Alternate History Ideas and Discussion

[Zyobot]

Naturally, Rome had its own mercantile colonies and whatnot, even as it was empire-building. The USA, since embarking on a more (de facto) imperialist course, has similarly only increased its trade empire at the same time.

Fair enough, though I'd still say that the US's celebration of business leaders and "unique entrepreneurial spirit" are still parallels ingrained in America's very being (as opposed to something incidental), which astute Carthaginians would no doubt notice. (I can also see Greco-Romans observing from the afterlife that, whereas Rome had hegemony and power projection, while Carthage had trade and commercial instincts, America has both qualities in spades—and as such, can expect to go further than either of them in becoming Master of the West.)

But anyway, I suppose in a "Germany as the New Rome" scenario that casts America as a New Carthage to be confronted down the line (though I still think the latter's odds of overpowering Germany are much greater), that'd make Great Britain something of a "Mega-Phoenicia"? After all, the British built history's biggest and most successful maritime empire up to that point, commanding the world's finest navy and conducting trade and commerce on a scale that'd make Hannibal's jaw hit the floor. (Hence, the prefix "mega-" in front of "Phoenicia".)

 

[WolfBear]

Possibly. But then again, even an A-H royal can get exposed to different and new viewpoints by reading literature, et cetera. So, while it's certainly possible that Otto would grow up in a more conservative milieu had A-H survived and especially avoided WWI, this doesn't necessarily mean that he'd be completely immune to all outside influences. If this guy will still write about Pan-Europeanism in this TL, Otto von Hapsburg might still get access to his book(s) and read it/them sooner or later:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_von_Coudenhove-Kalergi

Just like Kaiser Bill read books that he himself acquired an interest in, such as this one:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Influence_of_Sea_Power_upon_History

That specific book helped serve as an inspiration for Kaiser Bill's support of Germany's naval construction program, IIRC.

BTW, @sillygoose, I have a question for you: If Otto von Hapsburg does, in fact, eventually decide to implement the United States of Greater Austria plan in a TL where there is either no WWI at all or a CP victory in WWI (and after he himself eventually becomes A-H Kaiser, of course), what odds would you place on Austria-Hungary eventually collapsing and breaking up 1991-UUSR-style at a time of severe crisis? As in, with all of the constituent states of the USoGA either becoming their own independent countries or joining neighboring independent countries, such as Serbia, Romania, Italy, Germany, and perhaps Poland if it will already be recreated by that point in time:

 

[Eparkhos]

Alright, bit of a crack idea I had:

- The Huns crush the WRE, Visigoths and ERE over several years and establish a hegemonic, North-Europe-spanning empire over numerous Germanic tribes. This survives Attila's death thanks to a great deal of luck/hyper-competent successors and eventually morphs into a bizarre psuedo-HRE/China, with numerous stem/tribal duchies holding much of the real power and a centralized dynastic government trying to increase its own power, with an institutionalized (Catholic in structure if not theology) Arian Church tying it all together. During this time, thanks to heavy plows and crop rotation, the population of Northern Europe explodes, all while an increasingly interlinked Gothic-derived culture creates a unified national identity a la the Han, with this giant sprawling empire surviving through a series of dynasties, and so on...
- Added bonuses include no Slavic migration/expansion, King Arthur, an entirely Latinized North Africa, a unified Catholic Hispania under a Suevic Dynasty, an independent Coptic Egypt and a Nestorian-Zoroastrian syncretist Persian Empire dominated the Near East.

thoughts?

 

[WolfBear]

Alright, bit of a crack idea I had:

- The Huns crush the WRE, Visigoths and ERE over several years and establish a hegemonic, North-Europe-spanning empire over numerous Germanic tribes. This survives Attila's death thanks to a great deal of luck/hyper-competent successors and eventually morphs into a bizarre psuedo-HRE/China, with numerous stem/tribal duchies holding much of the real power and a centralized dynastic government trying to increase its own power, with an institutionalized (Catholic in structure if not theology) Arian Church tying it all together. During this time, thanks to heavy plows and crop rotation, the population of Northern Europe explodes, all while an increasingly interlinked Gothic-derived culture creates a unified national identity a la the Han, with this giant sprawling empire surviving through a series of dynasties, and so on...
- Added bonuses include no Slavic migration/expansion, King Arthur, an entirely Latinized North Africa, a unified Catholic Hispania under a Suevic Dynasty, an independent Coptic Egypt and a Nestorian-Zoroastrian syncretist Persian Empire dominated the Near East.

thoughts?

Sounds like Adolf Hitler's wet dream lol, especially if this giant Hunnic-Germanic Empire will also eventually expel its entire Jewish population somewhere else.

 

[Skallagrim]

Would it have ever actually been possible for British India to be partitioned along ethnic lines (1991 USSR-style) rather than along religious lines?

To some extent, this happeed, if you count the whole process, including the separation of Burma. The other big steps would be:

A) Some more Sino-Tibetan mountain states in the North, such as Ladakh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, and Mizoram (conceivably fused with parts of Tripura and the far Eastern strip of Bangladesh).

B) An independent Dravidian country/union/whatever in the South.


....Of course, the Western half of Pakistan would plausibly still become (part of) one or more independent countries, being Indo-Aryan like much of Northern India, but belonging to the Iranian rather than the Indic branch.

 

[Skallagrim]

Alright, bit of a crack idea I had:

- The Huns crush the WRE, Visigoths and ERE over several years and establish a hegemonic, North-Europe-spanning empire over numerous Germanic tribes. This survives Attila's death thanks to a great deal of luck/hyper-competent successors and eventually morphs into a bizarre psuedo-HRE/China, with numerous stem/tribal duchies holding much of the real power and a centralized dynastic government trying to increase its own power, with an institutionalized (Catholic in structure if not theology) Arian Church tying it all together. During this time, thanks to heavy plows and crop rotation, the population of Northern Europe explodes, all while an increasingly interlinked Gothic-derived culture creates a unified national identity a la the Han, with this giant sprawling empire surviving through a series of dynasties, and so on...
- Added bonuses include no Slavic migration/expansion, King Arthur, an entirely Latinized North Africa, a unified Catholic Hispania under a Suevic Dynasty, an independent Coptic Egypt and a Nestorian-Zoroastrian syncretist Persian Empire dominated the Near East.

thoughts?

I assume the Southern border would be Danube-Sava-Alps, and then further West... Rhine? Or pusing a bit further out, Moselle-Meuse-Somme? In the East, a Hunnic Empire could plausibly control the Dnieper, Don and Volga basins in their entirety. The Northern border in those parts would, for the time being, presumably be the Daugava.

If the Hunnic Empire can push across the Baltic Sea and annex Scandinavia, then the more Northern regions of European "Russia" would likewise be absorbed.

In the South-East, the Caucasus is the obvious border.



And in the mean-time, Southern Europe and North Africa is a gaggle of messy post-Roman successor states. The ATL situation surrounding the (more sudden) fall of Rome and the presence of a vast Arian empire to the North may well keep the Khalkedonian Church united, and this religious identity would be the main common identity tying the post-Roman world together.

 

[ATP]

Alright, bit of a crack idea I had:

- The Huns crush the WRE, Visigoths and ERE over several years and establish a hegemonic, North-Europe-spanning empire over numerous Germanic tribes. This survives Attila's death thanks to a great deal of luck/hyper-competent successors and eventually morphs into a bizarre psuedo-HRE/China, with numerous stem/tribal duchies holding much of the real power and a centralized dynastic government trying to increase its own power, with an institutionalized (Catholic in structure if not theology) Arian Church tying it all together. During this time, thanks to heavy plows and crop rotation, the population of Northern Europe explodes, all while an increasingly interlinked Gothic-derived culture creates a unified national identity a la the Han, with this giant sprawling empire surviving through a series of dynasties, and so on...
- Added bonuses include no Slavic migration/expansion, King Arthur, an entirely Latinized North Africa, a unified Catholic Hispania under a Suevic Dynasty, an independent Coptic Egypt and a Nestorian-Zoroastrian syncretist Persian Empire dominated the Near East.

thoughts?

One problem - thanks to DNA we knew that slavic people were there at least 1000BC.Goths,before being smashed by hunns,killed over 100 savic kings/probably just village chiefs/.
Other that that - interesting,especially King Artur.

Add Celtic America thanks to Brandon journey - maybe with pope on exile there ?

 

[Skallagrim]

One problem - thanks to DNA we knew that slavic people were there at least 1000BC.Goths,before being smashed by hunns,killed over 100 savic kings/probably just village chiefs/.

1000 BC? That's not accurate. If you meant 100 BC, I might buy that.

Still, "Slavs" as a concept only came into existence in the 6th century AD. The first tribes we can identify as direct ancestors of the slavs (whether these were already recogisably "slavic" in culture or language is open to debate) are referenced around AD 100, by the Romans. Basically: "those tribes East of Germania Magna, they're not Scythians, I don't know, whatever." So I can agree that the great-great-grand-daddies of these guys were probably around in 100 BC already, too.

But 1000 BC is just madness. The genetic background of Slavs is much-debated, but the "1000 BC" you reference must certainly refer to the so-called "East European" gene cluster -- which isn't uniquely "Slavic" as such. It also includes the ancestors of non-Slavic peoples, like the Hungarians.

But these matters are confusing, because there is also a "Northern European" gene cluster, which includes, for instance, the Finnic peoples. But the Finnic and Hungarian peoples are part of the same ethnic continuüm, so we're talking about overlapping clusters here. Proto-Slavs and Proto-Hungarians were clearly partially intermingled back then, and Proto-Finns and Proto-Hungarians were inter-mingled, too, but Proto-Finns and Proto-Slavs were not inter-mingled (that we know of).

It took a long time for these groups to really "solidify" and become truly distinct and identifiable. Pretending that there were "Slaves" in 1000 BC is ridiculous. There were distant ancentral populations, some of whose descendants would eventually form the tribes that would form the nucleus of the population we'd come to call "Slavs".

 

[ATP]

That's not accurate. "Slavs" as a concept only came into existence in the 6th century AD. The first tribes we can identify as direct ancestors of the slavs (whether these were already recogisably "slavic" in culture or language is open to debate) are referenced around AD 100, by the Romans. Basically: "those tribes East of Germania Magna, they're not Scythians, I don't know, whatever."

The genetic background of Slavs is much-debated, but the "1000 BC" you reference is about the so-called "East European" gene cluster -- which isn't "slavic" as such. It also includes the ancestors of non-Slavic peoples, like the Hungarians.

But these matters are confusing, because there is also a "Northern European" gene cluster, which includes, for instance, the Finnic peoples. But the Finnic and Hungarian peoples are part of the same ethnic continuüm, so we're talking about overlapping clusters here. Proto-Slavs and Proto-Hungarians were clearly partially intermingled back then, and Proto-Finns and Proto-Hungarians were inter-mingled, too, but Proto-Finns and Proto-Slavs were not inter-mingled (that we know of).

It took a long time for these groups to really "solidify" and become truly distinct and identifiable. Pretending that there were "Slaves" in 1000 BC is ridiculous. There were distant ancentral populations, some of whose descendants would eventually form the tribes that would form the nucleus of the population we'd come to call "Slavs".

R1a Y-DNA group.And 2000-4000BC.At least,males - womans DNA is almost entirely local/belonging to groups which come here some 10.000BC.
And Greek named all nomads as Scyts,and all settled as Celts,when roman mentioned Vends living here.
Which,as Jordanus in Gothica said,was just another name for slavic - germans named western slav as wends till 19th century.

 

[Skallagrim]

R1a Y-DNA group.And 2000-4000BC.At least,males - womans DNA is almost entirely local/belonging to groups which come here some 10.000BC.
And Greek named all nomads as Scyts,and all settled as Celts,when roman mentioned Vends living here.
Which,as Jordanus in Gothica said,was just another name for slavic - germans named western slav as wends till 19th century.

I'm afraid that you have no idea what you're talking about. Your claims about the DNA don't prove, in any way, what you actually think they do. And your claims about Greek naming conventions are just... plain wrong. I've read quite a lot of primary sources from Ancient Greece, and the notion that Greeks called all nomads Skuthoi and all sedentary tribes Keltoi is just... beyond retarded. Not remotely true.

Jordanes (not "Jordanus") wrote his De origine actibusque Getarum (not "Gothica") in the 6th century AD. Hey, who mentioned that as the time the term "Slavic" was invented again...? Oh, right, I did.

The Roman "Veneti" described in the region around AD 100 (not the much earlier dates you talked about) might be the same people as the Wends, but this is actually disputed, so don't be all that certain. By most accounts, the Veneti are a group that was later absotbed by the early Slavs (well after AD 100), and the Slavs actually originated in the region of the Polabian marches. Which would suggest that when the Romans referened the "Veneti" on the Vistula, these were a tribe that was not Slavic, but whose descendants were later over-run and absorned by the expanding Slavs.

You're peddling a lot of pseudo-history here.

 

[Buba]

Slavs actually originated in the region of the Polabian marches

???
Or did you mean to write
Polesian Marshes
?

 

[Skallagrim]

???
Or did you mean to write
Polesian Marshes
?

I always type this wrong. It's like my very own version of the Slovenia/Slovakia fuck-up.

Yes, Polesian -- around the Pripet river. Both genetic and archeological evidence points to this region as the Proto-Slavic Urheimat.

 

[Buba]

I always type this wrong.

Oh, yes, persistent typos, I know something about that

archeological evidence points to this region as the Proto-Slavic Urheimat.

The location of the Zarubinecka Culture clued me in as to what area you may have had in mind

 

[ATP]

I'm afraid that you have no idea what you're talking about. Your claims about the DNA don't prove, in any way, what you actually think they do. And your claims about Greek naming conventions are just... plain wrong. I've read quite a lot of primary sources from Ancient Greece, and the notion that Greeks called all nomads Skuthoi and all sedentary tribes Keltoi is just... beyond retarded. Not remotely true.

Jordanes (not "Jordanus") wrote his De origine actibusque Getarum (not "Gothica") in the 6th century AD. Hey, who mentioned that as the time the term "Slavic" was invented again...? Oh, right, I did.

The Roman "Veneti" described in the region around AD 100 (not the much earlier dates you talked about) might be the same people as the Wends, but this is actually disputed, so don't be all that certain. By most accounts, the Veneti are a group that was later absotbed by the early Slavs (well after AD 100), and the Slavs actually originated in the region of the Polabian marches. Which would suggest that when the Romans referened the "Veneti" on the Vistula, these were a tribe that was not Slavic, but whose descendants were later over-run and absorned by the expanding Slavs.

You're peddling a lot of pseudo-history here.

Not History,genetics.
First in Europe was hunters with haplogroup I,then/10.000BC/ settled people with G,E,J,haplogroups,and finally R1b who go throughh Africa/Dogons remained there/ ,go to West Europe and take territories there.

When people of R1a haplogroup come through Asia to Central Europe,most remained there,rest go to India and Iran later.
So,they could be considered as Aryans.
Which is no fair,becouse they come from central Europe,not India.

So,of course,all nations are mix of many groups - but was in Europe at least from 4.000 BC.Since last big wave of settlers come.

P.S Jordanus wrote his book in 6th century - but using oral sources from 4th century.And mentioned that weneds is old name for slavs.

 

[WolfBear]

To some extent, this happeed, if you count the whole process, including the separation of Burma. The other big steps would be:

A) Some more Sino-Tibetan mountain states in the North, such as Ladakh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, and Mizoram (conceivably fused with parts of Tripura and the far Eastern strip of Bangladesh).

B) An independent Dravidian country/union/whatever in the South.


....Of course, the Western half of Pakistan would plausibly still become (part of) one or more independent countries, being Indo-Aryan like much of Northern India, but belonging to the Iranian rather than the Indic branch.

What about doing even further than that? For instance, having separate Tamil, Punjabi, Sindhi, Rajasthani, Marathi, et cetera states?

Also, off-topic, but what are the odds of Germany eventually experiencing a revolution in the absence of World War I if Kaiser Bill will refuse to share sufficient power with the German Reichstag?

Here's what Snake Featherston wrote about this on AH.com over a decade ago:

German Politics Without WW1

What would the internal political situation have been in Germany if WW1 never happened? Historians suggest that one of the major reasons that the German ruling class was so eager for war was to reentrench themselves after the major socialist victories in 1912 in the Reichstag elections...

www.alternatehistory.com

As to the OP, I would say that the German Empire would face a major crisis of its existence. It would be required to either yield popular choice of the Chancellorship or Germany has its 1905.

That post was made in response to this post:

What would the internal political situation have been in Germany if WW1 never happened? Historians suggest that one of the major reasons that the German ruling class was so eager for war was to reentrench themselves after the major socialist victories in 1912 in the Reichstag elections. Without war would the socialists have managed to expand their influence enough to challenge the Kaiser and the 3-tier election system, as well as forcing the ratification of an actual constitution?
Would there be political violence? Kaiser Wilhelm balked at that when Bismarck suggested using the army to crush the socialists in the 1880's, but 3 decades later could he change his mind once his own unlimited power is threatened?

 

[Skallagrim]

Not History,genetics.
First in Europe was hunters with haplogroup I,then/10.000BC/ settled people with G,E,J,haplogroups,and finally R1b who go throughh Africa/Dogons remained there/ ,go to West Europe and take territories there.

When people of R1a haplogroup come through Asia to Central Europe,most remained there,rest go to India and Iran later.
So,they could be considered as Aryans.
Which is no fair,becouse they come from central Europe,not India.

So,of course,all nations are mix of many groups - but was in Europe at least from 4.000 BC.Since last big wave of settlers come.

Thank you for this extremely muddled account of (basically) the steppe theory of Indo-European origins -- with which I'm familiar, and from the looks of it, far more so than you are.

It doesn't prove anything about the origin of the Slavs as a recognisable group, except in the sense that you may (in your rather unclear post) be trying to argue that Slavs are genetically proven to be Indo-European. Which is not disputed, so it's hardly relevant.

P.S Jordanus wrote his book in 6th century - but using oral sources from 4th century.And mentioned that weneds is old name for slavs.

I already answered this point in some detail. You appear to have missed that. To recapitulate: whether the Mediaeval "Wends" are the same people as the "Veneti" referenced by the Romans is, for one, disputed. Even if not, however, the ancient Veneti in 100 BC were not a Slavic people. "Slavs" didn't yet exist at that time (as an identity), and the proto-Slavic tribal cultures inhabited the Pripet Marches of Polesia at that time.

The non-Slavic Veneti were later over-run when the Slavs expanded. Either they were absorbed, becoming culturally Slavic (and thus becoming the latter-day "Wends"), or they were more-or-less wiped out, and the Slavs took their land and their name (same way the Germans took Prussia and also stole the name), and then they became the latter-day Wends.



-------------------------------------------------------

What about doing even further than that? For instance, having separate Tamil, Punjabi, Sindhi, Rajasthani, Marathi, et cetera states?

You asked for ethnic division. I believe these identities existed in a cultural sense, but whether they considered themelves ethnically distinct from their direct neighbours is something I'm inclined to doubt.


-------------------------------------------------------

Also, off-topic, but what are the odds of Germany eventually experiencing a revolution in the absence of World War I if Kaiser Bill will refuse to share sufficient power with the German Reichstag?

The AH.com posts you cite betray a lack of understanding. It wasn't the socialists who were on an upward surge, but the social democrats. This is something that Wilhelm II (ever-mercurial) at times applauded. He was in favour of social welfare programmes. In fact, one reason he fell out with Bismarck is that Bismarck wanted to change course. Previously, Bismarck had deliberately supported moderate social reform, to take the "wind out of the sails" of the socialists. Bismarck wanted to stop that, since the socialists had pretty much been defeated. Compromises were no longer needed, then!

But Wilhelm II consider social reform a goal in itself, and disagreed with Bismarck. Wilhelm II, by the way, also opposed the tiered electoral system. He thought it was stupid, and that if he presenred himself as a champion of the people, elctoral reform would cause broad popular support for his reign.

All in all, no World War(s) means that Germany sees the social democrats making strides, and Wilhelm II often supporting reform. There will be no revolution.

 

[WolfBear]

@sillygoose If the Germans manage to capture Verdun in 1914, how would a 1916 German attack on the fortress of Toul further to the south have looked like and fared?

The logic here would still be the same: To try bleeding the French dry.

 

[WolfBear]

But Wilhelm II consider social reform a goal in itself, and disagreed with Bismarck. Wilhelm II, by the way, also opposed the tiered electoral system. He thought it was stupid, and that if he presenred himself as a champion of the people, elctoral reform would cause broad popular support for his reign.

Did he already have this attitude even before the start of World War I? I was under the impression that he came out against the tiered-voting system only in 1917, in the middle of World War I.

 

[Skallagrim]

Did he already have this attitude even before the start of World War I? I was under the impression that he came out against the tiered-voting system only in 1917, in the middle of World War I.

He had phases were he was more enthousiastic about progressive reforms, and this was already a recurring pattern when he was still Crown Prince. Like I said: this was already a factor when he fell out with Bismarck, and that was well before the War, obviously.

 

[Atarlost]

I think the difference in terms of inches and metric was more than the US and at that time the British empire still used imperial and just about everybody else used metric. For instance while it was said that say Bismarck had 15" guns they were actually the metric equivalent, 38cm. Its just that this would be referred to by its imperial equivalent in UK/US literature.

It doesn't do to understate how influential British naval gun manufacturers were. Most smaller navies were using imported British ships and some of the up and coming navies like Russia, Italy, and Japan (by the comparison to railway guns we're talking circa WWI) were using guns imported from Britain or based on British designs. And when a navy transitions to metric they're still using guns that are exact in inches but not in millimeters (unless they're a multiple of 127mm or 5") until they transition out all the old guns, which takes until the longest service ships are scrapped unless they get refit as thoroughly as the Italian battleships were in the interwar period, which AFAIK is a unique phenomenon outside carrier conversions.