronicles his return, and is an almost existential meditation on life and death.
Suzaku’s arrival in Japan once more leads with almost mechanistic certainty to a position in
which his only options are a hopeless fight or suicide. In between philosophical realizations and
the darkly beautiful poetry of this section is a scathing critique of the Regency-era bureaucracy
and the politics of the era. Rather than doom his allies, spouse, and children to a similar fate,
Suzaku sacrifices himself that they might survive and indeed ultimately prosper. His last
thoughts are a meditation on the ephemeral beauty of life.

Frankish Empire –
The Frankish Empire is a strange and polyglot beast. At the turn of the century, millions of
Europeans and the vast majority of Christendom live and die beneath the banner of the
Frankish Emperors, all of whom, with the exception of Majorian, have borne the name of
Aloysius. In 1100, the Frankish Empire is ruled by Aloysius X, a boy-king whose power and
authority are severely curtailed by the rise of powerful factions both temporal and ecclesiastical
within his dominion. Despite the geographical factors which would argue against a united
Europe, and many particularist tendencies throughout the Empire, the Franks have
manufactured an enduring dominion by combining their martial prowess with many elements
Roman administration.

The great dukes and other high nobles of the realm are actually not the great holders of power
within the Frankish Empire. The Frankish elite have a long memory of the anarchy of several
centuries past, before succession was stabilized and when the landholders had all the power.
Accordingly, only a select few vassals are actually powerful figures in their own right. Mostly,
power is concentrated in the vast Imperial court, where there now reside thousands of Palatine
counts and magistrates. These officials run the feudal bureaucracy of the Empire, travelling
around local circuits dispensing justice and resolving disputes. Theirs is an essentially
hereditary profession, and accordingly they have become an entrenched class, dependent on
royal largesse for their salaries.

The eleventh century has been good to the Franks. Viking raids are almost unheard of, and
peace has seen unprecedented amounts of riverine trade and the further growth of European
cities. Prosperity has even reached the peasant classes, who enjoy better diets and greater
safety than they have in centuries. There have been no Empire-wide wars, merely local border
skirmishes, and even the Xasar marches enjoyed a relatively quiet century.

If there is any fear, it seems to be that this state of prosperity cannot last forever. The profound
optimism of the eleventh century also hides serious divisions within the Frankish state. Tinanian
heresy has grown unchecked since Aloysius VI unofficially put a stop to the show trials across
Italy and Southern France. Many within the Imperial court themselves hold beliefs that could be
considered Tinanian, and despite a fresh round of persecutions in the 1070s, the heresy has
endured - although after the latest persecutions it is primarily an underground movement. The
push for new Patriarchates across Europe has also caused uncertainty. Despite little progress
being made, the Archbishops of Koln and Paris remain outspoken proponents of a reform of
Church hierarchy.

(Francia) Francia itself is the beating heart of the Empire. The vast Imperial demesne supports a
massive population and is wealthy enough on its own to support the Royal bureaucracy. The
Franks themselves are the most loyal subjects, at least by reputation – they provide the heavily
armored and mounted forces which are the vanguard of any Frankish war. For the bulk of
European nobility, marrying into the Frankish elite is essential, as the Franks enjoy the most
privileges. Their sons have the easiest time gaining prestigious court titles or spots in the clergy.

(Germania) The Germans tire of Frankish dominion. The story of the eleventh century might be
seen by an uncharitable observer as the Frankish Emperors struggling to resolve administrative
crises relating to the Germans. Perhaps, however, German rebelliousness is not unjustified.
Italy and France continue to gain most of the favors, and Ispana enjoys benign neglect. It is the
people of Germany who bear the burden of frontier defense and who receive little thanks.

The German Dukes are more powerful than their counterparts in most of the other regions – and
they have clawed and scraped for every inch of that power. Under the exacting terms of the
1036 Concordant of Koln, Pope Innocent III and Aloysius VII agreed to give the German Dukes
direct investiture within their territories, and to establish the Comitium Imperial (Landstag) – a
regular assembly wherein their ambassadors could maintain a permanent voice in the politics of
Aachen. However, these concessions emboldened the Germans, and allowed them to stack
their bishoprics and monasteries with political creatures loyal to their agenda. The German
Church is considerably more independent in doctrine and policy than its fellow Catholics. There
has been talk of establishing a new patriarchate in some city, perhaps Koln, but this has been
met by stern opposition.

There has also been talk of further compromises – of establishing a separate German kingdom
with its own Palatine Assembly. In 1066, Aloysius VIII briefly considered such a measure, during
one of his tours of the Empire, but he ultimately decided against such a measure.

(Ispana) Ispana often thinks of itself as a sister-kingdom, rather than a mere vassal of the
Frankish Empire. The King of Ispana (who is also Duke of Tarragona) is influential by dint of
being a cadet dynasty to the royal line. His is the only royal title not directly owned by the
monarchy. In the over a hundred years since the “Spanish Troubles” as they are often
euphemistically referred to, Ispana has become a relatively calm and settled place once more –
more akin to the pastoral region of historical memory than the violent and troubled country it
was more recently.

There are few major urban areas in Spain – the population is scattered across many sizable
towns, and it has become a sort of breadbasket for the burgeoning cities of Italy, as well as
being the chief source of high-quality iron for weaponmaking.

(Italia) Italia is the richest part of the Empire, and its northern half is by far and away the most
urban. Here cities dominate, with town councils and local guilds holding more power than the
rural lords who notionally rule. While trade fluctuates across the Mediterranean, the Italian cities
have generally remained afloat through the highs and lows.
Italia benefits from certain Imperial traditions that its fellow regions have no access to. The
coronation march on Rome is so formal and ritualized at this point that there is no tension or
uncertainty, and accordingly it is merely an opportunity for powerful Italian grandees to bask in
the generosity of a new Emperor.

Sklavenia – Sklavenia’s prime position along major avenues of European trade has brought
wealth to a new urban artisanal and mercantile class, and some of the major cities of the region
are approaching their population in Roman times once more. In one of the great ironies of
history, the Italian architectural styles in vogue among the Sklaveni elite are themselves an
evolution of imported Roman styles brought to Italy by Roman refugees fleeing the Sklaveni.
Generally, high Sklaveni culture is an imitation of Frankish and Italian norms and customs –
while the “low culture” of the common people still retains ancient Slavic folk traditions mixed with
some Rhomaic customs.

The Sklavenians, however, are a people diplomatically isolated. Old hatreds die hard, and the
Franks, Xasar, and the Asians all have their reasons for disliking and distrusting the Sklaveni.
Wars against the Xasar have been mostly inconclusive or debacles for the Sklaveni – who are
far more comfortable in the defense of strongholds in the hilly, wooded Balkans than they are
marching across the plains to wage war against the armored horsemen of the Xasar. Great
Achaia still remains lost to them as well, and in the hands of Italian Franks it is prosperous
indeed.

At the turn of the century, King Simon Alos, residing in his capital of Salunicha pays tribute to
the Franks and Xasar alike, and still finds himself squished between the two. This seems
unlikely to change in the near future, as any war against either of the great powers on his
doorstep is a major risk he cannot afford.

Votive Asia – Niketas did not long outlive his titanic wars. He was an old man when he
ascended to the position of Protohypatos – long a senior official in the Nikaian regime. But
before he died, he began acting as a Roman Emperor would. He named his daughter’s
husband, Ioannes Laskaris[1] co-Emperor, and oversaw a relatively peaceable transition of
power.

This did not solve Asia’s immediate problems. The Emperor had the loyalty of Nikaia and her
allies, but Samos, Kibyra, Galatia, and other regions were less tractable. The only blessing was
a mixed one. Alania and the central plateau were now owned directly by the Empire. In other
times, this might have been a huge boon – a massive imperial demesne. However, Ikonion and
her environs were vulnerable so long as the Iranians were at the doorstep.

In 1072, Emperor Ioannes fought a war to retake Kappadocia, but he was vexed, managing to
take several border towns but not make any significant incursions. The Votive enthusiasm of
Europe was sapped, and state finances were always a perilous thing. To maintain what many of
the Asian cities viewed as an informal league, Ioannes was often forced to make compromises.
Protohypatos and Emperor he might have been, but the central administration was only
responsible for directly ruled Imperial territories. To gain soldiers and coin from his subjects he
had to bargain.

In 1100, Ioannes’ grandson Emmanuel Laskaris holds the throne. He is a famous poet and
according to rumor has ambitions of retaking Konstantikert and a vast swathe of Xasar territory.
It is unclear to what extent he actually has the talent and capacity to do this, and only time will
tell if he can.

[1]His last name, which comes from the Iranian word Lashgari, meaning warrior, hints at origins
among the Rhom Eftal.

Dying in Paradise

Imagine the year is 1078.

Imagine you are tired and hungry. The hot sun beats down on your back and there is no
surcease. You are out of water. You are near out of food. As Captain, you share the hardships of
your men.

Prayers to the beneficent saints and God himself have not availed you. The sea, you now
realize, goes on forever. This journey was madness. The Great Land the Norse claim lies to the
utter West is false, a mad rumor. The brothers Ragnarssen are liars and con artists. You realize
that now. The ocean, as far as you know or care, is as infinite as the vault of heaven.

The boat in which you sail draws tight the confines of your world. Beyond its wooden planks lies
only infinite clear blue horizons. Whorls of distant clouds confirm only your heartbreaking
isolation. Sometimes thunderheads rear like the fist of some pagan god across the darkening
sky.

Your crew are weary, but still yoked together with a common aim. A fat golden coin with the cold
ringlet-haired face of Aloysius VIII looks down upon all of you. It will go to the first man who
sights land.

But there is no land. There is only the sea. Miles and miles of sprawling ocean and on the other
side, China. But China is too far. The world is too wide.

Three days later, you are sprawled across the deck. The crew has killed your sister’s son. The
deck is slick with his blood. The crossbow in his hands is still loaded. You crawl towards it. A
boot comes down hard upon your neck and pain shoots through you, white hot.

At least you will not starve.

Then, the mutineers shout with something so unlike execration that at first you do not
understand their meaning. Field birds! You rise slowly. Great flocks of birds wheel and turn in
the distance. Land is near. Hope is renewed.

You get to live and die with the rest of them. Three days later, the thunderheads return. This
time, they blot out the horizon. The men make their prayers. You mumble along with those who
might well have murdered you, your tongue swollen and heavy. You are not the Captain
anymore. There is no Captain.

The storm will leave naught but ruin.

The next morning, weak and confused, you first swim, then stumble through the muck of a white
sand beach. The isle is clear and agonizingly bright. Colorful birds screech above you. Your
head throbs with pain.

The swarthy women who find you will take you in. They will feed you. They will clothe you. You
will drink their water and in time when you are healthy you will lay with them in sinful union. You
will never see home again. On your deathbed, surrounded by children who call you father in the
tongue of the Hatabey, you will barely even remember the great castles and many spired
churches of your homeland. You will pray to the old gods of this island and you will not feel
shame.

Over the long years of your fruitful life, you have forgotten why you set out. The quest for glory,
for knowledge, for a new land with cities made of gold.

All that glory will go to another man. This era, and the great exchange of people, knowledge,
and disease that follows will bear his name.

But you will die having lived in paradise.

Practical Lobster's
world tour circa 1104 continues!

Poland – the Poles are the thankless bastion of Buddhism beyond the Urals. By their strength of
arms do German knights not range across the lands of Chernarus or sweep down from the
north against the Xasar.

However, the Buddhist nations of Transuralic Asia do not have an equivalent to Christendom.
Even when they were relatively united under a Khirichan Khagan, there was considerably less
sense of shared identity. Accordingly, the Buddhists of Poland find that their neighbors are more
likely to critique their doctrine than provide support or welcome aid. The Xasar have their own,
southern priorities, and the Kundajid are not nearly as strong as their predecessors. There is no
single great faith, and the notion of the Sangha, or community of believers, is split by sectarian
divisions. Even those who might come to the aid of the Poles consider them heterodox and
barbaric.

Poland is by some definitions a strong kingdom, in that for several centuries it has remained
remarkably unified in the face of outside pressure. Their identity is rooted in Slavic customs and
traditions, and it stands deeply opposed to the Germanized Christian identity of their Moravian
and German rivals. Under King Kazimirez, however, fissures have begun to develop – not the
expected cultural ones, but rather a sense of exhaustion brought on by continuous low-intensity
warfare. In another world, there might be compromise. The Poles might even have accepted the
primacy of the Pope and perhaps the Emperor in Aachen.

However, the German settlers have been loathe to encourage conversion among the Poles.
Overpopulation in Europe occurs in roughly generational waves. 1100 is a peak of sorts for the
German region, and Germans are flooding into Poland, more often than not heavily armed. This
colonialism is rewriting linguistic and cultural barriers, throwing the Polish world into chaos, in
the name of a broader Votive expansionism. With expansion into the Balkans checked by
stronger and more populous states, comparatively weak and tribal Poland is the only available
target.

The future of Poland is filled with questions. The Germans would find it hard to justify their
warfare if it was perpetrated against fellow Christians, but others in the Polish court suggest
redoubling efforts to find a protector to the East. However, major defeats against Moravia
suggest that time is running out for the peoples of the plain.

Baltic Tribes – Slowly opening up to the world is hard. One day, you think your hill-fort is the very
navel of the world, what some distant scholars you’ve never heard of and don’t care about call
the omphalos. You pray to the Great Thunderer and he has kept your family and your family’s
family safe for generations. Slowly opening up to the world is painful. It is especially painful for
those bright-eyed western missionaries who come to tell you about their dead God who returned
from the dead and fed his body to lambs. They speak your language haltingly and with great
uncertainty, and often they pay for it with their lives.

However, it is impossible to remain guarded from the world forever. The Balts, particularly in
places such as Prussia have learned that the hard way. While the Lithuanians bend the knee to
the long arm of the Han of Byalarus, and the northerners have fallen to the Wheel Realm,
others, the Livonians and Prussians have begun to listen to those strange missionaries from
Saxony and Denmark. They have begun to hear the word of the risen God.

In time, perhaps, even their Kings will throw off the shackles of the old Gods and pray to the
new reborn god from the curly-haired kings of the south.

Xasar Shahdom – The solidification of the Xasar state came at a time when regional and local
identities across Europe were also solidifying. But where the European world was diverging
along local and often linguistic lines, the Xasar experienced unification and greater heights of
political and cultural achievement than at any point in their often violent and tribal past. A sign of
this was the Xasar ruler taking the title of Shah, evoking the Khardi monarchy and distancing
himself from the Turkish past in favor of a largely mythologized Eftal-Iranian origin story, one
reinforced by Konstantikert’s status as a dual capital of the new state alongside double-walled
Shahidjan. One of the new Shah’s many titles is Shah of Rhom, emphasizing a false continuity
with the relatively-short lived state.

Culturally, the Xasar language has come to dominate, displacing dying languages such as the
Avar and Bulgar tongues, although Turkish and Slavic tongues still persist among large portions
of the common people. The hill peoples, the Rumana of Kluch, have retained their traditional
folk-Catholic religion and their language as well, and while they remain second class citizens to
some degree, they are treasured as fierce auxiliary soldiers. The relative stability of the eleventh
century has allowed interrelation between villages and regions, and a strong monarchy has
engaged in many fortification projects – creating a sort of “defense in depth” which mirrors the
fortification of the Frankish marches had has roughly solidified the borders of Christendom and
the East. The Xasar themselves are not a nomadic people and have not really been for some
time now. Their regime is defined by growing urbanism and steadily rising agricultural
productivity.

The Xasar military has undergone significant changes. The chief element of the army is still the
elite cavalry, a force which has proved its quality against European chivalry time and again.
Despite a preference for lighter armor and mobility, the Xasar have adopted European martial
innovations with readiness, and have pioneered the manufacture of the crossbow, a weapon
whose bolts in the hands of skilled Bulgar or Rumanian archer (“Turtleback” for their distinctive
shields) can kill a knight or armored footman with relative ease. The Xasar military track record
has been exemplary, including several major victories against the Moravians – however its
evolution is also massive. The horse archer of the new Xasar army, for example is no longer a
tribesman part of a federated clan but an aristocrat practiced in a style of traditional warfare who
is equally skilled with lance and long single-bladed sword.

The Xasar religious situation has if anything become more clear. The Mahayana Buddhism of
the Sogdian school still predominates, with strong undercurrents of Sravakayana – even some
small Nowbahar monasteries. The state’s main push has been towards a standardization of the
various polytheist traditions. The nobility, starting in 1043 has been required to take an oath
sworn at a holy fire temple to “Mihr, Protector of the Dharma” and the sangha as a whole.
Actions such as this by the monarchy have provided a sense of shared religious ritual to
complement their faith, and reinforced the prestige and status of the Shah.

Moravia – One of two Christian nations among the Slavs, Moravia is the stronger of the two.
Modelled off of the Frankish monarchy, Moravia has at various times paid token tribute to the
Emperor in Aachen. However, what Moravia refuses to do is kneel, and this is a position happily
accepted by the large number of German settlers who are gradually transforming the country
culturally.
Moravia’s has had seven kings over the course of the eleventh century, from Jaromir to Jan II.
The greatest of these was Sobeslav, whose conquests nearly broke the back of the Polish
crown in 1088, setting the stage for the massive onslaught of German marchers a decade later
when Polish manpower was at its lowest ebb.

The intellectual and cultural tradition of Moravia is primarily preserved in German – and
accordingly it is the stories of German settlers, artisans, and low nobles that history remembers.
It is the rise of men like Otto of Barvaria to Chancellor that is remembered, while the history of
Moravian gords is commonly forgotten. The intermarriage of the Moravian crown with German
princesses did not help either – by 1100 German is as common a language at the Moravian
court in Veligrad as any.

-
They don't need
another outlet for conquest - the frontier elements very much want one, as do any nobles who
don't fancy the idea of becoming either a courtier or a priest, but would rather go fight the infidel.
The Emperors in Aachen have some smart reasons for not wanting conquest as well -
disproportionately, expansion has increased the centrifugal tendencies within the state. What
they (or at least the palace faction) really wants, I imagine, is low intensity border wars that don't
really go anywhere - enough to keep people preoccupied but not to give them new
administrative headaches.

Sweden is a bit far away. I don't think anyone wants it but the Swedes in this timeline. Tunisia
would be a good target, but I'm uncertain how far into the countryside they could penetrate
against stubborn Berber resistance. The Mauri are concentrated in a few coastal cities and by
the standards of the overseas communities, the ones in Berber country are "going native." And
Tunisia does sell some agricultural surplus to Europe.

The Shah's court depends a lot on the day and the occasion. On normal days it's a rather
informal affair. The Shah meets with important officials and his close companions, usually has
some sort of communal palace meal, and entertains a few visiting guests. There's relatively
simple protocol. However, on festival days or if the realm is gathered for something, there's a
whole lot of ceremony, formal etiquette, etc. The Sahu get along great with the wider society -
they share an origin story with the Xasar, and accordingly the difference between a Xasar or a
Sahu lineage at this point is almost nil. The Bulgars I guess would be "Xasar-Turkish" along with
the remaining actual Turks. But the differences there are becoming rather slight.

There's essentially no sense of broader "pan-slavic" identity in this timeline. Perhaps one will
emerge down the line. The Sklavenians are rather tribal, but even the dialects of the common
people are mutually intelligible. The Slavic peoples who remained behind in Xasar country have
a similar local, tribal-style identity, but many of them have adopted Buddhism and at an elite
level, the Xasar language is becoming popular.
Don't underestimate Konstantikert - it's a tough nut to crack, and its nowhere near as dilapidated
and ruined as it was the last few times it fell. Shahidjan itself has a series of double-walls, and is
behind an elaborate system of fortifications - as are most major population centers in Xasardom.
Plus, there is some advantages to having the capitals near borders - rapid response from royal
forces is one. Also I was trying to explain how the Xasar had broadly moved away from hit-and-
run tactics. Their troops are becoming much heavier in response to the Frankish style of
warfare, and their idea of attrition tactics is basically "bog the Franks down in sieges and then
pick them apart." Away from the Frankish border, they tend to make use of more mobile cavalry,
but I was trying to explain how far they'd come from the nomadic armies of earlier centuries.
-
East Africa

Savahila polities

Kapudesa - Over the course of the eleventh century, it became increasingly obvious to those of
influence in Africa that there were two great seats of economic and political power – axes
around which the numerous city-states of the Savahila and their hinterlands orbited. The
League of Kapudesa, based around Mzishima, was perhaps the greater of these two leagues,
both in political power and influence. It’s language, Kapudesigaru, and its script, are the trade
languages of the East Coast of Africa, and have communities of speakers as far afield as
Arabia, Iran, and India.

Since the ninth century there has been a republican undercurrent in Kapudesa, brought by
Indian merchants. However, there has always been a King, or Rajsah, in Mzishima itself, and
that position, though elected, has a broad degree of authority and relatively few checks.
However, Kings are limited by tradition and common sense – it does not do to impose oneself
heavily when true power depends on league allies and guilds. In a sense, there is a deeper
state lurking behind the notional displays of royal authority – that of merchants and landholders.

Public religion is focused around the bhakti version of Indian religion, and is primarily described
as Ishvara worship – although Buddhism is also quite popular. Large Zoroastrian, Jain, and
Saihist communities still exist as well, and religious tolerance has enjoyed relatively few
interruptions. The plurality of religious faiths matches the polyglot nature of the state.

However, for all this tolerance, there are clear social hierarchies beneath the surface.
Intermarriage between faiths and ethnicities is commonplace but those who trace their lineage
back to the indigenous peoples of Savahila are considered substantially lesser than those
whose ancestors were migrants – and in the matter of migrants, newcomers and their children
are considered lesser to established families. Ishvara worshippers enjoy more privileges than
Buddhists. There is a complex code which controls one’s status in life, and it is difficult to
overcome – a legacy of the Indian castes.

Large scale warfare is essentially unknown in Kapudesa – which is not to say that theirs is a
peaceful country. As with many frontiers, there is a certain sense of lawlessness in the
hinterlands. Those who lack a place in their society can find one often among illegal
communities in the high country. Accordingly, Kapudesa maintains an army, although in training
and quality it would be an embarrassment compared to an Indian or European army. Their navy
by contrast is extremely skilled and crewed by professional citizen-soldiers.

Pazudesada - Once known as the three cities, Kintradoni overcame an alliance of her former
federates in 1021 and shortly thereafter reorganized her state into a stronger, more unified
regime. Where Kapudesa had remained broadly disunited and polyglot, Kintradoni has not had
that luxury. Migrations of the Maa and Garre peoples pose a significant threat – forcing them to
import horses and mercenaries from Arabia. Accordingly, Kintradoni has maintained something
of a more martial character – allowing her southern sister to surpass her in matters of political
dominance is a small price to pay for survival.

Now however, at the dawn of the century the Maa and Garre and their allied clans are largely
scattered or forced to submit, broken by two major campaigns led personally by Parajian, Prince
of Kintradoni. Clever alliances with the growing “Shah” of the Mbisha and trade pacts with the
Ganda have allowed Kintradoni to have a far safer and stronger position than her rivals. So long
as she can maintain her position as a vital link the Eurasian trade system, Pazudesada may be
the stronger state.

The Shah of Pazudesada is himself an Iranian, descendant of a line of generals who kept the
state safe during the 1021 crisis. However, like his southern counterpart he worships Ishvara
and speaks the Kapudesigaru language – as do his nobles and bureaucrats. Like Kapudesa,
the Indian Sreni still have substantial political importance, and accordingly the Shah keeps a
major embassy in Bharukaccha.

Tangrasirabh – Tangrasirabh is very different from the other major Savahila states. While there
is a large foreign merchant community, it is a colony run by Izaoriakans, and accordingly for
most of the 11th century was governed by a council of Randryan nobles. Tantric Hinduism,
rather than the monotheistic bhakti cults, dominate, alongside a few communities of Arabian and
Iranian Buddhists. Tangrasirabh, like her counterparts, does two sorts of trade – caravans
navigating the often risky land routes into the interior and serves as a waystation for naval trade.
By what is now an ancient treaty, Tangrasirabh ensures that no Watyan ships pass the port of
Ramamida without paying a toll, and through that toll if nothing else they have become rich.

However, in 1019 the Sakalava monarchy on Izaoriaka was overthrown, and shortly thereafter
Tangrasirabh came under the dominion of an Antemoro governor whose rule was despotic and
theocratic at the best of times. For some fifteen years this condition persisted, until a man
named Hasan Khutay, a prominent Arab merchant who had spent much of his life in the city’s
military, rebelled against an attempt by the Antemoro governor to shut down a prominent
Buddhist university in the city. He and his followers went south to Ramamida, where they rallied
a large army to travel north and overthrow the Antemoro governor in 1034.
Henceforth, Tangrasirabh has been an independent polity, run by a “Mahasangha” or guild
council, where members of the Khutay family still enjoy outsized influence.

Other

Kw`adza – the Kw’adza are often considered an inland version of Kapudesa by their
contemporaries, and the reason for this is not hard to see. After the legendary Sah Jirata unified
the disparate Cushitic tribes in the middle of the tenth century, they established diplomatic
relations with Mzishima, including intermarriages between tribal leaders and major coastal
potentates. Sah Jirata himself converted to Ishvara-worshipping Hinduism, and encouraged his
subjects to worship the same god – in a single step abandoning the polytheistic ancestor-
worship of the Kw’adza.

Kw’adza community life is based around the small, crudely fortified agrarian village. These
villages typically contain a meeting hall which doubles as a temple to Ishvara (and also often the
ancestors) and a mustering field where the young men go in times of war or strife. They fight
much as they always have, with throwing spears, round wooden shields, and iron axes. Perhaps
because they generally outnumber any tribe migrating from deeper in the interior, and because
relations with Kapudesa are generally peaceable, there have been few innovations to the
Kw’adzan style of warfare. The King himself has a small force of retainers, heavily armored in
mail or scale, who fight ceremonial duels and the battles themselves are typically resolved by a
few frenzied charges. Due to the tsetse fly, horses are almost unknown to the Kw’adza.

The current king of Kw’adza is Sidam Busula, whose dynasty claims matrilineal relation to Sah
Jirata. He has no fixed capital, but rather tours the villages in a yearly cycle which coincides with
a small festival in each township that he visits.

Ganda – Ganda is relatively isolated from the broader world – the kingdom of the great lakes,
ruled by the Abakama Ndahura of the Burenzi clan. There are many hundreds of rough kinship
groups united by the great kingdom of Ganda, and though the foremost clan changes frequently
through internecine plots and sporadic bursts of warfare, the overall system remains as strong
as the stone cities which dot the shores of Lake Nyanza.

Gandan culture acknowledges these frequent changes in power structures. Older clans with
more historic claims to land receive special deference and are called banansagwa, or “those
found in the place.” These clans are also the most traditionally agriculturalist and the builders of
the largest and most permanent urban communities. By contrast, many of the newcomers are
pastoralists and seek to imitate the traditions and mannerisms of the older, more established
clans. The fact that Lake Nyanza’s banks are thickly forested has helped the Gandan
agricultural communities to survive and thrive – many of the northern and western newcomers
are forced to abandon their traditional patterns of settlement on arrival, leaving them vulnerable
to assimilation.
Ganda has some small contact with Makuria, but more commonly they encounter Arab
missionaries and merchants from Pazudesada or Mbisha caravans. These caravans have to
cross substantial mountain ranges, however, and rely on the good will of intermediaries such as
the Taita, Iraqw, and Sabaki tribes – all of which consider themselves allies and federates of the
Kapudesa and take pleasure in extracting “gifts” from Pazudesada expeditions. To their north
they are bordered by a people called the Kalenjin, who are a semi-pastoralist people who like
their southern cousins the Kw’adza have adopted agricultural techniques from the Savahila
coast. The Kalenjin are a proper, organized rival, and in a confederation with several other tribes
have fought a few wars with Ganda.

Tsaibwe – The High Round remains the primary seat of political power in Tsaibwe society, and
still lacks meaningful rivals. Utilizing heavy (by the standards of the region) cavalry to great
effect, the Tsaibwe have retained their dominion, crushing any migratory hunter-gatherer groups
who might otherwise have posed a threat.

A few notable sites exist outside of the horizon of the High Round’s dominion. The greatest of
these in Kangila-Chomo, sitting on a high plateau to the north of Tsaibwe and stubbornly
refusing to submit. Like the High Round it has substantial roughstone walls, sufficient to negate
the cavalry which traditionally dominate the region, and like the High Round it has impressive
granaries. Despite routine wars and sieges, Kangila-Chomo refuses to fall.

Tsaibwe is relatively unique among the indigenous societies of East Africa. Alone it represents
the substantial consolidation of political and economic power in the hands of a miniscule
percentage of the population. Compared to the relatively egalitarian Gandan and Cushitic
societies to its north, the cattle-kings of Tsaibwe hold vast amounts of property and wealth in the
form of cattle, stored grain, and precious metals without distributing them among their broader
kin-group.

Accordingly, this has left the vast majority of the population dependent on their lords for the
ability to maintain more than a lifestyle of marginal subsistence agriculture. It is no wonder then,
that the cities of Tsaibwe are far more monumental in their construction than the scattered
townships of Ganda or Kw’adza – they are built by what is effectively indentured labor,
contracted in exchange for an additional ration of food. Visitors to the High Round and the
Eagle’s Seat and other major seats of power describe the ruins of enormous palaces meant to
house comparatively tiny populations.

Watya - The sheer availability of precious metals and the lack of centralized state control over
its supply (as in West Africa) has depressed the global value of gold substantially. While at first
Watya’s production was only a trickle in the grand scheme of things, and much of that
production went straight to Izaoriaka, social upheaval in the home country has released huge
stockpiles of stored gold onto the markets, coupled with a growing Watyan population who are
massive exporters of precious metals and diamonds. Pazudesada and Kapudesa have both
struggled economically as Indian financiers are all too aware of gold’s comparative easy
availability.
Of course, Watya also exports many other luxury goods – bush tea, rare fruits and herbs. It is a
land of impossible wealth, a mysterious place across the sea where many travel to seek their
fortune. According to legend its land has healing properties and those who travel there live
incredibly long lives. More reasonably, this can be attributed to the easy availability of land and
the fact that even those who in their poverty are forced to pledge themselves to a local
Randryan upon arrival tend to have a far better diet and manner of living than they might have
been accustomed to in their homelands.

Politically, little has changed in Watya over the past half-century. New laws to protect the rights
of landholders have been passed, ensuring that frontier violence over “claims” (especially those
relating to precious metal finds) is brought to a minimum. However, there is the growing specter
of tension as Indian and Arab merchants have begun setting up shop in coastal cities along the
cape – and these merchants are stigmatized as outsiders in a society that traditionally has been
pretty clearly homogenous – they are often accused of bringing crime and immorality.

Commercial
Revolution

1104 has received much scholarly attention of late. The Ragnarssen Exchange was the
beginning of vast migrations of people, commodities, and technology across the oceans. Two
worlds, which had grown up essentially separate from each other, were brought into sudden and
abrupt coalition. Millions of people across the New World would die in the successive waves of
disease and societal collapse which followed. Whole nations and empires would rise and fall as
a direct result of contact. Millions would suffer and thousands would prosper beyond their
wildest dreams.

However, almost simultaneously, across Asia, human history was being changed in even more
significant ways – so much so that the discovery of the New World is considered by some
historians to be not a cause or a parallel but rather a symptom of the Sri Lankan Revolution.
Also known as the Indian Commercial Revolution, was the second cycle of “Revolutions” born
out of the Indian subcontinent, a direct successor to the post-Maukhani political revolutions.

The sreni guilds, reborn and revitalized in the aftermath of the Maukhani collapse, were crucial
to the Commercial Revolution’s development, but the Revolution would ultimately destroy the
very world that allowed it to be born – in time it would allow Indian commercial interests to
surpass the often constraining politics of the local guild and become truly global. The general
increase in global commerce and the rise of financial services such as banking, insurance, and
investing from the tenth century onwards gave rise to new economic models and theories, and
perhaps most importantly to an environment of truly global competition. Over the next few
centuries, substantial new markets for raw materials would be opened to the vast manufacturing
and luxury goods production centers of the Indo-Sino Sphere.
The discovery of the new world would spur a global movement of exploration and conquest in all
directions. A reliable trade route circumnavigating Africa was the last step to fully connect the
three great landmasses together in a single transcontinental economy, and once it was
established, nothing would ever be the same. After the eleventh century, revolutions in
shipbuilding and navigation would increase at a rapid pace, spurred on by newfound exigencies.

Inflation, brought on by the vast gold and precious stone deposits of the Cape and West Africa,
and eventually the silver of the new world, was crushing to agricultural guilds of India and the
landholding aristocracy of Europe. However the new availability of precious metals made
commerce easier – as did the use of widely available bank notes of credit and debit by
merchants. The vast wealth of financial sreni allowed them to finance even incredibly risky
prestige expeditions – including a series of failed attempts to cross the great eastern ocean.

As cities such as Srivijaya and Mahatittha became global centers of finance and exchange, the
stage was set for the eventual revolution of not just commerce but industry and ultimately labor.
Not without reason is the incorporation of the Kashyapani banking family often considered the
start of world history. Before that moment, the story of people and nations was primarily one of
separate regions, divided by the constraints of geography and the fundamental limits of
technology. After that moment, the whole world would never be the same.

Southeast Asia

Srivijaya – The city of prosperous victory has many rivals now – the days of her easy hegemony
over the petty Rajas of the islands are long since passed into memory. However, she has
remained pre-eminent by virtue of her position as the first of the great maritime empires. The
mercantile networks that dominate Southeast Asia belonged to Srivijaya before the rise of
upstart city-kingdoms like Temaseka across the straits.

Accordingly, Srivijayan merchants range across the wide world, and there is no port they cannot
be found at, no place where they do not have contacts. The wealth of empires funnels back to
Srivijaya, where Maharaja Sri Dharmasetu sits in the splendid Lion Palace. The loss of Malay
and Java have hurt them, but the city has turned to new avenues for wealth creation –
manufacturing and finance have allowed Srivijaya to survive the collapse of her overseas
colonial empire.

Isyana – the latest Javan rivals of the Srivijaya, the Isyana rule an inland state that nevertheless
has substantial connections to the global trade system. Their capital at Kadiri is the center of the
Javanese dye trade, and accordingly has garnered outsized influence for itself, becoming a
center of art and culture and the beating heart of the most populous empire in the Malay
Archipelago. Their on and off warfare with Srivijaya has abated of late, quite probably because
Srivijaya cannot afford the heavy cost of another failed expedition to take Kadiri.

The Isyana are known for their promotion of monasteries, and under their patronage Java has
become something of a center for Hindu-Buddhist scholarship. Massive and beautiful temples
and universities rise out of the forests and mountains of their island at every turn, much to the
wonder of those who visit Java from foreign lands.

Silendra – The Silendra are a family of exiles and rebels, but nevertheless have many strong
footholds on the lesser Sunda isles. There are several Silendra-run principalities scattered
across the islands, usually little more than trade posts for merchants seeking dye, spices, and
sandalwood. However, the Silendra have done much to spread both Javanese culture and their
own ancestral hatred of the Srivijaya across the islands they rule – which has helped Srivijaya’s
various rivals immensely in gaining valuable footholds in Maritime Southeast Asia.

Kataha – the “Golden City” on the Malay peninsula, Kataha is also known as the Seat of
Tranquility and the City of White Elephants. It’s prestige, however, is often said to outstrip truth
and reality. Certainly Kataha has prospered under the “Twelve Happy Sreni” – a coalition of
guilds which govern the city and permit no commerce outside of their authority. It has a wide
range of trade partners across the archipelago and is famous for launching exploratory missions
– including one which claims to have discovered a vast southern continent of endless sands and
strange beasts.

However, Kataha is also known for its military weakness, a fact which makes a poor fit with its
reputation for prosperity. The Dvaravati city of Phetchaburi sends periodic expeditions to
demand tribute from Kataha, and so far the famed “Golden City” has acquiesced without a fight.
In old days, it might have sought the protection of the immense Srivijayan fleet, but in striking
out on her own Kataha has opened herself up to both prosperity and threats it is quite possibly
unprepared for.

Temaseka – Temaseka is a notional ally of Srivijaya, but over the past century it has clawed its
way from federate and vassal to equal partner. Maintaining its own massive trade network
across the islands and beyond, Temseka also has a critical position on the straits which helps
merchants to subvert the Srivijayan tariff system and use it as an waystation in preference to the
heavy tolls they would experience across the strait. Temaseka is known for strictly regulating the
status of foreigners. Outside guilds are not permitted to do business except in a certain quarter
of the city, something which has given the city a distinct and mysterious reputation – despite the
fact that unaffiliated foreigners can easily access almost any portion of the city by purchasing a
simple ensign from the city guards.

Mahavisayas – The Mahavisayas archipelago lies at the very end of the world. Once a colony of
the Srivijaya, it is now an independent polity with its own hegemonic ambitions. A union of local
city-states beneath a single Raja, Mahavisayas culture borrows heavily from outside influences
and the broader Indosphere. Their architecture, art, and manner of dress is all directly taken
from the Srivijaya, especially among the noble classes, who are eager to set themselves above
the “village-dwellers” who they rule.

The Mahavisayas are linked into the broader Eurasian trade network only tentatively in 1104.
The Srivijayan merchants who established the trading post that would become Srikabu that
would become the kingdom of Mahavisyas were explorers, seeking to expand the horizons of
their world and thus gain a competitive advantage over rival families and guilds. However, there
was little that the Mahavisyas possessed that could not be found closer to home. Only with the
slow improvement of naval technology and the colonial expansion race prompted by Srivijaya’s
rivalries will the Mahavisyas truly become important.

The Christian North and Scandinavia

Gautaland – Like all the Kings of Gautaland, King Stenkil has come to office by way of election,
and when he dies his successor shall be picked in the same manner. Stenkil rules a not
insubstantial land, but it is the weakest of the Christian kingdoms of Scandinavia, and often
considered little more than a buffer between Sweden and Denmark. Adding insult to injury, the
island of Gotland and the major trading center of Visby both lie in the hands of the “Folkthing” –
a democratic assembly of landholding men that rejects both sides in the northern Votive Wars,
and so far worships the traditional gods.

Gautaland itself is only roughly Christianized. Those of high rank, the King and the Jarls and
their retainers, have been baptized but the religion has only slowly spread to the common
people. However, Christianity is slowly catching on. In certain trials and local debates, Christian
missionaries have won, and this more than anything else has contributed to a massive upsurge
in the “Frankish” faith’s popularity.

Norway – The Kingdom of Norway was less enthusiastic than her sister Denmark in persecuting
the Votive Wars. The reason for this is not spiritual. Indeed, Norway has become deeply
Christian in the past century, although their version of the faith has some curious practices –
notably they appoint their bishops and high church officials by way of town assemblies, much in
the same manner as they elect Kings from the Sigurdsson dynasty. There are many
monasteries and increasingly ornate churches constructed in the Frankish style across their
lands.

The current Prince and likely heir to the throne, Hrolf Haakonson, however, does not look
towards god or within his country’s borders. He lusts for adventure, and in 1100 has begun
discussing with his Jarls the possibility of state sponsored and equipped voyages to the land of
the Skraelings, the Great Country beyond the swan-road. Due to the (often exaggerated) tales
which have been filtering back to him from across the sea, he is eager to continue the
exploratory voyages, and hopefully battle a monster or two. In a world in which the Viking era is
coming rapidly to a close, and raiders have qualms about war with fellow Christians perhaps this
is the future of Norway – as sailors and warriors exploring the vast new world across the sea.

Denmark – Denmark is ruled from the royal capital of Jelling, but it is the cities of Rosklide and
Hethabir which are increasingly becoming the center of power in the country. Jelling itself has if
anything contracted, and the Kings frequently have debated moving their hall to somewhere
more central to the Kingdom’s affairs. The main thing which stands in their way is the power of
the assemblies of these cities. Long centuries of peace with the Franks has meant
unprecedented trading opportunities, and Denmark stood perfectly placed to profit both by trade
itself and by a series of tolls and inspection fees for ships passing through their straits.

However, while this trade enriched the capital, it enriched the cities more. Local Things have
substantial power in Denmark, perhaps more than the landholding nobility or the King himself. A
century past, Denmark was at the forefront of the Northern Votive War, but that country is now
unrecognizable to an outside observer. The pagan armies who ostensibly clashed over the
religious fate of the north no longer exist. Denmark is a Christian nation now, one where the
pagan rites of the past are quickly fading into memory. However it has also lost much of its
martial strength and adventurous spirit. The new Kings of Denmark use the Geats as a buffer.

Sweden – King Solmundr the Blue-Black had twelve children, and yet it was his nephew
Torbjorn who came to power after his death. Torbjorn was not a notable king, despite the high
hopes of those who acclaimed him so. However, he did create a series of runestones
commemorating the life of his father, hailing Skara as a great victory for the Swedes and a
triumph against the tide of the Frankish God. At that point, however, it was perhaps premature.
Skara itself was a bloody slaughter with no true victor. The war would wind down only over the
next two years, and countless more fields would be bloodied with Northman dead.

Now, a century later, Solmundr’s legacy truly becomes clear. Unlike Denmark and Norway,
Sweden is somewhat isolated from the world. The Northern Votive war brought it into the same
cultural sphere as Gardaveldi. Increasingly, the blend of Buddhism and Norse traditions that
dominated among the people of the thousand towns became popular in the motherland itself.
Odin died on an ash tree to achieve enlightenment. Buddhism was a shockingly good fit with
their ancient customs and traditions. What changed primarily was the notion of sacrifice, which
slowly evolved into a sort of ritual charity. Most importantly, however, Norse customs found the
resiliency to combat the growing tide of Christianity.

The Swedes are not truly Buddhist in any sense, but they have quite successfully connected
themselves to a larger eastern world by way of the Wheel-Realm. In doing so, they have
preserved their ancient traditions and found a sort of middle path between accepting any foreign
religion outright. Their kings do not dress in extravagant saffron robes and ramble about chariots
which pass without obstruction. Instead, they see themselves as the very heart of the ancient
past which their brother-kings have let slip away. Alone on this middle-earth, they keep the old
faith.

Angland – Describing the Anglo-Dansk kingdom at the dawn of a new century is perhaps not as
relevant as considering what it will become. The Anglo-Dansk have retained the martial,
adventuring spirit of past decades. The end of the Viking era is perhaps most accurately
described as the beginning of the Anglo-Dansk one. Combining Norse shipbuilding and
exploration with an excellent island position and a rapidly growing population, the Anglisch have
been some of the most enthusiastic explorers of West Africa and continually push the limits of
their feeble craft in attempts to find new and greater glories. The sleepy seaside towns of
Ispana, however, have the economic resources to mount a strong challenge, and if the Anglisch
had foresight they would see that soon new and greater challengers will rise.

For now, however, Angland is a loosely united Kingdom ruled from Winchester by a line of
Norse rulers. Apart from a brief succession crisis in 1040, and a bloody but brief border war with
Skotland in 1066, the Kingdom has been largely a stable entity. Part of the reason for this
stability is a profound decentralization. Local Jarls largely keep their own affairs, and those on
the Welsh or Skottish marches fight their own cattle raids without interference. The central
government has a somewhat limited role, existing primarily to mediate disputes and to handle
those matters which are in the common interest of “All the Lords and Assemblies of this Land.”

Skotland – Skotland was not truly a Kingdom at the dawn of the century. Sure, notionally it was
united, but the great warriors of the Isles felt little need to bow to a single King in Glasga, and
there were still independent kingdoms of Picts. The kings of Skotland in those first few decades
were numerous and universally warlike. Dynasties rose and fell in internecine intrigues and
vicious battles. The Jarl of Orkney played kingmaker while retaining a notion of his own
independence until 1052, when the latest Jarl, a clever but undeniably brutal young man named
Black Dagmar broke the cycle of chaos and anarchy by declaring himself King of Skotland
through a tenuous connection to an exiled princess and sailed down on Glasga and burnt it to
the ground.

In the aftermath of this strike he retreated, letting the other claimants come to him. But once
they had unified, he sewed dissent, offering, according to legend, that each of them might
prosper if only they were to betray the others. At a confused and chaotic naval battle off the
coast of Islay, the Skottish Jarls turned on each other and were annihilated.

Black Dagmar Haakonson now turned on the Pictish kingdoms and demanded their surrender,
assuring their kings that the entire royal family up to two degrees of separation would be flayed
alive if they did not submit. After the fall of Circinn, the King lived up to his promise and the
remaining Picts quickly surrendered and were sent to live in monasteries – Black Dagmar did
much to expand the Christian Church in Skotland, and gave generously to it.

West Africa

Tauregs – Where there are caravans crisscrossing the wide deserts of their homeland, the
Tauregs are there. The introduction of the camel several centuries earlier has made their jobs
easier, and even with the rise of maritime trade lanes facilitated by the Andilanders (Canary
Island Norse) trans-Saharan land trade still is a valuable and indeed crucial part of the West
African economy.

Accordingly, the Tauregs have something of a mixed reputation among their fellows.
Traditionally they are somewhat few, living on marginal land where the climate does not favor
substantial agriculture. However, they are also disproportionately wealthy and powerful, and the
vastness of the desert and their importance to the trade networks of the region keeps that
wealth safe. But the Tauregs are also outsiders – their distinctive blue veils and unique,
“mysterious” customs keep them from ever being fully integrated into the societies they trade
with.

Christianity, especially Christianity mixed with Berber polytheism, is well-known to the Tauregs,
as they work with many Mauri merchants. However, even among the moderate percentage of
Tauregs that have adopted Christianity, outwardly they are much more inclined to identify as
members of a tribal group than by religious identification. Uniquely within the time period faith
for the Tauregs is a more personal matter, and accordingly for a population of travelers they
have produced remarkably few missionaries. The cult of the Supreme Being also has some
devotees, but these are few and far between, given the religion's relatively explicit Mande
cultural context.

Ghana – The streets of Ghana are not, as they are in legend, lined with shimmering gold.
Indeed, the gold of Ghana is mostly hidden. Her kings have always been notoriously stingy with
their vast wealth, and this has proven to be an excellent strategy now that the gold and salt
mines are lost to her and political power is shifting south to Niani.

The population of Ghana is perhaps half of what it was in her peak, and the foreign quarter is
reduced to a few groups of less successful Tauregs and some lingering Mauri mendicants who
seek to preach their faith to the King. They whisper that if only the King accepts the true God he
will be rewarded as the men of Kanem have been rewarded for their rightly guided faith. Ghana
could become great again, they say, if only he would be willing to take up the sword of the
Votive warrior.

This is not true, however. Ghana’s days of glory are long behind her.

Djenne – recently, Djenne has grown vast as Ghana has sunk into irrelevancy. Now, Djenne sits
at the head of a steadily growing empire which has incorporated much of the river’s length into
itself. Indeed, even Gao, its onetime ally, has fallen into its orbit. With Ghana cast into the
dustbin of history as the sands advance, Djenne along the river rises to claim its place as first of
cities in the Sahel.

The Djenne religion is at least notionally the new paganism of the Mande peoples, the cult of the
Supreme Being which holds so much sway among the urban elites and so little sway outside of
that small niche. The Supreme Being cult provides a strong justification for the practice of divine
Kingship. Just as God rules above with his host of divine servants, the lesser gods, so too does
the king rule, and his host of servants answer his will without question.

Niani – The city state of Niani has grown into a sizable empire in its own right, owing to the
unification of many Bambara tribes around a single great king, or Mansa. Ruling the southern
half of the Mande world, Niani is a fierce rival of Djenne, but the two states have much in
common. Both economically depend on the gold and salt trade. Both worship Ngala-Nyama, the
Supreme Being, in his manifold forms, as taught by the great Poet-Historian Nakhato.
However, Niani is closer to the sources of wealth, and in recent years they have been seeking a
path to undercut the Djenne Empire’s overland trade by turning west. The city of Takrur, one of
the largest ports on the coast of Africa, is their path to this. The Fula kingdom there does trade
with the Andilanders, and increasingly the Niani think that this maritime route might in one fell
swoop cut the Djenne and their Taureg allies out of the equation as middlemen.

However, there is a careful balance to be struck. If trade declines too precipitously, the Niani
know that the Djenne will turn on them, seeking to seize the productive land of the south for
themselves. So their goal has been to slowly starve their northern rivals, subsidizing merchants
to bring smaller and smaller quantities of precious trade goods north each year, while pleading
ignorance as they build the “salt road” across the continent to Takrur.

Kanem – roughly a century and a half after their glorious “Votive” victories, the Kanem rule an
impressive land empire, and one which is religiously unified to a remarkable degree. As an
important stop on West African trade lanes with the Ukwu Empire to the south and the Mande
kingdoms to the west, whosoever controls Kanem cannot help but prosper.

Kanem is still a theocracy ruled by the Kay and the Dalai “Students” but it has moderated
significantly. Without the zeal of new converts, their religious activities have become subdued –
they are now content to send embassies across the continent to preach the good news, but
these embassies are generally laughed out of court. So instead Kanem has turned inwards.
Beautiful copies of the Bible, written in the Kay language, and enormous churches of clay and
roughstone are the legacy of their rule. The artisans who once crafted idols now craft
iconography of Christ and the Saints.

East Africa

Gidaya – the story of Gidaya is that of a vacuum that was never filled. The collapse of the
Hawiya Empire left Egypt to briefly fill its shoes, but with the fall of Egypt at the beginning of the
eleventh century, there has been no local hegemon to enforce order. The Kingdom of Gidaya is
a weak, coastal state ruled by the descendants of Hawiya – whose pluralistic monarchy is now
nothing more than a distant memory.

The Gidayan state is a Christian one, and time, neglect, and distrust have combined to
annihilate the great Jain and Buddhist universities of the North African coast. Whole libraries
have been lost to the desert as changes in the climate have substantially diminished the whole
region and its former position as a major producer of incense. Now Gidaya’s hinterland is a
country of traveling mendicants, subsistence pastoralists, and bandits. The city itself endures as
an entrepot, but in that capacity it has been surpassed by other more ideally located seats such
as Adulis and Aden.

Axum – The Giramid Kingdom fell to the nomadic pagan and Jewish warlords of the Zanafij tribe
in 1024, and after that defeat the ephemeral glories of the Giramid Negus of Shoa have never
been restored. Axum now is curious and divided country. Jewish warlord-states sustain
themselves on highland pastoralism, and fortified monastery-communities which dot the
mountains and hillsides of the region are the major seats of political power. They maintain the
history and traditions of Axum in spite of centuries of constant degradation, and maintain the
dream of a united Axum once again ruled by a descendant of holy King Solomon.

Adulis – The ruler of Adulis, Cawil Elmidua, is a devout and pious man, and the city he rules is a
garden akin to heaven in the great emptiness of the red desert. Intricate irrigation works, a
legacy of Hawiya architects maintained by careful stewardship has allowed the city to remain
green, with opulent hanging gardens considered to be true wonder of the world. A nominal
vassal of Makuria, Adulis is mostly responsible for its own defense and affairs, and to this
purpose has built high walls and a series of border forts to guard against the Zanafij.

Makuria – The greatest of the Monophysite kingdoms, Makuria has blossomed with the
destruction of Egypt. Many of the greatest thinkers and intellectual works of Alexandria have
been transplanted to the south, to Tungul, which is often called the “new Alexandria” and is the
seat of the Patriarchate-in-exile.

The current King, Abraham II, has recently presided over a disastrous invasion of Egypt, an
event which shall surely define his entire reign. Rumors at court imply that he will step down
from the throne in favor of his son Zacharias, who though young and energetic is widely
considered to be a rude and arrogant boy. His father however is either unaware or unconcerned
with these defects, and in the several-year waiting period before he can truly retreat into
monastic seclusion, he has done little to prepare the state or to repair its army.

However, Makuria is not a weak state. Ambitious generals have pushed back the warlords of the
south and secured the Daju borders. The bureaucracy, modeled off of the old Egyptian system,
is an efficient and well-oiled machine. The monarch’s dispassionate lethargy has not been so
crippling as it might have been in another power. The simply calculus of Makurian politics have
not meaningfully changed either. To become more than it currently is, to aspire to any greatness
beyond the Upper Nile, it must necessarily conquer Egypt. However the Khardi, despite their
general mismanagement of the province are excellent warriors – the weakness of Makuria’s
armies was starkly revealed to them at the Cataracts. The Makurian army had been prepared to
fight its southern foes, disorganized horse raiders and brigands. Against a heavy charge of
cavalry sheeted in mail and barding, their forces were found particularly wanting. Despite
Makurian skill in archery and experience facing down the lightly armored Khardi soldiery, their
forces broke long before the impact of Khardi barge-pole lances, and their center was thrown
into total disarray.

If they can overcome this deficiency, or if the Khardi collapse and lose access to heavy Ifthal
horse, the Makurian army might sail down the Nile and rule its whole length from Tungul or
Alexandria. And then, when Alexandria is theirs and trade flows freely once more, what then?
Jerusalem is not so far, and the holiest of cities, the axis mundi, might be theirs.
 Vignette: The
Grandee and the Leviathans

Nfansou found himself often having to suppress his credulity whenever he saw the wooden
ships at dock. Many others were still ashore, great husks like the bodies of beached whales
decaying in reverse. Skeletal planks of wood were layered upon each other, coated in tar and
pitch until they glistened black in the hot savanna sun.

The timber was brought on huge barges, and the trunks were fatter than the legs of elephants,
hoary old trees from the south and the interior, where the empty salt sea was a barrier not an
opportunity. His people were the ones blessed by the Supreme God, the ones who would take
to the seas and conquer them as the pale-skinned northerners had.

His own people labored under the instruction of these northmen, while he, their nominal
supervisor and supposed master of the navy, languished beneath the spreading boughs of a
nearby tree, drinking Mauri wine. He understood nothing of the sea, of the wide salt emptiness
that was beyond the white beaches of this country. He was a grandee, and like nobility the world
over he lived for the saddle, for the rush of wind, and he worshipped a shimmering golden horse
with diamond eyes at the altar of the spirits.

These boats however, they were a different sort of thing. The Fulbe had no tales of the ocean,
no legends worth recounting, but the peoples who dwelled along the water, who cast nets and
dove for shellfish had their own tales of monsters in the outer dark, of vermiculate and muscular
leviathans with fat and toothy maws. And beyond the desert the Kay and the Frangis told stories
of Nowa, he of the Ark who sailed the oceans for forty days to conquer a new land for his sons,
or perhaps to escape some famine or plague. The details of false legends never concerned him.

For this reason, Nfansou, cousin of the king, gave little thought to the fanatic merchants with
their starry eyes and their promises of the world beyond. He gave more stock to the words of
the Northmen, who said that the afterlife was not so different from this world. That he could see.
That he could understand. And if the self-proclaimed prophet of the Tauregs brought the men of
the indigo veils down upon the Fula they would fight hard. Were they not a people born to holy
struggle? Had their ancestors not brought low the fast horsemen of Ghana? Had Diawallo not
broken a demon upon a potter’s wheel? They kept patience through suffering, kept dignity and
resolve, and now the gods conspired to reward them.

The people of the north were barbarians in so many ways. They lacked dignity and restraint.
Their curiosity was idle and they were at once childlike and akin to slaves. They were tillers of
the soil in the main, and kept no cattle. What gold they were given they spent on whores and
booze and trinkets. But to them the ocean was life and wealth. And if the King told Nfansou to
learn their secrets, then Nfansou would sit in the shade and watch, his Jola attendants and
interpreters close at hand.
The northmen would come to him from time to time and they would speak. They would tell him
of the laborers’ progress and haltingly explain sailing to the inland princeling who was their
patron and their master. The order of the world would soon be restored. Nfansou would cross
the ocean and find the lands of gold that lay beyond it. With iron and horse he would break the
peoples he found there, and then he too might be a king.

Across the waves, gulls were crying. Nfansou took a sip of the wine.

Today was a good day. Tomorrow would be still better.

The End of the

Beginning

As the first Andilander Norse take tentative steps across the Atlantic and the exchange between
New and Old Worlds begins, I’d like to go back in time six hundred years for the sake of context.

For all the shock of the initial Hephthalite invasion, for all the ramifications of the death of Shah
Kavad, the sack of Ctesiphon, the mass movement of eastern steppe peoples into Syria and
Mesopotamia, looking back it is sometimes difficult to understand how that led to the discovery
of the New World in 1104 by Bjorn Solva[1], an Andilander of Anglish ancestry.

What if the Hepthalites, or Eftal, as they became known, had simply gone East? One might
argue indeed, that the wealthy Indo-Gangetic plain was the logical direction for any ambitious
conqueror. India was a far richer prize, valuable beyond reckoning. But the Hepthalites became
entangled in the politics of the Near East, and became especially tied to the Sasanian Empire’s
policies in many regards. They found themselves persecuting Christians and warring with
Rome, and with those twin steps they set in motion events which would be the final nail in the
coffin for the classical world.

Meanwhile, the Gupta and their Maukhani successors were allowed to build a peaceful and
prosperous universal empire which laid the ground work for scientific and social revolution over
the next six centuries. The Hepthalites contented themselves with a lesser prize, although they
could not have known what other glories were possible. They did not follow in the footsteps of
the Saka and Kushan, though that precedent was long set. Instead they turned their destructive
impulses against the Roman Empire. The legacy of the classical world, accordingly, would be
limited to the Western Mediterranean.

The imported culture of the Hephthalites was Indo-Iranian, and that culture would endure and
dominate the Middle East, filtering through Arabia and Mesopotamia, through Kurdistan and
Armenia and ultimately Turkistan. Where in another world Arabic might have come to
predominate, here the closest thing to hegemonic culture was the uniquely blended heritage of
so many Central Asian peoples.
The Hephthalites might have wreaked unspeakable devastation on India. They might not have
closed the floodgates that allowed so many warlike peoples into the subcontinent, by diverting
the martial strength of the Iranian world directly westward. Their conquering Shahs might have
been known for sacking Buddhist stupas and universities, rather than destroying Christian
churches and monasteries.

Within this timeline, less charitable scholars of later centuries, seeking to rebut an established
scholarly trend based on the writings of the Khardi, would say that the Eftal made a garden into
a desert and called it a golden age. While the climatic degradation of the Near East cannot be
attributed to the Eftal, in an intellectual sense that is certainly true. The Eftal golden age was
based on received knowledge from India and Iran – it involved few original discoveries, and in
that period much of Greek learning was lost across the Middle East, only to be discovered
much, much later by researchers seeking lost vaults of knowledge. The Kurds followed in their
footsteps, annihilating much of what the Copts had preserved, and taking the rest back to Susa
where it would be lost following the collapse of their regime. By contrast, Indian learning had an
unbroken source of received knowledge going back to ancient times, a foundation if nothing
else kept safe in monasteries and generally preserved by successive monarchs and republics.
Even Europe, where the collapse of Rome was certainly disruptive to the social fabric of the
time, managed to preserve far, far more.

In another world, however, Europe might have benefitted more from the learning preserved in
the Near East and in a longer lived Eastern Roman Empire. Classical learning might have not
taken such heavy body-blows, and been far more disseminated. So many times throughout its
history, European civilization had to reinvent the wheel, so to speak.

It is difficult to speak in such broad brushstrokes. Plenty of Indian learning was lost through
history, and plenty of Greek knowledge preserved. China, for its part, maintained an
independent and unbroken tradition of philosophy and science. The world, generally speaking,
moved forwards, although it did so haltingly and unevenly. West Africa spent most of the time
period we have examined broadly isolated from the larger world, and accordingly its culture was
alien to Eurasia – although it will not be for long.

A new era is on the horizon, one utterly different from anything that came before. Global history
has been leading to this moment, the dawn of the Ragnarssen exchange and the great Contact
which would profoundly alter human civilization. The genie of revolution was out of the bottle as
well – the old certainties that had defined the Indian subcontinent up until the Maukhani were
gone, and the systems that replaced them were universally more ephemeral. This new era will
be one of interconnectedness, of trade and finance, of mass movements and social revolution,
of bloodthirsty conquest and the horrors of increasingly modern and global warfare, of
unprecedented prosperity and technological advancement for all.

That is what begins in the year 1104. From Bjorn Solva’s boot-print on white island sands
radiate out infinite possibilities. His path, whether inevitable or not, will define the coming
centuries.
Author's Note

I can’t think of a proper end to this part of the story. It’s been running for over a year, and I’ve
poured a lot of time and thought into it. Of course, it won’t end. Not truly. There are guest posts
yet to finish, and for my part I plan to take the story onwards into the future for quite some time
still.

However, as most of you well know by now, that will be done in a different thread. The story has
evolved and changed; the story will continue to evolve and change. I hope everyone who’s
slogged their way through the hundreds of thousands of words of print that this alternate history
produced has enjoyed their time, and I sincerely hope you’ll all continue to read going forwards.

Stay tuned for the New World of the White Huns.

[1] Unlike Christopher Columbus, Bjorn Solva is actually rather less known in this timeline. The
poor guy was the first to discover the New World in 1104, but that credit goes to the brothers
Ragnarssen in 988, who found OTL's Newfoundland and profited immensely from telling tales of
their adventures amongst the Skraelings. As such there's no Solvian exchange, and while 1104
is marked as the discovery of the New World proper, Solva plays second fiddle in the history
books. Poor bastard.

The vignette, though it may be obvious, does not focus on Solva but a less successful
contemporary.
[languages circa 1104]

[this next passage is ~maybe noncanon~ but whatever it’s more religious stuff and that’s always
cool]
By the era of the Liang dynasty, Chinese Buddhism could be said to be distinct from the
accumulated Indian and Tocharian texts it had received from outside missionaries. The
indigenous religions and philosophies of China caused Chinese Buddhism to turn outwards,
seeking to better understand the nature of reality and thus design governments in tune with that
reality. While this philosophy had its origins in the Qi dynasty, it was under the decadent
aesthete Emperors of the later Yaol dynasty that it truly enjoyed prominence. The Kitai rulers,
unlike their often philistine Uighur counterparts, were deeply concerned with matters of form and
function, with the broader applicability of Buddhist enlightenment to rulership and justice. This
became known as the Exoteric school, and ultimately it leaned towards a form of realism in its
philosophy, holding that there was a true and ideal form for all things in existence, and that the
state might be used as a tool to achieve that universal state of perfection which would bring
about the enlightenment of all sentient beings. It goes without saying that neither the Yaol nor
their contemporaries in the South ever achieved this goal.

It was contrasted by the equally popular Esoteric school, which enjoyed the support of many
monasteries – especially after the arrival of the Uighur Empire, which pushed many of the
overtly political Esoteric schools into hiding. The Esoterics focused on hidden mysteries,
recitations, and meditative orthopraxy. Ultimately, they would align themselves with the Chan
school in opposition to the courtly refinement of the Exoterics, preferring to seek personal
enlightenment over political. The Esoterics were deeply anti-realist, and believed that truth itself
was an illusion, and that the transitory nature of all things imperiled any attempt to build a truly
harmonious state. Retreat, both spiritual and physical, was the proper response to the chaos of
the world. “Form,” they preached “does not differ from the void, nor void from the form. All
phenomenon is a bubble in a fevered dream without precedent.”

Similar teachings could be found among Chan practitioners, but the Chan were concerned not
so much with retreat but with the spark of sudden inspiration, and stood in opposition to both the
Exoterics and another school called the “Flowering Coalescence” which ultimately merged with
the Esoterics. Across China these various schools competed for the favor of local potentates
and held impressive scholarly debates.

India and the broader Indosphere only complicated the notion of a single Buddhist faith further.
They had their own numerous schools, most notably the Pramanavada, or “School of Inference”
popularized during the Maukhani era. Based on using observations to achieve rational
conclusions, the ideas of the Pramanavada would eventually find application in science and
technological research, developed in parallel often by members of universities which taught the
Pramanavada school. However, in Gandhara, the Pajcanada, and Sindh,the primary schools of
thought, though often regional and particularistic, were similar to that of the Vajrayana. Tantric
Buddhist techniques were used alongside religious iconography that would not have seemed
alien to anyone in the subcontinent.

Through these schools, including Vajrayana, Indian Buddhism survived in a mass form. More
limited schools under the Theravada umbrella endured in Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, and
elsewhere on the periphery, but their mass appeal was understandably limited – the agnostic
view towards popular deity-worship often proved harmful, as did their general preaching of a
narrow path towards enlightenment.

In popular consciousness, Buddhist ideas also penetrated Hinduism deeply. Particularly on the
Malay Archipelago, Buddhism and Hinduism were virtually indecipherable from one another –
while some schools kept separate from the whirlwind of theological and metaphysical questions
in Hindu philosophy, others would come to embrace it. For many folk believers however,
Buddha was an avatar of the Supreme God, or Visnu, or perhaps a god in his own right. This
belief was encouraged by those outside of the Buddhist priesthood, including many local rulers,
leading to the “thirty-three hundred sorts of Buddhas” a joke telling of the multiplicity of ways in
which the Buddha was understood or worshipped village to village, particularly in rural regions.

Western Buddhism, descended from the “Sogdian School,” built its beliefs on a fundamentally
different basis. The Indo-Iranian context of the Hephthalites disseminated a relatively orthodox
version of the Sravakayana Buddhist teachings. That it might have been augmented by a
blended pantheon of Indian and Iranian deities was simply a facet of Hephthalite paganism, and
the pagan beliefs of the Iranian Eftal existed in parallel with Buddhist philosophy, being
strengthened and reinforced by each other, and giving a resilience to Eftal paganism that many
of its contemporaries lacked.

However, Iranian culture was deep and ancient, and would come to have a profound impact on
Western Buddhism. After the rise of the Mahadevists, Zoroastrianism largely imploded on itself.
The failure of all their apocalyptic prophesies and the continued foreign dominance of Iran led to
a crisis of confidence. Mahadevism in many senses was the last nationalistic gasp of the
Sasanian culture – after it faded, it was replaced, broadly speaking by a more universal culture,
for whom the definition of Iran was far larger.

Between the Eftal Golden Age and the new rise of Western Buddhism on a mass scale, Iranian
Buddhism was built on a very different, distinctly Iranian philosophical basis, incorporating both
dualistic and pagan traditions that were difficult to reconcile with Buddhism as it was known in
the East, and would have been utterly alien to many Buddhists. While the Sravakayana
monasteries endured around the Caspian and in Transuralic Asia (among the Sahu and Xasar
particularly), the Buddhist-Paganism of the typical lay devotee and aristocrat had substantial
differences. In particular, this Buddhism was perhaps less “philosophical” and more
metaphysical. It was as concerned with ritual and divine blessing as it was with enlightenment,
and in time it would open the door for a limited form of divine salvation not so different from the
concept of the “Pure Land” in China.

Iranian Buddhism developed a vast pantheon of indigenous Bodhisattvas and Arhats, as well as
divine figures such as Mihir who while never supreme gods were nevertheless guardians of the
greater Buddhist community and who were possessed of impressive powers over the natural
world, generally stemming from their greater understanding of the inherent Truth of reality.
Indeed, the dualistic battle between Truth and Lie, Good and Evil, was something that western,
particularly Iranian, Buddhism was never able to defeat. While traditionally pagan groups such
as the Ifthal and Khardi found little to sway them in such rhetoric, the existence of the fanatically
“orthodox” and iconoclastic Nowbahar sect speaks to the influence of Persia on Iranian
Buddhism. Perhaps because of their on-and-off wars with Christian powers, the Xasar
Buddhism, despite worshipping many gods and coming from a pagan source, has much of the
same militancy.

However, it is also difficult to characterize all Western Buddhism. Leaving aside the strange
Norse-Buddhist syncretism of the Gardaveldi, the Rus, Arabs, and East Africans all have their
own distinctive traditions. East African Buddhism is a diverse phenomenon, but most commonly
resembles the Vajrayana or Theravada schools, is commonly passed on among certain
merchant families, and accordingly has remained distinct from most theistic influences, perhaps
because of the massive Bhakti presence in East Africa. Meanwhile, Arabian Buddhism is itself a
strange phenomenon, which is at once very philosophically similar to the original practices of
the Sri Lankan missionaries who spread the faith there (perhaps in response to Saihism) and
yet has many of its own distinct cultural traditions, such as strict iconoclasm.

Despite descending from Iranian Buddhism, Buddhist practice among the Ruschi has wholly
embraced the experiential journey of the inspired forest teacher. They have few monasteries,
and generally believe that liberation is a personal, individual journey to be sought with the help
of said teacher. While monks certainly maintain certain schools and holy sites, the itinerant
monk is a distinctive feature of Ruschi Buddhism.

[and now the train is back on the tracks]

1 How is the state of astronomy in regions like India or Europe? Does geocentrism (still)
dominate in the latter, and what are the common-held beliefs on the earth's size-shape?
2 And speaking of the sciences, what about philosophy? Many of the religions described so far
hint at interesting forms of metaphysics. Compared to OTL, where would we find the most
divergence/eccentricities in ethics, philosophies of mind, etc.?
3 I know that this might be deemed to divergent, but do any of this world's ideologies resemble
socialism? This is perhaps a loaded question. I'm just curious whether you are of the opinion
that the socialist movement is an outgrowth of a larger movement in human thought against
state and property, or whether it is a fluke of 19th century economics. Or maybe you take a third
option, I'm just curious.
4 I was going to ask how the Andilanders are doing, but they seem pivotal to the next thread, so
I'll let you keep the surprise
5 How is technology/science in general doing? Of course, there is no such thing as
'technology/science in general', but general trends would be interesting to know. In fact, I would
urge you to go full-divergent, as too many timeline eschew this approach for something more
convergent, leaving this salient source of AH alone. If you need any inspiration in this regard, I
would refer you to the timelines by Tony Jones, specifically his Cliveless World and Mughal
World (Gurkani Alam).
6 Now, as far as I know, this timeline has let two regions of the world go unmentioned: The
Americas (for sequel-timeline reasons) and Oceania. Sure, the latter might not have seen too
much divergence, but the pacific island cultures are the central factor in an early pacific-New
World approach, and so could be an interesting area to explore. An early settlement of New
Zealand (or even Australia) by the Maori could certainly prove vital in this regard. Then again, to
turn that part of TTL into a Lands of Red and Gold-lite would require an earlier PoD...
7 Do you think this AH overall has a central 'mood' to it, and if so, how would you describe it?
Utopian, dystopian, humanistic, these terms come to mind.
8 What are/were your main sources in compiling this Alternate History? And what is your writing
process in general like?
9 Ooh, again, I won't try to make you spoil anything, but this subject is sure to come up in the
sequel TL: Plagues! Will epidemics be covered more as the world urbanises (and perhaps
industrialises)? I'm sure they won't occur in the same timeframes as OTL, but I don't think they
can be discounted entirely. Especially when it comes to contact with the New World or Oceania.
10 Lastly, as White-Hun-world moves on, is there any chance of another split in the Abrahamic
faiths, akin to Islam? Or is the most we can expect a reformation-type event, where a religion
schisms while not considering either strand 'heathen' or 'pagan', but merely misguided and
heretical? Of course, you could come up with something that is more ambiguously a heresy or a
separate religion entirely, and end up with something like Mormonism. It's your TL!

I hope you will not feel burdened by my questions, and feel free to disregard any of them I
believe I still owe you a discussion on TTL's historiography, but feel free to PM me for anything
from philosophy to science to the eventual Space Race of the White Huns TL we are all dying to
read (I know I am)...

Ah, I just saw this as I posted. You've given me a lot of food for thought, and here are the best
answers I can give. For now:

1. Roughly as OTL. The first heliocentric model is still to come, but will likely come from Asia
rather than Europe. Some other comments I want to make on this will be spoilers, but rest
assured some people will be making some pretty dodgy calculations about size and shape of
the earth soon enough.

2. I gave you a bit of philosophy. Stay tuned for more! In short, there are going to be some really
weird philosophies coming into fruition in this world. The biggest divergences obviously are
taking place in the Near East and Africa. The former is deeply inspired by Buddhism rather than
Abraham faith, and I think Africa shows a lot of interesting potential in the absence of Islam and
the slave trade alike. India naturally has a lot of OTL philosophies to draw on, and I'm hoping to
shuffle the deck a bit in terms of which ones become popular. I have this notion of maybe
making deterministic atheism a big part of the Indian worldview in coming centuries but that's
not a spoiler because I'm not sure where I want to go with that yet.

3. The closest thing to leftism we have is peasant revolts against the "corporate" guild structure
in India. Generally I believe that the ideologies of a given timeline will emerge in response to the
conditions of that timeline. In a world with capitalism and (substantial) wealth inequality you're
likely to see ideologies that attempt to address that. You will see such ideologies down the line
in this timeline as well - although there are often more pressing issues for the average thinker in
1104.

5. Early gunpowder will totally throw off the evolution of medieval warfare as we know it. In
some senses it already is. Navigational technology is going to race ahead as necessity spurs
innovation - and is already ahead of OTL. Agriculturally India's made some pretty substantial
advances that are now filtered out to much of the Indosphere and beyond. Generally the rule is
that technology is advancing quicker everywhere, even places that seem like they're lagging
behind in this timeline - a la Europe. I will mention though that European tactics are rather
stagnated compared to OTL - the Franks just haven't fought as many wars and still use a lot of
massed shield walls.

I've tried to mention various early inventions throughout this timeline when they happen. The
compass is a big one. The printing press (Thanks Gandhara) is an even bigger one, although
it's nowhere near as good as Gutenberg's OTL one. Mostly just used to stamp official
declarations in text and for mass producing religious tracts. Soon we'll be seeing a lot of
revolutions in mechanic technology overall in India, and we've already seen something of a
global hydraulics revolution. I know that my broad focus on politics has hidden some of this, but
I hope it's filtering through. Movable type, rapidly improving metallurgy - this world is going to be
really advanced by 2000 if they don't all blow it up first.

6. I'm not even going to try to imitate Jared in that regard... but the Polynesian cultures will play
a role down the line. As will Australia itself. What that role is will be deeply influenced by
colonialism at a much earlier point than OTL, so expect a lot of really big changes.

7. You'd be better off asking the audience. I'm too involved in it, I think. I think it's optimistic in its
vision of Indian technological progress for the sake of making a point about what might have
been if successive waves of invaders hadn't kept smashing India's most populous regions for
fun and profit.

8. I've checked out a lot of library books over the day, a few histories on India, one on China,
and I have a bunch of (likely dated) books on Medieval Europe and the Crusades. UNESCO's
sources on Africa and Central Asia have also been invaluable, as have Ian Mjaldov's maps and
writings on Byzantium. Fortunately, since my scope has been broad, my options for books have
been as well. I'm sorry, but I honestly forget a lot of these names as soon as I return the books.
It's embarrassing too because I don't remember which book gave me the idea for the Indian
guild republican revolution anymore. That one really stings, since I'd love to give that guy more
credit.

9. We did already have one massive plague, the Egyptian Plague, a worse version of the
Plague of Justinian. Other minor epidemics have happened in this timeline. Broadly speaking I
haven't touched on them much, although there are some references... I think? If not my bad.
Yes there will be massive plagues coming up soon. We should all live in fear of the "Flowering
Flesh."

10. Don't forget about the Tinanian heresy, which is my more successful Catharism (sort of) and
some of the weirder African versions of Monophysitism.
 oh man looks like it’s time for the

N E W
N EW
W O R L D
W O R LD
Prelude to the Flowering

When Roland of Rennes laid eyes upon the sprawling city of Colhuancan in 1213, he witnessed
the climax of a mortally wounded civilization, gripped by the heady rush of collapse. When he
returned in 1217, the antique city of pyramids and gardens was no more, overthrown by a tribe
of the Nahua who called themselves the Mexica.
Vast and apocalyptic migrations of peoples, most notably the Nahua and Chichimecas, had
begun several decades before, mixed with plagues which would seemingly strike and level
whole nations. Scattered bands of European adventurers brought with them warfare and
disease. In the south, the armies of Mansa Nfansou (Fanceau to his European rivals and
federates) were carving out a nation from the backs of their swift horses, gathering allies and
enemies in equal measure and turning the valley peoples to war.

Meanwhile, the people of Colhuacan and their settled counterparts, who were in the eyes of
Nahua and European alike the “civilized ones” or “artisans” were building every greater works of
art and culture, ever more intricate pieces of golden finery which were every bit as ephemeral as
their civilization and painted art that would not long survive the plunder of migrating peoples.
The past century had been one of environmental shifts that in another world might have simply
been devastating. However, combined with Old World plagues and the arrival of adventuring
conquerors, there was simply no chance.

Like Tula, a city which had once held a hundred thousand souls and was now little more than
overthrown ruin, Colhuacan in time would succumb as well. A year later, the Emperor Nfansou
and his Fula cavalrymen would ride into the Valley of Mexico triumphant. They would record
their victories on stele in the varied tongues of the region and founded the city of Kafibaka on
the backs of their supposed native allies. The Mexica would prostrate themselves in rows before
the triumphant Mansa, who demanded the traditional submission of his Fula culture from the
conquered tribes.

Later, Europeans and their Nahua subjects would pick through the stony rubbish of these cities
and more. They would marvel for what was lost, but they would not understand. The Nahua kept
records, but these were shrouded in myth. They spoke of the people who came before them as
Tolteca, but little truth could be discerned from their reports – to them time was cyclical,
governed by patterns that only the wise could see. The fall of the Tolteca was every bit as
inevitable as the fall of the Franks and Fula.

In time, the Mexica claimed, a new round of disease and famine would purge the haughty
nations across the sea.

They had no idea how right they were.

The New World and the Old

The Frankish Empire needed an outlet, and the New World was the perfect answer.
Agriculturally, the Old World European populations were overburdened. They suffered from a
surfeit of nobles in a world where Eastern conquests were becoming increasingly unpalatable.
The 1128 conversion of the Polish King to Christianity marked the end of the Votive era in
Europe, and the beginning of the end of German migration. Stealing land from coreligionists
was hard to justify and far less palatable to the average migrant.
By and large, the Franks had come to terms with the state of affairs in the East. Xasar country
was an armed camp, whose great fortresses had marked the end of more than one ambitious
Marcher Lord with fanatic zeal and too few forces to make a difference. For the Germans, Slavic
country was increasingly off limits, and quite simply there was nowhere to go.

Was it any wonder that so many chose to flee the swollen cities of Europe or forfeit their royal
stipends to seek adventure in the new world? For the nobility, the cloistered misery of the
monastic life was nothing compared to the opportunity to take up Votive arms for Christ in a new
land. For the peasantry, the new world represented unprecedented social advancement in a
land where supposedly even the meanest tenant could have slaves of his own. It meant a land
of gold and adventure where anything was possible.

The New World was not what Europe wanted or needed in 1104.

The merchants of Italy and Ispana were far more concerned with the Near East than the Utter
West. Preachers on their payroll still clamored for Votive War and the destruction of Iran.

They were not wrong to think in this way: the wealth of Asia far outpaced that of Solvia, and the
luxury goods they wanted were all found in the Orient. Whatever bounty could be found
overseas was difficult to extract and bring back. The overwhelming majority of those who set sail
for the Utter West stayed there, never to return. Those who returned were more often than not
recruiters, and were shunned by landholders who wanted to keep their farms staffed and
merchants who thought this was all a vast distraction from the real war, the oldest war, between
the deadly fanatics of Boddo and the warriors of Christ.

For groups such as the Mauri and Ispanians, however, one major boon did present itself. Sailing
around Africa meant an alternative to Khardi tolls and the wartorn chaos of the Near East. It also
meant opportunities to bring back vast cargos of salt in exchange for what the Ispanians
considered a pittance. So while the Germans and Franks eagerly dreamed of Votive crusade
and glory, the merchants of the south plotted how best to circumnavigate the vast continent to
their south. It could be done – wise men all believed that much was obvious. Royal
mathematicians in Ispanic courts bickered and disputed the distances involved, but by 1146, the
first Italian-funded Ispanian voyage had reached Cape Watya.

In time the trickle of adventurers would become a flood.

First Steps

The first contacts between the Old and New Worlds were a series of utter disasters. Would-be
conquerors were time and again scattered to the winds or overrun by their own ignorance.
Navigation and nautical technology as a whole was still in its infancy. Whole fleets and voyages
were swallowed up in the passage.

If iron and steel would give the invaders an advantage, as many later scholars have postulated,
it was not readily apparent in the early post-contact days. The early decades post-contact
passed without major incidents, and after 1104, a series of pitched battles between natives and
newcomers would primarily end with the newcomers buried by sheer weight of numbers,
slaughtered despite technological advantages they presumed would keep them safe.

Few accounts of these early battles survive, and what stories we do have tell of huddled,
starving Franks surrounded and picked off one by one. However, these tales of atrocity are not
necessarily representative of the majority of these early post-contact massacres. Later
archeology indicates that pitched battles were more common than previously believed – that the
usual pattern of contact was one of brutal open warfare. The attritional patterns of later conflicts
only began after the natives were decimated by disease and forced back into the hinterlands. In
general these early battles were disastrous for the lightly-equipped seafarers who almost
universally underestimated their native foes time and again. Open hospitality gave way to
distrust, and soon the Caribbean was inflamed against the voyagers from the west.

However these disasters did not mark the end, but rather the beginning. The Europeans learned
from their mistakes, and benefitted from the collapse of native populations in their absence.
Future conquests swept islands already depopulated by plague and incipient social collapse.
Conquering lords set up cities under “the authority of the king” and built wooden castles and
churches so as to proclaim themselves victors. The use of “theatrical violence” brought many
cautious or outright hostile tribes to heel, and combined with the taking of (overwhelmingly
female) hostages as “wives” these early colonies were able to survive.

One Hundred Ships

There is no more vivid image of the conquest of Tolteca in the popular imagination than that of
Mansa Nfansou and his hundred ships setting sail from Fula country. Occurring a mere century
after the initial contact, Mansa Nfansou and his adventures quickly took on the aspect of legend
or myth, and few accurate chronicles of his voyage have survived. There is a gulf in the
historical record – between the legendary hundred ships and scattered accounts from the petty
“Duke” of Tahiti, who records no more than five ships limping into his harbor. The famed Mansa
in his account is a proud and arrogant man, a warlord who refuses to acknowledge the
disastrous storms that have ruined his fleet and left him “as a beggar in the Carib Sea” – a king
reduced to eating his valuable warhorses.

From there, Nfansou’s next steps become difficult to trace, not for a want of accounts, but for
the confusion of those royal historians and Norse chroniclers who travelled with him. He either
landed near the city of “Cuetsala” or “Cuetseleuca” on the Gulf of Tolteca, the location of which
is lost to history. Shortly thereafter he began involving himself in the affairs of native kings, and
rode to the city of “Ohsakag” – where in a ceremony which rapidly became confused by issues
of translation, he demanded the submission of the Ohsakagi King and his entourage.

The ensuing war was brutal chaos, but another wave of disease would fortuitously strike a year
after his landfall, and Ohsakagi would be destroyed by a rival city state that has been identified
to a large degree of certainty as Coyolapan. Shortly thereafter, a war with the Sabotegi would
throw him back on the defensive, and Nfansou’s chaotic and tumultuous rise to the top would
continue.

The Norse and Fula chroniclers who charted Nfansou’s ascension to power are broadly
responsible for the legendary quality of his conquests and the pervasive misconceptions which
endure to this day about his victories. The Norse in particular emphasized the individual heroism
of a small band of conquering heroes holding back endless waves of chaotic barbarians. To
them, Nfansou’s foes dressed in carnival motley. Each battle was a legion of unrestrained
cannibal demons throwing themselves on the long-armed and stern warriors of the Fula, who
kept disciplined ranks and repulsed their foes time and again. The native allies of the Fula
feature not at all in their accounts. The savage chaos of warriors armed with stone clubs
assailing the finely armored horsemen of the Fula made for a beautiful and romantic picture, but
an inaccurate one. Equally fraudulent was the Fula depictions, which emphasized the
pseudodivine glory of Nfansou, the heroics of the cavalry charge, and their enormous,
incomprehensibly vast fleet and army which won submission after submission with a minimum
of effort.

The truth, as ever, is a grimy thing. First, the Fula fleet was in no small part composed of Canary
Norse, a people who had rapidly outbred the carrying capacity of their small island. Second,
what sparse native accounts and oral histories remain do not focus on the cavalry at all, and
given the Duke’s account of the Mansa forced to eat many of his horses, it is likely that the
cavalry contingent was small to say the least. Third, the Fula would have been annihilated if it
was not for the apocalyptic chaos gripping the whole of the region. Mass migrations, societal
breakdown, and a rapid series of plagues all allowed Nfansou to carve out a state where
otherwise he might have simply been killed along with the starving men who staggered ashore
in 1208.

Still, Nfansou’s conquests were uncertain and ephemeral at best. Many of the native kings
whose “submission” he attained saw him as little better than a particularly high quality
mercenary. There were various Frankish and Norse mercenaries already in the New World by
the time of Nfansou, and he would certainly not be the last Old World leader to cross the sea
and engage in mercenary activity. The famed womanizer and mercenary Niccolo Cosca, who
had passed away some four decades previously, was hailed as a hero by the Xicallanca of
Cholula and his travelogues, widely disseminated in Italian vernacular, had proved wildly
popular with the common people of his home country.

Nfansou, in the eyes of many historians and contemporaries, was acting in the same tradition as
the Cosca family, who were in the 1220’s represented in the new world by Stefano Cosca, a
cousin of the famed adventurer, and his little brother who was called the Lesser Niccolo. But the
story of the New World is not the story of great men or grand adventures.

The story of the New World is of vast impersonal forces. From the first meetings of sailors and
Carib islanders, diseases leapt from mouth to mouth, from flea to flesh. From early beginnings
and perilous voyages, the groundwork for a truly global economy was laid. The engine of global
trade was even now being primed in the far East – when it reached the shores of the Americas,
nothing would ever be the same.

The story of the New World is the story of an exchange of ideas. From the first contact,
representations of Christ and the native gods of the Taino were painted on cliff-faces and pieces
of stone and bark. Cultures long separated by the yawning gulf of the Atlantic Ocean struggled
to understand and make sense of new worlds beyond their reckoning.

The story of the New World is one born in blood and fire. From the first meetings between
Haitians and Franks, it is the story of unspeakable atrocities and the lowest depths of human
degradation, of starving sailors butchering unprepared natives and being butchered in turn by
vengeful war-parties. It is the story of arrogant conquering Princes who sought everlasting glory
at sword point. It is the story of the New Votive Wars and the bloody religious revolution which
would follow.

[These posts are meant to be more "teasers" than anything. Fear not, I'll be going into more
detail shortly. However, there may be a bit more chronological jumping about in this part of the
story, especially when it comes to discussing cultural themes and the various revolutionary
changes taking place in Asia.

N.B. All guest posts set before 1104 should still be posted in the original White Huns thread. If I
have any additional posts that discuss pre-1104 topics they will go there as well. ]

A New Era in the

East

Immanuel Laskaris was a man for an earlier age. He would have, perhaps, made a great
Roman Emperor, but he was a poor match for the limited resources of the Asian State, a region
whose heartland was pastoral at worst and feudal at best, a region whose few remaining great
cities hugged the coastline and clung to the memory of ancient times. However, Immanuel was
a poet and aspiring philosopher, few Emperors did so much to foster the growth of Asian cultural
life, or wasted so much blood and treasure in their attempts to live up to the hoary legacy of
Rome. His warring began at a young age, with an intricately planed three-pronged assault on
the Xasar city of Konstantikert. Fed by the fields of the Dnieper, the city had grown into a true
metropolis under the Xasar, and its walls and exterior fortifications were well-maintained. A seat
of Buddhist scholarship, playing host to universities and temples and an opulent Xasar royal
palace, the city was in the eyes of the Asian cities, an insult to everything that old
Constantinople had once been. Accordingly, Immanuel had near total support from the powerful
urban magistrates and the rural landlords alike.

His defeat was thus all the more humiliating. While the Xasar fleet was swept aside and ruined,
the Asian army starved and suffered outside Constantinople, and as Xasar reinforcements
poured in and encircled the besieging army, Immanuel was forced to lead a disastrous retreat
back across the strait. If not for their distaste for ruling a large Christian population, the Xasar
might have invaded and wreaked devastation upon Asia Minor. As it was, they contented
themselves with an indemnity and hostages from the great cities of Asia.

Smarting from this blow, Immanuel turned East, towards the weakening Khardi Empire,
embroiled in border wars and distracted with substantial economic problems. He raised many
mercenaries and Votive soldiers with the promise of plunder for payment, and for some time it
seemed that he could not be defeated. He swept as far south as Jerusalem, holding a victorious
parade in the captured city and praising God for his victories. His troops hailed him as a savior
and a conqueror, and, emboldened, he embarked on a campaign to rescue “our Assyrian
brothers, who languish under the Boddo’s yoke.”

Mesopotamia was a bridge too far. The Khardi armies were ruined and unable to prevent his
march down the Tigris, or the overthrow of the current Shah (and the subsequent “Susa
Anarchy” which would last much of the following decade) but, bolstered by Arab and Bajinak
mercenaries they were able to prevent the loss of Susa and wear down the limited resources of
Immanuel’s army. While Immanuel was off playing the conqueror, his homelands were
vulnerable, and the Ifthal wreaked havoc across Asia Minor in his absence, while the army
slowly disintegrated. Soldiers, enriched by plunder, had almost no loyalty to Immanuel and
within two years, he was no closer to taking Susa and his forces were all but gone. Encamped
and eventually surrounded in the ruins of Tesifon, he was captured and ransomed back to Asia.

The Khardi would recover, but their prestige was shaken. A series of child Shahs only ensured
that satraps would gain more and more power. The more successful local rulers were quick to
begin calling themselves Shahs, and tax revenues continued to decline.

The Khardi had swept the Near East like a storm in their heyday. Unlikely conquerors, the sons
of nomads, they had forged an enduring state in the wake of Ifthal and Turkish anarchy by
taking advantage of the agricultural and commercial wealth of the Tigris and Euphrates. But the
very land which won them their fortune was a fickle mistress. The Khardi were compelled by
fortune to travel far from their hard-won homeland, and as settler colonies became ubiquitous,
those who remained landholders imported increasing numbers of slaves, weakening the once
great base of Khardi manpower. From Susa, a city transformed by a singular ambition to ape
the past, the Iranshahs looked out at their territory and realized how shaky great empires could
be. Their kingdom was built on the backs of so many cities, so many nations, so many proud
peoples once broken.
In a sense, they must have known it was all doomed to ruin.

The first stirrings of trouble came in the wake of Emperor Immanuel Laskaris’ disastrous
campaigns. Afterwards, the border lords consolidated their power independent of the central
state, and no group did more to unsettle Khardi power in the west than the sect or association of
warriors who called themselves the Bakhtiyar, or the fortunate ones.

Throughout history, many great minds have conceived of time as cyclical. What is the passing of
the seasons but a microcosm of grander patterns? As one ephemeral generation is born, and
lives, and dies to be replaced by another, we see time in its ceaseless flow, but also rebirth.
Nowhere is this pattern more obvious than among the nations of Iran, cursed to see Empires
rise and fall around them. From the Arsakid Palhava to the Sasanians to the Ifthal to the Khardi
to the Bakhtiyar, the pattern remains constant.

The contender to the title of Shah rose, as all great dynasties do, from humble beginnings. They
were derisively called Tayzig (from the Iranian Tajik) by the old and pure Eftal families, a word
which derided them as Arab pastoralists and ignored the Khardi’s own antique origins as
herdsmen in the Zargos mountains. There was truth to the slur, however, that the Bakhityar
were mixed Arab-Ifthal in origin. Their own name for themselves roughly meant “fortunate” and
in no small sense, they were incredibly fortunate. Far from the decadent and vicious court of
Susa, they were able to carve out a real state for themselves with minimal interference.

However, the Bakhtiyar had their origins not as nobility but as bandits, a group of allied clans
ruling Tadmur under the dominion of an enigmatic warlord named Akhsau, who was called
Mansar, from the Arabic Mansur, or Victorious. There were many legends about Mansar. Some
said that he was born blind, that he did not gain the ability to see until he was a man. Others
said that at the age of thirteen he wandered in the desert and spoke to God, either the Christian
deity or Ohrmazd, depending on whom you spoke to. Still others said that he was a demon in
human flesh, and that his words seized things in the hearts of men that should not be seized.

Most, however, simply acknowledged that he was a brilliant and capable tactician, the sort of
figure who would usurp the King of Tadmur at the age of 21 and expand his dominion from
there, conquering fortress after fortress and through force, charisma and guile bringing the
house of Mihiragula in line and carving out a crude but effective state which paid only lip-service
to the royal court in Susa.

Akhsau was a rare sort of figure, and the Bakhityar were a completely unanticipated event
historically. Within a few decades, all history would be changed by their rise.

Arabia was undergoing a crisis of faith. Saihism, the Arabic world’s response to the great
missionary religions, was on the decline. Nestorianism and Buddhism warred for the hearts and
minds of the Arab world, and the Church of the East, exiled from many of its traditional seats,
had found a fertile audience among the scattered desert tribes of Arabia. Buddhism was popular
in the south, among the wealthy merchant cities whose culture and civilization were an example
for the northern tribes.

Akhsau took all comers, and encouraged the mystical reputation he had gathered. As he moved
from victory to victory, the Arabs of the interior flocked to his banner, transforming desert raiders
and bandits into a disciplined fighting force of bow-armed light cavalry. If the Ifthal had forgotten
their nomadic roots, this new whirlwind from the desert had not at all – they specialized in
ambush and raiding warfare, and they excelled at starving the Ifthal fortresses into submission.

While the Bakhtiyar moved from strength to strength, they were able to do so because of
anarchy in the East. By the time Akhsau was forty, the Khardi had lost much of the Iranian
plateau to marauding Turko-Afghan warlords in what was a sort of repeat of the Eftal collapse.
Asia never truly recovered from the disastrous rule of Immanuel Laskaris, a sort of twenty year
false “Golden Age” that would lead to their doom. Swift Tayzig and Ifthal cavalrymen turned the
peninsula of Asia Minor upside down, and by 1150 the whole region was under Tayzig control.
By 1160, Akhsau, now an old man, would not even acknowledge the Shah in Susa. By 1183,
there was no longer a Shah in Susa, and the Khardi were divided into warring petty states.

As we will see, the Bakhtiyar themselves struggled to create an enduring state or legacy.
Perhaps because of their origins, they quickly allowed internal divisions to overcome them in the
aftermath of Akhsau’s conquests. Their architectural and cultural legacy was more enduring, as
was their grand project to rebuild the Canal of the Pharaohs, which became known as the
Mansar Canal. For a brief time, a unified Bakhtiyar Empire seemed poised to overcome the
Khardi and reunite the Near East, but ultimately no-one would do more to unseat the Khardi
than themselves. As the Khardi lost their distinct provincial culture and ties of tribe and clan to
the appeal of universal Empire, as they accepted the broader Indo-Iranian culture practiced by
the Ifthal, they became indistinct from their many subjects and even began to identify as them.
Latter-day laws to prevent intermarriage between Khardi and Turks were never strictly followed,
and coupled with the economic decline of Mesopotamia (rapid salinization and the rise of
unproductive slave estates) their fate was sealed long before the Bajinak conquered Mosil.

[Don’t worry, I’m gonna talk about the Near East more soon. I know that things moved fast in
this overview, and that my focus was nowhere near complete. But I wanted to start somewhere
and start laying the groundwork for the larger themes of the 12th century, which even beyond
the New World promises to be one full of shocking twists. Egypt, Iran, and many other places
deserve a more in-depth focus than I gave them in this segment.

However, for the next update I think we're going to look at China and the changing East Asian
economic scene, and perhaps also at Central Asia in the world of the Kitai and the Afsar. As
ever, I welcome questions and comments. There's a lot of hints and references to events that
need larger explanation in this segment, and I appreciate the chance to explain that stuff for
those who are interested.]

Great Cathay
The twelfth century in Kitai China was one of political consolidation and economic expansion.
On the military front, the half-Mongol half-Kitai general Chimtay advanced from victory to victory.
The Wu state crumbled under the brunt of his invasion.

The Kitai Emperor might have retired into the sublime luxuries of his palace at Kaifeng, but the
Kitai nobility still raised their sons on the steppe and taught them to fight. Unlike the Uighurs
before them, they did not integrate with their subject populations to the same degree. Instead
they utilized the Han bureaucracy and their Uighur federates as intermediaries between the
larger populace and their own relatively austere world. If the Kitai idolized the broader Chinese
culture, they were not immediately consumed by it. If they saw their Emperors become
decadent and wealthy behind the cloistered walls of the Kaifeng Golden Palace, they did not
rebel against it. Indeed, no sooner did the Emperor start to fear that his people were growing
restless than he ordered the massive 1123 invasion of Wu.

Chimtay was a capable tactician and won many proud cities over by the extent of his legendary
mercy. During his campaign against the Wu, cities such asTongzhouand Yangzhou surrendered
without a fight, bringing vast sums of wealth into the Imperial coffers and bringing the country
closer and closer to reunification under a single Imperial banner When, several years later,
Chimtay was ordered to invade the Chu, the siege of Fangcheng was notably ended within
mere months as opposed to the anticipated years. In 1130, the general was in command of
three whole southern divisions, and had the de facto backing of many of the ministries. His field
army was unmatched for the quantity and quality of his cavalry, and from the silk road had
acquired the latest in firepowder formulas.

Chimtay authored many early experiments into firepowder. Fangcheng was subject to an
immense rain of bolts tipped with explosive “grenades” and the Chinese variant of the firespear,
perfected by Imperial technicians, proved to be an unmatched shock weapon even in the hands
of unskilled peasantry.

It is unclear whether or not he had imperial authority to invader the South Kingdom of Tai, but he
did so, and when yet another sweeping victory came to him in 1132, Chimtay seemed
unstoppable. His fame and reputation had eclipsed the hidden Emperor’s by far. A year later,
summoned back to the capital, he came in force, with a huge army at his back.

He walked directly into a trap. The Kitai Emperor had enlisted the help of the Naiman Yabgu,
and had hired two thousand personally loyal imperial guard soldiers. He gave them the
standards and equipment of Chimtay’s own personal soldiers, and during a celebration of the
general’s achievements, had these soldiers turn on Chimtay. In the confusion the general was
quickly killed by the imposters, and the rank-and-file quickly fell into line. Those suspected of
involvement in Chimtay’s plotting were either executed or quietly reassigned to distant frontiers.
The architect of this plot, however, was not the Emperor but his confidant, the rising scholar-
bureaucrat Zhao Wei.
Zhao Wei, the Prime Minister from 1153-1161 advocated revolutionary changes in the economic
system of the country. In his opinion “The state and the ministries must take on their back the
whole management of commerce, industry, and agriculture, so as to ensure the prosperity of all.
It is the degradation of the common farmer that turns him to banditry, and it is the suffering of
the merchant that leads him to sympathize with esoteric preachers.” Perfect social order, he
argued, could be generated by enhanced state involvement. A devout member of Exoteric
Buddhism, he believed strongly that a perfected regime could be attained only by strenuous
application of all the power of the state bureaucracy.

The unification of the Yangtze River by a single power and the restoration of degraded and
silted parts of the Grand Canal allowed economic renovation on an unprecedented scale. The
coastal cities patronized by the Wu and Tai benefitted immensely from uninterrupted contact
with the interior. The Kitai devoted immense resources to pacifying banditry and restoring order,
and these acts seem to have paid off. Zhao Wei’s policies took inspiration perhaps from the
Tamil trading houses he knew of from his youth as a hostage among the Tai. He established a
central banking system as part of the Ministry of Revenue, and gave it a broad purview to invest
in promising commercial enterprises.

The Emperor Yaol Jelu (Muzong) ruled in splendid opulence, remote as all his people were from
the day-to-day affair of governing the south. Accordingly, it was a vastly expanded northern
bureaucracy which took on that responsibility, in concert with local magistrates. The exam
system, atrophied since its Qi era height, was brought back as a universal institution. If the
gentry idolized the life of the noble farmer, they nevertheless found great fortunes to be made in
investing in trade.

One of the largest advantages the new Kitai state had was that its Han gentry were intimately
connected to a vast foreign population. Many of those who had fled the Uighurs had distant
relations back in their mother country, and the Chinese overseas did not necessarily associate
the Yaol dynasty with the brutality of the Uighurs. The Yaol were distant foreign despots whose
meritocratic attitude did much to endear them to their subjects. And yet despite this era of
harmony and contentment, the Uighur garrison cities remained, a fist within the velvet glove of
Kitai hegemony.

All under heaven was reunited. But the top-down imperium of the Kitai had its flaws. In the rivers
and valleys of China, new and bold thinkers were authoring their own novel philosophies that
would eventually come into conflict with imperial orthodoxy…

North India

The Kshatriya warrior guilds and their mercenary counterparts had by the twelfth century blurred
so as to become indistinct from one another. However, a defining facet of warfare on the
subcontinent was that combat was almost exclusively conducted either by these groups or by
massed levies of relatively poor quality. Professional troops represented a small clique within
the broader civilization, and one that was difficult to gain access to.
When the Afghani warlord Khingal Askunu and his Turkish allies swept through Gandhara and
broke upon the plains of Panchala, their fellow Sahputi often turned and betrayed their
supposed paymasters. The republics of the north were overwhelmed one by one. Their treasure
was brought back to Shamibal, the seat of the Askunu before Khingal’s son resettled in
Lohawar.

The battles that defined the century were brutal affairs. The Askunu and their retainers fought as
heavily armed and armored cavalry, and unlike the guild warriors they had no sense of fairness
or honor. Where guild combat had become regulated by codes of conduct and diplomacy both
practical and ritual, the Afghans did not care to preserve the lives of the defeated or maintain the
social structures of the subcontinent.

However, perhaps because of the moderating influence of the Sahputi, the great temples and
universities of the region were preserved. The sangha and equal-kingdoms were broken but in
their submission they were allowed to organize as they saw fit. In victory, to Askunu were
merciful. However, their destruction of the old North Indian martial elite fundamentally changed
the region, and brought them into direct conflict with Gurjars and their Chandratreya patrons.

Afghanistan itself was a place in turmoil. It had never quite reconciled its glorious past with its
new status as a frontier. The country of the Afghans was the home of great empires! Did not the
Eftal come from Balkh, and the Johiyava come from their valley kingdoms? They sat at the
crossroads of civilization, and they had no desire to be mere subjects of a distant monarch in
Susa. No sooner did the Mitradharmids begin crumbling on itself than much of Afghanistan rose
in open rebellion. The garrison cities were massacred. The tribes of the mountains, of whom the
Askunu were but one of many, rose up openly and besieged Balkh, cutting off the Khardi Satrap
from his lines of communication.

By the time the Khardi might have considered a counter-attack, the Afsar Turks were ranging
freely across the Iranian plateau, and the Bajinak were besieging Mosil. There were higher
priorities. Afghanistan was distant and inconsequential to the new Khardi policy, which was
focused on maintaining its ever-weakening hold on the fertile crescent.

[Again, things will continue to be filled out as time goes on. I have a massive post on the fall of
the Khardi in the works, but it's proving frustratingly difficult. Rest assured these posts will make
more sense with that added context.

To those of you saying India was overdue for an invasion... yeah, you were right. And as soon
as the Khardi began cracking, as soon as there wasn't a monolithic empire in the Near East... I
think it was pretty much inevitable. However, its an open question whether or not the Afghans
will reach the real centers of the Indian revolution. The warrior guilds of the Ganges have far
greater numbers than the guilds of the north, and if nothing else economically that region has
been less embroiled in the unproductive border wars that the Khardi and Gandharans faced off
in time and again, or the relative power vacuum along the Indus.]
 In the broad compass
of history, it can be easy to neglect the small scale. Certainly when telling the story of the all
mankind, from the first city states along the banks of flooding rivers to mankind united in a
global era of information and space exploration, it can be easy to forget the lesser moments that
change the world.

And yet these moments happen constantly. If a different merchant had traveled to Ethiopia and
not brushed against a rat, humanity might have avoided what would become the worst
pandemic in human history, the first global plague which touched every continent. If a soldier
had not brought down his cudgel on the head of a Sassanian Shah, the Eftal might never have
risen to power. If a herder’s son hadn’t traveled to Constantinople and joined their army as a
mercenary, the Roman Empire might never have fallen.

When dealing with an event as vast as the Ragnarssen exchange, when so many disparate
peoples began massive oceanic migrations, it is especially easy to forget. One of the long term
goals of this second iteration of Rise of the White Huns will be to capture as much of that as
possible while still overlaying the broad trends and themes of each era. Suggestions as to how
best to achieve this are always welcome.

Heretics and Votivists – the Troubles of Europe go West

The culture of Ispana was unique within the Frankish Empire. With its own royal court, it was a
proper kingdom where the rest of the “nations” were duchies and marches with nothing but
shared culture to unite them. Culturally, Ispana was nevertheless considered a backwater. Her
poetry, the courtly elites of Aachen said, was pastoral and vulgar at best, and crude and
blasphemous at worst. Her scholarship had nothing on the heady grandeur of Italy, where great
minds discussed the nature of angels and matter along platonic lines. Her architecture was
infused with barbarian models taken from the unique Mauri sensibility which permeated the
southern Mediterranean and had little in common with the delicate arches and spires of the
north.

Accordingly, the religious movements Ispana spawned were unique as well. One common
heresy, called Autotheism, held that the perfect soul and the Godhead were indistinguishable
from each other. Believed to be inspired by the movement of peoples and ideas from the East,
Autotheism found fertile ground in Spain, Sicily, and other areas where local rulers had little
incentive to directly combat heresy. In time it would come to influence the paganism of the
Berber peoples as well. Another, the Josefite cult, was classically gnostic – its followers
refrained from vaginal heterosexual intercourse so as to not bring new souls into the damned
world. Accordingly, it died out within in a generation. Its legacy was preserved in church tracts
which condemned the cult as a “a den of the most perverse sodomites, a cellar of inequity at the
root of the Christian world.”

As Christian missionaries found their way to the New World, so too did a small but growing
number of Autotheists. The lawlessness of Fanceau’s regime appealed to those who could at a
moment’s notice find themselves persecuted. Unlike the Tinanian heresy, which had secular
wealth and importance, Autotheists by contrast generally were all too well aware that they
survived by the dint of their local lord’s whim, and accordingly were more encouraged than any
other group to flee. The desire to found a “New Jerusalem to the Perfection of the Soul” as one
later Autotheist writer put it, was strong. Accordingly of all the various groups who would risk
their lives on the great transatlantic journey, few were more fanatical in their hopes than the
Autotheists. If they were only a small number, on a virgin island whose inhabitants were
slaughtered by disease, the Autotheists had a critical advantage – alone of the Frankish
colonists they had brought a significant number of women, and their towns were able to sustain
their numbers far more efficiently than the scattered Frankish trading posts and waystations.

The Duke of Haiti himself was an Ispanian, and while undoubtedly familiar with the sect, he
declared that his “city” would not become another seat for the “false men and sodomites” who
came ashore after the great journey. Where he gave shelter to heathens, adventurers, and
brigands, and tolerated the varied forms of “vice” and “immortality” that accompanied any
colonial settlement, heretics, it seemed, were a bridge too far in the mind of Duke Rodrigo
Meles. Autotheists quickly established their own safe haven not so far away, on the Isle of
Aravacia.

Back home, the lords of Ispana were happy. Whatever worries of land overcrowded by a surfeit
of hungry tenants or heretics they might have held were assuaged by the promise of a vast new
world which would conveniently serve as a dumping ground. Furthermore, they were beginning
to see the profits of their overseas voyages. With each new expedition, men such as Fernanti
Dias de Vivar brought back ships laden with treasure. Regular lines of trade and communication
were slowly being established with the Fula and the scattered southern coastal tribes. In 1157,
the Ukwu sent an embassy to the Frankish court, to much wonder and amazement. The Ukwu
Embassy, whose name is recorded only as “John”, was more than happy to embrace Christ and
be baptized. In all probability, the language barrier was far too great for such things to be clear,
and the Ukwu concept of divinity was utterly alien to the European mind, but it was a
propaganda coup nonetheless for the reigning Emperor, Aloysius the Blond.

Marcel de Amiens was another such man whose character and individual actions would set the
course of history along a different path. He was a man of famed humility and piety, but also
extraordinary charm and persuasiveness. Where his contemporaries, such as the decadent and
notorious Niccolo Cosca, were unscrupulous aspiring warlords, Marcel de Amiens was a loyal
servant of the Frankish crown. What he did in the New World, he did for God and Emperor alike.
When he conquered, he read royal writs out loud to the people, blithely ignoring the fact that
they did not understand the language, and accepting that his duties were done. He was the first
Votivist of the New World.

Arriving in the New World, he learned while in Haiti of a famed kingdom far to the north, where
great cities of gold rose out of mounds in the earth. Gathering a motley crew of adventurers and
a few native translators, he would embark up the Great River that divided Northern Solvia. He
would never return, but his influence would live on.
Liuqiu and the rise of Chola hegemony

The decline of Srivijaya left a power vacuum. It was the Chola dynasty that found themselves
most positioned to exploit that vacuum. They already had connections in every great trading city
across the Malay islands. They already had immense wealth and a navy more than capable of
asserting its dominance across the ocean.

They only needed a cause to expand their power even further afield. Fortunately, fate would
give one to them.

Besides the aboriginals, who claimed they had always lived on the island since the dawn of
time, the first settlers of Liuqiu[1] were exiles and refugees from the Qi state. Merchants made
sporadic contact with Liuqiu, and in the Liang dynasty era there had even been a plan proposed
to colonize the island make it into a colony or a tributary, but that plan was quickly dismissed
when it was realized by visiting emissaries that the island had no particular value. There was
nothing to be found in Liuqiu that could not be found in the Rivers and Valleys of China.

It was only with the rise of the Kitai that the first permanent settlement of Chinese people was
established on the island. A rough and disordered community of exiles, their communities
quickly became a haven for pirates, particularly the notorious Zheng Li. From sheltered bases
on Liuqiu, they were able to raid the sea lanes with impunity, and several attempts by the Wu
Kingdom navy to defeat the pirate bases were ineffectual at best – the Wu would arrive, but by
then the pirates would have taken shelter with the aboriginal peoples, and their only prize would
be burning empty villages and towns.

Part of this had to do with the gradual atrophy of the Wu navy. As the Kitai grew stronger, the
Wu pulled money from their fleet and put more money into ultimately hopeless attempts to
defend their northern border. As more and more ships were abandoned and left to rot, the Wu
lost their capacity to project power. Zheng Li and his pirates became ever bolder, building a fleet
which could rival anything the Wu had in their arsenal.

In 1116, a group of Chola backed “sreni men” would arrive on Liuqiu, seeking a lost convoy
which they believed to have been taken by the pirates. Their main purpose, as it always was,
was to negotiate a ransom for the lost cargo of silks and perhaps any high-ranking sailors
whose lives were particularly valuable. These sorts of negotiations had occurred before. They
were usually conducted with relative peace. For whatever reason however, this time
negotiations broke down.

It would not be until two years later that even one of their number would return. He had
seemingly aged many years, and he had clearly been brutalized. He could barely speak, but
one name was on his lips: Zheng Li.
This was a bridge too far for the Chola. Pirates were an acceptable cost of business –
sometimes you found yourself attacked by them, but usually they could be bribed or threatened
and overall they only took a small cut of the profits. This was different. Pirates who did not
negotiate were pirates that couldn’t be accounted for. Aligning themselves with several Champa
and Malay cities who had a grievance against Zheng Li and his marauders, the Chola built a
massive naval coalition to not only raid the coasts, as so many had done before, but indeed to
conquer the island outright and establish a friendly state there.

In 1119, a not insubstantial Chola fleet arrived in Liuqiu after a several month long tour of the
region. The campaign was swift – after the pirates retreated into the highland, they were
shocked to find an army, including several war elephants, disembark after them and give chase.
They were even more shocked when the Chola did not immediately attack but rather met with
the head of a lesser coastal tribe, the Siraya.

The Chola Admiral, speaking through an interpreter, made a simple declaration, the exact text of
which is apocryphal. The Siraya were granted the island to rule as a proxy of the Chola
Maharaja and were to work to prevent piracy. In exchange they would receive arms, goods, and
support from the Chola. However, none of it was as easy as it sounded. It would be a long,
bloody, three year campaign to subdue the highland tribes and bring “order” to the island. Even
then, disease and poor supply had sapped the effectiveness of the Chola army. Their allies had
largely pulled out of the fighting and morale was low. The war only ended with the Siraya signing
the Datu Compact, an agreement which limited their territory to the western lowlands and
allowed the other tribes to maintain their independence and pay a token tribute to the Siraya.

In 1126, a joint Chola-Champa venture organized by the Golden Bull Nakara Sreni had
established a city called Soulang (Sian) on the western coast of the island. They brought in red
brick from Java and raised a fortress and temple to Visnu Narayana some ten miles from the
Siraya capital of Chali (Kalipura). Instead of a pirate haven, the Siraya kingdom was a friendly
waystation for ships on their way north, and kingdom’s small landholding class provided a
captive market for Chola goods.

[1] Taiwan, a name which unless I’m wrong about the etymology I couldn’t really justify using.

The Procellaric Ocean and Greater Oceania

Early European voyages around Watya Cape were broadly speaking, disastrous. The early
vessels of European exploration could just about make it all the way south to the very tip of
Africa, although doing so involved a level of bravery and planning comparable to those who
wished to cross the Atlantic. In the early days, friendly kingdoms and waystations had not yet
been established along the coast. Chance encounters with locals could spell disaster.

It was worth it, however, to reach Watya, a land of strange and exotic spices where precious
stones were (supposedly) as cheap as dirt. However, the Randryan prohibited European
vessels from carrying on beyond the cape. Much as Tangrasirabh had a monopoly on trade to
Watya, Watya sought to establish themselves as a middleman for the pale-faced Ispanan
traders.

If the Ispanians wanted to circumvent this trade system, they would have to work with a group of
smuggling cartels traditionally known as the Seven Cliques. However, the Cliques themselves
were not terribly interested in anything beyond bypassing the customs taxes which kept
Tangrasirabh afloat, and with the language barrier such as it was, the Ispanians struggled to
make deals or even find the Cliques, open secret that they might have been to a local or a
native. Furthermore, without local knowledge and charts, even attempting to navigate the Cape
was extraordinarily dangerous for these early European ships. Several attempts were lost, and
several more were caught in the act and had their cargos seized.

It was thus no surprise that as European adventurers explored down the southern coast of
Solvia, they began to realize that perhaps there was an alternate way to the Indies – if Solvia
could be circumvented, perhaps they could find India. Surely the mystical land of spices and
wealth was not so far away once you bypassed the Solvian continent?

None of those early mariners who tried ever returned. The “Ocean of Lost Sailors” or the
“Ocean of Storms” (Oceanus Procellarum) claimed them all. Thus for Europeans the name
Procellaric Ocean would endure even after many explorers found that the ocean itself was in
many places peaceful and calm.

The southern continent was far larger than anyone could have imagined. Explorers like the Sri
Lankan Prashant Alakeshwar assumed that they would only find islands of varying sizes -- a
continued archipelago not unlike what they came from. They treated Javanese tales of the great
desert land to the south as rumors and superstition. Even if the Javanese had made sparse
contact with forested capes to the south, it seemed unlikely that there were any great
landmasses so far from the center of their world. When these South Indian and Sinhalese
naysayers were proved wrong, they almost immediately began fabricating tales of great
kingdoms with legendary wealth and new, never-before tasted spices and strange, never-before
seen birds and beasts.

They were half right.

The Sanskrit names “Daksinakhand” or “Yolnadvipa” came into common use among the
educated, although the sailors often just called it “Pula” or Island – a way of making the strange
and unfamiliar world beyond seem small and quaint. To treat the southern continent like any
other island was to make it safe. And the Southern continent was not safe.

The natives of Daksinakhand were primitive by the standards of the world that discovered them.
Their tendency towards outsiders was, broadly speaking, suspicion and violence, suspicion
aggravated by the lack of a mutual language. They were not overly impressed by the
northerners who came, not at first. The Yolgnu in particular were a practical people. They had no
desire for useless trinkets, but rather iron tools, cloth, alcohol, and other such gifts. In return
they traded what little they had – food, particularly sea cucumbers, and sex for practical
implements such as the Javanese were willing to part with.

In general the expeditions to Daksinakhand found little of value. Unlike the Europeans, the
Javanese and Indian explorers sought cities and populated regions with which to do business.
There was no missionary of Votivist zeal to animate them, and unlike the Europeans and
Africans, they never did find any urban centers, at least none close enough to the coast as to be
useful. Generally, they found a barren and unsafe continent with little to recommend it to the
outside world.

However, the Malay would return to the north in great numbers. Sea cucumbers were delicacy
in China and some parts of the archipelago. By trading with the Yolgnu, they were able to
acquire vast quantities of the delicacy for outrageously little cost. The Yolgnu had little
comprehension of how easy it was to manufacture an iron-tipped weapon or cloth, and
accordingly would work for a pittance wage in kind, harvesting and drying their ocean’s bounty
for the Malay, who in time established trading posts directly in Yolgnu territory.

It was in this way that agriculture was introduced to the Yolgnu. Although the agricultural
package of the Malay isles was not exactly compatible, it was sufficient to augment their diets
and allowed an increased level of health and consequent population growth.

The rest of the “Island” was explored in piecemeal voyages over the course of the next two
decades. Prashant was the instigator of most of these voyages. His trading company, the
Nanadesi, was convinced that they simply had to explore in greater depth to find the mythic
southern kingdoms of the continent, and they pursued this goal to ultimate financial ruin.
However, they were instrumental in mapping the coastline of the southern continent and
identifying safe harbors and major inland rivers and terrain features. They made contact with
countless native groups, and although they broadly struggled to have peaceful interactions with
them, one group, who called themselves the Gunditjmara, who according to Prashant dwelled in
stone houses and had a sophisticated system of aquaculture revolving around eels. Digging
channels, they were able to expand the wetlands that were their primary source of food and in
another world perhaps they might have developed primitive agriculture of their own accord. In
hard times and times of drought, they subsisted on tuberous roots which they cultivated with
artificial fires. The wild yam fields of the continent were not truly domesticated however – and
without this critical leap there was no great civilization on the Island, much to the disappointment
of Prashant and his fellows.

Other explorations were equally frought with disappointment. The unfavorable winds off the
coasts of Daksinakhand were perilous at the best of times, and it was only Prashant’s crew’s
skilled sailors and navigators that kept their dhangis from dangers and being thrown off course.
A Javanese guild expedition was less lucky. Strong winds from the north meant that a group of
three ships were forced to go East into empty ocean. Though they thought themselves doomed,
ultimately the group, led by the explorer Sudirmana, came into contact with what they called the
“Deep Clouded Isle” in 1265. It was an empty island to their eyes. The first tentative arrivals of
Polynesian settlers went unnoticed by them. The people who would come to call themselves the
Tengata Whenua were then very few in number – surviving by hunting the enormous birds that
roamed the land.

Sudirmana and his men marveled for finding a virgin land, unknown by humans in its entirety. A
learned man, a guru, was among their number, and he drew sketches of the strange birds and
wildlife of the island. The men would kill many of these birds, and hew trees for lumber. Then
they would depart, and the tales of the clouded island they found would become exaggerated
and strange with time and retelling.

The Tangata population would grow rapidly. Several other waves of Polynesian colonizers
arrived by 1300, and with abundant food supplies, even the relatively short and brutal lifespans
of these early settlers did not keep birth rates low. In time, clans began splintering and the new
settlers spread across the hills and mountains of their new homeland, everywhere they went
hunting the huge birds of the island and making huge mounds of their bones.

Later voyages would find a very different island.

These extreme voyages are perhaps notable for their scope and grandeur – there is something
romantic in pushing the envelope of human knowledge, of discovering huge new continents and
meeting civilizations who had lost contact with the broader human race beyond. However, while
Prashanti and his contemporaries were circumnavigating Daksinakhand, the empires of
Indonesia were also engaged in a much more immediate sort of colonization.

The Maluku islands and increasingly the whole of Melanesia played host to trading posts of the
rival Malay powers. Isyana, Srivijaya, and the Silendra competed over the valuable Maluku
islands, trying to gain monopolies on the production of spices such as cloves and nutmeg. The
value of these islands had long been known, but under Srivijayan hegemony, trade had been
largely peaceful. The native peoples had been slowly converting to the Hindu-Buddhism of their
Javanese neighbors, and gradually adopting the styles and language of the Malay to the west.
However, now outright imperialism was the order of the day – no power could afford to let any
other power become wealthier or gain more productive territory than any other, lest a new
hegemony be established.

The trade wars of the early twelfth century were a zero sum game for those involved, and
accordingly the indigenous populations suffered immensely, declining in numbers quite
significantly and being replaced with a combination of migrants and slaves taken from other
nearby islands. Fortresses and fleets were used to contest the islands, and trading posts
became armed camps overseeing spice plantations. The large island of Wanin came to have
fortified trading posts as well – its forests were utilized for timber during the naval arms race,
and the Silendra in particular were fond of establishing bases wherever they could.
The trade wars, if anything, only increased demand for spices. More cultivated terrain meant
simply more availability, which opened the envelope of those, particularly in places such as
China and India, who could afford to purchase spices and in turn demand only rose. Attempts to
open up Wanin to cultivation by the Silendra were met with resistance by the warlike Korowai
and other tribes who raided any outlying Silendra frontier settlements.

Discovery of the broader Procellaric Ocean would have to wait. There were few commercial
interests to explore beyond Melanesia and Daksinakhand. The Malay agricultural package was
poorly suited for any climate beyond their tropical zone, and accordingly settlement was an
uncertain prospect going forwards. With each ambitious voyage out to sea, it became
increasingly obvious that the peoples of the utter eastern ocean were violent and had little to
entice colonial ventures. Their islands became small and volcanic, their remarkable double-
hulled vessels a not insignificant threat to incautious explorers. Even storms and a lack of
knowledge of the region could prove fatal – archeological and genetic evidence seems to hint
that Polynesia did have contact with the broader “Old World” but that said contact was
essentially one-way – rare, and primarily conducted by people who were lost and stranded
rather than ambitious adventurers.

The Procellaric demanded of would-be explorers a level of technology, desire, and expertise
that was simply not available at the time. For those who threw caution to the wind and explored
anyhow, it swallowed them whole.
Yemen and Colonialism

While Tamil merchants explored the ironically calm blue vastness of the Procellaric Oceania and
asserted maritime hegemony over the Malay Isles, through the twelfth century, the mercantile
cities of the Chandratreya asserted dominance across the western half of the Indian Ocean.

This work would not have been possible without the complicity and indeed alliance with many
prominent Arab groups. The Arabs of Yemen sought safety from the growing power of the
Bakhtiyar, who unlike the Khardi were very comfortable expanding along desert paths that had
been safe from the “civilized” grasp of Susa. The Bakhtiyar also understood the value of trade –
they did not disdain merchants for many of them were the sons or brothers of merchants before
Akhsau had brought them together and made them conquering heroes and Shahs.

The explosion of Tayzig nomads southwards into the old caravan lanes culminated in the sack
of Al-Taif by a Bakhtiyar companion and later successor-Shah named Gashayar Harun and a
small cohort of swift cavalrymen. The overland routes, which had prospered as Egypt declined,
were now cut off once more. The southern kingdoms folded one by one as the northern peoples
descended southwards, taking the rich incense-growing country. As an aside, it was the
Bakhtiyar who would introduce the world to the glories of the coffee plant. They discovered it
among the Yemeni towns that they conquered, and the “Zanj drink” in time would spread across
the middle east, where it became a popular beverage for farmers in the morning and to give to
soldiers before battle, mixed with strong wheat alcohol. [1]
The Yemeni, particularly the Hadhramut and Aden, feared the growing power of the Bakhtiyar,
with their swift horses and camelry. The coastal cities were in danger of plunder, and pleaded
with their merchant connections for relief – for firepowder arms, for ships and men to resist the
onslaught, for loans to hire mercenaries. In this way, cities such as Bharukaccha became truly
colonial. Rather than simply striking unfavorable trade pacts, now they were permitted to send
guild armies on permanent station in Arabia and elsewhere. Sahputi and Gurjar mercenaries
were shipped en masse, along with a small corps of Bharukacchan advisors.

As their local contacts became embedded, Chandratreya licensed merchant houses were able
to invest in and buy the manufacturing of the Arabian peninsula, dominating the coffee and
incense trade of the region without having to lift a finger or provide their own labor. State and
Guild mercenaries provided the defense of Yemen, and an uneasy alliance grew between the
Malik of Aden and his foreign patrons.

In 1171, a full scale Bakhtiyar invasion of Yemen occurred under the leadership of the brilliant
tactician Gashayar Harun – but the Shah was dealt a rare reversal, underestimating the vast
number of mercenaries that would take the field against him. He retreated north towards his
fortress at Taxitar-in-Palestine and from there would spend several years licking his wounds.
However, so long as the threat of the Bakhtiyar remained, the Malik of Yemen was content to
maintain his deals, and quickly he realized that these foreign banks and guilds could be useful.
Several Arab trading houses sought to restore a Hawiya Shah in Ethiopia, and believed they
had a viable pretender – a family of Gidayan exiles who had lived for more than a few
generations among the Hadhramut and were culturally quite Arabized and religious Buddhist.
However, these small details were overlooked by the Yemeni in their fervor to restore the
profitable plantations and manufactories of Ethiopia – under Arab rule.

The Yemeni partisans of the Hawiya approached the Chandratreya Maharaja for a loan and
soldiers, promising him a substantial cut of the profits. However, the Chandratreya were
distracted and reeling. The Afghan Shahs and their Sahputi cavalry had won three major battles
against the Chandratreya and their Gurjar allies in the past five years. The Chandratreya,
despite their gunpowder and numerous armies, lacked the discipline and cavalry tactics of the
Sahputi. They suffered grievous losses in their engagements, but thanks to their vast resources
and long-established pre-eminence on the subcontinent, the Sahputi could not gain ground
against them.

The Yemeni would have to turn to the Mahatitta banks for help.[2]

[1] There is a substantial drinking culture in the Middle East, which various Buddhist injunctions
against alcohol have done almost nothing to combat. Bakhtiyar Shahs are expected to drink
with their companions much as Akhsau Mansar did with their forefathers, and a Shah who does
not engage in hedonistic debauchery, elaborate hunting parties, and other such activities is
barely a Shah at all. In this, among many other ways, the Bakhtiyar have done almost nothing to
earn the support or sympathy of the Nowbahar.
[2] A story for another time, but in case you've forgotten, Mahatitta, Sri Lanka, is one of the
major financial centers of the world at this juncture. They could with relative ease provide ships
and money enough to buy whole armies of mercenaries.

Shahs and Romans

In the twelfth century, the Xasar state was able to take advantage of the collapse of Asia and the
growing weakness and internal division within Francia to expand and consolidate its borders.
While the Xasar Shah had long claimed titles which hinted at an ambition to universal empire, in
1122, with the ascension of Shah Ormatsidar, they began claiming to be the “King of Kings” in
addition to their many lofty titles which included Shah of Rhom. The latter title was part of a
broader pretension to the Roman legacy which vexed and frustrated the Frankish Emperors,
who not without reason regarded themselves as truer heirs to the Roman Empire than Iranian
nomads who took pride in sacking the Eternal city in past centuries.

The cultivated plains of the Danube and Thrace supported a large population and in turn a large
tax base, which in turn allowed the Xasar to build a sizable, well developed state apparatus to
govern the disparate peoples under their rule. The Christian populations, however, posed a
unique challenge from the standpoint of legitimacy. What right beside force of arms gave the
Xasar Shahs the authority to rule over Christians? While the number of Christians they ruled
over grew, the Xasar were forced to grapple with this more and more.

To Konstantikert, the answer was clear. Persecution had never really been considered viable.
They made heavy use of Christian soldiers as auxiliaries and Christian populations had always
been too substantial for persecution to be viable. Rather, Christian elites in newly-conquered
regions were forced by treaty or “encouraged” to send their children to be raised in the palace.
These “Gold and Purple Sons”[1] were expected to take part in Buddhist-pagan religious rituals
and serve in the royal guard cavalry. In a generation, with peer pressure, the wealthy and
important landholders of an expansive Christian region were culturally alienated from their
parents and in time would identify more as Xasar than as Slavs or Romans or Franks. These
children were at the forefront of a dramatic cultural shift – the Slavic, Roman, and Italian
populations of the Balkans who remained Christian were largely ruled by an aristocracy that
despite disparate origins identified with the Turko-Iranian culture in which they had been raised.

Unlike many other “pagan” peoples who came into such a situation, the Xasar could not and
would not convert. Their eclectic version of Buddhist paganism was a part of their identity and a
unifying factor. Temples and stupa were the central of Pannonian and Danubian cultural life for
the overwhelming majority of the people, and these crossed the diminishing barriers of ethnic
identity.

In this way, the Xasar were able to do what the Khirichan for all their military superiority and vast
resources could not. The Xasar Shahs chipped away the last bastions of Christendom in Asia
and the Balkans. Combined with a strong navy, they were able to secure the Aegean and
engage in a wave of conquests which while geographically less impressive than the ambitions
of the Khirichan, were far more long lasting.

Under Shah Ormatsidar and his successor, the usurper Arjaxa Darasakya, the Xasar expanded
deep into Slavonian and Asian territory. Ormatsidar (1122-1141) followed a relatively traditional
pattern of expansion, pushing deep into the Balkans, taking advantage of Frankish distraction
and repairing fortifications he knew he would need to withstand the inevitable counterattack.
Gone were the days of sweeping into Europe on horseback and pillaging the fields. His war was
one of attrition on all fronts, relying on siege engineering and some small quantities of
firepowder imported from the Khardi lands at great expense.

Arjaxa, however, had a different opportunity. When he rose to power, it was a coup for the
bureaucratic faction and palace-raised nobility, with whom he identified. The Darasakya family
were not high nobles – they rose to power by merit and won the throne because Ormatsidar had
insisted upon appointing his mentally handicapped son Mihirdata to the throne and making
Arjaxa a mere Regent. Within a month Mihirdata suffered a “hunting accident” and the throne
was secure for the Darasakya. Arjaxa grew up in Konstantikert, unlike Ormatsidar who’s early
life had been spent in military camps and on the warpath. Arjaxa instead focused on the urban,
developed world of Asia. To him, Slavic princelings and Frankish marchers were a poor harvest
for the Empire. There was no wealth in the Balkans, merely farms and antique ruins.

Within the 4th year of his reign, in 1145, he would accept the surrender of the Sklavenian King
George Alos at Salunicha. George had spent most of his reign watching the Xasar press the
Franks out of the Balkans, and he had pre-emptively seized a series of ports on the Adriatic, so
as to keep them out of pagan hands. This turned out to be his undoing, as the Franks refused to
come to his aid. The Xasar defeated the Sklavenian army and besieged Salunicha – and
although their victories would be hard-fought and hard-won, the Xasar triumphed.

Defeating Sklavenia once and for all solidified the power of the Xasar. Arjaxa returned to
Shahdijan in a spectacular triumph. The Xasar mathematicians were hired to make a trail of
Sklavenian heads on pikes running along a road that in antique times was the Via Egnatia.
Durasa became a major base for the Xasar fleet, which now could directly threaten the Italian
possessions of the Frankish Empire. The hills and forests of the Balkans would remain bandit
country, untamed and uncontrolled for a generation longer, but in time the last holdouts of
resistance were rooted out, in no small part because they became increasingly desperate and
apocalyptic in their ideology, and alienated the common people.

Asia was the real triumph of Arjaxa’s reign however. By 1150, the Bakhtiyar and their Tayzig
allies were everywhere – Phokaia, one of the last holdouts on the Aegean, was besieged in
1151 by the Tayzig warlord Khalid Shira, and sent numerous appeals to Rome and Aachen for
aid. However, these requests fell on deaf ears. Instead, it would be a Xasar fleet that offered
them protection from a certain Bakhtiyar sack. In coming months, the Bakhtiyar would be
pushed back – the Xasar actually managed to portray themselves as heroes and liberators
because of the famed brutality of the Bakhtiyar. Over the next decade, the Bakhtiyar would be
pushed out of Nikaia, Amastris, and Sinope. All Bithynia and Pontus was retaken, as was much
of the old Roman province of Asia.

Akhsau himself would ride into Asia in 1162, and strike the peace of Ammorion, which allowed
the Bakhtiyar to retain a sprawling territory, including wealthy regions such as Lycia and
Trebizond. The Bakhtiyar also aligned themselves with the Christianized pastoralists of the
Anatolian plateau, using them as enforcers and auxiliary soldiers.

Arjaxa, however, would take credit as being one of the greatest Xasar Shahs in the history of
their empire. From humble Pannonian origins, the Xasar now ruled a not insubstantial portion of
the Roman Empire. Konstantikert was made the official capital once more, with Shahdijan
relegated to secondary status as a major military center and local economic hub. While plunder
was light, the economic advantage of conquering Asia was substantial. The coastal cities were
still very rich and very powerful, and the sons of their merchant families were now obliged to be
held as hostages in Konstantikert and serve in the Xasar army.

In 1165, on his deathbed, Arjaxa took his nephew, Nanaivant and crowned him Shah to great
acclamation. “To you,” he said, “I leave the Empire of the Romans and the Xasar.”

[1]The Xasar nation’s symbols in this era are white stork on black – the banner of the
Darasakya, or golden chakra on purple – a royal symbol similar to that used by the Gardaveldi.

[Poll: is the Xasar Shahdom a continuation of the Eftal Rhom Shahdom]

[Poll: is the Xasar Shahdom a continuation of the Roman Empire?]

[Poll: is the above continuation poll a continuation of previous continuation polls?]

Masamida and the Transatlantic Migrations

At an elite level of the Masamida were seeing widespread Christianization. While many rural
tribal groups refused to convert, urban centers where Chrsitianity had long been a minority
religion in decline saw rapid growth of new converts. Starting perhaps a decade before the turn
of the century, Christianity had been enjoying massive revival in North Africa. The religion had
never truly vanished. If many churches were abandoned in the countryside, the faith was still
equated with urbanity and civilization. Christ-worship, even if the specifics were unclear, was
part of the sort of lifestyle the Masamida aspired to.

As Masamida country was a valuable stopover point for Ispanian ships exploring, Churches
were founded to accommodate them, and local governors increasingly found it worthwhile to
convert to the religion to make their guests more welcome. On another level, the Masamida
were torn. The new relevance of their shores meant new contact with the world and a new
cosmopolitan sense of belonging to the broader Christian world, however, many rural tribes
rebelled against this new paradigm, seeing it as destructive of tradition.
They did not know just how irrelevant they were. The Kings of Masamida looked westward and
southward, but always across the ocean. The Tauregs made obscene profits as a cabal of
middlemen astride all the great trade routes, and their northern cousins knew they would not be
dislodged. In time, the rural Berbers would come around to the growing Christian consensus,
and it was them who spread the religion southwards to the Tauregs.

Over the century, Masamida collaboration with the Ipsanians would increase. The Masamida
Agilld would marry an Ispanian noblewoman in 1119, and increasingly Masamida and Ispanian
ships would work together to map the coast of Africa and explore the New World. They
struggled in these ventures, in no small part because the diseases of the continent were
merciless to newcomers. In the north, Fula country proved more hospitable but the north was
the country of cavalry-empires and long established trade networks. The Fula and the Mande
knew the Masamida intimately, and while they saw the utility of a transatlantic trade route, they
were all too well aware of what sorts of profits they could make. The Fula were just another
middleman, but crafty enough to cut their prices a shade below what the Taureg charged.

Soon, gold, salt, and many other finished goods flowed north from Niani. Of particular note,
however, was the flow of slaves. Traditionally, the societies of West Africa had enslaved many
people, largely in warfare. These slaves enjoyed varied conditions, but overall were not
substantially worse off than the serfs and indentured laborers of Western Europe. Broadly, they
were kept fit and healthy and used as a resource.

It was the Masamida who determined they might be useful as soldiers. The Kings of Masamida
feared their own tribes, especially given the religious controversies sweeping the nation. So they
purchased large numbers of young slaves and trained them as soldiers, promising them
freedom and a stipend at the end of twenty years of service. As the Norse began to turn away
from their traditional mercenary profession, slave “mercenaries” began to replace them in
Ispana and across Francia – a trend that would only increase as the Frankish aristocracy’s
fighting strength was sapped. The peasantry of Francia had lost much of their martial
experience – centuries of peace in Europe had left the common soldier near-useless.

While West Africans reached Solvia in a variety of ways, especially in waves of conquering
expeditions, enslaved labor, primarily from a hodgepodge of African states, quickly became a
part of the colonial fabric. Compared to the slaves used as soldiers in Europe, these slaves
were both far less expendable and far more important. Given the vast limits on European
manpower, all imported slaves in Solvia universally enjoyed higher status than the natives, who
when conquered were considered considerably lesser.

Many contemporary studies have focused heavily on the role of slavery in the colonization of the
Americas, but it is worth noting that the majority of West Africans who came to the continent did
so as free laborers, and by contrast many Western Europeans came to the continent as
indentured servants. In either case, manumission was common. After the first few centuries, the
focus of the slave trade shifted as well – as West Africa enjoyed greater and greater political
unity, slavers were forced to seek out regions with continued endemic warfare such as the
Kongo. Furthermore, it is worth noting that the Slavic slave trade was both a far larger and far
more brutal institution than the African Slave trade ever was, and had a far greater impact on
demographics.

Over the next two centuries, the Ispanians and Mauri would establish trading posts along the
coast of West Africa. As the number and size of these posts grew, the indigenous economy of
West Africa adapted and shifted to embrace these changes. The political and economic center
of the region shifted from the utter north and the cavalry empires increasingly towards the
various southern tribal groups, especially those who made the jump and embraced maritime
technology to its fullest extent.

In this early period, however, most naval traffic was oriented clearly towards Watya, and many
ports of call were stopovers, grim little dockyards seated on the borderline of what was to the
Ispanians and Mauri a vast and unexplored continent riddled with savagery and disease.
Repairs and replacement crew were their main attractions, but gradually and inevitably the sale
of ivory, sex, and other baubles became commonplace at even some of the most isolated
entrepots. Watya was the great goal and prize of any expedition however – if there was wealth
to be found in the New World and West Africa, a merchant could purchase a handful of
diamonds, fill his hold with spices and redbush tea, and never work again off of the profits.

Tajiks and Turks – the Story of Two Frontiers

“The Bajinak and Imur breed swift ponies, and train them from a young age to not fear the crash
of firepowder or the clamor of battle. In this way their horse can charge home against ranks of
men armed with fire-spears without fear of disruption. When they come close, they fire arrows
into the dense ranks of men and wheel swiftly so as to not come within the range of spears.”

The story of Iran’s collapse is one best told through symbols.

The decentralization of state authority and the devolution of royal authority to ever-more
powerful satraps slowed the decline of the state but also made it inevitable. Where dynasts such
as the Artsruni prospered and were able to solidify their personal commands, the Khardi in Susa
became increasingly weaker. Coinage of the era began showing the faces of local satraps and
eventually Bakhtiyar warlords. Temples, which in the era often had a statue of the monarch, saw
these statues looted and destroyed. While some scholarship has pointed to waves of Nowbahar
sentiment in response to the Bakhtiyar, the current consensus seems to be that the Bakhtiyar
refused to exalt or deify themselves, preferring to use the reputation of Akhsau Mansar as the
foremost symbol of their power. The erosion of the symbols of royal authority – statuary and
coinage – were quickly followed by very tangible collapse.

For the late-era Khardi, there were two rapidly expanding frontiers – Tayzigistan and Turkestan,
in the west and east respectively. However, the western and eastern frontiers, it is commonly
said, fell for opposite reasons. In the west there were too many soldiers, in the east, too few. In
the west, the Ifthal and Bakhtiyar eventually were able to come to common cause and enjoy a
swathe of military victories – however these victories only entrenched Akhsau as a sort of
secondary Shah – even before he claimed the title outright. As Viceroy, he had absolute power
to do as he pleased in any territory his soldiers could reach, and the Bakhtiyar made the most of
that – however they proved useless in the wake of such disasters as the Bajinak invasion. The
estates and cities of Mesopotamia, hard won and revitalized by the Khardi, were allowed to
wither on the vine once more, in what was becoming an all too familiar cycle of death and
rebirth.

In the East, a new class of Turkish warlord found their home. While the popular narrative for
some time pointed to massacres of Khardi garrison cities and rapid uprisings across the region,
it seems that there is only limited truth to that account. Some notable regions, such as
Afghanistan, saw rapid and violent takeovers by local aristocrats. The Khardi were annihilated
and replaced in widespread instances of communal violence. However, overall the Khardi
simply faded away. The Turkish nobles who replaced them were loyal to the Afsar Khaganate,
but only notionally. The scattered Turkish clans raided and extracted tribute from Iran with ease.

The fall of the Khardi, obviously, represented a new era of endemic warfare in its hinterlands,
and this came at perhaps the worst time. The overland Eurasian trade routes were hanging on
by a bare thread. Whether in Sogd and Balkh, or Mesopotamia and Egypt and Syria – the Near
East was simply not an appealing route for overland merchants – especially once the Canal of
the Pharaohs was finished its renovation in 1162.

Visualizing the Divine in Western Buddhism

For the Western Buddhists in the Xasar Empire and elsewhere, the interplay of pagan divinity
and Buddhist practice represented not two distinct but equal avenues for religious
enlightenment as Buddhism was treated in many parts of the East, but rather one coherent
universal whole. However, it was not always this way, and the road towards a unified religious
experience was a long and difficult one.

The center of Western Buddhist religious worship was the fixed temple, but even this innovation,
taken for granted though it may be, was not indigenous to the Xasar or their Turkish federates –
being a nomadic people, the temple itself was imported from the Sahu who in turn based their
designs on the Indo-Iranian sensibilities of the Eftal. Accordingly, the simple exteriors of
Zoroastrian temples were abandoned in favor of the gaudy and vibrant murals and reliefs
beloved by the Eftal. Later Khardi influences would only exacerbate this trend, as the revival of
Eftal styles touched the utter West as well. However, after the fall of the Khardi, later temples
and monasteries were decorated in a simpler style – geometric patterns came into vogue,
echoing the aesthetic sensibilities of the post-Bakhtiyar states.

The Xasar temple was typically a strange, chimeric creation, especially in its early days. The
addition of exterior shrines and temples around a central courtyard, a profound feature of early
temples, was not a planned design but rather a natural evolution as new gods were added and
patronized by various wealthy donors. The central Buddha statues which became commonplace
in the courtyards were a later addition, brought about as pagan and Buddhist ritual blended
together. The divinities worshiped in these shrines were often called Yajata, hinting at the
antique connection between Khardi paganism and the paganism of the west.

Inside the main temple, the statue of the Yajata Mihir triumphant which so frequently dominated
Xasar, Sahu, and ultimately Rusichi observance was placed behind a small sacred fire, to which
wealthier devotees would ritually offer sweet-smelling wood imported at great cost from the
East. The Mihir statue would have been a touch of familiarity to Christian converts – instead of
images of God the Father and Christ on the cross, the centerpiece of the pagan temple was
Mihir crowned victorious, standing as judge and defender of truth before the sacred fire. While
some very early temples featured Xormost or Ohrmazd, the former highest God of Iranian
religion had struggled to find a place in western Buddhism, and ultimately Mihir became more
commonplace.

Buddhism in these temples was difficult to find. While Buddhist ideas were understood by the
elite and the educated, the average observer found relatively simpler comfort in the vast
assortment of deities. The presence of Tangra, the Turkish divinity which so often was mirrored
in the pale blue domes of temples, and Anahida, the female maiden deity whose temples were
often comparable to Mihir’s in size and grandeur, allowed most to find some divinity which they
could worship and give direct offerings.

Time would ultimately put an end to this pluralism as the integration of Buddhism became more
profound and direct. The temples of Mihir gave way to temples to the Buddha and various
imported holy figures – Buddhist saints - whose cults were often established in such a way as to
subvert lesser gods. However, the pagan deities remained. Unlike many Slavic deities, who
were worshiped in nature away from the town and temple, the Turko-Iranian culture of the Xasar
world did not connect their deities to geography. Accordingly, their deities were forced to share
space with the Buddhists – and though the devout pagans who found this an affront did not
know it, that was what enabled them to survive in a more authentic form than any Slavic deity.
Mihir became the Guardian of the Dharma, perhaps, and the sacred fire became less important
than the image of the Buddha, but the deities eventually came to an easy truce with the teacher
of gods and men. They retained their places in alcoves and adjacent shrines and retained their
worshippers, even as the pursuit of enlightenment took center stage.