WI/PC: Christian Muhammad

Fed

(Not entirely sure whether this goes here, sorry)

Alright, so, as my posts in the map and flag threads kinda give out, I have a "no Islam" timeline in that other wiki (which, if you resist mild amounts of space mammals all around, you can read here) in which Muhammad's vision has him convert to Christianity of a very heretical branch, which eventually only spreads to Arabia, not beyond. However, I'm planning to write a version of it over here and, given the fact that I'm not very sure of the direction I threw the TL in I'm asking you what would be the most plausible outcome of Muhammad preaching Christianity (and btw, being assassinated and replaced by his daughter Fatimah) instead of Islam. Would Fatimah keep inside Arabia after diplomacy with the Byzantines? Or would the Arabs still go into hyper-conquest mode and crush both Byzantines and Sassanids?
 

Malta

Hmmm, I need to get back to my TL that means.

Though, given that we have a politically united Arab state I don't think they would fail to go OTL and attack both Byzantines and Sassanids. If Muhammad's doctrine is more agreeable to the Miaphysites of the Eastern East Roman Empire then they may entirely fold into them-with the exception of the Church of the East: The Nestorians, who make up most of Persian Mesopotamia.
 

Fed

King of Malta said:
Hmmm, I need to get back to my TL that means.

Though, given that we have a politically united Arab state I don't think they would fail to go OTL and attack both Byzantines and Sassanids. If Muhammad's doctrine is more agreeable to the Miaphysites of the Eastern East Roman Empire then they may entirely fold into them-with the exception of the Church of the East: The Nestorians, who make up most of Persian Mesopotamia.
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Well, I wrote them off, at least in the beginning (before the birth of an Aramaic Empire) as a sort of more independent Ghassanids; they were Christian, so they sided with the Byzantines, but they were less friendly than the actual Ghassanids, instead just kinda siding with them sometimes and then, after like 655, becoming bitter enemies.

The Nestorians in the TL also became independent, as an Aramaic empire (which eventually did become Aramaic :p), which also saved Zoroastrianism as the Shah became polarised against Christianity.
 

Malta

Fedelede said:
Well, I wrote them off, at least in the beginning (before the birth of an Aramaic Empire) as a sort of more independent Ghassanids; they were Christian, so they sided with the Byzantines, but they were less friendly than the actual Ghassanids, instead just kinda siding with them sometimes and then, after like 655, becoming bitter enemies.

The Nestorians in the TL also became independent, as an Aramaic empire (which eventually did become Aramaic :p), which also saved Zoroastrianism as the Shah became polarised against Christianity.
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Why wouldn't they invade the Persians and Byzantines?
 

Fed

King of Malta said:
Why wouldn't they invade the Persians and Byzantines?
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The Sassanids would be invaded, but Fatimah in the TL would've allied with Byzantium so to gain the Arabian areas, but then after Fatimah's death Ali actually marries Shahrbanu and sides with the Sassanids; and after a few wars and an Aramaic revolt the three are unalligned.
 
Baconheimer

Baconheimer

I really dont see why the Arabs would invade all over, although maybe they would attack "heretic states" on the borders.
 

Fed

Baconheimer said:
I really dont see why the Arabs would invade all over, although maybe they would attack "heretic states" on the borders.
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Well, I'm having them invade the Ghassanids and the Lakhmids, as well as Oman and the Sassanid Arab territories (although South Arabia will stay out of their grasp)

Wolfpaw said:
*cough*Agent of Byzantium*cough*
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...Yeah, I'm not going to wank Byzantium, nor am I going to turn this into Cold War v.600 AD.
 

Malta

Fedelede said:
Well, I'm having them invade the Ghassanids and the Lakhmids, as well as Oman and the Sassanid Arab territories (although South Arabia will stay out of their grasp)
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Technically speaking the Lakhmids had been for a while the Puppets of the Sassanids, but a dispute by Khosrau II had the Persians invade the Lakhmids and install a Persian governor. Despite the decentralization of power by Yazdegerd III's time the Persians still maintained rule over the Arabian Peninsula on the Persian Gulf, Oman, and Yemen. Only, through Mohammad's conquest of the Peninsula would the Persians be pushed out, but they had absorbed the Lakhmids and I believe the Ghassanids by this point.

Further even if the Sassanids didn't invade, but were defeated this would have been the death blow to the Sassanids, as evidenced by the fact that Yazdegerd couldn't get any help from the more Eastern Satraps. The power of the Sassanids had been unraveling ever since Khosrau II.
 

Fed

King of Malta said:
Technically speaking the Lakhmids had been for a while the Puppets of the Sassanids, but a dispute by Khosrau II had the Persians invade the Lakhmids and install a Persian governor. Despite the decentralization of power by Yazdegerd III's time the Persians still maintained rule over the Arabian Peninsula on the Persian Gulf, Oman, and Yemen. Only, through Mohammad's conquest of the Peninsula would the Persians be pushed out, but they had absorbed the Lakhmids and I believe the Ghassanids by this point.

Further even if the Sassanids didn't invade, but were defeated this would have been the death blow to the Sassanids, as evidenced by the fact that Yazdegerd couldn't get any help from the more Eastern Satraps. The power of the Sassanids had been unraveling ever since Khosrau II.
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Wait, so would thhe Sassanids collapse if they lost the Arabian territories? Weren't those raer minor in comparison to Persia and Mesopotamia?
 

Malta

Fedelede said:
Wait, so would thhe Sassanids collapse if they lost the Arabian territories? Weren't those raer minor in comparison to Persia and Mesopotamia?
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As the Arabians swept through the Sassanid's Arabian satraps the Sassanids saw and recognized the Arabs as a threat. At the time though they were in no position to confront any force on an offensive scale. The Arabians are going to take advantage of the Sassanids and take what was considered Arabistan, on the lower Tigris and Euphrates river which would lead Yazdegerd to confront them. Such a battle would likely result in a Sassanid defeat. This would speed up the breakup of the Sassanid dynasty which was already without Arab interference in the process of breaking up.
 

Fed

King of Malta said:
As the Arabians swept through the Sassanid's Arabian satraps the Sassanids saw and recognized the Arabs as a threat. At the time though they were in no position to confront any force on an offensive scale. The Arabians are going to take advantage of the Sassanids and take what was considered Arabistan, on the lower Tigris and Euphrates river which would lead Yazdegerd to confront them. Such a battle would likely result in a Sassanid defeat. This would speed up the breakup of the Sassanid dynasty which was already without Arab interference in the process of breaking up.
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What about Arabia joining in the 602-628 War, which stretches it out longer; the Sassanids are taken aback but eventually return and destroy (and are destroyed) in a battle in which both the Byzantine and Sassanid emperors are killed, and regencies in the two, weary of the war, result in an independent Assuristan? Would that lead to a Sassanid collapse or would they survive?
 

Malta

Fedelede said:
What about Arabia joining in the 602-628 War, which stretches it out longer; the Sassanids are taken aback but eventually return and destroy (and are destroyed) in a battle in which both the Byzantine and Sassanid emperors are killed, and regencies in the two, weary of the war, result in an independent Assuristan? Would that lead to a Sassanid collapse or would they survive?
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Arabians had already joined in the conflict, but not as a unified force. Mostly, against the Sassanids anyway -Ghassanids-.

The Heraclian and Sassanid dynasty positions are rather reversed. The Heraclian dynasty has much more legitimacy given it won the conflict, while the Sassanids had less so as they lost the war/had a succession of backstabbing rulers.

In my own TL the Sassanids collapse and another ones takes their place, rebuilding the Sassanids.
 

Fed

King of Malta said:
Arabians had already joined in the conflict, but not as a unified force. Mostly, against the Sassanids anyway -Ghassanids-.

The Heraclian and Sassanid dynasty positions are rather reversed. The Heraclian dynasty has much more legitimacy given it won the conflict, while the Sassanids had less so as they lost the war/had a succession of backstabbing rulers.

In my own TL the Sassanids collapse and another ones takes their place, rebuilding the Sassanids.
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Alright, so let me write up a basic timeline of the scenario and then could you please tell me what could be improved on?

Muhammad converts to Christianity around 610, and by 615, he has a large enough power base so to actually threaten the political stability of the Quaraish (at this point, it's still a lot of cut Islam, paste Christianity). So the Quaraish kill Muhammad. Khadijah succeeds Muhammad as leader of the tribe and has them flee to Yathrib (not Yathrib and Axum), which is, like OTL, renamed Medina. From there, the Quaraish in Mecca are defeated, and eventually Arabia is unified in a single empire; the Byzantines send an emissary there, hoping to ally themselves with a fellow Christian empire, but Khadijah denies. However, she dies shortly afterwards and is replaced by 'Ali, who does join in the war, and is eventually able to push the Sassanids as far back as Gombroon. However, a young Sassanid prince/Persian nobleman takes control of the weakened Persian armies and with excellent leadership he is able to retake most of the area. However, he is deposed and exiled to Tabaristan by Yazdegerd III, who takes command of the army and sends them forward, dying (with the enemy Emperor and most of both armies) in an important battle.

Noblemen in both countries seize power and negotiate a truce, in which Assuristan and a very large part of the Diocese of the East are given to a rebellious Syriac leader hailing from Palmyra.

EDIT: Alright, so if the Sassanids go, a zealously Zoroastrian House of Aspahapet will rise.
 
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Malta

Then the Byzantines will not likely let the Diocese go. Somewhere down the line the Arabs are going to expand and do out the Byzantines and Persians if they had a chance. In my opinion.
 

Fed

King of Malta said:
Then the Byzantines will not likely let the Diocese go. Somewhere down the line the Arabs are going to expand and do out the Byzantines and Persians if they had a chance. In my opinion.
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Well, it's not Antioch and Jerusalem they're losing (yet), it's more like the Mesopotamian provinces, Syria Salutaris, Arabia, Phoenicia Libanensis and Palestina Salutaris, which IMO would be lost more easily by nobles who are tired of war ("we aren't losing the most important territories of the area; Egypt and Antioch are still reasonably safe; those damnednest Persians are losing more; and I don't want to send my peasants into war!") and the new nation would become more than a worthy competitor for Arabia. And anyways, after the Aspahapetians reach power, they strengthen the Persian state.
 

lordyu

The empire will never allow these provinces go. Unless you have a Yarmuk type situation then the empire will reconquer them.
 
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