Surviving Achaemenid Persia

334 BC, at the Granicus River, the young King of Macedon Alexander is leading his cavalry troops on a daring charge into the Persian ranks. Unfortunately for him, it's a bit too daring and his force is separated from the main army and assailed from all sides as the Persians under the Greek mercenary Memnon go in for the kill. Alexander is busy fending off numerous opponents when a Persian noble named Spithridates lands a blow on Alexander's helmeted head with his axe. Stunned from the hard hit, Alexander falls to the ground and Spithridates readies to finish off the Macedonian. However, a Macedonian nobleman named Cleitus sees this and goes off to spear Spithridates and save his king. Unfortunately for him however, he's a second late and Alexander dies from a fatal case of axe-in-brain. Spithridates finds himself shish-kebabed by a vengeful Cleitus, but for the Macedonians it's already too late and they are barely able to bring Alexander's remains out of the melee before they retreat. Their bold invasion of Asia that had been in the planning since Alexander's father was king has now failed in its early stages and the Macedonian army beats a hasty retreat home to secure Greece and settle the succession issue before the Persians can take advantage of the situation.

Or at least that's one possible scenario as to how to successfully preserve the ruling Achaemenid Dynasty of the Persian Empire for the time being at least. You yourselves could debate from any other altering PoD you can think of, though preferably in the same time frame. It'd probably be best to keep it simple for now at least and focus on the repercussions of the above scenario. In any case, this particular idea felt like making itself a thread when I read it in the AH book "What If?" where one of the many scenarios takes this exact same PoD. However, I found the book's version to be extremely unsatisfactory, as was the rest of the book for that matter. The author seemingly had little concept of the butterfly effect, little imagination, and came across as rather Eurocentric, as did all the others. It started off logically enough, with a proposed Athenian rise to fill a power-vacuum in Greece, compounded by an Athens-Carthage rivalry that brought war all across the Mediterranean. Then it ended stupidly with Rome rising exactly as OTL, albeit crushing Athens more brutally, and Rome and Persia dominating the world or something.

So I decided I could crowd-source a more intuitive and intelligent batch of responses by posting this on a forum where the concept of critical thinking exists. So yeah, assuming a failed Macedonian invasion of Asia, how do you see the fortunes of the Achaemenid Empire turning out?

Well I always thought Memnon's strategy was brilliant if the Persian nobles would have listened to him-basically, a scorched earth campaign in Anatolia, while he swung around with the fleet and launched an invasion of Macedon itself. That would have really put Alexander in a bind.

But anyway, the Achaemenid empire may well fall apart. Certainly there will be civil war, Darius is far from secure on his throne.

As for Rome well, at this point aren't they beginning their coming out party in the Italian peninsula? It would be hard for the Samnites to defeat them, but not impossible.

Anyway, I've always thought an ATL where Alexander The Great fails and Alexander the Molossian succeeds splendidly in Italy (and ends up being called Alexander The Great) would be awesome.

I might be optimistic, but I don't think the situation in Persia was that bad. Even without following Memnon's original plan the Persians have dealt a crippling blow to the Macedonians before they got very far, so the state wouldn't look very weak I'd imagine. Now granted, I've heard a lot of conflicting stories about Darius III's leadership qualities, but who exactly would actually start a civil war to topple him? Bessus? Bessus seemed like more of a short-sighted opportunist than anything else.

In any case, as far as cultural repercussions go, I don't think a gigantic Hellenic army is going to come sweeping through again in the near-future, so for the time being at least OTL's Hellenistic period ain't happening. I'd think that the local cultures all across the empire would therefore last much longer, the Achaemenids were a tolerant lot. Zoroastrianism might spread more as a result, but I'd think Buddhism would have less influence, IIRC the Indo-Greeks were big patrons of that religion.

9 Fanged Hummingbird said:

I might be optimistic, but I don't think the situation in Persia was that bad. Even without following Memnon's original plan the Persians have dealt a crippling blow to the Macedonians before they got very far, so the state wouldn't look very weak I'd imagine. Now granted, I've heard a lot of conflicting stories about Darius III's leadership qualities, but who exactly would actually start a civil war to topple him? Bessus? Bessus seemed like more of a short-sighted opportunist than anything else.

In any case, as far as cultural repercussions go, I don't think a gigantic Hellenic army is going to come sweeping through again in the near-future, so for the time being at least OTL's Hellenistic period ain't happening. I'd think that the local cultures all across the empire would therefore last much longer, the Achaemenids were a tolerant lot. Zoroastrianism might spread more as a result, but I'd think Buddhism would have less influence, IIRC the Indo-Greeks were big patrons of that religion.

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Would a short sighted opportunist not be the perfect man to launch a civil war, win, and then screw everything up after the fact?

Also, even if they stay together, they are going to have serious problems with Egypt. Egypt might be able to get its independence back.

A long lasting Achemaenid Empire would probably not have gone any farther west to conquer Italy.I do think that the Achmaenids finally will pacify Greece, however. What this means is pretty revolutionary for Western culture. Greek and Zoroastrian Persian culture come together but Greek and Roman culture do not come together and the Classical West which gets butterflied away. There may still be some fusion of Greek and Roman gods since Rome has taken over Sicily, but Rome won't have the sense of taking over a particularly superior culture unless that culture is Cannanite Carthage. Look to a Roman pantheon and Imperial classicism that fuses Italian, Cannanite, Celtic (and if the Romans conquer Germania, Teutonic) elements. Instead of Jupiter-Zeus, Jupiter-Tauranis-Wotan maybe.
Rome still must fight Persia, but in places like Buda instead of Carrhae. And the Jews have a totally different history with Christianity totally butterflied away.

slydessertfox said:

Would a short sighted opportunist not be the perfect man to launch a civil war, win, and then screw everything up after the fact?

Also, even if they stay together, they are going to have serious problems with Egypt. Egypt might be able to get its independence back.

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Bessus betrayed Darius when they were on the run from Alexander, bumming it out in the boonies like bandits. Here however, Darius is the hero of the day who ended the Macedonian invasion and is still securely the king of Asia and ruling the largest known empire. Bessus meanwhile is just a satrap of Bactria, not the most important of provinces. Even if he was stupid enough to betray Darius, and I'm skeptical on that given that he didn't do so in different circumstances, I can't understand how he'd win. And even if Egypt does regain independence, I don't think that'd break the Achaemenid hold on Persia or the rest of their Asian domains. Egypt broke away before without that happening.

I actually hate to de-rail the topic a bit, but I always thought Bactria was, while not THE most important province, certainly one of the bigger and more prosperous ones. Huh, I admit surprise to learn this.

It's no Babylon, and regardless of how important it actually was I can't imagine any good explanation as to why there'd be a sudden civil war in the aftermath of a victory rather than OTL's rats jumping from a sinking ship.

Also, I think butterflies alone would kill the chances of a Roman Empire. They don't have a lot of rivals at this time for domination of the Italian peninsula, but assuming they'd still conquer Carthage and Europe seems to be jumping rather far ahead without a good base. The fact that there's still a gigantic and most likely still-unified empire dominating Asia will be very important for the future, a future where you don't have feuding Diadochi states all across the eastern Mediterranean.

Bump

Any more input? And does anyone know where I can find a good detailed history on the Achaemenid Empire? Just curious. In any case, why do people assume the Romans would come to dominate the western world as if on schedule or something given so drastic a change as no Alexandrian conquests?

Why would a surviving Achaemenid Persia butterfly away the Romans? I can still see the rise of Rome. However, its border with Persia will be on the Bosphorus, thus Rome will be centerd on Europe and NW Africa. I think Egypt will break free, and will see competition with the Persians for Arabia, leading to its earlier development. In the long run we will see a 3-way cold war between Persian west/central Asia, a european/nw Roman empire and an Egypt centered on northeast and eastern Africa.

9 Fanged Hummingbird said:

Bump

Any more input? And does anyone know where I can find a good detailed history on the Achaemenid Empire? Just curious. In any case, why do people assume the Romans would come to dominate the western world as if on schedule or something given so drastic a change as no Alexandrian conquests?

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No ideas for further working with this, but From Cyrus to Alexander by Pierre Briant is probably quite as detailed as you want.

Every time I read about the conquest of Alexander the Great I wonder how strong and stable was the Achaemenid Empire.
Defeat after defeat the Empire held out against the Macedons. I do not know too many empires which could do the same.
And most surprising was that during these defeats and losing one part of the Empire after another Darius III kept his power. In my opinion he was an outstanding politician.
If Alexander the Great is dead at the Granicus river the Empire of Darius III has a stable promising future. The Macedons would most probably squabble among themselves over the Macedon throne and the Greeks will most definitely rise against the Macedonian rule.
I guess Darius will use his gold to keep Greece disunited as the Persians usually did. So the Empire will be stable at least 50 years or so. The Greeks and the Macedonians will fight among themselves to the joy of the Persians and they will supply the mercenaries into the armies of the King of Kings.
But after 50 years or so there might be a period of instability of the Persian Empire and the Macedonians/Greeks might use this to their advantage.
I suppose that Egypt will be lost by the Achaemenid Empire and some Greeks/Macedonians will conquer it. Some Greek parts of Asia Minor might get independence or get under protection of Macedon.

IMHO the rise of Rome is inevitable and it won't be butterflied away. Somewhere in the I century B.C. the Romans would come to the Eastern Mediterranean and the clash of the Empires would become inevitable. That clash would be something like rivalry of the Seleucids and the Romans. But the Seleucids were in a disadvantage as all their centers were in the west - very close to the Romans, so very vulnerable.
But in this alternative TL all the centres, the core of the Achaemenids are far in the East, so safe and secure. And the Persian power base is much bigger than that of the Seleucids, all the Iranian East is the place where the Achaemenids could draw their strength from.
Rome would probably take Egypt, Greece, Macedon and Thrace. But Asia will be in the hands of the Persian Empire. This ATL Roman/Achaemenid confrontation will look like OTL Roman/Sassanian confrontation. That will be the rivalry of the equal opponents, cold war alternated with bursts of fierce warfare: the Romans trying to take Asia Minor and the lands up to Mesopotamia, the Persians trying to reconquer Egypt and drive the Romans away from Greece/Macedon.

Without Greece's Persian conquests it's possible that the go West instead and colonise more and more of Italy and the next big clash is Carthage vs Greece with Rome allying with one side or the other. Possibly the Carthaginians as they had very favourable relations with them before the 1st Punic War

The Achamenids were the Hegmons of the East. I am not very sure on how Rome would react to their apparent Still-A-State.

Largely, depending on who was Shahanshah the power of the Central State waxed and waned as the Achemanids had previously effective means to corral the Satrapies.

9 Fanged Hummingbird said:

Bessus betrayed Darius when they were on the run from Alexander, bumming it out in the boonies like bandits. Here however, Darius is the hero of the day who ended the Macedonian invasion and is still securely the king of Asia and ruling the largest known empire. Bessus meanwhile is just a satrap of Bactria, not the most important of provinces.

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Well if Alexander dies at the Granicus, Darius isn't really the hero of the day-Memnon and the Persian satraps in the area are more of the heros of the day. Bessus seemed capable enough to be able to possibly maintain an independent Baktria. Even Alexander had a devil of a time subduing it, and still never really managed to do so. IIRC, it was subdued by Cyrus, but Darius is no Cyrus.

Dfront21 said:

Why would a surviving Achaemenid Persia butterfly away the Romans? I can still see the rise of Rome. However, its border with Persia will be on the Bosphorus, thus Rome will be centerd on Europe and NW Africa. I think Egypt will break free, and will see competition with the Persians for Arabia, leading to its earlier development. In the long run we will see a 3-way cold war between Persian west/central Asia, a european/nw Roman empire and an Egypt centered on northeast and eastern Africa.

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The problem is the obvious overpopulation of Greece for the time (not by today's standards). They need an outlet for their excess population. Alex provided that in Asia. But if that road is closed - and any large scale migration of Greeks into Asia is going to run into Persian swords, ITTL - their best bet is westward migration, into Italy, Sicily, North Africa, and possibly even farther west into Spain. ITTL, Carthage may be screwed - it depends on how they play their cards. Properly managed, they maybe able to turn these excess Greeks into useful cannon fodder in their wars in Sicily, and Spain, or they may be overrun by a stronger Syracusae. There is the obvious question just how strong Carthage is going to become. Carthage blossomed after the fall of the Persian empire, benefiting from the emigration of the Phoenicians from Tyre, Sidon, Arad and Byblos, because the Greeks were favoured in mercantile activities and the Phoenicians lost their favoured positions in the Persian empire. ITTL, they are going to stay more in Syria, and Carthage is not going to get these people to bolster its strength.

The problem for Rome is that is is going to run into a far stronger Magna Graecia, and Pyrrhus-ish characters will find Italy (possibly, Rome) the place to show off their skills. Even against Pyrrhus, they had a fairly nasty time. Against this stronger Magna Graecia, they may come a cropper, and be a stillborn state. It depends more on Roman diplomacy. If they ally with Carthage and the other native Italians, they may be able to create a more powerful state, by crushing the Greeks of Italy, and Sicily. Otherwise, there will be a Greek empire (culturally, at least) in southern Europe and northern Africa.

9 Fanged Hummingbird said:

Bump

Any more input? And does anyone know where I can find a good detailed history on the Achaemenid Empire? Just curious. In any case, why do people assume the Romans would come to dominate the western world as if on schedule or something given so drastic a change as no Alexandrian conquests?

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An old (with some strong biases) but still excellent read is `The History of the Persian Empire' by Olmstead.

Wouldn't an obvious direction for overpopulatd Greece be north into the heart of the Balkan Peninsula into what is now Serbia and eventually Pannonia,?
It's not as if the Alexandrian Period is a Little Ice Age. And Pannonia is very fertile if the Greeks can figure out how to make a moldboard plow and a horsecollar to pull it with horses. It's not as though Greeks are failures at innovating.
Failing that, the Greeks may need to do what the Caananite Phonecians did when they found themselves hemmed in in a similar fashion a few centuries earlier--colonize overseas. In this case places as diverse as southern Mauretania and the Canary Islands and Hibernia or maybe Galicia. or Luisitania. All of these places are well within range of Greek ships if the Greeks are porcupined away from Italia, Carthage, Epirus, the Black Sea and the east side of Iberia. The Greeks will simply have to seek the line of least resistance for expansion. Where might that be ITTL?

katchen said:

Wouldn't an obvious direction for overpopulatd Greece be north into the heart of the Balkan Peninsula into what is now Serbia and eventually Pannonia,?
It's not as if the Alexandrian Period is a Little Ice Age. And Pannonia is very fertile if the Greeks can figure out how to make a moldboard plow and a horsecollar to pull it with horses. It's not as though Greeks are failures at innovating.

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The Greeks tended to favour the Mediterranean climate. The kind of crops to be grown (and practices required for them) farther north were not the ones favoured by the Greeks. Even in Asia, the Greeks mostly settled down in Asia Minor and Syria (both regions exhibiting the Mediterranean climate) rather than farther inland in Mesopotamia, Armenia or farther east). Sure, there were Greek rulers and nobles in the other regions, but the Greek peasant backbone did not exist in those regions. Consequently, the region likely to receive the most Greeks are the cities of southern Italy.

Failing that, the Greeks may need to do what the Caananite Phonecians did when they found themselves hemmed in in a similar fashion a few centuries earlier--colonize overseas. In this case places as diverse as southern Mauretania and the Canary Islands and Hibernia or maybe Galicia. or Luisitania. All of these places are well within range of Greek ships if the Greeks are porcupined away from Italia, Carthage, Epirus, the Black Sea and the east side of Iberia.

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There is a problem with this. The Carthaginians tended to be extremely proprietary when it came to the sea west of the Sicily. It was Carthaginian practice to bar the route to everyone (they did not want anyone to take away their trade), and there was a permanent Carthaginian watch post (and fort) at the straits of Gibraltar. They could and would block the Greeks from sailing west. The only way the Greeks could colonise these regions would be if the colonisation attempts were funded by some naval power that escorted the colonists (Athens? The cities of Magna Graecia on the Italian mainland? Syracusae?)

The Greeks will simply have to seek the line of least resistance for expansion. Where might that be ITTL?

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Not sure, but how about the shores of the Black sea? Crimea was already known and there were minor Greek colonies there. Can we expect to see a Greek southern Ukraine, or on the Bulgarian/Romanian coast around the Danube delta? Or maybe even farther east near the mouths of the Don, or Dneister, or the Dneiper?

An interesting premise. Magna Graecia becomes Magna Graecia in fact. The dominant power within Greece shifts from Athens to say, Syracuse or Crotona. And Magna Graecia calls the shots on colonization of the Euxine Sea as an early day Venice.
The only problem the Greeks would have would be coexisting with the Sarmatians--who would also be their customers and trading partners.
This has definite possibilities in a big way. I could easily see a Venice or a Ravenna developing in the easily defended Danube Delta. Other cities where we could see well defended Venice type entrepots would be Tanais (Don Delta) and Phasis (Colchis marshes). Maybe even something similar on the Volga Delta.
It would be interesting to see if the Greeks can graduate from Mediteranean-Euxine galley commerce to European river commerce. So many of Europe's great rivers flow into the Black Sea. The Danube flows all the way to Germania and one can easily portage from the Danube to the Oder, thereby reaching the Baltic. Then there's the Brystheneys (Dneipr) from which one can also reach the Baltic. And the Don from which one can portage to the Volga from which one can reach the fur bearing regions of the North, again the Baltic, the White Sea of Bjarmia and even portage low mountains east of which there are rivers from which one can reach east to near the lands of silk. Lots of possibilities. How many of them can the Euxine Greeks realize?