Europe/North Africa/Avalon:
It seemed the power of the short-lived Catholic League was broken, as Austrian and Papal armies were decisively defeated in the battles of Rome, Salonika, and Venice. The occupation of the Eternal City itself was a humiliating blow to the entire Catholic world, and it left Byzantium as the unquestioned master of the eastern Mediterranean.
But Austria was merely beaten, and hardly destroyed.
Disgraced, Emperor Leopold abdicated in favor of his nephew, Maximilian. Emperor Maximilian I would prove to be the finest statesman and political leader of his generation. His first action was to shrewdly sign a peace treaty with Byzantium, returning the occupied Croatian lands in return for a large indemnity.
He used this indemnity to rebuild and reform the Radiant Cross brigades. The Austrian pistol was refined and perfected, allowing the Emperor’s cavalry to once again be the finest in Europe. The Emperor then signed a treaty of mutual defense with the Kingdoms of Tuscany and Milan, which had formed a royal marriage that culminated in a personal union of the two Italian kingdoms. (See below.)
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Austria swiftly marshaled her armies to prepare an intervention in the Bavarian Civil War, orchestrated by the Emperor himself.
After the dubious and costly victory at Bremen, Lord-Commander Luthor Bernhardt found himself unquestioned master of an enlarged, highly unstable Bavarian empire, one that stretched from southern Germany to the Baltic. He had great plans, indeed…and quietly encouraged by Austrian diplomats, he pronounced himself King Luthor I of Bavaria.
The Austrian reaction was outrage. A military officer, and the son of a merchant at that, declaring himself the head of a kingdom! Acting as a steward for Otto I was bad enough, but this was grounds for war! Austrian armies, carefully pre-positioned, stormed across the Bavarian border, and reached the Danube within a month. The shocked Bavarian army was quickly routed, and Munich was put under siege.
Knowing that the defenses (already weakened from Norse and Lothringen sieges) would not hold, Bernhardt withdrew to the north bank of the Danube, abandoning his capital to the advancing Austrian armies.
Even though his army was completely broken, the Lord-Commander still had powerful allies, including the Landgrave of Thuringia. Much of the old Saxon and Thuringian nobility (deposed by Otto) supported Luthor, as well as the North-German peasants who viewed him as a liberator from the Norse, Swedes and Mongolian hordes. Not to mention, he was a brilliant tactician. Reforming the core of his armies around the surviving Landsknecht regiments, he fought the Austrians to a standstill in central Germany. Leopold’s armies withdrew, having already secured their objective: the pro-Austrian lands of southern Germany.
Luthor himself created a conservative, militaristic monarchy in the north, evoking the old Bavarian loyalty to the Holy Roman Empire in his “pure German” nation, untainted by the Austrian-influenced, South German blood that had already intermingled with Slavs and Italians…or so he told his subjects. The nation of Greater Thuringia is very stable, nationalist, and incredibly racist, relying on bayonet rule but widely supported by the majority of the North German population. Already the so-called “Second Reich” has made many enemies, especially with the Norse and Austria.
Emperor Maximilian married his daughter to the now rescued, senile, and aging King Otto, who died within the year. His lands were quickly annexed to the Austrian throne, while a peripheral puppet state, the resurrected County Palatine, or Palatinate, was set up in the Rhineland, under a minor branch of the Austrian ruling house. Dominated by Austrian “advisors” in court and the military, it is mostly a buffer state against Westphalian or Lothringen expansion.
Having achieved what he wanted, Maximilian began to plot his next move…against Byzantium. (see below)
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In the power vacuum created during the collapse of Bavaria, Prague fell into chaos yet again. The end of the Confederacy (and resulting civil war) several years before had already purged the king, nobility, and any remnant of an upper class, so when Bavarian troops withdrew to the north, and were not immediately followed by Austrians, another period of infighting began. After several weeks, a large group of merchants and private citizens stepped into the chaos, organizing a militia that gained control over the city and its environs.
The “Council of Twelve,” as it would become known, rapidly reorganized the government, implementing a series of radical reforms. A semi-democratic system of government was implemented, based on the Genoan and Courlander models, and some public property was (*gasp*) redistributed to the peasants in small parcels. This system soon gained enthusiastic, even fanatical support from the Czechs, who were, frankly, sick of getting slaughtered by the latest Polish or German lord to claim their city.
So far, the “Republic of Bohemia” has been in a state of quiet preparation, frantically trying to play its powerful neighbors off one another. Neither Thuringia, Austria, or Poland wants the other to capture the city, but all sides detest the “plurocrats” equally…and after all, they are Czechs.
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To celebrate the recapture of Rome and unification of Hungary, Basilissa Tryphaina I Commenus held a month of lavish celebrations in Constantinople. Truly, the Roman Empire had reached a new zenith unseen since the days of Justinian…even if Greeks ruled it nowadays. The treasure of sacked Rome and Venice enriched Constantinople’s coffers, (
) and support for the Empire reached a new high in Greece, Bulgaria and Anatolia. But Catholics everywhere simmered with dissent against the brutality of the Mad Empress, as she was now branded, particularly in Rome, Dubrovnik, and Bucharest.
Having defeated Austria and Rome, subdued Egypt, and recovered Jerusalem, the Roman Empire readjusted itself to peace. Agreements of peace were signed with Austria, and persecution of Catholics largely ended, though this did little to please the Italians. Hungary and Palestine were fully integrated into the Empire, and the economy boomed from 1512-1525. Agriculture and industry expanded, a new banking system flourished, and the population of the core Imperial Thema swelled to new heights.
With economic prosperity came political reform. There were rumblings of dissent from the nobility in Constantinople when the Basilissa decreed universal male citizenship, and these increased when she unveiled a plan to give the Thema increased autonomy, but these were crushed with efficiency, as the few dissenting nobles were exiled to a small island in the Morea for their insolence.
The military was reformed as well, into Themata regiments for garrison duty and defensive operations, and Tagmata Legions for offensive operations. With the formation of the Tagmata, Rome (and her Empress) felt confident that she could weather whatever storm Fate might throw at her.
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Roman foreign policy oscillated from glorious victory to catastrophic defeat. In 1514, Galicia and the Horde again exploded into war, propelled by internal conflicts that tore open Eastern Europe.
Galicia, under Tsar Vasily II, had beaten back the Horde advance multiple times. The Third Battle of Kiev, fought only two weeks after Bremen, was a brutal conflict, with a large army of Kulikovans under the Tsar trying to relieve the city, while the Horde force desperately tried to breach the fortifications before they were surrounded. The walls of the city were finally breached, but not before over two thirds of the Horde’s army was pincered between the city’s defenders and the Tsar’s relief force. It was a crushing victory for the Galicians, which was followed by a false, temporary peace that neither side planned to keep.
When the Tsar relocated his capital to liberated Kiev, the Horde immediately prepared for another invasion. The vassals were marshaled, against the growing protests of the Kostromans and Courlanders, and the Cossacks were pressed into service once more. But significant tensions had slowly been developing throughout the land. Mamai Khan’s reforms had brought stability and control to the vast territories of the Golden Horde, but after his death the Great Reforms weren’t effectively maintained.
Mamai’s son, Kusai, was a brash and ambitious leader with none of the tact or patience of his father. Only the respect that the subject peoples of the Horde had for his chief advisor, Sayed Akhmad, the chief general and former second-in-command to Mamai himself, kept the simmering rebellions in check.
Historians would later exhume the buried corpse of Kusai, and determine that a “skeletal anomaly” may have caused frequent pressure on the young Khan’s brain, leading to infrequent seizures and bouts of unpredictability. At any rate, the war began with sporadic skirmishing on the Dnieper, both sides stalling for time as they waited for their allies to send support.
It was the Khan’s allies who made the first move, as a large force of Lithuanian cavalry attacked Poland under the Grand Duke Paweł (Pavel) Holszański, a young and popular noble who Mamai had shrewdly elevated to the throne, in one of the last actions before his death. The Lithuanian army, reformed and expanded since the German Wars, made steady gains against Poland, who had recently formed strong ties with Byzantium and Galicia, and recently declared for the Orthodox alliance. Though the initial battles went well for the Grand Duke, both Vasily and the Byzantines knew that it was a tactic to stall for time. Ignoring Poland for the moment, they prepared their strike.
The Byzantine navy sailed unchallenged into the Black Sea, eradicated what pitiful resistance the Horde “navy” had to offer, and blockaded the coast of Crimea.
As the Khan repositioned his troops south, Galicia unveiled their trump card: The betrayal of Courland and Kostroma. They were sick of being puppets with minimal to no gain, and especially hated handing their armies over to Mongol commanders. In the Battle of Narva, the unprepared northern army of the Horde was attacked from three sides, their footmen largely decimated by disciplined charges from the Kulikovans, and their retreat cut off by Courlander mercenary infanty.
In the south, the combined armies of Byzantium and Galicia began offensive operations. Elite Tagmata were landed along the coast of Crimea, while one hundred ships sailed into the Sea of Azov. The entire peninsula was soon secured, despite heavy resistance from the Cossack tribes who were heavily loyal to Kusai. A large Galician force under the Tsar himself swept north from the upper Dnieper to entrap the remnant of the Horde’s armies retreating south, and a combined Galician-Kostroman army liberated the ruins of Moskva in a bloody (and well-remembered) battle. The liberation of Russia had truly began.
It seemed that the only bright spot for the Horde in the whole war was Lithuania’s excellent performance against Poland. Largely ignored by Galicia and Courland, the Grand Duke pushed further and further into Polish lands. In the face of disaster, the aging King Sigismund largely failed to unify the fractious nobles, some of whom even defected to the Grand Duke’s cause, Pavel having a fairly good claim on the Polish throne himself. As an opportunistic Thuringian invasion crossed the Oder, all was lost for Poland…but none of this really affected the main theatre, anyways, and Byzantium was happy to let a (somewhat) Orthodox nation run rampant over a Catholic one.
At this point the Khan, whose management of the war had been…less than stellar so far, really lost it. Flying into a blind rage after hearing of the loss of Crimea and Muscovy, he drew his sword on his chief advisor, none other than Warlord Akhmad himself. Amused by the poor attempts of the Khan to kill him, the experienced general quickly cut him down without blinking. The aging warrior walked out of the tent, told the guards that the Khan was drunk and didn’t want to be disturbed, and fled east.
The next day, pandemonium broke out. The Byzantines and Galicians were marching on the Don, with barely ten thousand Cossacks and an equally sized Horde force to oppose them. The dead Khan’s huge levy army was melting away, and the unstable ethnic mix of the Horde had slowly begun to fracture. Into this chaotic situation stepped Kusai’s younger brother Almat, who rapidly consolidated control over Sarai Berke and declared himself Khan. The coming battle on the river Don would be the last stand for the Horde’s dwindling armies.
Khan Almat arrived on the Don, where Galician forces were approaching from the north, and Byzantine troops were in the process of landing at the mouth of the river. The Battle of the Don was in reality two separate engagements that occurred over seven days. Almat committed only a small force of Cossacks to harass the Galicians, who were suffering from poor logistics and a campaign that stretched into winter. Then he brought the bulk of his force to attack the Byzantine beachhead by night. Unprepared for the sudden attack, and with only an unstable supply line stretching overseas to Crimea, the (still small) Byzantine force was driven back to their ships with heavy casualties.
Hearing of the Byzantine defeat to the south, Vasily decided to risk a quick crossing of the Don and go for the brass ring: Sarai Berke. But continued partisan attacks from the Cossacks along with horrible winter attrition delayed his advance, until Almat could bring up the bulk of his forces. The resulting battle (of mostly cavalry) would decimate both armies, and was a tactical stalemate. But Vasily was denied the strength to continue the invasion without support from Byzantium.
Almat had the initiative, and he chose to do something that no one expected: Convert to Orthodox Christianity, and call for an immediate cease-fire and negotiations. The Basilissa, surprised and somewhat unwilling to send more troops to the north, agreed.
The resulting peace treaty redrew almost all of Eastern Europe’s borders. Byzantium received the Crimea, minus the Genoan colony at Sebastopol, while Galicia annexed a large stretch of territory in eastern Ukraine, White Russia and the Baltic. Lithuania and conquered Poland were unified into the Kingdom of Lithuania and Poland, led by King Pavel I. Kostroma was rewarded with some minor border territories, which left them bitter and isolated as always…
The Golden Horde came out of the war with its army shattered, but its core territories mostly intact. But Khan Almat would have much greater challenges in the days ahead, namely a civil war. (see Asia)
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With the “Crimean War” an easy success, the Basilissa committed Byzantine troops to continued Mediterranean expansion. Supported by the Empire of Christian Spain, along with several indigenous Berber tribes, the forces of the Zayanid Sultanate were slowly pushing back those of the Hafsids, who had captured several traditionally Zayanid cities during the chaos after Andalusia’s collapse.
As usual, the Hafsids sent frantic pleas to Muwahhidun Egypt and Constantinople, both traditional supporters of their dynasty. The Roman Empire sent troops, to the joy of the Sultanate, but their joy turned to horror when disembarking Byzantine troops slaughtered the garrison of Tunis on their arrival. This began the long and painful annexation of Tunis and the surrounding Hafsid territory. Unwilling to break the Latin Pact, the Spanish encouraged the Zayanids to advance up to Tunisia, but no further.
The next five years would see Hafsid resistance gradually crushed, as the remaining partisans were driven into the desert or betrayed. But Roman soldiers took heavy casualties to attrition and disease, even as Tunis was rebuilt and renovated at great expense to become the “third city of the Empire”. To Roman annoyance, Egyptian soldiers overran Cyrenaica, and hastily built a line of forts to secure the territory.
The Roman Empire’s power began to eclipse in 1528. Ever-larger garrisons were sent to the outer territories in Africa and Palestine, and corruption within the newly formed banking system led to, among other things, financial panic in Constantinople, and a brief wave of riots against Jews, on whom the Basilissa shrewdly blamed the corruption to redirect criticism away from her appointed officials. As domestic instability grew, the Gilanid Shahdom of Persia succumbed to a massive invasion from the north, (see Asia,) and practically begged the Basilissa for assistance.
As a combined Romano-Persian army was annihilated at the gates of Baghdad, the Basilissa showed increasing signs of instability. Conservative nobles in court, led by a faction supported by Andronikos, the Basilissa’s eldest son, attempted to seize power from the aging queen in a quiet coup. It succeeded, but not before Tryphaina and Andronikos sent conflicting orders to the garrisons in the outer Themata, throwing them into confusion.
Thus began the first crisis of the Commenid Dynasty.
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Emperor Maximilian of Austria and King Alessandro of Tuscany declared joint war on the “Greek usurpers of Rome,” and supported by a wave of Catholic rebellions across Hungary and Italy, the newest round of Catholic-Orthodox conflict began.
The Catholic allies realized that a long-term victory against Constantinople was impossible, at least for now. But they used the advantages of surprise and (initially) superior numbers to inflict a series of harsh defeats on the Roman forces. As the Themata scrambled to put down the latest Neapolitan rebellion, the Florentine armies attacked directly for Rome, meeting the predictable Roman counterattack in full force.
Of course, this was a diversion, masterminded by General Machiavelli, the Florentine statesman turned military commander. An Austrian attack across the Po linked with a sweeping Florentine flanking movement to the northeast, eliminating the forward Byzantine garrisons and liberating the entire province of Romagna. The combined Austro-Florentine army swept south, to inflict another crushing defeat on the outnumbered Roman garrison forces at the Battle of Ancona. To exploit this, Machiavelli repositioned his forces west, to seize the crucial Apennine passes that led to Rome.
The quality of Austrian and Roman armies were equal, with the disciplined Greek infantry regiments superior to the German levies, but the Radiant Cross cavalry of the Austrians unchallenged by the Roman horse. The balance was tipped by a three to one advantage in numbers to Austria, combined with a wave of incredibly fierce Catholic insurrections that swept across Hungary and down into Croatia. The Basilissa had underestimated the hatred that the Sack of Rome had instigated.
The Austrians had also built a new, more powerful artillery corps that pounded the newly rebuilt walls of Bucharest and Dubrovnik into dust. As the major cities of Croatia and western Hungary steadily fell to the advancing Austrians, Leopold proposed a peace treaty to the embattled Emperor Andronikos. Wary of his political strength, and the need to preserve a collapsing Persia from complete defeat (see Asia,) the Emperor agreed to the Treaty of Bucharest.
Rome recognized the Austrian Emperor as “Grand Duke of Bucharest, and Crown Prince of Croatia,” while Andronikos was given the title “King of Hungary and Romania.” Hungary itself was divided evenly between Rome and Austria, while Croatia was ceded entirely to the Austrians. In Italy, Tuscany received Romagna, Ancona, and several other central Italian provinces, in return for a pledge not to attack Rome itself. The Catholics also gave Andronikos a large payment, reportedly 5,000,000 ducats, to “encourage” the Emperor to respect the peace.
In a way, Rome became more stable after the war, having lost their most vulnerable and strongly Catholic provinces, and gained a valuable North African province in return. Efforts were made to recreate Carthage as the “third city of the Empire,” and Greek colonists were sent to Tunisia and Palestine. But the Roman Empire now has a range of new problems to deal with, including the resurgent Muwahhiduns, a broken Persian ally, and the creation of a resurgent powerful Austria on their northern border.
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Having roughly tripled his homeland’s territory, Emperor Maximilian proudly declared the formation of the Holy German Empire, which terrified virtually everyone except Thuringia, who was merely enraged. Great new public works projects are now underway in Vienna and Munich, and Italian artisans have been hired to build a lavish cathedral in the capital. Though the “German Empire” has a powerful cultural identity, it also has to deal with potentially rebellious Italian, Hungarian, and Croatian minorities.
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The Norse ended their wars with an incredibly pyrrhic victory in Germany, protecting Denmark and the Netherlands at the expense of the finest Tredje corps in the army, as well as the life of the Emperor. Seeing the rising tide of dissent and emigration in Britain, Canute’s son and heir, Harold III, took power with a vow to end the Empire’s foreign adventures in Germany. For the next twenty years, the Norse Empire went into semi-isolation, focusing on domestic reforms.
Under pressure from his advisors and the nobility, Emperor Harold summoned a Great Storting (or Council) of nobles from Angland, Scotland, Norway and Denmark, with minor representatives from Sweden allowed to attend. After several months of negotiation, they drafted the Carta Libertatum, or Charter of Freedoms. It set down in codified form the rights and privileges given to the nobility, the Emperor, and the people. It also created a High Council, made up of 50 noblemen from the highest peerages in the land, and a Low Council, made up of 100 elected commoners. The Councils were given power to declare war and tax, though the Emperor retained the power to “request” such actions. The Low Council had very little real power, and could only amend laws proposed by the High Council.
The nobility came out very satisfied from the compromise, and the commoners accepted it, not really having any choice. Emperor Harold was reluctant to agree, but feared repeating his father’s disaster at Bremen. So, a new age in Norse society began: the Age of the Council. So far, the new combined government has pursued a policy of isolation, making no strong alliances
However, a growing sense of frustration is building among many nationalists, who believe that the Norse Empire is being shut out of Avalon. In response to this, the Emperor ordered a large expedition to Africa, where Norse traders set up a small slaving colony. The so-called “slave coast” could provide a major economic boon to the Norse, or one of their rivals, depending on which gains control of the slave trade. Currently Genoa has the largest share.
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Western Europe faced its first true crisis in the War of Breton Succession, which pitted unlikely allies against the Lion Throne of Toledo.
Despite the crushing Spanish victory over Aquitaine, Emperor Ferdinand was perfectly willing to reestablish an alliance with his defeated foe, King Gilles. The Spanish annexed Languedoc, but little else, and provided economic and military assistance to the resurgent Aquitanian power. With Toledo’s support firmly behind him, Gilles declared himself King of France, and the French monarchy restored. But the Norse Empire’s territories were far too heavily fortified to attack. The French turned their eyes towards Brittany, a former French dependency turned independent monarchy.
The crisis began when the Bretons received two royal marriage offers for the hand of King Eon’s daughter, from Ireland and France. The Bretons naturally accepted the Irish offer due to their strong alliance, dramatically insulting the French. When the aging King Ion died shortly after, placing full control of Brittany in his Irish wife’s hands, the French claimed foul play. The French declaration of war arrived in Gallimhe only one day after the crowns of Brittany and Ireland were declared to be in personal union.
Appealing to the Papacy, King Gilles requested support in a crusade against the heretic followers of the Irish Rite who were attempting to extend their control into Europe. The new Papacy (see below) heartily agreed, and pressured Spain to honor their alliance with the French. But Spain’s declaration of war on Ireland brought about something totally unexpected: Genoan intervention.
As the crisis over Brittany exploded, Spain and Genoa were involved in their own dispute. After a massive economic boom following the integration of Andalusia’s colonies into the Spanish Empire, rampant inflation had begun to rapidly deplete the treasury. Echoing the policies of extinct Andalusia, the Spanish monarchy issued a tax on all shipping passing through the Straits of Gibraltar, by tonnage. The Genoans were outraged, claiming the strait itself to be international waters, and ordered all merchant shipping to refuse Spanish ports. Once they did so, Emperor Ferdinand banned all Genoan shipping from passing through the straits entirely, crippling the Genoan economy and separating their colonial empire from the homeland. The Genoans sent messages to their captains, and prepared to strike.
When Spain declared war on Ireland, the Genoans declared war on Spain, and immediately launched an attack on Gibraltar.
Much of the Spanish Navy had taken to the seas to support Aquitaine’s invasion of Brittany, and to fend off the Irish. So the Genoans won a crushing victory over the thirty Spanish ships still guarding the straits, sending them fleeing into Gibraltar’s port. The Genoans reestablished their trading routes to the Americas, and occupied Cadiz after a two-week bombardment. Ferdinand’s rage was multiplied when the war spread to Avalon.
In the Alkaribi Sea, the Genoan navy ensued mass chaos, capturing gold and silver shipments, destroying island colonies, and raiding the larger islands. The Spanish diverted over half of their navy to protect the colonies, allowing the Irish more breathing room in the north.
The world’s first colonial land war was somewhat clumsy, as large groups of provincial militia were mustered, native Avalonians were bribed to support either side, and very few professional troops were involved.
The initial Irish-Breton invasion of Nouvelle Aquitaine was a disaster, as Five Nations guerilla fighters bought by French gold attacked and slaughtered a Breton militia attempting to attack the port of Chelais. (Near OTL Atlantic City) Meanwhile, a large Spanish fleet arrived and bombarded the small southern Irish colony, which refused to submit, storming the only sizable with a battalion of Tercios.
The war slowly settled into stalemate in both continents on land and sea. Franco-Spanish forces in Brittany proper got bogged down in a lengthy siege of Nantes, which was protected by fortified, entrenched artillery. Repeated charges eventually took the city, but at horrific cost for the attackers, who failed to advance beyond their initial gains.
At this stage in the war, unlucky Provence made the worst decision of its history, deciding to declare war on France due to the “usurpation of the rightful Angevin crown”. They had expected Genoan assistance, but none came. Realizing that Brittany was a lost cause, the Franco-Spanish alliance attacked Provence as a face-saving gesture with renewed vigor. The Provencal forces were decimated, having barely recovered from the last war. This time, their opportunistic gamble failed to pay off.
Eventually Emperor Ferdinand, who was beginning to feel the economic sting from Genoa’s control of the Straits, forced the unwilling French to the peace table. Genoa annexed the sugar islands of the Lesser Antilles, and Ireland’s union with Brittany was recognized, while Spain gained Ireland’s southern colony, and a promise from Ireland and Genoa that the remainder of North Avalon would be a Spanish domain. France annexed Avignon and a huge slice of Provencal territory, and reduced Provence to a small Duchy under virtual French control.
Both sides were unsatisfied with the compromise. Spain still feels insecure in the Americas, and Genoa fears losing control of their South Atlantic empire. Ireland is happy enough to absorb her Breton territories, but for how long…?
Lets hope Thy doesn't deliver similar much-hyped disappointments 
(Only kidding, but I guess I can't really be sure til we see updatage 
