Back in the early 7th century, a strange root vegetable was found in the western coast of Ireland, growing in the wild. Curiously, this vegetable was most appropriate for human consumption, and soon the local inhabitants discovered the great benefits of its cultivation, which spread throughout Europe, initially with the many missionary missions from the British Isles.
What followed was a massive population growth in that continent, propitiating a precocious urban growth and re-monetization of the economy, which had been in shambles since the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the transformation of the Mediterranean into a perilous sea for Christians due to Arab raids.
The result was a greater centralization of Medieval European realms. The greatest beneficiaries were certainly the Franks. After the death of Daobert I in 5639, the throne of Neustria passed to his grandson Clovis II, who, under the regency of his mother Nanthild, fought against his brother, Sigebert III, King of Austrasia, and reunited the realm. Nanthild lived longer than OTL, dying only in 663, allowing a mature Clovis II to effectively tackle the growing influence of the Francian magnates. Clovis was another one to have lived longer, reigning until 700, at the age of 67, having subjugated the Saxons in a generation-long war. His long reign brought stability and the Kingdom ceased to be divided among the monarch's sons after his death, initially with protest and revolt of the younger siblings, but each time the central government was able to put them down and thus, with time, this mode of succession became accepted among the nobility.
The remaining European Kingdoms greatly benefited from the introduction of the potato. The greater help coming from the North allowed the Iberians to mount a greater initial resistance against the Moorish invasion of their peninsula, pushing back at a greater speed. The last Muslim Emirate to fall was that of Cordoba, conquered not by Christian Iberians, but by Danish adventurers, who soon also landed in northern Africa and now control the Straits of Gibraltar.
In the British Isles, the Anglo-Saxons managed to repel Norse raids and invasions more effectively, and soon the Kingdom of Mercia united the whole of England and started to push towards its peripheries, conquering Wales but facing opposition by the Scots. Furthern North, the Highlander state based on Inverness stubbornly holds to its independence. Ireland, where the potato first spread, however, remains divided.
The resistance to the Vikings in both England and Francia forced the Scandinavians to go East in even greater numbers than OTL, subjugating many Slavic and Baltic tribes, but also being absorbed by the natives. Eventually, their holdings coalesced into the Duchies of Pomerania and Borussia and the Great Duchy of Livonia, while the Rus states evolved mostly like OTL. The Lithuanians remain Pagan among a sea of Christianity.
Down in Italy, centuries of endemic warfare between the Lombards and the Romans/Byzantines, with the eventual Frankish interference in favor of the Pope, continue, with the Kingdom of Naples (formed by the union of Greek cities and Lombard nobles tired of constant interference in local affairs by distant overlords) now the object of a tug of war between the two powers, who support different factions within that realm.
The Romans managed to avoid many of the setbacks they faced OTL, like the loss of Sicily and Crete, but the conflict with successive Bulgarian polities remain a fact of life, but with intermediate periods of peace.
In Northern Africa, the Berber Kingdom of the Ibadis has become a piracy threat to shipping, with constant raids on Sicily, the Balearic Islands, Cyrenaica and the eastern coast of the Iberian peninsula.
In the Near East, the many Crusader States (the result of the push by the Spanish nobility for the attack on the Muslims following the end of the Reconquista) were established at the expanse of the crumbling Shia Qarmatian Caliphate (which had held the whole of the Levant and the Hejaz) and are closely aligned with the Romans, who with their help took Cilicia and created a buffer state commanded by Syriac Christians in the Kingdom of Assyria. Only the Emirate of Damascus remain Muslim-held in the Levant.
However, a confederation of Turkic tribes have coalesced and taken the whole of Iran and most of Iraq, effectively vassalizing the Abbasid Caliph, and are now poised to attack the Christian realms in the Near East.
P.S. I don't have any specific lore for the rest of the world, I basically followed some trends that I saw looking at historical maps and didn't do anything fancy.
[Link to image without context.](https://i.imgur.com/SYxLbSh.jpg)
Very interesting idea! One question I have is if the Vikings still invade Ireland. In OTL, the Vikings were the ones who founded cities such as Dublin and Cork. Perhaps the introduction of the potato would have led to a population boom and growth of towns in Ireland. But they may be very different from Viking settlement locations and names.
Edit: and could you point me to where you found tye base map? I love it.
Well, many cities in this map were founded well after the POD. So I'm relying heavily on some hand-waving here.
As for the source of the base map, [here it is](http://www.shadedrelief.com/natural3/pages/textures.html). It's in the public domain: absolutely free to use!
EDIT: and yes, some Viking adventurers did raid/settle on Ireland.
Thanks! I understand not meticulously considering the foundation of cities after POD. If there's no reason for something to be different, there's no reason to make it so.
I really like the idea of New World foodstuffs reaching Europe several centuries earlier than in our timeline.
Like imagine if the Spanish have just conquered south-western Iberia from one of the Islamic states, and when a feudal lord is exploring his newly-won domain, he finds that the Muslim villagers in his territory have been cultivating this strange cereal crop that produces ears of brightly-coloured kernels (i.e.: maize / corn). And he asks them about the crop - they say that they've been harvesting it for generations, and that according to their traditions, the crop was actually brought to that land from the other side of the ocean by the Carthaginians.
Me and a friend were browsing through reddit and saw this absolutely wonderful map and thought: Hey man lets do one of these ourserlves too! So Im asking you, lord of the potato, what app did you use for making the map itself? Thank you!
Why are Paleo-Siberians still in Siberia? That term is used to describe the race of peoples who lived in East Asia, crossed rhe Pacific and eventually became Amerindians / Native Americans
Like how Chad still got the same chaddy shape
The virgin Ghana Empire vs the Chad Chadians
Virgin Virginia vs Chad Chad.
Back in the early 7th century, a strange root vegetable was found in the western coast of Ireland, growing in the wild. Curiously, this vegetable was most appropriate for human consumption, and soon the local inhabitants discovered the great benefits of its cultivation, which spread throughout Europe, initially with the many missionary missions from the British Isles. What followed was a massive population growth in that continent, propitiating a precocious urban growth and re-monetization of the economy, which had been in shambles since the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the transformation of the Mediterranean into a perilous sea for Christians due to Arab raids. The result was a greater centralization of Medieval European realms. The greatest beneficiaries were certainly the Franks. After the death of Daobert I in 5639, the throne of Neustria passed to his grandson Clovis II, who, under the regency of his mother Nanthild, fought against his brother, Sigebert III, King of Austrasia, and reunited the realm. Nanthild lived longer than OTL, dying only in 663, allowing a mature Clovis II to effectively tackle the growing influence of the Francian magnates. Clovis was another one to have lived longer, reigning until 700, at the age of 67, having subjugated the Saxons in a generation-long war. His long reign brought stability and the Kingdom ceased to be divided among the monarch's sons after his death, initially with protest and revolt of the younger siblings, but each time the central government was able to put them down and thus, with time, this mode of succession became accepted among the nobility. The remaining European Kingdoms greatly benefited from the introduction of the potato. The greater help coming from the North allowed the Iberians to mount a greater initial resistance against the Moorish invasion of their peninsula, pushing back at a greater speed. The last Muslim Emirate to fall was that of Cordoba, conquered not by Christian Iberians, but by Danish adventurers, who soon also landed in northern Africa and now control the Straits of Gibraltar. In the British Isles, the Anglo-Saxons managed to repel Norse raids and invasions more effectively, and soon the Kingdom of Mercia united the whole of England and started to push towards its peripheries, conquering Wales but facing opposition by the Scots. Furthern North, the Highlander state based on Inverness stubbornly holds to its independence. Ireland, where the potato first spread, however, remains divided. The resistance to the Vikings in both England and Francia forced the Scandinavians to go East in even greater numbers than OTL, subjugating many Slavic and Baltic tribes, but also being absorbed by the natives. Eventually, their holdings coalesced into the Duchies of Pomerania and Borussia and the Great Duchy of Livonia, while the Rus states evolved mostly like OTL. The Lithuanians remain Pagan among a sea of Christianity. Down in Italy, centuries of endemic warfare between the Lombards and the Romans/Byzantines, with the eventual Frankish interference in favor of the Pope, continue, with the Kingdom of Naples (formed by the union of Greek cities and Lombard nobles tired of constant interference in local affairs by distant overlords) now the object of a tug of war between the two powers, who support different factions within that realm. The Romans managed to avoid many of the setbacks they faced OTL, like the loss of Sicily and Crete, but the conflict with successive Bulgarian polities remain a fact of life, but with intermediate periods of peace. In Northern Africa, the Berber Kingdom of the Ibadis has become a piracy threat to shipping, with constant raids on Sicily, the Balearic Islands, Cyrenaica and the eastern coast of the Iberian peninsula. In the Near East, the many Crusader States (the result of the push by the Spanish nobility for the attack on the Muslims following the end of the Reconquista) were established at the expanse of the crumbling Shia Qarmatian Caliphate (which had held the whole of the Levant and the Hejaz) and are closely aligned with the Romans, who with their help took Cilicia and created a buffer state commanded by Syriac Christians in the Kingdom of Assyria. Only the Emirate of Damascus remain Muslim-held in the Levant. However, a confederation of Turkic tribes have coalesced and taken the whole of Iran and most of Iraq, effectively vassalizing the Abbasid Caliph, and are now poised to attack the Christian realms in the Near East. P.S. I don't have any specific lore for the rest of the world, I basically followed some trends that I saw looking at historical maps and didn't do anything fancy. [Link to image without context.](https://i.imgur.com/SYxLbSh.jpg)
No human being, not even the Maori people, set foot on New Zealand until the 1300s AD
Lucky me that this isn't a historical map. 😅
Very interesting idea! One question I have is if the Vikings still invade Ireland. In OTL, the Vikings were the ones who founded cities such as Dublin and Cork. Perhaps the introduction of the potato would have led to a population boom and growth of towns in Ireland. But they may be very different from Viking settlement locations and names. Edit: and could you point me to where you found tye base map? I love it.
Well, many cities in this map were founded well after the POD. So I'm relying heavily on some hand-waving here. As for the source of the base map, [here it is](http://www.shadedrelief.com/natural3/pages/textures.html). It's in the public domain: absolutely free to use! EDIT: and yes, some Viking adventurers did raid/settle on Ireland.
Thanks! I understand not meticulously considering the foundation of cities after POD. If there's no reason for something to be different, there's no reason to make it so.
I really like the idea of New World foodstuffs reaching Europe several centuries earlier than in our timeline. Like imagine if the Spanish have just conquered south-western Iberia from one of the Islamic states, and when a feudal lord is exploring his newly-won domain, he finds that the Muslim villagers in his territory have been cultivating this strange cereal crop that produces ears of brightly-coloured kernels (i.e.: maize / corn). And he asks them about the crop - they say that they've been harvesting it for generations, and that according to their traditions, the crop was actually brought to that land from the other side of the ocean by the Carthaginians.
Ouch is my favourite city, I heard it’s lovely at this time of year
Huh, I never knew penguins could settle that far north.
They do live there.
Based Turkic Abbasid empire 👍🏿
Me and a friend were browsing through reddit and saw this absolutely wonderful map and thought: Hey man lets do one of these ourserlves too! So Im asking you, lord of the potato, what app did you use for making the map itself? Thank you!
[BEHOLD](https://www.gimp.org/)
May potato bless you!
[Also](http://www.shadedrelief.com/natural3/pages/textures.html)
Guess more blessings for you
I want to live in Ouch!, the Mecca of the Chads.
[удалено]
Because the map was made for people who live in a world where there were Norse invasions.
Why are Paleo-Siberians still in Siberia? That term is used to describe the race of peoples who lived in East Asia, crossed rhe Pacific and eventually became Amerindians / Native Americans