Part I. Effects
I'll talk about some possible interesting effects and worry about PoDs later.-
Say the Ottomans are able to expand into Italy, much of Germany and Poland.
Is there a possibility of other Bosnias or Albanias developing, where a big share of the population converts to Islam?
My favorite candidates for conversion would be-
1. The Bohemian Hussites. Maybe like the Bogomil heretics who became Muslim in Bosnia and Bulgaria, they might become Ottoman loyalists and muslims, partly in reaction against their German Catholic neighbors. no Pilsner here, modern lighter beers are based on english ales.
2. Lithuanians - They were pagans until very late and linguistically had little in common with their neighbors. They could be a tributary ally of the Ottomans or loyalists within the empire.
3. Romanies? undoubtedly if they took anything from Islam they would make it their own.
4. Vlachs (later Romanians) ? Only because they seem to have been ridden over by nomads for so long before they established identifiable states.
An occupied Italy and the Renaissance - would ottoman occupation destroy it, or might it have the effect of the French invasions, injuring it in its home cities but importing many of its aspects back to Turkey?
Balance of power effects-
By poaching on what later became core Habsburg domains, maybe it permits France to become hegemon in western Europe.
Part II. PoDs- pick your favorite
1. The Black Death is worse (Robert Silverberg used this one, but I don't like it because a worse Black Death in Europe is probably a worse black death everywhere else).
2. No Timurlane- He smashed up Ottoman Anatolia pretty good in 1402. If you avoid him, you give the ottomans at least a thirty year head start. I'm not sure how much they can do with it though. As an added bonus for later however, the lack of a Timurlane slows down the collapse of the Golden Horde and the rise of Muscovy to a position where it can menace the Ottmans.
3.No Persian consolidation under Shiite Safavids. Persia is run by petty Sunni, mostly Turkic ruled states. It does not become an ideological concern for Suleiman, who does not feel impelled to attack Persia or occupy the Mameluke lands of Egypt and the Levant. This frees the Ottomans to stay focused on Europe, where they take Vienna and keep moving. Since its too late to prevent the Reformation at this point, the crushing of the Habsburgs ends up crippling the Habsburgs and the Counter-Reformation and means more of non-Ottoman Europe is Protestant.
4. Internal Ottoman changes-
IIRC the Turkic ghazis favored lots of wars of expansion directed at Chriistian Europe. The janissaries and groups with origins in Europe preferred expansion into exsiting Muslim territorries like Egypt and Iraq. There was tension and a shifting balance between the two that influenced Ottoman history. What if the Ghazis were more dominant- the area south of the Taurus is ignored.
5. More disasters after Manzikert- The Turks gain Anatolia and Thrace in the decades after that battle. Constantinople is besiged and taken in the 1100s or early 1200s. Is this plausible?
6. No call for Crusades. Somewhat similar to #5, the Byzantines are crushed between Norman-Venetian attacks on Greece and turkic attacks on Anatolia and Thrace
I'll talk about some possible interesting effects and worry about PoDs later.-
Say the Ottomans are able to expand into Italy, much of Germany and Poland.
Is there a possibility of other Bosnias or Albanias developing, where a big share of the population converts to Islam?
My favorite candidates for conversion would be-
1. The Bohemian Hussites. Maybe like the Bogomil heretics who became Muslim in Bosnia and Bulgaria, they might become Ottoman loyalists and muslims, partly in reaction against their German Catholic neighbors. no Pilsner here, modern lighter beers are based on english ales.
2. Lithuanians - They were pagans until very late and linguistically had little in common with their neighbors. They could be a tributary ally of the Ottomans or loyalists within the empire.
3. Romanies? undoubtedly if they took anything from Islam they would make it their own.
4. Vlachs (later Romanians) ? Only because they seem to have been ridden over by nomads for so long before they established identifiable states.
An occupied Italy and the Renaissance - would ottoman occupation destroy it, or might it have the effect of the French invasions, injuring it in its home cities but importing many of its aspects back to Turkey?
Balance of power effects-
By poaching on what later became core Habsburg domains, maybe it permits France to become hegemon in western Europe.
Part II. PoDs- pick your favorite
1. The Black Death is worse (Robert Silverberg used this one, but I don't like it because a worse Black Death in Europe is probably a worse black death everywhere else).
2. No Timurlane- He smashed up Ottoman Anatolia pretty good in 1402. If you avoid him, you give the ottomans at least a thirty year head start. I'm not sure how much they can do with it though. As an added bonus for later however, the lack of a Timurlane slows down the collapse of the Golden Horde and the rise of Muscovy to a position where it can menace the Ottmans.
3.No Persian consolidation under Shiite Safavids. Persia is run by petty Sunni, mostly Turkic ruled states. It does not become an ideological concern for Suleiman, who does not feel impelled to attack Persia or occupy the Mameluke lands of Egypt and the Levant. This frees the Ottomans to stay focused on Europe, where they take Vienna and keep moving. Since its too late to prevent the Reformation at this point, the crushing of the Habsburgs ends up crippling the Habsburgs and the Counter-Reformation and means more of non-Ottoman Europe is Protestant.
4. Internal Ottoman changes-
IIRC the Turkic ghazis favored lots of wars of expansion directed at Chriistian Europe. The janissaries and groups with origins in Europe preferred expansion into exsiting Muslim territorries like Egypt and Iraq. There was tension and a shifting balance between the two that influenced Ottoman history. What if the Ghazis were more dominant- the area south of the Taurus is ignored.
5. More disasters after Manzikert- The Turks gain Anatolia and Thrace in the decades after that battle. Constantinople is besiged and taken in the 1100s or early 1200s. Is this plausible?
6. No call for Crusades. Somewhat similar to #5, the Byzantines are crushed between Norman-Venetian attacks on Greece and turkic attacks on Anatolia and Thrace