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The Fallen Eagle: A Byzantine Empire AAR

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A brief history of Imperial reforms from the 16th to early 18th centuries​

The Anathemization of Peter the Great, and consequential excommunication of Mikhael XI by the Russian Emperor had embroiled the two sides in a war that could easily last decades at that point. The Emperor in Constantinople however refused to revoke his anathemization of Peter unless he were to restore the rightful Patriarch of Moscow and return to the title Tsar. Peter was adamant about keeping both his title and his reforms to his Church however, condemning what he saw as Constantinople’s meddling in Russia’s internal affairs.

Though the nobility of the Imperial Senate were behind the Emperor to whom they owed their titles and their wealth, the old thematic nobility, who had been long since stripped of the land associated with them, were adamantly opposed to the war.
The thematic system had been out of use for several centuries, being replaced during the reign of the Komnenos Dynasty in the 12th century. After the reconquest of Constantinole in 1261 and the Empire’s slow recovery, further reforms were implemented.

Emperors in 16th century had realized the flaws in the Komnenian Army, one of the most major ones being that it required exceptional Emperors to properly maintain and use it effectively. The rise of Hussein Ibrahim as Grand Domestic partially showed the solution: Even though not all of the Emperors of the early 16th century were not considered competent, the Empire did not suffer the substantial losses that usually accompanied an incompetent ruler. On the contrary, it continued to expand in many cases, as Ibrahim’s genius as a commander continued to win the Empire battle after battle, even when assigned goals by militarily inept Emperors that most men would buckle under.

Ibrahim’s conquests revealed the solution to the problem: Even if the ruling Emperor lacked talent as a General, a competent and experienced Grand Domestic could compensate for this, assuming the Emperor did not overrule him.
It was in the 16th century that the Grand Domestics became free to act more independently, in order to suppress revolts, lead armies against incursions, and even go on the offensive if necessary without the Emperor’s direct authorization. While this increased the risk of a Grand Domestic becoming too independent and turning his army on Constantinople, this was mostly rectified by creating the Konstantinoypoli Tagma, which would remain in Thrace and answered directly to the Emperor.

A loyal Grand Domestic’s family was also substantially rewarded at the end of their service, granting them land, as well as titles of nobility, another reform. In an effort by Konstantinos XIII to further weaken the now defunct Thematic Nobility, he initiated social reforms which closely mirrored those of western and central Europe.
A great admirer of the Renaissance Art of Italy and the west in general, he brought many great works of art to Constantinople, filling both the Imperial Palace, as well as the Imperial Academy with its social etiquette and teachings.
The Thematic Komes were outraged when he, following the traditions of the west whom he admired so, reduced them to mere ‘lower nobility’, under the numerous Doux who greatly enjoyed flaunting their newfound power over the much older families.

By the 1720s the Thematic Komes were, for men of ancient nobility at least, an impoverished group with little real power within the Empire. They constantly had to pay heavy taxes to the Imperial treasury, even though they no longer ruled any lands, and received very little in exchange.
Things had only become worse for them after Zoe II. When Georgios II Komnenos attempted to seize Constantinople in 1612, the Thematic Komes sided with him, contributing all their wealth to his cause, which in turn helped him to raise a large army. When he was defeated by the Empress, she sent the Imperial army to take the Komes’ families hostage, threatening retribution against them should they attempt to oppose her rule again.

The Emperors were also extremely careful in not appointing any Grand Domestic’s from their ranks, or any who might have had connections to them. By doing this, they insured that only those loyal to them controlled the army.
Still, despite their lack of real political power, these Counts, longing for the days in which the Empire’s security and defense rested in their hands, would still often oppose the Palaiologid Emperors, sometimes threatening to not pay their taxes when the Imperial treasury was in desperate need of funds for a campaign of economic reform.
When the Emperor anathemized Peter the Great of Russia, they once again tried to combined their wealth together to bribe the Patriarch of Constantinople. Though individually poor, together they were able to gather 80,000 pounds worth from the 30 of them.

However the Patriarch refused, and in turn reported their attempted bribery to Emperor Mikhael XI. This resulted in him threatening to remove their titles altogether unless they gave the 80,000 pounds worth of ducats they were originally going to give the Patriarch to the treasury directly. For many of the Thematic counts, this money was all they could afford to gather, and giving it to the treasury would nearly bankrupt them.
Some of the Counts who could still just barely afford it chose to pay their piece of the 80,000, but many chose to refuse the Emperor’s demands and were in turn stripped of their ancient titles.

Out of the original 30, only 17 remained after this, the Emperor not bothering to replace them. The reaction of the many Doux within the Imperial Senate was ecstatic, as the Emperor gifted them with the wealth given to the treasury.
For the 17 Komes who remained, their hatred of the Palaiologid Dynasty was at its worst. Gradually throughout the 18th century the Emperors would continue to make ever increasing demands on these “Old Counts”, causing many more to go bankrupt, forced to sell their titles to the Emperor in order to gain support for their families. By the outbreak of the American Revolution in 1775, there were only 4 out of the original 30 left.

Despite the rather dastardly methods used by the first Palaiologid Emperor to obtain the throne, the Palaiologid Dynasty is considered by historians to be the greatest Dynasty in Byzantine History, as they were the first Emperors to truly reform the entire structure of the Empire, which it badly needed, in over 500 centuries.
This was not limited to just military reforms, but also social and administrative reforms, which resulted in many old and defunct offices and titles being officially abolished, and the workings of the Empire streamlined to make it an efficient modern state that rivaled both Britain and France at their height in the 18th century.

These extensive reforms ensured the Empire’s survival centuries after it should have fallen from internal corruption and civil wars. Most historians agree that it was this general openness to new ideas and its talent for effective reforms that allowed the Dynasty to stay on the throne longer than any that came before it in the history of the Empire…

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There you go. Read and reply. :) Speaking to Chief Ragusa, I realized that I needed to clarify just how much the Empire had changed from its Medieval days.
 
Wow the updates are really coming fast now. Nice to get a (brief) explanation on how the empire has been reformed over the past centuries.

This war with the russians has the possibility to get really intresting I think plus there hasen't been a good "war over religion" in some time now :D

I'll be waiting for the next update SeanB
 
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An interesting and inventive narrative, SeanB.

I think you are right in that a Byzantium that survived could not have done so with the creaking bloated bureuacracy. The Palaeoligid Emperors dealt with the problem most elegantly. The four Thematic Counts who remain must be extraordinarily resiliant.
 
Asidenos and Soltikov: Battle for Anatolia​

As the chill of winter receded with the onset of spring, Grand Domestic Georgios Curcuas ordered General Eustratios Asidenos to begin his offensive in the Caucasus. The young General commanded an army of roughly 50 - 60,000, on par with the Russian General Semen Soltikov’s force. He would not get the chance to make the first move, however.
Soltikov had stopped his advance after the battle of Kazak, fearful of his supplies becoming overextended, setting up camp around the recently occupied settlement. The population of the Caucasus is said to have been terrified of the Russians, hearing of their brutality towards the peoples that they conquered.

On April 24th, Soltikov began to march towards the west, though this went against his orders from Mikhail Golitsyn, who had commanded him to seize Armenia once the snow had thawed. However Soltikov believed this was simply Golitsyn wanting to take all the glory by leading the offensive into Anatolia once he finished in Crimea.
Seemingly eager for glory, Soltikov lead his 60,000 men into eastern Anatolia, seizing and looting the Kurdish town of Agri. He then attempted to press further west, hoping to be in Ankyra before summer according to his officer‘s journals.

However, though surprised by Soltikov’s attack on Anatolia, General Eustratios Asidenos allegedly retained his calm, marching his army directly in the path of Soltikov’s, essentially throwing down the gauntlet.
Soltikov, never one to pass up an opportunity for glory, confronted the Greek general near the city of Mus. Though at the time it might have seemed as if Asidenos had allowed Soltikov to push far too deep into Eastern Anatolia, pillaging and burning without any response, he had actually been allowing him to extend his supply lines ever further, making them vulnerable.

Soltikov had neglected to secure any naval ports in northern Anatolia, and so supplies had to come through the Caucasus by land. The people of the conquered lands met him with great hostility in the aftermath of the destruction his army brought with them, and it was the Russians who now began to find themselves in unfamiliar and unfriendly conditions at that point.
Prior to confronting Soltikov, General Asidenos had detached a small army of roughly 5,000 men from his main force and sent them into northeastern Anatolia. Soltikov’s scouts, not expecting Roman soldiers to be behind them failed to spot the small force’s advance, as it was much further to the north than they were instructed to cover.

On the eve of the battle between the two main forces, the small 5,000 man group neared the vital town of Tutak, seizing it without much resistance from the small Russian garrison left there. This cut the Russian army near Mus off from fresh supplies, though they had yet to realize the fact.
Rather than directly confronting the Russians, Asidenos chose maneuver his army in such a way as to avoid a decisive encounter with the Soltikov, only permitting his men to fight skirmishes with the enemy at most, making short, organized retreats if things became to intense.

Soltikov mistook this delaying tactic as an attempt to keep his army pinned down until more Greek reinforcements could arrive, and responded on May 9th by forcing an encounter with Asidenos, expecting his slight numerical advantage to win him the battle against his foe. Soltikov did this expecting to receive fresh supplies on the 10th, as his current stock was beginning to run low.
On the first day of fighting, Asidenos continued to be elusive, only fighting major encounters when he felt it was either to his advantage or unavoidable. Both sides performed well on the first day, with casualties for the Russians only slightly higher.

However when Soltikov’s expected supplies did not arrive, his army began losing morale, as ammunition for their cannon began running low, and rations had to be halved to go around. Asidenos continued avoiding a direct confrontation with his counterpart, as Soltikov continued to press him for a pitched battle.
By the 13th, the Russian cannon were almost completely out of ammunition, and morale within the army was plummeting, with rations now being scarce. Soltikov at this point must have known what had happened, as he attempted to order a retreat.

Sensing his chance, General Asidenos ordered his army to attack the withdrawing Russian army. Well supplied and fed, they pursued their Russian counterparts as they attempted to escape back to the Caucasus.
Asidenos sent word ahead to the 5,000 men at Tutak, ordering them to confront the Russian army in retreat. Despite their small numbers, they were more than capable of doing so as the main bulk of the Roman army was only a short distance behind that of their Russian foes.

The 5,000 men met the Russians near the village of Patnoc on the 15th, and succeeded in delaying them until the main Roman army could arrive, though suffering moderate casualties in doing so. At this point many of the men in the Russian army had not eaten in three days, enough rations being left for only the officers, and even that had to been strenuously divided. Many men had deserted, causing the Russian army to dwindle, losing the numerical superiority that was their only advantage over the Romans at that point. Starved, exhausted from marching and low on ammunition, the Russian army was no match for Asidenos.

Soltikov attempted to order a bayonet charge against Asidenos lines, hoping to force a wide enough breach to make some sort of retreat, but his tired and starving soldiers quickly broke in the face of concentrated Roman musket fire.
It was at this point that Asidenos ordered his Imperial Heavy Hussars to charge the center of Soltikov’s shaken army, the heavily armored horsemen tearing through the beleaguered ranks of the Russians. Following this, a massive rout ensued, as Russian soldiers threw down their weapons, stripping off their uniforms as they fled the field in hopes of escaping.

Soltikov managed to escape himself, accompanied by about 20 horsemen, fleeing back to the Caucasus in disgrace. Asidenos pursued the fleeing General out of Anatolia, continuing his advance all the way to Georgia.
By June 19th, most of the Imperial Caucasus had been liberated as miniscule Russian garrisons were easily defeated, making it mostly a long march. Soltikov managed to elude capture, retreating back into Russia. However he was quickly caught by Golitsyn and sentenced to death for going against his orders, leading to the destruction of his army.

General Eustratios Asidenos proved the Grand Domestic’s choice in appointing him to be a correct one, and for driving the Russians out of Anatolia and the Caucasus, he was awarded the land of one of the recently abolished Thematic Counts.
The victory in Anatolia restored the Caucasus to Imperial control, thus making an invasion of Russia possible besides through the Crimea. Emperor Peter the Great however remained staunch in his refusal to negotiate over his new title or his reforms to his Church. And in Constantinople, Emperor Mikhael XI Palaiologos began to worry about the war taking the same path as the previous one…

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There you go, read and reply. :)
 
I think that Mikhael XI is going to need this war to be a major success, else people will start thinking of it in the same way as the war with France. The burning of St. Petersburg should make the point.

One thing that I haven't seen considered: Unlike the last war, both sides are Orthodox. How would the religious aspect affect the opinion of John Q. Citizen?
 
The Emperors have got themselves into an impasse. Neither can really back down without losing face. Peter wants the title Tsar and Mikhael Xi his rights over the Orthodox Church. Mikhael can argue that the title Tsar is a version of Kaisar, wehich is an inferior title to Basileios He can concede that in exchange for the rights over Orthodoxy and the Crimea and land connecting the Crimea to the Imperial Caucasus. The Russians as vassals would be good, too but unless Curcuas can take the Capital, the Russians will not do that and it may not be possible to take the land and make them vassals. I hope Mikhael XI chooses to make Russia a vassal and then an ally.

Curcuas is appointing talented generals. That's a good start. A very well worked campaigh in eastern Anatolia.
 
this seems to me as if its going to be the first of many wars... my question is, where will Rome expand to in the late 18th and 19th centuries? Into Russia? or will it become a serious colonizing Power? or perhaps the rise of Rome that we've witnessed in this AAR will be followed by another regression.
 
While General Eustratios Asidenos had been fighting the Russians in Anatolia in the Spring of 1722, Grand Domestic Georgios Curcuas was attempting to invade Russia from the Crimea, through the narrow land bridge that linked it to the Ukraine.
However the winter had given the Russian army time to construct a strong fortification on the land bridge, under General Mikhail Golitsyn’s orders. Curcuas, despite his talents as a general was unable to find a way to reasonably breach these fortifications without suffering heavy casualties in the process.

However, the victory in Anatolia had opened up a new possibility for invasion. With an army of nearly 60,000 the young but talented Eustratios Asidenos had defeated a Russian force of similar proportions, and in the process had not only saved Anatolia, but the Caucasus from Russian rule. The remaining Russian army near the Roman Caucasus was now extremely weak, no longer a match for Asidenos’ army.
Seeing a new possibility for invasion opening up to him, Grand Domestic Curcuas took 50,000 troops from the Crimea, reassigning Asidenos to the 40,000 that remained, as he was the only one whom Curcuas trusted to hold back the Russians there.

The Grand Domestic, once his army joined with that in the Caucasus, had a force of roughly 110,000 men, considered a large army by even Russian standards for a single commander. The two armies met near Kerch, defeating the much smaller Russian force that protected the land bridge to the Caucasus there.
When Golitsyn learned of this maneuver by the Greeks, he quickly gathered new recruits from the surrounding lands, amassing a stunning army of over 140,000 men. However while this army was indeed massive, it was slow as a result, and Golitsyn was unable to respond to the Roman assaults against the Russian fortresses in the Caucasus.

The Imperial Army under the command of the Grand Domestic successfully took control of several important Russian forts in the area, the Russian army having very little presence remaining in the Caucasus after Soltikov’s defeat.
The Roman army looted what they needed but often left crops untouched when they had enough food and supplies. Much of this was due to direct orders by the Grand Domestic, as he knew how the hostility of the people of Anatolia helped to defeat Soltikov, and wished to avoid angering the native Cossack people of the region, fearful of their legendary skill as horsemen.

By August 2nd, the Roman army had advanced up to Rostov, Curcuas making sure to secure any coastal ports along the way to keep supplies coming by sea. However Golitsyn had now caught up to the Grand Domestic, ready with his larger force to drive the Greeks back into their home in the Mediterranean where they belonged...

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Eh, sorry about the small size of this one, it was a busy day. This is a lead up to the next post, a battle between the two main armies of both Empires. :)
 
The decisive battle of the campaign.You've given Curcuas the biggest army you can manage to scrape up and the Russians have raised another large force. Their abiitity to raise large numbers of troops and mesmerised obsession with the Caucasus is a real bugbear.
 
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I say again the speed that these updates are comin is great :D

A russian vassal may be to mutch for the empire to handel but since the emporer probobly wants great gains from this war to make his subjekts happy, I would think that making the black sea a roman lak would be enouf and it would remove the (small) threat of an russian naval invasion of constantinopel.

Glad to see your back in the writning proces again Sean.
 
Basileios I said:
How about making the empire a republic in the end? Something like the French revolution in the Eastern Empire. ;)
Click to expand...

NOOOO the emporer rules alone and no peasents (or anybody ells for that mather) will change that. :D

But it would proboly make a fun war to read about ;)
 
Hey SeanB!

I've only just caught up to this spot, and I have to say: this AAR is truly amazing! You've combined excellent writing skills with believeable characters, and a really tantalising "what if?" Plus the fact that you've been doing this since 2005 is also an achivement!

I am subscribing with extreme prejudice!

On the subject of having a revolution, that would be interesting, but I can't really see the conditions that caused the French rev occuring in the Autokratoria unless this war goes really badly and causes the Empire to go bankrupt etc
 
Wow, great AAR! Very enjoyable to read, and since I just started reading this yesterday, there was lots of great material to catch up on. In my opinion those awards were well-deserved, and hopefully there will be more awards in the future.
 
The Battle of Rostov​

The opposing Roman and Russian armies were separated by the Don river, which stretched from the black sea all the way up to central Russia, and was one of the major rivers of the Russian Empire.
The two armies themselves were lined along the river, near the town of Rostov. Both commanders were hesitant to attack as it would mean attempting to cross the rather deep river under enemy fire. However for Grand Domestic Georgios Curcuas there was little option. He was the one invading Russia, and he was the one who had to attack.

myrusrostovja7.gif

Positions of the two armies prior to August 11th.

It was already August, and in a few months the air would begin to cool as winter drew near. Knowing this, the Duke of Malta chose August 11th as the day of his attack. While this gave his troops little time to prepare for the battle itself, the Roman soldier of the era was well trained to face river crossings under enemy harassment as many such situations had arrived in the War of the Spanish Succession, prompting Curcuas to make an issue out of preparing his soldiers for future occurrences after the war.
The Grand Domestic had been involved in several river crossings in France personally, and had commanded several in Italy as well, both during the aforementioned war, and understood the principles well.

Mikhail Golitsyn himself had more experience in offensive campaigns rather than defensive ones, as he was responsible for conquering and devastating Swedish Finland during the Great Northern War.
His most notable victory was the battle of Storkyro where he completely destroyed the Finnish army, delivering the region into Russia’s hands until peace was made with Sweden several years later. The devastation he caused to Finland, unusually harsh even for the day, became known as the ‘Greater Wrath’.

Despite his failure to defend the Crimea, and his mistake in appointing the ambitious Soltikov to lead the Caucasus campaign, the Emperor, Peter, had yet to remove him from command, deciding to give him one last chance to crush the Romans.
Golitsyn must have been under an immense amount of pressure as the battle drew closer, as he knew he would surely be imprisoned and possibly tortured to death for his failures by the Russian Emperor if he were to lose.
There is some indication that Peter the Great was already preparing to take command of the Russian army in the event of a defeat at Rostov, as there was already an army of over 100,000 assembled near St. Petersburg, and under his direct command.

Grand Domestic and Duke of Malta Georgios Curcuas was also under immense pressure from Constantinople. Because of his failure to anticipate the Russian winter offensive in the Caucasus, the region, as well as parts of eastern Anatolia had been ravaged by the advancing Russian army, before it was defeated by Asidenos.
He was also a member of the “new nobility” that now made up the majority of the Dynatoi of the Empire. He represented them in the face of the Old Nobles, the old Counts, who, now inferior in status to men they once held real authority over, were secretly praying for his defeat.

The Emperor in Constantinople was hoping that a crushing victory at Rostov would force his rival in St. Petersburg to sue for peace on his terms and return to his old title of Tsar, and restore the Orthodox Church to its “proper functions”.
Peter, on the other hand, wanted to force the Emperor in Constantinople to acknowledge him as an equal and Co-Emperor of a sorts to the ancient Roman Legacy, and give him free reign over the functions of the Orthodox Church in Russia and the Far East in general.

The entire situation made tensions incredibly high for both Generals at Rostov, but for Mikhail Golitsyn especially, as his very life hinged on how he performed. On the morning of August 11th, the Roman cannon began a relentless barrage against the Russian position across the river as Grand Domestic Curcuas armies crossed the Don.
Using the cover provided by the cannon barrage, the soldiers waded through the relatively deep river, in the shallower part on foot with their muskets held above their heads, and in small wooden boats for deeper sections of the river.

In spite of the Roman cannon’s constant pounding of their position however, Golitsyn managed to send several regiments of skirmishers forward to harass and hinder the Romans as they attempted to cross the Don.
The Roman soldiers crossing the river were only able to respond with scattered shots from their straight marching lines, which proved ineffective against the skirmishers who were spaced out and firing in no particular formation.
The Russian cannon were also able to return fire, targeting the river itself and causing further chaos as mud and water were thrown high into the air around the crossing regiments with each impact.

Many Roman soldiers fell to the Russian skirmishers, their bodies being carried away by the river’s current. The sight of the comrades' bodies floating down the Don must have been a demoralizing sight for soldiers further down the river.
As several Greek regiments managed to cross the river they were able to form into proper firing lines, and in spite the casualties they suffered crossing the river, this proved to be effective in driving off the skirmishers who were no match for the disciplined fire that was brought against them, nor were they equipped to fight the bayonet armed soldiers who charged after them.

As more and more soldiers successfully crossed the river, Golitsyn withdrew his remaining skirmishers, and readied his men in their defensive fortifications. By 10 AM, most of the forward regiments had finished crossing the Don.
The situation that now faced Curcuas was how to attack Golitsyn’s defenses. The Russians had superior numbers, and they were the ones on the defensive, making an attack even more potentially disastrous.
Moreover, the Romans, though in supply, were in foreign land against an enemy who was surely better suited to the terrain than they.

The Grand Domestic knew that if he were to simply order a rash attack, his soldiers would be cut to pieces by the Russian's defenses, and then overran by their superior numbers afterwards. In this knowledge, the Duke of Malta ordered that his cannon be brought forward across the Don, in order to bring them directly in range of the Russian fortifications, making them thus able to blast open a path for his soldiers to exploit.
When Golitsyn saw this he became panicked, ordering nearly 40,000 of his men to leave their fortifications and go on the attack against the forward regiments who had crossed the river, and to destroy the cannon before they could be properly deployed.

The Grand Domestic ordered his forward regiments to hold their ground against the attack once word reached him of the Russian offensive. He then ordered several regiments of cavalry under Count Kalamodios Himarios to cross the river far to the east of Rostov where most of the army was concentrated.
As the Russian army clashed with their Greek foes, they were met with a staunch and determined resistance. Despite being hard pressed by the determined Russian advance, which included several strong bayonet charges by the tough and resilient northerners, the Greek line managed to hold, if only just, against the Slavic Horde.

Further east down the Don, the cavalry had crossed a shallow section of the river, under harassment by the Skirmishers in the area. However once on the other side they were able to quickly ride the thinly spread and slow firing soldiers down.
With most of his divisions concentrated further west, attempting to punch a hole in the Roman lines, Golitsyn was unable to quickly bring more forces to bear against the cavalry. However, he realized what the Grand Domestic had planned.
Knowing he planned for the cavalry to sweep around and cut off his advancing soldiers, he quickly ordered them to withdraw to the fortifications once more.

This maneuver on the Roman’s part however had proven valuable, as most of the cannon were successfully moved ashore on the other side of the river, while more regiments crossed the Don, establishing a more solid presence near Rostov.
Though the Russians maintained their numerical advantage with the successful withdrawal of Golitsyn’s attacking regiments, the Roman cannon soon opened fire on their fortifications, destroying the wooden structures and sending sharp splinters of wood flying in all directions, maiming many Russian soldiers and even killing some.
The Russian cannon returned fire, but the Roman’s position proved to be more flexible and fluid than that of their foes, who had to maintain a static defense.

After several hours of bombardment, the Duke of Malta ordered his army to begin its advance on the Russian’s battered defensive fortifications. At roughly 4:30 PM, the Greeks began their charge on the defenses of Rostov.
Even as Russian cannon hammered their advance, they remained strong, taking and returning fire as they grew close to the soldiers at the fortifications. Knowing they had to use the numbers they possessed wisely, Curcuas focused his best regiments on the weakest points within Rostov’s defensive line.

At the heart of this fighting was a detachment of the 19th legion, successor to the old 19th Regiment of the Stratos Italias in the War of the Spanish Succession. After he became Grand Domestic in 1714, he honored his old regiment by naming a new Tagma after it. Its numbers grew from a regiment of 1,000 to a full Tagma of 4,000 of the Empire’s most distinguished and elite soldiers.
Being a member of 19th Legion was considered a great honor and a symbol of pride by all within it. It first distinguished itself by crushing a much larger Spanish army of 10,000 men in Sicily during the Empire’s short involvement in the War of the Quadruple Alliance, and showed its elite title to not simply be for show.

The Grand Domestic naturally brought his best men along with him on the Russian campaign, as he knew he could depend on them to carry out any order he gave them to their last breath. He knew that their current task would certainly prove this.
The men of the 19th, in spite of being outnumbered nearly 3 to 1 fought fiercely, fighting into the Russian ranks with their bayonets, the sheer ferocity and skill shown by them causing many Russian soldiers to hesitate out of fear.
This hesitation allowed for more Greek regiments and Tagma to exploit the gap they made in the Russian line, flooding into the breach and forcing the Russian defenders back into the town of Rostov itself. The people of the town hid in their homes as the fighting took place all around them.

It is hard to imagine what must have been going through Golitsyn’s mind at that point. He would have had to have known that his army was in a desperate situation that was unlikely to improve once they had been pushed into the city.
Despite their superior numbers, he had been outmaneuvered by Curcuas, and as the fortifications began to be overran in more and more areas, the Russian army started to break and retreat in panic at their advancing foe.
Curcuas himself mounted his horse in order to lead a final push into Rostov, fighting along side his men with his saber.

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Golitsyn stood hunched over the table where the map of the battlefield was lain, red and blue army units on it representing the various divisions of each army. As reports came in they were moved slightly by his staff to keep him updated on the situation.
“We have lost the Church on the east bank. It has been occupied by the Greeks. Our soldiers in that area are retreating towards the center of town.” He said as a galloper entered and delivered the news to him, prompting him to replace a blue Russian figurine with a red Greek one, moving the blue closer to the center of Rostov on the map.

Golitsyn growled under his breath as he watched several Russian soldiers dash past the open door of the building he was using as his headquarters for the battle. He could hear the screams from outside, as many men had began fleeing from the town altogether.
The old General angrily slammed his fists on the table in a huff,
“I’m in command of an army of COWARDS!” He shouted, startling several of his officers, “We have numerical superiority, they are on our land, and we are defending! What more could they ask for?! If they would swallow their cowardice and fight on till the end, we couldn’t possibly lose!” He ranted as he angrily glared at the map.

Another galloper quickly rushed into the HQ, saluting the men around him before telling them the news he brought, “Sir, our soldiers are retreating from the marketplace near the north of town, as well as the granary to the west. Our officers report that the Rostov Cathedral is under heavy attack.”
As the galloper finished, a stunned Golitsyn could only stare ahead blankly as he slowly sat down in his seat. He could hear the sounds of musket fire in the distance. He knew that the fighting was growing ever closer.

“What is the overall status of our army, lieutenant?” Golitsyn asked somberly to the galloper who was watching one of the officers move the pieces on the map.
“The soldiers who are still within the fortifications to the south of the town are now trapped behind the enemy that is now within Rostov itself. Capture seems inevitable for them as they are surrounded. Our army within the town is still fighting, but many regiments have began retreating, some even surrendering. It would be a fair guess to say that we have at this point lost our numerical advantage, sir.” He said carefully.

Golitsyn simply sat there and listened to him as it all slowly sunk in. When one of his officers moved another piece on the map, his hand suddenly lashed out, swiping a great deal of pieces onto the floor in a fit of rage.
“Damn those bastards to hell!!” He shouted to the top of his lungs as more fleeing soldiers came rushing past the open door to his HQ.

Several hours later, the door to the building was now closed, and barricaded shut. The windows were closed, and all candlelights had been extinguished. The place seemed to be utterly deserted. Nobody had bothered to defend it, and it was relatively undamaged save for a few scars from stray musket shots.
At this point, the fighting was mostly over. The greatest majority of the Russian army had either retreated in panic or surrendered. And anything on the exterior that could show that this building had once been the command center had been removed.
The shutters slowly creaked in the wind as several members of the 19th legion stood outside, looking over the building.

The door suddenly shuddered as one of the men approached it, smashing it with the butt of his musket as he and his comrades attempted to force their way in. Eventually the door gave way and the men entered, quickly glancing around the room, their muskets ready in case any Russian soldiers were hiding inside.
“Hey, look at this guys.” One of the young soldiers said as he approached a table near the center of the room. “It’s a map of this area I think.” He finished as the others came rushing over to look at it.

“Look at those little men there, are those suppose to be us and the Slavs?” Another questioned as he looked the ones on the map, and in the floor. Suddenly, they thought they heard a rummaging in the closet nearby.
The men looked at each other, the Decarch of the group slowly approached the closet with two others, quickly smashing it open with his musket. What they saw inside they could hardly believe. It was Golitsyn, cowering in a ball at the back of the closet.
“I don’t believe it…He looks like a commanding officer, a really high one at that.” The Decarch said with a tone of shock and surprise.

“Come on, we have to bring him to the Domestic, he’ll know what to do with him.” he said as the two soldiers beside him grabbed him by the shoulders, as Golitsyn muttered in Russian to them as they forced him along….

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Through a series of maneuvers that took General Golitsyn by complete surprise, Grand Domestic Georgios Curcuas defeated the numerically superior and well fortified Golitsyn, dealing the Russians another crushing defeat.
One interesting fact worth noting is that Golitsyn himself was later captured after he was found hiding in a closet within his headquarters by a small group of soldiers after the battle. When brought to Curcuas, he was immediately identified and sent by ship to Constantinople as a prisoner. Some historians theorize that this was Golitsyn’s intention, as he feared what the Russian Emperor would do to him should he return in defeat.

Regardless, the Battle of Rostov ended in a Roman Victory in spite of the odds that they faced. Though casualties were relatively high on both sides, the outcome left little doubt on who won the battle. Out of an army of roughly 110,000, the Romans suffered around 7,500 casualties. While out of an army of 140,000, the Russians suffered over 22,000 casualties. This victory showed the Emperor in St. Petersburg that he could not afford to place his trust in anyone but himself, and after word of the battle reached him, he announced that he would be taking personal command of the entire Russian army in order to crush the Greek invaders…

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There you go, sorry for the wait but the length should make up for it. ;) Read and reply. :)
 
Another general sent to Constantinople. Curcuas is starting to make a habit of it. A great Roman victory, now for another(!) Russian army of 100000 and the Tsar himself. Not that the army Curcuas is fighting has been hammered out of existence, but I am sure a series of running encounters will achieve that objective.

Good to see the 19th at the point of the attack, once more. A tagma now, and still growing. There must be stiff competition for a place in that legion. They and the army will march on to teach the Russians a thing or two about Roman prowess.
 
Another stunning victory for the Romans! Can this winning streak continue though? I wonder who will choose where the final battle is pitched? If Peter manages to give battle on the plains, then he would be able to use numbers to his advantage...

Also, what do you plan to do after you defeat the Tsar in battle? Is there any way that you can guarantee that Russia won't threaten you, or that is has an obligation to be your ally?

btw Is there any way that I could get the Roman/Byzantine flag that you're using now as an avatar? Like the one that Chief Ragusa's using? Cos that would be really cool!
 
Scorched Earth and Schismatics​

Following Russia’s defeat at Rostov, the Russian Emperor, Peter the Great took personal command of Russia’s armies. Determined to not let his rival in Constantinople get the best of him, he gathered the defeated soldiers at Rostov and reassembled them in Moscow along with 100,000 troops from St. Petersburg.
The Tsar now had an army of over 180,000 at his command; an utterly massive army for the period, it would have been a true sight to behold. However Peter was not eager to confront the Roman Grand Domestic after the defeat of Golitsyn, as he recognized the skill of the Greek commander, and understood that more than brute force would be needed to win the war.

Following one of the oldest Russian traditions of war, the Russian Emperor ordered that the crops as well as any useful goods in the path of the advancing Roman Army be burnt and destroyed to prevent them being used by Curcuas.
Though the Grand Domestic had stayed well supplied due to being near the coast, he would now be forced to leave its safety and enter deep into inner-Russia, where the only supplies came across hundreds of miles of land. This made the exploitations of crops and other such necessities essential for any invading army.

When denied these, any large invading force would quickly find its supplies running dangerously low. This would cause starvation among the ranks, and could eventually lead to desertion and even mutiny against its commander.
Grand Domestic Curcuas however knew of many of the past wars that had been fought in Russia’s long and bloody history, and understood the risks of going into inner Russia. He sent letters to the Emperor in Constantinople asking him to not force him to attempt to push towards Moscow, but the Emperor refused.
The reasons for Mikhael XI’s refusal aren’t as unreasonable as they might at first seem. The Grand Domestic in one of his letters had urged the Emperor to allow him to simply stand his ground near Rostov, and compelled him to send Imperial governors to the occupied regions to rule them as Imperial Territories.

The Grand Domestic had hoped that such an action would provoke the Tsar into a rash attack against the Imperial Army, allowing him to defeat him, crippling their strongest army and forcing the Tsar to sue for peace.
However, this plan was highly dubious, as it relied on the Tsar falling for his trap and acting uncharacteristically foolish. The Russian Emperor, though he might have appeared to be somewhat overeager and rash, was actually quite clever, and not someone whom you could afford to underestimate even for a second.

Though Mikhael XI likely knew the great risks of trying to push to Moscow and St. Petersburg, the unfortunate truth was that they had no other choice. They could not force the Tsar to terms if they did not press on and put Russia‘s heartland at risk.
Though the Grand Domestic was reasonably against the orders to march further into Russia, he loyally obeyed and set out from Rostov on April 26th, 1723. His army, now slightly larger due to reinforcements from Anatolia held roughly 120,000 men. He hoped and prayed that the Tsar would choose to confront him directly rather than resort to Scorched Earth tactics.

His prayers went unanswered, as he witnessed the desolation of all of the crops and villages in his path. Though he had supplied his army as best he could before setting off from Rostov, he knew that would only carry them so far.
When they first set off, the Imperial Army had extremely high spirits. Having just defeated a much larger Russian army at Rostov, they were likely full of pride and vigor. It is likely that many of the soldiers in Curcuas army thought that they would be meeting the Russian army in the field again, where they would crush them one last and final time. Few would have understood the concept of scorched earth, and the risks that invading such a large country held.

Though the Grand Domestic’s army occupied such important fortresses and cities such as Tsaritsyn (The future Stalingrad) and Voronezh, the Russian army itself made little effort to oppose or stop them. However, it was hardly just a long march.
Added to the scorched earth tactics of the Russians, raiding bands of Cossack horsemen constantly raided the Imperial army as it made its way through Russia. These raids, combined with the onset of starvation and the gradual degradation of the army’s once high morale proved to be a deadly combination.

The greatest fear of the Duke of Malta was being stuck deep in Russia when the winter came. As harsh as things were at that point, he knew they would be ten times worse when the chill and frost swept over them.
To add to this fear, as they made their way deeper into Russia, the army itself began launching brief but consistent attacks on them. This had the affect of greatly delaying their progress towards Moscow, and further shaking the morale of the soldiers as the well supplied and rested Russian army used hit and run tactics against them.

To frustrate matters further, reports were being heard that the Russian army had continued to gather more men, and at that point had over 200,000 soldiers ready to descend upon them at the Tsar’s command.
As Spring turned to Summer, and Summer turned to fall, the Grand Domestic began to realize the futility of their march. The Russians outnumbered them vastly, and were well supplied within their own country. They were far away from home, and they were by August 1723 forced to ration their food into miniscule portions.
There had already been some desertions among the men, and morale was at the lowest he had ever seen within his own army.

The only tagma that did not suffer any desertions thus far was the 19th legion, the Grand Domestic’s elite force at the head of his army. Despite their own hunger, these hardened veterans offered much of their own rations to the rest of the army to keep them in fighting shape and to dissuade desertion among the ranks.
The men of the 19th considered their service to the Emperor and the Empire a sacred oath, and thought it their duty to die for their sake, be it by the enemy’s hands, or by hunger’s. Even as the other tagma marched with their heads lowered, it is said that the 19th continued to hold their heads high and even sang on the march.

But they were unfortunately the exception for the Roman army at that point. The truth was that the Grand Domestic was thinking about turning back before the winter chill set in, making a retreat almost as dangerous as continuing forward.
In Constantinople also, the Emperor’s iron resolve for victory was beginning to crack. The casualties suffered in previous battles were starting to cause some concern among the Bourgeoisie in the Imperial Parliament, and though it in itself was mostly powerless, it provided an outlet for them to address grievances with the sovereign.
One fear of the Emperor was that his Bourgeoisie supporters would turn against him, and together with those opposed to him withdraw their support and consequently their money from the war.

However, things in Russia were not as great as they appeared to be from the Roman perspective. The Tsar’s anathemization of the Emperor in Constantinople had sparked a great amount of dissent among the Russian nobility.
The nobility of Russia had been dealt some fairly hard blows by Peter, he had abolished the Boyar title, he had abolished their Duma, he had even turned the ancient hereditary nature of the Russian nobility into a sort of meritocracy. Titles of nobility would be granted to those who showed merit, and for their service to the Emperor.

This, coupled with the fear of a second schism in the Church coming from his anathemization of the Emperor in Constantinople, had many of the old nobility ready to revolt against Peter. The Tsar realized that the prolonging of this war could lead to him losing the stability he had fought so hard for.
Also, while the scorched earth tactic was great for defeating an invading enemy, it left the invaded country in question devastated, and the population hostile to its own rulers in many cases. The last thing the Russian Emperor wanted was for his people to support Curcuas.

With the fate of their largest army in question, and with his new found Empire threatening to erupt in civil war, the Russian and Roman Empire’s sent their foreign ministers to each others capitals to attempt to negotiate peace.
Both sides had their terms, some conflicting with the other sides naturally. Neither side wished to say that they were on the losing end of the war, and both were reluctant to give any large concessions to their foe.

However, near the end of September, they were able to reach a rather tenuous agreement. Peter I Romanov would keep his title of Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias, but would acknowledge the Emperor in Constantinople as the leader of the Orthodox Church. He would also restore the Patriarch of Moscow to his position, but Peter would retain authority over the Orthodox Church in Russia in the Roman Emperor‘s name.
This agreement was not truly to the liking of either sovereign, but the risk of this turning into a long and bloody war was enough to force both to give peace a chance.

Skirmishes between the Roman and Russian armies continued into late October, until the Treaty of Pest was signed in neutral Austrian territory by both sides, formally ending the war. Though a second schism had been avoided narrowly, the memory of how close they were to further dividing the True Faith stuck with the Imperial Courts of both countries for many decades to come, consequently ensuring the two Empire’s strived for better relations throughout the rest of the 18th century…

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And there you go. Read and reply. :)
 
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