Prester John's Kingdoms: African Christian Nations

Not only were they staunchly Christian they also participated in the crusades. It was actually the end of the crusades that brought about the end of Nubia. It was Scotland in the Auld Alliance with France. Once the fight is over with the big dog. The annoying little neighbor who tries to stab you in the back gets the serious beat down. But Ethiopia was way to far South in easily defendable mountain terrain for it to be ever fully conquered, except possibly by Italy.

Nubia participated in the Crusades? How so? This is new to me.
 
The most likely Prestor John, in my eyes, would be Hulagu Khan. If he had converted to Nestorian Christianity Catholic Europe might have been more inclined to deal with him (The French already OTL made several attempts at an Alliance) remember that the Prestor John legend was that a ruler from the east would one day push back Islam to the Arabian Peninsula. Hulagu Khan, matched with a Supported Catholic Crusade, might have just done that.

For a few decades, maybe, before the Persian elite/Muslim Turkic tribes/Mameluks get around to overthrowing him (or his descendents).

Persia is almost entirely Muslim at this point, which will NOT change. The only historically Muslim area to be re-christianized ever was Spain, and that was only accomplished through the expulsion of basically the entire Muslim population over a couple hundred years.
 
Anyways the point is to have alongside Abysinnia nations in Africa that are Christian and so not as immediately exploitable by the European powers, and perhaps with the continuous contact with Europe thanks to religious ties, turns into political and trade ties and causes them to be more developed than OTL. Aside from Benin and Kongo, I'm not sure what other possibilities there were in West Africa.

I think we can also count Muslim nations. A surviving Mali Empire, anybody? Or the Songhay?
 
I don't want to fully discount the impact of Christianity, but...
  1. Ethiopia is largely desert. Only 10% of its land is arable, and only 0.65% is actually cultivated. That makes it fairly unattractive to imperialists.
  2. Ethiopia is mountainous. That makes it fairly hard for imperialists to take over.
Deserts aren't enough to stop imperialists (Namibia, Algeria, Rajasthan, etc.), and mountains aren't enough to stop imperialists (Kenya, Peru, etc.) but the combination is difficult, so those areas tend to be the very last ones to fall under outside control (Utah, Tibet, Afghanistan, etc.)

A bit distorted. Ethiopia is not largely desert, that is a western misconception, only the extreme western portions, both in the north and south. The vast majprity of the Ogaden is not desert but rather scrubland. Please tell me this is a desert.
The ten or so percent arable land is comparable to that of nations of
Now as you stated yourself, only 0.65% of the land (out of 10% arable) is cultivated. If this was at say 5% or 7%, much more food could be produced. In addition, the definition of arable is skewed. "Arable land", as the definition goes, excludes mountainous land. Now, if terracing was introduced, contour plowing, or something similar, the amount of productive land could be greatly increased. Admittedly, the mountains look like this in the dry season, but tell me what western Europe and America look like in Winter!
 
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