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Chapter 3.23 The Peace of Ixbalanqué 451-506 CE
Chapter 3.23 The Peace of Ixbalanqué 451-506 CE


After the long rule of Ixbalanqué Christians were finally accepted into the Empire after the conquest of Carthage and the acceptance of Jesus into the Mayan Pantheon, this started a period known as “The Peace of Ixbalanqué”, tolerance of another faiths was common and even if the world around the Empire was engulfed in the flames of the Hunnic conquest of Europe the Mayans were more preoccupied about trade and prosperity than about war outside the borders of their lands.

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Ixbalanqué was succeeded by his son, who was crowned as Kuhul Ahau Tecun-Uman II, he was a wise young man that was best known for not meeting the beauty standards of the Mayan culture, his head had not been elongated during his childhood so his appearance was strange to the Imperial nobility and because of that he was nicknamed as “the ugly”. He would be remembered for his two most important reforms , the first by dividing the Empire into three viceroyalties; Lusitania, that encompassed most of the Iberian lands of the Empire, Mauria, that encompassed the North African coast of the Empire and Gaetulia, the desertic lands of the south inhabited by the Berber nomadic tribes.

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His second reform would be to ban cranial enlargement in the Empire.

He died in 466 CE and was succeeded by his son, who was crowned as Kuhul Ahau Ixbalanqué II

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Reign of Ixbalanqué II Q'uk'umatz 466- 501 CE​

The rule of Ixbalanqué II was peaceful and favored greater integration of the Christian subjects into the Empire, even if he faced some minor Visigothic revolts that were easily subdued.

The Council of New Tikal 472 CE

Even if the Mayans had accepted Christ as one of their demigods during the reign of Ixbalanqué I in they were not Christians in the proper sense, and had continued to worship their many gods, including Buluc Chabtan their god of war that had to be honored with sacrifice and even with the ban on human sacrifice proclaimed more than 30 years ago some Mayans continued with that practice in secret, to most scholars under the tutelage of the Kuhul Ahau seemed that the mixture between the old and the new ways was incompatible and a recipe for continuous religious tension in the Empire and great debates were held all over the Empire about the nature of their religion. After all, the changes made were too great and challenged a celestial order that had existed for millennia, if the Kuhul Ahau was now the biggest religious authority inside the Empire and most priests respected this fact, the lack of coherence between the diverse Imperial and regional beliefs was confusing at best.


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That’s why Ixbalanqué II summoned all priests of the Empire to a great council to be held in the Great Temple Complex of New Tikal, soon the Visigothic Fraticelli, Maya Old Icon (Maya-Christians) and Phoenician Nestorian priests and others from the minor faiths came to the Imperial Capital in great numbers and discussed the theological nature of their faiths for many weeks, at the end they agreed in some points for the sake of Imperial unity after the intervention of the Kuhul Ahau as the higher autority:

- Divine Hierarchy and syncretism:
Only one major God, now unnamed because of an ongoing trend among Christians about not naming their God. Some called him “El” but it was prohibited the use of the old “Itzamná” name because of heretic connotations that caused confusion among the people.

The mother of Christ was worshipped by Nestorians and Fraticelli but they didn’t agreed about the divine nature of her, Mayans had added her cult to their old cult of the Triple Goddess, a compromise was achieved and Ixchel was identified as Mary, this caused concern among the Nestorians and Fraticelli inside the Empire but they saw this as a necessary compromise to expand their influence.

Jesus Christ remained with central role it has in Christianism, with the expanded aspect of being the son of God and his sacrifice being the reason why human sacrifice was no longer necessary in the Celestial order. There was a huge discussion about the nature of Jesus with the Nestorians being supported by the Kuhul Ahau and their vision (Dyophysitism) as the official inside of the borders of the Empire, the Fraticelli protested but as they were the minority they lost the dispute.

The cult of Buluc Chabtan was banned and replaced with the cult of Saint Iacobus Boanerges (Saint James in otl), one of the followers of Jesus that came to New Tikal before the Mayan Invasion and created the first Christian churches in Iberia.

Many other minor Mayan cults were mixed or replaced with Christian Saints. But the Imperial Cult to Kukulkan, the Sky Serpent God related to the Imperial family line continued.

- Church Hierarchy:

The Churches would remain independent with only the contents of the Council being mandatory for all of them; there would be no outside authority on the Churches aside from the Kuhul Ahau.

After the end of the Council there where two major consequences to it:

The Visigothic Fraticelli revolted and they were quickly subdued, their leaders were decapitated instead of Crucified.

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The Balearic Islands, the epicenter of the Phoenician culture after the fall of Carthage became a center of learning during this period and many classical books were translated into Mayan, and after the Council they became more and more culturally relevant in the Empire.

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The Empire at the end of the Century

Ixbalanqué II reigned without further conflicts for the rest of his life until his death in 501 CE, after 35 years of almost complete peace. He was succeeded by his son, Butz-Chan.

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Reign of But-Chan Q'uk'umatz 501-505 CE​

Butz-Chan ruled for 4 years and died from a mysterious illness, we was succeeded by his 6 years old son Ixbalanqué III.

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Reign of Ixbalanqué III Q'uk'umatz 505-506 CE​

Who was in turn mysteriously murdered in 506, after only one year of rule.

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Reign of Pacal-Balam Q'uk'umatz 506- CE​

His five years old brother Pacal-Balam was crowned in 506 as the New Kuhul Ahau, but his reign did not lasted even one month and the viceroyalties revolted demanding independence, this time it was not a minor revolt of the southerners or the northerner Visigothic subjects of the Mayans ….instead was almost the entire Empire demanding independence.

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With a kid being the Kuhul Ahau and the Council having no other options the demands of the Imperial subjects were accepted and the Empire was shattered.

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The peace of Ixbalanqué lasted 55 years. Will the divided Mayan Kingdoms survive enough time until a strong ruler is capable of reunifying the Empire or they will end being conquered by the Huns?
 
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Oh my! Shattered empire is no good at all!
 
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I've missed this AAR so much.
This is certainly one of the most unique on whole site, and you put incredible work into it.

And it's inrecredible that empire which existed for so long and spilled so much blood, shattered so fast and bloddlessly...yet
 
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Oh my.

Did not see that coming.
 
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Oh my! Shattered empire is no good at all!
I think the successors can reunite it, but at the time the Mayan Army was too weak to wage war and they should preserve their forces in case the Huns attack.


It could be the basis of new nations in the future who knows :)

A lot of things can happen, Islam will appear in 100 years!


I've missed this AAR so much.
This is certainly one of the most unique on whole site, and you put incredible work into it.

And it's inrecredible that empire which existed for so long and spilled so much blood, shattered so fast and bloddlessly...yet
Thanks!, the Empire can still survive :D
 
Chapter 3.24 The First Ecumenical Council - Cagliari 500 CE
Chapter 3.24 The First Ecumenical Council - Cagliari 500 CE

The Hunnic Empire and the hordes that spawned from it were the dominant power in the Mediterranean for the past century. After many deaths and rebirths seemed like they would conquer the entire world if nobody interfered on their path to total dominance.


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The Huns had almost lost 150 years ago and now they are stronger than ever, i have seen that Empire rise and fall 3 times but now... it seems like they are pushing for a WC...


Once the religion that united the Etruscans against their enemies from the East and for some time was widespread all across the Mediterranean , Christians were now being hunted down by their nomadic conquerors and were in the brink of extinction, the only place where they were safe was in what remained of the Mayan Empire…for now.

The Powerful Greek and Armenian Kingdoms of Anatolia had fell after being conquered by Askungur, better known as “the Monster of Vaspurakan” who settled his people in the region and ruled with a strong fist, Armenia had been expanding into Anatolia and with their military conquest they were converting their new subjects to Miaphysite Christianity, but now the future of their church was uncertain.

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The legendary Etruscans were conquered some decades ago and their lands were destroyed by the Ugekid hunnic Horde, their once great cities were abandoned by their inhabitants and their surviving nobility was reduced to slavery. It was an apocalyptic scenario with the entire population of many Etruscan cities being murdered and many works of art and literature burned and lost to history.

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The proud Gaulish peoples that had converted to the Fraticelli faith in the last century were conquered by Tat-Utyak and his horde which settled in the region and created the Kingdom of Aquitanica. The Gaulish became subjects of the former nomadic hordes, they experienced a better fate than the Etruscans and their cities and towns were just occupied by the Huns instead of being destroyed during the conquest.

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The Visighotic Kingdom of Tolosa fell after the horde of Alburia settled in their lands and that caused the surviving nobles to flee into many the Vandalic lands and also to the Mayan Empire.

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With Christianity in the brink of disappearing under the iron fist of the Huns, Pope Gregorius of the Fraticelli sent letters to all the surviving Cardinals and important leaders of the many Christian churches that survived the past century, his intent was to unify the faith and stop it from disappearing or dividing even further, they reunited in Cagliari, the capital of the last remnant of the Vandalic Kingdom that had fell a decade before to a combination of Hunnic and Mayan invasions.

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All the Cardinals and Popes came with their followers and a great council was held, there were more than 100 priests and they discussed during three entire months about all the problems that their faith were facing in the wake of Hunnic supremacy, all over the Mediterranean churches were razed and many good Christians died trying to convert their conquerors to the true faith, they had become martyrs and symbols of Christian resistance.

The main point of discussion was the survival of the faith, but after some weeks of theological discussion they discovered that they were already starting to differ on many topics, the nature of Christ being the biggest polemic of them all.

That’s why they decided, after another month of discussions, to vote on the issues that they believed necessary for the survival of the faith.

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The fathers of the Church became "germanized" after the fall of Etruria, the Eastern popes got more votes as they are leaders of greater churches and all cardinals got a vote.

All of them agreed that the Pope should not vote as many of his powers would be discussed.

The main issues were (between parenthesis the difficulty of the reform, d12 being the dice to roll):

- Power of the Fraticelli Pope, a polemic in the last century was the power of the Pope appointed by the Etrurian Kings, in the wake of the Hunnic invasion the first Pope, Agapetus, excommunicated King Nepotianus II of Etruria, causing more problems amongs the Christian defenders of the Kingdom, many Cardinals believe that the Pope must be the first among the leaders of the Church and not “the king” of the Fraticelli ( the power to Excommunicate will be removed with d3, the power to grant divorce with d7, the power to grant claim with d7 and the request invasion with d7)



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Poor King, he was fighting the Huns in behalf of Christianity and got excommunicated.​


- Unity of all the Christian churches, this is a contested issue because the Eastern and Western churches developed independently of each other’s and the eastern ones don’t recognize the authority of the Fraticelli pope over them, at the same time, the Cardinals that have power inside the Mayan Empire don’t recognize the power of the Pope over their jurisdiction according to the Council of New Tikal of 472. (d10)- Terrenal power of the clergy, The Fraticelli Pope used to rule over the city of Rome at some point, and many priests that had led revolts against the Huns have gained lands and are recognized as rulers by their communities, can the Priests inherit? (d7)

- Nature of Christ, the biggest issue between the churches is the nature of Christ but the vote here was evenly divided to they agreed not to vote for the sake of the survival of the Church.

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Canons of the Council of Cagliari:

- The Fraticelli Pope cannot excommunicate temporal leaders
- The Fraticelli Pope cannot grant divorces and that power belongs to the local authorities and temporal laws according to each jurisdiction.
- The Fraticelli Pope can grant claims on temporal leaders if there are legal issues involved.
- The Fraticelli Pope can also grant invasion claims on heretic rulers.
- The legal jurisdiction of the Christian churches will remain as of now.
- The Priests must remain as spiritual leaders and cannot inherit.

It was agreed that more Councils should be organized in the future to settle more theological issues in the future and that Christians should work for the survival of the faith on these difficult and almost apocalyptic times, they also agreed on send more priests to the Mayan Empire, the only "Christian" realm that had an actual army to liberate the rest of the world from Hunnic Tyranny.

Will the divided and oppressed Christians be able to survive this era?
 
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Chapter 3.25 Seeds of War 506-518 CE
Chapter 3.25 Seeds of War 506-518 CE

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Reign of Pacal-Balam Q’uk’umatz 506-516 CE​



Ispal, 516 CE

The city of Ispal became a bustling city after a great wave of Etruscan Migrants settled there five decades ago; the Mayan Empire continued to prosper in the decade after the fragmentation aided by this revitalizing wave of new migrants coming from the fallen Christian Kingdoms of the east.

Benigna, a lowborn Etruscan woman that spoke many languages had married a local Etruscan merchant and thanks to his connections to the Fraticelli church and maybe following a hidden agenda she was allowed to access the Imperial Court and over time had gained the important position of court tutor in an increasingly pluralistic Mayan Society of the 6th century.


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Many Christians migrated to the Mayan Empire fleeing from oppression

Thanks to her position she directed the education of the young Kuhul Ahau and his brother and heir Balam-Quitze among with their sisters and many Mayan nobles on behalf of the ruling council. That was how the new generation of Mayan nobility learned to speak many of the languages of the Mediterranean, the politics of the world around them and how the “demonic Hunnic hordes” destroyed the Christian Kingdoms of the east, from Etruria to the Armenian Empire of the east, the Huns spared no man, woman or child…and the Mayan Empire could be next if they became too confident or negligent.

The daughter of the court tutor, Marcia, was a promising student and quickly gained the admiration and friendship of the kids of the Imperial family, the kids were inseparable until their adolescence, then the character of Pacal-Balam changed as he was being trained to become the new Kuhul Ahau and he became more and more distant from his group of friends and the relationship between the next Kuhul Ahau and his heir became increasingly sour as both fell in love with Marcia and competed to see who would be married to her, the Council of Regency wanted a political marriage for Pacal-Balam and tried to convince the young man into accepting that plan but he instead planned to marry one of his sisters to the new Khagan of the Hunnic Empire, he chose Itzayana to fill that role as she was the political ally of Balam-Quitzé and his biggest enemy in court.

Itzayana tried to protest the decision but every noble was swayed by the opportunity to forge an Alliance with the easterners and she lacked the support in the court to stop his hated brother from marrying her to the enemies of Christianity in return from a temporary alliance.


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Balam-Quitzé was outraged, he would not only lose his beloved Marcia to his brother, he also would lose his sister Itzayana and she would end living in the other side of the world and married to a barbarian. He was then exiled to Mallorca to stop him from planning any crazy idea; there were only months for the coronation of his brother after all.

A week later the uncrowned Pacal-Balam was hunting with his most trusted advisors and his beloved sister Nicte-ha when he was murdered in a confusing incident.



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Reign of Balam-Quitzé Q’uk’umatz 516- CE​

Balam-Quitzé inherited the throne, pardoned everyone involved in the murder of the former Kuhul Ahau and after he came of age he invited the Fraticelli Pope to his wedding. It was the first time a foreign religious authority traveled to the Empire.


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His mother was a Nestorian Persian after all​

Following the example of his wife he converted to Fraticelli Christianity and organized a great ceremony for his Coronation where he was crowned by the Pope himself instead of a local priest, this novelty caused some commotion among the local nobles, but at this time and after the fragmentation of the Empire many of the noble houses were of non-Mayan origin so there was no unrest about this whole situation and the people celebrated anyways.

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After the celebrations ended he sent a letter to his sister Itzayana, Khatun of the Hunnic Empire and murderer of the former Kuhul Ahau to start negotiations to create an alliance between the Empires, a new age of cooperation between the two biggest Empires on the Mediterranean was about to begin…

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…But fist, he needed to conquer the lands his brother lost more than 10 years ago.


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In the former Viceroyalties of Mauria and Gaetulia the Maya-Berber culture replaced the old Maya, times are changing and they feel too distinct from the rest of their people to continue identifying with the old culture.
 
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Hmm interesting conversion... Does that mean Syncretic Mayan Old Icon Christianity is going to die out? In case of culture: Etruscan culture seems to gather more influence in Empire. Will it trigger some kind of changes in Imperial culture? Time will tell ;)
 
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Hmm interesting conversion... Does that mean Syncretic Mayan Old Icon Christianity is going to die out? In case of culture: Etruscan culture seems to gather more influence in Empire. Will it trigger some kind of changes in Imperial culture? Time will tell ;)
The Old Icon faith will survive in the more rural areas, i'm planning to give more independence to the Maya-Berber and see how they develop into something else. And about the Etruscans, they have to rebuilt the Empire they lost, we will see how they interact with the Maya in the future :p
 
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That is a very interesting development.
 
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Chapter 3.26 Seeds of War II, 518-524 CE
Chapter 3.26 Seeds of War II, 518-524 CE


Reign of Balam-Quitzé Q’uk’umatz 516-
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Constantius was only five years old when the last Etruscan King was sacrificed to the Germanic gods of the Ostrogoths after trying to protect his people from the eastern invaders in 472 CE. His parents were murdered in the violence that followed the conquest of Ravenna and he would have become a slave but he was saved by the Fraticelli priests who later educated him as one of their own. These were tumultuous times and most Christians lived in constant fear of being executed by the Hunnic authorities or sacrificed by the Ostrogothic chieftains that ruled the south of Italy.


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That was how the most powerful Empire in the west ended, with their King being sacrificed to the Germanic Gods.


Sometimes the Etruscan villages that accepted the rule of the Huns would be raided by another nomadic tribe and their inhabitants either murdered or sold as slaves, there was no certainty of survival and Christianity became a symbol of resistance against the tyranny of the conquerors, in this context many Fraticelli priests that in the past condemned violence became leaders of many peasant uprisings, and some of them even led bands that attacked slave camps to free their prisoners and send them to the Gallic and Vandalic Kingdoms that later were conquered too by other Hunnic hordes. Over time Constantius became one of these warrior-priests and continued with the sacred duty of his saviors, rescuing large numbers of civilians from the aggression and brutality of the pagans.


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Rome is being ruled by the Ostrogoths and the Pope somehow managed to continue living there.


For this reason, when he was chosen as the fifth Fraticelli Pope in 497 CE and after taking the name "Gregorius" he focused mainly on continuing with his work to save Christians, this time sending many communities to live within the Empire of the Atlanteans, which had unexpectedly become the last bastion of Christendom. After the First Ecumenical Council of 500 CE he realized that the theological divisions within his faith were about to completely destroy the organization he led and that both in the east and the west the pagans were beginning with a systematic extermination of their faith. Divided, Christians were easy prey for their enemies, but perhaps if they united under the banner of one leader they might have a chance of survival or at least what was what Pope Gregorious believed.

When the Kuhul Ahau of the Atlanteans asked him to preside over his coronation in 517 CE he felt that God had heard his prayers and immediately left for New Tikal to crown the leader he had been waiting for, but after spending a few months in the court of his host understood that it would be a more complicated task than he had thought, the "Mayans" (that's how the Atlanteans refer to themselves) did not wanted to wage war, they had even allowed their Empire to fragment in order to not have conflicts in these dangerous times.

To gain more power within the Empire, Pope Gregorius ordained several priests, and taking advantage of the death of some of the older Etruscan Cardinals he appointed the three most important priests in their replacement, now the Mayans would have influence in what remained of the Christianity and he, like the Pope, would have more support from the other Cardinals by having the support of the only Christian leader with a large army, Balam-Quitze Q'uk'umatz.

Now the task was to convince him to attack the Huns and to free the Christians under their yoke.

Fracitelli Christianism gained huge support after the conversion of the Kuhul Ahau but still most nobles were wary of embracing a foreign faith, to combat this, a great ceremony was held at one of the new Churches of the capital, there, the first son and Imperial heir was baptized by the newly appointed Cardinal Yaxum-Balam of Malaga as the first noble child to be baptized following the new rite, the Pope sanctioned the ritual and refused to perform it himself only because he wanted the local Cardinals to gain more political power in the Imperial Court.

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What followed was a campaign to peacefully convert the population of the major cities to the faith in order to gain support from all the foreign nations that were conquered by the Huns, this was an act to forge political alliances with the nobles of all the Mediterranean and hopefully after that, launch a campaign to retake their lands in the name of Christianity before the Huns ended up invading the Mayan Empire like they did with everyone else in the region. More and more Fraticelli priests traveled to the Empire and with them mercenaries and warriors that wanted to avenge their people.

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The Old Mayan religion and the Maya-Christians were expelled or converted in the old Imperial Capital, but there are a lot of people who refused to change their ways.


At the same time and going completely unnoticed inside the Empire the war against the Kingdom of Mauria to re-annex it into the Empire continued and until now and for the past two years the war did not had any big battle or disaster, it seemed like the two armies were avoiding each other and instead were conquering or reconquering the coastal towns of North Africa.

Then, in 521, the two armies clashed in the battle of Tizi Ouzou, the Imperial obtained an almost bloodless victory and the Maurians retreated into the mountains.

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After the victory of the Imperial forces discovered that the commander of the Maurians was a Hunnic noble in service of their Ahau, and that many Huns were already settling in the southern lands, this caused an huge uproar in the Imperial court and many saw this as a dangerous precedent.

While that war continued Tziquin Hunapuid of southern Lusitania usurped the Kingdom of Lusitania from their Phoenician Queen and retook a great amount of terrirory for the Empire without bloodshed, some nobles demanded that he should return the title to the Kuhul Ahau as tradition demanded but Balam-Quitze authorized the use of the title as hereditary instead as a Viceroyalty claiming that the House Hunapuid had blood ties with the House Q'uk'umatz as the founder of that house was the brother of Ixbalanqué I "the Architect".

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That was unexpected


With the Empire reunited and the armies ready for war the Pope tried to pressure the Kuhul Ahau into declaring war against the Huns to kick them out of Christian lands before they dared to invade what remained of Christianity.


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Gaetulia would remain independent and their Maya-Berber population has converted mostly to Mayan Christianism.


But he was unsuccessful at convincing the Kuhul Ahau about the neccesity of the war against the Huns, even after the Hunnic Khagan Sandlikh of Uldin was deposed and murdered by the new Khagan and he in turn imprisoned Itzayana the beloved sister of the Kuhul Ahau, Balam-Quitzé did not wished to go to war against an Empire that had never attacked his people or declared any hostility against the Mayan people.

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There goes my Alliance with the Huns...
 
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Chapter 3.27 The Great Hunnic War I , 526-528 CE
Chapter 3.27 The Great Hunnic War I , 526-528 CE


The Tuldilid Invasion of Mauria, 526

After all the warnings made by the Pope about the Hunnic threat were ignored, he continued with his pet project started some years ago when he visited the Wu Empire and created the first Christian churches in the east more than a decade before.

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Yeah, a 60+ old deaf man traveled all the way from Rome to China


From the contact with the easterners he learned that the Wu had fought against nomadic Empires many times and defeated them after making heroic efforts, the knowledge that nomads could be defeated filled him with hope and for that reason he prayed every day that God would illuminate the head of the Kuhul Ahau, the only leader in the west capable of recovering the lost lands at the hands of the Huns by being the only Christian with an army and a good financial base.

But it was useless, even if he convinced the Kuhul Ahau through his Etruscan wife ... the Maya and Phoenician nobles did not want to start a war against the Huns, partly because trade with the East was quite lucrative, partly because they did not want to send their own people into a senseless war.

But everything changed when the Tuldilid Horde attacked.

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Without warning.

Without provocation.


The Kuhul Ahau had tried to negotiate with the horde marching towards his Empire without success, he had even sent letters and envoys to the east without receiving answers or the envoys returning home, for years he had tried to create peace between the two biggest Empires of the Mediterranean and now the war the Pope had warned him about for years was a reality.

Throughout the Empire there were rumors that these were the end times and that the Huns were the antichrist made flesh, not only had Etruria, the Gallic Kingdoms, the Kingdom of the Vandals and many other Christian kingdoms fallen, also the pagans Northern German kingdoms had been conquered and became subjects of the bloodthirsty nomads. Peasant revolts raged throughout the recently unified Empire and various false prophets tried to take advantage of the widespread panic.

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One of the many, many revolts that happened in the same year.

But Balam-Quitzé was worried about other matters, while preparing his troops for the campaign ahead he learned that his beloved Marcia had been unfaithful to him with one of his Cardinals and his own mother in law and Spymaster who informed him about the issue, he could not believe what was happening and for a time he denied the whole situation because he still trusted his wife.

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After a painful week he quickly sent the Cardinal to the most miserable prison in the entire Empire, nobody could save the traitor from the Oubliette.

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These Cardinals do not understand their limits, this will show them

Without any other issue distracting him he dedicated all his time to the preparation of the war, the Huns were already sacking towns in their way to the Imperial Capital and he ordered his commanders to take the main army to intercept them at Benalmadena, a small coastal town in Malaga in the hope to delay their advance, he was receiving many letters from minor Christian rulers that wanted to aid him in the war against the Huns and he asked them in turn to send their troops to the capital and to bolster his forces he recruited mercenary companies and fortified the city.

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Even with the combined Visigothic, Etruscan, Phoenician and Mayan forces the Imperial armies were defeated at the Battle of Benalmadena and were forced to retreat into the Imperial Capital, there they could try to reorganize the army and make a counter attack to save the situation.

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For weeks the troops prepared the small coastal city of Ixbalanqué for the last stand of the Mayan Empire, all the defenders of the city knew that if they lost there…it would be the end of all. The priests blessed the soldiers while many civilians fled to North Africa in fear of the unspeakable things the Huns were known to do after they conquered any city or town. The Huns quickly appeared in the outskirts of the city as the Mayan commanders expected and the awaited battle started when the nomadic cavalry charged directly into the trenches and other traps prepared by the defenders.

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The battle lasted at least a month and the defenders used everything they had in their favor, the terrain, the proximity to a supply center, the fact than most of the Hunnic Horde had to cross a river and the numerical advantage to win the battle against the until now undefeated Huns.

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The only way to defeat these nomads its to stack all modifiers on my favor, Cavalry is op.

The Horde could not replace the more of two thousand men and horses they lost in the Battle of Ixbalanqué and the Imperial forces pursued their remaining armies across Iberia, this caused the invading Horde to surrender after two more devastating victories of the Mayans and their allies using the same strategy of using the terrain and waiting for the Huns to attack them, ending the war for good.




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The victory of Pope Gregorious “the Black”

New Tikal, Mayan Empire, 16 August 528​


The Huns, overconfident by their constant victories against the Christians were not prepared for what awaited them, the great Alliance of Christian peoples had achieved an unexpected victory against one of the lesser Hordes and now everyone knew it was a matter of time. For either the other hordes or the mighty Hunnic Empire to attempt to invade from the Mayan Empire, this time successfully.
Faced with this threat, the Kuhul Ahau had to make an important decision and believed he required the aid of all Christian nobles, for the same reason asked the Pope to summon all Christian nobles to his capital to discuss what to do next, after a week most of them arrived at New Tikal and for a few days they discussed plans and strategies to confront the enemies of Christendom once for all.

Pope Gregorious, showing that he had not abandoned the idea of directly invading the Hunnic Empire had convinced many that the only viable course of action was to create a Grand Alliance between all Christians to directly attack the enemies, taking advantage of the fact that they were always at war and that the Imperial troops had high morale after their recent victory against the nomads, this time the Kuhul Ahau agreed with this and ordered the recruitment of more men to his army, this time they will be attacking the Huns before they dared to return.


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I added a new CB to the mod, this one works like an invasion and will be used ONLY against the Huns in the Mediterranean, just to stop them from converting the entire world into Hunnic culture/Tengri religion and destroying any hint of diversity on this Megacampaign. I'll add some melting pots just in case i fail on this endeavor.
 
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I hope to see some fruit of Pope's eastern escapade in EU IV :)

The Hunnic general on the picture is Coptic, does it mean not all Huns are enemies of Christianity?

Great Idea with antihunnic CB it will definitely make world more diversed, but if they will remain powerful the melting pots is way to go.
Ironically Latin could be replaced with Hun/Xiongnu as the Lingua Franca of Middle Ages, but I hope they atleast convert from Tengri if that's the case :)
 
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The Hunnic general on the picture is Coptic, does it mean not all Huns are enemies of Christianity?
Huns are a pretty diverse group atm, some have even converted to the Germanic faith, the "enemy of christianity" thing its because they have been specifically exterminating all the Christian nations until now :p


Ironically Latin could be replaced with Hun/Xiongnu as the Lingua Franca of Middle Ages, but I hope they atleast convert from Tengri if that's the case :)
Just imagine Eurasia being just "Asia" in that case o_O , it could happen, Huns are OP.
 
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Chapter 3.28 The Great Hunnic War II 528-535 CE
Chapter 3.28 The Great Hunnic War II 528-535 CE


After divorcing his now ex-wife, the Kuhul Ahau married Katarina Hasdingi, a Vandal princess to strengthen the recent Alliance between the peoples who until a few decades ago were enemies but who had united in the face of the threat posed by the Huns. Pope Gregorius had a lot to do with this decision since Balam-Quitzé did not want to remarry after the disaster that her previous marriage meant to him.

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Vandals, from enemies to allies.

After the wedding many great warriors traveled to offer their services to the Mayan Empire, some came invited by the noble houses that wanted to strengthen their position in the Imperial court, but most of of them traveled invited by Balam-Quitzé himself because he wanted experts on the lands he was about to invade, the Mayan Army now had Ostrogoth, Visigoth, Vandal and Etruscan commanders and soldiers, something that would be considered impossible just a few generations before.

In the middle of the preparations to invade Sicily the Kuhul Ahau received sad news from the east, Itzayana, his sister and best friend died from Cancer in 529 while imprisoned by the Hunnic Khagan. This, added to the unfaithfulness of Marcia made him to become a drunkard and to indulge in food to escape the frustration.

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His best friend, and the failed alliance with the Huns.

To all this was added that in 529 the midst of the peasant revolts that continued to take place in the period, a group of traditionalists led by Ixbalanqué Q'uk'umatz, Balam-Quitzé's cousin, declared themselves in open rebellion against the crown offended by the Kuhul Ahau's abandonment of its role as a leader of faith in favor of foreign religions and conflicts.

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The old ways will never die

Although the traditionalists had become a minority over the decades, it did not took them much effort to recruit people for their revolt because many saw with bad eyes that the Empire was involved in a war of this size and trade with the east was interrupted by the conflict, for this reason they received a significant amount of donations to finance the campaign. Many more volunteers joined the revolt after the Kuhul Ahau in 530 showed complete indifference to the passing of the comet of Q'uk’umatz, a symbol of its own dynasty, this was deemed as a bad omen for the ruling dynasty and the Empire as a whole.


While that was happening the Imperial troops were invading the towns on the island of Sicily, but had to retreat towards the sea before the unrelenting advance of the enemy Horde. The troops were under strict orders not to engage the Hun on terrain that would allow the nomads to fight to their full potential as this would mean total defeat for the Mayans, and of course they obeyed this order and sailed to Italy.

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Never fight nomads on open plains! never!

After that the Imperial troops built their base of operations in the mountains of southern Italy, liberating the Ostrogoth peoples from the Hunnish yoke and adding new warriors for the cause of the Christians, this helped because due to the knowledge that they had of the territory and allowed the Huns to suffer their first defeats in the war, which were followed by many more due to the fact that the cavalry of the nomads could not deploy and abuse their mobility in the mountains where the Christian forces had taken refuge.

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My best ally is the AI, just imagine splitting your troops that way, i had no troops in North Africa.

As the war raged and the traditionalists grew strong in the mountains of North Africa, conspiracies and betrayals followed one after another, threatening to undo all the achievements of the armies fighting in the east, but luckily, none of the intrigues came to fruition and the conspirators would end their days imprisoned.


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Luckily for me, my heir survived and the traitors were exposed, a civil war on a middle of a war against the Huns would have destroyed all my hopes and dreams :)


After the end of a short but bloody civil war among the Huns and many other defeats inflicted upon them by the Mayans and their allies, Khagan Bu-Urgan II of the Hunnic Empire surrendered the south of Italy to the Christians in 535, apparently the nomads had too many conflicts at the time and he could not risk losing everything for some lands in the west and needed their troops back at home.

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The Huns have so many conflicts going on, that i can easily take advantage of that in the future.

With the second victory in the Great Hunnic war the south of Italy was added to the lands of the Mayan Empire but was given to the converted Ostrogoths so they can spend their time rebuilding the area and converting their own people, who had settled in these lands a long time ago. This was made with the approval of the Pope Gregorius “the Black” because the Ostrogoth, with a strong warrior culture were better as allies than as enemies.

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I will continue the war to the north, these Ugekid are dangerous.
 
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