DBWI: Buddhism falters in Roman Empire

[Shoshana]

The history of rice in the west is kind of weird; it arrived by way of trade with the east along with spices (which yes, did have a massive influence), but for most of subsequent history never really caught on. In Europe and West Asia, our cereal grain of choice has pretty much always been wheat, though the North developed a taste for Maize based foods (among others) following the Atlantean Exchange.* And yes, there were periods when it certain rice meals were in fashion, and the Mediterranean rich would subsidize rice farms in certain places for awhile, but until the recent invention of fast food, it was unknown to most of the population, and even then it's still more popular in Egypt and surrounding regions (here in the North, it's still considered something of a foreign dish).

wow. Thank you! I'm writing a school report on food history. So this is really helpful! Do you think without Buddhism in Rome, your grains of choice would change. Especially in the northern regions with their taste for maize. Will there still be the Roman age of discovery without Buddhism? Perhaps Maize just stays an Atlantean thing in a no Buddhist Roma timeline.
I watched a TV show recently about the Tawantinsuyu and their potato crops. How they bred potato over the centuries so they're no longer toxic. The Tawantinsuyu took to Buddhism really well. Potatoes were a huge trading currency for them. Without Buddhism, maybe we butterfly the potato trade with the Tawantinsuyu?
With rice I can only really think what I know. My hometown has lots of rice fastfood take outs. We have rice fields in the Hula valley, not far from me, and there's the research village near the dead sea. They actually genetically modified rice so it can grow in salt water.

I did an internet search on the meatiest recipe in places like Roma and Hibernia. I saw one for doormouse tikka masala served in a hollowed bread with a cucumber and mint salad. Actually looks really yummy. I'm vegetarian though so I can't.

That sounds really great! You've convinced me. Especially the food I like pomegranate but getting it here can be hard...

oh no! really! I can't imagine life without pomegranates! My parents make pomegranate wine and olive oil. Its our family business. We still make olive oil the old fashioned way using big stone presses too. Everybody in town comes and helps with our harvest, and in turn we help other farmers with their cotton and apple crops. I was helping in a watermelon field yesterday.
And even though we make our own, my parents still say Persian wine is the best. They're huge fans of the Shiraz vineyards. We're going to visit there next week. I can finally see the ruins of Parsa! So I will take lots of pictures.

I think we have lots to thank Buddhism for. Even my own religion changed over the two thousandish years. Without Buddhism, I think my life would be soooo different. I cant imagine how our religion would be. I guess we would not have a female rabbi. Which means there'll be an old man with a beard instead, like in those orthodox neighborhoods. And it would be hard for me to chat with him about certain things, so I think I would be less interested in our religion. Maybe I would convert to Zoroastrianism instead in a no Buddhist-Roma timeline.

That's good that they're a minority...

Sounds like Hibernia a bit. Women could be nuns from the first appearance of the Sangha - both Hibernia and the Northlands had more experience of women in positions of temporal power than some regions did, so of course the new religion could have female leaders. Actually in Hibernia, back when the Three Jewels first got brought the convents provided education to girls who might not have had the same opportunities as the daughters of chieftains (and still do). But even now, more 'orthodox' Druids say that only men can actually become Druids. The newer schools of thought disagree, of course.

The orthodox Druids only really have currency in the more backwoods parts of the country of course. In Black Pool* and the East and South - where the major cities were built during Northern rule - it's totally liberal. And Druidical beliefs aren't followed at all in Iceland, so it's got no issues.

Gods preserve King Snorri

That sounds scary and horrible. And yes, kind of like our ultraorthodox neighborhoods in Yarushalem. We have lots to thank Buddhism for. Without it, maybe your Druid religion stays male dominated too. I dont think I like this no Buddhist Roma world. It will be a mean and scary place with lots of people fighting each other. And no yummy food either without all the spices, sugar and rice.

 

[Indicus]

That sounds scary and horrible. And yes, kind of like our ultraorthodox neighborhoods in Yarushalem. We have lots to thank Buddhism for. Without it, maybe your Druid religion stays male dominated too. I dont think I like this no Buddhist Roma world. It will be a mean and scary place with lots of people fighting each other. And no yummy food either without all the spices, sugar and rice.

I think you're overstating the importance of Buddhism. You're right about the food that was transmitted through it, but do remember that despite Buddhism, people still fight for lots of reasons, and I think that Druidic religion would have lost its male-dominated clergy over time anyways.

 

[BootOnFace]

Yeah people shouldn't forget the Uyghur Empire was Buddhist and Bilga Khahan's conquests killed upwards of 40 million people even though he was nominally Buddhist. And that's not even mentioning the more modern, secular states that fought in the Great Wars of last century that had predominantly Buddhist populations. It didn't stop the Rhomains from deporting all the Manichee Armenians from the Caucasus to Bolgharia.

 

[theg*ddam*hoi2fan]

Yeah people shouldn't forget the Uyghur Empire was Buddhist and Bilga Khahan's conquests killed upwards of 40 million people even though he was nominally Buddhist. And that's not even mentioning the more modern, secular states that fought in the Great Wars of last century that had predominantly Buddhist populations. It didn't stop the Rhomains from deporting all the Manichee Armenians from the Caucasus to Bolgharia.

Agreed. OTOH, there've been a number of potential conflicts even in recent history that the monastic community has managed to head off via popular pressure or acting as negotiators. So while wars do happen, a world where a different religion was dominant might have been worse.

 

[Miss Teri]

So, how would research develop in a world where Buddhist thought didn't come to heavily influence the scientific practices inherited from the Greeks?

 

[John Fredrick Parker]

So, how would research develop in a world where Buddhist thought didn't come to heavily influence the scientific practices inherited from the Greeks?

Hard to say; AIUI, there were several times that scientific advancement stagnated for a number of centuries until havng a kind of Renaissance.

 

[theg*ddam*hoi2fan]

Unsure about science - as @John Fredrick Parker says, it's peaked and troughed considerably.

What do we think the overall state of technology would be? Air travel, for instance: OTL, airships have stayed fairly solid for civilian use in short-range freight transport and internal travel for the last near-century, with planes only being used for the military and long-range travel. But the tech powering them has changed a lot - internal airship flights these days are primarily solar-powered these days. Do we think that'd be the same?

 

[John Fredrick Parker]

Do we think that'd be the same?

Discussing how the last century is affected by a PoD from nearly two millenia ago? That gap is so big, and brushing past so many butterflies, it's not even funny

 

[Miss Teri]

Discussing how the last century is affected by a PoD from nearly two millenia ago? That gap is so big, and brushing past so many butterflies, it's not even funny

Well, let's start small. Would the planets still be known by their Greco-Roman names, since Buddhist influence gradually changed them to their Hindu influenced names, like Budha, Sukra, Mangala, Guru, Shani, Indra, and Yama (OOC: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune).

 

[BootOnFace]

My guess is that whatever culture develops the telescope and uses it for astronomy will spread its own names for planets. Buddhism bringing new planet names is a myth and Hindu names for the planets only dates back to about 500 years ago. It wasn't Buddhism that brought Hindu names of the planets to Europe, it was the scientific community in Europe using Indian names thanks to the advanced state of the science there. Remember it was Devadatta Bhandarkar who calculated that the planets all move in ellipses around the Sun, not Lavrosius. He just translated Indian works and proved them to the Europeans.


So wherever high-level math and precision lenscrafting meet first I assume will have dibs on planet names. China or Rome would be my first inclinations, but perhaps a Persian culture could also be a contender.

 

[Miss Teri]

China or Rome would be my first inclinations, but perhaps a Persian culture could also be a contender.

Like I said, they might just keep the Greco-Roman names (though, what would Indra and Yama be called in that case? Minerva and Pluto, perhaps?)

 

[John Fredrick Parker]

@BootOnFace Actually, since you bring up Heliocentrism, it actually was the Greeks who first proposed it; in fact, one Selucian was using reasoning to argue for the earth revolving around the sun at least as early as the fourth century*. True, most Greek thinkers found this unconvincing compared to their more convoluted Geocentric Model, but these arguments were out there, nearly seven hundred years before Indian astronomers picked Heliocentric reasoning back up again.** Of course, all this predates by centuries what we would call real "science", since it was not until the telescope that astrological hypotheses could be rigorously tested; and it's why Heliocentrisn went from being one model of many to a widely accepted scientific "fact" within fifty years of the first use of the telescope to study the heavens.***

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EDIT ADD: So I came across a book on Kanishka the Great, and there was this passage on an unknown man, likely from Central Asia (or Western Tianxia, depending on your cartographer), who brought to Kushan the art of paper making. Kadishka was so impressed with this new arrival that he ordered that all his correspondence and personal records should use the new material, and the foreigner became effectively part of the court. Anyway, some decades later, when Buddhist teachers were making their way west to Rome, many of them brought scriptures printed on paper, which (and I can't believe I didn't realize this before) the Romans had never seen before.

Now I do realize that Roman domestic production of paper (at least in any significant quantity to get historical notice) was still a ways off at this point, but do you guys think it's possie that, absent this (on review, unlikely) historical exchange, that the Westen world would have gone significantly longer without access to this pretty important discovery? Or is tech like this pretty much destined to spread?

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OOC: *This is referring to Seleucus of Selucia, and his work from circa 150 BCE, well before our PoD -- remember, TTL considers 483 BCE to be Year One.

**Aryabhata was working around this time OTL; and while his magnum opus, AIUI, was based on Geocentrism, his work was nonetheless revolutionary and paved the way for Indian astronomers to make Heliocentric arguments in the coming centuries. He also had a massive influence on Islamic astrology OTL, and thus subsequently on European astronomy.

***Corresponding to (what I understand to be) how quickly Heliocentrism was accepted folliwi g the work of Gallileo OTL; mind you, TTLs equivalent can be earlier (or later).

 

[Indicus]

So I came across a book on Kanishka the Great, and there was this passage on an unknown man, likely from Central Asia (or Western Tianxia, depending on your cartographer), who brought to Kushan the art of paper making. Kadishka was so impressed with this new arrival that he ordered that all his correspondence and personal records should use the new material, and the foreigner became effectively part of the court. Anyway, some decades later, when Buddhist teachers were making their way west to Rome, many of them brought scriptures printed on paper, which (and I can't believe I didn't realize this before) the Romans had never seen before.

Now I do realize that Roman domestic production of paper (at least in any significant quantity to get historical notice) was still a ways off at this point, but do you guys think it's possie that, absent this (on review, unlikely) historical exchange, that the Westen world would have gone significantly longer without access to this pretty important discovery? Or is tech like this pretty much destined to spread?

Paper is pretty much destined to spread everywhere, as it's just so much better than any other contemporary form of writing material.

It really is something comparable to the vast spread of Indic numerals. During the Neo-Kushan Empire, they evolved out of pre-existing Indic numerals, along with the use of zero as any other standard number. They were so incredibly superior to any and all other kinds of numerals that they spread to Persia, Egypt, China, and everywhere where the Neo-Kushan Empire held trading links, as they were just so much better. The only thing that changed about them as they spread from India to everywhere else was their shapes, and their methods of usage has remained unchanged just about everywhere. Similarly, paper would be shown to be better than any other equivalent, and so they would spread everywhere after their introduction.

 

[danteheadman]

There's been a little balagan lately though. A few extreme ultraorthodox groups in Yarushalem still refuse to accept a female rabbi. They're the very small minority though, thankfully.

I live in Manahatta[1] now, but I have family in Yerusholaim. What's so frustrating about that conflict is that the orthodox rely on a fictional narrative of a "pure Judaism" which never existed! I can barely talk to some of my cousins about local politics anymore.


They forget that even by the time Julian the Messiah[2] (that's Julian the Monotheist, to y'all non-Jews) authorized the rebuilding of the Temple in 849,[3] Judaism in the old Roman Empire had already changed immensely. Exposure to Bodhist thinking had a direct influence on the Mishna and Talmud, as most critical scholarship could tell you. Rabbinic emphasis on prayer and meditation over material animal sacrifice? Clearly a Bodhist idea. The yeshiva tradition of study "in chevruta"? A blatant adoption of Bodhist debate styles found in monastaries across the world.[4]


It's even more apparent in the design of the Julian Temple: there was no outdoor meditation plaza in the First or Second Temples, nor was there a "Tomb of the Kohanim" before the mid-900s. Let's be honest with ourselves here: it's a Stupa, we copied the design from Constanton's in Roma. And it's not like we actually make korbanot more than a few times a year, nothing like the stories say we did during the Second Temple days.[5]

The radicals in Yerusholaim are just reactionaries, idealizing a mythological Judaism to disguise their xenophobic protests against the Economic Union. They pretend that everything is "pure Judaism," that the Tomb was a Jewish idea, that the meditation cites back to 1 Kings 8:46-50, but its so blatantly a sham. We don't practice Second Temple Judaism, and they didn't practice First Temple Judaism. The Orthodox's denial of basic history makes me so angry.

____________________

OOC:

[1] The OTL Lenape name for Manhattan, meaning "many hills"

[2] Julian the Apostate OTL was a religious throwback, the last "pagan" Emperor, a neoplatonist and anti-Christian who really authorized the rebuilding of the Temple. ITTL, his strident neoplatonism marked him as a monotheist, contrary to the majority of the Romano-Buddhist populace. He is called "Messiah" like Cyrus the Great is: not the Final Redemption, but an annointed hero to the Jewish people

[3] Going off of @John Fredrick Parker - ITTL Year One is OTL 483 BCE. Julian authorized construction in OTL 363 CE.

[4] These are features of OTL Judaism

[5] These are not features of OTL Judaism

 

[BootOnFace]

According to many Hebraicists, the Jewish religion started having "foreign" influences as soon as they left Egypt. Just look at the tales of Samson or David and compare to Greek heroes like Heracles. It's quite different from their previous heroes who were generally prophets and channels for the power of their god.

And yes, Julian was quite a last gasp for paganism. He even tried to take the parts of Bodhism that he liked to reform the Roman organized religion, opening "academia" that were basically monasteries dedicated to neoplatonism. Ironically, this legitimized some of the more controversial aspects of Bodhism among many pagans. Seeing the same reclusive, "anti-social," hermitages they condemned for being leeches be organized by the Emperor neutralized a key objection local authorities could levy against Bodhists.

 

[John Fredrick Parker]

So I've recently come across an interesting debate on the historical role of Buddhism in Europe -- it comes down to why Europe and *Western* Civilization in general have historically been so much more *monogamous* than certain other parts of the world, which (especially in pre-*modernity*) practiced polygyny and concubinage to varying levels. Scholars argue that this fact of family life, even if it was largely only relevant for the elites, played a very sizeable role in the gender politics of *medieval* *Europe* and as such the groundwork for proto-*feminism*.

What's relevant here is that this line of argument tends to (though not always) lay the ultimate foundation of this family and gender dynamic in pre-Buddhist antiquity, specifically in Egyptian and Greco-Roman civilization. And naturally, a few of them go on to conclude that even in the absence of Buddhism, Europe and the *Mediterranean* World would still be the global leaders in terms of *women's rights*.

Suffice to say, number of Buddhist scholars take issue with this analysis -- they point out that the Greco-Roman world was an emphatically *patriarchal* one; that Buddhism promoted monogamy in the *West* just as it did with all civilizations it found influence in; and several have even take a critical look at claims that the *medieval* European world was particularly any more *feminist* than Asia.

What are your thoughts?

 

[BootOnFace]

OOC: Due to the religious difference between the Middle East and Western Europe being more Protestant v Catholic than Christian v "heathen," I'd argue that the "Western World" would be the Mediterranean Basin + Europe and descendant colonies in the Americas. Eastern would be Persia->East. Also is you look at polygyny worldwide OTL, it's almost entirely due to the influence of Islam, which gets its polygyny from traditional Arab culture.


IC: You can argue that monogamy is a Western trait, but then you'd have to define "West" very strangely. Sure the Aryan and Semitic cultures are in general polygynous, but China is almost entirely monogamous and Jews, as opposed to Zoroastrian Arabs, are Semites who practice monogamy. Furthermore, Indian society, from which we get Bodhism, is monogamous outside the more Zoroastrian northwest. I'd argue that polygynous societies are just rare worldwide and is more of a quirk of the Near East. Polygyny is only such a bugbear in Western society due to Iranophobia that's arguably thousands of years old.

China and Rome both have had monogamous patriarchal societies for thousands of years. I believe Republicanism should be credited with feminism, with the idea that all men are equal and deserve equal representation to be the basis for the idea that women are equal, too. Yes there have been schools of thought in China arguing for equality between sexes, but the prevailing Confucian/Neodaoist philosophy has ingrained the idea of a natural order that places certain people above others thanks to their birth and even though most Chinese people subscribe to some kind of Bodhist belief, this hasn't changed Chinese culture. I'd say that Chinese culture has changed Bodhism to be appropriate for the Chinese instead.

 

[danteheadman]

OOC: Due to the religious difference between the Middle East and Western Europe being more Protestant v Catholic than Christian v "heathen," I'd argue that the "Western World" would be the Mediterranean Basin + Europe and descendant colonies in the Americas. Eastern would be Persia->East. Also is you look at polygyny worldwide OTL, it's almost entirely due to the influence of Islam, which gets its polygyny from traditional Arab culture.

OOC post:

So that includes the MENA? I.e. north of the Sahara and west of / inclusive of Mesopotamia? Why? Because of Rome?

With the cultural gravity of Eurasia ITTL being India, given its central position and origin of Buddhism, "west" should be "everything west of the Indian subcontinent" and "east" should be "everything east of the subcontinent."

The whole Europe/Asia dichotomy might not exist in a world with stronger cultural links between the different parts of Eurasia.

 

[John Fredrick Parker]

OOC: I'm assuming the latter two paragraphs were IC?

IC:

You can argue that monogamy is a Western trait, but then you'd have to define "West" very strangely.

Perfectly fair. [*]

China is almost entirely monogamous... China and Rome both have had monogamous patriarchal societies for thousands of years... Yes there have been schools of thought in China arguing for equality between sexes, but the prevailing Confucian/Neodaoist philosophy has ingrained the idea of a natural order that places certain people above others thanks to their birth and even though most Chinese people subscribe to some kind of Bodhist belief, this hasn't changed Chinese culture. I'd say that Chinese culture has changed Bodhism to be appropriate for the Chinese instead.

Concubinage in China is, AIUI, something very different from the practice of *open adultery* in the *West*, even as it is also different from polygyny as practiced by, for example, Persia. And while influence between Buddhism and Confucianism in China has been a two way street, the former can at least take credit for ending the practice of concubinage and *plural marriage* for the nation's elite... which does proffer evidence for the some of the arguments I mentioned above.

Sure the Aryan and Semitic cultures are in general polygynous, but... Jews, as opposed to Zoroastrian Arabs, are Semites who practice monogamy. Furthermore, Indian society, from which we get Bodhism, is monogamous outside the more Zoroastrian northwest. I'd argue that polygynous societies are just rare worldwide and is more of a quirk of the Near East. Polygyny is only such a bugbear in Western society due to Iranophobia that's arguably thousands of years old.

I've read sources that argue that the decline of polygyny in Judaism and *Hinduism* can be chalked up largely to the inuence of Buddhism. Mind you, at least a few of these writers do seem to have a strong anti-Iran axe to grind, so I suppose I should be taking their analyses with a grain of salt, but I can't help but find it interesting to think about nonetheless. After all, it also should be remembered that sub-Saharan Africa also has a long history of plural marriages (though they're also distinct from West Asian practices), as do several native societies in the western hemisphere (which are a whole other kettle of fish).

OOC: [*]note, words with asterix quotes (*example*) are approximations

 

[BootOnFace]

OOC post:

So that includes the MENA? I.e. north of the Sahara and west of / inclusive of Mesopotamia? Why? Because of Rome?

With the cultural gravity of Eurasia ITTL being India, given its central position and origin of Buddhism, "west" should be "everything west of the Indian subcontinent" and "east" should be "everything east of the subcontinent."

The whole Europe/Asia dichotomy might not exist in a world with stronger cultural links between the different parts of Eurasia.

OOC: It's been established that MENA west of the Euphrates(roughly) is strongly Buddhist and I presume that as such, the close links between southern Europe and North Africa wouldn't be nearly severed as the were OTL. And as such I think the more classical version of "East vs West" of Hellenic culture vs Iranian culture would remain as the paradigm. Of course after the ITTL Age of Exploration, links between India and China and the "Western World" would complicate the narrative and make the metaphor more of a dogwhistle for anti-Iranists. Remember the the Iranian cultural sphere ITTL remains Zoroastrian and it seems there's historical tension between Romans and Persians. To include greater Iran into the "Western World" would remove the cultural continuity of such a phrase. The Europe of this world is just as defined by the legacy of Rome as our Europe is, with almost every country in Europe using a descendant of Roman law.


Of course this is a DBWI and doesn't hold up to the standard of real TLs due to the collaborative nature of the worldbuilding but I'm trying to find interesting parts of the premise and build it up.