300-399 (Abrittus)

300s
Gregor the Illuminator proselytises with considerable success among peoples of the Caucasus. The Armenian nobility tries to violently suppress it. Lakians, Svani and Cercetians stick to their traditional gods, and Sassanid azats prevent Grego's entourage from entering Albania, but in Iberia and Lasika, Gregor is quite successful. Even in Armenia, the rural population and the middle and lower classes in the towns embrace Christianity.

301
Imaziyen: The Garamants have become peaceful traders with the Roman cities at Africa's Northern coast, and expand at the cost of other Berber kingdoms. This is the year in which Tafilalt, their strongest and last enemy in the West, finally falls under Garamant control.

302
The Empire of Meroë is finally dissolved and split into the three successor kingdoms of Nobatia, Makuria and Alodia.

303
Gaul: In cities across Britannia, Gaul, Germania and Hispania, a republican-democratic movement has grown, too. Its strongholds lie in the old senatorial province of Gallia Narbonnensis with its wealthy cities, which trade intensively with the Roman Republic and host many Roman citizens. Under Tetricus and Constantius, the movement has been temporarily weakened due to persecutions, but also due to increased political stability and further reforms.

In 303, though, sparked by the introduction of a Wine Excise which threatened the local economy, the movement revives, especially in Southern Gaul. Protesters in Gallia Narbonnensis demand a democratisation of political procedures in Gaul after the Roman example. Unauthorised Plebeian Councils form and a federation organises the resistance.

Gaul's Caesar Constantius sends a legion to quash the rebellion. The Narbonnensis Conventum appeals to Rome for help. The Senate hesitates.

304
Gaul / Roman Empire: After Celtic imperial troops committed a bloodbath among republicans in Narbo, Roman public opinion finally favours an intervention, which at first aims only at defending Antipolis, which is under siege. As Constantius declares war on Rome, more legions are sent.

Rome quickly manages to conquer the eastern half of Gallia Narbonnensis. After a decisive battle near Tarasco, Roman legions cross the Rhodanus River and occupy the Western part of the province, too.

Celtic re-inforcements are sent in from the North. After a battle at Segodunum ends inconclusively, both sides dig in. In autumn, Constantius and the Roman Consuls sign a peace treaty. The insurgent civitates of Gallia Narbonnensis join the Roman Republic, but the Republic will not station or move its federal troops there.

Constantius successfully cracks down on the remaining republicans in other provinces like Aquitania.

305
Persia / India: Shah Narseh I defeats another insurgency in the Indian satrapies.

306
Persia: Persian scholars who came into contact with the Confucian philosophy in China establish the first faculty of political philosophy at the University of Taxila in the Sassanid satrapy of Gandhara.

307
Tamilakam: A Kalabhra attack on Muchiri fails, partly due to the assistance provided to the Chera defenders by several Sassanid and Roman ships and their military crew, who had accompanied merchant ships, who bought pepper for the Middle Eastern and Mediterranean markets.

308
Tamilakam: The Sassanid admiral negotiates a pact of military assistance with the Chera court at Muchiri, who only control the land a dozen miles around the port town. In exchange, Sassanid ships would not have to pay staple tolls.

309
Gaul: Seeking to foster a separate Celtic identity and to redefine the empire as not being a mere breakaway from Rome, Constantius lays down rules for a new state cult and mints new coins. The latter show the caesar's face on one side, and a Celtic symbol together with the words "Imperium Galliarum" (no longer: Imperium Romanum Galliarum) on the other. While religious freedom is still granted to everyone, the new Celtic state cult renames deities in accordance with Celtic mythology and switches the festive calendar to the eight Celtic festive days plus New Year's Eve, which is the only common festivity with the Roman Empire now.

310s
The secret societies and their lore of self-defense reaches the coastal towns of Tamilakam, where its perceived necessity (against the Kalabhras) is even greater than in the Sassanid satrapies, where things have calmed down a bit after Kartir's death.

311
Sheba / Persia: After Sheba has conquered the entire southern half of the Arabian peninsula, conflicts with the Sassanid empire over who controls the Strait of Hormuz erupt. Beginning of the first Sabaean-Persian war.

312
Sheba / Persia: The first Sabaean-Persian war ends with the Sassanids defeated, having been unable to use their superior ground forces, losing several naval battles. Although the treaty asserts Sabaean control over the Strait of Hormuz and imposes limits on the Persian navy, shah Narseh I starts a secret naval build-up.

313
Celtic Empire: To protect the "property" of Celtic slave owners, Constantius violates the contract with Rome and begins the erection of a wooden limes between the Roman province of Narbonennsis and the Celtic Empire, guarded by limitanei, who see to it that no escaped slaves can flee to the Roman Empire and freedom. Rome protests, but does not care enough to wage another war against its neighbour.

314
Persia: The windmill is invented in Northern Eran. In less than ten years, the innovation will have spread across the Empire to India and Mesopotamia, facilitating grain procession.

316
Celtic Empire: The biggest Anglic / Saxon raid / invasion so far devastates Britannia's East Coast and takes weeks to drive back.

317
Celtic Empire: Constantius dies. Articnus and Boudiccus contend for his succession. Another period of political instability haunts the Celtic Empire, and once again, the republicans are on the rise.

319
Persia / India: Shakastan - the former Western Satrapies - finally appears to be under control. The province yields incredible amounts of taxes for the shahanshah, whose power now reaches across OTL Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Madya Pradesh, too.

320s
The inner crisis of the Celtic Empire strengthens the republican movement even in Britannia and Hispania. Across the Celtic Empire, the new professional collegia, which have formed after the Roman model, are the main support base of republicanism. In comparison to the Roman Empire, Celtic republicanism is much more bourgeois and moderate, it has little ideological connection to Christianity, which is weak in the Celtic Empire anyway, and certainly does not have a liberation of slaves on its agenda. Nevertheless, the progressive majority in the Roman Senate supports the Celtic republican movement and offers asylum to persecuted activists. With Sapientius' ascension to caesarship in 325, another period of relative inner stability follows and republicanism is weakened again. Official Celtic-Roman relations reach a new low, though.

320
The three-field crop rotation has become standard across Europe. After grain prices had initially dropped, increasing population levels have restored the balance.

Relatively stable trade relations between the Alemanni and the Celtic and Roman Empires have grown; the Alemanni sell grain and furs and buy wine and glass. Alemannic villages in the Rhine valley, close to the Celtic border, have grown into the first indigenous Germanic towns, and syncretic religious practices blending Germanic paganism with Christian elements have been observed. The Alemannic High Kings officially recognise Celtic overlordship, but factually, the Celtic Empire has given up most of its territories West of the Rhine.

322
Roman spies in the cities along the Silk Road in the Sassanid Empire's Sogdian satrapy report unprecedented masses of nomads pouring into Sogdia and moving Westward, effacing Sassanid control over the region.

323
Roman Empire: For the first time, an arch-gravity dam is built not only for irrigation, but also in combination with two large watermills in Leptis Magna (Cyrene).

Many peregrini from among the Garamants work in this large project. Among the workers, they come into contact with Simonist Christianity.

Persia: Shah Narseh I dies. His young grandchild Shapur II inherits the throne.

324
Gaul / Franconia / Saxony: After Saxons have repeatedly raided Britannia and also regained control over northern Westphalia, four Frankish kings and the Celts under their military leader Sapientius form a temporal alliance against the Saxons. The Saxons manage to escape any decisive confrontation in battle, but many villages are burnt. The Celtic Navy sets up military camps at the Saxon North Sea shore. Frankish control over Westphalia is restored.

327
Roman Empire: An attempted Markomannic invasion of Pannonia shatters at the Danube Limes.

329
Persia: Young Shah Shapur II decides to settle conflicts between the dehqan ("village lords"), urban guilds and the high aristocracy to a certain extent in favour of the former two (the latter having tutelaged him over the past years ...), while at the same time dealing with religious uncertainties caused by the rise of Manichaeism.

Inspired by the Roman model of the Comitia Civitatum, but also clearly delineating the Sassanid model against the democratic Roman one, Shapur II sets out to define the constituent units of the empire's satrapies. At the centre of each of these smallest political units is a Zoroastrian fire temple. Issues like the collection of taxes, the settling of (property and other) disputes and the upholding of public order are to be sorted out by dehqans in rural areas and town councils in urban environments; dehqans are to preside over rural assemblies, to provide census information and to announce imperial laws: town councils must do the same in the cities. Low-ranking local Zoroastrian priests (herbads) are to play important advisory and ceremonial roles in these political processes. The high aristocracy is only left with the governorship of satrapies and military command of the various segments of the Sassanid armed forces, while the high clergy (mobads) advises the satraps and the shahanshah and presides over cultic organisation, choosing herbads and overseeing theological education.

330s
Tamil merchant guilds (nikamam), with members trained in armed and unarmed combat, revive trade with the hinterland and overland trade in Tamilakam. They travel in armed convoys through Kalabhra-controlled territory.

330
Gaul / Saxony: Saxons burn down several Celtic coast camps.

331
Persia: Shapur II's communal reforms are implemented from the Euphrates to the Yamuna.

332
Persia / Sheba / Aksum: Shaipur II declares war against Sheba. The secret fleet planned  by his grandfather defeats the Sabaean navy in several battles. Sheba asks its Christian neighbour (and long-time rival) Aksum for help. Aksum, fearing they would be next on Shaipur's list, allies with Sheba. Together, Aksum and Sheba manage to defeat the Persian navy.

334
Persia / India: The first Sassanid university in OTL India is founded in the booming port town of Barygaza, which has become a large city and a wealthy commercial centre, where Indian spices, cloth, cotton and medicinal plants are traded for wine, glass and petra oleum from Persia's heartland and Western provinces as well as from Roman Europe, and where the crafts blossom, Western and Indian techniques fertilising each other. The University of Barygaza is mostly necessary for the education of future civil servants - as such, it offers a unique opportunity for upward social mobility for the sons of Indians from different castes and corroborates the support for Sassanid rule. On the other hand, it also becomes a centre of Zoroastrianism in India. Staunch Shaivists, Vaishavists, Buddhists and Jainists view this with some skepticism. Their continuously perceived necessity for self-defense - but also and increasingly the fact that such secret societies prove an alternative way of facilitating one's career within traditional Indian social structures like the shreni - has led to tens of thousands of Barygazans belonging to secret martial arts societies. Frequent Sassanid raids to enforce the ban on private weapons appear to be futile.

335
Roman Empire: The Greutungs have rebuilt a considerable empire. Having brought the Bosporans and their navy under their control, a fleet of Ostrogoth boatmen raids Sinope.

The Republic retorts by moving its navy from the Mediterranean into the Black Sea, hunting down the pirates and helping the Bosporans in regaining control over their cities. A punitive campaign in the steppe fails utterly, though. The Goths cannot be grasped, and the Republican troops must withdraw before the advent of winter.

The Consuls negotiate a closer co-operation with the Bosporan Kingdom and the Kingdom of Lasika, who both allow the Roman Republican navy to be stationed in their ports. But beyond the coastline, Rome is not yet able to stop the consolidation of the Greutungs' imperial power.

336
Iberia: King Mirian converts to Trinitarian Christianity and declares the faith, which has been embraced by a majority of his subjects, as the official religion of his small state. Although Trinitarian, the Iberian church is autocephalous like Sheba's or Aksum's.

337
Sassanid Empire / Arabia: The Abd al-Qais, an Arab tribe living in OTL Bahrain, crosses the Persian Gulf and plunders Persia.

338
Sassanid Empire / Arabia: Shapur's retaliation is not limited to the Abd al-Qais. Together with his Lakhmid allies, Shapur's armies penetrate deep into Arabia and persecute the (mainly Christian) Taghlib and Banu Bakr ibn Wa'il, too. The Taghlib appeal to their Christian brethren in Sheba and in the Roman civitates of Palmyra and Petra, who send support.

The war in Arabia thus threatens the peace between the Roman Republic and the Sassanid Empire. Consul Antonius Sicilius barely manages to contain the diplomatic damage. The republican leadership is angry but has no means to stop its Arabian cities from pursuing their own policies. Their exclusion from the Republic is discussed, but dismissed, since this would endanger Rome's economically extremely important control over the Maris Erythrae (Red Sea).

On the battlefield, the united Palmyran/Petraean, Sabaean, Taghlib and Banu Bakr troops are about to suffer a final defeat when news of the establishment of an independent Kidarite kingdom in the Sassanid satrapy of Bactria reaches Shapur II.

The Sassanids retreat from the Arabian Peninsula, leaving only a few garrisoned troops to control Bahrain, and ride to the Empire's Northern border.

The fortunate outcome of the military confrontation for the Christian Arab alliance - only the Abd al-Qais have been deported and enslaved in greater numbers, while the Taghlib only suffered minor losses - strengthens both Sheba's ascendancy to hegemony on the Arab Peninsula and the close ties between the Roman civitates dominated by Simonist Ghassanids and their fellow Christians in Arabia.

Aksum / Nobatia / Alodia: In the midst of a Nobatian campaign aimed at conquering Alodia, the Alodian Queen Amanipilade calls to Aksum for help. After discussions with Aksum's King Ezana, Amanipilade converts to Christianity, and so do many of her subjects in a great baptism before the joint military operation of Aksumites and Alodians against the Nobatians. The ensuing defeat of the Nobatian invaders is ascribed to divine intervention in Alodian and Aksumite legends formed during the Christianisation of all of Alodia and its integration as a relatively autonomous sub-kingdom into Aksum, which transforms from a kingdom into an empire.

339
Celtic Empire: After the camps on the Saxon coast have finally fallen, Anglians, Saxons and Jutes start new raids at the Britannic and even the Batavian coast.

Sassanid Empire: Shapur II's first military campaign against the Xionite / Kidarite / Hephtalite / Huna nomads in Bactria ends inconclusively, with the nomads retreating far beyond the Oxus. (Three years later, they will have returned.)

340
Roman Empire: Among Christians, the schism between Arianists and Trinitarians breaks out.

Roman Empire / Gothic Empire: After a Gothic raid on Olbia, two less pacifist Consuls mobilise several legions and march them against the Goths, who had already retreated to the steppe. The confrontation takes place much farther East than Rome had expected, and the heavily armed, inflexible Roman cavalry is soundly defeated by light Gothic riders, who had learned from the Sarmatians.

Rome's Dacian and lower Moesian cities must prepare to increase their defenses against the Greutungs. Colonists begin to retreat and move into safer regions West of the Carpathians as they see that their neighbours beyond the Republic's border become vassalised by the Greutungs.

342
Roman Empire: In the long overdue conference on military challenges for the empire held at the Academia Martiana, the twin challenges of a) defending the empire's North-Eastern flank against nomadic riders from the steppe and b) securing naval safety to maintain the important trade with India are discussed and weighed against each other. The feeble republic cannot yet master both challenges at once.

The proponents of the "Hun Thesis" argue with the Roman incapacity vis-a-vis Ostrogothic attacks and the fate of their Sassanid neighbour and call for a surge in diversified cavalry buildup and co-operation with Persia. The proponents of the "Naval Strategy" argue that the fortified limites will have to suffice and territories beyond the limites should be given up. Rome should rather build up and modernise its classis (navy) to be able to secure Roman-Indian trade, as they see the Sassanids more as an enemy, not a partner.

In the following years, the A.M., the military leadership and even Consuls and the Senate are deeply influenced by this heated debate - actual military policies reflect a bit of both approaches.

343
Celtic Empire: Picts attack Britannia. Their invasion is stopped at Isurium Brigantum.

344
Aksum: In the process of the integration of Alodia, the archbishop of Aksum becomes the Patriarch of Aksum, who in future times would be jointly appointed by the Emperor of Aksum and a synod of bishops from Aksum and Alodia.

346
Persian Empire (India): Zoroastrian priests in Barygaza create a syncretic sort of Zoroastro-Hinduism, in which Indian deities are neatly divided into sub-gods in the realm of light and major demons in the realm of darkness, and traditional rituals are relocated into temples, where they would take place under the supervision of priests assigned from Ctesiphon.

347
Tamilakam: The Kalabhra ruler Tiraiyan converts himself and his entourage to Buddhism. He invites monks from the Gupta Empire into a monastery he builds near Urayur.

348
Roman Empire: The refurbishment of the Alexandria-Bubastis-Red Sea Canal, begun in 333, initiated and co-financed by the Egyptian civitates and supervised by the Republican Aedils, who have covered half of the costs, is finished. It is expected to double the trade volume with India, Persia, South Arabia and East Africa over the next decades.

Further maintenance is expected to be financed through toll payments. Ships sailing under the flag of the SPQR or one of its member civitates or collegia pay a reduced rate. A small detachment of the classis is stationed in Bubastis to secure the safety of the passage.

349
Tamilakam: Tiraiyan guarantees the nikamams of Korkai, Kaveripattinam, Muchiri, Cochin and Kanyakumari safe passage through the territory controlled by him.

350
The Bosporanian king Thohorses II converts himself and his small beleaguered kingdom to Tannait Judaism. Since Thohorses II has not found sufficient support and commitment on the leadership levels of the Roman Republic and Sassanid Empire, and since independent small players like his Lasikan neighbour does not wish to strengthen the hellenistic elements in his own country, he builds alliances with the strong Jewish communities in powerful Roman civitates like Antiochia and Alexandria and the Sassanid city of Babylon.

352
Sassanid Empire: Another Xionite attack, this time reaching deep into the South. This time, Shapur II prepares a very comprehensive plan after having stopped the incursion. He leads a huge army, with Arab and Indian cavalries, into the battle, making sure that a huge provisioning corps guarantees the army's supplies at all times and even in very dry regions. His troops encircle the nomads, then he forces negotiations upon their leaders. Among the leadership of his troops, there are dozens of skilled military and political leaders in whom Shaipur trusts to take over the administration and defenses of Bactria and Sogdia.

Persia / Arabia / Sheba: With Sassanid troops bound in the North, Sheba conquers the Gulf Coast, together with a couple of Christian Arab allies.

353
Gaul: A system of fortifications and an enlarged Classis Gallica protects Britannia's Eastern shore and Batavian settlements near the Channel.

Sassanid Empire: Shapur's second campaign against the nomads in the North becomes a great, but incredibly cruel success. His army secures the Oxus and a line from there Westward to the Caspian Sea first, then pushes hundreds of thousands of nomads into the Karakum Desert, where an unknown, large number dies. Some tens of thousands of riders manage to break through the Sassanid lines in the Balkani province near the Caspian Sea and flee onto steppe land controlled by the Alani.

354
Sassanid Empire: Shapur's armies lead tens of thousands of nomads, who give themselves in, into slavery. Now the fights are concentrating on the remaining pockets of Kidarite and Hepthalite resistance in Sogdia, where they will continue for another four years.

The influx of a great number of refugees destabilises the power structures of the Alani confederacy; a civil war ensues.

355
Roman Empire / Celtic Empire: Customs disputes lead to Celts and Romans both stopping each other's ships at the Strait of Gibraltar. The Western Mediterranean draws breath as a war between the two empires seems inevitable. But after two weeks, the Gibraltar crisis is settled in negotiations between the Consuls and Caesar Indutiomarus II A joint customs committee is established and revenues are split equally.

Persia / India: Samudragupta I's troops cross the Yamuna to re-establish their overlordship over several Shakan principalities, which had become Sassanid satrapies

356
In spite of limited Roman military aid, the Bosporanian Kingdom is once again defeated by the Gothic Empire; Thothorses II becomes a vassal of the Greutungs.

357
Out of the civil war in the lands of the Alani, an aggressive group emerges victorious. They call themselves Huns, or more specifically, Black Huns.

358
Sassanid Empire: Shapur II. concludes his massive campaign to secure Balkania, Choresmia, Marginia, Bactria, and Sogdia. In negotiations, two Hephtalite tribes have joined his side and accepted Sassanid suzerainty; they will be allowed to herd in specific places, join the Sassanid cavalry, and participate in the administration of Bactrian and Sogdian cities. City walls and roads are to be rebuilt and improved over the next years. Shapur replaces many of the local satraps and city kings, who had proved incapable of defending their towns against the nomads, with leaders he trusted, and gave land and administrative functions to his most loyal followers from Arabia to India, creating a unique cultural blend in the Northern parts of the Sassanid Empire, while at the same time strengthening Sassanid control over this region considerably. No Iranian speaking nomads would ever threaten these lands and the Silk Road again.

Lasika / Iberia: The joint troops of Lasikans and Iberians manage to halt the advance of those Alani who had been defeated by the Huns and not joined them on their move Westward.

Nevertheless, rests of the Alani have managed to gain control over the more mountainous regions of the Northern Caucasus, becoming the overlords over several dozen tribes. These Alani will soon turn to sheep- and goat-herding, become semi-sedentary and fortify their dwellings, which are no longer inhabited exclusively during winter times.

Roman Empire: Reports about Hunnic migration across the pontic steppe and into the Roman sphere of influence creates alarm in Rome and Alexandria. Troops are drafted and moved across the Republic.

359
The Huns (and many Alani, although it is not certain whether it makes sense to differentiate here) overrun the Gothic Empire. A large part of the Greutung royal court and nobility are killed in battle. Without leadership, the "Goths" (again, among them many different ethnic groups, only few of which speak Eastern Germanic Gothic) flee to Tauris in the South and toward the Danube.

360
Waves of refugees, fleeing from the devastation brought about by the Huns, arrive at the Roman Empire's border with Gothia. They circumvent Moesia Inferior's Eastern border protections sailing on board overcrowded ships. The Roman port town of Olbia is flooded with refugees.

The civitates of Olbia, Borysthenes, Tyros, Harpis, Arganum and Histria cannot control the crowds of refugees, many of them still armed. They call for help from the Republic.

The moderate Consuls Antonius and Pius send a medium-sized army of 20,000 to restore order in Moesia, disarm the Gothic refugees and create the infrastructure for increased supplies as well as shelters for the refugees outside the fortified towns - which they manage to do - and then to march and ride against the Huns.

18,000 Roman soldiers encounter the Hunnic hordes as the latter attempt to cross the river Tyros. The battle ends in a terrible Roman defeat.

Sassanid Empire / India: Shapur II. reconquers the Sassanid possessions in India up to the Yamuna. A punitive campaign against the Gupta, aimed at charging reparation and tribute, fails because the Sassanids cannot move their war elephants across the Yamuna quickly enough.

361
Roman Empire: Accounts of the surprising military tactics of the Huns, the skilled archers and their strong composite bows are taken very seriously now.

Because the MCM considers the local Moesian defenses and the Limes Transalutanus as practically indefensible, imperial Aedils organise the evacuation of Dacia and the trans-danubian Moesian coastline, while troops already stationed in Moesia are organised into a strong defense of the Danube. Only Roman citizens (and a small handful of Gothic leaders, who were able to bribe the Roman authorities) are evacuated from Dacia and the Moesian coastline, though, because Moesian and Thracian civitates refuse to accomodate the great numbers of Gothic refugees. The evacuation is conducted with Roman thoroughness: much of the Dacian gold and even huge expensive mechanical devices are carried across the Danube.

Farther to the North, Ugro-Finnic peoples formerly subdued or tributary to the Ostrogoths (Komi, Mordwinians and Mari) are not swept away by the Hunnic tide. Instead, they have regained their independence.

362
Sea-faring merchants from the Sassanid Empire and a handful of Arab merchants build the new port town of Barawa on the ruins of the former Roman emporium Essina.

Roman Empire: Huns penetrate the Roman empire for the first time, plundering towns and villages in Dacia, but not finding much that is of any value. Local border troops confront them at Porolissum, but are overwhelmed by the strategically versatile Huns. They withdraw to the South according to Plan B, so as to strengthen the defense of the Danube Limes. They must fight off Hunnic pursuers at Apulum, Tibiscum and Acidava, but join with the bulk of the army on the other side of the Danube finally. They bring some examples of the extremely powerful Hunnic bows with them for A.M. engineers to analyse. Famine and diseases haunt the refugee camps north of the Danube - and then, things get even worse ... The Huns reach the Danube at Tegulicum, where tens of thousands of refugees live in camps on the unguarded Northern side of the Danube, to which Roman soldiers bring provisions until the Huns arrive, at which moment they all retreat in order to secure the Southern shore.

The Huns take control of the masses of panicking refugees and commit one of the most gruesome atrocities of this war. They force unarmed refugees to advance across the Danube bridges as human shields. The Roman defenders are compelled to slay thousands of helpless men, women and children - when these news reach Rome and the other great cities of the empire, the "civil society" is outraged. A small minority blames Moesian policies of refusing the refugees, while the vast majority of Romans foams about the contemptible Hunnic barbarians, who ought to be seriously "sorted out".

But the Danube Limes still holds ...

363
Sassanid Empire / Arabia: In a swift campaign, Shapur II destroys Sheba's positions on the Gulf coast.

364
After a whole year of peace, in which the Huns nurture their herds on the abandoned Dacian plains and meadows, a new attack hits the Vandals. It appears that the Hunnic hordes have absorbed and included many Iazyges.

Roman Empire: Vandal refugees seek asylum. The Comitia Civitatum of Aquincum (OTL Budapest) and Brigetio (OTL Komarom) accept unarmed women and children into their city walls.

The surviving refugees from the Ostrogothic Empire, who had been camped in Dacia, have mostly trekked Eastward after last year's catastrophe. In August, an estimated 70,000 refugees reach Tauris (OTL Crimea) and roll over the weakened Bosporanian Kingdom and take control of what the Huns have left of great cities like Kerkinitis, Chersonesos, Kimmerikon and Nymphaion. The Greek elite temporarily submits themselves, as they had been compelled to do before with Scythians, Sarmatians, Goths etc.

365
Quiet on the Hun front. Roman spies report of a great alliance of Germanic tribes preparing for war under the leadership of the Langobard King Albert.

Roman Empire: Military engineers manage to copy the Huns' composite crossbows. Mass production and training of both cavalry and infantry is started.

Celtic Empire: Saxon attempts at raiding Britannian coastal towns fail due to the Celtic naval build-up and new fortifications.

366
Roman Empire: A large Germanic army, uniting Burgundians, Lugians, Langobards, Markomanni, Alemanni, Varisci, Quadi and even a handful of Franks under the leadership of the Langobard King Albert confronts the Huns on the Eastern Pannonian Plains. Both sides suffer heavy losses, but the outnumbered Huns still prove to be tactically more flexible and endowed with better weapons that fit their strategy. Cruelly decimated Germanic forces finally submit to the Huns and are incorporated into their hordes, which plunder the agricultural stocks of much of Southern Germania. Markomannic, Langobard and others (women and children only) flee to the South and find asylum in civitates like Boiodurum (OTL Passau), Cetium (OTL St. Pölten), Lauriacum (OTL Enns), Lentia (OTL LInz) and Cannabiaca (OTL Zeiselmauer). The Burgunds hastily retreat into OTL Bohemia, losing thousands of civilian lives on the long marches in winter. The Franks under High King Lothar retreat earlier and in a very organised manner.

Tauris: The old Bosporanian Kingdom has come to a definite end. Tauris is overcrowded with starving refugees. From out of the chaos, a mixed group of leaders of Greek, Ostrogothic, Mordwinian and other backgrounds arises (the Tauris Group). They re-establish contacts with the Roman Republic, asking for grain and help in reconstructing their water supplies, while offering manpower in the Roman defense against the Huns. The Senate is still in doubt whether to see them as (dangerous) Goths or as (traditionally allied) Bosporans and offers only very limited aid, especially since the humanitarian and military situation at its Northern border demands more attention now.

367
Roman Empire: In reaction to the Hun danger, in the Senate, a militarily aggressive majority forms for the first time and elects equally imperailist Consuls.

Tauris: In spring, a diplomatic mission of the Tauris Group to Rome finally succeeds. The Taureans have adapted the Judaist faith and improved their Greek in the meantime to appear more "civilised" to the Romans. The new Consuls, Severus and Liquinius, begin to include them in their plans of how to sort out the Hun problem, and send humanitarian aid, too. Roman Empire / Gaul: In a new campaign in late summer, the Huns and their vassals finally break into (nominally Celtic, but factually Alemannic) Germania Superior and (Roman) Vindelicia, plundering the relatively helpless Alemannic villages, then dividing. A small group heads Northward, where a Celtic legion, aided by a Frankish confederacy led by High King Lothar, manages to defeat them, while the larger group besieges several cities in Vindelicia. The local defenses hold, and Rome's Republican troops are already on their way across the Alps to defend their citizens against the Huns.

Sassanid Empire / India: The border between the Sassanid Empire and its neighbouring Indian kingdoms, especially the Gupta Empire, is secured through fortifications. This also facilitates the enforcement of customs payments.

368
Roman Empire: The Republican troops encricle and defeat the Huns in a campaign that lasts seven months.

Although nobody knows if the Hunnic danger is completely eliminated once and for all, Rome celebrates its triumph and the successful defense of its Danube border. 16,000 Hunnic prisoners of war are under Roman control. As slavery is outlawed in the empire, the Senate decides to sell the prisoners to the Celts.

Celtic Empire: The Christian community at Abila (OTL Ávila) elects Priscillian as their new bishop. Priscillian is an outspoken critic of slavery - one of the most outspoken critics, in fact, since Simonism has not attracted many followers in the Celtic Empire. Politically, he shares many views of the Simonists, and goes even farther by positing a complete equality of men and women, but religiously, he stresses asceticism to a much greater extent than the Simonists.

369
Celtic Empire: Using the newly acquired Hunnic slaves, the Celtic navy undergoes another expansion. Coal and ore extraction resurges, too, with the help of such cheap labour.

Roman Empire: The local militias of Vindelican, Norican, and Pannonian towns begin a coordinated campaign across the Danube with the aim of combing the devastated region of remaining Huns and their former allies. Dispersed bands of men from different Germanic tribes join them. Throughout spring, summer and autumn, they round up approximately 30,000 nomadic captives and build provisional castra. After the prisoners are sold into Celtic slavery, too, the militiamen return to their homes, and the Germanic refugees move into these castra, which are expanded into fortified small towns after the Roman example.

Slowly, the evacuated Roman Dacians move back into their (often destroyed) towns, too, accompanied by three Republican divisions which comb the lands and restore safety West of the Carpathians.

Severus and Liquinius prepare a huge punitive campaign against the Hunnic settlement nuclei in the steppe beyond the Volga. They negotiate with potential allies - the new Ostrogoths on Tauris are on board, and so are the Lasikans, but even the Nakh, the Caucasian Alani and the Sassanid Empire offer at least infrastructural help. After the Senate agrees to the plan - with strong support from the towns in the North and against fierce opposition from Christian, Jewish, gnostic and other pacifistic groups in the South-East of the Republic -, the campaign is planned for next year.

370
Roman Empire: The Hun Campaign is postponed for one year to implement tactical trainings suggested by Sassanid advisors (inspired by Shapur's second campaign against the Xionites, et al), who find the idea of removing the Northern nomadic threat to their Caucasus passes quite appealing. Imaziyen: The Berbers, from Tifilalt over Ouargla to Garama, have become Simonist Christians. Their kings and queens have abdicated and have (more or less voluntarily) become commoners. Private property is overcome in the oases. Dissenters mostly emigrate to Rome's African cities.

Celtic Empire: In Hispania, Christians influenced by Priscillian propagate the abolition of slavery. The provincial administration begins to take penal actions against individuals.

371
The Hun Campaign becomes the largest genocide in history so far. Fastidiously organised and cruelly executed, portion after portion of the steppe is scoured by both light and heavy cavalry units. Its nomad population is encircled, their leaders killed, and the rest captivated. The captives are split up and marched by light infantry units into the towns at the Northern shore of the Black Sea or into newly built castra along the rivers Borysthenes (OTL Dnieper) and Tanais (OTL Don). Thousands die on the battlefield, during the marches or, malnourished, in captivity. Those who survive are mostly shipped to Lasika and from there marched into Sassanid Albania, where the Sassanids use the new slaves in the fortification of their Northern Caucasian border, then march the survivors into Persia, where wealthy people from across the empire buy them for their estates, mines, manufacturers, harems or brothels.

The Hun Campaign marks the disappearance of the Black or European Huns, Antes, Sarmatians, Western Alani and Onogurs from history. Caucasian Alani and Sabirs only survived to a small degree as refugees in the Caucasian mountains, where they focused their herding on sheep and goats and became partly sedentary. It prevents the appearance of the Bulgars, who, in OTL, emerge from some of the former tribes and federations.

The pontic steppe is temporarily controlled by troops of the Roman Republic, but the MCM and the Senate are well aware that such a large territory cannot be held for long and not turned into a new province within a short period of time.

Instead, a pre-discussed plan to establish a new relation and division of labour between the Roman Republic and the "new Ostrogoths" represented by the Tauris Group is put into action.

The Roman navy will patrol the Borysthenes and the Tanais; it will establish new naval bases on the Borysthenes named Nikopolis, Chortitia (OTL Khortytsia Island in Zaporizhia) and Severopolis (OTL Dnepropetrowsk) and on the Tanais (Castra Luhana, Kallipolis). They serve as the backbone of an early warning system that would allow the Roman Republic to protect its towns and citizens by intercepting nomad invasions long before they reach its borders. To ensure safe access to and from the Black Sea, the Roman navy would also erect naval bases in Neapolis Borysthenea and in Tanais (OTL Rostow). These towns lie at the fringes of the current settlement area of the "new Ostrogoths" - this settlement area would, together with the civil vici that would cater to Rome's river naval bases, become the Roman Republic's first  "margo" - a new structure of association with the Roman Empire, which adapted the idea of a client state to the conditions of Roman republican democracy - and be called "Tauris te Bosporos Kimmerikos". The margo and its towns would rule themselves, but receive comprehensive economic aid and military training, while institutionalised co-operation and harmonisation - along with the presence of the Classis Romana - would make sure that Rome did not send its aid to a potential new rival or enemy.

The capture of so many nomadic slaves is an important economic factor both for the Republican budget, which profits from the sales of captives in this year's pontic campaign, and for the budgets of the Vindelican, Norican and Pannonian civitates, who had caught slaves in last and this year's expeditions across the Danube. Slavery remains abolished in the Roman Empire, but selling "Hun" captives to the Celts and the Sassanids is not - or at least public opinion does not seem to object to it right now. The Vindelican, Norican and Pannonian civitates use these enormous sums of money to improve their infrastructure, further fortify the Danube, and - most importantly - to found dozens of new academiae collegiatae (in this case, the money is lent to the professional collegiae, or syndicates) and academiae civiles (in this case, the local administration runs the academies themselves). Thousands of engineers and scholars from other, more developed parts of the Republic move into these formerly underdeveloped border provinces to become professors in these colleges and train new professionals there. The poor North becomes the booming North, where numerous dams and mills, manufacturers and mines will be built in the next decades.

The revenues for the federal budget are used likewise to fund new Academiae Martianae so that the Republic would never be surprised by barbarian invaders again, and other SPQR academies, too. This lays the foundation for a quick technological and scientific progress in the early 5th century CE - and because the academiae can't spend their entire endowments so quickly, this is also the birth of the public credit system which would develop over the next centuries in the Roman Empire, where public institutions, often universities, provide loans for projects which they consider "deserving" of financial support, and where the interests of these loans swell the purses of these public institutions even further, giving them ever more socioeconomic power.

Reports from the steppe battlefields divide the society into enraged pacifists and hawks, who have found new pride for their empire. Christian Simonist communities of the Garamants turn away from the Roman Republic.

372
Armenia: Christianity and social protest of the dispossessed classes have fused over the past decades. A Christian revolution, led by Vaihan Mamikonian (one of the few Christianised nobles, even with Arsakid ancestry), aimed at eliminating the rule of King Varazdat, breaks out. Varazdat appeals to Shapur II for help.

373
Armenia: Shapur II is wary of violating the treaty with the Roman Republic. Instead of sending troops, he sends military equipment to Varazdat. Vaihan Mamokanian appeals to his Roman neighbours, many of whom are Christians and view his revolutionary agenda favourably. In the battle of Avarayr, both sides suffer dramatic losses. In the end, a cousin of Vaihan Mamokanian leads the Christians to victory, and Armenia is turned into Christian theocratic republic. Roman and Sassanid ambassadors convene and decide that their treaty has not been violated.

Celtic Empire: Priscillian`s teachings have found followers all across the Iberian peninsula. Ascetic communities form themselves and separate themselves from the rest of the society in monastic recluses - men and women together, but completely ascetic, no families whatsoever.

374
Germania: With almost all Germanic refugees returned to their homelands, Germania is thoroughly reshaped and the influence of Roman civilization makes itself felt.

Only among the Franks, the social model with warrior kings at the top is considered a success. The Frankish Confederacy, enriched by slaves, would later expand across central Germany and deep into formerly Alemannic lands, all along the Celts' north-eastern border.

Returning asylum Germanii meet scattered rests of their Alemannic, Markomannic and Vandal clans. As a result of what had happened to them, they fortify their dwellings heavily, thus creating a multitude of middle-size, small and miniature "city-states" north of the Danube and Rhine.

The Burgunds isolate themselves in Bohemia and participate very little in the developments of the next century.

375
Persia / India: Shaipur II realises he must foster local Indian religions as well to enhance Sassanid acceptance. At the (now four) Sassanid universities in the Indian world (at Taxila, Debul, Kabura and Barygaza), Buddhism is promoted, too, now.

The Kushan and Shakan satraps are free to define the constituent political unities of their satrapies by other means than around Zoroastrian temples, where rural or urban councils or assemblies are to be held. (This gives the Indian satraps greater power than their Western equivalents, where the political constituencies could not be redefined by worldly leaders.)

Over the next decade, the last in Shaipur's reign, several Hindu temples for the veneration of Kali (a goddess popular with the vast majority of the Indian Hindu population and not with the anti-Sassanid Brahman elite) are erected, too. Sassanid influence begins to shape Hinduism.

376
Celtic Empire: A handful of new infrastructural measures is begun with the aid of Hunnic slaves.

377
Franconia: High King Lothar I orders the codification of traditional law in the Latin language in a thing in Frankish capital, Bonn (vis-a-vis a similarly named Celtic town on the other side of the Rhine).

378
Tamilakam: The Tamil poetess Kaakkaippaadiniyaar sings religious hymns, in which Munishswaran and Pei are described as the dual supreme deities, using ample fire and light metaphors. Both the imagery and the dualistic conception are interpreted as influences of Sassanid Zoroastrianism, which in ths timeline exerts a much stronger influence on Tamil religion, replacing the OTL influence of Vedic religion.

379
Celtic Empire: A synode of Celtic Catholic bishops condemns Priscillian`s teachings as heresies.

380
Franconia: High King Lothar I nominates learned judges who must preside all juries. Regional aristocrats are thus bereft of their judicial powers. They brood, but Lothar's popularity is so enormous that they do not dare to protest.

382
Rome ends its grain deliveries to Tauris after the canals which provide the peninsula with water have been repaired and the new Ostrogoths have resumed agriculture on the Southern shore of the continent and in the proximity of Rome's naval bases on the Borysthenes and Tanais, too.

The first Taurean division trained entirely in Roman Academiae Martianae begins operations to fortify the margo's core territory. The margo has given itself a republican constitution after the Roman model. Its consuls forge treaties of non-aggression and a trade agreement with Lasika and a dozen tukhums of the Nakh.

383
Aksum / Makuria / Nobatia: Aksum's Emperor Mehadeyis intervenes in the ongoing war between Makuria and Nobatia, which threatens Aksum's Alodian province. Allying itself with the Nobatian King Charamadoye, Mehadeyis' troops conquer Makuria. In Makuria's capital, Tungul, King Shekanda ceremoniously accepts the overlordship of Aksum's Emperor Mehadeyis. Makuria becomes a subordinate kingdom with relative autonomy under the genuine Aksumite imperial system. Nobatia's King Charamadoye is prevented by the Aksumites from plundering Tungul too much. Small ensuing skirmishes between Nobatians and the Imperial Aksumite Army go badly for the retreating Nobatians.

385
Aksum / Nobatia: In a futile attempt to rescue its political independence and prevent an Aksumite invasion, Nobatia's King Charamadoye converts himself to miaphysitic Christianity. He is baptised by the Patriarch of Aksum, who, together with Charamadoye, appoints bishops for Nobatia.

Celtic Empire: Bishop Priscillian is assassinated. Many theories circulate about who killed him. For his followers, he has become a martyr. State measures against the Priscillianists prove to be ineffective: they are excluded from public services - but many of them prefer to live in ascetic communities anyway. Penal trials only succeed seldom. Priscillianism does not spread like wildfire - a chief reason being that it is only rarely transmitted from parents to children, since most Priscillianists abide by the sexually ascetic principles of their religious leader - but it remains an important factor (and a destabilising political factor) in the Celtic Empire.

387
Sassanid Empire / India: Aided by revolting Shaka Kshatriyas from the Easternmost satrapies of the Sassanid Empire, Chandragupta I's soldiers cross the Sassanid border and try to incorporate the Shaka satrapies into his kingdom. The Sassanids manage to defeat the Gupta army at Ujjain.

388
Sassanid Empire / India: A Sassanid advance into Gupta India is stopped at the Ganges near Varanasi. Yazdegerd's troops retreat and comb their satrapies for insurgents and illoyal traitors, leading thousands into slavery in the Persian mainland, where they contribute greatly to the dissemination of Hindu culture and philosophy in the Middle East, in spite of their low social position there.

389
Nobatia: The Nobatian archbishop Stebanos decides against coercive and for peaceful proselytisation. With means from Aksum's profitable control of the important Red Sea passage, an influential school is built in Faras.

392
After the death of Shapur's last cronies, who had been granted governorships in Bactria and Sogdia, all the cities in the region are governed by city councils now which are immediate to the Shahanshah Yazdegerd. Yazdegerd's royal imperial cavalry and infantry, where soldiers and officers of formerly Hephtalite, Arabian, Persian and Indian descent serve together, protects the countryside and the important roads of the Silk Route, whereas the cities have their own guards.

394
The port town of Merca, ruled by local Biyomaals, begins to rival the neighbouring port town of Barawa. Its inhabitants trade their own products (instead of being just a stop-over like Barawa) with merchants from India and the Mediterranean - among them also small red berries with a vitalising effect on humans and animals (=coffee).

396
Roman Empire: Toll payments from Celtic ships at the Alexandria-Bubastis-Red Sea Canal have halved over the past two decades. It is speculated that Celtic traders commission Ostrogothic ships, who enjoy lower tariffs due to Tauris' status as a Roman margo, to carry their goods to and from the Middle East.

397
Persia / India: Chandragupta's daughter marries a Vakatakan prince. The Gupta-Vakataka alliance is much closer than in OTL because it is seen as vital in the defense against Sassanid expansion. It also facilitates the proliferation of the innovations which Chandragupta had learned from his powerful and wealthy Sassanid neighbour farther to the South - from windmills over universities and academies to diversified military forces.

398
Sassanid Empire: The first Sassanid university with Sogdian as official language is established by the city council of Samarqand.

399
Roman Empire: By the end of the century, the use of waterpower to replace the force of oxen and human slaves has become so frequent that the total power of watermills installed across the Roman Empire has grown by the factor 320 as compared to the beginning of the century.

This required the building of many smaller and larger dams, which in turn made expropriations and relocations necessary. Where such processes were not undertaken in co-operation with local elites, protest groups have begun to form.

On the other hand, increased use of waterpower and higher productivity have made many jobs superfluous - and created highly skilled ones instead, needed for the construction, maintenance and operation of the dams, millwheels, turbines, sawmills, grain mills, hammers, etc.

These workers need training. Provinces often reward innovators by hiring them as professors. Since the 360s, these gather in Academiae of applied sciences. Some of these academies were endowed with the Hun money and have risen above the others to empire-wide excellence.

Salvador79 (talk) 09:52, March 3, 2014 (UTC)

Abrittus