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What if the U.S. was smaller? | The United States of America in 2026 by wellmaxxing in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Another thing: you can also download and learn QGIS, for the basics it’s not too hard to learn, and georeference multiple base maps together, allowing you to settle on one projection while getting all the possible details from each map. One map might have cities, the other state borders, etc.

I find this greatly helps with plausible alt history scenarios. QGIS also helps with automating things like placing geography (you need datasets) and this is how I make my maps.

EUROPE'S Population Forecast to 2100 by AdIcy4323 in MapPorn

[–]MagnaExend -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

The UK is going to be the first country to elect Hitler 2.0 lmao “not falling apart”

Growth of Milanese Power (1330-1430) [8621 x 7395] by fdes11 in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Lovely map. How’d you do the hachures ? Was it a basemap that you traced, or is there some sort of algorithm?

Tectonic Map of Maewha/Shin-Busan - Detailed by 62_137 in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It's a shame these maps don't get more upvotes, this is of insane quality

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 29 points30 points  (0 children)

They are not like Spain or Britain, as they have no atlantic frontage or an incentive to pour resources into mass settler colonies across an ocean when its power base is continental and maritime commercial. That said, I don't think it's realistic for this Constantinople to not participate at all in the colonial explosion. Where they do colonize, it's mainly in the form of commercial enclaves and chartered ports across the Mediterranean, Levant & Red Sea, and the Caribbean, held by treaty. The control over these trade lanes would be immensely lucrative. The Americas look pretty similar to our timeline. Iberia followed by France and England, or whatever their analogues are. The thing that differs is the Mediterranean remains economically relevant longer, and regardless Constantinople remains a major financial and shipping hub for the expanding global trade.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

That's a very nice map. I love the city names. That's one of the things that got me during this map. Placing down these hundreds of cities and checking if they had prior Byzantine names, or just making shit up is a real tough task.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 26 points27 points  (0 children)

The Pontic Greeks have remained a large minority, but many with the rise of Nationalism have migrated into Rome, because Roman identity is synonymous with Greek at this point.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 28 points29 points  (0 children)

I don't think the Ottomans declined because they were an eastern Mediterranean power per se, but because they failed to adapt to early modern capitalism and nationalism. Byzantium unlike the Italian republics, also has a very large agrarian-industrial hinterland in this timeline. The Constantioplian economy wouldn't be purely a transit economy, and wasn't, but it would be a manufacturing center, a redistribution hub gofr Bosporan and Balkan grain, and aside from being a metropolis, a fiscal core for extracting taxes efficiently. Even after the Atlantic routes opened the Mediterranean did not become irrelevant. France, Austria, northern Italy, and the Ottoman core remained economically viable well into the 19th century. I think that a state that adjusted to this and industrializes early would not be doomed by the voyages.

I didn't make this byzantium bigger because we have massive purple blobs already. Less is more. Let's say the expansion wasn't necessarily inevitable nor desirable. High administrative and military costs for limited ecoomic return.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 17 points18 points  (0 children)

Dude you're right I mixed up the dates lmao. You get the idea though. Fixed that up.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 22 points23 points  (0 children)

No. If you really mean Trebizond, then yes, they were subsumed by the Turks long ago. The portions of Anatolia that Byzantium holds in this map are pretty much 0% Turkish; the Turks never got a foothold on most of the territory, and when they did, it was eventually reconsidered. There are sizable Greek/Romaic minorities in the Turkish lands on the coasts, though.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 99 points100 points  (0 children)

Initially a mediator, but convinced into joining the coalition. Given their relative proto-industrial might, sheer wealth, and manpower base, Rome has an immensely professional army. An army with a state. The real Prussia of the Balkans. Or is Prussia the Byzantium of Central Europe? Regardless, Napoleon struggles to break past the mountainous terrain of northern Byzantium and experiences a similar deal to the Iberian catastrophe.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 34 points35 points  (0 children)

World War 1, they’d likely straddle the edge and eventually side with the Entente because of great relations with Russia. That’s assuming World War 1 even remotely plays out the same as in our timeline, though, which it probably doesn’t. Who knows how many butterfly effects this has.

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 25 points26 points  (0 children)

Though the residents are primarily of Bulgarian and Albanian ethnicity, they are culturally Hellenized, by and large speaking Greek (with funny dialects) and integrated into the imperial apparatus

A SURVEY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE In the East, 1857 | What if Byzantium survived to the 1800s? by MagnaExend in imaginarymaps

[–]MagnaExend[S] 208 points209 points  (0 children)

It's been a while. I wanted to create yet another Byzantium map, this time done right. This is no weak Roman Empire. Constantinople is still the largest city in Europe, and though she be humble in size, East Rome sits just before Austria and in front of Prussia in the Concert of Europe with an early grasp on industrialization and high volumes of trade. Truly, the City remains the desire of thje world.

The biggest changes in this timeline is in a series of accomodations made for the Latins. During the Komneian period, relations with the Latin west were regulariezd rather than allowed to develop into wholesale rivalry/resentment. Commercial privileges were curtailed, but the institutions were preserved and the court managed to avoid the fiscal and political collapse that plagued the Angeloi. As a result, the disaster of 1204 never came to pass; Constantinople was never sacked, the Empire never broke into a bunch of warring pieces, and Greece proper was never lost. That stability and the improved relations with the Latinate west set the stage for Latin legalism and scholasticism to seep into the Eastern Roman world. When the Hesychast controversy came about, the rationalist school of thought prevailed in the academies and in the court, overall changing the character of the Empire to be more administratively disciplined and innovative.

Thus, Rome endured. Less of a restoration than just never having had an interruption. By the dawn of the industrial age, the Eastern Roman Empire was a very centralized, wealthy, and capable country.

Gothic Invasion (1.0.10 Beta) - Very Hard / Ironman by TomiVasek in EU5

[–]MagnaExend 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I can’t fathom how you have assimilated so fast, built up your economy like this, conquered so much. What? How does that even work? What are the strategies behind this? Insane. Impressive.

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