Chapter 11
The conquests of Mariam I the Conqueror
Mariam’s rule was a combination of extensive military ventures – whose high command was composed by her and a few trusted generals – and of great economic growth and reconstruction, handed mostly by the palace bureaucracy. During this period the Caliphate expanded into every direction: into the eastern areas of Persia, into North Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean, Armenia, Azerbaijan and the lands surrounding the Horn of Africa.
The Red Army in battle. Note the use of cannons in the distance.
While Mariam was decidedly what could be described as a ‘progressive’ monarch – as her support of the merchant class and of meritocratic appointments show – she did not lack the widespread religious zeal that characterized most of the Caliphate’s rulers. It is with her rule that we begin to see the Caliphate’s expansion into areas that were not traditionally held by Muslims, and the – mostly successful - attempts at conversions of said areas.
After true internal stability was achieved, she proceeded to conquer and submit the Black Sheep Turks, and with it bringing the last significant Shi’a populations under her control. Needless to say, a sect which at every point reneged her authority was not very well-received and its members were prosecuted to renege their faith. Colonies of Syrians were established among the mostly nomadic Turks, contributing to the conversion and assimilation of these nomadic cattle herders.
Almost simultaneously, large swathes of Timurid land were taken, establishing a line of defense that went all the way from Makran on the Persian Gulf to the Aral Sea.
The mountain ranges and deserts of Eastern Persia proved to be easily defendable, and would remain the Caliphate's eastern border for quite some time, while it was more focused on its Mediterranean ventures.
Seeing this rapid and decisive action by a supposedly ‘frail woman’ – while Mariam did not ride directly onto battle, she was a confessed tactical and logistical genius, having pushed for the adoption of standardized supply carriages which adapted nicely into rough cobblestone roads, and enhanced the efficiency of supply operations, and the later adoption of muskets as standard combat weapons – a group of Sheiks from the region of Adal, who found their possessions endangered by the encroachment of the Yemenite Kingdom – which had been, for over a decade, ‘exiled’ in Ethiopia – begged the Calipha to help them and defeat the Yemenites, who routinely descended from the Ethiopian Highlands to raid and pillage the lands and cities of the Somalis and Adalans – which relied on the Indian Ocean trade routes for their wealth.
General Zulqifar Jahagir, an adventurer who left his home in the Maghreb as a young man - at the time of its conquest by the Christians - to work as a mercenary for the highest bidder. Eventually he became an officer in the newly-formed Green Army. His sound tactical mind, good leadership and resourcefulness - which were to prove crucial during the campaign in Ethiopia - landed him promotion after promotion, eventually serving as a War Minister and general to Mariam I and shortly to her sucessor.
Knowing that these would-be allies were in dire straits and she could simply strangle their trade routes if she desired, Mariam compelled them to accept vassalage – which would later be replaced with full rule under a nominated governor, after the Caliphate’s position in the region had stabilized. Thus the Red and Green armies were dispatched under Zulqifar Jahagir (who had been given full control of the theatre, given its remoteness) to annihilate the Yemenite Kingdom.
What transpired was a difficult campaign, despite the Caliphate’s superiority in armament and discipline – the Yemenites were driven to conscript Christian Ethiopian auxiliaries, who, wary of their oppression, frequently mutinied. The war was mostly fought with ambushes and siege warfare along the narrow passes of the mountains. The troops of the Red and Green armies eventually succeeded, however not without many deaths from pestilence and starvation in the barren Highlands. With the capture of Harer and the Yemenite Sultan, he was forced to swear vassalage and turn his kingdom into a protectorate, while ceding control of all coastal cities to the Caliphate.
The area around the Horn of Africa after the war, circa 1490.
Jahagir’s decision – as a plenipotentiary – is very much understandable. He knew that the populace would relentlessly rebel under direct rule, while they could be easily contained with – Yemenite – control closer to them, and that the Caliphate could not have a naval adversary who could easily blockade entry into the Red Sea – hence the conquest of all coastal territory surrounding the Horn of Africa, from Eritrea to Mogadishu. This joint rule of much of Eastern Africa lead to a rapid development of once-tribal areas and the adoption of Arabic culture and customs by the populace, along with widespread propagation of Islam.
With the Caliphate’s eastern and southern flanks secure, Mariam turned her attention to what would become her most lasting contribution to the Caliphate’s history: the beginning of the conquest of the lands surrounding the Mediterranean.
With her father’s timely decree (just shortly before his mysterious death) of creating a strong naval presence in the Mediterranean to prevent the widespread piracy conducted by the Knights of St. John, Mariam was left with a strong fleet, crewed mostly by inhabitants of the maritime Syrian cities – as had been the mighty fleets of Phoenicians under the Achaemenid rulers of ancient Persia - and Alexandria, fisherman and overseas traders by tradition.
The standard warship in the Mediterranean Fleet's arsenal during this time. A fusion of the European carrack design with the oars of a galley gave it both the heavy cannon and durability of the former, and the manouverabity and ability to sail against the wind of the latter.
In an unexpected move, Mariam, instead of contenting herself with playing on the defensive and responding to the roaming Christian ‘knights’, issued a full-on attack on the island of Malta, the Order’s stronghold. Using gigantic cannons together with a complete blockade of the island lead to the fall of the Knights’ citadels, and the entire garrison – which had surrendered and included the Grandmaster and all high officials of the order – was put to death for the crime of piracy.
The Order's Grandmaster, Philipe de Anjou, in face of a losing battle, makes the decision to surrender.
The proceeds from the looting of the Order’s treasury – mostly the result of raids on Muslim shipping and coastal areas – were to be given to their former owners, but the administrative limitations of the era, a shortage of cash in the Caliphate’s aerarum and the desire to maintain the army’s goodwill led to it being more or less split between the Caliphate’s treasury and the army officers, who were instructed to split it among themselves and the soldiers.
Although the Calipha was well, the Calipha and therefore the protector of Muslims, the destruction of the Order of Saint John led to the Caliphate being increasingly recognized as the Muslim power
par excellence; this was also due to the sad fall of the North African sultanates at the hands of Spaniards, and the demise of the Ottomans into infighting.
The few remnants of the Order were received by the Orthodox bishop of Crete, and Mariam now understood that she would have to control the Mediterranean itself to ward off this menace.
This, coupled with a desire to liberate the Maghreb from Christian rule would lead to the Great Jihad against nearly all Christian powers on the Mediterranean – and even some outside it: the Kingdom of England and Aquitaine sent its formidable fleet to help its allies, but a precarious logistical position eventually led to its withdrawal – and the eventual declaration of the 11th* Crusade, headed by the Holy League – an alliance of Venice, Spain, Portugal, the Pope, the Kingdom of Austria-Sicily#, the Kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica, and all Italian Statesº except for Florenceª.
The Holy League's flag. The Holy League was an alliance composed of nearly all Christian states on the Mediterranean, who were very much threatened by the Caliphate's apparent intention of expanding its rule and influence to all corners of the Mediterraenian Sea.
The Mediterranean would soon be plunged into one of its most vicious wars, and the winner would control all. Thousands of empires rose and fell in the Mediterranean Basin. Would the Caliphate be just another one?
The Mediterranean Fleet leaves the port of Alexandria, to relieve a minor Venetian fleet's blockade of Patras, on the Peleponnese. They were surprised by a much larger force of 225 galleys, 6 galleasses and a vast array of pinnaces and other smaller ships. Outnumbered, cornered and nonplussed, hopes of victory seemed dim at the Battle of Lepanto
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Notes
* The failed 10th Crusade had been directed against the Caliphate some 20 years before. It was joined only by Castille, who sent tens of thousand of its men to die in the Libyan Desert. The 11th Crusade had one sole objective: the utter destruction of the Caliphate; recently revealed documents suggest that Judea and Jerusalem would be given to the Bishop of Rome, while the rest of the Levant would be allotted as trading colonies to the Italian States. Spain and Portugal would be free to partition Egypt and Arabia as they wished.
# The Habsburg main line had inherited Joan II of Anjou, Queen of the Two Sicilies, who died with no male heir and was pressured to marry her eldest daughter to Charles, the father of the then- current King. With the southern half of the kingdom of Austria-Sicily poised in the way of Islamic interests, the kingdom was, together with Spain and the Pope, the ones to first to push for the Holy League and the 11th Crusade.
ºThe Italian states which joined in the League were:
* The Pisan confederacy - a union of the various cities on the coast of Tuscany, from Lucca to Siena.
* The Most Serene Republic of Venice - which had been a resolute enemy of the Caliphate since it denied them trading rights on the Levant, reducing it to seek concessions from the fickle barbarians of the Golden Horde for an overland route to the spices and silks of the East.
* The Papal State - whose main contribution was in the naval sphere at the battle of Lepanto, since its armies were tied down fighting the Florentines.
* The Duchy of Savoy - whose ruler died on the taking of the isle of Corfu from the Caliphate, leading to the absortion of the rulerless Duchy by the French Crown, setting the stage for the War of Lombardy.
* The Margraviate of Ferrara - who sent ten galleys to the battle of Lepanto.
* The Duchy of Milan - who unsuccessfully tried to prevent the sacking of Rome in the Battle of the Tiber.
* The city-state of Genoa - who, after the loss of its overseas colonies (Azow, Kaffa, the isles of Lesbos and Corsica) sought to establish colonies in the Holy Land.
* The city of Cremona, where the League's treasury was located, and lent mostly finantial support in lieau of its lack of a navy or a substantial army; the large sums kept treasury were later plundered by the Milanese forces, desperate for funds and men at the beggining of the War of Lombardy.
ª The Florentine Republic, in a move that didn’t endear it to the rest of Christian World (for obvious reasons), declared war on the Papal States – becoming an unintentional ally of the Caliphate in the process - and gained the coast from the Po estuary to and including Ancona. The Republic, headed by the de Pazzi family, which had defeated the upstart de Medici family and exiled them to Genoa, was to play a preeminent role in the Peninsula’s politics from then on, managing to keep itself clear of trouble through clever diplomacy.