alternatehistory.com

I've been mulling over an idea in my head, and I just thought I'd share it. I have no intent to really take it further, but here goes:

Would it be possible for a steppe group, maybe the Avars or the Chionites, which had come into contact with religions like Manichaeism and Christianity, to fashion their own "Islam" like steppe religion, and then through that religion unify a larger social group (akin to an ummah) and conquer a vast swathe of central Europe starting with the Pannonian basin?

I was thinking maybe the Chionites (Red Huns) or Avars find themselves pushed East onto the Pontic Steppe, where they come into contact with Armenian missionaries from time to time. Eventually, around the time the Celestial Turks are rising in strength, a tribal leader goes off and has a revelation about the true way to worship, and from there everything gets thrown into chaos. As this new steppe religious community flees the rising power of the Turks, they bring their religion to the Slavs and central Europe.

I've got no idea what this religion would look like, either. I assume that a lot of it would just be trying to adapt Christianity the context of say, Avar culture, but would that then make it unappealing outside of a limited context? Perhaps the religion might have a large fundamentally oral component, drawing on the folklore of central asia.

[I'm only procrastinating a little on the next "White Huns" update. Promise.]
Top