Maybe not expanding slavery make Muslim feels threatened,the Abbasid lost almost all their power in the zanj rebellion
Challenge: Find a way for the Islamic world to be as dominant as their Christian rivals
- Thread starter LibPrime
- Start date
Yes it was competitive, but there was no shift which caused the Christian world to overtake the Muslim world, the Christian world was just better geared toward the changes to warfare which happened after 1600. You saw something similar in the High Middle Ages, which lasted until the rise of the gunpowder empires, which fit well with the Turko-Persian style of governance, society and warfare.
In general warfare which favor mass armies, low mobility and focus on the defense fit well with the Christian world, while smaller and highly mobile armies and offensive tactics fit well with the Muslim world.
And not until after the Restoration that the Puritans who ran Massachusetts Bay Colony were forced to tolerate Quakers (see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_martyrs)...
Yes, around the time when the European Christian powers were also rising to world power status. If the four Islamic Gunpowder Empires keep pace, it will achieve the OP.
Even without the scientific 'mode' of islam( which is somewhat heterodox) , with a later POD ( post mongol) you can achieve it much within islamic frame by focusing on 'humanism' as 'sunnah way of dealing with slaves/servants'. Have this ideology take over in a strategically important states and disseminate their ideas. As I stated earlier this will not be total abolitionist but will make slavery costlier( owners will have little choice to prevent slave rebellions). With that you have innovators gearing towards Mechanical works and gradually industrialisation of some if not all Economic sectors. I hope this is plausible enough
Waiting eagerly for a TL......
Post-Zanj Rebellion, much of Islamic Slavery tended to be on the Palatine side, like the slaves being permanent servants/human appliances that field workhorses, even ottoman forced labour were of the penal kind rather chattel one, the technological advance would leave both the way of Dodo gradually
Some early PODs:
I think reversing the Reconquista needs earlier changes - anything involving Granada is too late. E.g. No Berber Revolt — > Asturias doesn’t double its size while Arabs are distracted with suppression — > Al-Andalus eventually controls the entire Iberian Peninsula. This could also tie into replacing reliance on pillaging and jizya with property and graduated poll tax since taxation was a big source of Berber discontent.
Divert Hulagu’s campaign towards Baghdad/the Levant/Egypt into an expanded version of the Batu/Subutai invasion of Europe. Europe’s peripheral geographic position, terrain and the buffer zone from Magyar/Slavic Christianization in the 9th-10th century protected it from much of the nomadic destruction that hit the ME. The only major chance to break that trend I see is the Mongols.
I think reversing the Reconquista needs earlier changes - anything involving Granada is too late. E.g. No Berber Revolt — > Asturias doesn’t double its size while Arabs are distracted with suppression — > Al-Andalus eventually controls the entire Iberian Peninsula. This could also tie into replacing reliance on pillaging and jizya with property and graduated poll tax since taxation was a big source of Berber discontent.
Divert Hulagu’s campaign towards Baghdad/the Levant/Egypt into an expanded version of the Batu/Subutai invasion of Europe. Europe’s peripheral geographic position, terrain and the buffer zone from Magyar/Slavic Christianization in the 9th-10th century protected it from much of the nomadic destruction that hit the ME. The only major chance to break that trend I see is the Mongols.
Last edited:
You could also add a 5th Islamic Gunpowder Empire based in the steppe - something like a reformed, stabilised and modernising Golden Horde - to better achieve the OP. @Arctodus simus has an excellent TL about a more successful Golden Horde.
In all fairness, the Ottoman Empire was still on-par with European Great Powers such as Russia and Austria until the latter part of the 18th century. It's only after the Ottoman Empire completely missed out on the reforms that came with the Seven Years War that the Ottoman Empire really started to lose the ability to compete as a peer with European states. And throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Ottoman Empire was able to give a better account of itself vis-a-vis European states than most other non-European states, Japan being the only real exception.
The Islamic world could have been more "competitive" had Islamic states remained stronger in the 18th century, a time which saw consolidation and growth of state power in many parts of the world such as China, Southeast Asia and of course, Europe, but which in the Islamic world saw a near-century of division and infighting in Persia, the collapse of the Mughal Empire, and the weakening of the internal structure of the Ottoman Empire. Hell, keep the Mughals healthy and you can butterfly the British Raj, which won't stop European industrialization, but will take away the linchpin of European power in Asia.
Industrialization guarantees a European economic edge, and the chances of replicating that elsewhere were pretty slim, at least if Kenneth Pomeranz is to be believed. But this economic edge doesn't last forever. Japan, South Korea and now China utilized their positions to develop manufacturing sectors that are the envy of countries such as Britain. Part of the problem is that while East Asia has had, very broadly speaking, some good times from about 1950-1980 (depending on the country you're in) onward, much of the Muslim world has instead experienced economic stagnation. Tempting as it may be to look for the causes in Islam itself, the truth is that Muslim countries from Morocco to Indonesia have a whole host of different conditions that have resulted in this stagnation, and though the Arabian Gulf is rich because of oil, just having oil on its own is no guarantee of wealth (look at Libya, Venezuala, etc...).
A lot of rambling here, but if you're looking for an Islamic world that is competitive, it's actually fairly easy and there are a number of different ways you can do it. As for an Islamic world that is dominant, well that's harder. My instinctive answer is that an Islamic world that manages to unify the Mediterranean Basin might be the best option. If Muslims can seize places such as the South of France and Italy, as well as the rest of the Eastern Roman Empire during its initial wave of expansion, Northern Europe will be far more severely isolated than it was in OTL for longer. Hell, there's no telling what will happen in the long term.
This however is a bit of a wankish scenario, and while far from impossible, isn't exactly very likely either. It requires quite a number of things to go differently for the Muslims in several different areas. The idea of the Mediterranean being unified under "Dar al-Islam" allows for a greater growth of trade and for the Mediterranean to take on the same kind of role that it did for the Romans, rather than being the home of Muslim and Christian Corsairs for centuries, retarding growth and making things generally "a bit shit".
The Islamic world could have been more "competitive" had Islamic states remained stronger in the 18th century, a time which saw consolidation and growth of state power in many parts of the world such as China, Southeast Asia and of course, Europe, but which in the Islamic world saw a near-century of division and infighting in Persia, the collapse of the Mughal Empire, and the weakening of the internal structure of the Ottoman Empire. Hell, keep the Mughals healthy and you can butterfly the British Raj, which won't stop European industrialization, but will take away the linchpin of European power in Asia.
Industrialization guarantees a European economic edge, and the chances of replicating that elsewhere were pretty slim, at least if Kenneth Pomeranz is to be believed. But this economic edge doesn't last forever. Japan, South Korea and now China utilized their positions to develop manufacturing sectors that are the envy of countries such as Britain. Part of the problem is that while East Asia has had, very broadly speaking, some good times from about 1950-1980 (depending on the country you're in) onward, much of the Muslim world has instead experienced economic stagnation. Tempting as it may be to look for the causes in Islam itself, the truth is that Muslim countries from Morocco to Indonesia have a whole host of different conditions that have resulted in this stagnation, and though the Arabian Gulf is rich because of oil, just having oil on its own is no guarantee of wealth (look at Libya, Venezuala, etc...).
A lot of rambling here, but if you're looking for an Islamic world that is competitive, it's actually fairly easy and there are a number of different ways you can do it. As for an Islamic world that is dominant, well that's harder. My instinctive answer is that an Islamic world that manages to unify the Mediterranean Basin might be the best option. If Muslims can seize places such as the South of France and Italy, as well as the rest of the Eastern Roman Empire during its initial wave of expansion, Northern Europe will be far more severely isolated than it was in OTL for longer. Hell, there's no telling what will happen in the long term.
This however is a bit of a wankish scenario, and while far from impossible, isn't exactly very likely either. It requires quite a number of things to go differently for the Muslims in several different areas. The idea of the Mediterranean being unified under "Dar al-Islam" allows for a greater growth of trade and for the Mediterranean to take on the same kind of role that it did for the Romans, rather than being the home of Muslim and Christian Corsairs for centuries, retarding growth and making things generally "a bit shit".
Baghdad was a (comparatively) liberal centre of learning in the muslim world. It had one of the largest public libraries in the world which was subsequently destroyed by the mongols who proceeded to depopulate the city. Islam never recovered.
A library is pretty useless if it’s the only center of knowledge. In that case it’s more like a hidden treasure chest, it has a potential value but as long as it’s hidden it doesn’t affect the greater economy.
Also, the invasion that destroyed Baghdad didn't take out one city, it destroyed the entire infrastructure - crucially including the irrigation network - for the entire region. Imagine the Mongols having sacked France during the reign of Charlemagne and what that would have done to Europe.
Slight misconceptions here.
If you are referring to the Mu'atazlia, their influence on the development on science within the Abbasid Caliphate tends to be exaggerated.
Moreover, Baghdad had already been in decline at the time. Other events such as the Zanj rebellion had been incredibly destructive to the region, centuries before the Mongol incursions.
France was ravaged by a century of war a few centuries later, Germany experienced the 30YW, Russia had the time of trouble. None of this stopped these countries fro rising again.
IIRC Aceh once asked for Ottoman aid, promising to become a vassal-state in exchange, but the Ottomans were too busy with troubles closer to home to do anything serious about that situation.
Okay, I googled it. A partnership against the Portuguese. Looks more of an alliance - arguably a stretch to call it a client-state-type relationship, since it's not like the Ottomans could extract much value from the relationship (aside from mere diplomatic courtesies recognizing the Ottomans as the supreme Caliph or what)
Doesn't sound like colonialism in any sense of the word.