I want you to make an alternative history for Egypt in which Egypt will continue the Egyptian Coptic language in it is essential but religious Muslim
Egypt is a Coptic language Sunni Islam is religious
- Thread starter ahmed1ghoneim
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You should move this to pre-1900s. However, the short answer I can best give would be to have Caliphate influence in Egypt collapse faster and harder.
The large collapse in power structure would have the Arabian people be absorbed into the population and will probably be Muslim for sometime. Granted, with how harsher the collapse may be, Islam would probably less dominance in the area as it would in our timeline (maybe 60% it and 30% Coptic if its lucky.)
Burton K Wheeler
Moderator
I'm thinking on analogue with Iran, where the native language initially withered after Islamic conquest but then revived. The Umayyads made Arabic the official language of administration, but that wouldn't be enough to change the language of the rural population. Maybe an Egyptian native dynasty around the time of the Fatimids or Ayyubids that encourages Egyptian nationalism? If Egypt is the sole stronghold of Shi'i Islam, the Egyptians would try to set themselves apart from Arabs in the same way Shi'i Iranians did. I don't know that there was an Egyptian landowning class to produce such a dynasty in the same way there was in Iran, though.
The other thing is that Iran only has Arabic-speaking countries on one side, it's not an island surrounded by Arabs like Egypt. Maybe North Africa falls to Christians in the medieval era somehow, leaving Egypt between Arabs and Franks?
The other thing is that Iran only has Arabic-speaking countries on one side, it's not an island surrounded by Arabs like Egypt. Maybe North Africa falls to Christians in the medieval era somehow, leaving Egypt between Arabs and Franks?
Burton K Wheeler
Moderator
Wasn't necessary in Iran.
I guess, though, you would need a Coptic literary epic about the pharaohs. A sort of Egyptian Shahnameh.
You may not even have to have North Africa fall to Christians (not that it isn't a cool scenario, just logistically difficult), you could also have Islamized Berber dynasties promoting Berber identities in North Africa. This could build from the OTL Shu'ubiyya movement which did exist in Al-Andalus and the Maghreb and emphasized removing the privileged status of Arabs within the Ummah. Then Egypt would not be surrounded and may even be encouraged in its efforts to differentiate itself from Arabs. Creating this Berber renaissance would be helped by the fact that there were already Shia and Ibadi Berber dynasties OTL.
Now I'm thinking of an ATL where the boundaries of the Muslim world are much the same as OTL but the Arab world is just Arabia, the Levant, and Mesopotamia. Would be interesting to see the ATL political developments now that pan-Arabism is obviously neutered.
Probably the only real thing necessary is an earlier and stronger Sufi movement in Egypt that uses Coptic to be closer to the people.
Burton K Wheeler
Moderator
I hadn't thought of that part too. You're right, though, Coptic never adopted the Arabic alphabet to my knowledge. I don't know if I'd say Persian has a history of jumping scripts. Other than Tajikistan using Cyrillic, it only jumped the once (over 1000 years ago).
Coptic indeed has not changed scripts, but Old Persian, Middle Persian, and Modern Persian each used separate writing systems.
Burton K Wheeler
Moderator
I wasn't counting anything from before the Arab conquest. Not terribly relevant to modern Farsi.