Cool Map, what base did you use? cos that looks quite nice. I have been trying for a similar effect but my maps are always to big bitwise to post
Map Thread VI
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Cool Map, what base did you use? cos that looks quite nice. I have been trying for a similar effect but my maps are always to big bitwise to post
Faeelin
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You're asking why the world's strongest nation ends up weaker than OTL most of the time?
Thanks! I used the satellite image here. I'm unsure of the filesize limit for imageshack.us, which I used for this map (which is 4.3MB), but Deviantart allows submissions of up to 30MB, and seems to be the favoured medium for some of the more in-depth mapmakers here.
Indeed
The LMDM German Republic has very little in common with the OTL German Empire>Republic, being more an analogue of the OTL French Republic. As its subdivisions suggest (or would suggest if I didn't have a compulsion to cover them up with annotations) it's a direct descendent of the HRE, and has historically been dominated by Bohemia. In terms of national culture they're similar to the colonial Dutch, with a soupçon of Revolutionary French Rationalism. Prussian militarism doesn't get a look in, which significantly alters their outlook.
It's because, despite the wet-dreams of many fat Ameriteens, America was very lucky to gain as much territory as it did IOTL.
It's because, despite the wet-dreams of many fat Ameriteens, America was very lucky to gain as much territory as it did IOTL.
The USA was very "lucky" to exist in the first place. That whole nation's history is built on a long string of unusual affairs and events. Though I suppose the same could be said about most other nations as well, but USA really stands out.
Cornwall does not equal Devon. Just so were clear, and you aren't forewarned about the horde of angry British members about to descend. Very nice map though. Pretty.
Another first-rate map, to be sure. But I note you still haven't explained Scottish colonial success: perhaps English refugees provide some more manpower, but the Scots hardly have the resources to protect settlers from the Spanish colossus or from the French, if they decide to move into N. America beyond the arctic bits they seem to have obtained. And although the Gaelic names are nice, hadn't lowland Scots (a Germanic language) become dominant by the mid-15th century time of the POD? That extra English manpower wouldn't be speaking Gaelic, either.
Sorry if I offend...
Bruce
PS-when and how did Mexico/Mecica become independent?
Very nice! Is that your own basemap? Someone mentioned when I posted something similar on the Blank Map Thread that there was already a Ptolemy-style ancient world base, but I was never able to find it. Are the 'New Lands' the Americas? 'Israel in exile' (
No, it is the Great Southern Continent AKA Terra Incognita AKA Terra Australis, often proposed as a necessary counterbalance to the northern continents, in speculations going back to Plato. As far as I know, a continent _west_ of the known world wasn't something anyone was thinking of at the time. Not my basemap, just something I found online, and a bitch it was to color with basic paint.
(If it was a _Celtic_ universe, Hy-Brasil would indeed be an Island.
)Bruce
Another first-rate map, to be sure. But I note you still haven't explained Scottish colonial success: perhaps English refugees provide some more manpower, but the Scots hardly have the resources to protect settlers from the Spanish colossus or from the French, if they decide to move into N. America beyond the arctic bits they seem to have obtained. And although the Gaelic names are nice, hadn't lowland Scots (a Germanic language) become dominant by the mid-15th century time of the POD? That extra English manpower wouldn't be speaking Gaelic, either.
Sorry if I offend...
Bruce
PS-when and how did Mexico/Mecica become independent?
Thanks - The Empire of Meçica was detached from the rest of the Spanish Empire as part of the peace that allowed Spain to absorb Portugal. It's currently under an Oldemburgo cadet branch and has historically been in close alliance with Spain, though it is fiercely defensive of its integrity (which makes it a convenient buffer against Spanish northward expansion).
Scotland's colonial ventures begin during the Union of the Scottish and English Crowns, but mostly succeed due to the fact that it is the only country in the game at the time. Spanish attention is focused southwards on the still-extant Inca Empire, whilst the French have their hands full in Europe. Terra-Neuve was a possession of the English crown, taken by the Lancastrians when they surrendered their claim to the island throne, and the Company lands exist only by New Scottish sufferance.
The Gaelic naming was a little fanciful on my part: the premise of the TL requires English to be eradicated, so I've had to assume a 'Ghaedlig' revival, which might make more sense if it were confined to place names in New Scotland (similar to the Latin and Greek pretensions of the OTL American colonists). I didn't necessarily envisage the English refugees as the American colonists, merely as generating wealth and potentially starting a demographic boom.
There is no White Ship Disaster in 1120. William Adelin ascends the English throne as William III. Geoffrey Plantagenet marries Bertha, Duchess of Brittany. As OTL Eleanor of Aquitaine's first marriage to Louis VII is without issue, and in 1150 she takes Frederick Barbarossa for her husband
This idea is so interesting that it would be worth a TL!
SRegan,
Totally awesome killer map. Just one nit though, the claims lines you have drawn over Antarctica should be straight lines, the north-south running lines should be vertical, and the east-west running lines should be horizontal straight lines on that map projection. The way you have them drawn ruins what should be a major awesome map, just my two cents as an experienced cartographer. BTW, I love the use of a satellite image of the world for a base map, as well as showing internal divisions, albiet unlabelled.
Totally awesome killer map.
Just one nit though, the claims lines you have drawn over Antarctica should be straight lines, the north-south running lines should be vertical, and the east-west running lines should be horizontal straight lines on that map projection. The way you have them drawn ruins what should be a major awesome map, just my two cents as an experienced cartographer. BTW, I love the use of a satellite image of the world for a base map, as well as showing internal divisions, albiet unlabelled.I am doing some research for one, though I don't know quite how far the idea will go yet.This idea is so interesting that it would be worth a TL!
SRegan,
Totally awesome killer map. Just one nit though, the claims lines you have drawn over Antarctica should be straight lines, the north-south running lines should be vertical, and the east-west running lines should be horizontal straight lines on that map projection. The way you have them drawn ruins what should be a major awesome map, just my two cents as an experienced cartographer. BTW, I love the use of a satellite image of the world for a base map, as well as showing internal divisions, albiet unlabelled.
Totally awesome killer map.
Just one nit though, the claims lines you have drawn over Antarctica should be straight lines, the north-south running lines should be vertical, and the east-west running lines should be horizontal straight lines on that map projection. The way you have them drawn ruins what should be a major awesome map, just my two cents as an experienced cartographer. BTW, I love the use of a satellite image of the world for a base map, as well as showing internal divisions, albiet unlabelled.Another Alternate History Travel Guides world...
Toyotomi Japan – in this world the Japanese converted to Catholicism (sorta) and allied with the Spanish Habsburgs (the Japanese insistence on their Emperor’s descent from the House of David is politely overlooked by the Spaniards).
The Japanese-Spanish alliance has lasted until today, and the Japanese have expanded their own Empire, although they have failed to conquer China (they kinda jumped the gun on invading before they had enough of a technological and organizational edge) – they controlled most of the country at one time, but nowadays are confined to Manchuria, (which they took before it filled up with Chinese) Korea and Eastern Siberia, the Pacific Northwest of America, and various other parts of Asia and even Africa.
The Habsburg-Japanese alliance is increasingly feeble: the Japanese have too many resources tied up in opposing the Chinese to give much help to the Spanish in fending off the French and holding together their vast possessions.
The Habsburg alliance crushed the Dutch and later the British Republic, but were unable to finish off the French, and in the end the French-Prussian-Russian alliance drove the Austrian Habsburgs from Central Europe in the early 19th century. Nowadays the Habsburgs only hold Iberia and Italy in Europe, Belgium being French, the Netherlands in the “Prussian Sphere of Influence”, and Austria is held by a Bavarian dynasty.
Theoretically, they still hold most of the Americas, but in reality the difficulties of maintaining control of an area several times as populous and many time larger than their European holdings has forced the Crown to grant much authority to local nobility and to branches of the royal family planted here and there in the Americas. In South America, their authority is almost as weak as that of the old Holy Roman Emperors: their authority is stronger in North America and the Caribbean, where fear of France helps keep the local ruling classes loyal to the crown. Hungary is ruled by another branch of the Bourbon dynasty, and Switzerland was broken up for parts a while back: Britain has been Protestant, and then Catholic, and then Protestant again: what with a couple centuries of religious warfare and frequent French or Spanish meddling, it’s a minor – and rather xenophobic – power nowadays.
It is a multi-polar world: aside from the Habsburg-Japanese alliance and the French and their Prussian allies there is the Empire of China, and Russia has largely disassociated itself from the French-Prussian alliance after it ceased to have any borders with the Habsburgs. It instead turned south, eventually driving the Ottomans from the Balkans, but overreached itself when it moved into Persia and Arabia. In the mid-20th century Russia was repelled from the Middle East by a new unifying Islamic “purification” movement arising in Iran (which, after pushing out the Russians, promptly split into Egyptian and Iranian branches, and spends rather more time trying to conquer the other and establish orthodoxy than in trying to push the Russians out of Central Asia or over the Caucuses).
Technology is late 19th century, physics are still stuck in Aether, there are telegraphs but no radio, steamships and locomotives but no airplanes (although some crazy Prussian has devised the rocket-powered kite, which as is dangerous as it sounds), and Evolutionary theory has only reluctantly been allowed to be taught in French colleges, and suppressed entirely in the Spanish realms. If Japan is Catholic and a bit Hispanicized, Spain is slightly nipponicized, having picked up some Japanese practices as to government organization, ritual pageantry, and farming (not to mention you can get decent sushi in Mexico city).
Spain is still an absolute monarchy (if a very bureaucratic one), while in France government officials and the Church have been stealing power from the monarchy since the days of Richelieu (Louis “sun king” XIV was butterflied away). Nowadays the King is largely for show: France is effectively run by a three-way alliance between the rich (noble or not noble: there is little different, since rich commoners generally buy patents of nobility anyway), the Church (the French Church broke away from Rome in the 18th century, after an annoying succession of German and Spanish popes) and the immense unelected bureaucracy.
Bruce
Toyotomi Japan – in this world the Japanese converted to Catholicism (sorta) and allied with the Spanish Habsburgs (the Japanese insistence on their Emperor’s descent from the House of David is politely overlooked by the Spaniards).
The Japanese-Spanish alliance has lasted until today, and the Japanese have expanded their own Empire, although they have failed to conquer China (they kinda jumped the gun on invading before they had enough of a technological and organizational edge) – they controlled most of the country at one time, but nowadays are confined to Manchuria, (which they took before it filled up with Chinese) Korea and Eastern Siberia, the Pacific Northwest of America, and various other parts of Asia and even Africa.
The Habsburg-Japanese alliance is increasingly feeble: the Japanese have too many resources tied up in opposing the Chinese to give much help to the Spanish in fending off the French and holding together their vast possessions.
The Habsburg alliance crushed the Dutch and later the British Republic, but were unable to finish off the French, and in the end the French-Prussian-Russian alliance drove the Austrian Habsburgs from Central Europe in the early 19th century. Nowadays the Habsburgs only hold Iberia and Italy in Europe, Belgium being French, the Netherlands in the “Prussian Sphere of Influence”, and Austria is held by a Bavarian dynasty.
Theoretically, they still hold most of the Americas, but in reality the difficulties of maintaining control of an area several times as populous and many time larger than their European holdings has forced the Crown to grant much authority to local nobility and to branches of the royal family planted here and there in the Americas. In South America, their authority is almost as weak as that of the old Holy Roman Emperors: their authority is stronger in North America and the Caribbean, where fear of France helps keep the local ruling classes loyal to the crown. Hungary is ruled by another branch of the Bourbon dynasty, and Switzerland was broken up for parts a while back: Britain has been Protestant, and then Catholic, and then Protestant again: what with a couple centuries of religious warfare and frequent French or Spanish meddling, it’s a minor – and rather xenophobic – power nowadays.
It is a multi-polar world: aside from the Habsburg-Japanese alliance and the French and their Prussian allies there is the Empire of China, and Russia has largely disassociated itself from the French-Prussian alliance after it ceased to have any borders with the Habsburgs. It instead turned south, eventually driving the Ottomans from the Balkans, but overreached itself when it moved into Persia and Arabia. In the mid-20th century Russia was repelled from the Middle East by a new unifying Islamic “purification” movement arising in Iran (which, after pushing out the Russians, promptly split into Egyptian and Iranian branches, and spends rather more time trying to conquer the other and establish orthodoxy than in trying to push the Russians out of Central Asia or over the Caucuses).
Technology is late 19th century, physics are still stuck in Aether, there are telegraphs but no radio, steamships and locomotives but no airplanes (although some crazy Prussian has devised the rocket-powered kite, which as is dangerous as it sounds), and Evolutionary theory has only reluctantly been allowed to be taught in French colleges, and suppressed entirely in the Spanish realms. If Japan is Catholic and a bit Hispanicized, Spain is slightly nipponicized, having picked up some Japanese practices as to government organization, ritual pageantry, and farming (not to mention you can get decent sushi in Mexico city).
Spain is still an absolute monarchy (if a very bureaucratic one), while in France government officials and the Church have been stealing power from the monarchy since the days of Richelieu (Louis “sun king” XIV was butterflied away). Nowadays the King is largely for show: France is effectively run by a three-way alliance between the rich (noble or not noble: there is little different, since rich commoners generally buy patents of nobility anyway), the Church (the French Church broke away from Rome in the 18th century, after an annoying succession of German and Spanish popes) and the immense unelected bureaucracy.
Bruce
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