Since the Accounting: A Chronicle of the Roman Khanate

Chapter 508 Four Constantines

There are 70 minutes left before the demise of the Song Dynasty

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It's not yet bright, but the lights outside the city are already bright.

Just now, several Varangians followed Queen Elizabeth to the celebration venue outside the city.

It may be that the tragic experience of that year left a deep impression on the decision-makers of the Purple Horde Khanate. Therefore, for a long time, the city defense layout of Dadu was not so much to prevent foreign enemies from invading, but to prevent internal strife. Run out in time when it appears. For example, there are several city gates that have always been controlled by Varyag rather than by specialized city defenders.

Sure enough, after the situation in the city, these convenience doors and the doors used for ceremonial purposes on weekdays came in handy.

This habit has been around for a long time. Even though the city later faced massive attacks from foreign enemies, the original thinking still left a profound impact.

When Guo Di re-planned the city, he also made suggestions to transform the city defenses and repair the city walls. He believed that the Theodosian walls were too ancient to keep up with the development of the modern era. Due to the limitations of technical conditions at the time, this kind of one-line wall was actually not suitable for displaying firepower, and the design of the arrow tower was also lagging behind. The defensive advantage of the boulder wall itself is limited to its huge size, and its actual efficiency is not high. It can be said to be a waste.

Therefore, he suggested repairing the original interior wall, demolishing various outbuildings behind the stone wall, and then using the stone wall as the core and adding rammed earth on both sides to thicken the wall. On the high ground of the city wall, a special thick circular earth platform was built to place heavy artillery. The low-lying areas are raised by filling with soil.

The huge amount of soil required for the project was excavated from the area between the inner and outer walls, and then the outer wall was expanded outward, so that a second moat could be formed between the two stepped walls. On weekdays, a bridge is used for traffic, but during the war, the bridge was demolished, and the two walls were connected by a hanging ladder set up by a crane. In this way, two problems can be solved at once.

However, this plan received almost no support from anyone. Everyone feels that this is a waste of money and has no benefit. In the eyes of the Khanate managers, this plan is good, but it just shouldn't be used here.

Although the name Dadu is very majestic, for a long time, the city's positioning was somewhat embarrassing. Because the core area of ​​the Purple Horde Khanate is in "Romania" in the north, not the Greek area. Moving here back then was purely for political purposes rather than economic and military needs.

Therefore, Dadu at that time was not only not a safe area in the central hinterland, but also a fortress on the southern front: the unwilling Greeks and Serbs in the west, the eyeing Turkmen forces in the east, and even the countless Italian and Greek pirates in the south continued to fight. threaten surrounding areas. In fact, it is a situation of "the great khan guarding the country".

During this period, Dadu did have high military needs. However, the problem with Theodosius's city wall was never that it had insufficient defensive effects - on the contrary, its problem was that it was too large.

As the forefront of the south, in the original strategy, there was no need to gather so many troops here.

Compared with the previous dynasties, the system of the Purple Horde Khanate is relatively stable. At least it can avoid the classic "Byzantine general problem" most of the time, and does not need to be so sensitive to the imperial army.

Moreover, the Thracian Plain is actually not that big, probably the size of Sili in the Han Dynasty. Even if the Great Khan is really required to guard the country, it does not mean that all the troops must be piled up in the city - the Han Dynasty did not stuff all the northern and southern armies into Chang'an. The neighboring provinces in the north can transfer people over at any time. It is much simpler militarily and logistically to station them dispersedly like this.

But the scope of Constantinople's city defense was too large, and it was very empty. It could be said that it had nothing but political influence. If it is other cities, they can still shrink - let's look at Chang'an. After the collapse of the late Tang Dynasty, the outer city and the palace city were abandoned, leaving only the imperial city as the new Chang'an city. However, the city defense facilities of Constantinople were basically located on the outer walls, and the palace city and the imperial city were not even clearly separated. The outer wall was extremely thick, and it did not collapse even if it was neglected. Following the example of the late Tang Dynasty, the time required to demolish city walls and build palace walls was enough to build a new city.

Therefore, this formed a chain: if you occupy the city, you have to defend it; to defend it, you have to invest a lot of troops; once you invest the troops, you can't eat food here in vain, you must have a supporting strategic plan; with supporting plan requires more logistical supplies and resource investment. In this way, it seems that they have only occupied one city, but in fact, the entire country's policy has been led southward.

Therefore, for a long time, there were many voices in the Khan's court who opposed moving the capital here, feeling that this city had kidnapped the country's strategy. Later, as trade resumed, these voices gradually died down. But the reluctance to invest here and the wariness of the local environment have always existed.

Therefore, Guo Di's plan is unlikely to be recognized by everyone - everyone thinks it is too big, and you want to make it even bigger. Isn't this asking everyone to accompany you to enjoy the wonders. Therefore, except for Guo Di, who was always interested in building cities everywhere, almost no one was interested in it.

In fact, his plan has basically never been implemented anywhere. After being rejected, he was shelved until Guo Di himself died.

The reason is also very simple: the Purple Horde Khanate does not need a fortress of this size. His enemies on land were mainly Europeans, and the Europeans' military system made it almost impossible for them to carry out large-scale attacks.

Battles on the border are often organized by the localities on both sides, and the maximum number is basically no more than a few hundred people. Further up, the only way for the big lord to come forward is to summon vassals and recruit mercenaries with great fanfare, literally letting the world know about it - only in this way can we attract more and better mercenaries, and the result may be more economical. Money.

Faced with this situation of individual transparency, the Purple Horde Khanate generally would not stick to its defense, but would also assemble its main forces and strive to solve the enemy in the field. Because our side can mobilize faster, it can maintain its strategic advantage for a long time; and destroying the enemy in the field is much easier than attacking a city, which is more conducive to the use of their cavalry.

Therefore, the result is that everyone thinks that this kind of city defense is not needed in small battles, and in big battles it is the army of the Purple Horde Khan who takes the initiative to fight in the field. If we lose the battle in the field...then we will be waiting for death in the city, but it will just delay for a little longer. It's better to give up on such a big and useless city, go back to the grasslands to herd sheep, and look for opportunities to make a comeback.

Until now, there is not a single city defense force in the metropolis. Various battle groups and even the navy have stations in the city, and their relationships are complicated. Even though most of the garrison has now moved outside the city, many problems still remain.

The regular armed forces in the entire city are actually still "extroverted" and their thinking is still to prepare for going out to fight. In the event of an unexpected situation, without a unified legion headquarters to manage the situation, it would reach a level of chaos where it was impossible to even tell who should go to quell the chaos.

The only advantage this time was that after discovering that something had happened in the city, someone quickly informed the Queen Mother. Although she often ignores actual affairs, the Queen Mother responded very quickly this time. On the one hand, she sent people to rescue important people urgently; on the other hand, she quickly left the monastery where she was stationed. Without waiting for more people to gather or anyone to come to her, she took the initiative and took the risk to rush to the navy. 's camp.

In addition to the city gates controlled by Varyag, there is another entrance and exit not under the control of the traditional "city guards", which is the naval dock located in the Golden Horn.

If you really want to talk about it, the Golden Horn fleet is actually the "last Roman". Even after the complete decline of the Palaeolian dynasty, this small fleet still existed, and even launched an attack on the Genoese across the bay, forcing them to agree to relax conditions and distribute more money to the small Greek court in the city. This is also the last meaningful active attack for the entire dynasty.

As trade revived, the need for maritime power naturally increased rapidly. As a force that has always been relatively independent, although there are a large number of Greeks among its members, their relationship with various forces in the city has always been relatively delicate - the navy actually looks down on the old Greek nobles in the city to some extent, but it also has a close relationship with these long-term People engaged in trade will inevitably have contacts. But tonight, it was very quiet here, and there was no movement. It wasn't until some citizens were affected by the fire and began to flee toward the coast that the navy in the port reacted and made hurried preparations. Seeing this situation, the Queen Mother did not miss the opportunity and broke into the military port with a few followers.

Several leaders of the navy are not here. In the port, there are only camp guards and a few officers on duty. Several boats were training for night sailing and had just returned. The Queen Mother immediately requested that all the soldiers that could be summoned be gathered and go ashore to prepare for battle.

The officers were completely confused about this and felt that even if they were facing the enemy, they should get on the ship and go to sea. As for the shore, people should deal with it themselves. However, the leader of the small fleet returning home happened to be Shi Ke, the eldest grandson of the Shi family. He was relatively familiar with the Queen Mother, so he took the initiative to suppress the opposition and rowed two boats carrying naval guns over to the shore. While cruising, the gunners were on standby on the ship, ready to provide support at any time; while other sailors on duty were armed to control several important places outside the port.

Although the Queen Mother has always been indifferent and does not have many administrative contacts with other people, on the other hand, this also means that she is relatively neutral and has nothing to fear or doubt from others. Therefore, seeing him come out and take the initiative to take command - including, of course, the responsibility for the aftermath, the other officers no longer objected.

Afterwards, in accordance with the Queen Mother's request, he mobilized a speedboat to take the Queen Mother and her entourage directly along the waterway to the venue outside the city.

Here, she saw Queen Anna who was milling around anxiously, and everyone who was already drunk and unconscious. After taking a look at the others, she ignored her son and grandson who were sleeping soundly. Instead, she walked to the edge of the tent, where Prime Minister Wang was, and reached out to grab his hair.

"Old Wang, get up!"

However, Prime Minister Wang was also very drunk and completely ignored her. The Queen Mother stretched out a big hand and slapped him twice in the face of the unexpected looks of the guards. But even so, Prime Minister Wang just muttered dissatisfiedly, talking nonsense that he couldn't understand, and soon fell asleep again.

The Queen Mother was speechless for a moment, so she had no choice but to walk next to Bai Saihan and face him again - this time, everyone's eyes turned to astonishment.

"Why, have you never seen my mother beating her son?" The Queen Mother scolded: "Stop looking and call someone quickly!"

"You too." She glared at her daughter-in-law dissatisfied: "You have been watching from the side, how can you let him drink like this?"

"They are all drinking, I can't stop them at all." The queen defended.

"Your man can't stop him, and your men can't stop him either. What about your son?" The Queen Mother threw Bao Saihan on the table, walked to Tuo Huan, lifted his head up, and spanked him four times. : "Look, you actually let this kid pass out from drinking - how did you become such a mother that you can't even control your son!"

"Then you can't control your son..." the queen muttered.

The Queen Mother thought about it and found that what she said made sense. She blushed and was speechless for a moment. I had no choice but to excuse myself: "Well, I indulged them too much before, and I also have problems - but now, I can only hurry up and clean up their mess before talking about this."

She looked around again to see if anyone was still awake. As a result, she found a little boy at the tent door with his eyes wide open, looking at him curiously but cautiously.

"Hey, isn't this Constantine? Why did you end up here?" She complained casually: "These people are careless. Why are you taking care of children when you drink?"

"His father is in the tent opposite, and he must have drunk too much. I called him over before, hoping that he would greet everyone, but everyone else was already so drunk that they couldn't even salute. Let Jun Constantine took care of him, but he himself began to talk nonsense. There was no choice but to leave the boy waiting there for the time being."

"Oh, oh." The Queen Mother probably understood and could only shake her head: "Hey, look at how well-behaved my children are. They all have the same name, but why are their tempers so different..."

The queen had to explain that Constantine was actually a very common name. Tuo Huan is called this, Guo Kang is called this, and Zhu Wenkui's Christian name is also called this. Among the Greeks, of course, there are many names like this. This little boy was the queen's nephew, Constantine of the Palaiologos family.

People in their family are often either vain, arrogant or incompetent - of course, more often than not they are both. But this child has been smart since he was a child and has a calm personality. He doesn't look like this family.

His parents are probably aware of this to some extent. It just so happened that after all, Tuo Huan was also a relative of his, so he would look for opportunities from time to time to bring him over and get acquainted with Tuo Huan and others.

　It's almost the end of the twelve o'clock period, so I'll publish it in a separate volume later.

　　This can be considered an attempt, with experience and lessons learned. The amount of text in a single paper is not much higher than expected in the outline. It should be mainly because I was busy with graduation matters in the middle two months. The update frequency is too low, which seems very procrastinating. But in the future, you will probably know how to deal with it better.

　　In the short period of time at the beginning, I may have written a little too much about the settings, but at least the rest is within the plan, and there is no background introduction that will not be used in the short term. Moreover, in this book, I can no longer write about popular science. In fact, when it comes to popularizing science, just like the previous book, the first half of a chapter is all about that...

　　Of course, there was nothing we could do at that time. Although it has only been a few years, to be honest, the online trend has become really fast. When I first started writing, some people in the article said that Europeans eat with their hands, and some people thought I was deliberately smearing the West. When I wrote about the church, people said that (actually, I have always been a braggart about the church, and always said that the church is the beacon of European civilization...) At the most outrageous time, someone said that I was adulterous, and I posted the information, but someone said that he knew This is true, but we can’t speak ill of the West so directly, because casually exposing the shortcomings of the West will make everyone blindly arrogant and turn them back to the Qing Dynasty... There are all these...

　　So I keep reminding myself that we are actually a "small circle" here, and for this reason I may be too cautious. Anyway, please forgive me.

　　

　

(End of this chapter)