January Meme: Roman Babylon 5 AU?

[selenak]

redfiona99 asked me: how would you feel about a Roman AU for Babylon 5? (I quite like the idea of circa fall of the Republic but ...

This got my imagination going, but not to the fall of the Republic; it went to either the Third Century Crisis or later the Attila the Hun era instead, or maybe Justinian. Either way, it's tricky whom to cast the Minbari as, since they are canonically the most powerful of the space faring "younger" races - as Londo says, even at the height of the Centauri Empire, they left the Minbari alone - but there has to be something more powerful standing in for the Shadows and Vorlons, while the Centauri need to be still powerful enough to re-conquer the Narn with Shadow aid.

Preliminarily, I'm going with....

Minbari: Persians (The Sassanian Empire, to be precise)

Humans: Arabs

Centauri: Romans (naturally, but depending on whether we're talking Third Century or Fifth Century or Sixth Centauri, the location of Centauri Prime can be Rome in the first case and Constantinople in the other two)

Narn: Goths

Shadows: Attila the Hun

Vorlons: ???? (If you want to be mean, you can say Christianity)

I could also see the Humans as Franks (equally an up and coming power). Howver: the Minbari really need to be the Persians no matter which century you set the story in in a Roman AU because the Persians (or Parthians) for a thousand years were the one Empire the Romans, even at the height of their power, were forced to see at least as equals. The Romans and the Persians never managed to conquer each other, and it's highly symbolic that after a thousand years (Delenn's favourite time span) of duking it out or being in cold war, you have first one and then the other near victorious and then the newly islamized Arabs steamroll over both in the 7th century. (Well nearly steamroll over both, they didn't get Constantinople, and the Byzantines managed to regroup after a century, reconquer big parts and hang on for some centuries more.) Which is why my AU couldn't be later than the sixth century. And if the Minbari are the Persians, you have the problem that the Franks are far, far away and have no direct conflict with them, whereas the various Arab kingdoms, usually client kingdoms of the Romans when the Empire was powerful and in its decline getting more and more independence, did have conflicts with the Persians.


Babylon 5 itself is a problem. I'm tempted to go with Alexandria as THE multicultural city of antiquity and keeping that distinction well after it had no more politicial power, but it's a bit tricky to justify why the Goths should send a representative there. Well, maybe Theoderich really wanted good doctors and illegal copies from the great Library?


Anyway, I could see Sinclair and Sheridan as being (nominally) Roman governors of Egypt in present time who used to fight for their Arab kingdom of origin against the Persians in the past. Londo is a Roman (either Roman Roman or Byzantine Roman) at the start of the story aware of the utter pointlessness of his Senator position and the decline of Roman power and wishing for the past who gets sold on the idea that allying with these new barbarians, the Huns, is just the ticket to get the Empire back to full strength, and of course finds out how horribly mistaken he is, but in fact he's following tried and true later Roman policy of trying to play one nomadic warrior nation against the other. (Later, when he tries to fix what he's done, he has overtones of Aetius "The Last Roman".) The Narn/Goths are first exposed to the Huns (hence them ending up in Northern Italy and Spain to begin with), which is why Goth!G'Kar is an early warner who doesn't get listened to.

Delenn is a direct descendant of Aradashir I. i.e. a member of the Sassanid royal family, and a Zoroastrian, of course. She is on the track to becoming Queen of Queens but declines in favour of "pursueing her studies at Alexandria" while maintaining all sorts of important political connections to Persian generals and heads of influential families. This has long term consequences. (I could also see Delenn as Pulcheria, with Sheridan as Marcian, but then she's Roman, not Minbari.)
Pulcheria, but then she's not Minbari

Arab!Sheridan's breaking point when he declares independence: if it's the Third Century Crisis, can be at any point when the various Roman Emperors assassinate each other in dizzying speed. If it's the Fifth or Sixth Century, when it looks like the Huns could take over the entire Roman Empire, full stop. And then the Archbishop of Alexandria or Justinian himself wants him to kill all the heretics, at which point Arab!Sheridan breaks with the Church as well.

By the end of the story, the Huns are gone, but what was the Roman Empire has been irrevocably transformed, and many new kingdoms arisen. It is a new age, etc.


The other days

Comments

[redfiona99]

Oooh, I hadn't considered the fall of the Eastern Empire but that would work.

I just like the idea of Goth G'Kar.

[selenak]

Me too, and I never would have had it if not for your prompt, so thank you for challenging me!

ETA: Londo-Morden scene, late Roman style.

[cahn]

WHAT wait how did I miss this entire opera, also imagining them as Londo and Morden is both hilarious and kind of heartbreaking at the same time

also also omg Ramey and Zancanaro are amazing!!

[selenak]

Well, it's early Verdi, and also, the man had to work for a living, so I'm sure you (and I) missed plenty of other operas as well. Not every one is a masterpiece. Actually, I've never seen a performance of Atilla, either, but I did hear individual songs.

[redfiona99]

I have a horrid feeling that aria is pretty much how that meeting goes

[jack]

That's interesting! I really liked the B5 reboot theory as well.

I was thinking that Vorlons and Shadows could be Morally Ambiguous God, and Demons which would fit the period quite well. But you've done amazingly matching it to actual historical trends somehow it would be nicer not to bring those in.

[selenak]

Procopius would certainly insist on Demons, given he had Justinian interact with them, but I feel historical trends would be more satisfying. :)

ETA: Londo-Morden scene, late Roman style.

[msilverstar]

That works so well! I've been listening to Byzantine history and I totally see it

[selenak]

Doesn‘t it just? I mean, you‘d have to handwave and adjust some bits, but what historical fiction doesn‘t, and it would fit with the period.


ETA: Londo-Morden scene, late Roman style.

[cahn]

Oh this is really cool! Especially with the Verdi soundtrack :D (Okay, so, why ISN'T Babylon 5, or maybe even just some piece of it, also a (Human) opera??) I actually do think Christianity as the Vorlons could be quite interesting... although then I guess it would have to be an AU of our history as well, right?

[selenak]

Especially since Christopher Franke certainly had the musical chops for writing opera. :)

I actually do think Christianity as the Vorlons could be quite interesting... although then I guess it would have to be an AU of our history as well, right?

Only if you take "Sheridan turns against the Vorlons when they start killing people in their crusade and engineers a standoff resulting in a clear rejection of both Vorlons and Shadows by most younger races" to men Arab!Sheridan needs to defeat Christianity in totem. Given that even in late antiquity, a great many Christians were busy argueing and fighting with each other (Arians versus Orthodox, Monophysites versus Orthodox), and then in the Middle Ages you had many an Emperor going Mano a Mano with the Popes, it could simply be that Arab!Sheridan does what the occasional Emperor (both Byzantine and HRE) managed, i.e. oust the current Patriarch and/or Pope who gave them such trouble and install a new one more in line with his vision of the Church.