AHC/WI: African Romance Survived

What if the Mauro-Roman Kingdom never fell and the Berbers eventually developed a Romance language with heavy Berber admixture not do dissimilar from French or even Romanian? What sound changes could be predicted to happen from sound changes already known to have happened?
 
If the muslim invasions go like OTL but the berbers manage to remain culturally independent, al-andalus will be radically different (as sustained contact with the berber world was a large part of its survival). after the umayyad era it probably becomes more latin than arabic in nature, which would make the reconquista of spain (if it even happens) either very easy or very complex.

the trade between west africa and the berber kingdoms might be extended to other Mediterranean latin nations as well, and if they remain christian then catholisicm might become the popular religion in ghana, and later mali and songhai as islam did OTL. if both of these happen and the reconquista goes as in OTL, then the colonial age will basically be even more of a catholic-wank (having not two, but four catholic powers extremely close to the americas - the portoguese, the spaniards, the berbers and the west africans)

in addition, the modern world will probably see these latin states as a part of 'the west' - especially if they're not muslim. in fact, the definition of 'Europe' might even stretch to include the northwest of Africa if these berber states remain a part of european affairs into the modern era (and considering their likeliness to become colonial powers like Spain and Portugal, they probably will)
 
What if the Mauro-Roman Kingdom never fell and the Berbers eventually developed a Romance language with heavy Berber admixture not do dissimilar from French or even Romanian?
I think there's three distinct features to be discussed there.
1) The emergence of a distinct Africano-Romance speech : while Vulgar Latin did survived long enough (up to the XIIth century), it's virtually unknown as Latin remained the administrative language up to the Arab conquest andit might have recieved a fair lot of other Romance influence in its latter stages (maybe as Dalmatian with Italian).

2) Its differences with the greater Romance ensemble : giving we don't know really anything about African language, we can't make a comparison with the whole ensemble. However, we can assume that, loanwoards in Berber being to the accusative, that AR knew a similar evolution on Vulgar Latin (reduction of cases and accusative/oblique case being the dominating one at the expense of nominative/subject case).

Some descriptions seems to indicate that, phonologically at least, African Romance might have been close enough to Sardinian : if we admit it was the case, Africano-Romance might be tied to a Southern Romance ensemble.

3) Barbarian influence on Africano-Romance : French is essentially a Vulgar Latin evolution with few loanwords from Germanic and non-Romance speeches. The same goes for essentially all Gallo-/Occitano-/Ibero-/Italo- Romance language; Rumanian being its own case due to being heavily re-romanized (while always being a Romance language, of course) in the XIXth.
But we know that Latin and Vulgar Latin in Africa were fairly limited in use compared to other western Romania's region : St. Augustine had to get an interpret to be understood from a good part of his flock, which spoke either a neo-Punic speech or Berber speech. While the coastal presence of Vulgar Latin is unmistakable, its administrative/instititutional presence even less, you might have a Berber adstratum on Africano-Romance more comparable to what Slavic influence was to Rumanian, than Germanic to French, at least in some features.


What sound changes could be predicted to happen from sound changes already known to have happened?
Frankly, we virtually don't know anything about Africano-Romance except it probably existed as a distinct language. It apparently knew similar evolution from Vulgar Latin, and it might have been close enough to Sardinian.
It makes any prediction pretty much impossible, except in the broader sense that it would have been close and tied enough with other Romance ensemble to possibly not diverge too much while having a possibly important influence from non-Romance speeches.
 
If the muslim invasions go like OTL
I think that the emergence of a romanized Berber state, probably existing along similar structural lines as most Barbarian kingdoms in the West (that is, essentially inheriting late Roman features) would imply a lot of butterflies : it doesn't mean Islam doesn't have to rise as IOTL, but the conditions of its expension over eastern Romania at the least pretty much is (would it be only because it butterfly Heraclius)

but the berbers manage to remain culturally independent al-andalus will be radically different (as sustained contact with the berber world was a large part of its survival).
Arabo-Andalusian relationship with Berbers is...complex at best. You're entierely right to underline that al-Andalus relied on Berber mercenariship and conscription to survive militarily (altough it was true enough from Saqaliba and Christian enlistement), until the XIIth, you had a particularily important social differenciation.
While Andalusian Berbers (which was not really the case of African Berbers, at least up to the XIIIth century who remained culturally distinct IOTL) were strongly Arabized (and while you did had a fresh Berber immigrations popping up regularily), they were systematically put under the thumb of an Arab-dominated elite which really stressed their arabity against both muladi and Berbers.

Note that with a Berber state in Northern Africa, there wouldn't be much chances (it would actually be particularily implausible) of an Arabo-Berber conquest of Maghrib and Andalus.

after the umayyad era it probably becomes more latin than arabic in nature
Latin was heavily declining in use since the middle of the IXth century, with a wave of arabization amongst Mozarabs. Even the neo-Mozarab migrations (Christians from the North settling in numbers in al-Andalus) did nothing on this regard.
 
Vulgar Latin in the African provinces was certainly developing in an interesting direction, although I think the African Romance of Carthage would be rather separate from the African Romance of Tingis. We can guess it was similar to Sardinian, and perhaps also the Latin of Sicily before the Arabs arrived.

From what we can see, the Punic language played an important role in the development of African Romance languages, since it seems to form a substrate in the Vulgar Latin of North Africa. But I wonder how far things might go in the direction of local languages. It would be interesting to see a Romance language with the broken plurals and other distinctive traits of Afroasiatic languages like Punic or the Berber languages.

Frankly, we virtually don't know anything about Africano-Romance except it probably existed as a distinct language. It apparently knew similar evolution from Vulgar Latin, and it might have been close enough to Sardinian.
It makes any prediction pretty much impossible, except in the broader sense that it would have been close and tied enough with other Romance ensemble to possibly not diverge too much while having a possibly important influence from non-Romance speeches.

But if we took 4th-6th century Vulgar Latin inscriptions, epigraphy, etc. from Gaul, Hispania, etc., would we be able to guess the development of the Romance languages of those regions, as we might from 4th-6th century Vulgar Latin in North Africa?
 
although I think the African Romance of Carthage would be rather separate from the African Romance of Tingis.
I think that's quite speculative to be honest : we don't know anything about Romance speeches in Mauretania, or even if they really emerged to begin with.
Now, without having much to support it, I'd rather think that if Romance speech was to root itself in coastal Mauretania, it'd be closer to Hispano-Romance speeches giving the social-cultural proximity with Betica.

We can guess it was similar to Sardinian, and perhaps also the Latin of Sicily before the Arabs arrived.
While there is a known proximity with Sardinian phonology, and maybe Hispano-Romance phonology, I didn't saw Italo-Romance being mentioned.I was under the impression that the thin knowledge we have about it would make Afro-Romance more of a south/western Romance language, but I might miss something there : what does make you think about a possible connection to Italo-Romance?

But I wonder how far things might go in the direction of local languages.
They were certainly more present, (Both neo-Punic and Berber) in African provincial culture than their counterpart in western Romania (Gaulish influence is not even superficial, and Germanic influence is mostly phonologic and vocabulary based in Gallo-Romance for instance). I'd expect Berber, in the case of a Berbero-Roman ensemble pulling a Merovingian in the VIth, to at least play the role of Germanic speeches in Gallo-Romance, with the distinction having another important language being spoken already in the region (and likely survived as Afro-Romance until the XIth to XIIth centuries). Now I agree that Neo-Punic might disappear earlier ITTL due to being itself importantly Berberized in Late Antiquity, but that would reinforce Berber influence IMO.

But if we took 4th-6th century Vulgar Latin inscriptions, epigraphy, etc. from Gaul, Hispania, etc., would we be able to guess the development of the Romance languages of those regions, as we might from 4th-6th century Vulgar Latin in North Africa?
There's no much vulgar Latin written sources tough : Merovingian Latin (as a form of Late Latin) for instance is more a decomposition of classical Latin rules than representative of the evolution of common speach (for exemple, Merovingian Latin uses variant of classical cases essentially as a decorative tool, while Vulgar Latin does reduce and systematise them).
Most of what we know of Vulgar Latin forms comes from partial epigraphy since the beggining of the millenium, sources written in classical Latin, some features of Late Latin and reconstruction from early distinguished romance languages (such as in the Oaths of Strasbourg).
What we know of Vulgar Latin at this point doesn't really help highlight the regional differenciations, because all speeches went trough the same development altough with various result depending of ad/sub-strates and contingential events. If you're interested this site provides with a lot of information.

Now, you're right that we can deduce something of African Late Latin trough Spanish sources, for exemple.
I don't agree with the author that Africano-Romance had such a marking influence into the making of Ibero-Romance phonology, but African Latin certainly did had an enormous prestige in Spain, as well as an Afro-Romance adstratum. Still, the comparison with Sardinian might be more fructuous at this point.
Eventually, for what matter Afro-Romance, we even have less exemples than usual, due to scaracity of aformentioned sources, a more important connection to late classical Latinity, etc. and the more important survivance of non-Romance speeches in Africa (and their possible substratic or adstratic influence on Africano-Romance) make it a bit distinct there.
 
What factors influences or determines why a specific dialect to share some important characteristics with some but not other dialectal groups? For example why would African Romance of the province of Africa evolve more like Ibero-Romance rather than Peninsular Italian?
 
What factors influences or determines why a specific dialect to share some important characteristics with some but not other dialectal groups?
Pretty much everything that ties two regions and not a third : common/similar administrations (meaning more chances of common script and uses), more exchanges (meaning populations being used to understand and borrow from each other), self-identity, etc.
Then dialectal fragmentations comes often from the contrary, then became closer due to aformentioned factors in a complex and dynamic change.

Of course linguistic elements factors a lot in this development, in this case adstratum and substratum, but institutional-social factors can be decisive on the long run (such as the end of a common polity in western Romania provoking a socio-cultural regionalisation including linguistically).

For example why would African Romance of the province of Africa evolve more like Ibero-Romance rather than Peninsular Italian?
More ties with Spain than Italy, would it be culturally. Note that the mentioned article doesn't argue that Afro-Romance was closer to Ibero-Romance as such, but had possibly an influence on its development.
 
Wasn't Punic still heavily in use? Could we possibly have a slightly silly system where a Afro-Roman state in North Africa espouses to the ideals and legacy of Rome but also maintains it's "Carthaginian" roots? The best of Hannibal and Scipio, if you will?
 
Wasn't Punic still heavily in use? Could we possibly have a slightly silly system where a Afro-Roman state in North Africa espouses to the ideals and legacy of Rome but also maintains it's "Carthaginian" roots? The best of Hannibal and Scipio, if you will?
I don't think Punic was heavily used by the time of the collapse.
 
I don't think Punic was heavily used by the time of the collapse.
According to wiki the last known testimony of Punic as a living language was by Augustine of Hippo, who died in 430 AD. I think the language evolved to Neo-Punic by the 200s BC (mostly script changes), and then evolved to Latino-Punic, written in the Latin alphabet, but all of the spellings favored the Northwest African pronunciation. There's something like in seventy recovered texts recorded in Latino-Punic, apparently.
 
According to wiki the last known testimony of Punic as a living language was by Augustine of Hippo, who died in 430 AD. I think the language evolved to Neo-Punic by the 200s BC (mostly script changes), and then evolved to Latino-Punic, written in the Latin alphabet, but all of the spellings favored the Northwest African pronunciation. There's something like in seventy recovered texts recorded in Latino-Punic, apparently.
Well you can see that by the 5th century the language was moribund basically.
 
I have read that if we butterfly Islam then a strong North African romance language is pretty inevitable outside some black swan events to strengthen Berber.

I've also read that any change in North Africa to allow them to resist the Islamic conquest needs to be so far back that Islam is butterflied. In other words the POD is before Mohammed is born. Less convinced on that. On that I'm not convinced.

I do believe though that a romance North Africa that remains Christian would be so linked to Europe that it would be a completely different relationship than we feel today where there is this hard cultural line.
 
What about the early and sudden death of one of the early caliphs? If Umar died suddenly during the invasion of Armenia, whether it be due to a wound suffered in combat, assassination by a rival or some illness, without having the time to name a successor, could they not suffer a civil war similar to what happened after Uthman's death while Byzantium and Persia are still in a position to retake some if not all of the lands they had lost?
 
Well you can see that by the 5th century the language was moribund basically.
There were neo-punic speakers by the VIIth century ; it was certainly in strong decline before this, but calling it moribund? I think it's not a given. It's even possible that some speakers still used it by the XIth century, which would mean Punic surviving almost as long as Mozarabic speeches.
Arguably, Neo-Punic of Ifriqiya (which was written in punic script relatively late) seems to have been stronger than the rest of North Africa.

II've also read that any change in North Africa to allow them to resist the Islamic conquest needs to be so far back that Islam is butterflied. In other words the POD is before Mohammed is born. Less convinced on that. On that I'm not convinced.
It's not as much the PoD is remote, that the appearance of a Berber-Romance ensemble or state is implying a very different ERE geostrategy in the early VIth century, different focus that the more obvious cause would be about what happen in Near and Middle-East. Furthermore, no Byzantine Africa means no Heraclius and some events in the VIIth. A quite different ERE would have significant chances to butterfly Islam, or rather butterfly significant things about it including its expansion over Romania.
 
I do really think that after Islamic sustained conquest, the long term survival of African Romance is very unlikely--even Coptic hardly survived as all, and only liturgically. But I don't think that the entrance of Islam doesn't guarantee conquest of North Africa. The invasion can go poorly, or the nomadic people can reject Islam or eject the conqueror, or the conquest can be spread thinly, being so far from the Arab power base, that the Islamic veneer is shaken off in a time of political turmoil and never restored. The conquest of Egypt could've gone a lot worse, or the Arab conquests in the East could've been more fruitful into India--there are a lot of factors that could direct Arab attention elsewhere. Africa is the low hanging fruit, but there just as many other opportunities closer to home for the Arabs.
 
I do believe though that a romance North Africa that remains Christian would be so linked to Europe that it would be a completely different relationship than we feel today where there is this hard cultural line.

Yes, North Africa would probably be part of the “West” and the Sahara would be the big barrier instead of the Mediterranean.
 
What about the early and sudden death of one of the early caliphs? If Umar died suddenly during the invasion of Armenia, whether it be due to a wound suffered in combat, assassination by a rival or some illness, without having the time to name a successor, could they not suffer a civil war similar to what happened after Uthman's death while Byzantium and Persia are still in a position to retake some if not all of the lands they had lost?
Personally I believe that if Dihya never used her scorch earth tactics, she would have still won since IRL she lost the loyalty of urban populations. Also this is most likely a myth but if its true, don't adopt the Arab general as your son.
 
Also any insight on how Greek would affect African Romance as the Greeks had heavy involvement in Africa though up until Heraclius, their court language was latin.
 
Also any insight on how Greek would affect African Romance as the Greeks had heavy involvement in Africa though up until Heraclius, their court language was latin.
I don't think there was much influence from Greek in Afro-Romance, possibly even less than Italo-Romance, arguably safe scholar vocabulary.
 
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