ASB scenario - the land up over, Australia teleported to its antipodes in 3100 BC

[raharris1973]

What if on Mayday 3100 BC, the Australian continent and nearby islands (like Tasmania) and reefs were teleported to their antipodes in the northern and Western Hemisphere?

For the aboriginal peoples, plant, and animal life of Australia, what was mid-autumn will turn into mid-spring, and 3100 BC will be the year of the second summer and no winter.

Here is what it will look like on the map, depending on the projection:

equirectangular:



a different projection, with political boundaries:



As you can see, this is the dawn of civilization, so there are precious few recognizable or even estimated political boundaries. There are nascent civilizations along the Nile in Egypt, in Sumer at the Tigris and Euphrates, and in the Indus Valley. Chinese civilization is still a thing of the future.

How does the movement of Australia effect the natural and human world?

When will the Afro-Eurasian branch of humanity meet the Australian and American branches of humanity again? Australia by this point has been inhabited for circa 45k years, and its contacts with non-Australia have been miniscule for 2-5,000 years with rapid sea level rise. The Americas by this point have been inhabited for circa 12k years and their contacts outside the Americas have been minuscule for 2-5,000 years. Both Australia and the Americas were on the far periphery of the human centers of mass in Afro-Eurasia even when somewhat more connected.

 

[Buba]

New Zealand soooo loooonely!

IMO the most probable scenario is no lasting contact with neither America nor Africa pre XIVth century.

I have strong luso-wank vibes

 

[raharris1973]

XIVth century = 1300s. Not the 1400s. Are you sure you meant the XIVth? The number-th of the century is always one ahead of what the digits make you think they should be, that's why 190x = 20th century, etc.

Figure 1300s is when population density/shipping tech in the western parts of Europe or Africa gets to be enough that people start to go from there to Australia and back? What part of the 1300s, early, pre-plague, or late, post plague?

Will the climates of Europe and the Mediterranean, and Australia and North America, have been disturbed in the 3400 years between 3100 BC and 1300 AD?

 

[Buba]

Yes, I meant the 1400s. IMO 1300s is too early. Although the Canaries are thought to have been "discovered" in the mid 1300s, IIRC, going beyond them is not a given.

@raharris1973 I'm not sure about the climatic impact.
Australia could be wetter or the total rainfall remains the same but it falls in different places, e.g. coastal Queensland and NSW could become deserts, while the Darling-Murray basin is wetter and Lake Eyre is perenial and expands .
I'd not expect changes to the Gulf Stream as NBL Australia seems to lie smack in the middle of the NA gyre.

 

[gral]

Every hurricane that gets deflected to the mid-North Atlantic would go over Australia here. Don't know how much change there would be other than the basic 'hurricanes would lose strength more quickly(as they grow weaker over land, generally)'.

 

[Buba]

Ha!
Hurricanes!
I knew I was forgetting something ... this:

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

will be replaced by

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

So pretty much things stay the same ...
Shocking!

Then again, antipodes, hence similar conditions should prevail

As I know fuck all about climate - maybe US SE hurricanes stay same? More stronk? Puny?

 

[Atarlost]

Ha!
Hurricanes!
I knew I was forgetting something ... this:

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

will be replaced by

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

So pretty much things stay the same ...
Shocking!

Then again, antipodes, hence similar conditions should prevail

As I know fuck all about climate - maybe US SE hurricanes stay same? More stronk? Puny?

My money's on nearly nonexistent. Australia'd be right where most Hurricanes form. Some might make it past the fang looking peninsulas at what becomes south Australia but all the tracks down there seem to hit the Yucatan.

Spoiler: Hurricane map large image

Good news for Florida and the Carolinas is bad news for Madagascar and the nearby African coast. Indian Ocean cyclones now have the entire Pacific to grow in before they get to where they can start either forming or recovering after crossing Australia in our world. I think Europeans aren't going to compete to colonize that part of Africa for very long.

Spoiler: Indian Ocean cyclone tracks

 

[Buba]

So, a wetter Madagascar?

 

[ATP]

Spain never conqer Aztecs,instead would be fighting Aborigens.No spanish empire.
Americas - after both Aztecs and Inkas fall thanks to their own stupidity,we have some smarter kingdoms which could survive contacts with Europe.

P.S i long ago read alternate magical history where Australian cannibals created empire which invaded alternate Europe to take people for meat.They used cangooro calvary and giant lizards,but was defeated by barbarians on mammoths.
Forget title,as usual.

 

[Buba]

The Victorian goldfields are in the part closest to Europe.

 

[ATP]

The Victorian goldfields are in the part closest to Europe.

True,but spaniards would not discover them so soon.Aborigens do not cared about that,after all.To be honest,except few places on shore with good lands,european would have no reasons to explore anything there.

 

[Atarlost]

Spain never conqer Aztecs,instead would be fighting Aborigens.No spanish empire.
Americas - after both Aztecs and Inkas fall thanks to their own stupidity,we have some smarter kingdoms which could survive contacts with Europe.

Spain didn't set out to find the first landmass they could conquer, they set out to find a route to India and China. They're going to see that Australia isn't China and look for routes around it and, lo and behold, it's something small they can go around not some massive wall of rock running from the impassible arctic nearly to the antarctic. Explorers going around the north wind up in the vicinity of Newfoundland, but explorers going around the south wind up in the West Indies right where the Spanish started off OTL, mistake them for the East Indies, and find the Aztecs while looking for China. The Aztecs were living on borrowed time once bronze was reinvented by their neighbors, but they had long enough while they figured out the military applications and got production up to a sufficient scale that the Spanish would probably show up in time to take credit and I don't think the Incas had a timer.

 

[WolfBear]

What's that gray hole (lake?) in the Pakistan area?

 

[raharris1973]

What's that gray hole (lake?) in the Pakistan area?

The Indus Valley civilization I think

 

[WolfBear]

The Indus Valley civilization I think

OK. Well, not very much would actually change for centuries, I would presume, and I don't know which butterfly effects would affect things here because we have a PoD that's so far in the past here. If Spain and/or Portugal, or whatever their equivalents are in this TL, still eventually become great seafearing powers, I would expect them to discover Australia while they are engaging in their circumnavigation of Africa, and very likely before they actually discover the Americas.

 

[ATP]

Spain didn't set out to find the first landmass they could conquer, they set out to find a route to India and China. They're going to see that Australia isn't China and look for routes around it and, lo and behold, it's something small they can go around not some massive wall of rock running from the impassible arctic nearly to the antarctic. Explorers going around the north wind up in the vicinity of Newfoundland, but explorers going around the south wind up in the West Indies right where the Spanish started off OTL, mistake them for the East Indies, and find the Aztecs while looking for China. The Aztecs were living on borrowed time once bronze was reinvented by their neighbors, but they had long enough while they figured out the military applications and got production up to a sufficient scale that the Spanish would probably show up in time to take credit and I don't think the Incas had a timer.

You have a point.No matter how you look at them,Aborigens could not be mistaken for chineese.
But - maybe they would disciver Americas 50 year later,and by then Aztecs would be history.Incas,unfortunatelly,could be destroyed only by cyvil war when they conqer all advanced civilisations,so they would be still there.

But - Spain would still get less gold and silver,so their empire would be weaker.

The Indus Valley civilization I think

Indeed.Harappa and other cities.According to van Deniken,they were destroyed by nukes.
And,to be honest,when i once read Mahabharata/smaller version,of course/ it looked like they have advanced technology.

 

[Atarlost]

But - maybe they would disciver Americas 50 year later,and by then Aztecs would be history.Incas,unfortunatelly,could be destroyed only by cyvil war when they conqer all advanced civilisations,so they would be still there.

It's not going to take the Spanish 50 years to send expeditions around Australia. Unless the Spanish get really badly delayed in Newfoundland and completely neglect to go around Australia to the south there's not going to be much delay. A major expedition sets out ever 2-3 years on averages and Australia probably only adds a couple to map the routes around it. This only buys the Aztecs maybe as little as five years and probably not much more than ten.

The Incas are bought more time since the Treaty of Tordesillas will draw a line farther east so Spain can have Australia. Portugal thought they were just getting Africa when it was signed so they're probably okay with that, at least initially. This, though, means that unless the treaty is renegotiated after the discovery of Brazil the Portugese stop trying to go around the Americas to the south and invest fully in exploring and colonizing Africa.

 

[ATP]

It's not going to take the Spanish 50 years to send expeditions around Australia. Unless the Spanish get really badly delayed in Newfoundland and completely neglect to go around Australia to the south there's not going to be much delay. A major expedition sets out ever 2-3 years on averages and Australia probably only adds a couple to map the routes around it. This only buys the Aztecs maybe as little as five years and probably not much more than ten.

The Incas are bought more time since the Treaty of Tordesillas will draw a line farther east so Spain can have Australia. Portugal thought they were just getting Africa when it was signed so they're probably okay with that, at least initially. This, though, means that unless the treaty is renegotiated after the discovery of Brazil the Portugese stop trying to go around the Americas to the south and invest fully in exploring and colonizing Africa.

It could be enough.
If i remember correctly,Aztecs had prophecy about Quecalcoatl coming back in 1519,and that was only reason why they do not fight them before their capital.
If they choosed to fight they would eventually get defeated,but it would gave Tarascans/their enemies on Pacyfic shore with bronze weapons and fighting to kill/ time to expand.
Their state coud survive.

Incas - it was very lucky for spaniards,they faced rebeliant who murdered rightful ruler after cyvil war and plague.
Without that,they should hold for more time - althought they need to change their customs to survive.
Giving each Inca mummy its own court really was bad idea.