path: root/WORLDBUILDING.md

# Victoria 3 Alternate History Mod - Worldbuilding Document

## Core Premise

Northern Song Dynasty avoids the Jingkang Incident (1127). Emperor Huizong's northern expansion succeeds. Song recovers the Sixteen Prefectures (Yan region) and expands into Manchuria. These sparsely populated northern territories, combined with Song's already advanced proto-industrial economy (coal-based industry, commodity economy, paper money), create the labor scarcity conditions that drive mechanization and industrialization.

The result: by 1836 (V3 start date), an industrialized Eastern power exists, and the global order is fundamentally different from our timeline.

---

## Divergence Point: ~1120s

Song Huizong's northern campaigns succeed instead of ending in the Jingkang disaster. Song absorbs significant Liao/Jin territory. The Jin Dynasty is weakened, later finished off by the Mongols.

### Song's Internal Development

- Northern territories (Manchuria, Yan region) are sparsely populated -> labor scarcity drives mechanization
- Southern Song heartland remains labor-intensive agriculture and commerce
- Over centuries, a North-South economic divide develops:
  - **North**: Industrial economy, coal/iron, early mechanization, multi-ethnic frontier society
  - **South**: Traditional commodity economy, dense population, agriculture and handicrafts
- Military pressure from Mongols empowers military officials (similar to jiedushi/Tang dynasty military governors)
- The civilian bureaucracy can no longer fully constrain military officials
- Eventually: Southern uprising or equivalent of North-South civil war
  - Northern military officials likely suppress it (legitimacy argument, similar to Eastern Jin restoration)
  - Result: intensified social contradictions but technologically advanced Song
  - Imperial power further weakened
  - Governance becomes: hereditary military officials + civilian government (dual power structure)
  - Song's existing institutions (keju examination, censorate, prime ministerial system) evolve toward something resembling constitutional governance

### Song by 1836

- The most industrialized nation in the world
- Controls China proper + northern territories (Manchuria south) + likely South China Sea / Southeast Asian colonial possessions
- Political system: evolved from Song's civil-military dual structure, possibly constitutional monarchy or some form of representative government evolved from the keju-scholar-official class
- Key V3 gameplay tensions: North-South divide, colonial management, relationship with Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus)

---

## The Mongol Conquests (Alternate Timeline)

### What Stays the Same
- Genghis Khan unifies Mongol tribes (~1206)
- First Western Campaign against Khwarezm (1219-1224) - Khwarezm destroyed
- Mongol military genius and organizational ability

### What Changes
- **Mongols cannot conquer Song** - Song's industrial base, fire weapons, and fortified northern frontier are too strong
- Mongols purchase fire weapons/military equipment from Song through trade
- Mongol armies become: fewer in number but more elite, equipped with early firearms
- Eastern front becomes a stalemate -> all expansion energy redirected westward

### First Western Campaign (Revised, ~1219-1230s)
- Khwarezm destroyed (same as historical)
- Volga Bulgaria destroyed (historically happened during Batu's campaign, moved earlier in this timeline)
- Black Sea region conquered earlier
- Golden Horde established earlier (Kiev/Kuban/North Caucasus)
- **Nicaea (Byzantine successor state) becomes a Mongol vassal** during this phase
  - Nicaea offers submission in exchange for Mongol support to recapture Constantinople from the Latin Empire
  - Fits Byzantine diplomatic tradition of using external powers

### Second/Third Western Campaigns (~1236-1250s)
- Batu's campaign conquers Rus directly (not just vassalage - direct rule)
- Mongols equipped with Song-manufactured fire weapons
- **Central European castles no longer effective** against fire weapons
- Campaign pushes along the North European Plain through Poland, Prussia, into the Holy Roman Empire
- **Teutonic Order destroyed** (in the path of the Mongol advance)
- HRE feudal structure shattered
- Mongol advance stops at the Low Countries (logistical limit)
- Northern France (Flanders, Picardy) raided but not occupied
- Alps and Carpathians prevent effective southward expansion into Italy

**Key difference from history**: Ogedei does not stay in the east (no Chinese population/production to manage). He moves to Rus, eventually establishing the imperial center on the Volga River.

### Constantinople (~1261)
- Nicaea, as a Mongol vassal, recaptures Constantinople from the weakened Latin Empire with Mongol support
- **Byzantine Empire restored as a Mongol vassal state**
- Byzantium becomes the Mongol Empire's "administrative contractor" for the Balkans and Anatolia:
  - Provides bureaucratic expertise
  - Provides limited naval capability (Mongol weakness)
  - Manages intelligence and diplomacy with European states
  - Controls the Bosphorus trade route (Silk Road goods -> Black Sea -> Constantinople -> Mediterranean)
- Balkans organized through Byzantine indirect management
- Role similar to Han Chinese bureaucrats under the Qing Dynasty

### Hulagu's Middle Eastern Campaign (~1256-1265)
- Assassins destroyed (same as historical)
- Abbasid Caliphate destroyed, Baghdad falls 1258 (same)
- **Mamluks defeated** (unlike historical Ain Jalut)
  - Hulagu's forces have fire weapons
  - No recall due to succession crisis (eastern front is not a priority)
  - Byzantine logistical support available from Mediterranean
  - Ilkhanate expands to include Syria, Palestine, possibly Egypt
- Crusader states: likely become Byzantine vassals or are absorbed
  - Crusader states and Mongols historically attempted alliances against Mamluks
  - Contested between Byzantium and Ilkhanate (potential V3 event chain)

---

## Mongol Empire Structure at Peak (~1260s-1270s)

### Great Khan's Domain (Ogedei's line -> merges with Jochi's line after succession crisis)
- **Capital**: New city on the Volga River (near historical Sarai)
- **Direct territory**: Volga region, Rus settled territories (Kiev, Novgorod, Moscow as major cities), Ukrainian steppe, Galicia-Volhynia, Moldavia, Transylvania, Hungarian Plain, Wallachia
- The core forms an "L-shape":
  - Horizontal axis: Mongol steppe -> Kazakhstan -> Ukrainian steppe -> Black Sea coast
  - Western extension: Moldavia -> Transylvania (through Carpathian passes) -> Hungarian Plain

### Golden Horde (Jochi's line)
- Black Sea steppe, Kuban, North Caucasus
- Eventually merges with the Great Khan's domain after succession crisis

### Chagatai Khanate
- Central Asia (Transoxiana), Xinjiang, parts of Afghanistan
- Capital: Samarkand area
- Nominally submits to Great Khan, but practically independent
- Closer to the Volga-based Great Khan than historically (Karakorum was much further)

### Ilkhanate (Hulagu's line)
- Persia, Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Egypt
- Capital: Tabriz (northwestern Persia/Azerbaijan)
- Eventually independent after succession crisis
- **Already substantially Islamicized by ~1300** (historical pattern: Ghazan Khan converted 1295)
- Persian bureaucrats are the administrative backbone (mirror of Byzantium's role in Great Khanate)
- Culturally evolving into a Mongol-dynasty Persian-Islamic empire
- **Egypt**: governed by Mongol military governor (replacing Turkic Mamluk elite). Mongol hereditary military aristocracy replaces the non-hereditary Mamluk slave-soldier system. Arab/Coptic administrative class retained. Al-Azhar and Islamic institutions preserved. Tendency toward autonomy over time (Egypt always separates eventually — Tulunids, Fatimids, Muhammad Ali pattern). By V3 era: likely a Mongol-blooded but fully Arabicized/Islamicized dynasty.

### Mongol Khanate (Mongol Ulus) (Far East)
- **Mongol homeland** (now the imperial periphery, not the center)
- Northern Manchuria (Jianzhou/Jurchen tribal areas north of Song border)
- Siberia and Russian Far East (nominally - actually scattered tribes)
- Very sparse population (hundreds of thousands at most), extremely poor
- **Excluded from ALL major trade routes** — Silk Road passes through Song (Hexi) and Chagatai, not Mongolia
- Economy: pastoral nomadism + limited Jianzhou agriculture + undeveloped mineral resources (copper, gold, coal, later oil)
- Analogous to modern Mongolia: geographically large, economically marginal
- Cannot raid Song (industrial military) or Great Khanate (overwhelming force) or Chagatai (too far, defended)
- Cannot reach Korea (Song-controlled southern Manchuria blocks access)
- Little Ice Age hits pastoral economy hard — dzud (white disaster) frequency increases
- **Long-term trajectory**: mineral wealth attracts Song and Great Khanate economic colonization (foreign capital extracts resources, profits flow out). By V3 era, may be economically semi-colonized.
- **V3 playable faction** — extreme difficulty, but multiple gameplay paths:
  - "Mongol Restoration": claim Great Khanate during instability
  - "Mandate of Heaven": exploit Song internal crisis to invade south, recreating the Qing scenario
  - "Far Eastern Balancer": play Song and Great Khanate against each other
  - "Mining Modernization": leverage mineral resources for industrialization (requires foreign investment/technology)

---

## Succession Crisis and Empire Split (~1270s-1300s)

Ogedei dies (alcoholism, historical pattern). Succession crisis ensues, but fundamentally different from our timeline:

### Why It's Different
- Almost all claimants are concentrated in the Rus core (not spread across Eurasia)
- No Chinese theater to fight over
- Crisis plays out more like Ottoman fratricide than historical Mongol cross-continental civil wars
- Resolved faster (proximity) but more violently

### Outcome: Possibility B (Rus core consolidates, periphery separates)
- **Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus)**: Ogedei/Jochi lines merge. Controls Rus + Golden Horde territories + Hungary + direct corridor. Strongest successor state.
- **Chagatai Khanate**: Central Asia becomes fully independent
- **Ilkhanate**: Middle East becomes fully independent, Islamicizes
- **Mongol Khanate (Mongol Ulus)**: Retains Mongol homeland + Far East, becomes a peripheral power
- Volga capital's geographic advantage: close enough to maintain stronger authority over Golden Horde and Central Asia than historical Karakorum, but still loses control of distant Ilkhanate

---

## The Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus) (Post-Split, ~1300 onward)

### Nature: Between Ottoman Empire and Qing Dynasty
- Not as many radically different ethnic groups as the Ottomans
- Not as unified a subject population as the Qing's Han Chinese
- Slavic majority population with no single unified identity (Novgorod republic tradition vs. Kiev tradition vs. northeast forest principalities)
- Mongol ruling minority can exploit these divisions

### Qing Dynasty Parallels

| Qing Dynasty | Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus) |
|---|---|
| Manchu minority rules Han majority | Mongol minority rules Slavic majority |
| Adopts keju examination system | Adopts Orthodox Church + Slavic civil service |
| Eight Banners maintain Manchu military privilege | Mongol cavalry nobility maintains military privilege |
| Manchu language gradually dies, elite sinicizes | Mongol language gradually yields to Slavic |
| Late Qing Manchu-Han tensions explode | By V3 era: Mongol-Slavic tensions as event chain |

### Capital and Major Cities
- **Capital**: New city on Volga River (similar to historical Sarai's location)
- **Kiev**: Major city, symbolic importance (spiritual capital of Rus civilization)
- **Novgorod**: Northern trade hub, gateway to Baltic, retains some republican self-governance traditions
- **Moscow**: Major city in the forest zone

### Key Characteristics for V3
- Enormous territory, relatively low GDP
- Multi-ethnic stability problems (similar to vanilla Austria/Ottoman)
- Industrialization reform as main storyline (technology dependent on Song imports)
- Relationship with Song: trade dependence vs. geopolitical rivalry
- Internal Mongol identity vs. Slavic identity conflict

---

## Vassal and Neighbor States

### Hungary: Absorbed into Great Khanate Core
- Hungarian Plain = western terminus of the Eurasian Steppe
- Directly incorporated, not vassalized
- Mongol/Kipchak/Cuman nomads settle the eastern plain
- Magyar population pushed to margins (Transdanubia, northern mountains/Slovakia)
- By 1836: ethnically mixed region (Mongol/Turkic/Slavic/Magyar), core province of Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus)
- Magyar identity possibly extinct or reduced to minority status (like historical Avars)

### Poland: "Korean Model" Vassal
- **Territory**: Greater Poland (Poznan), Lesser Poland (Krakow), Masovia (Warsaw), Kuyavia
  - Lost Silesia to Greater Germany (already Germanizing)
  - Lost Galicia to Mongol direct control (Rus territory, strategic corridor)
  - Lost Pomerania to German/Novgorod Baltic sphere
- Piast dynasty (or successor) retains throne
- Mongol darughachi (resident overseer) stationed in Krakow
- Polish szlachta (nobility) retains local power
- Catholic Church allowed to operate (Mongol religious tolerance)
- Must pay tribute, provide troops, defer on foreign policy
- **Core V3 tension**: Catholic/Western cultural identity under Eastern/Orthodox Mongol suzerainty
- Strong potential for independence movement event chains

### Bulgaria (Bulgar Khanate): Mongol Vassal
- Balkan region north of Byzantine territory, south of Danube
- Danube serves as boundary between Mongol direct territory (Wallachia, north bank) and Bulgarian vassal (south bank)
- Mongol vassal from the first western campaign

### Byzantine Empire: Mongol Vassal / Indirect Manager
- Restored in Constantinople (1261) with Mongol support
- Manages Balkans and Anatolia on behalf of the Mongol system
- Controls Bosphorus strait
- Provides: administration, navy, diplomacy, trade management
- Various smaller Balkan entities under Byzantine indirect management
- Seljuk Sultanate of Rum remains as vassal under Byzantine oversight
- Similar to Han Chinese bureaucrats serving the Qing

### Lithuania: Mongol Military District
- Too small to resist Mongols in the 1250s
- Incorporated as a directly-administered border military zone
- Lithuanian people serve as border military caste (similar to Mongol Banners for ethnic minorities)
- Guards the western frontier against Germany

### Baltic Region (Estonia, Latvia, Old Prussia)
- Teutonic Order destroyed by Mongol advance
- German colonization of Prussia interrupted -> Prussian Germans remain a small minority
- Teutonic Order remnant: submits to some power for protection, eventually becomes a German-minority autonomous district (parallel to historical Livonian Order fate)
- Region managed by Novgorod as the Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus)'s Baltic proxy
- Baltic tribal peoples (Latvians, Estonians, Old Prussians) persist without German colonization pressure
- Denmark may retain northern Estonia

---

## Western Europe

### Greater Germany (Grossdeutschland)
- **Formation**: Mongol destruction of HRE feudal structure -> accelerated German national consciousness -> unification
- **Led by**: Hanseatic League cities (least damaged, strongest economy, bourgeois/civic nationalism)
- **Territory**: From the Low Countries (Dutch-speaking areas, pre-separate identity) to Switzerland and Austria
- **Excludes**: Poland (Mongol vassal), Prussia (destroyed/Mongol sphere), Bohemia (independent)
- **Relationship with Mongols**: Initially loose vassal/tribute, gradually asserts independence as Mongol grip weakens
- **V3 status**: Major European power, commercially strong, but lacking overseas colonies (?)
- **Includes Silesia**: absorbed from Poland due to existing Germanization

### Bohemia
- **Status**: Independent kingdom, allied with but not merged into Greater Germany
- **Protected by**: Mountain basin geography (Sudetes, Ore Mountains, Bohemian Forest)
- **Possibly bypassed** by main Mongol thrust along the northern plain
- Czech national identity too strong for absorption into German nationalism
- Silver mining wealth, industrial potential
- Strategically positioned between Greater Germany and Great Khanate sphere
- In V3: mid-tier independent power

### The Partition of France and the Plantagenet Kingdom

Mongol raids into northern France (Flanders, Picardy, ~1240s-1250s) weaken the Capetian dynasty. England exploits this rather than allying (medieval political logic). The result is not "England conquering France" but the **Plantagenet dynasty reclaiming and unifying its continental and insular domains**.

#### Why England Claims the French Crown
- The English court already speaks Anglo-Norman French
- The Plantagenet kings are originally French nobles (Anjou, Normandy)
- Losing continental territories (1204, King John) was the anomaly; reclaiming them is "going home"
- Population ratio ~4:1 (France:England) means the continental territory is the real center of power

#### Capital: Paris
- Paris (~200,000) dwarfs London (~40-50,000)
- An English king who gains France would move the capital to Paris - same logic as any peripheral conqueror moving to the richer core (Norman -> England in 1066, but in reverse now)
- England becomes an "overseas province" of a Paris-centered kingdom
- Over time, French identity absorbs English identity at the elite level

#### Plantagenet France Territory (~1300)
- **Core**: Île-de-France (Paris), Normandy (recovered), Anjou/Maine/Touraine (recovered), Picardy, Champagne
- **Original English holdings**: Aquitaine/Gascony (Bordeaux region)
- **Insular**: England, possibly Wales, contested Scotland/Ireland
- **Vassal**: Brittany (semi-independent, in Plantagenet sphere)
- English Channel becomes an internal waterway

#### Contested with Burgundy
- Plantagenet king claims all of France -> includes sovereignty over Burgundy
- Burgundian duke (Capetian cadet branch) may claim to be the true French heir
- Creates a **legitimacy war**: two "Frances" competing for the Capetian inheritance
- Disputed territories along the Burgundy-Île-de-France border

#### Long-term Implications
- French language remains elite/court language (English court already French-speaking)
- English language persists on the islands as commoner language, developing independently
- England/Scotland/Ireland may develop distinct identities resisting continental French elite
- By 1836: Atlantic power centered on Paris, controlling northern/western France + British Isles. French-speaking court, English-speaking island populace.

### Duchy of Burgundy (Independent)
- **Formation**: Capetian cadet branch declares independence as France collapses
- **Territory**: Duchy of Burgundy (Dijon) + County of Burgundy / Franche-Comté (Besançon)
- **Language**: Almost entirely French-speaking (~100%). The Franco-German linguistic border runs along the Vosges Mountains; Burgundy is fully on the French side. Franche-Comté was in the HRE but linguistically Romance.
- **Relationship with Greater Germany**: Strategic ally but NOT part of German unification. German ethnic nationalism cannot absorb a purely French-speaking state. Alliance based on shared threats (Plantagenet France to the west, Great Khanate to the east).
- **Claims**: May claim to be the legitimate successor to the French crown (Capetian blood vs. Plantagenet usurpers)
- **V3 role**: Mid-tier independent French-speaking state, buffer between Plantagenet France and Greater Germany

### Iberian Peninsula (Divided)
- Reconquista effectively complete by ~1270 (only Granada remains as Castilian tributary)
- **Castile and Aragon do NOT merge** (unlike historical 1469 marriage union)

#### Crown of Aragon (Mediterranean Power)
- **Territory**: Catalonia, Aragon, Valencia, Majorca, **Languedoc** (reclaimed from collapsed France - Occitan/Catalan cultural affinity)
- **Possibly also**: Provence, Mediterranean islands (Sicily, Sardinia - historical Aragonese expansion)
- **Absorbed Navarre**: France's collapse removes Navarre's protector; too small to survive independently; culturally/geographically closer to Aragon
- **Orientation**: Mediterranean, facing Italy and North Africa
- **Language zone**: Catalan-Occitan continuum across Pyrenees

#### Kingdom of Castile-León (Atlantic Power)
- **Territory**: Central and western Iberia (largest Iberian state)
- **Orientation**: Atlantic, facing Africa and potentially the open ocean
- **Granada**: Emirate survives as Castilian tributary - without Aragon's help, Castile may never muster the political will to finish the Reconquista. Granada could survive to V3 era as a small Muslim vassal state.
- **Competitor**: Portugal for Atlantic expansion

#### Kingdom of Portugal
- **Territory**: Western Iberian coast, Reconquista completed 1249
- **Orientation**: Atlantic, historically the pioneer of maritime exploration
- **Competitor**: Castile for Atlantic routes
- **Small but independent**, may punch above its weight in exploration/colonization

#### Emirate of Granada (Surviving Muslim State)
- Last remnant of Al-Andalus
- Castilian tributary/vassal
- Without united Spain, may survive to 1836 as a small but culturally significant Muslim enclave in Europe
- V3: interesting minor power, potential flashpoint

### Scandinavia / Kalmar Union
- Mongols don't reach Scandinavia (too cold, too forested, too poor)
- **Kalmar Union will form** (even more pressure than historical):
  - Anglo-French union across the Channel
  - Earlier unified Greater Germany
  - Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus) with Novgorod buffer
- Denmark may lose northern Estonia to Great Khanate sphere
- Sweden continues Finnish expansion unopposed
- Norway maintains Atlantic possessions (Iceland, Greenland, Faroe Islands)
- No Great Northern War equivalent (Great Khanate doesn't prioritize Baltic access - their window is Black Sea/Constantinople)

### Italy (~1300: No significant divergence yet)
- Protected by Alps from Mongol invasion - no direct impact
- City-states continue as in our timeline (Venice, Genoa, Florence, Papal States, Naples/Sicily, etc.)
- Northern Italian economic connections to Germany weakened by Mongol destruction of HRE, but butterfly effects have not yet materialized by 1300
- Status at 1300: essentially same as our timeline's Italy. Divergence will come later.
- **Post-1300 evolution: TO BE DETERMINED**

---

## Key Trade Routes

### Hexi Corridor: Song-Controlled
- Western Xia destroyed by Genghis Khan (1227) — territory reverts to vacuum
- Song fills the vacuum: Hexi Corridor (Gansu) is easily reached and defended from the Chinese heartland, historically Han-populated
- **Song controls the eastern terminus of the Silk Road** — not just a goods supplier but the gateway manager

### Land Silk Road
Song (Guanzhong) → Hexi Corridor (Song) → Dunhuang → splits:
1. **Northern route**: → Chagatai Khanate → Great Khanate → Novgorod → Hanseatic League / Europe
2. **Southern route**: → Chagatai Khanate → Ilkhanate → Syria → Mediterranean

### Third Land Route (Burma Road, developing ~1325-1350)
Song (Yunnan) → Burma (Pagan remnant / Song influence) → Bengal / Eastern India → connects to maritime network
- Still ultimately reaches Ilkhanate territory for westward trade (Persian Gulf / Red Sea)
- Bypasses Chagatai's overland middleman cut
- Under development in this period, not yet fully operational

### Maritime Silk Road
Song → South China Sea → Malacca Strait → Indian Ocean → two endpoints:
1. **Persian Gulf** (Hormuz → Ilkhanate): major trade terminus
2. **Red Sea** (Aden → Egypt/Ilkhanate): connects to Mediterranean via Cairo
- **Ilkhanate profits from BOTH land and sea routes** — sits on two of three trade paths
- Song Southeast Asian colonies serve as waypoints and resource extraction sites

### Song Maritime Trade and Southeast Asian Colonization (~1325)
Layered presence, from most to least control:
1. **Xuanweisi (宣慰司, pacification commissions)**: Direct administration. Champa coast, parts of Vietnam.
2. **Trading posts (商埠)**: Song merchant communities + small garrisons. Srivijaya (Palembang), Malacca, north Java coast. Similar to Portuguese Goa/Malacca model.
3. **Chinese settler polities**: Self-organized miner/farmer republics in Borneo, Sumatra interior. Precursors to historical Lanfang Republic (1777) but centuries earlier. Song gives nominal recognition without direct governance.
4. **Tributary/trade partners**: Siam, Khmer (Cambodia), Pagan remnants. Not colonies, just trade relationships.
- Little Ice Age drives development: SE Asian tropical agriculture unaffected by cooling, attracts Song migrants fleeing southern economic crisis
- Long-term: when Little Ice Age ends + commercial agriculture develops, SE Asia experiences agricultural economic boom

### Japan: Silver Island
- No Mongol invasions (1274, 1281) → less national cohesion, Kamakura shogunate's legitimacy basis differs
- Japanese gold/silver output (Iwami Ginzan etc.) is globally critical — **without New World silver, Japan is the world's primary precious metal supplier**
- Song merchants active in Hakata, Hirado; Japan integrated into Song trade network
- But no external threat → less motivation for centralization or technology adoption
- V3 era: pre-industrial but wealthy from silver, capable of rapid industrialization if stimulated (Black Ships equivalent scenario)

### Korea (Goryeo): Song Tributary
- Mongol Khanate cannot reach Korea (Song controls southern Manchuria, blocks land approach)
- Korea defaults to traditional tributary relationship with Chinese dynasty (Song)
- Purchases Song industrial goods, maintains internal autonomy
- Culturally influenced by Song but politically independent

### Trade Route Summary
| Route | Song share | Middlemen | Endpoint |
|---|---|---|---|
| Northern Silk Road | Hexi Corridor | Chagatai → Great Khanate | Europe (Novgorod) |
| Southern Silk Road | Hexi Corridor | Chagatai → Ilkhanate | Mediterranean |
| Burma Road | Yunnan | Burma → India | Ilkhanate (Persian Gulf/Red Sea) |
| Maritime | SE Asian colonies | Indian Ocean | Ilkhanate (Hormuz/Aden) |
| **Mongol Khanate** | **None** | **None** | **Excluded from all routes** |

---

## Manchuria / Jianzhou

### Division
- **Southern Manchuria** (Liao River corridor, southern Jilin): Song-controlled
  - Site of Song's northern industrial expansion
  - Jurchen minority gradually sinicized
  - Key to Song's industrialization story (labor scarcity -> mechanization)
- **Northern Manchuria** (Heilongjiang, outer Manchuria): Mongol Khanate (Mongol Ulus) sphere
  - Forest/tundra, very sparse population
  - Jianzhou and other Jurchen tribes maintain semi-independent hunting/fishing lifestyle
  - Too cold and poor for Song expansion, too marginal for Mongol attention

### Why Manchu/Qing Never Happens
- Historical Manchu unification required: weak Ming control of northeast + space for Jurchen consolidation
- In this timeline: Song industrial control in south + Mongol sphere in north = two strong powers squeezing Jurchens
- Jurchens never unify into a single state
- By 1836: minority ethnic group split between Song (assimilated) and Mongol Khanate (Mongol Ulus) (tribal)

---

## India (~1300-1325)

### Delhi Sultanate (Dominant North Indian Power)
- Khalji dynasty (1290-1320), then Tughluq dynasty (1320+)
- Alauddin Khalji (1296-1316): peak power, repelled historical Mongol invasions, conquered Deccan
- In this timeline: Chagatai Khanate (with fire weapons) poses greater threat from the northwest via Afghanistan
- But Delhi can acquire fire weapons through Song maritime trade and Burma road → threat is manageable
- India's production capacity far exceeds Chagatai's despite being agricultural/pre-industrial
- **Emerging threat**: Song industrial textiles entering Indian coastal markets via maritime trade
  - India is the world's largest textile producer
  - Song cheap factory-made cloth will undercut Indian handloom textiles
  - Effect similar to British Industrial Revolution's destruction of Indian industry — but 500 years earlier
  - By ~1375-1400: serious economic disruption in Indian textile-producing regions

### South India
- Pandya, Hoysala, Kakatiya kingdoms being conquered by Delhi
- Vijayanagara Empire will form ~1336 as resistance to Delhi
- Coastal cities increasingly integrated into Song maritime trade network

### India's Long-term Role
- Sits on the Burma Road (third Silk Road) between Song and the Ilkhanate
- Major market for Song industrial goods AND supplier of spices, gems, cotton
- Politically fragmented → vulnerable to Song economic penetration
- Not colonized (too large, too populated) but economically dependent on Song trade

---

## Tibet (~1300)

- Historical Sakya-Mongol alliance (1240s) depended on Yuan Dynasty patronage — no Yuan in this timeline
- Tibet is **effectively independent**, fragmented among Buddhist monastic schools/sects
- Song does not prioritize Tibet: high altitude, low economic value, difficult logistics
- Song expansion priorities: Southeast Asia (rich) > Burma Road (strategic) > Tibet (not urgent)
- Tibet may come under loose Song cultural/religious influence over time
- Long-term: Song may eventually assert control to prevent Chagatai or Mongol Khanate from using it as staging ground

---

## Religion in This World

### Eastern Orthodoxy
- Becomes the dominant religion of the Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus)
- Great Khan baptized ~1325-1350, but **rejects Constantinople's religious authority**
- Develops a distinctive **Mongolized Orthodox sect**: fuses Orthodox Christian theology with Mongol/Tengri cultural traditions
  - Possibly independent patriarchate on the Volga, refusing Constantinople's primacy
  - Parallels: Ethiopian Orthodox Church (independent from broader Orthodoxy), or Moscow's "Third Rome" doctrine but earlier and more radical
  - Mongol shamanic elements incorporated into ritual and imagery
- Constantinople remains the spiritual center for Byzantine/Balkan Orthodoxy only
- Creates a religious split within the Orthodox world: Volga Orthodoxy vs. Constantinople Orthodoxy

### Catholicism
- Survives in: Western Europe (Germany, France, England, Iberia, Italy, Scandinavia)
- Poland: Catholic enclave under Orthodox Mongol suzerainty (major tension source)
- Bohemia: Catholic
- Papacy: survives in Rome (Italy protected by Alps)

### Islam: Decentralized, No Single Authority
- **Abbasid Caliphate destroyed (1258)** and no successor emerges:
  - No Ottoman Empire to claim caliphal authority
  - No Mamluk-hosted shadow caliphate in Cairo (Mamluks are now Mongol vassals)
- **Ilkhanate**: Islamicized by ~1300, but Mongol-conquest origin limits religious legitimacy
- **Chagatai Khanate**: Islamicizing, Central Asian Islam continues
- **North Africa (Maghreb)**: The last fully independent Sunni Muslim region
  - Morocco (Marinid dynasty): independent
  - Algeria (Zayyanid dynasty): independent
  - **Tunisia (Hafsid dynasty): potential new center of Sunni Islam** — Hafsid sultans were historically recognized as caliphs by some; in a world without Abbasids or Ottomans, Tunis may become the spiritual capital of Sunni Islam
- **Consequences of decentralization**:
  - Sufi orders gain importance as trans-political religious networks
  - Shia Islam may gain more space under Mongol rule in Persia (Mongols indifferent to Sunni-Shia divide)
  - Islamic legal/scholarly authority fragments among regional ulama centers (Al-Azhar in Cairo, Qarawiyyin in Fez, Samarkand)
  - No single Islamic power capable of projecting force like the historical Ottomans

### Song China
- Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism (historical pattern)
- No significant change from baseline

---

## 1300 Snapshot: COMPLETE

All major regions defined at the 1300 checkpoint. Summary of world powers:

| Power | Center | Nature |
|---|---|---|
| Song Dynasty | China (Kaifeng/Hangzhou) | Industrial superpower, expanding into SE Asia |
| Great Khanate (Yeke Ulus) | Volga River | Largest land empire, Orthodox, Mongol-Slavic hybrid |
| Ilkhanate | Tabriz | Islamicized Mongol-Persian empire, controls Middle East + Egypt |
| Chagatai Khanate | Samarkand | Central Asian, Islamicizing |
| Mongol Khanate (Mongol Ulus) | Mongolia/Siberia | Peripheral, poor, strategic position |
| Plantagenet France | Paris | Atlantic power, cross-Channel, rising |
| Greater Germany | Hanseatic cities | Commercial power, emerging from Mongol vassalage |
| Crown of Aragon | Barcelona | Mediterranean + Languedoc |
| Castile-León | Toledo/Burgos | Atlantic Iberia |
| Portugal | Lisbon | Small Atlantic state |
| Burgundy | Dijon | Independent French-speaking buffer state |
| Bohemia | Prague | Independent, mountain-protected |
| Kalmar Union | Forming | Scandinavian defensive alliance |
| Byzantine Empire | Constantinople | Mongol vassal, Balkans/Anatolia manager |
| Hafsid Tunisia | Tunis | Potential new center of Sunni Islam |
| Marinid Morocco | Fez | Independent Islamic state |
| Italy | Various | City-states, no divergence yet |
| Poland | Krakow | Mongol vassal (Korean model) |
| Granada | Granada | Last European Muslim state, Castilian tributary |

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## Open Questions (Post-1300 Chronological Development)

1. **1300-1500 era**: Each region's evolution through late medieval period
2. **Italy post-1300**: Renaissance? Different city-state dynamics? Unification pressure?
3. **Age of Exploration**: Delayed? Led by whom? Song maritime expansion vs. European exploration?
4. **The Americas**: Who discovers/colonizes them?
5. **Africa and India**: Song colonial sphere? European competition?
6. **Song's North-South civil war**: When? Outcome? What does Song look like by 1836?
7. **Great Khanate internal evolution**: Slavic nationalism? Industrialization attempts?
8. **Ilkhanate fragmentation**: Does Egypt break away? Persia's trajectory?
9. **1836 technology levels**: Who has what? Is Song far ahead of everyone?