WI No Indoeuropean invasion?

If the indoeuropeans stay around steppes, Caspian Basin, etc.

Will they kept their own culture, at least until 100 BC? Development of religion, language, social stratification and... government. If is impossible to develop a state in the steppes at this time, they must conquer an area for capital. The location of this capital will be decisive for future development of mankind: for avoid a Persian Empire or a Greek Empire or whatever civilization like TTL, can be the Indoeuropean capital in Crimea?

How avoid cliches: punic civilization as an equivalent of TTL's roman civilization, America being colonized before TTL's Columbus by Carthage.

Without Persian Empire, how will develop Babylon and Egypt? What about the Indus Valley Culture?

Some archaeologists and linguists believe that the inhabitants of the Balkans prior to the Indo-European expansion spoke an Afro-Asiatic language (reasons: some loan words that stuck with IE languages after the expansion, the prevailing archaeological model that the first European farmers island-hopped from Anatolia through Greece into the Balkans). This suggests that, culturally and linguistically, Greece and the Balkans would be much more comparable to other states of the Near East.

Past that, it's difficult to make any guess, given that this would basically re-write the entire history of the Old World from the Bronze Age onward.

Interesting, and it is plaussible for phoenicians, and maybe carthaginians, to colonize Balkans' coastline.

About rewriting, yes, butterflies are strong in this what if.

Polish Eagle said:

Some archaeologists and linguists believe that the inhabitants of the Balkans prior to the Indo-European expansion spoke an Afro-Asiatic language (reasons: some loan words that stuck with IE languages after the expansion, the prevailing archaeological model that the first European farmers island-hopped from Anatolia through Greece into the Balkans). This suggests that, culturally and linguistically, Greece and the Balkans would be much more comparable to other states of the Near East.

Click to expand...

I can believe this. It has been apparent for some time that there are apparent Minoan/Semitic cognates in much of the known Linear A vocabulary (assuming that Linear A and Linear B share a majority of symbol/sound correspondences). For example, compare KU-NI-SU "emmer wheat" in Linear A to Akkadian kunisu "wheat", and the famous KU-RO "total" compared to Semitic kuro "the whole". Of course, in the absence of written texts it is impossible to know what languages were spoken further north in the present-day Balkans at that time, but it seems reasonable to me that proto-Semitic languages may have been brought with the first farmers when they spread across the area.

The pre-hellenic civilization can develop itself to regional power?

They stayed where they were

Myths like the drama of Gullveig, associated with the conflict between Aesir and Vanir, are quite similar to Northwest Coast Native American ceremonies. Gullveig, who is killed three times is very like the Toquid woman, who dares people to kill her, then comes back to life. The exploits of Cuchulain who is tamed only after he sees a nude female relative, are like those of the hamatsa, who is tamed only after dancing with his naked sister.
I Ibelieve that the conflict between the Aesir and the Vanir is a reflection of the contention between the Northwest Coast like Ertebolle culture and the encroaching farmer culture. In the ensuing TRB culture, the former foragers had the upper hand.
But I believe that the Indo-Europeans were not yet completed. As the TRB people expanded eastward, they came into contact with people from the steppes. The result of this contact was the formation of a people like the Metis of Canada. As the Metis resulted from westward moving French and natives of the steppes, the "other" people were formed in the same way. A regular sound change from latiin "alien" will result in "Aryan". Like many groups, they turned this derogatory name into a name of honor..
While some of these Aryans moved east, some of them moved west and contributed to the corded ware culture.
So in this scenario, there never was a single Indo-european language. The languages are mostly the result of the interaction between three groups. They are the Ertebolle foragers, whom I call the Tauta, the LBK farmers, whom I call the Danu, and the and the steppe people , who contributed to the Aryans.
This is my two cents worth.

Armot said:

If the indoeuropeans stay around steppes, Caspian Basin, etc.

Will they kept their own culture, at least until 100 BC? Development of religion, language, social stratification and... government. If is impossible to develop a state in the steppes at this time, they must conquer an area for capital. The location of this capital will be decisive for future development of mankind: for avoid a Persian Empire or a Greek Empire or whatever civilization like TTL, can be the Indoeuropean capital in Crimea?

How avoid cliches: punic civilization as an equivalent of TTL's roman civilization, America being colonized before TTL's Columbus by Carthage.

Without Persian Empire, how will develop Babylon and Egypt? What about the Indus Valley Culture?

Click to expand...

This would more or less require no horses, as even if the PIEs don't domesticate the horse, some other ethnolinguistic group will and things stay more or less the same.

So, with that said, for now let's see what we won't have:

• Hyksos, Hittites, &c..
• Chariot warfare and later, even more importantly, pastoral nomadic barbarians. Thus, Eurasian civilization could indeed end up in some ways developing quite like Mesoamerican or Andean Civilizations, with ATL forces like Araucanian-speaking groups in the Battle of the Maule perhaps replacing OTL Altaic-speaking groups.
• China as we know it. Shang China was heavily moulded by chariot warfare and obviously later steppe nomads remained a regular threat, especially when the central government was on the decline, until arguably either the Ming Dynasty and abundant firearms or even the end of Imperial China itself, as the Qing were themselves nomadic.
• Iranian Religions. And thus nothing recognizable as the Abrahamic Religions as well could reasonably be expected to exist, given the influence Zoroastrianism over Judaism and Christianity in OTL.
• Hinduism. The IVC would probably also survive and even flourish, with no real threat from not just horse-riding barbarians but furthermore less disruption in trade routes. On a related note, this of course means no caste system in India.