500-599 (Abrittus)

Rough sketch - additions and comments welcome!

Centennial developments and trends
The bubonic plague breaks out in Europe and the Middle East, reducing population and military strength of Romans and Sassanids in turns. Whoever gains the upper hand, often gets to control the Gulf and European-Indian trade. Medical academies, especially in the Greek regions of the Roman Empire, work feverishly, experimenting with new ailments and substances, to find ways to combat the plague, but without success so far.

Economy and Technology:

 * Mechanical looms are invented in the Roman Empire and powered by water. They further increase the availability of textiles and make Rome the world`s largest importer of wool and cotton and the largest exporter of cloth and clothes.
 * The twin booming branches of distillation and glass manufacturing trigger various related inventions and new professions: the distillation of crude oil, the oil lamp, the test tube, ailments extracted from roots etc. through alcohol, the looking glass and the monocle (still rather primitive). The branches and professions still overlap in the 6th century: distillers and apothecaries, apothecaries and chemists, chemists and gaffers, gaffers and opticians. The innovations achieved in the Roman, Celtic and Sassanid empires reach the neighboring states half a century later.
 * The increased importance of oil brings new wealth and conflicts to the region between Egypt and Persia. New wars between Rome and the Sassanids arise out of attempts to control petroleum seep sites and easily accessible oil fields.
 * In several places in the Celtic, Roman and Sassanid Empires, improvements in windmill technology are achieved, experimenting with horizontal and vertical axes and constructing the first post mills and smock mills.
 * The development of credit systems has reached a critical point both in the Roman Empire (where public institutions like the academies, temples, infrastructural agencies or even the Cura Annonae are the main lenders) and in India and China (where Buddhist monasteries are the main lenders). Not only occasional debt crises create unrest, but also the enormous power of the lending institutions (crossing imperial borders etc.) harbors potential for conflicts. Christians increasingly stress their anti-interest position, which varies from violent Simonist action to the establishment of interest-free mutual credit systems sponsored/backed by the Roman Catholic Church (and which were, to a great extent, inspired by the mutual credit networks of the Jewish Ostrogothic sea merchants).
 * Celts and Scandinavians learn from each other`s ship designs: Norwegians now build longboats with sails, and sell them to Celts, too.
 * Copying Nordic ship designs, Ostrogothic sea merchants expand their trade network (accompanied by their own, exclusive, internal credit network, which was free of interest and proved very stable in comparison to other forms of credit over the next centuries) along the European and African Atlantic coasts.
 * During the periods when ships with Roman goods and citizens on board are able to travel East, the first trade contacts with China are established.

Military:

 * Renewed Roman-Sassanid wars lead to a permanent alliance between Rome and Saba. Roman/Saban and Sassanid control over the Persian Gulf, one of the main sea trade routes to India, alternate with the bubonic plague sometimes hitting Rome harder, sometimes Persia. The alliance with Rome strengthens Saba`s position in Arabia.
 * Romans and Sassanids both use lighter, portable flame-throwers in their frequent wars against each other. Towards the end of the century, Rome´s military superiority results in the consolidation of Roman power over (oil-rich) Western Mesopotamia and the fortification of its Eastern Euphrates border.
 * The Celts have managed to copy flamethrowers and install them on their battleships as well.
 * After their Kattegat defeat in 535, the Celtic Navy does not venture into the Baltic Sea again and relies on auxiliaries instead. This marks the end of Celtic imperial expansion for more than three centuries and the definite end of expansion under the Celtic Caesarist absolutism.

Philosophy/science:

 * Celtic (empiricist) philosophy spreads across the Roman Empire, not without conflict. In the context of conflicts between empiricists and various religious groups, another philosophical school develops in the Roman Empire: rationalism.
 * Those universities, where Celtic philosophy has dominated for over 100 years already, begin to develop separate branches for chemical /pharmaceutical research and natural philosophy centered around optics and light. Researchers in Alexandria discover ways to gain sulfuric acid from alaun, while their colleagues in Lugdunum use sulfuric acid to gain acidum salis petrae. Medicine is "adopted" by the empiricists and included in their new Faculties of natural sciences.

Religion:

 * While Christianity begins to weaken in the Roman West, it starts to heavily influence Saharan and Sub-Saharan Africa. While Simonist Christianity, carried across the Sahara by the Garamants, disrupts the divine kingdoms of the Sahel, the liberal atmosphere in Aksum and its coastal cities allows for various mixtures of Christianity with local brands of Animism.
 * To stop their decline, the Roman Catholic church founds large religious schools akin to the universities. They develop intellectually refined Christian doctrines, which later on will lead to new revivals of Catholic Christianity.

Nations of Europe:

 * Celtic Empire / Jutland / Anglia / Saxony: In 506, the Saxon king Derick demands tribute from chieftains of the Jutes, who live in the Northernmost part of the Kimbrian Peninsula. In a Thing, the chiefs of the Jutes decide to ask the Celtic Empire for help. Caesar Gnaeus Maximus stations cavalry units in Jutland and increases Celtic naval presence in the North Sea close to the Kimbrian Peninsula. The Jutes manage to prevent the Saxon cavalry from crossing the Agger Tange and hold the Northern shore of the Limfjord for three days. After the Saxons break through the lines near Løgstør (a loophole left on purpose), Jutes and Celts attack the advancing Saxons from East and West simultaneously and defeat them. Only few Saxons manage to escape and flee back to Anglia. A Celtic legion pursues them, crossing the Agger Tange. Erec, the duke of Anglia handpicked by Derick`s father Widukind, gathers an Anglian unit and faces the advancing Celts, but the Celtic cavalry, who has not lost the excellence it gained in the Hun Wars, easily disperses them. Derick has to muster new troops to throw them against the Celtic menace in the North. In the meantime, insubordinate Anglians under the unofficial leader Horsa form an alliance with the Celts. The decisive battle at the Egða ends in a Saxon defeat. Saxony must cede Anglia, which becomes independent again. Horsa becomes the new Duke of Anglia. He allows the Celts to station a minor military presence, but in contrast to Jutland, which becomes the Celtic imperial province of Iutia in 513, Anglia remains independent from 506 to 580.
 * Celtic Empire / Scandinavia: Already in the 490s, trade contacts and exchange between the Celtic Empire and Norway, which had intensified in the 5th century, had led to a technological cross-fertilisation in ship-building: Norse shipbuilders from the (then small) village of Sørstad at the Southern tip of OTL Norway (OTL Kristianstad) began to build longboats with sails (much earlier than in OTL). The Celtic navy bought such longboats, which were considerably quicker than their own ships, which were basically still the same as the Roman type, in great numbers, in the hope of being able to control the Kattegat and consequently the Baltic Sea. This enriched Sørstad`s shipbuilders beyond what they could imagine. The new type of longboat, the new-found wealth and the good contacts with the Celtic Empire were the bedrock upon which the powerful economic / merchant alliance of the Sørstaders was based. Within half a century, they built sister towns e.g. in Älvsborg (in the land of the Geats), Vineta (at the mouth of the Odra) and Grobiņa (in the land of the Curonians). The Sørstaders formed secret societies of commercial and crafts elites, where knowledge was passed on, exclusive commercial relations and privileges were established and mutual assistance and common action were organised.
 * Celtic Empire / Denmark: Because the Celtic merchant fleet was still an easy prey for pirates in the Kattegat, Caesar Antonius decides to start a campaign aimed at conquering the Danish isles in 523. New divisions of the Celtic Navy, equipped with the new fast longboats, sailed into the Kattegat, and everything looked good at first, with some islets easily conquered. But when the Celts encountered the main body of a Danish fleet under the command of Horik, a small king in Lejre, they learned that having longboats does not yet make one a skillful Viking sea warrior. The Celtic naval detachment was nearly destroyed - and the first part of the legend of heroic Danish resistance is created.
 * Celtic Empire / Denmark: After the Celts have managed to copy Roman models of "Greek fire" and installed them on their various (traditional and longboat-style) ships, they start another attempt at invading Denmark in 549. With the treasury less than empty, though, only a limited number of sailors and soldiers was deployed, which were supplemented by Anglian allies, who sought to conquer a Danish isle or two, too. The Danes, led by a small king Ragnar in Gudme, cleverly managed to escape a direct confrontation in battle for several months. When the Celts and Anglians had finally encircled them and the final battle was fought on the isle of Fyn, the number of Celtic soldiers and the lack of co-ordination between Celtic and Anglian troops proved to be too little for the fierce and desperate resistance of the Danish fighters. Celts and Anglians had to retreat and abandoned their campaign in 550 - thus creating the second part of the legend of heroic Danish resistance. Also due to the bubonic plague, no further attempts at conquering Denmark were undertaken.
 * Celtic Empire: Celts in longboats discover Glaciana (OTL: Iceland) in 576.
 * Celtic Empire: Military failures, an empty state treasury, open criticism by the self-confident intellectual elites, a temporal breakdown of public order during epidemic waves of the bubonic plague, and a widening gap in competition between Celts and Romans in several industries, chiefly among them the textile industry, initiates a reform process in the Celtic Empire, beginning with the abolition of slavery and the introduction of local democracy in 561 resp. 563 and ending in a parliamentary constitution akin to the Roman one in 596. The end of the Celtic Caesars` absolute rule also marks the end of the first wave of Celtic imperial expansion. The elected Senates of the next six centuries are rather reluctant at military adventures and wary of overstretching the empire. Instead, they pursue policies aimed at indirectly securing Celtic access to resources and outlet markets through free and safe trade.
 * Roman Empire: Increasing trade volumes and postal communication requirements result in empire-wide, large infrastructural projects. Roads, ports and lighthouses are renovated, the network of roads is extended across the outer provincial regions, the Alexandria-Bubastis-Red Sea Canal is refurbished. Economically, living standards continue to improve, but the bubonic plague turns especially the second half of the century into a less pleasant era.
 * Roman Empire: In several provinces, Conventa tries to address the perceived problem of increased alcohol abuse among the masses (and resulting violence and low work productivity) by increasing brandy excises, limiting the sale or prohibiting it altogether.
 * Roman Empire: An earthquake kills approximately 100,000 people in Cilicia and its capital city of Antiochia.
 * Celtic / Roman Empire: A more precise census containing much more information is introduced first in the Roman Empire in 506, then in Gaul in 545.
 * During a period of Sassanid blockage of European-Indian trade, Ostrogothic ships rely on the astronomic theories that postulate a round earth, and look for a westward way to India. They discover the Nesoi Atlantikoi (Azores), where unfavourable winds force them to return. The Atlantic islands are claimed and settled by Ostrogoths after the return of the discoverers.
 * Due to quicker economic development in the Roman Empire as compared to Gaul, the Southern Frankish kingdoms, who trade both with Rome and Gaul, develop faster than their Northern countrymen, who are also frequently plagued by military conflicts with Saxony. As a result, the southern kingdoms of the Usipetri and the Bructeri become the most influential members of the confederacy.
 * Scandinavia: Several petty kingdoms of the Svear are united. Capital of the new united kingfom of the Svear is Uppsala; its most important religious centre is Helgö, and its most important trading port and hub of crafts development is Birka. As Danish and Geatic pirates make Svear-Celtic trade difficult, the Svear focus more on trade (and sometimes raids) with Baltic, Estonian and Finnish tribes. The Svear kings also establish close political ties with the kings of Saxony, and Swedish religious concepts as well as the runic alphabet are adopted in Saxony.
 * Saxony / Venedia:
 * Visigothic Dacia: Visigothic influence over the Danubian towns becomes stronger and stronger, with many sons of wealthy townsmen being educated in Vipjabaurgs. The Gothic alphabet is used in most Danubian towns, and the different Germanic dialects start to assimilate to the Visigothic language, which now incorporates as much Latin influences as their own dialects. Visigothic Dacia is also allowed an exception from the Senate`s policy of not stretching the empire any farther; they found a new province "Dacia Inferior" in the Danube Delta and to its East and North, where no Sklavenoi have settled yet.
 * At the beginning of the 6th century, the Ostrogoth`s  northern Slavic neighbors intensify their trade with Tauris and build a city around their trading port, called "Bogatygavan" (rich port). Its wealth means that the "gravitational centre" of the Slavs is in the South of their settlement regions, which expand farther to the East than in OTL, instead of in the proximity of Ugro-Finnic peoples as in OTL with Nowgorod. In the North-West, Obodritic tribes successively advance into Saxon territory.

Nations of Africa:

 * Following trade contacts with Simonist Christian Garamants, Simonist thought and a revolutionary mood spread first among the Hausa and Banza city-states and undermine the divine kingdoms. After several revolutions and ensuing wars between the city-states, 12 city-states form a Simonist federation, while two are completely destroyed.
 * The fall of Kanem: After the Hausa/Banza refuse sending slave tributes to Kanem, war breaks out. Troops from Kanem devastate the Hausa cities of Gobir and Zaria. Simonist Hausa refugees call the Garamants for help. The Garamants decide to accelerate and escalate a proselytising (and instigating) campaign among the Tubu, who guard Kanem´s sanctuary, Mune. Simonist Tubu rise up against Duguwa rule. Convinced by eloquent Garamants, they declare Mune to be the sacred Israelitic ark of the covenant, whose power must only be wielded by God`s chosen people, i.e. now the Christians, and not the Duguwa "divine" kings. They find ample support among different oppressed tribes and groups in Kanem. With help from the Garamants and the Hausa, the revolution succeeds and the Duguwa and Sefuwa nobility are driven out of the country. With the end of the monarchy, Kanem falls apart. In the West, the Sao cities declare their independence and become the next arenas of civil strife between Simonists and adherents of the old cult and order - and later, together with the Hausa, the greatest exporters of cotton to Europe, from where they import glass, alcohol and later petrochemical products and steel. In the North, the Tubu model their Anarcho-Communist Simonist society after the Garamants. In a great assembly/Simonist Christian mass, the Tubu and the Garamants swear oaths of peace, co-operation and piety. (Mune will become an important Christian sanctuary of the unified Imaziyen.) In the South, the chiefdoms of Mandara, Kotoko and Bagiri are happy to pursue their ways of life without further interference from Kanem, too.
 * Aksum profits heavily from trade with Rome and its control over the Red Sea. With increasing living standards, Aksum`s political system reforms towards a parliamentary monarchy, and Aksumite Christianity becomes the most liberal brand. Wealth, participation and religious tolerance are the key to the successful establishment and growth of Aksumite or Aksum-allied cities at Africa`s Indian Ocean coast (where Ostrogothic sea merchants make their appearance alongside Persian ones), as well as to a peaceful integration of or co-operation with animist African peoples like the Nuer, the Massai and the Kikuyu.

Nations of Asia:

 * TO BE EDITED: Persia: After more than two centuries of peace in the West, Shah Zamasp reverts to expansionist policies. He leads war against Rome over Mesopotamia 505-507. The North comes under attack from Göktürks in the 530s, who devastate Bactria and Sogdia. Shah Chosrau I withdraws troops from Arabia and manages to stop the Göktürks, but allied Roman and Saban troops have already seized control of the Arabian Gulf coast..
 * TO BE EDITED: Especially in the second half of the century, under siege from all sides and haunted by the bubonic plague, the Sassanid empire takes on totalitarian traits at times, which includes attempts at imposing Zoroastrianism upon all its citizens. The failure starts to become apparent towards the end of the century, and Shah Chosrau II. adopts a more liberal strategy, even signing a peace contract with Rome and forging a common strategy to (re-)control the Silk trade route.
 * TO BE EDITED: Gupta India: Maharaja Bhanugupta II. implements a twin strategy: in the rich port towns, he supports the development of crafts to make his empire less reliant on Roman imports, and supports Buddhism and the suspension of the caste system, which hinders the social rise of new important shudras like gaffers and apothecaries, founding new Buddhist universities. In the countryside, he supports the Hinduist order and erects new temples.
 * Funan`s last king dies. Oc Eo is conquered by Chenla and integrated into its loose network, which does not manage to maintain control over Indian-Chinese sea trade.
 * Sri Vijaya takes its place and expands over the entire Malakka peninsula and on to Sumatra.
 * Lam Ap becomes a vassal of Sui China.

Salvador79 (talk) 15:05, March 6, 2014 (UTC)

Abrittus