This scenario probably requires a very early POD to work, maybe the initial POD is that Muslims don't conquer Iberia at all, thus already creating the geopolitical situation we see from the late 13th century 6 centuries earlier.
The idea is to have an alt-high medieval Europe colonize the Americas during the period of massive demographic growth and before any diseases or famine-caused massive decline, the Americas would be an outlet for the exploding European population.
Given the temporal distance between the POD and the goal of the scenario, I think we shouldn't focus on the specifics but rather at the broad difference that such a scenario would involve, in 1100-1200 Europeans will not find the sizeable empires of the Incas and the Aztecs(I'm not applying chaos theory, I don't find it useful here) and will probably be less centralized themselves.
So the question is how to engineer such a scenario with an early POD? Here are some ideas:
Butterflies in the Americas should largely not be considered, general trends and periods of regional American histories should be taken as they are without chaos theory and only applying butterflies were direct changes through European contact happen(doesn't have to be direct contact itself).
The idea is to have an alt-high medieval Europe colonize the Americas during the period of massive demographic growth and before any diseases or famine-caused massive decline, the Americas would be an outlet for the exploding European population.
Given the temporal distance between the POD and the goal of the scenario, I think we shouldn't focus on the specifics but rather at the broad difference that such a scenario would involve, in 1100-1200 Europeans will not find the sizeable empires of the Incas and the Aztecs(I'm not applying chaos theory, I don't find it useful here) and will probably be less centralized themselves.
So the question is how to engineer such a scenario with an early POD? Here are some ideas:
- No seriously contested European Atlantic front, meaning in a post 7th century context no Islam in Europe by the high medieval times, whether this happens by preventing the conquest or having a faster reconquest is probably not vital, but I imagine either scenario could work better than the other if considering other factors.
- Quicker development of ocean-going naval technology, sure the Norse were able to reach Newfoundland around the early 11th century, but for it to be a more reliable contact in other places through different routes we need faster development on that front.
- Strong enough interest in transatlantic colonialism, I believe this can be achieved not solely by economics, but also by other factors such as culture, politics and demographics. Maybe this can be achieved by vikings or viking-like entities taking over all of the British isles and after Christianization they keep this pioneering attitude, leading at least to the settlement of at least Northern New England and Atlantic Canada by 1200 or so.
- The spark of first contact that we saw with Columbus could a more gradual phenomenon with the Norse colonization of North America.
- In Southern Europe a Atlantic pioneering could be incited by Iberians and Italians fighting against a Maghrebi Berber and Arab islamic states and trying to circumvent transsaharan routes to West Africa(at least initially) or rather Italian, Byzantine or Arab control in West Asia and Red Sea.
- No massive steppe empire like the Mongols, without the creation of a more accessible land route to Asian markets, there is a stronger push to look westwards.
- Considering Vinland, having an already existing and sizeable European community there for centuries would incite more people to come given the better knowledge of the land and its exploitable resources.
- I'm not envisioning a stunted and slow European expansion in the Americas, it doesn't have to be like the Spanish that conquered millions of km2 and people in 80 years, at the same time I'm not looking at a limited coastal presence like in early modern Africa or a constant sludge like in 16th century North America throughout all the medieval era. The PODs clearly involves faster naval technical developments and relatively strong interest in oversea expansion, so the timeline should reflect that.
- As for diseases, I think it's commonly accepted that there is to some extent an inherent difference in immunity between most Afro-Eurasia and most of the Americas by this point in time so I believe there shouldn't be a too big of a debate there, it's also important to note that the population decline in the Americas clearly would have taken very long to recover and I hope people's timelines or concepts reflect that instead of assuming it takes a century or less for the dense regions of the Americas to regain their population, it took Europe between a century or even 2 or 3 for some regions to retake their population, it shouldn't take less for a bigger population decline. On top of that it's important to note the effective isolation of many communities in North America insofar as many diseases are concerned, the diseases shouldn't spread like wildfire in many regions, so no English immediately spreading diseases in Mesoamerica in the 13th century from landing in Virginia or something akin to that.
- If possible European settlements and colonization should be done in a decentralized fashion, this is more of a wish than a rule but I'd like to see something akin to Greek and Phoenician colonialism than OTL early modern colonialism, I believe there will be an easy time doing this in the middle ages with a different political structure, better demographic and climatic situation in most of Europe and with existing examples of Viking settlement in Iceland and Greenland and even the system of crusades in the Baltic and Levant.
- Another concept I wanted to explore is an American contact without the Europeans really involving themselves with Subsaharan Africa or Asia for centuries, how would local economies play out without transatlantic slavery from the get go(if at all), what would happen eventually when direct contact with the rest Asia and Africa actually happens centuries after settlements in the Americas and in a context where decentralized colonialism in the Americas happens, how would independent polities in the Americas play into this?
- A side question within this timeline is what would be the linguistic effects of a earlier settlement of the Americas? If we say the first settlements happen between 6(for Vinland) to 3 centuries(for most of the Atlantic Americas minus Mesoamerica and Patagonia) before OTL Columbus, how much more would the local languages diverge especially in the context of decentralized settlements?
Butterflies in the Americas should largely not be considered, general trends and periods of regional American histories should be taken as they are without chaos theory and only applying butterflies were direct changes through European contact happen(doesn't have to be direct contact itself).
