The Eagle of Eastern Europe

From the Roman Empire to the east, there are Anatolia and Syria, where the topography and climate have changed greatly. It has been less than 20 years since Rome resumed its rule here, so there are still many cultural traces from the Turkic tribes. But the culture of nomadic peoples disappeared quickly, and local people began to speak Romanian, but rarely spoke Turkic.

Yerevan, a border town of Rome. Goods passing through Tabriz will come here for circulation. Looking west from the highest point here, you can see the holy land of the Armenians-Mount Ararat. The legendary landing place of Noah's Ark.

Starting from Emperor Mircea, the Roman Empire built a long wall southward with Yerevan as the starting point. And arranged a large army to garrison. The Black Sheep Dynasty also realized that Rome was deliberately guarding against itself, and the relationship gradually cooled. But it couldn't do without the trade income with Rome, so it kept going on like this.

But this is not a long-term solution. After dealing with Zaraier, Yusuf found a place to break the deadlock, Georgia.

King Alexander, who shared the same name as the Roman crown prince, was unwilling to submit to Rome, so he looked for allies everywhere to break through his current status, but his geographical location could only allow him to find pagans to cooperate.

After failing to support the Komnenos family before, Georgia had been very well behaved. But when Peter came to power and was busy with the wars in Egypt and Western Europe, Alexander sent his army to attack Yerevan and Trebizond, attempting to create a fait accompli and force the other party to recognize his scope.

But the result was that he failed, and the local governor directly led people to beat up the Georgian army without the emperor's action. Listerine, who was in charge of national affairs in Constantinople, acted decisively and allowed the Trebizond and Yerevan armies to enter Georgia, forcing Alexander to live in Constantinople for two years.

Alexander regarded this period as a shame, and what was even more shameful was that Peter forcibly made Alexander a great nobleman of Rome after returning to Constantinople. This was equivalent to not recognizing Georgia's independence in disguise, but treating him as part of Rome.

Such humiliation made Alexander want to send troops to take revenge immediately, but Georgia and Rome were like an egg hitting a stone. Therefore, Alexander decided to develop eastward first, and he was overconfident with the Black Sheep Dynasty, so he decided to attack the Atropatene Kingdom in the west.

Atropatene was a theocratic state established by the previous Knights in Baku, named after the name before the rule of the Parthian Empire. They obeyed the orders of the Roman emperor and the teachings of the Patriarch of Constantinople, and took the spread of Orthodoxy as their mission, and attacked all around many times.

At this time, Atropatene had occupied a large area of ​​land including Baku, which was about the same as Azerbaijan in later generations. The leader of the country was concurrently served by the head of the Knights, and several departments were in charge of the country's military, economy, religion, and diplomacy.

At the local level, the method of enfeoffment was adopted. Each member of the Knights would receive a fief, and the soldiers who joined the army would also have a piece of arable land to cultivate. And the church would also have its own land, they hired farmers to cultivate it, and collected taxes and rents themselves. As long as the nobles who were here before converted to Orthodoxy, their property would remain unchanged.

Relying on the geographical location, this place quickly prospered. The local land is suitable for growing wheat and vegetables, and fishing is possible on the coast of the Caspian Sea. Atropatene constantly traded with other countries, and invited many missionaries from Rome to help local people convert. In 1416, the Patriarch of Constantinople officially approved Baku's upgrading to an archbishopric, and obtained the qualification to preach in Persia. After several years of development, Atropatene has become a country with a population of more than 700,000, and can devote more than 20,000 troops to foreign wars at a time.

It is undoubtedly more difficult for Georgia to annex this place to strengthen its strength, but it is also the easiest place compared to Rome or the Black Sheep. He has no courage or perseverance to cross the Caucasus Mountains to expand. And his ultimate goal is to strengthen his strength and force Rome to recognize his sphere of influence in the east of Trebizond. In his opinion, this is the biggest thing he can do. Therefore, Alexander began to form an alliance with the Black Sheep Dynasty, agreeing that the north of Baku belongs to Georgia and the south to the Black Sheep.

Yusuf was also playing a good chess game. It seemed that the Orthodox Church was not united. What he had to do was to use Georgia to consume the strength of Rome, and then take the opportunity to seize the Caucasus region. Then he would go west or east, forcing Rome to cede land or destroy the Timurid Empire.

Although he had already controlled the Zhalayir Dynasty, the two countries were separated by the Zhagros Mountains, and transportation was inconvenient. The so-called coordination was even more unsuccessful. It was better to expect the other party to make trouble to contain Rome than to expect the other party to send troops to advance.

Rome was not afraid of the turbulent eastern region. How could Peter not know the thoughts of these two people? This was also the reason why he built the city wall in Anatolia. Only Georgia was the weak place of the empire. If the enemy wanted to drive them out through Georgia, it would be very difficult.

Therefore, Rome has been controlling Georgia in recent years, and forcibly ennobling the king of Georgia as a noble of the country is also one of his means. In addition, when the Georgian army was beaten up before, the Roman army was stationed in cities such as Tiberius, and successfully got the king to "agree" to station troops in Husumi and Gori. At the same time, ambassadors to Georgia assisted the empire, achieving deep penetration into Georgia.

Unlike the previous Roman emperors who established autonomous principalities on the border, Peter directly governed the border. Direct rule was achieved by establishing provinces and establishing bureaucratic rule. And try to appease the local people, open up channels for them to support the Constantinople government, and pay more taxes to expand the army.

As the military focus shifted to Palestine, the defense of the Yerevan area had to be more careful. The empire's infiltration into Georgia became more severe, and some funds were transferred to Atropatni to let them pay attention to the movements of the black sheep. The emperor did not want his plan to cause other troubles.

The troops here were not like those in Europe. There were fewer water sources here, and they could only advance along cities and trade routes. Moreover, the enemy would hinder their steps by poisoning the wells, so they had to prepare for the worst.

The problem of water shortage really troubled them for a long time, because they were not very clear about the oasis in the desert, and long-distance transportation would increase the cost. How to control the cost to the maximum extent became their problem.