Chapter Thirty-Five: “Romania”

Though it may sound absurd, Hellenization is currently a thorny issue for the Roman Khanate. And this is not a concern exclusive to the Mongols; the ministers of Bulgaria and Serbia, and even the Han military and political leaders who have always prided themselves on their own culture, are constantly grappling with this troublesome situation.

This problem was first raised by certain Bulgarian officials. As the place where the Khanate's ascent began, Bulgarians constitute a large portion of the high-ranking officials. However, with the expansion of the Khanate, what has been established is an order based more on "Greek rules."

The system of the Purple Tent is claimed to be derived from the Tang dynasty, though in reality, it incorporates a great deal of organizational methods and terminology from the Liao and Yuan dynasties. Yet, in practice, it leans toward Greek traditions. For example, their military prefectures are a hybrid of Tang-era systems and Greek customs. To this day, in some Greek-language documents, they are still referred to as "themes."

In Europe, only the organizational system of the Greeks is similar enough to the Tang dynasty to be easily understood by the officials and the populace. Other nations, even France with its most sophisticated institutions, fall far behind. Thus, this situation is perhaps difficult to avoid.

These Bulgarians question whether the system being used is a Han system appropriately adapted to local conditions, or a Greek system upgraded with the help of Han institutions. If it is the former, it is acceptable, as it is equivalent to everyone learning from the advanced experience of the Seres. If it is the latter, these Bulgarians cannot help but feel uneasy.

The Bulgarian Kingdom has been established for centuries and has spent years at war with the Greeks. Although deeply influenced by the Greeks and even ruled by the Roman Empire on multiple occasions, their sense of independence has always been strong. As experienced bureaucrats, they can clearly see that the Han system introduced by the Purple Tent Khanate emphasizes centralization more than the East Roman system, capable of eroding local autonomy. If this continues, will it lead to the disappearance of the Bulgarians, leaving them assimilated by the Greeks?

In short, they can fully accept—and even take pride in—being part of Rome, as they were the ones to first respond and fight for this current Roman Empire bit by bit. But to turn them all into Greeks? That is something that surely leaves everyone feeling uncomfortable.

And Bulgaria is, in fact, among the better-off cases. Since Khan Asparuh led the Bulgar tribes to migrate here, Bulgaria has been a nation for nearly eight hundred years, possessing its own heritage and historical memory. But other regions, such as Wallachia and even Serbia, only achieved true independent statehood as the Roman Empire declined and contracted, a mere century or two ago. Now that the Purple Tent Khanate has unified these various regions and promoted Greek institutions, it is highly likely that they will be assimilated right back.

As for other places, such as Moldavia and Crimea, they lacked even a structured government in the past. Now that the Purple Tent Khanate is promoting land reclamation, establishing military districts, and organizing legions there, it is foreseeable that they, too, will become Hellenized in the future. Does this not mean that everyone is fighting to the death only to provide a dowry for the Greeks?

The Easterners at the highest levels of the Purple Tent Khanate may not care much. Even if this were to happen, they could simply join the Greeks themselves. But for the Bulgarians, this is clearly the least acceptable outcome. The last time the Greeks invited an Armenian emperor, he had the Bulgarians' eyes put out—a memory that still lingers today. With the Greeks now so powerful, should they find another capable leader to take the helm, the Bulgarians would likely suffer once again.

In response, the current strategy of the Khanate's court is to use the Roman banner as much as possible to avoid Greek elements. In the new administrative districts established by the Purple Tent Khanate, regardless of their former names, they are now uniformly given the formal name "Da Qin" in Han characters, with the pronunciation of "Roma" in Greek.

Logically, Latin would be the most orthodox choice, but "Latin" has since acquired other connotations. Whenever Latin or the Latins are mentioned, people think of the barbarians from the lands of the Western Roman Empire. This term has been tainted by the barbarians and is no longer usable. Consequently, the only mature scripts available to everyone are Greek and Han. The Mongols have not even determined their own alphabet—the Yuan dynasty itself could not decide whether to use the Uyghur script or the Phags-pa script—and the other nations here all use Greek characters or derived symbols for recording, having yet to develop their own unique writing systems.

To avoid "Hellenization," the Greek script must also be discarded. And so, all that remains is the Han script...

Thus, a strange phenomenon has emerged in the Purple Tent Khanate: in the legionary manors along the Black Sea coast, whether they are migrating Bulgarians, local Slavs, or recruited steppe people, they all refer to themselves as "Romans," and they are organized together during daily life. Hanging at the entrance of these manors is a sign reading "Da Qin," and there are even traditional red Roman banners inscribed with the character "Qin." It is a pity it is not "Han," or else one might not be able to tell whose banner it truly is...

The soldiers in training depart from the manors for field exercises. The commands and written orders for these men are also in Chinese. The Purple Tent Khanate was built upon its legions, and the power of the Han military lords stems from this; a century ago, they were training soldiers in this very manner. Thus, this unique legionary culture formed long ago.

However, it must be said that the officers do indeed enjoy this system, as its pronunciation and writing are extremely concise, making it perfect for issuing orders within the army—even the Greeks use it. Therefore, there are still no signs of it falling into decline. Of course, it is difficult to call this true Chinese. Due to the cultural limitations of the users, this "language" is greatly simplified, often consisting of individual words organized roughly according to the grammar familiar to the locals, provided that everyone can understand it. Locally, it is colloquially known as "Roman Chinese" or "Legion Script," distinguishing it from the long-winded "Chinese" used by the scribes.

On a broader scale, with these legionary manors and Roman towns as the center, the true foundation of the Purple Tent Khanate has been formed—"Romania."

This term is not the specific country from Guo Kang's past life. Today, that concept is far from taking shape, and it is hard to say whether it could even form in this world. Originally, the Wallachians would have repelled the Hungarians in 1330 and established the first predecessor of modern Romania. But according to the historical records of the Purple Tent Khanate, the ones who drove out the Hungarians at that time were the armies led by Bayan Temür and Guo Gai, which were nominally still the Golden Horde. Thus, those subsequent events never came to pass.

In the past, Eastern European regimes often saw nothing more than kings replacing one another, with little change at the local level. But after the establishment of the Purple Tent Khanate, they suffered year-round from having too many enemies and insufficient combat strength. At that time, the Golden Horde was still a behemoth that could come to hunt down these rebels at any moment. Hungary and Poland were also among the major powers of Europe. In such a situation, everyone had to do their utmost to improve their organizational capabilities and combat prowess.

Therefore, under immense pressure, the Khanate's court began to push for the removal and relocation of local nobles, establishing military prefectures in the regions. The ancestors of the Guo family, such as Guo Gai, and those of the Li family, such as Li Tianying, were the main proponents of this measure. The Khanate paid the price of decades of energy and huge costs, with many, including Li Tianying, dying in internal and external wars. It was not until Li Tianying's younger brother, the theater-loving Li Tiance, served as regent that the core regions were finally stabilized. The reforms were essentially completed only after Li Yinglin won the North-South War.

The result was the establishment of a reasonably complete bureaucratic system in these areas, successfully realizing a restoration and returning to the era before the feudalization of the East Roman Empire. Consequently, the mobilization capacity of the Purple Tent Khanate was significantly higher than that of neighboring countries, and their ability to fight against multiple opponents year after year without much struggle lies in this foundation.

Because the original nobles and territories were broken up, the Khanate's court also used a new naming system. These pioneering territories, stretching from Thrace to Crimea, and even including the Georgian regions along the Black Sea, were collectively referred to by the court as the land of the Romans, "Romania."

However, "Romania" itself has adopted a great deal of Greek cultural and institutional products. As time passed, even Rome began to grow increasingly Greek, which is deeply worrying. This is not because everyone is hostile to or rejects the Greeks; in fact, people like Li Xuanying are quite fond of Greek culture. But everyone is also very clear about the consequences of Hellenization.