Timeline 1020-1040 (Interference)

== 1021-1025 ==
1021
Northern Europe:
Olaf II “the Saint” :rolleyes: finally enforces Christianization upon Norway when he routs at Ringsaker his five rebel heathen vassals, whom he cruelly mutilates :eek: , each in a different way.
Southern Europe:
Melo of Bari dies just after freeing his town from imperial (Western Byzantine) authority with help from the Byzantine Norman Guard of Albania :cool: ; the free city of Bari pledges alliance to Constantinople.
Byzantine Empire:
John I Vladislav kills his brother Peter :mad: and remains the sole basileus of the Romans and Czar of Bulgaria. The Byzantine army fails an attempt to retake Antioch.
Middle East:
The Muwahiddin (*OTL Druze) religious sect arises between Lebanon and Palestine after the death of the Fatimid Caliph al-Hakim, a cruel madman they believe to be an incarnation of God; the Fatimid Empire begins its slow decline.
Central Asia:
Mahmud of Ghazna conquers Kabul liquidating the last Hindu presence in Afghanistan: the main route to India is now open for the Muslim powers.
1021-1022
Caucasus:
When king Gagik I dies Byzantium annexes most of Armenia, including the kingdom of Vaspurakan, which becomes a theme (province) in the empire. After the abortive revolt led by Nikephoros Xiphias, an Armenian principality is established in Cesarea/Mazhak (*OTL Kayseri) in eastern Cappadocia, under strict Byzantine suzerainty
1022
British Isles:
High King Malachy II of Meath dies and Ireland plunges into chaos as kingdoms and clans vie for supremacy.
Western Europe:
Navarra is obliged to accept the overlordship of the double crown of Spain and Mauretania
Caucasus:
The Alans subdue the ancient Caucasian tribe of the Circassians defeating their chieftain Rededya; in later times, the Alans themselves will be known as Circassians.
India:
Foundation of the Hoysala dynasty of Belur/Halebid (Deccan) under the tribal chief Nripa Kama. The Cholas invade Orissa (eastern India) weakening the Somvamsi rule.
1022-1023
Southern Europe:
Western Byzantines, Corsican Normans backed by Pisa and Balearic pirates vie for supremacy over the judicates (local kingdoms) of Sardinia; the Balearics prevail under the leadership of their chieftain, Magonian the Black :cool:
1023
Middle East:
A Byzantine-sponsored rebellion in Aleppo results in the city's rejection of Fatimid rule under Salih ibn Mirdas, founder of the local Mirdasid dynasty
1023-1025
Southern Europe:
The powerful Patriarch of Aquileia Wolfgang/Poppo von Treffen wrests Grado from Venice, but the Venetians retake in in two years' space.
Byzantine Empire:
Enraged at Peter's murder in Constantinople, the Kievan Rus' ravage Thrace, Taurida (*OTL Crimea) and Bithynia with their naval raids, and have to be bought off with heavy tributes by basileus-Czar John I Vladislav.
1024
Southern Europe:
On the death of Pope (and king of Italy/Spoleto) Benedict VIII in Rome, emperor Peter agrees to the appointment of his younger brother Romanus as Pope John XV (*OTL John XIX).
India:
The Cholas invade Bengal; the Hoysalas overrun Mysore upon the extinction of the ancient Western Ganga dynasty (the eastern Gangas are, on the contrary, ascendant in Orissa)
1024-1030
Northern Europe:
King Henry III of Germany (*OTL emperor Henry II of the HRE) dies without heirs, extinguishing the glorious Liudolfingian house of Saxony. A fierce succession war rages for six years between the Luxemburgian pretender Frederick, nephew of the queen dowager Kunigunde, and the “national” candidate Conrad nicknamed the Salian, a powerful feudatory from Alsace; both candidates are forced to concede heritability of minor fiefdoms during the long struggle to gain support
1025
Northern Hesperia (*OTL America):
A second wave of Norse settlers led by Ragnar Arnarsson reaches Vinlandria (*OTL Newfoundland) from Greenland. By this time the European community on the island reaches about 1000 people; the new influx of settlers makes Christians the majority of Hesperian (*American) Norsemen
Central-Eastern Europe:
Just before dying king Boleslaw of Poland rejects subjection to Germany; thereafter his sons begin to vie for power, weakening the kingdom.
India:
Mahmud of Ghazna vassalizes Gujarat.
SE Asia:
The Chola fleet vassalizes Srivijaya, sealing its decline; the Cholas annex most of the Malay peninsula to their domains, forming an impressive sea empire across the eastern Indian Ocean.
== 1026-1030 ==
1026 
Southern Europe:
King William I of Burgundy/Provence dies, succeeded by his son Berenger I. Count Corrado of Canossa quells another anti-Papal revolt in Ravenna, then dies by malaria and his lands revert to his brother, margrave Bonifacio of Tuscany. King Pipino I of Lombardy (*OTL Ottone son of Arduin) tries a half-hearted invasion of Emilia to hamper the reunification of the Canossa domains, but is quickly repulsed; the Canossas, though not overtly rejecting Lombard suzerainty, keep on ruling their lands as sovereigns in all but word
1027
Northern Europe:
Conrad the Salian narrowly wins the bloody battle of Ochsenfurt against Frederick of Luxembourg, but the German succession war still drags on
Southern Europe:
Romancia (*OTL eastern Switzerland plus Vorarlberg and Valtellina) detaches herself from Germany during the succession war rampaging there, and hails as king Pipino I of Lombardy, who'll hold the two crowns in dynastical union. Ariberto of Intimiano, archbishop of Milan, clashes with king Pipino I of Lombardy over the appointment of the bishop of Lodi. He thereafter tries the heretic Cathars of Monforte (Piedmont) and has them burnt at the stake :mad: in Milan, but their faith will gain a foothold in the same city with the birth of the Pataria movement. The Pechenegs, routed by the Rus' of Kiev, head south across the Danube invading the Sklaviniai (*OTL Balkans), but are thwarted by the Byzantine general Constantine Diogenes.
Central-Eastern Europe:
The king of Hungary Stephen I the Saint conquers Slovakia from the Poles, making it an appanage duchy for the heirs to the Hungarian throne.
Caucasus:
A Zoroastrian uprising led by Manushir I of the Kesrani warrior clan overthrows the Yazidid dynasty in the emirate of Shirvan (Azerbaijan).
Central Hesperia (*OTL America):
In Yucatàn the decline of Uxmal is followed by the ascendancy of Chichén Itzà, resettled by the Tutul Xiu after an era of abandonment; the southern Maya lands (Guatemala, highlands), once rich and populated in the heyday of Classical Maya age, are now the ghost of their former self.
1028 
Northern Europe:
Olaf II “the Saint” of Norway is defeated and killed by the rebels in the service of Knut/Canute the Great, whose empire now stretches from England to the Baltic and from Schleswig to the Arctic Sea.
North Africa:
Viceroy John of Sicily and Ifrigia (later Punia, *OTL Tunisia) campaigns in Numidia, subduing several local states (notably Constantina) to Western Byzantine authority.
Central Asia:
The Sunni Wali (*the Muslim ”Pope” in TTL) Abdallah VI relocates from Derbent to Samarkand, whence the Muslim Karakhanid rulers expel all unbelievers (Nestorians, Manichaeans, Zoroastrians, Buddhists, Jews...) to make it a “pure” Islamic city, worthy of hosting the saintly Walis. Thus Samarkand becomes one of the foremost Muslim “holy cities”
Far East:
The XiXia Tangut kingdom conquers the Uygur khanate of Kan-chou.
1028-1030
Central-Eastern Europe:
King Stephen I of Hungary, allied with Frederick of Luxembourg, raids Austria and Carinthia.
1029
Southern Europe:
Marquard III of Eppenstein is given the castle and town of Gurizberg (*OTL Gorizia) from his father-in-law, the Patriarch of Aquileia Wolfgang/Poppo von Treffen
Central Asia:
Mahmud of Ghazna takes Rayy from the last Justanids of Daylam and drives the Fatimids from central Persia/Iran; Tagh ad-Din I Nasr ibn Ahmad founds the Nasrid dyansty in Seistan as a Ghaznavid vassal.
1030
Northern Europe:
Conrad the Salian is killed by treason :mad: by his former supporter, duke Ernest of Swabia, thus ending the long German succession war with the final accession to the throne of Frederick and the establishment of the Luxemburg dynasty in Germany
Southern Europe:
The Norman Rainulf Drengot, helped by Pisa, invades northern Sardinia, wresting the judicate (kingdom) of Torres from king Gonario, a client of Magonian the Black's Balearic pirates. Rainulf becomes the first Norman judge (king) of Sardinia, marking the start of Norman encroachments in the island
Black Africa:
Conversion to Islam of the Songhai kingdom under Kosoy Muslim Dam.
Middle East:
The Byzantine army suffers a grave defeat at the battle of Edessa (*OTL Urfa) against the Arab Fatimid-Numayrid army.
Central Asia:
Driven south by the raiding Kipchak/Cumans, who rule the steppes between the Don and the Irtyš rivers, the Seljuks invade and desolate Khorassan under the leadership of Chagri and Tughril Beg, two grandsons of Seljuk. After suffering defeat in battle at the hands of the Ghaznavids, the Seljuks resort to guerrilla and live off the land, migrating further west across the north of Persia.
ca. 1030
Southern Europe:
The united fleets of the Tyrrenian sea trading towns, both Lombard and independent or imperial (Genoa, Pisa, Amalfi and Gaeta) expel the Balearic pirates from the waters of Sardinia; the islands' judicates-kingdoms accept a vague Pisan overlorship, but the real masters are the Normans in Torres and the southern native judicates, Arborea and Cagliari/Santa Igia.
Central Asia:
The Ghaznavids vassalize Tabaristan (which has reverted back to Shiism in the last decades).
Northern Hesperia (*OTL America):
The Norsemen of Vinlandria (*OTL Newfoundland) explore the coasts of northern Hesperia (*OTL America) from Helluland Sound (*OTL Baffin Bay) up to New Palestine (*OTL Massachussetts); the extent of their discoveries, though, goes completely unnoticed in Europe, where it feebly echoes as a Scandinavian saga no more credible than those on sea monsters of trolls:D .
Central Hesperia (*OTL America):
Prophet Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Snake, kills himself upon a burial stake after gaining a wide following among the Mayans too with the name of Cuculcàn.
== 1031-1035 ==
1031 
Central-Eastern Europe:
Polish power declines following the usurpation of Bezprym against his younger step-brother Mieczisław/Mieszko II: the resurgent Germans wrest Lusatia from Polish influence, the duke of Bohemia Břetislav the Great reconquers Moravia, prince Jaroslav I of Kiev occupies Transcarpathian Ruthenia (east of the Carpathian range), king Canute/Knut II the Great of Denmark, Norway and England seizes Pomerania.
Southern Europe:
Civil war erupts in southern Italy between emperor Peter and his nephew John II, ruling over Sicily and Ifrigia (later Punia, *OTL Tunisia), who invades Calabria, taking Reggio and Crotone; the naval battle of Capo Palinuro, though, is won by the emperor's forces led by his son, Theophylactus II. The bishop of Trient (*OTL Trento), Ulrich II, is made the first prince-bishop of the town by king Frederick I of Germany.
1032
Western Europe:
Following a brief war over feudal rights, France wrests back Auvergne from Aquitainian possession. Poitou and Limoges are instead recognized to Aquitaine
Central-Eastern Europe:
Germany anew vassalizes Poland by restoring Mieczisław/Mieszko II on the throne (actually the country is carved between the king and two of his relatives).
Southern Europe:
John XV (*OTL John XIX) dies in Rome, succeeded as Pope and king of Italy-Spoleto by his unworthy :mad: nephew Benedict IX, a young puppet in the hands of emperor Peter. The Western Byzantine civil war sees the involvement of mercenaries (Normans from Corsica, Sardinia, Albania and Normandy proper, Numidians from Africa) and soon reduces to low-level fighting in southern Italy. In Gaeta local power is wrested from the Docibile family, who made the error of supporting John II of Sicily and Ifrigia:o ; the town becomes a Norman duchy, giving the French warriors their first stronghold in southern Italy. A Byzantine fleet helped by ships from Ragusa/Dubrovnik and Bari defeats the Cyrenaic pirates in the Ionian sea.
Byzantine Empire, Middle East:
General George Maniaces reaffirms Byzantine authority in Syria in a brilliant campaign against the Fatimids and Numayrids, climaxing in the capture of Edessa (*OTL Urfa). A few weeks later basileus-Czar John I Vladislav is murdered with his heir Constantine in a plot schemed by his second son Alusian, who then forces Patriarch Alexius Studites to crown him; but Alusian's two surviving brothers, Troianos and Gabriel, manage to escape to Anatolia and swear revenge over him.
Central Asia:
The Karakhanid Empire fragments into a western part with Samarkand (now the capital at the expense of the “infidel” Bukhara, still majority non–Muslim and inhabited by Jews, Nestorian and Zoroastrians) and an eastern half with Kashgar, Balasaghun (the ancient Uighur capital in Mongolia), the Tarim basin, Dzungaria and parts of Mongolia
1033
Western Europe, Southern Europe, Middle East:
To celebrate the millenary of Christ's crucifixion and resurrection, the Catholic Church launches “God's Truce”: the feuding knights must not fight each other from Thursday to Monday; this norm will be applied “cum grano salis” :o . Always in the wake of the millennial celebrations, many rulers of Christian Europe go to pilgrimage to Jerusalem :) with thousands of their subjects, coming into contact with the cultures of the Mediterranean and the Middle East. The wave of millenarism also causes massacres of Jews :eek: from France to Germany.
Western Europe:
Young king Frederick III of Lorraine dies at 13, leaving to rule the country her elder sister Beatrice under the patronage of her relative, king Henry II of Luxemburg. The county of Limburg is founded in eastern Belgium.
India:
A Ghaznavid army suffers a massive defeat in Awadh (region of Benares/Varanasi, India) at the hands of a Hindu alliance of local rulers; Muslim encroachment in India is put to an end
1033-1034
Western Europe:
Count Eudes I of Champagne invades Burgundy, citing the violation of his feudal rights in border areas; his campaign, though, founders after the failed siege of Geneva, which is thereafter made a county by king Berenger I of Burgundy; Humbert Blanchemain, the loyal conestable of Burgundy, is made count of Savoy. In the end the Champagne ruler is bought off with the cession of certain commercial rights and provileges
Southern Europe:
the Western Byzantine civil war grinds to an effective halt with John II in control of Sicily, Ifrigia (*OTL Tunisia) and Calabria, Bari in control of much of central Puglia and the Normans in Gaeta. Emperor Peter sends his heir Theophylactus II in Naples to bolster local defenses
Byzantine Empire:
Fratricide war is waged between the usurper Alusian and his brothers Troianos and Gabriel, supported by most of the army under the leadership of George Maniaces and Constantine Diogenes. Alusian resists by barricading himself in Constantinople and keeping the loyalty of the fleet, until the clergy manages to stage a popular rebellion who end in the blinding :eek: and imprisonment of the usurper. Troianos and Gabriel are jointly crowned as co-emperors for Europe and Asia respectively; the Bulgarian crown, though, goes to Troianos only, as the elder heir
1034-1041
Central-Eastern Europe:
The last great pagan uprising happens in Poland; monasteries are burnt to ashes, the clergy massacred by the heathens. The rebellion is utterly crushed in the end, but Greater Poland is so completely devastated that the core of the Polish nation shifts south to Lesser Poland and Cracow
1034-1060
Central Asia:
The western half of the Karakhanid domains falls prey to a long and chaotic civil war who opens the road for Seljuk ascendancy in Central Asia
1035
Western Europe:
King Baldwin III of France dies, succeeded by his son Baldwin IV the Pilgrim (so called for his recent pilgrimage to Jerusalem)
Southern Europe:
The feudatories and the inhabitants of Lodi rebel against the abuses committed by the powerful archbishop of Milan, Ariberto of Intimiano; Lodisan and Milanese forces clash in the battle of Campomalo near San Colombano hill, only a few miles from king Pipino I's capital in Pavia:o . Then the king of Lombardy steps in to settle the affair, ensuring the hostily of the archbishop and of the Milanese at large. In the meantime the absentee marquis of Milan (a title by now devoid of any significance), Azzone II degli Obertenghi, settles down at Este (Veneto), whence his descendants will take the family name.
Northern Europe, British Isles:
Norway anew rejects the Danish yoke under the leadership of Magnus I the Good, a stepson of Olaf II “the Saint”. At the same time Canute/Knut II the Great dies and his Norse empire is carved among his sons:( : England is seized by the illegitimate Harold I, Denmark and (theoretically) Norway go to Harthacanute, born by the marriage between Canute and Emma, widow of the Anglo-Saxon king Ethelred the Unready.
== 1036-1040 ==
1035-1040
Southern Europe:
Stefan Vojislav rebels against Byzantine overlordship in Duklja/Zeta/Melanoria (*OTL Montenegro); at first he is defeated and exiled to Smyrna, thereafter he manages to escape and wage a successful guerrilla war in his mountains
1036
British Isles:
Alfred the Ætheling, son of the former Anglo-Saxon king Ethelred the Unready, comes back to England from Hungary along with his brother Edward to restore the Cerdicingas on the English throne, but is caught and killed by the Viking ruler Harold I Harefoot; Edward saves his own life and flees to his young relative, duke William of Normandy:eek:
Central-Eastern Europe:
The Oghuz Turks (Ouzoi) invade Ukraine and push the fleeing Pechenegs towards the Sklaviniai (*OTL Balkans). The kingdom of Tmutarakan, already ruled by a Rurikid branch, is annexed by Kiev; on the contrary Volhynia splits from Kiev under Svjatoslav I, a nephew of its former ruler Vsevolod I
Far East:
The Tangut XiXia kingdom finally defeats the Uygurs; it gets control over the Gansu corridor between China and eastern Turkestan.
1037
Western Europe:
Count Eudes II of Champagne tries to enforce a marriage between queen Beatrice of Lorraine and his own son, Thibaut, but dies in battle against Luxemburgian forces at Bar.
Southern Europe:
King Pipino I of Lombardy is rejected by the Milanese populace after his alleged offenses to the archbishop of Milan, the powerful Ariberto of Intimiano. He puts the city under siege and extorts a tax from it :D before leaving to his capital in Pavia.
Byzantine Empire, Middle East:
The Byzantines led by George Maniaces successfully reconquer the island of Cyprus from the Fatimids
1037-1042
Middle East:
The Fatimids temporarily recapture Aleppo thanks to Anushtegin's Turkic mercenaries; after a protracted struggle and repeated Byzantine campaigns the city comes back into Mirdasid hands. During this campaigns a Norwegian of royal Yngling ancestry, Harald Hardradi:eek: , proves his valor along with his Viking mercenaries
1038
Western Europe:
Beatrice, queen of Lorraine, marries her distant cousin Giselbert, count of Salm and Longwy and younger brother of king Henry II of Luxemburg.
Southern Europe:
The unworthy Pope and king of Italy/Spoleto Benedict IX is deposed:D after an infamous six years-rule by a council of bishops held in Rome and replaced with the more suitable John XVI. The council was summoned by Benedict's disgusted former patron, emperor Peter. John II of Sicily and Ifrigia (later Punia, *OTL Tunisia) catches the moment to resume the fight in southern Italy, claiming an act of violence has been performed against the Papacy:p . The Normans in Gaeta in turn switch side :rolleyes: passing with John: they defeat and kill emperor Peter's son, Theophylactus II, at the battle of Capua, thereafter extending their domain to most of Campania, except Naples, Salerno, Amalfi, Sorrento, who pledge obedience to John II.
Central-Eastern Europe:
King Stephen I the Saint of Hungary dies; he is succeeded by his nephew Pietro Orseolo, son of the former Doge of Venice, Otone
India:
Vajrahasta III of the Eastern Gangas becomes Lord of Trikalinga, marking the beginning of the dynasty's rule over Orissa
Far East:
Li Yuanhao, king of the Xixia Tanguts, proclaims himself emperor (Huangdi) and claims the lands held centuries before by the Toba/northern Wei empire.
1038-1040
Southern Europe:
Civil war rages in southern Italy until Emperor Peter is ousted from Rome by a revolt led by the Tuscolo family, after which John XVI is deposed and mutilated :mad: and the unworthy Benedict IX reinstated :mad: :mad: as Pope and king of Italy/Spoleto (more and more a theoretical title). Emperor Peter flees to Sardinia, where he abdicates and retires to a monastery. His nephew John II, though taking for himself the Roman (Western Byzantine) imperial title, will never try to enter Rome due to his distrust of the Normans controlling the best lands of of southwestern Italy, and Rome's domination by the now anti-imperial Tuscolo family.
Central-Eastern Europe:
The duke of Bohemia, Břetislav the Great, conquers Silesia, Cracow and, taking advantage of the rampaging chaos, the entirety of Poland
1039
Southern Europe:
The Western Byzantine emperor John II crushes the revolt of Amalfi against his trade taxes; for the Campanian sea-trading powerhouse this marks the beginning of decline
1039-1041
British Isles:
Siward Bjornsson reunifies all of Northumbria under his rule
1040
British Isles:
Harthacanute lands in England just weeks afetr the death of his rival step-brother, Harold I, and gets the English crown in addition to the Danish one
Southern Europe:
Lombardy: king Pipino I makes peace with the Archbishop of Milan, Ariberto of Intimiano. He also concedes the heritability of minor fiefs to counter the power of the Lombard magnates (“capitanei”) and of the Milanese Church. The king of Germany, Frederick I, makes Histria a margraviate splitting it from Carinthia.
Byzantine Empire:
Basileus-Czar Troianos suddenly dies, leaving his brother Gabriel as the only heir to both Byzantium and Bulgaria.
Central Asia:
Massud, son and heir of the great Mahmud of Ghazna, is heavily defeated at the hands of the Seljuk Turks in the battle of Dandanqan and has to withdraw behind the Hindu Kush range; the Seljuks now master northern Persia/Iran and Khorassan, having also gained obedience from Tabaristan.
Arabia:
Aden (Yemen) secedes from the Fatimid Empire under Alì ibn Muhammad al-Sulayhi
ca. 1040
Southern Europe:
The (nominal) marquis of Milan, Azzone II degli Obertenghi, marries Kunigunde, sister of the duke of Carinthia Welf III; their descendants will form the Welf dynasty, destined to gain influence in Germany.