900-999 (Abrittus)

Still writing on this one...

Four Political Models at the World`s Threshold Into Modernity
The 10th century is the last stable century of the "Old World" (e.g. with Atlantis, Caribia and the Taipyingyang islands mostly untouched) before the temporary collapse during the Black Death and the subsequent age of discoveries (12th c.) and industrialisation (beginning in the 13th c.) turn the world of this timeline upside down just like they did in OTL. In the 10th century, the world´s map is cluttered with small and tiny polities and a handful of larger states, where countless ethnic groups speak tens of thousands of languages and organise themselves after manifold political, traditional, and cultural ways.

Yet, four different, but powerful and influential political systems have established themselves in different regions of the world; and these systems are the ones which will shape the 2nd millennium AD, interacting and conflicting with each other (instead of the monoculture of the late-feudalist, early-capitalist Christian absolutist monarchies of Europe which dominated the OTL path into modernity):
 * the "res publica" system of the Roman and Celtic Empires
 * the system of the Chinese Empire
 * the system of the Indianised world and
 * the anarcho-communist Simonist system of Northern Africa.

The Res Publica
The system of the "res publica" traces its roots back to the first Roman Republic (6th-1st centuries BC), but also bears important traits acquired during the Principate (e.g. Caracalla`s citizenship reform) and, most importantly, it incorporates the changes resulting from the 260s revolution. The classical model of the "res publica" developed in the Roman and, with roughly two centuries delay, in the Celtic Empire. It exerts a strong influence on the smaller European nations to its North and the smaller Caucasian nations to its East as well as on the international Ostrogothic Commonwealth, and a certain degree of influence on Aksum, Saba and Persia. This influence is never enforced through hard power. The soft power of the res publica model is strong across all domains.

To choose one political structure which is both typical for the Roman model, and of some explanatory power, it is best to look at the 'Roman Senate. 'It is the centerpiece of Rome's representative democracy, a place of important debates, dominated by two major political parties, whose changing platforms and policies mirror the complicated ways in which social majorities form and political paradigms come and go. Regional backgrounds and loyalty to one`s constituency are important, but at the bottom, the Senate is a universalist institution, where arguments are made not by reference to particularist traditions but to a common rationale concerning the greater good of the entire Empire. There is no tendency towards consensus; political differences are central to the Roman democracy exemplified in the Senate. Powerful economic and social groups organise in particularist groups, too, but the power only lies in the empire`s universal institutions (and in those of its provinces), so if a group wants to impose a certain policy, it must seek to influence the republican institutions, most notably the Senate.

The Chinese Model
The Chinese model obviously developed in the Chinese Empire. Its monarchic principles date back at least to the 3rd century BC. Its political, social and economic theories have developed over one and a half millennia; they prove highly stable despite heated controversies. In contrast to OTL, the structures created in the Sui and early Tang era are not undermined, but develop continually to incorporate suitable new elements which in OTL occurred much later during Song or Ming rule. The Chinese model influenced the political system in Balhae, Silla, Nihon and later Nam Viet and Taipyingyang insular states to a great extent, and the political systems of Turkic polities as well as South-East Asian states like Dali and the Tai states to a certain extent. The diffusion of the Chinese model is sometimes enforced through hard power; its soft power is strongest in the socioeconomic domain.

A political structure that explains a lot about the Chinese model is the 'Jun-tian. 'In contrast to India or Roman Europe, land (and later most other resources, too) is not owned by individuals, families or corporations, but by the empire. The empire lends pieces of land to its citizens, to each according to how much land they can work on by themselves; after the landholder`s death, the land usually returns to the state. Especially the good pieces of land come with strings attached: the farmers must serve in the army as long as they`re capable to, for a limited time of the year (fu-bing). Although familial relations are still relatively strong (as anywhere else in the world during the Classical Age), they are continuously undermined by the atomising force of the omnipresent state, and this is felt through the Jun-tian system, too. When a young man does not find any land available in his family`s vicinity, they often move to another place where they are granted land. The structure of local rural organisation which fits this system, and which differs greatly from the highly traditionalist, conservative, clan-based structures in India and the economically hierarchical structures of the Roman villae rusticae, is that of the Bao-jia. All rural subjects of the Chinese emperor are registered into groups of exactly 100 people, who live territorially close together. The sorting out of local matters of these 100 people is placed into the hands of one household for one year; this office rotates by lot among the households. Whenever Chinese peasants migrate - which they often do - they have a status comparable to that of the Roman "peregrini" until the beginning of the next year, when all Bao-jias are formed anew.

The Indian model
The Indian model developed on the Indian subcontinent. Its strong cultural foundations developed in the 1st millennium BC. Its classical political and military structures were influenced by Western influences mediated through the Sassanid Empire and developed into their prototypical form of federations and confederations of small republics in response to the demands of safe trade on the Silk Road and on the sea route to China. It differs from the OTLMandala model insofar as state power is weaker and overarching safety is not provided by stronger polities dominating smaller ones, but in a dual system of private and political associations and alliances. The Indian model diffused across continental Indochina and insular Indonesia as well as Northwards into the mountainous regions between the Indian subcontinent and China as well as between the Persian and the Chinese sphere of influence. Hard power was seldom wielded in this expansion, which is mainly driven by cultural and religious soft power as well as the establishment of commercial networks. Upon expansion, usually one ethnic group Indianises, often concentrated on coastal regions and arable land, while non-assimilating ethnicities are marginalised into remote regions. Assimilation of the latter happens either under pressure of economic scarcity, but mostly following religious diffusion.

A social structure that explains a lot about the Indian model is the 'Shreni. ///continue///'

The Persian sphere shows Indian influences in its urban centres and a rural organisation akin to the Simonist model, albeit developed separately from the Mazdakist tradition.

The Simonist Model
The Simonist model is derived from early Christian communes and the anarchic structures of Christian resistance during religious persecution. It shows influences of Jewish communes like the Essenes. A separate, but similar socio-economic model developed in Persia with the Mazdakists. The Simonist model spread across the Sahara and Sahel, while the Mazdakist model prevails in rural Persia and spread to Choresmia and Madagascar. Expansion relies on proselytising which usually implies political subversion.

Corvatia Dominates the Peresechen Alliance
At the beginning of the 10th century, latent conflicts between the Peresechen alliance and the Slavonian Republic caused by the northward expansion of both turned into open hostilities. Both Peresechen and New Bogatygavan had tried to win the fortified towns of Wolyn and Turau into their alliances. After Wolyn opted for Peresechen and Turau for the Slavonic Republic, but Slavonia did not cease with its plans to expand its infrastructure into Wolhynia, Peresechen decided to seize on the opportunity that the North of the Slavonic Republic had not yet been as de-tribalised as the South. They decided to equip the Drewlani, a tribe living in the vicinity of the Dregovici-controlled Turau, with light firearms and unleashed them as river pirates on the Borysthenes and as highwaymen.

Slavonia quickly retaliated and did the same with the Buzhans in the vicinity of Wolyn in the North, but also with the Bunjevci further South in the heartland of Peresechen's trading network, who had been somewhat systematically excluded from urban development and modernisation by the (Arianist) White Corvats and (Catholic) Serbs who were the elite of Peresechen and its neighbouring cities, perhaps on account of the Bujevci`s clinging to traditional Slavic cult.

On the whole, the subsidised piracy turned out disastrous mostly for the city of Peresechen. Slavonia was able to muster enough military police to secure its Northern provinces and smoke out the pirates after several years, but the looser Peresechen alliance did not have comparable manpower, the rural population not being in any sort of formalised military relationship with the trading towns.

So, to regain control and ensure the safety of its trade, Peresechen took a fatal decision. The inhabitants of its land still had tribal allegiances, especially in the countryside, but just like in Northern Slavonia or in Venedia, their chiefs had not turned into medieval aristocrats, and their tribal areas were no territorial states. Peresechen now set out to change this. In its own vicinity, it paid chieftain Dragomir of the White Corvats, a military genius, handsomely to deal with the Bunjevci nuisance. Among the Wolhynian clans, a chieftain was determined and a Principate of Wolhynia established. Peresechen sent weapons, military and political counselors - only to find that, not even a decade later, the prince of Wolhynia had indeed dealt with the piracy, but also began skirting Peresechen`s trading terms and negotiating directly with Roman trading companies. He expanded his sphere of influence over several important towns in the North and dictated his conditions.

Peresechen`s venues were curbed considerably, its influence dwindled. In a desperate attempt to win back what they had lost, the people of Peresechen decided in a "vece" to rally behind the White Corvat Dragomir, who had built a strong army, once again. Dragomir promised to guarantee the independence of Peresechen and its allied towns and the democratic rights of the vece, but demanded considerable amounts of funds and soldiers, and the rule over all conquered territories for himself and his offspring, should he lead Peresechen's allies into a victorious battle. The Veches of Peresechen, Cernovits, Krakow, Lwiw and several smaller towns agreed, and the Serbian prince Bogdan joined the alliance, too, in the promise of an extended sphere of influence in which Roman Catholicism would go unchallenged.

In 940, the alliance led by the White Corvats attacked Wolhynia. After seven weeks, most of the Northern territory was brought under control, and Wolyn's fortifications had suffered under the cannons. Prince Vladimir of Wolhynia did not appeal to Slavonia for help, for fear of being annexed by Slavonia instead of Corvatia then, and turned to the Baltic tribe of the Zemaits, whose lands his Northward expansion and the achievement of overlordship over the Krivichs had come to touch, for assistance. The Zemaits saw no advantage in helping Vladimir and little chance of success for his side, too, so they began negotiating with Dragomir instead. Dragomir promised to strictly respect the new border with the Zemaits (inviting Vineta as a neutral arbiter to oversee this), if the Zemaits remained neutral, and a reversal of Wolhynian-Krivich land grabbing as well as a part of the loot, should the Zemaits participate on his side against Vladimir. The Zemaits decided to remain neutral and watched as Dragomir's army finally took Wolyn.

After Wolhynian defeat, a great gathering of representatives from all towns and tribes was organised in the (now formal) capital of Peresechen. A constitution for the Sredny (= central) Slavic Union, which would come to be called simply "Corvatia", was drafted in which some towns retained great degrees of independence and internal democracy with their veces, while others became part of the new (tribe-based) principates of Corvatia, Serbia, Gorania, Smolyanya and Wolhynia. The princes would, in principle, elect the king of the union, but as long as Dragomir would have male ancestors, the crown would remain theirs. (This would be the case into the 1300s, which is why the country came to be called Corvatia).

The result of this nation building, which happened in quite a different fashion from that of Slavonia, Venedia or Moravia, was the particular longevity of tribal structures in Corvatia. Together with the scarcity of treasures of the soil and the great fertility of the soil, this contributed to Corvatia remaining an agricultural state for a very long time - and actually very much into the present.

Economy & Technology

 * Mechanical clocks are invented in Italy. They are huge and lose a lot of time. The Italian Conventum decides to install one in every major city on the peninsula. Urban Vigintisexviri are mandated to hire people responsible for keeping their public clock working and showing the official time.
 * Several pneumatic devices are developed in the Eastern Celtic provinces and used mostly in mining.
 * A Persian engineer presents a draft of a battery-powered electrical motor. So far, nobody tries to apply the idea (or at least nobody succeeds in doing so).

Military
Adapting to the strategies imposed by firearms, which are now found in all sorts and sizes, many large developed countries switch from professional warrior armies to large popular armies. Targeting the  infrastructure of the enemy becomes more and more important.

Philosophy / Science

 * A natural philosopher from India develops the physical theory of inertia.
 * In 926, Liu Zhiyuan becomes chancellor. He pursues reform policies similar to those of OTL Wang Anshi one century later: Liu Zhiyuan was an economic egalitarian as much as he was a political supporter of the absolute monarchy. He confiscates extremely large enterprises and has the government run them; he begins to build the imperial welfare state (orphanages, hospitals, hospices, reserve granaries from which the urban poor received something akin to the Roman cura anonae) and reforms the military by replacing the Fubing system, where only a limited amount of farmers were soldiers, too, with the Baojia system, which effectively turned the entire rural population of China into potential conscripts, but also introduced a sort of half-democratic local self-organisation which assisted the imperial administration. Liu Zhiyuan was assassinated by his conservative enemies in 948, but his policies so popular that they could never be rolled back. Instead, they were copied on many Indochinese islands.
 * Chinese scientists (similar to OTL Shen Kuo a century later) posit for the first time the theories of long-term climate changes and of the tectonic formation of continents and mountains.

Religion

 * The Worldwide Simonist Community is established and founds a theological school in Jerusalem.
 * Lasikian emigrants seeking more profitable employment and Armenians persecuted as a religious minority bring the Paulician Christian creed to Asia Minor.

Nations of Europe

 * Saxony: While kings from earlier and later dynasties in other centuries function as motors of social and political progress, the 10th century is marked by a 55-year rule of a dynasty which tries to monopolise royal power. This brings commoners from the cities and noblemen from the countryside, who had fought against each other, together in the Thing as the parliament must fight for its old and achieved rights. Economically, this is another bad century for Saxony, after high taxes to pay the reparations to Vineta have drained the country of capital.
 * Denmark: The War of Danish Succession breaks out in 933 and ends the next year with a Geatic victory. Danes led by Leif of Gudme declare their independence in 961 and defend it in two victorious battles (the second one in 969) against the Geats. The last Geatic defeat was so thorough that Svearike-Sjonarike seizes the opportunity to invade Geatland. Thus, in 972, Sweden is unified and Uppsala becomes the capital of the Svearike, Sjonarike och Götland.
 * Sweden intensifies its colonisation of Finland. A first revolt of indigenous Finns is crushed with the help of firearms. Attempts at a similar colonisation of Estonia are prevented, as Estonian chiefs appeal to Vineta for help. Vineta's mercenaries defeat a Swedish expeditionary corps in 939. The port towns of Tallinn, Saaremaa and Kalmieda are established and fortified in the 940s and 950s and sign contracts which integrate them into Vineta's network. Estonian traders have established good trading relations with Sara.
 * Venedia: A peasant rebellion among the Milceni is barely contained by Vineta's soldier guild, until Lech, the leader of the rebellious peasants, is captured and brought to Vineta. He is not executed, as his followers feared, but made a member of the city council instead. This move of Vineta's elites, aimed at integrating and pacifying the rebellious peasantry, works for a while, but does not bring lasting improvements for the rural population, as Lech's successors as representatives in Vineta are all middle-sized landowners who do not share the same problems as the rebellious small or landless peasantry.
 * Led and funded by Moravian enterprises, Burgundy begins to develop its economy and seize on its wealth in coal and ore. Roads are built, towns grow into cities, education increases (Burgundian is written in the Latin alphabet). Burgundy`s kings are successful in their attempts to modernise and preserve Germanic religion against Christian influences from the Roman Empire, though.

Nations of Asia

 * Tang China annexes Taiwan and settles Han peasants from the crowded mainland there.
 * A peasant revolt overthrows aristocratic rule in Silla and installs a peasant republic.
 * Nihon: Forty years of crisis. Violent conflicts between powerful land-owning families, the central power of the tenno, organising craftsmen and landless peasants cost many thousands of lives due to modern warfare with firearms. They end with the "New Taika", another series of reforms including a land reform after the Chinese model, the overdue modernisation and centralisation of the armed forces, an improved taxation system and the abolition of the landed gentry. As a consequence of the extremely bloody escalation, all members of the aristocracy except for the tenno`s direct family are either killed or driven into exile.
 * Exiled Fujiwara nobles who fled to Hokkaido manage to establish a shogunate on this Northern island, forcing the Ezo population to abandon their lifestyles of hunting and gathering and work as wage labourers on their fishing boats and in newly built ports.
 * The re-consolidated and reformed Nihon temporarily enters an alliance with Silla and Nihon (for the first time in history) against the new threat from the Hokkaido Shogunate.
 * The Tai/Lao city states along the Mekong forge a confederacy with the capital in Vieng Prueksa. Periods of close alliance with the equally Theravada Buddhist Dvaravati (e.g. against Tang domination) and periods of rivalry alternate.
 * After a change of dynasties, Nanzhao becomes known as the Dali Kingdom. While its economic relations are strongest with the Pyu cities and with Tang China, Dali also forges alliances with the Yarlung in the North and Vieng Prueksa in the South to maintain its independence.
 * Sponsored by Persian, Roman and Celtic tycoons, who seek a cheaper alternative to the official international Silk Road, the Talas Alliance and the Uyghur-Oirate Confederacy fend off Kyrghyz attacks and keep the alternative Tien-Shan route open.

Nations of Africa

 * The Horon fortify their wealthy towns against raids. Their ships begin to copy a Frisian cog design which allows them to land at mangrove coasts, too. They expand their trade network to the Gulf of Guinea, where they encounter the Yoruba and engage in trade with them.
 * In the Kingdom of Yoruba, a paranoia of Simonist conspiracies and encirclement spreads among the elites, leading to a military offensive against the Hausa, Banza and Sao city states. (Neither side has been able to afford significant amounts of firearms.) After initial success, the Simonist communities resort to a rather successful guerrilla warfare, which they extend and carry into the lands of the Yoruba. After Yorubans commit a bloodbath in Kano, Simonist voluntaries from among the Garamants, the Tubu and the Mandinke of Wagadu come to the rescue. Yoruba must withdraw after nine years and considerable losses of warriors, resources and land. New rural Simonist communities are established in central OTL Nigeria.
 * Its quick expansion has overstretched the empire of Kitara. Conflicts among regional lords result in a breakup of the empire and the constitution of smaller, independent successor states: the Kingdoms of Buganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Ankole and Kyamutwara. In spite of this frequent warfare, the 10th century is a time of technological development, in which modern steel manufacturing, dam and road building are undertaken and new types of boats and ships are used for transportation and fishing on the Great Lakes. More and more people in the small central African kingdoms know how to read and write, with the Aksumite Ge'ez alphabet, the Saban alphabet and the Simonists' Garamant alphabet contending for supremacy in the fixture of the various Bantu dialects. Christianity is not very popular with the population, though; two or three rulers, who convert to this faith, are either killed by traditionalist aristocrats, or have their kingdom overrun by an anti-Christian neighbour state.
 * In the Kirinyaga Alliance, the "genuinely African" faction gains the upper hand from the 910s to the 960s. It contributes to Kitara`s breakup and forges alliances with some of the successor states against others, attempting to form an anti-Christian, anti-colonial influences bloc. During this period, political debate and philosophy blossom in Central East Africa, with the Kikuyu philosopher Gathi being the most influential. Gathi formulates the foundations of a philosophy which unites the Kirinyaga ideals of kiyama democracy and Bantu cosmogony in terms which were partly recurring on the philosophical categories imported from Europe, Arabia, Persia and India, but which sought to delimit itself from their connotations at the same time. Gathi was assassinated - some say by Saban agents -, which led to a temporal radicalisation of Kirinyagan policies against interference from the coast, and a Christian coup against radical Gathists in 969. But Gathism survived these early conflicts and became influential across much of the Bantu-inhabited central, Southern and Eastern African regions.
 * Munhumupatapa expands further to the South. Indigenous San are pushed further to the South and West. The elite of Munhumupatapa`s capital, Zimbabwe, and Munhumupatapan traders have learned how to read and write their Bantu language in the Aksumite Ge`ez alphabet. The empire`s heartland is technologically revolutionised with canals, complex irrigation systems, watermills, furnaces and the use of imported fertilisers and new crops from Northern Africa and Asia.

Nations of Atlantis
Salvador79 (talk) 12:10, April 22, 2014 (UTC)
 * Celts establish trading ports, monasteries and a couple of military forts throughout the lands of the Eastern Inuit, Beothuk, Miqmaq, Abenaki and another dozen Algonquin tribes. So far, control is still weak and locally limited; trade and contacts with the natives are not yet fraught with heavy conflicts, and the land has not yet become an imperial province.
 * Ostrogothic ships full of Taino gold stimulate interest in Europe and beyond. The Roman Empire, the Frisian Republic and the Horon each claim one or more islands and exploit, under varying circumstances, gold mines. Tensions between the rivaling powers in the archipelago increase.
 * A first Ostrogoth-Taino university opens in Guaynia on Borikén (OTL Puerto Rico) after a network of schools has always been laid out across the Ostrogoth-settled Taino islands. Educational language is Greek, whose alphabet is increasingly also used by Taino to write in their own language.
 * Years of drought kill tens of thousands of Maya. Ostrogothic trading ships are stormed by Maya refugees seeking a better future somewhere else. Aboard them (and other improvised vessels), Mayans spread across Southern Atlantis and as far as the northern shore of Caribia (OTL South America). Educated Mayans begin to gravitate towards Guaynia and its university. They contribute greatly to the scientific community`s awareness of the ecological disaster and spread the word of this problem across an increasing number of Atlantic people, among them the powerful Nahua.

Abrittus