crusades

If the Battle of Manzikert was to never happen or unfold differently meaning that the Seljuks never manage to get into Anatolia would the Crusades still happen?

The Crusade of 1101 was arguably the less successful crusade and it had. To summarise it the nobles that turned back from the First Crusade and others that did not participate joined in what probably was the third biggest crusade, after the first and the third; almost all of them died in...

The son of a Seljuk prince who lost a dispute for the throne, Suleiman ibn Qutalmish took advantage of the civil wars that engulfed the Byzantine Empire after the Battle of Manzikert to take over most of Anatolia during the 1070s, laying the foundations of a new state, the Sultanate of Rum...

I posted something similar a while ago, but I'd like to discuss it in broader terms the ramifications of a Norman conquest of the Byzantine Empire. It's underappreciated just how close Duke Robert Guiscard and the Normans of Sicily came to overunning the troubled and declining empire in the...

The Byzantines were quite famous for using lamellar armor which was a type of armor that used sets of smaller plates fitted together atop a type of padding. What would it take for the Byzantines to adopt Western Style plate armor, or even make their own versions? How would this affect the...

So the general feeling, here at least, is that if Stephen of Blois hadn't lost his nerve the day before Antioch fell, not only would relations between the Crusaders and Emperor Alexios have not deteriorated, but there wouldn't have been a six month delay that saw many of the Crusaders, including...

What if the Byzantines, influenced by Western Europeans during the high middle ages started building Castles to fortify important positions? How would this affect the Empire's development and territorial integrity? Could this help secure Anatolia from Turkish raiders, and possibly help them...

So shortly before Constantinople was sacked over Alexios IV's inability to pay the Crusaders what he had promised them, the emperor the Crusaders were hired to overthrow, Alexios III, was contesting his nephew's counter-coup from his power base in Thrace, and at the same time Leo Sgouros was in...

what if the schism was worse preventing crusades. Kilij arslan subdues the danishmends and launches an invasion of balkans with Tzachas bey's ships. This laying the ground work for his successors to evenutally dominate eastern europe and middle east. Later fighting the mongols

I am in the process of watching the Kings and Generals collection of videos on the First Crusade. In the episode on the Prince's Crusade, K&G mentions that Bohemond requested that Alexios appoint him as Domestic of the East before they set out toward Nicaea. Alexios declined and instead offered...

The sultan of Rum from 1092 until his premature death in 1107, Kilij Arslan I was the first Muslim monarch to face a crusade, easily defeating the disorganized peasant army led by Peter the Hermit in October 1096. Unfortunately for him, the scale of his victory made him think the sultanate's...

In 1199, Constance of Brittany would be convinced decide to maintain her alliance with Philip II and allow Innocent III’s plan to subjugate the Archbishopric of Dol to Tours as she and the English under Richard I had issues and continued the planned marriage between Eleanor of Brittany in 1200...

If the French kingdom under Charles the Simple or one of his successors had collapsed or fallen to the Ottonian dynasty a few decades after the land grant to the Normans, and said Normans had stayed in the region to consolidate instead of departing on conquests to England, Italy and the Holy...

Famously, the Templar Grand Master was a notorious warmonger and militarily inept. He escaped as 1 of 3 from the slaughter of over 100 Hospitallers and Templars at the springs of Cresson in 1187. Before Hattin, he is purported to have been the last voice in the ear of the King of Jerusalem, Guy...

In the year of our lord 1164, the world was very different than what we see nowadays. First, the Albertas [1] had not yet been discovered and would not be found for another 336 years. Then, there's the fact that Iberia was divided into several Christian Kingdoms of Aragon, Castille, Leon...

Children of Eleanor of Aquitaine d. 1157 With Louis VII Marie of France, Duchess of Aquitaine and Princess of Antioch b. 1145 m. Bohemond III of Antioch Alix of France b. 1151 m. William, Count of Dieppe With Henry II of England William b. 1153 d. 1156 Henry b. 1155 d. 1157 Matilda b...

On 1148, Louis VII would tell Raymond of Poitiers to continue reclaiming Edessa rather than Damascus which they would retake in 1148 from Nur Al Din in 1149 which would be a great victory and the Count of Edessa would be able to regain Edessa, Eleanor and Louis VII would return to France happily...

Little Serb: A Longer Lasting Lazarevic Dynasty in the 15th Century Historically the Lazarevic dynasty ruled Serbia for two generations following the collapse of the Serbian Empire. During that time the dynasty was both an enemy and ally of the Ottoman Empire. Stefan the Tall, the second ruler...

A bit of a weird (and I don't know how plausible) idea that came to my mind after hearing of how Saladin spared the first King of Cyprus (and King jure uxoris of Jerusalem) after capturing him at the Battle of Hattin. What If, instead of simply annexing almost the entirety of the lands of the...

For those who don't know, Kerbogha was the Turkish atabeg (leader) of Mosul who led an army to relieve the city of Antioch, which was besieged by the First Crusade, and, after it fell before his arrival, to retake it from them. Wikipedia provides two possible PODs which could've resulted in the...