And All Nations Shall Gather To It - Volume I: The Abode of Peace

[galileo-034]

A difficult proposition.
We are not talking "fighting the French" since this does not mean anything then, because politics are framed in terms of feudal allegiances, we are talking fighting the King, the Crown. So when you say "with crusader help", you're not talking a rebellion by a troublesome vassal like Charles the Bold of Burgundy did IOTL, you are implying a Crusade against the King of France. Lashing out at Cathars is one thing, waging war against one of the most powerful, in theory at least, sovereigns of Christian Europe, quite another.
Then no ruler there really wishes for "independence". The Raimondines after being expelled from Toulouse can only survive as a staunch ally of the Capetian crown in the South, against either the Welfs of the Kingdom of Arles, the Aragonese and the Aquitaine, lest they be eaten up by their Trancavel vassals in Septimania or by the House of Poitiers.
And the Dukes of Aquitaine stand to lose lot of land to the House of Anjou (our OTL Plantagenet), ever keen to expand their domains in the Loire Valley at the expense of Aquitaine.
The worst thing that can happens is rebellions if like in England IOTL, the King policies were encroaching on their vassals' privileges, like the Capetian-Plantagenet or the Burgundian wars, rebellions that could at best lead to reinforcement of said privileges. The Dukes of Aquitaine, if very lucky, meaning Welf Imperial support and a total collapse of the Capetians in the South, could think of reneging on their homage lige and restoring the centuries long dead kingdom of Aquitaine, but then, that is not Languedoc, that is Aquitaine.

So, independence? At the time, you really had only the historical core of Swiss cantons who did that even though that was only recognized in 1648 treaties of Westphalia, the Scots and later the Swedes, but only to restore their independence, not to declare it, or the United Provinces

 

[TickTock The Witch's Dead]

Thinking about the linguistic development of a Crusader Egypt. I originally thought that it’d be Coptic but now that I think about it it’s most likely going to be a creole of Coptic plus French plus Latin. The new creole language that’ll develop in Egypt will be very interesting.

 

[Quinkana]

Thinking about the linguistic development of a Crusader Egypt. I originally thought that it’d be Coptic but now that I think about it it’s most likely going to be a creole of Coptic plus French plus Latin. The new creole language that’ll develop in Egypt will be very interesting.

I agree, but I think it'd be more similar to English, with mostly Coptic grammar but with a bunch of french, Latin and even Arabian loanwords considering how many arabians would be present and the countries surrounding it would be Arabic, and some Arabs would still work with the crusaders.

i just hope the language is written in Greek script as a way to differentiate themselves from the more overtly European Syrian/Palestinians.

 

[TickTock The Witch's Dead]

I'm interested in the demographic effects of a more successful Crusades. The Europeans are obviously going to want more Europeans coming over which means that there'll be an incentive for them to come over to the Levant and Egypt. As more warriors, peasants, craftsmen, and others leave Europe for elsewhere, are the demographic changes big enough to really shift politics on the continent? I've already talked about how the crusades will turn into a human pressure valve to reduce population pressures in Europe. Will enough people leave for effects to be seen? Especially when it comes to warfare and taxation, with European states being limited in warfare since many of the troops and cash they could have aren't there since they're elsewhere like in the Middle East (with tax money not as present since less taxable heads)?

 

[Quinkana]

I'm interested in the demographic effects of a more successful Crusades. The Europeans are obviously going to want more Europeans coming over which means that there'll be an incentive for them to come over to the Levant and Egypt. As more warriors, peasants, craftsmen, and others leave Europe for elsewhere, are the demographic changes big enough to really shift politics on the continent? I've already talked about how the crusades will turn into a human pressure valve to reduce population pressures in Europe. Will enough people leave for effects to be seen? Especially when it comes to warfare and taxation, with European states being limited in warfare since many of the troops and cash they could have aren't there since they're elsewhere like in the Middle East (with tax money not as present since less taxable heads)?

I think we'd see the Levant and Syria be populated with Occitan speakers most likely, with Egypt being populated with a Coptic language with a bunch of loan words from Latin and Arabic. the Author did say that the end goal is for the Levant to speak some European language after all.

 

[Gloss]

Thinking about the linguistic development of a Crusader Egypt. I originally thought that it’d be Coptic but now that I think about it it’s most likely going to be a creole of Coptic plus French plus Latin. The new creole language that’ll develop in Egypt will be very interesting.

Cotpic is basically dead by this point, its influence would be mostly seen as a weak substratum within Egyptian Arabic or by loaning some religious terminology.

Source: https://journals.openedition.org/ema/1920

"For the transition from Coptic to Arabic, this second phase is, no doubt, the crucial one. While Coptic is well represented in the papyri until the mid-eleventh century, there is almost nothing in Coptic after the year 1200."
"The third period is the one best known and best recorded in our manuscripts. By now, Coptic had ceased to be a living language, and thus translations had become restricted to a limited number of scholars and monks who were willing to study their old language."

Edit: Altough it could be open to interpretation it seems clear from the evidence that the majority of religiously Coptic people didn't speak Coptic by 1200, so at the very least less than 10% of all Egyptian people spoke Coptic by then.

 

[TickTock The Witch's Dead]

I think we'd see the Levant and Syria be populated with Occitan speakers most likely, with Egypt being populated with a Coptic language with a bunch of loan words from Latin and Arabic. the Author did say that the end goal is for the Levant to speak some European language after all.

My post was about the demographic effects in Europe actually. I think you’re referring to something else.

 

[Quinkana]

Coptic is basically dead by this point, its influence would be mostly seen as a weak substratum within Egyptian Arabic or by loaning some religious terminology.

Source: https://journals.openedition.org/ema/1920

"For the transition from Coptic to Arabic, this second phase is, no doubt, the crucial one. While Coptic is well represented in the papyri until the mid-eleventh century, there is almost nothing in Coptic after the year 1200."
"The third period is the one best known and best recorded in our manuscripts. By now, Coptic had ceased to be a living language, and thus translations had become restricted to a limited number of scholars and monks who were willing to study their old language."

Edit: Altough it could be open to interpretation it seems clear from the evidence that the majority of religiously Coptic people didn't speak Coptic by 1200, so at the very least less than 10% of all Egyptian people spoke Coptic by then.

Firstly the POD is in the late 1000s so things could have changed. More success in the Crusades may cause the Coptic Orthodox church to still use Coptic in some churches, and the collapse in Egypt favours the villages more than the urban muslims.

Considering that Coptic is still used by the common population a lot as their native language, and that Coptic is still a liturgical language (the conquest is around 1200 according to your source), when the Crusaders conquer the place Latin/French (but prob Latin) will immediately become the main language of administration. Arabic would have the same position as greek before the Muslim conquests, which is being a formerly useful language which is mostly concentrated in the delta and in the urban centres, which doesn't bode well for longevity of a arabic-latinite language.

 

[Quinkana]

Edit: Although it could be open to interpretation it seems clear from the evidence that the majority of religiously Coptic people didn't speak Coptic by 1200, so at the very least less than 10% of all Egyptian people spoke Coptic by then.

I do think its very possible for the arabic christian speakers to switch back to using Coptic. The Crusaders encouraging the Coptic Orthodox church to switch back to Coptic is defo very possible and to ensure the Christians and Muslims are clearly separated. Arabic also isn't the prestige language due to the invasion so dropping arabic is defo very much possible.

 

[Gloss]

Firstly the POD is in the late 1000s so things could have changed. More success in the Crusades may cause the Coptic Orthodox church to still use Coptic in some churches, and the collapse in Egypt favours the villages more than the urban muslims.

By the time of the POD Coptic was already very weak, there is nothing outside of pure magic that would make Egypt speak Coptic if European Catholic Crusaders take it.

My source is very clear on the topic and there is no way to pretend that the situation in 1090 would have been drastically different, the shift was well underway and if bothered to read the source and actually trusted the opinion of the author you would understand that Arabic was already conquering even the literate sphere within the church.

Considering that Coptic is still used by the common population a lot as their native language,

Please provide credible evidence of this and by credible I mean an actual scholar that supports this, no random newspapers of dubious credibility.

and that Coptic is still a liturgical language (the conquest is around 1200 according to your source),

The conquest? What happened by 1200 is that Coptic was basically dead, only a small portion of people could have spoken it and anyone that versed in its literature seemed to have had to learn it like people learned Latin in the West.

Edit: Also the example of Malta shows that Arabic wouldn't necessarily be supplanted.

 

[Sarufiyyun]

Maybe instead of Coptic or some Romance language we just get a giant equivalent to Maltese taking hold in Christian Egypt.

 

[Beatriz]

To what extebt is Christianization in Egypt a possibility?

 

[Gloss]

To what extebt is Christianization in Egypt a possibility?

Andalus, Sicily, Malta were all Christianized within centuries after the respective conquests, I think it's plausible.

 

[TickTock The Witch's Dead]

Maybe instead of Coptic or some Romance language we just get a giant equivalent to Maltese taking hold in Christian Egypt.

Or a fusion of Coptic, Romance languages, and Arabic.

 

[St. Just]

I think the eventual demotic language will depend on how much elites are allowed to "go native." The native Christian tongues with religious prestige, Coptic and Aramaic, lacked popular saturation by the time the Crusaders took them ITTL. If Roger of Sicily was willing to promote Arabic, there's nothing stopping the Crusader criollos -- except, of course, a constant influx of xenophobic Europeans and the added religious element of running a Crusader state.

That being said, where Latin (and Greek) will serve well as a language of mutual communication among a nobility of multivariate origins, neither language have a deep presence among the hoi polloi (a marked difference to Iberia, where you had a large population of Arabized Romance-speakers.) Mass language, then, would have to emerge from the native middle class, which has contact with both the Latinate nobility above and the locals below.

Given the position of native Christians, I think it will be their languages that provide the second piece of influence alongside the European languages. In the Levant, I think this would involve a Romance language with heavy Aramaic/Arabic and slight Greek and Armenian influence.

In Egypt, the linguistic mix would be more varied, but I'd wager a bizarro "English" -- Germanic technically, but with a great deal of Romance influence and redundant vocabulary, with heavy Coptic and Greek influence as well. Arabic might get "crowded out" by Romance languages here, particularly as its conquest was aided by a Crusader state of multiple generations run by criollo Latins.

 

[TickTock The Witch's Dead]

A part of me is betting that the Normans might establish an independent kingdom on Cyrenaica. Dunno why it’s a gut feeling.

 

[Tursiops Amicus]

By the time of the POD Coptic was already very weak, there is nothing outside of pure magic that would make Egypt speak Coptic if European Catholic Crusaders take it.

My source is very clear on the topic and there is no way to pretend that the situation in 1090 would have been drastically different, the shift was well underway and if bothered to read the source and actually trusted the opinion of the author you would understand that Arabic was already conquering even the literate sphere within the church.

Please provide credible evidence of this and by credible I mean an actual scholar that supports this, no random newspapers of dubious credibility.

The conquest? What happened by 1200 is that Coptic was basically dead, only a small portion of people could have spoken it and anyone that versed in its literature seemed to have had to learn it like people learned Latin in the West.

Edit: Also the example of Malta shows that Arabic wouldn't necessarily be supplanted.

I think conquerors won't give a damn about Coptic because they doesn't understand. In the other side most of them will have at least some knowledge of Arabic, so why to use a different language that isn't even widely spoken?

Moreover, for adminstration tasks they will probably have inherited a mostly Arabic speaking bureaucracy.

 

[Quinkana]

I think conquerors won't give a damn about Coptic because they doesn't understand. In the other side most of them will have at least some knowledge of Arabic, so why to use a different language that isn't even widely spoken?

Moreover, for adminstration tasks they will probably have inherited a mostly Arabic speaking bureaucracy.

Tbf we know that we've have a bunch of bilingual Coptic Arabic bible documents in the 14th century so things aren't so clear cut.

Also that the middle to low governmental positions were Coptic Christians anyways, and they would have had knowledge of Coptic as a language, so it's very different from what you've shown.

On the Road to Heaven: Taxation, Conversions, and the Coptic-Muslim Socioeconomic Gap in Medieval Egypt | The Journal of Economic History | Cambridge Core

On the Road to Heaven: Taxation, Conversions, and the Coptic-Muslim Socioeconomic Gap in Medieval Egypt - Volume 78 Issue 2

www.cambridge.org

 

[Noblesse Oblige]

By the time of the POD Coptic was already very weak, there is nothing outside of pure magic that would make Egypt speak Coptic if European Catholic Crusaders take it.

My source is very clear on the topic and there is no way to pretend that the situation in 1090 would have been drastically different, the shift was well underway and if bothered to read the source and actually trusted the opinion of the author you would understand that Arabic was already conquering even the literate sphere within the church.

Please provide credible evidence of this and by credible I mean an actual scholar that supports this, no random newspapers of dubious credibility.

The conquest? What happened by 1200 is that Coptic was basically dead, only a small portion of people could have spoken it and anyone that versed in its literature seemed to have had to learn it like people learned Latin in the West.

Edit: Also the example of Malta shows that Arabic wouldn't necessarily be supplanted.

I actually agree with this situation. If anything, I would say the development of language in Egypt would be closer to something akin to Maltese than anything remotely related to Coptic (which IMO would likely play out exactly the same way as it did IOTL, largely a language that is forever endangered and has only recently been extinct as a spoken language, but still around as a liturgical language (though there is the possibility it could be rendered flat-out extinct completely, even as a liturgical language)

 

[DanMcCollum]

I actually agree with this situation. If anything, I would say the development of language in Egypt would be closer to something akin to Maltese than anything remotely related to Coptic (which IMO would likely play out exactly the same way as it did IOTL, largely a language that is forever endangered and has only recently been extinct as a spoken language, but still around as a liturgical language (though there is the possibility it could be rendered flat-out extinct completely, even as a liturgical language)

Yes, I think an Egyptian language akin to Maltese makes the most sense - given an extended period of Crusader rule - so we start with a base of Egypto-Arabic and then a large amount of Romance vocabulary. Although it looks like half of Maltese's vocabulary comes from Italian/Sicialian - I wonder if the amount will become as high in *Egyptian as well as who the majority of European settlers/rulers will be in this state.