Allohistorical convergence pet peeves

Thande

Donor
Putting this in Before 1900 because it mostly involves history before then.

This is a thread in which we can bring up allohistorical convergences, such as a border which we know was arbitrarily chosen in 1840 turning up the same in a map of a timeline with a POD in 1600. Let's try to be informative rather than snarky.

I will begin with a few fairly well known ones to kick off.

1. Kazakhstan. The OTL Russo-Kazakh border was chosen by the Soviets well into the 20th century and does not actually reflect ethnic distributions all that well. It should not realistically show up in an timeline with a POD before WW1.

2. Switzerland. Despite its reputation for staying exactly the same, Switzerland in fact added several additional cantons in OTL at the Congress of Vienna in 1815. Maps with PODs before the Napoleonic Wars should bear this in mind.

3. The word "robot". This was an import into English from Czech, in which it means 'slave', due to a popular Czech science fiction play from 1921. When you think about it, this is a very unlikely circumstance that shouldn't be repeated in most timelines with a POD before that time. Therefore, terms like 'robot' or 'robotic' should be avoided in, for example, nineteenth-century steampunk timelines with mechanical marvels.

Let's hear your suggestions.
 
2. Switzerland. Despite its reputation for staying exactly the same, Switzerland in fact added several additional cantons in OTL at the Congress of Vienna in 1815. Maps with PODs before the Napoleonic Wars should bear this in mind.


It also missed out on one or two. The Swiss had claims to Mulhouse, Chablais and Valtelline and might have got one or more of them had they pushed harder in 1815. Due to internal dicisions they didn't.
 
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elder.wyrm

Banned
No matter how far back into the 19th century the PoD goes, the Wall Street Stock Market Crash and the descent into the Great Depression will always happen in October of 1929, as if the gods themselves decreed it.
 

Thande

Donor
Let's stick to allohistorical convergences here, not general AH criticism.

6. The name 'European Union'. I see this crop up far too often. 'European Union' is a fairly awkward compromise name that was instituted in OTL in 1993 due to disagreements of how federalist a united Europe should be. You often see the name used in situations where people are trying to do a Eurofederalism-wank with a politically united Europe; well, if that came about then it should use the preferred Eurofederalist name, "United States of Europe". Furthermore, a less unified version should keep the name European Economic Community or use something like European Confederation. Note that the term Western European Union to describe a defensive alliance does date from 1954, however, so the term EU could have emerged independently but only if the political situation matches the OTL balance between federalists and Eurosceptics. Certainly if you have a European project emerging from a POD before the 20th century, that is far from implausible, but ask yourself should it really have the same name as OTL's?
 

Thande

Donor
Can you define this better?

Things that should be different from accumulated butterflies due to a distant-past POD, but are left the same due to ignorance on the part of the writer. I'll use an example which most people do realise: the car. OTL, when it first came about, there were at least 20 competing names for it (think of modern USB flash drives/pens/memory sticks/whatever you call them). These were narrowed down to a few in different countries such as car and automobile but this linguistic development is obviously subject to chance. Now imagine you have a TL where, say, Napoleon dies in 1810. Someone is eventually going to invent something like the car years later as it's a natural consequence of technological progress, but it's very unlikely it will be referred to by the exact same terms we do in OTL.
 
In nearly all timelines, the Americas are a mess of either space-filling empires or a few smaller states but never a large number. They are also nine times out of ten ethnically dominated by the Old World and if there are native states in existence it is always one of these groups and never anyone else: Iriquois, Cherokee, Inca, Aztec, Maya, or Navajo. Said tribes are always treated as the only meaningful natives and all the others are either expunged or completely meaningless.

In a lot of timelines it's understandable because they have late enough POD's, but then you get ones with like POD's in Roman times and the exact same thing happens. Apparently the natives are doomed to never play a role in AH beyond ASB scenarios.
 

Thande

Donor
if there are native states in existence it is always one of these groups and never anyone else: Iriquois, Cherokee, Inca, Aztec, Maya, or Navajo. Said tribes are always treated as the only meaningful natives and all the others are either expunged or completely meaningless.
This is a good example for this thread, and obviously caused by people only knowing about the tribes that have impinged on OTL European and European-derived (e.g. US) history.

but then you get ones with like POD's in Roman times and the exact same thing happens. Apparently the natives are doomed to never play a role in AH beyond ASB scenarios.
This on the other hand is less defensible. There are very good reasons why native Americans would find it hard to fight off any kind of Old World invaders under any circumstances: disease, lack of domesticated animals & other agricultural thingummabobs, lack of metallurgy, and so on. You can however make the claim that North American Indians could have played a bigger cultural role in USA-analogue states, as in Mexico, Peru etc.
 
Let's stick to allohistorical convergences here, not general AH criticism.

6. The name 'European Union'. I see this crop up far too often. 'European Union' is a fairly awkward compromise name that was instituted in OTL in 1993 due to disagreements of how federalist a united Europe should be. You often see the name used in situations where people are trying to do a Eurofederalism-wank with a politically united Europe; well, if that came about then it should use the preferred Eurofederalist name, "United States of Europe". Furthermore, a less unified version should keep the name European Economic Community or use something like European Confederation. Note that the term Western European Union to describe a defensive alliance does date from 1954, however, so the term EU could have emerged independently but only if the political situation matches the OTL balance between federalists and Eurosceptics. Certainly if you have a European project emerging from a POD before the 20th century, that is far from implausible, but ask yourself should it really have the same name as OTL's?

In fact the name 'Union' doesnt really mean much- Is it a supranational club of countries or a very loose superstate?- but surely a USE option was never taken seriously. It just sounds very silly since we have the USA using the same name. And it wouldnt work as well in other languages. The European (Con)federation, on the other hand, is very cool.

Ahem. I think here I will complain about the attitude that if the PoD doesnt directly effect an area (say, a Roman PoD to America), no butterflies will occur until contact between the areas is established. Or is this not what you wanted us to complain about... ;)
 

Thande

Donor
Here's one I can't believe I forgot...

8. Geography is not static. Particularly noticeable with the Netherlands, as many historical maps use the modern coastline when the Dutch have constantly reclaimed land over the years. Valdemar told me the other day that the top part of Jutland in Denmark wasn't an island until 1825. The Red Sea coastline has also changed considerably since ancient times. Some large bodies of water are artificial, such as Lake Nasser in Egypt, and others have been destroyed by human activity, such as the Aral Sea in Russia.
 
An independent Quebec somehow takes the maritimes with it, or Newfoundland and Labrador - all English-speaking provinces or regions who would scream to find they're suddenly a part of La Republique du Quebec. Labrador was attached to Newfoundland in 1763, re-attached to the island in 1809, and yes, it DID claim the Goose Valley watershed for much of that time, not just the 'coasts'.

In defense of Quebec, though, seeing the Gaspee/Gaspesia peninsula made a part of some Anglophone state or province is just as infuriating. It's historically Francophone since the founding days of New France, and conveniently pushed away from Anglos and towards the St. Lawrence River (IE, Quebec City) valley via the northern tip of the Appalachians.

EDIT: Clarifying things a bit better, so I don't inadvertedly make this a generic alt-history pet peeve post...
 

Thande

Donor
but surely a USE option was never taken seriously. It just sounds very silly since we have the USA using the same name.
Not at all, it has cropped up at every European summit since before WW2. To take the most recent example, it was the original title of the 2004 European Constution before revision.

Ahem. I think here I will complain about the attitude that if the PoD doesnt directly effect an area (say, a Roman PoD to America), no butterflies will occur until contact between the areas is established. Or is this not what you wanted us to complain about... ;)
That is more of a philosophical debate relying upon whether one believes in chaos theory. This is about trackable consequences that are basically inarguable (to use my robot example above, if that Czech playwright is killed in 1918 before he can write his play in 1921, it is almost 100% certain that the word robot will never be used in English to describe a mechanical automaton).
 
Here's one I can't believe I forgot...

8. Geography is not static. Particularly noticeable with the Netherlands, as many historical maps use the modern coastline when the Dutch have constantly reclaimed land over the years. Valdemar told me the other day that the top part of Jutland in Denmark wasn't an island until 1825. The Red Sea coastline has also changed considerably since ancient times. Some large bodies of water are artificial, such as Lake Nasser in Egypt, and others have been destroyed by human activity, such as the Aral Sea in Russia.

Somewhat satirically put, from a geological perspective, this is self-explanatory. ;)

But on a more serious note, you could also add Lake Chad there (which has been fluctuating through history), as well as... if we depart from coastlines, you should also take climate changes (and no, I don't mean glawbul wahming) into account, for example the Little Ice Age and the Medieval Warm Period. Also how areas like North Africa used to be more fertile in Roman times.
 
Usually the same areas in Africa and Asia colonized by the same powers. I mean how about some originality. Like a Nordic American empire based in Quebec, Labrador, southern Onatario, Acadia minus Nova Scotia, and parts of the Old Northwest.
 
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