In the Shade of the Baobabs

The Lion's Brood Triumphant

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POD 215 BC: The Battle of Dertosa. Better command of his cavalry lead to Hasdrubal Barca having a victory at the Battle of Dertosa. Momentarily giving up the idea of engaging the Carthaginians in Iberia, the Scipios takes the remainder of their army and head back to the Italian peninsula to support the Roman armies against the armies of Hannibal, Mago, and Hasdrubal Gisco.

With reinforcements from Mago and Hasdrubal Gisco, Hannibal is able to successfully siege and take the city of Nola in 214 BC. Several more city-states, including a few northern ones, on the Peninsula come over to Hannibal after the Battle of Nola. With almost all of Southern Italy under his sway, Hannibal must now contend with the legendary Roman legions harassing him whenever he makes war with in another region of the Italian Peninsula. However, with four armies at his command instead of the one he had IOTL, he manages to inflict several crushing defeats on them. Having been rebuffed when he came to Rome to talk peace terms, Hannibal has a new goal: to capture Rome itself and make the Romans see that their cause is lost.

Hannibal suffers a devastating blow when the Scipios in charge of an extremely large legionary force manages to crush the forces led by Mago Barca and kill Mago at the Battle of Latina (June 212 BC) while sustaining heavy losses of their own. A stalemate develops a few miles east of Latina and continues throughout the summer. During this time, Hannibal appeals to Carthage to send more troops. However, the anti-Barca factions of Carthage work against him to only send 4000 Numidian cavalry men and 20 elephants.

In order to bolster his forces, Hannibal sends Hasdrubal to Ptolemaic Egypt to hire mercenaries. Hasdrubal returns with 8,000 Egyptian infantry and 500 Egyptian cavalry composed almost entirely of native Egyptians. In September 212 BC, Hannibal ambushes the Scipios a few miles from Latina and manages to win a decisive victory against their forces, killing most of the men along with both Scipio the Elder and Publius Cornelius Scipio.

September 212 BC: Hannibal continues a rapid march to Rome to lay siege to the city but is met with a large force of 15,000, mainly the dregs of Roman soldier commanded by Scipio the Younger and Gnaeus Fulvius. The seasoned Carthaginians and fresh mercenaries make short work of them and continue their famed March to Rome. Rome is in a panic not seen since Hannibal took Cannae as the Senate desperately raises a combined force of free men and slaves to face Hannibal.

But farmers, city-dwellers, and slaves do not fight like soldiers and mercenaries and the army is crushed with many made prisoner. Hannibal starts to siege Rome while the Senate debates whether to sue for peace. Hannibal has repeatedly stressed that Sicily will be returned to Carthage and Rome remains mostly confined to the Italian Peninsula. As one senator says, “Should Hannibal should breach our gates, the people of Rome will be made slaves of Carthage.”

During the siege, Carthage sends an additional 8000 infantry with supplies to aid Hannibal in his siege. The Romans muster another force of 15,000 infantry and 1000 cavalry, to force the Carthaginians out. The Battle for Rome (December 212 BC) is a bitter one but ends in the utter defeat and merciless slaughter of the Roman force. After the battle, the Senate begins to debate again whether to raise yet another force to fight the Carthaginians. As Cato the Elder begins an impassioned speech for Rome to fight until “Hannibal is forced to march his men through the streets of Hell”, Scipio the Younger without a word yanks him down from the platform, ending his speech and any more discussion about fighting Carthage.

212 BC: The Roman Senate sues for peace and Hannibal consults with the Carthaginian government to determine the terms of Roman surrender. Rome returns Sicily to Carthage, pays a small war fine to Carthage, and recognizes the supremacy of Carthage in the western Mediterranean.

211 BC: Carthage ran a huge debt with their protracted war with Rome and desperately needed to get new sources of precious metals to avoid another Mercenary War and the revolt of various Hispanic and Numidian tribes. Tale of fields of gold are already known to Carthage from Berber nomads and they use camels from Persia to make the journey. A few diplomats and merchants make the journey to Jenne Jeno.
 
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The Great Egyptian Revolt


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205-189 BC: The Great Egyptian Revolt occurs where there is a general uprising against the Ptolemaic Dynasty after the events of the Fourth Syrian War (219-217 BC). The influence of the Egyptian mercenaries becomes very important in the leadership of the Revolt. They have an impressive reputation of being hardened veterans from the infamous Second Punic War and they lend their support and advice to the self-declared pharaoh of Upper Egypt, a Nubian named Hugronaphor.

Operating from his base in Upper Egypt and appealing to the masses as a pharaoh of old come to drive out the oppressive Greeks, he manages to extend his reach into Lower Egypt and the delta region in 202 BC. The Ptolemies mount an offensive that manages to push Hugronahpor back to Memphis where the two sides stalemate for several years.


Hugronahpor dies and his possible son Ankhmakis takes the throne. During this time, Ptolemy V (204-181) is paranoid about the prospects of defeat and begins to enact harsher measures (curfews, taxes, stricter prohibition on Egyptians being able to serve in the bureaucracy and army) on the native Egyptian population, resulting in widespread discontent with the current leadership. This causes people who otherwise would support Ptolemy to support Ankhmakis instead as well as desertion of the army by native Egyptians.

Knowledgeable of the Delta population’s discontent with Ptolemy V, Ankhmakis launches a new and ruthless offensive with a component of living off the land that results in his forces diving deep into the delta and that when forced to retreat, adopting a scorched earth policy. Thus in 190 BC, the siege of Alexandria begins.

Here the Egyptian veterans that fought in the Battles for Rome prove themselves invaluable with their experience. They instruct Ankhmakis in how to minimize the losses of his forces while maximizing his opponents’ and how to effectively break the will of a city under siege while chipping away at their defenses.

Their leader, a wiry man named Abayomi, is heard to have remarked in disgust, “These perfumed Greeks do not possess an ounce of the fire and rage of Rome. They deserve their fate.” The city falls in 189 BC and Ptolemy V flees along with most of his court to Macedonia. Thus ends the Diadochi dynasty.


Ankhmakis is crowned and officially recognized as pharaoh of all of Egypt by the priests of Alexandria. He lifts the bans on Egyptians being able to serve in the different branches of the military and in leadership positions and encourages a revival in using Demotic in royal records and business transactions. To avoid the revolt of communities with large Greek populations, he gives Coptic and Demotic equal standing in those regions. He also takes a half Egyptian-Ptolemaic wife named Cleopatra to pacify any Ptolemaic loyalists and presides over an Egypt that now blends predominant Egyptian culture with strong Greek influences.
 
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Yes, earlier trans-Saharan trade and the butterflies that come from that will definitely be a part of this timeline. Carthage is too far away to extract tribute from the Sahel though there will be strong trade links between Carthage and the Sahel.
 
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Small Beginnings


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208-170 BC: The trip to Jenne is a success and Carthage’s need and desire for gold quickly fuels the rise of a trans-Saharan trade with the inhabitants of Sub-Saharan West Africa. The Mandinka people are the greatest beneficiaries of this trade and local chieftaincies grow larger located along the Niger River for trade. Little direct contact is made between Carthage and the various Soninke and Mandinka polities as they grow in size and power.

In Carthage, Hannibal is regarded as a national hero, lionized as a military genius who has ensured the supremacy of Carthage in the western Mediterranean. He has easily been elected as suffete and the portion of the oligarchy who always opposed him can do little to harm him. He enacts several democratic reforms that serve to limit the terms of the suffete and the oligarchs. He, along with Hasdrubal Barca and Gisco are immensely popular with both the common people and the military.

150 BC: A son named Kebba is born to the chief warlord of a Mandinka state, Jenne. Kebba expands the borders of Jenne to the north and east to better control the Saharan trade routes. This rapid expansion is made possible in part by the introduction of the camel and horse to West Africa which revolutionizes the trans-Saharan trade and Sahelian states.

The camel allows far more regular and intensive contact between the different Sahel states and Carthage, and as a result, trade with the Sahel comes to be a larger part of Carthage’s income and more importantly, gold supply.

The horse fundamentally alters warfare by allowing the quicker movement of armies and states to maintain larger borders. Although highly expensive to purchase and maintain, the horse gives the Sahel states an undeniable military advantage over the people in the tsetse belt, allowing them to occasionally raid them for slaves for domestic use and for sale to the Carthaginians.

State formation and greater ease of transportation prompt population growth and a common Mandinka dominated culture starts to spread along the Niger River. The Niger River is critical for transportation and easy, efficient access to the forest region of West Africa and so the Sahel states compete with each other for control over the river. However, the Sahel states stay mostly confined to the region bounded by the Hamada and the desert tribes to the north and the tsetse fly belt to the south.

130 BC: As Jenne grows in size and complexity, the need for greater administration becomes apparent and Kebba imports several Carthaginian scholars as well as Punic literature in the form of scientific, fictional, historical, and business transaction texts. He bids them to teach himself and his jalis (griots) how to read and write in the Punic script to aid the noble and warrior families they are bound to.

130-100 BC: A modified Punic script spreads through the Sahel and in time spreads to the savanna and forest regions of West Africa.

112 BC: The Sahel civilizations are having ripple effects on their surrounding regions. Their demand for exotic goods such as palm oil, kola nuts, ivory, leopard skins, and slaves have prompted the gathering of large groups of people in order to satisfy the quantity of goods demanded. Leaders deal with the foreign merchants and direct the work and organization of their community to balance between producing luxury goods and agriculture needed to support the community. Trade routes that have been in existence for centuries are widened and strengthened between the desert, Sahel, savanna, and forest regions and prompts the rise of states originating from the already complex political institutions in place among the Africans. The Wolof, Asante, Yoruba, Fon, Hausa and more start to form loosely organized polities at this time though their populations remain low. Minimal Sahel influence is found here due to the differences in climate and fauna and is mostly manifested in prominent members of the community being buried with foreign goods and murals and sculptures depicting horses and camels.
 
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Interesting concept. Usually Carthage victory timelines focus on the goings ons in the Med. Basin, but a focus further south has, I think, not really been done before.

The Carthaginians were noted for their fine horses that are believed to be similar to todays Arabian Horses. So, it seems that trade with the Carthaginians would lead to perhaps a breeding population of very fine horses.
 
Elands and Agriculture


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Around 80-100 AD, a pivotal moment for Sub-Saharan Africa occurred. This is the first time archaeologists find evidence of humans and giant elands living in close proximity to each other though there are a few pieces of artwork that suggest earlier eland taming. The evidence is found in the tsetse fly belt of West Africa, leading to hypotheses that people tamed giant eland because they needed draft animals but were unable to use horses, camels, and cattle. Giant eland are relatively docile and non-territorial but at the same time wary of predators. People probably acclimatized giant eland to human presence by putting out salt licks near human habitations.


There are several reasons why humans would domesticate giant elands. Giant elands provide large amounts of meat, nutritious milk, and high quality hides, even when fed an inferior diet to what cattle eat. Their milk can also be kept for several weeks whereas cow milk can only be kept for a few days before spoiling. They are remarkably strong animals and can be used to draw carts and plows and be used to aid in construction and clearing the land. Furthermore, they are exceptionally quick animals and can be used for transportation. Finally, they are immune to the tsetse fly and do not require water in the same quantities cows do. The domestication of eland is thought to have occurred just east of the Niger River and spread in all cardinal directions from there.

100-900 AD: The domestication of the giant eland would transform Africa. Plow agriculture spreads throughout the continent, resulting in larger yields and enabling communities to devote less time to agriculture. Men took an increased role in agriculture as they were the ones responsible for clearing, plowing, and planting the earth as well as herding and breeding the eland. Women became responsible for weeding and harvesting the fields as well as milking the eland and processing the milk and grain. They were also responsible for maintaining small garden plots for familial use. As the burden of agriculture shifted more equitably to the men, monogamy became increasingly common as the onus was on the man to provide for his wife and children, therefore increasing paternal investment and decreasing the age gap between husband and wife. Trade rapidly grew and the merchants who controlled those routes became increasingly wealthy. Goods could be transported much quicker now that eland could be used to traverse different type of climate regions. Archaeologists find that the spread of the giant eland positively correlates with a significant increase in community size and health as determined by burial plots, the height of the people, and the conditions of their bones. Infant mortality also decreased, prompting a significant bias towards lactose tolerance.

However giant eland brought several curses as well as blessings. Warfare became increasingly common as communities sought to control the best grazing grounds and eland herds. The creation of a giant eland cavalry led to warfare on a scale that had before been rarely seen in SSA. Parasites spread from eland into human populations. Society became more stratified. Before, the age set system had prevented the rise of notable lineages but giant eland converted otherwise useless bushes, trees, and grasses into movable forms of wealth that could be controlled and inherited. Additionally, unregulated browsing and grazing combined with iron working led to desertification in semi-arid areas and the decline of several civilizations.
 
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The Kingdom of Ansongo


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150 AD: The chief imperial jali (griot) did his best not to appear anxious as he quickly made his way over to the imperial hall where the king and queen held court. He had received urgent summons in the middle of a lesson to his apprentices to appear in the hall as soon as he possibly could. The king had called an impromptu meeting of most prominent officials in the capital. Sarjo reached the doors to the throne room, took a moment to compose himself and then entered.

The hall was made in the classic Mandinka style with mudbrick columns and walls and intricately woven rugs. Baturu, the king, sat in the middle of the room along with his wife, Oba. The king was a handsome man in the prime of his life and Oba was as radiant as polished copper. But it was the new addition to the throne room that drew Sarjo’s attention. The skin of some great shaggy animal with sickle-like claws was draped across the back of the hardwood throne.

The king stood up, instantly quieting the room before he spoke. “Sarjo, how many kingdoms lie among the Niger? “Five, my king” Sarjo quickly answered. “Five…all with populations less than Ansongo?” “Indeed, three million souls reside in your domain and half a million more in our client states. Jenne (1 million), Mopti (.5 million), Ke Macina (.8 million), and Koulikoro(1 million).” Baturu became pensive for as he listened the jali list the various states with their populations. It was Oba who spoke next, “Perhaps it is time a mansa united our people. The desert clans demand greater tribute for their part in the protection of the caravans and the Fula push east.” “We must stop this infighting, this constant struggle for supremacy when our enemies gather around us.”

While the Berbers were indeed threatening to restrict the desert trade, Sarjo privately suspected that it was completion from the other Mandinka kingdoms that vexed Baturu most of all. Baturu spoke then, "Mopti and Ke Macina grow bolder with each month, cutting into our profits, challenging Ansongo’s sovereignty, and enslaving our citizens. It would seem to be a display of strength but my spies tell me the contrary. Their croplands turning into dust as their herds overgraze and their demand for iron strips the land bare. Like a lion dying from its wounds that lashes out at every passing thing. Left alone they may just as easily atrophy or regain their strength. But this an opportunity that may not come again. With one stroke, we can ensure our survival and gain control over trade with Carthage and the forest chiefdoms.”

Sarjo fully grasped why the king had called him, to legitimize his ascension from king to mansa and to provide the recorded context of why such a claim had been made. If the campaigns succeeded, he would be lofted as protective king that had conquered out of humanitarian impulses whereas if the conquest went less favorably, the king would be able to defend himself against accusations of greed and hubris from the scribes and province-masters. “What is your first charge, mansa Baturu?” The pause before the plunge, thought Sarjo. Baturu answered with a triumphant smile, “The destruction of our enemies and the liberation of our people”.
 
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Just a writer's note: This is my first piece of dialogue I've ever written so I may later revise it. If you have any suggestions for how I can improve my writing style, please let me know!
 
It reads smoothly and conveys a good sense of place, and it advances the story.

One thing, though: Musa is a Muslim name, and would be anachronistic in a classical-era empire.
 
A Brief Overview of the Nile Civilization


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180 BC – 100 AD: Egypt and the Seleucids signed a new treaty to respect their current holdings and to no longer war against each other. The new pharaoh Ankhamis is recorded to have said in private, “I have little interest in the dead empire of a rotting Greek.” His interests were directed inward. He focused on making Egypt impervious to foreign domination. To accomplish this, he maintained a relatively large standing army and navy and fortified the Sinai Peninsula, especially the entrance to the delta, the verdant heart of Egypt. While the army was large relative to the size of Egypt’s population, widespread use of Ptolemaic watermills, better irrigation practices, and the fertility of the Nile made Ankhamis’ policies feasible. The influence of the Greek aristocracy was gradually lessened by abolishing the restrictions of Egyptians from serving in the government and military.

Demotic literature underwent a renaissance as Ankhamis gave equal status to Demotic and Coptic scripts but in the cities with the highest Greek influence, Coptic remained the more prominent of the two writing systems. While worship of the native Egyptian pantheon was still the dominant religion, much of the Greek population continued to worship the gods of their homeland instead of Egyptian gods, due to Ptolemaic efforts to retain a distinct Greek population.

To secure the Levant territories under Egyptian control, Egyptians were encouraged to immigrate to the area to hopefully eventually constitute a large percentage of the local population. To the Jews of the Levant, the migration of the Egyptians and the erection of their temples in Judea looked to be to some a near reversal of the covenant between them and Yahweh. This had the effect of causing Judaism to simultaneously gain more extremist and more pagan elements to it as people searched for answers on how to reverse this invasion. Thus the Levant became one of the greatest mosaics in the Mediterranean world, with Jews, Greeks, Egyptians, and Persians all interacting and exchanging ideas on philosophy, technology, and most far reaching, religions.

The mixture of religions in the cultural mosaic of the Levant caused many “hybrid” religions to spring up that combined Judaism with the polytheism of the Greeks or Egyptians. A notable individual influenced by these cults was a simple man born to a typical Jewish family. Around 10 AD, a Jewish carpenter named Meir began to preach a new faith. Central to his belief was the idea that there were two supreme gods, not one. After a short stint in Judea, he gathered a modest following and traveled to Avaris, Egypt to continue spreading his faith.

Approximately 100 AD, the pharoah Nekure decided to mount an offensive against Meroe with the hope of acquiring strategic depth and securing its natural resources of timber. While the conquest was a failure, partially due to generals underestimating the forces needed to subdue Meroe and partially due to the famed skill of the Nubian archers, Egyptian spies made a discovery that was to have geopolitical ramifications for over 1000 years: the source of the Nile was Lake Tana in Aksum.
 
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Fascinating to see a revived Egyptian civilization complete with religion. I imagine Carthage and Egypt competing for dominance in Africa and the Mediterranean, while West Africa continues to develope.
 
Fascinating to see a revived Egyptian civilization complete with religion. I imagine Carthage and Egypt competing for dominance in Africa and the Mediterranean, while West Africa continues to develope.

I'm glad you like it! Carthage has been growing wealthy off of the trans-Saharan trade and by the first century AD, Egypt is definitely interested in where all this gold is coming from. On this time period, Sub-Saharan West Africa was a mystery to Egypt. The thing is, Carthage and Egypt might be content to stay in their respetive domains of West and east Mediterranean.
 

Deleted member 67076

Very much enjoying this. Not many timelines do an early trans saharan trade. I wonder, would Sahelian rice and Yams spread north? Theyd be quite a boom to the Mediterranean.
 
Very much enjoying this. Not many timelines do an early trans saharan trade. I wonder, would Sahelian rice and Yams spread north? Theyd be quite a boom to the Mediterranean.

I'm glad you're enjoying the timeline! I don't think yams would be of much use to the Mediterranean. They're adapted for a tropical and subtropical climate with rains from May to October and it barely rains in the summer in the Mediterranean so I don't think yam growing would be feasible there. Additionally, IIRC, yams aren't the most nutritious food source. The different growing seasons would present the same problems for African rice as well.

What I'm thinking of doing is introducing African rice to the Kongo basin at the same time bananas are introduced from the east to develop the region.
 
The Path of the Two Gods​


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“May the Father be praised! May the Mother be adored!”​
- The beginning of a traditional Aksumite psalm worshiping the gods of creation.​

20 BC - 35 AD: Meir was born to a Jewish family in the town of Nazareth around 20 B.C. during the time of Egyptian rule of the Levant. Egyptian emigrants and Persian merchants along with their gods were an established part of Meir’s world while growing up. As he matured, he learned his father’s trade of carpentry and it seemed he would lead an ordinary life. But in his early 20s, he became friends with Jahan, a Persian man and a devout follower of Zoroastrianism, and would often discuss the intricacies of their respective beliefs and meditate on this in his spare time.

When he reached 30, he began to preach of a new faith. Two gods were responsible for creating the world, one male and one female. Together they created everything and through them, everything was sustained. They each had their own domains which they had created and presided over. However they both influenced the other's domains, much as the moon influences the ocean. The Father was strongly associated with water, stars, and lightning while the Mother was connected with the earth, fire, and the moon. Everything in creation belonged in either the Father or the Mother's domains, except for the following: humans, knowledge, love, fertility, justice, and life and death. These things belonged to the Two Gods in equal measure.

Furthermore, belief in them was solely imperative for access to the afterlife, the abode of the two gods and to avoid being swept from existence. He began to travel around the province, preaching his faith and gaining a sizable following. Eventually, he traveled to Egypt after he learned of a conspiracy on his life by the local authorities and in 16 AD, settled in Avaris with a few of his followers along his friend and foremost disciple Jahan. This religion was particularly popular with the common folk and women with its promise of immortality and paradise upon death and a female goddess the equal of her male counterpart, with no “weighing of the heart” trial to undergo. Meir later died in 35 AD, and while many hybrid religions faded with their founder, by luck or by providence, this one spread within the Delta and down the Nile in the years following his death. A few of Meir's acolytes were literate in Demotic and Coptic and so were able to transcribe segments of what he preached, as well as their own thoughts and interpretation on Meir's faith in a book that eventually became known as The Tome. The Two God Path or Meirism, as it came to be called, was regarded in Egypt as merely another peasant cult, albeit one more popular and organized than others.

Followers of the Two God Path came from all walks of life and occupations which proved crucial to spreading their religion. Merchants who followed the Path established temples in Meroe and Aksum and the priests that maintained them started to win a few converts. In Aksum especially, people seemed drawn to this new faith and became enthusiastic converts, especially those of the lower class. To be under the constant protection of benevolent gods that did not care about the number of children one had was a relief to many. Eventually, the negu of Aksum, Azaba was persuaded by his wife who had converted to the Two God Path to entertain one of her favorite priests. After years of listening and in 210 AD, in an open field in the shade of the baobabs, he converted to Meirism.
 
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