As we all know, Islam is currently a minority religion in the Arabian Penninsula. Not particularly large or important, but still moderately relevant.
However, I recently read the first book of an obscure AH series, the name of it's author currently eludes me, in which the muslims manage to conquer more than half of the (then) known-world in less than a century.
In this story, it all begins with the Islamic prophet Muhammad much like in OTL, but ITTL he established a new unified polity in the Arabian Peninsula which under the subsequent Rashidun (The Rightly Guided Caliphs) and Umayyad Caliphates sees a century of rapid expansion of Muslim power.
Basically, they grow well beyond the Arabian Peninsula in the form of a Muslim Empire with an area of influence that stretches from the borders of China and the Indian subcontinent, across Central Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, Longobardia, and the Iberian Peninsula, to the Pyrenees.
The Muslim conquests bring about the collapse of the Sassanid Empire and a great territorial loss for the Byzantine Empire. I know that sounds extremely ASB, and it's not very well explained in the story either, where the author just writes that centuries of fighting each other left them extremely weak, but some critics note that he also implies that this ATL muslims actually have God's favour with them.
I haven't read the rest of this series, but I have spoiled myself a little for the next book, and apparently the muslims manage to take Constantinople in the mid 1400s :/
However, I recently read the first book of an obscure AH series, the name of it's author currently eludes me, in which the muslims manage to conquer more than half of the (then) known-world in less than a century.
In this story, it all begins with the Islamic prophet Muhammad much like in OTL, but ITTL he established a new unified polity in the Arabian Peninsula which under the subsequent Rashidun (The Rightly Guided Caliphs) and Umayyad Caliphates sees a century of rapid expansion of Muslim power.
Basically, they grow well beyond the Arabian Peninsula in the form of a Muslim Empire with an area of influence that stretches from the borders of China and the Indian subcontinent, across Central Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, Longobardia, and the Iberian Peninsula, to the Pyrenees.
The Muslim conquests bring about the collapse of the Sassanid Empire and a great territorial loss for the Byzantine Empire. I know that sounds extremely ASB, and it's not very well explained in the story either, where the author just writes that centuries of fighting each other left them extremely weak, but some critics note that he also implies that this ATL muslims actually have God's favour with them.
I haven't read the rest of this series, but I have spoiled myself a little for the next book, and apparently the muslims manage to take Constantinople in the mid 1400s :/