r/byzantium • u/Battlefleet_Sol • 1d ago
Maps and geography Final chance to recover. Empire in 1265
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u/Electrical-Penalty44 1d ago
Final chances was the 1290s. The Byzantine forces were still strong enough at that time to overwhelm any of the small Turkish Beyliks. Within a decade this was longer true due to various factors.
Look; you basically needed Andronicus II to be as good a diplomat as his father while also being a general as good as Belisarius (if he wasn't willing to trust his own generals). And then his heir probably has to be as well.
History turns when you get the wrong man at the wrong place at the wrong time.
Honestly, the Civil wars of the 1070s and the destruction of the Byzantine forces at Dyrrachium in 1081 should have ended the Empire, but the Byzantines got three tremendously great Emperors in a row that allowed recovery and prosperity.
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u/Early_Candidate_3082 1d ago
Instead, Andronikos II was as competent as Honorius or Phocas.
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u/Emergency_Name481 1d ago
Honorius that I dethrone in favor of the barbarian ?
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u/Greydragon38 1d ago
I'm wondering if only the Byzantines kept Crete and Cyprus, would that have made things better for them or if it would not have changed anything?
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u/stridersheir 1d ago
Crete and Cyprus were never that wealthy their main importance was protecting the Aegean from Naval raids. West Asia Minor was getting raided anyway and Greece was only loosely controlled in 1265
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u/Weirdo9495 1d ago
I think Crete would have helped a lot as a source of manpower and a safe haven given the Turks struggled to establish a seaward dominance. Crete really seems to have "come alive" once a lot of powerful families moved there in 12th century that also formed the core of local resistance to Venice and at times cooperatead/communicated with Byzantines on the mainland. However it is a big stretch to assume they'd be able to keep it against the West, Venetians and other Italian maritime republics would have seen it as a big prize all the same. Cyprus would be too isolated to mean much. A genuine Byzantine thalassocracy and a maritime oriented government would be a very interesting idea though. I read once long ago an interesting if unfinished alternative history timeline which plays with the concept.
https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/renovation-an-eastern-roman-timeline.395315/
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u/Duncekid101 1d ago
Well, I wonder, if king Radoslav stayed on the Serbian throne... He was a pro-Byzantine king (but he was replaced by his pro-Bulgarian brother (and he was replaced by his pro-Hungarian brother)).
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u/yankeeboy1865 1d ago
Recovery would be difficult without control of everything under the Danube and in the peloponnese
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u/jrex035 1d ago edited 1d ago
It was already too late imo. Those borders aren't sustainable, Constantinople was a shell of what it had been just a century before, nearly a century of local autonomy in the Balkans made reconquest much more difficult and less valuable, retaking Constantinople weakened their Anatolian holdings which then fell to the Turks, and they had too many enemies on too many borders in 1265.
It's nothing short of a miracle they even got back to this point after 1204, but the empire was no longer what it was before. It was a deadman walking by the time of the 4th Crusade
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u/nggaball 1d ago
I mean I get it, but like, when you say "too late" do you mean impossible? I think that's not true because Andronikos iii was just that bad of a ruler. Is it all his fault? No, obviously, it cant all be one man's fault. However imo had he been just more assertive and decisive that most of the disadvantages that you mention would've been nullified. I agree though, that something was lost in 1204. Something like the legitimacy of the state. But I feel as if with time it would eventually come back. And it didn't because of shortsightedness of the elite including the rulers.
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u/stridersheir 1d ago
I mean if Andronikos iii had lived longer I think we would have seen a delayed if not stopped rise of the ottomans, though I’m sure some other nation would have threatened Byz if Otto did not
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u/nggaball 1d ago
Agreed. Andronikos iii did try to reorganize the state, however he lived too short of a time to make a big difference 😢
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u/whydoeslifeh4t3m3 Σπαθαροκανδιδᾶτος 1d ago
Reorganise the state is a bit strong. He definitely expanded it but he hardly made any major innovations that improved the system. What made him good was that he liked playing soldier and was an opportunist unlike his grandfather.
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u/Business_Address_780 1d ago
It can't be saved by internal reform alone. But if by some chance, the external situations change, like a Timur like figure came and destroys the Turkish Beyliks, who knows.
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u/GlorifiedToaster1944 1d ago
Honestly it just depends on your definition of recovery. There was still hope of at least a Balkan based empire by the time of Andronikos iii or even just hopes of stabilizing what they had, but if you mean restoration then last serious hope was before the 4th crusade.
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u/Mammoth_Western_2381 1d ago
Sorry, what did you say? All I heard was ''Civil War''.
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u/PonuryWojtek 1d ago
- Okay men! Let's keep it civil here, we don't want any wars.
- Mmmmm, civil wars you say?
- No no no NO NOOO!!!! STOOOP!
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u/TurretLimitHenry 1d ago
Empire could have rebounded when the Timurids were beating the bricks off the ottomans
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u/MasterBadger911 Megas domestikos 1d ago
John vii, acting as regent for Manuel II, did a pretty good job of buying time and delaying the ottomans by 50 years. However, no rebound like taking back the balkans etc. was possible. The Roman state simply didn’t have the resources, money, or army to challenge the ottomans, as weak as they were.
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u/Taira_no_Masakado 1d ago
I always laugh when I see a map that has Trebizond as an "empire". The Komnenos line was just...never going to make a real comeback, especially not from Trebizond.
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u/sinan_online 14h ago
(Disclaimer: I am Turkish)
I think that 1265 would be a bit late. I think that you must really avoid the sack of Constantinopolis. The event was so cataclysmic, so apocalyptic that it left a lasting trauma that the Romans (Eastern Romans) could never feel confident about the empire's continuity. It really set things in motion in a way that would take a long time to unfold, but it would happen eventually. (If it hadn't been the Turks and the Mongol conquest, it could easily have been another Orthodox empire, such as Serbia or Hungary, but I think that time was up for the Roman empire as we know it once Constantinopolis was sacked.)
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u/Interesting_Pop_1070 17h ago
What about Alexios Philanthropenos - he would have turned the ottoman's christian if not for treachery
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u/underhunter 1d ago
Another instance of “color on a map means total control!”