I started of as the Sheikh Ma’an of Al-Mariyat of the Sumadíyun-dynasty, who is the only vassal of the Emir of Gharnataah. I always found the Iberian Peninsula to be an interesting place, especially its Muslim history and read beforehand quite a bit about the rise and fall of its Caliphate and the subsequent Taifa-states. So, the first objective was clear – to gain independence and eat my way fast enough through muslim Hispania, in order to survive the murderous infighting of the Taifa-states, while trying to fend of the Christian of the Leon / Castilla / Aragon / Navarra etc. While I grew in the south and subjugated my neighbours, I helped to roughly maintain the status quo in the North, the only major changes up until 1140 being, that Aragon was consumed by the Al-Hudi Emirate [Saragusta] and Leon expanding on the western flank a little bit southwards.
Since 1140 – the last 15 years – some big changes occurred. The HRE and France, who both had been the major allies of Iberian Christians, gained both a foothold in Hispanias north-eastern corner, the HRE controls now Tortoas and Lleida, while France did conquer Barcelona. Right after that – I was quite frightened by this development, because this did put the HRE in the range of holy wars against me – both fell into crisis, because they had to deal with several major revolts. I actively helped the HRE’s Italian independence revolt, by raiding its territories in Italy and crushing their scattered armies, which succeeded in consequence, so that all the merchant republics of Genoa, Pisa, Venezia and Pikentine [Ancona] are independent now, along with the duchies of Spoleto, Ravenna and some others.
Meanwhile, my muslim brothers successfully exploited this temporary unguardedness of the Christian kingdoms of Iberia and conquered them all besides the tiny Navarra, which is now the last remnant of genuine Iberian Christianity. This process finished in 1148. In the next two years I conquered county by county so that by 1150 I finally hit the 51% mark to recreate the “Malikate of Al-Andalus”. After more than 120 years, there once again ruled a Sunni Sultan on the Iberian Peninsula.
Yet I wasn’t rewarded with peace, as France, the HRE and its newly ally Denmark [+Norway] declared holy wars on the former Christian territories. Together they fielded 100k, while the combined strength of muslim Iberia plus its allies out of north Africa [me: 25k at that time] counted 45k. The AI enjoys a dubious fame, when it comes to cleverly fighting wars and this massive onslaught was no exception. But it felt heroic nonetheless: This inofficial crusade was decided in an epic battle, when my army of 25k lured the primary army of the HRE, which consisted of 35k, into the Pyrenean mountains. This battle served as a gigantic magnet, because both my allies and the other enemy armies stopped their current siege and came running to aid.
Thanks to CK II’s strange combat system, this decisive battle lasted for 45 days, in whose course my glorious Sultan / Malik Musa killed the HRE emperor in combat and took the French King hostage. In the end, 48k of Denmarks, the HRE’s and France’s men were dead, while me and my allies suffered only losses of 10k. In consequence, France withdrew from the war in exchange for the safe return of the king, while the HRE’s and Denmarks armies routed in several directions – all of them were hunted down and the peace on the Peninsula was restored once again.
Unfortunately, but not unexpected due to his old age, Malik Musa just passed away and his lunatic, badly educated [I have no idea what went wrong] son Utba ascended the throne of the Malikate of Al-Andalus. Thanks to his incompetence, my levy-count is reduced to 18k [before: 25k] and my demesme is too big by one. As I am taking things slow in order not to overstretch my power, I guess the pace of expansion will be slowed down, until I have recovered to my former strength, so that my vasalls don’t get any ideas. Yet this won’t mean that my army will get rusty swords, because at least the HRE is right now once again wasting men in the Pyreneas and I will envoy my vasall troops by ships to raid some Christian realms bordering the dangerous sea. The Viking age might be over, but this only means, that the scourge of Christianity has just changed its place of origin: Once it came out of north, now the ships appear in the south.
Here is a more detailed look of the corner of the world directly concerning me:
Besides the affairs directly involving my realm, some other things might be worthy of note:
(1) The HRE did, what I have seen it doing only in vanilla: it expanded into North Africa and took roughly nowadays Tunisia. Not forgetting its outpost in Muslim Hispania, this makes ‘Ifriqya’ its second overseas territory. Although there have been holy wars and even an Ismail’I djihad, the Fatimids were not able to reconquer this strip of land.
Yet, this expansion of Christianity into muslim lands is no exception: As you can see, Hvratska [Croatia] has conquered its personal colony as well, and there exists a nice kingdom of Jerusalem, after the second crusade succeeded. It is now ruled by king ‘Maél Brigte’ I. of house ‘Dùn Fhoitear’. If you never heard it before, don’t feel bad, I did neither, as the king of Alba – who I think had ‘won’ the crusade but wanted to keep his frosty kingdom in the north – granted the holy land to his most loyal veteran, who stood out in the battle for Jerusalem – at least this is what I imagine in my RP-mind. This guy was created out of nowhere and is the first of his dynasty. I blessed him with luck, because I don’t want Jerusalem gone after the next decade [This was actually the first time I saw a crusade in HIP succeed so I could witness it’s changed mechanism to grant the land. I like it!].
This alternate history is due to two facts, I think.
First – as to the HRE’s ability to spread into North Africa – the HRE launches its invasions of Sardinia/Corsica, which puts North Africa in holy-war range. I do not know, if this is intended.
Second, although not iron-man and I did not consciously turn it off via game-rule (is that even possible?) neither the HRE nor the ERE have to endure any imperial decay. This makes the ERE invincibly strong (60k atm) and stable, so they expanded into every direction a little bit. The same goes for the HRE. I also don’t think this is intended but at least in my case, it creates a considerable challenge, which I like. Yet I guess, if I wouldn’t interfer into the region, the muslim AI could not deal with it in the long-term, as their numerous failed attempts show, to reconquer the land lost. I have really no clue, what is causing imperial decay not to work, as I have a clean Cacao2 installed, with no other mods besides.
Third, the muslim world has no superpower who could play the role of the hegemon protecting the other realms. In the far east, Ghaznavids are small and the Selcuks have broken into ‘Khorasan’ and ‘Selcuklar’. These three are Sunni and they are battling ‘Buyi’ and ‘Parsa’, both Shia. The biggest muslim realm still are the Fatimids – still Ismaili -, but compared to their initial size in 1043, I think they have suffered losses in nearly every direction. North Africa has no true hegemon neither, that could lead the charge against the Christians. So, what keeps intrareligious diversity of the umma alive, by having many medium-sized realms, leads to islam slowly losing ground to the Christian onslaught. And the mongols are still to come, too. Yet I think, that given time and luck, I will be able to turn the tide around. I obviously plan on creating a muslim empire of Hispania and afterwards I want to conquer either Italy or France via an invasion, to drive Catholic MA into the ground. Maybe this already does the trick for Western Europes ambitions to expand south.
Here is a close-up of the Christian footholds in former muslim territory:
(2) On first glance, it looks like Hravtska somehow incorporated Norman strip of land in southern Italy. Yet, it was the other way round. I think it was in the 1120’s, when the last Hravtskan king died without an eligible son, which made his daughter ascend the throne, who was the wife of the then-leader of the Italian Normans. She died off and her son, an Italian Norman inherited both this Norman strip of land and the kingdom of Hravtska. Hravtska’s Italian belongings are still controlled by norman vasalls, as is Hravtska’s part of the Mediterraenean coast, which is the royal demesme. And Normans of house d'Hauteville stay true to their nordic martial heritage. Both Faramond I. & II. [epic names!] died in battle:
(3) Denmark is quite strong, and his king still has a weak claim of England. But he is 69 and I guess will die off without ever attempting to recreate the North-sea realm – which did exist in my game around 1080, for exactly two months, when the Danish king inherited England but succumbed to Consumption shortly after. Curse the elective succession, because that is what prevented England to fall into the lapse of the next Danish king.
England itself is boring as ever. Not so much happens there, besides there being now a revolt lead by the famous house of Westseax, but they are losing, so … everything stays the same.
(4) There are quite a lot, AI-created merchant republics, I think: There is Gotland, Utlande, Holstein, the islands in the channel in the north, and Pisa, Genoa, Venezia, Ragusa and Pikentine [Ancona] in the south.
(5) William the Conqueror did not achieve much. He never went for England and I really think he somehow should be more likely to do so. Yet, what is truely remarkable are his three sucessors: Herleva 'the Strange', Adelise 'the Cruel' and now Hermine 'the Just'. I did not follow the where-abouts of this astounding succession, but these three woman managed to conquer the whole of Britanny which makes the current duchesse of Normandie the most powerful vasall of the French king. Oh, I really hope they will gain independence one day or conquer the throne of France.
(6) Religious chaos prevails in the North-eastern edge of the map. Negus Marios ‘the Silent’ rules Mavi Turkestan and I have no idea, how he came there. Mavi Turkestan is the biggest remant of the once mighty Khumans, who around 1100 controlled everything from what is now Perm, Mokshet, Bolgar, and the greatest part of Khorasan. Then, under lead of their glorious Khan, they decided to settle down and became tribal – at this point still Tengri. Shortly after, the said Khan died, and since then I think every time I look into this corner of the world, they have a changed leader, their realm gets ever more bordergorish and religions of the new rulers come and go. There was Tengri in the beginning, followed by Orthodox, then Sunni, Zoroastrian [!] with no lasting effect and now … Coptic ?!. I really hope Dschinghis Khan will reimport order to that region …
And I guess, that’s about it.
I do really like my first 1043 start, especially the well balanced-muslim world, which indeed has some potential superpowers [Fatimids, Selcuks], but where is the raw-material for it to go in a completely other direction. I also enjoyed watching the southern Norman’s destiny as well as the first succeeded crusade. I am looking forward for the centuries to come!
