Epilogue I: The Fate of Outremer
Outremer itself a French term that simply means "over seas". The word alone demonstrates how Europe once looked at the lands visited by crusaders in 1099. They were simply
somewhere else, an almost fantasy land in which Christian ideals took physical form in the struggle against both the harsh Saracens and even harsher landscape. Christendom would watch enthralled as some of the great dramas of the age were played out and towering actors such as Godfrey of Bouillon, Richard the Lionheart and Guy de Lusignan made their mark on the region.
But there are few processes that work solely one way. Just as Europe influenced events across the sea then so too did Outremer affect the affairs of Europe. As the map of the Levant was once again redrawn in the 14th century it permanently ended the Muslim threat to the West. At the same time the success of the crusades would bolster a militant Church still seeking to exert its influence and temporal powers over a reluctant Christendom.
Naturally however it was within the lands surrounding the Eastern Mediterranean the rise of Cyprus had the greatest impact. The fluid borders of medieval Outremer would be changed irrevocably in the space of a few short decades. For some this would bring opportunity, for others despair.
Armenia Minor
The rise of Cyprus in 1339 was mirrored by the fall of Armenia Minor to the armies of Eretnid in the same year. It was almost two decades later before its restoration as a duchy under Cyprus, and later Jerusalem. Efforts by various Armenian lords to remove themselves from the rule of Franks would continue for decades and take on an increasingly nationalist tone. It would take the disruption caused by the War of Two Crowns for these dreams to be finally realised. While never matching the power or influence of previous incarnations of the Kingdom of Armenia, the Armenians would nonetheless play an important role in Outremer politics for centuries to come. In particular clashes with the Turks that had settled throughout the other regions of historical Armenia would continue unabated and eventually escalate into genocide in the early years of the 20th century.
Baghdad
As one of two Muslim Emirate to survive the tumultuous decades, the other being Medina, Baghdad remained largely unaffected by the advances of either the Franks or Mongols. With the spectacular collapse of the Mamluk Sultanate Baghdad would once again be the centre of the Arab world… and its last bastion of power. Caught between the twin powers of Jerusalem and Il-Khanat the Emirate would survive uneasily until the eruption of civil war amongst the Mongols. The chaos that erupted throughout the Persia effectively destroyed trade in the region when the Emirs in Baghdad needed its income more than ever. With the trade routes migrating north the city and its lands slowly lost their importance and began to stagnate. Centuries later a backwater Baghdad would prove an easy target for the next wave of European imperialism.
Byzantium
Both Ioannes and Heraklios Palaiologos would join that select group of "Few Good Emperors" that dotted the downward trajectory of the Roman Empire. Under Palaiologos leadership the Empire's territorial shrinkage was arrested but, like past Emperors, the underlying problems facing the Empire remained untouched. The decrepit and decaying Imperial structures would be incapable of dealing with the rising Balkan powers of Serbia and Bulgaria or its own vassals. The early death of an heirless Heraklios in a hunting accident in 1392 would precipitate the final civil war as the various Princes scrambled for power. By the time the Bulgarian army led by Ivan Sratzimir entered Constantinople in 1453 the title of Emperor of the Romans existed solely on paper. The later centuries would see intermittent warfare between the various Aegean states until the emergence of a unified Greek state, comprising lands in Greece and Western Anatolia, following Napoleon's 1809 campaign in the region.
Siege of Constantinople 1453
Cyprus
Victory was not kind to Cyprus. The original campaign in Anatolia had been designed to safeguard the island's economic health. The success of Guy de Lusignan in re-establishing Christian rule on mainland Levant would do what the Turkish pirates never could have in destroying the island's economy. The reopening of ports in Acre, Tyre and Jaffa rendered Cyprus' strategic position obsolete and precipitated the mass migration of merchants and trading houses to the kingdom to the east. The War of Two Crowns saw the island's descent into an economic and political backwater complete as it was stripped of its kingdom status and relegated to a mere province within the Kingdom of Jerusalem.
Egypt
Despite the collapse of the Plantagenet empire in 1385, less than a decade after it had reached its peak with the addition of the French crown, English rule would continue in Egypt well into the 16th century. Ultimately it would be Henry VIII's formation of a Church of England that would lead to conflict. The distances from Westminster had bred a powerful and independent minded class of nobles who took offence to Henry's crude attempts to use the Patriarch of Alexandria to further his divorce from Rome. With Jerusalem's aid a new King of Egypt was elected in 1537. There was little that Henry could do but watch.
Il-Khanat
The devastating march of the Il-Khanat armies across both the Near East and Europe would shape the European world on a scale not seen since the fall of Rome. At its peak in 1375 the Khan controlled a vast expanse of land stretching from Persia to Lyon in France. As the Golden Horde slowly folded under Russian and Lithuanian pressure, the Holy Roman Empire disintegrated at the appearance of the Il-Khanat armies. After finally being halted at the Battle of Lyon in 1375, the Mongol advance would slowly be rolled back in a two decade campaign that would largely define the end of the 14th century.
The Mongol Horde Sweeps Through Europe
In the face of their first military setbacks in decades it was the turn of the Il-Khanat leadership to splinter and fragment. The process had already begun when Abagha of Esfahan eschewed tradition by dividing his lands amongst his two sons, Yakut and Tolun, on his death. The divisions would erupt into open warfare in1394 as dissatisfaction with Yakut's prosecution of the war in the West reached explosive levels. The resulting war would devastate vast tracts of Persia and the Near East and would ultimately result in the complete destruction of the unified Mongol horde. A century later all that remained of the mighty Khanate were over a dozen petty warlords warring with each other throughout Persia.
Mamluk Sultanate
The disintegration of the Mamluk Sultanate was one of the most significant processes in Near East history. Without the chronic instability within the Mamluk ranks it is doubtful as to whether the de Lusignans could ever have taken, much less hold, Jerusalem. The final campaign of 1368 destroyed the final bastion of Mamluk power and the last Sultan would die six years later in a small fishing village on the Libyan coast. Nothing would remain of the Mamluk's once dominant empire.
Religious Orders
Despite Guy de Lusignan's chequered history with the Orders both the Knights Hospitaller and Knights Templar would retain their holdings in the Levant. Neither would be permitted to amass the wealth or status that they once commanded however and without the Muslim threat their purpose slowly faded. In the absence of a frontier to police and guard both would eventually be reduced to elements of the Jerusalem honours system. The concept of military orders, and that of the holy warrior itself, was an anachronism that had no place in the new stable and secure society the de Lusignans would build around Jerusalem.
Artistic Depiction of Knight Hospitaller Returning Home