Glad I decided to check the board again, or else I might have missed this entirely. The lack of the epilogue is somewhat unfortunate, but I believe that the conclusion as it stands is perfectly satisfactory. The narrative framework does bear perhaps too much similarity to OTL (scrapped epilogue...
Neat stuff! Do I spot a bit of inspiration taken from Manichaeism as well as Islam?
It's interesting to see how Hushatru theology has already been reinterpreted among its Indo-European neophytes. While the orthodoxy holds that human beings can choose either evil or good regardless of what soul...
This is a key point you've brought up: people do things that make sense to them at the time, within the context of a pre-established worldview and events, but which do not necessarily make sense to outside observers such as ourselves, with different worldviews and (perhaps) a clearer...
Thanks for the feedback on the map! As you've no doubt put together, Southeast Asia was the most difficult part of the map to put together (not least due to my lack of expertise on the region), and I agree that changes need to be made. As an informational note, I modeled the region by working...
It strikes me as a bit odd that 200-300 year old political philosophies are relevant to university students and professors. You'd think these movements would have progressed to something intellectually equivalent to postmodernism (Postmaaternism maybe?). I suppose Whig History and classical...
Reminds me of some professors I've actually had. At least Hadjeamin didn't leave the entire thing unmarked except for "PASSED" at the bottom, or worse, lose the whole stack of essays and scramble to give everyone arbitrary grades before the deadline. Now that would have been true to life.
A very nice final chapter (excluding the epilogue, of course). You've painted a fascinating and sad picture of how the Amaloxians came to understand the uniqueness of their model in the broader world and navigated their cultural traumas. The ending is bittersweet; on the one hand, the Amaloxians...
I think you misplace the importance of muscle strength on pre-modern battlefields. It takes relatively little strength to remain in a pike square, phalanx, or similar formation, march forward, and thrust with sufficient force to injure and kill. Amaloxians could do something similar with long...
Fascinating stuff! It's difficult to peer past Khepushoping's bias and propagandizing, but I'd speculate that the "shameless and rowdy orgy" is more like a communion than anything else. The genesis of the Hushatru and their expansion also seems to have shades of a collectivist revolutionary...
I doubt that the OTL BMAC would have had a prominent Uralic/Kelteminar character, given that the Kelteminar waned and were probably overtaken by the Andronovo Culture before the BMAC took shape. Any Kelteminar remnants were probably assimilated into healthier cultures. Without the Andronovo, the...
The Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex
I had read that the Kelteminar Culture and the Pit-Comb Ware Culture might be related, and thus might both be ancestral to the Uralic peoples, but that could easily be mistaken and whatever the case, it's clear you're not taking that route. I'm still...
The Oxus and Karakum Desert are identical to the lands of the Kelteminar Culture, assuming that they still live there and haven't been driven out by migratory pressures. I'll be very curious to see where you go with this, especially if there wind up being any similarities to OTL Uralic myths in...
I'll speculate that the Amaloxians might have adopted monarchy partly due to influences from their relatives in Anatolia or the new Ameru arrivals. Nine generations seems like plenty of time for monarchical rule to cement itself and for their oligarchic traditions to be forgotten amid a flood of...