Divide the world

[Xen]

Currently there are close to 200 nations recognized by the United Nations, it is very easy to create a world with 200 nations. However let's divide the world up to get as many countries as possible. Looking at a map of Europe and North America it is easy to create multiple nations out of already existing ones.

Even Russia is sort of easy to create several nations from, China and India could easily be divided into several new nations. Now where it gets hard is the Southern Hemisphere. One could create over a hundred nations by using the tribes of Africa, or at least close to it, but finding information on African tribes and their location in Africa has proven a challenge for me. South America is another challenge, how does one divide up South America? What about Australia?

[Thande]

"What about Australia?"

You can get at least 3 main states, plus however many South Africa style Aboriginal states, without getting too ASB-y. Queensland, Cygnia(Westralia) and everything else, which I assume would be known as NSW.

[Agentdark]

America-Hawaii,Alaska, California, Texas, Desert,New England, CSA, Rump USA

Argentinia-Patangonia,Rump Argentina

[Xen]

"What about Australia?"

You can get at least 3 main states, plus however many South Africa style Aboriginal states, without getting too ASB-y. Queensland, Cygnia(Westralia) and everything else, which I assume would be known as NSW.


Good points about Australia, I figured out how to split it into I believe 4 or 5states, obviously Western Australia is one, Queensland and Northern Territory becoming a state of its own, New South Wales and Victoria becoming another and Southern Australia as the fourth, Im undecided about Tasmania, it could go with Victoria and New South Wales or become its own nation state.

New Zealand can be split between the islands.

China can be split into three Chinas (Four including Taiwan) Central China, Northern China and Eastern China, then we can add Manchuria, Tibet, Uighuristan, and Inner Mongolia.

I still need some sources on Africa though, how to find maps showing the distribution of various tribes and indiginous people throughout the continent. It would also be nice to find a map of Africa that also shows the religious distribution whether it be tribal, Islamic, or Christian.

South America is a bit easier to find sources on, dividing up Brazil is of course the thing I need to concentrate on the most. Realistic ways to divide up the largest nation in South America.

[Max Sinister]

Africa could prove especially difficult - not only aren't the country borders in any way related to the cultural ones, often several people live together mixed - seperating them would be a bit as if you wanted to seperate blacks and whites in the US. F.e. in Rwanda and Burundi there are Tutsi and Hutu, the latter being the majority.
For the names of African people, I'd simply recommend reading the Wikipedia articles for the African countries...

[Condottiero]

North Andorra, Central Andorra, Southern Andorra, Republic of Western San Marino, East San Marino Princedom, Commonwealth of Northern Liechtenstein, Popular Republic of Lichtenstein, Republic of Malta, Republic of Gozo, Republic of the Rock of Gibraltar, Republic of the Isthmus of Gibraltar, Kingdom of the town of Gibraltar...

[Doctor What]

I still need some sources on Africa though, how to find maps showing the distribution of various tribes and indiginous people throughout the continent. It would also be nice to find a map of Africa that also shows the religious distribution whether it be tribal, Islamic, or Christian.


There are a LOT of different tribes and ethnic groups in Africa--often two or more in the same country (done deliberately by the colonial powers so each group will fight each rather than the powers).

Here's a link that will prove very useful--it shows a map for each country in Africa divided among pretty much any theme you want.

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/thematic.html#ethnography.html

[Leo Caesius]

You could divide them by language group; that would probably be easiest. Here are some African languages:

African Language Families:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/d/da/Afro-Asiatic.png/300px-Afro-Asiatic.png

As a rule of thumb, the distribution of Islam in Africa is roughly that of the Afroasiatic languages, and blends into the northern part of the Niger-Kordofanian languages.

http://ehl.santafe.edu/maps/Afro-Asiatic.gif

Berber dialects:

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/amina.mettouchi/Fieldwork_fichiers/image008.jpg

Niger-Kordofanian (Mandinka, Swahili, Yoruba, Zulu, etc):

http://www.ship.edu/~cgboeree/bantu.gif

Khoisan (Bushmen and Hottentots):

http://www.ship.edu/~cgboeree/bushman.gif

[Doctor What]

One really weird but cool method could be by vegetation

http://www.indiana.edu/~origins/images/Africanow.jpeg

http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/africa.html

[Xen]

Thanks for the Maps Leo and Dr What, I was considering doing something for the "Ancient" Egyptians, the Coptic speaking Christians of northern Egypt. I had no idea they dominated the Sinai.

[Leo Caesius]

Thanks for the Maps Leo and Dr What, I was considering doing something for the "Ancient" Egyptians, the Coptic speaking Christians of northern Egypt. I had no idea they dominated the Sinai.No, that's pretty conjectural, and Coptic died out in the 17th century. There are a few monasteries in the Sinai (including St. Catherine's) so that may be what the cartographer was thinking; still, it doesn't belong there. Most of the Copts are either located in the cities (Alexandria, Cairo) or in small villages in the south of Egypt; no matter where they are, though, they are outnumbered by Muslims.

[Floid]

No, that's pretty conjectural, and Coptic died out in the 17th century. There are a few monasteries in the Sinai (including St. Catherine's) so that may be what the cartographer was thinking; still, it doesn't belong there. Most of the Copts are either located in the cities (Alexandria, Cairo) or in small villages in the south of Egypt; no matter where they are, though, they are outnumbered by Muslims.Coptic died out in the sense that Latin has died out. It's still spoken by some, mostly for religious services.

[Leo Caesius]

Coptic died out in the sense that Latin has died out. It's still spoken by some, mostly for religious services.It is used almost exclusively for the Coptic Orthodox liturgy, unless I'm badly mistaken. Unlike Latin, there's no dictionary of modern Coptic (with terms like "airplane" or "cover girl") or radio programs broadcasted daily in Coptic from Alexandria. Babbo Kyrellos attempted to revive it by instructing the private religious schools to teach it to children, with mixed results. I don't believe that Shenouda has continued this policy, but I could be wrong.

[Othniel]

America-Hawaii,Alaska, California, Texas, Desert,New England, CSA, Rump USA
You could certainly get more detailed than that. First you split up the fifty states, then indpedance granted to each and every Indian Reserve, then you start splitng up states by culture....

Argentinia-Patangonia,Rump Argentina
Again you can split that up a whole lot more, even following demographic civilizations.

[Othniel]

The Easist way to do this is to have every state be a city-state.

[Hermanubis]

You really have to take into consideration viability, thou
Otherwise what's the point? Why not draw up a grid and divide the world that way?

[The Sandman]

What about France? You could get Brittany, Gascony, Burgundy, Provence, Savoy, Picardy, and, of course, the Duchy of Grand Fenwick.

[sunsurf]

Don't forget to divide up the world's oceans. The inhabitants would live on cruise ships or oil rigs, or in submarines, and everybody has Global Positioning Systems and buoys to help define the boundaries. The inhabitants would live on fishing, deep-sea mining, researching how to exploit the plant and animal life found within their territory. They'd mine the ocean floors and do aquaculture.
For this purpose a grid might make sense. Or the currents, or the surface temperature gradients would determine the boundaries.
I like the idea of dividing up the world by language group--but let's include dialects, accents and artificial languages.

[SkyEmperor]

In the middle east we can add:
Muslim Lebanon
Chruistian lebanon
Kurdistan
Hejaz
Inner Yemen
Shia Iraq
Sunni Iraq
Christian Cyprus
Muslim Cyprus
Palestine
Persia
Abkhazia
Chechnya

[Xen]

In Europe Spain, Italy and Germany are very easy to divide, the UK and France aren't that hard either, the obvious in the UK are Scotland, England and Wales. Ireland can be divided up by the traditional counties such as Ulster, Munster, etc.

Poland is a bit more difficult, Im not aware of any minorities in Poland, Im sure they're there though. The Ukraine probably can be divided between Russian and Ukrainian speaking populations. Portugal, Slovakia, Greece, etc are small enough as is, so there really is no need to divide them further.

How does one carve a Turkey? :D We have the obvious Kurdistan in the Southeast, but how else can we manage it?

[Hermanubis]

How does one carve a Turkey? :D We have the obvious Kurdistan in the Southeast, but how else can we manage it?
You could give some peices to Greece and Armenia, but that would make those countries bigger...

[Swede]

Scandinavia would be real easy to carve up. There are a few obvious layers of both historical/cultural divisions and current administrative ones.

Counties, municiplities, realms, provinces...
/only one is the same in all: Gotland. and both Gothenburg and Stockholm straddle the olden province borders.

[Alexius]

UK splits into:
Scottish Highlands, Scottish Lowlands, Northumberland, Wessex, East Anglia, Mercia, Kernow, Gwynedd, Powys, Isle of Wight, Isle of Man, Channel Islands, Northern Islands (Shetlands, Orkneys, etc.), Hebrides.

Spain certainly splits into Catalunya, Castile, Aragon and Galicia, plus the Basque country (possibly with bits of France).

Turkey is carved into Kurdistan, Anatolia, and the Western bit (Byzantium?)

Iraq continues on its present course...

Greece probably stays Greece, apart from the northern Macedonians and possibly some of the islands (Republic of Chios...)

Canada splits into Alberta, Quebec, C.A.R. (Canadian Arctic Republic) and the rest.

Russia splits into all the little autonomous republics.

[eschaton]

Okay, my count is as following for Europe

1. Iceland
2. Faeroes
3. Shetland
4. Scotland
5. Ulster
6. Ireland
7. Isle of Man
8. Wales
9. England
10. Brittany
11. France
12. Occitania
13. Alcase(SP?)-Lorraine
14. Corsica
15. Eskudia
16. Catalonia
17. Spain
18. Galicia
19. Portugal
20. Belares
21. Gibralter
22. Sardinia
23. Sicily
24. Naples
25. Vatican City
26. Italy
27. San Marino
28. Pandania
29. Ticino
30. Venetia
31. Ladinia
32. Rhaetia
33. Chur
34. Geneva (French Swiss state)
35. Rump Switzerland
36. Bavaria
37. Germany
38. Sorbia
39. Austria
40. Slovenia
41. Croatia
42. Bosnia
43. Serbia
44. Kosovo
45. Sanjak
46. Montenegro
47. Albania
48. Greece
49. Malta
50. Bulgaria
51. Romania
52. Moldova
53. Slovakia
54. Ruthenia
55. Czech Republic
60. Hungary
61. Poland
62. Kalingrad
63. Lithuania
64. Latvia
63. Estonia
64. Finland
65. Alland Islands
66. Sweden
67. Norway
68. Sammi state
70. Karelia
71. Belarus
72. Ukraine
73. Crimea
74. Georgia
75. Abkazia
76. Ossetia
77. Armenia
78. Azerbaijan
79. Chechnya
80. Ingusheta
81. Dagestan
82. Kalmykia
83. Circassia
84. Tartarstan
85. Komi
86. Mari-El
87. Russia
88. Flandres
89. Walonia
90. Luxembourg
91. Holland
92. Frisia
93. Lichenstien
94. Monaco
95. Andorra
96. Channel Islands
97. Macedonia
98. Mordova
99. Chuvashia
100. Christiana :D

Whew.

[Thande]

You can break up England and France more than that.

[Imajin]

As well as Spain (Asturias, Leon, Castile..) and Romania (Wallachia, Dobruja, Moldavia)...

[eschaton]

You can break up England and France more than that.

If you're replying to me, I was trying to follow certain rules...not splitting nations geographically, only seperating them along ethnic lines. I thought about having Gascony seperate however. I could see London as a city state as well

Hrrm, and I left Mount Athos out entirely, and that essentially is an independent state in OTL.

[eschaton]

As well as Spain (Asturias, Leon, Castile..) and Romania (Wallachia, Dobruja, Moldavia)...

Does any significant amout of people still speak Asturian or Leonese that would form the basis of a seperate nation state from Castille? Same goes for Romania.

If we don't set up *some* ground rules we might as well just declare every county or the equivilant an independent nation in this scenerio.

[Imajin]

Does any significant amout of people still speak Asturian or Leonese that would form the basis of a seperate nation state from Castille? Same goes for Romania.

If we don't set up *some* ground rules we might as well just declare every county or the equivilant an independent nation in this scenerio.
You made Kaliningrad (Russian) and Alsace-Lorraine (pretty much completely French now) independent, so...

[Hermanubis]

If we don't set up *some* ground rules we might as well just declare every county or the equivilant an independent nation in this scenerio.
Thank you! Thats what I've been trying to say!

[Swede]

If you're replying to me, I was trying to follow certain rules...not splitting nations geographically, only seperating them along ethnic lines. I thought about having Gascony seperate however. I could see London as a city state as well.
But how relevant do the divisions have to be? Denmark could be split into Denmark and Jutland, Sweden into Svealand, Götaland, Gotland, Skåneland & Norrland. More about dialects than actual ethnic groups these days tho.

[Xen]

If we don't set up *some* ground rules we might as well just declare every county or the equivilant an independent nation in this scenerio.

Let us set the rules of ethnic group and culture as the main two, IE the people in the Ozarks share a similiar culture, same is true with the Appalachains, but do people in the Rockies? Perhaps we can look at places of mixed or overlapping ethncity and culture, such as the way Transylvania was with the Hungarians and Romanians.

Let us spare the dialects for the time being.