Anyone interested in me doing a timeline next on the Byzantine Empire surviving the 1203-4 Crusader invasion intact and holding on in a stronger position into the later medieval period and the Renaissance? The Comneni and the Paleologi are a fascinating bunch, ditto the Lascaris and Vatatzes in the C13th - it's an object lesson in leadership of a top-down-run state how in OTL the Empire veered from the 'brutal but highly capable' types like Michael VIII to the utterly useless like Andronicus II. And what could Andronicus III have achieved if he had not died in his 40s in 1341, or Manuel II, John VIII and Constantine XI done with more resources.
I have some basic scenarios outlined for a chapter of my next Alt Hist analysis book on Byzantium, the follow-up to 'Caesars of the Bosphorus', and I did a longer written version of this as a student which I can remember bits of. The repercussions of a Byz state not an Ottoman one in the Balkans will be felt as far ahead as the Russian civil war in 1918-20. I am working on my Roman books at the moment, but could probably get something together on the lines of my current Roman post-180 blog ready for when Sealion have a blog slot open in a few months. This will enable me to throw a few spanners in the works for OTL European, Middle Eastern and Russian history too.
