The Maiden Reforms

The Maiden Reforms, drafted by the Roman Empress Zoe in 1485 and implemented the same year, were a series of comprehensive military reforms that aimed to streamline and improve the then-Germanized Roman army, strengthening Tormentorum regiments and transforming them into the Neo-Legions of popular imagination. The reforms also innovated religious and cultural tolerance in Europe, guaranteeing civil freedoms and, perhaps most infamously, allowing women to enter politics and enlist in the army.

They were first created to address the Roman Legions' inability to capture key cities in Illyria, then known as the Balkans, as the mountains prevented any large-scale invasion from taking place. The solution, Zoe surmised, was to forego combat altogether and instead focus squarely on siege warfare — that is, streamlining the then-scarce Tormentorum regiments into a projectile-based infantry that could not only fight in close quarters, but also fight from afar, effectively creating the first modern, professional soldier. The idea to include women and Muslims as recruits was also meant to solve a severe lack of manpower, as was the case using strictly-Greek regiments. Naturally, Zoe figured, if they were to serve in the army then they would eventually ask to serve in politics, as did many of her retired officers.

The reforms were met with universal disdain upon their ratification — mainly from the Senate of Constantinople, which was made up of wealthy landowners and other Greek aristocracy — and would lead to a brief civil war in 1487, during which Zoe would purge the Synkletos and replace nearly every seat with senators that supported her reforms.

Orthodox Patriarchs were especially shocked by the reforms, despite not playing a role in the civil war. While Orthodox Greeks were likewise outraged at the prospect of equality to their "barbaric" Islamic neighbors, organizing several revolts throughout Zoe's reign, Muslims seemed wholly unoffended by the sudden "open-ness" of the Romans, while Catholics began seeing the reforms as the Empire "desecrating" Europe by allowing Muslims to travel freely within their borders.

Although the decrees said nothing of the sort, the Maiden Reforms were in many ways responsible for the decline of Orthodox Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire — and the rise of religious freedom as a civil liberty, both in the Empire and as an ideal abroad. Such liberties, as is commonly speculated, led to the circulation and propagation of new and exciting ideas, and possibly inciting the Protestant Reformation in Europe, through which the Catholic Church's authority was severed.