Sons of Tabiti: The Scythian 'Redhairs' of East Asia

Key players originally devised on this thread: https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...ernate-new-ethnic-groups-of-the-world.459094/

Affiliate nationalities and ethnic groups by the present time in this ATL:

Oriental Persian
Nationalities


Hvatanese

Language:
Scytho-Khotanese (a.k.a. Sakan) with Tocharian, Turkic, Tunguskic and East Asian linguistic influences. Called Hvatanese and classified as an Indo-Iranian, East Persian Language.
Ancestry: A mix of Scythian and Tocharian ancestries which migrated eastward during the time of the Khotanese Empire which ruled China from c.250 AD to c.600. Intermixed with Mongol, Jurchen and Korean bloodlines.
Appearance: Inheritors of the fair hair and eye colours of they're Scythian/Tocharian ancestors with more Asiatic traits manifesting in epicanthal folds and neotenous features. Taller than most East Asians.
Religion: Predominantly Vajrayana Buddhism of a similar stand to that practised in Mongolia and Tibet. Some unique Scythian folk elements owning to Indo-Iranian paganism.
Culture: Historically diverse with a cosmopolitan settled culture developing in Southern Hvatna (Manchuria) during the mid 1st Millennium AD alongside continued nomadic pastoralism on the Western plains and a maritime culture originating in the Amur Basin.
Space: Northeast Asia, north of Korea, occupying all of OTL Manchuria (including Outer Manchuria) which is called Hvatna in ATL. Extensive historical migration and settlement to Sakhalin, Northern Japan, Korea, the Kurils and Kamchatka.

Sacnese

Language
:
Sacnese, an East Persian language related to Hvatnese with Scythian and Tocharian influences.
Ancestry: The same Aryan nomads that the Hvatnese are descended from, conquerors of the Khotanese Empire in the 200's AD
Religion: Vajrayana Buddhism with Aryan pagan influences.
Culture: A rich heritage as horsemen, mercenaries and traders with significant affinities to the East Hvatnese.
Space: The region of the historical kingdom of Sacu within the Chinese regions of Gansu and Northern Qinghai. Scattered settlement across Northern China.

Hybrid Nationalities

Hatemish/Datemish

Language:
Hatemishi is a variant of Hvatnese heavily influenced by the Ainu/Emishi language and Japanese. Today most are Japanese speakers.
Ancestry: West Hvatnese raiders and settlers populated the lands of the Ainu from the 8th century AD onward with a large second wave of settlement in the 13th century. Large scale assimilation of the Ainu occurred during this time.
Religion: Folk religion influenced by Aryan and Ainu Shamanistic Pagan beliefs and Vajrayana Buddhism.
Culture: Now heavily diluted by modern Japanese culture outside rural settlements in Ezo and Tohoku. A cultural revival is underway and some Hatemish have preserved they're distinctive aesthetic traits, reddish hair and blue-green eyes (rare).
Region: Historical zone of Ainu settlement across Northern Japan, Sakhalin, the Kurils and Kamchatka. Live mostly in areas administered by Hvatna, Japan and Russia.

Hat-sam

Language:
Various disparate Korean dialects influenced by Hvatnese. In Northern Korea, near the Hvatnese, small communities still speak Hvatnese itself.
Ancestry: Dependent on where they live. Northern Hat-sam are mostly descended from Hvatnese who migrated from the north via land while Southern, Coastal and Jeju Hat-sam are descended from maritime settlers from West Hvatna.
Religion: Vajrayana Buddhism.
Culture: Like the Hatemish, heavily diluted by modern influence, this time from Korea. Experienced suppression in the north within the DPRK (1948-1996) followed by a period of revival. Look distinctly tall and fair with natural red hair common.
Region: Spread around Korea in dispersed cultural areas. Northern mountain region, the Northwest coast, Southern coastal islands and Jeju island.

Hat-min

Language:
Hat-min Creole, Hokkien Chinese base with a large number of Hvatnese loanwords.
Ancestry: West Hvatnese settlers of Taiwan and the coasts of Southern China intermixed with Taiwanese aborigines and Cantonese peoples.
Religion: A mix of Vajrayana and Mahayana Buddhism, Folk Religion and later on Christianity.
Culture: Influence by the maritime heritage of the West Hvatnese wayfarers who conducted waves of migrations out of the Amur Basin across the Asian-Pacific Rim. Conspicuously taller and fairer in hair and eye colours than other peoples of the region.
Space: Scattered across Taiwan, Southern Chinese Coast and more recently, South-East Asia.

Historical Cultural Entities

'Redhairs': An Eastern Aryan culture group responsible for spreading Hvatnese and Sacnese settlers and influences across East Asia via land and sea from the 3rd century AD to the 14th century.

Language: Scytho-Khotanese, the parent language to all Oriental-Persian languages. Also referred to as Sakan. Tocharian spoken among Yuzehi groups who were later assimilated into Sakan or Sino-Tibetan communities.
Ancestry: Indo-European Steppe peoples and Tocharians. Related to Indo-Iranians living in Persia and Afghanistan.
Religion: A mixture of Aryan pagan focused around worship of the Goddess Tabiti (Tabitism) and Buddhism of the Mahayana and later Vajrayana sects which they played a crucial role in propagating.
Culture: A nomadic pastoral culture initially focus on horse husbandry, warfare and raiding. Later, following their conquests many became sedentary and cosmopolitan traders and administrators. Amur Basin settlers morphed into a maritime raiding culture.
Region: Far Eastern Steppes. Settled fringes of North China and North-east Asia by 600 AD. Conducted settlement of regions as far apart as Kamchatka and Taiwan after the 8th century and raided and conquered polities as far afield as Java.
 
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From Khotan came Butterflys....

A rough timeline of events during the 3rd Century:

c.200 AD: Large scale Sakan migrations arrive in the Tarim Basin. With assistance from recently settle Sakan lords they subjugate the Tocharian trading cities of the region, establishing the Kingdom of Khotan. To acclimatise to governing their conquests they adopt elements of Tocharian culture and religion and intermix with their subjects.
c.210-215: The influx of Sakan migrants east continues due to upheavals brought about by Hunnic invasions on the Central Asian Steppe. Initially these settlers are welcomed by Khotan but soon the natural resources of the region become stretched and the Saka continue east into Xiongnu territories adjacent to the Kingdom of Cao Wei, a North Chinese Kingdom embroiled in a war with two other Chinese kingdoms to the south, Shu Han and Wu.
215: Cao Wei begins a war effort to subjugate the Upper Yellow River Valley, pressuring Sakan and Xiongnu living there. The recently establish Kingdom of Sacu calls on Khotan to come to her aid. Khotan seeking to incorporate the new Sakan state and it's rich trading outposts obliges. War between Khotan and Cao Wei.
220: POD - Cao Wei suffers a crushing defeat at the hands of Khotan, being unprepared for a large scale conflict with nomadic horse army fielded at Khotanese behest. She holds her heartlands on the North China plain for now but her manpower reserves are greatly depleted. Khotan consolidates power and influence over the Upper Yellow Valley and a rush of Sakan and Tocharian settlement from the Tarim Basin takes place during the 220's.
c.230: Cao Wei has been crumbling through the last decade as the previously subjugated Yuan Shao rise up in rebellion followed other vassals smelling Wei's weakness. The struggle however tires all sides and make Northern China vulnerable to Nomadic attacks from Mongolian, Korean and Aryan raiders. While this goes on Shu Han and Wu are engaged in war between one another, generally unable to effect events in the north.
232-8: The Khotanese conquest of former Wei territory in earnest. The Khotanese Empire, given the native name Hvatana, has reaped the benefits of a population boom but is still stretching her resources so seeks continued territorial expansion. The Wei rump state and Yuan Shao are exhausted but their wars and so fall quickly to the Empire but then the conquerors march on to eliminate the threat posed by the Gongsun who occupied lands along the north shore of the Yellow Sea and the Liaodong Peninsula.
c.240: The first of the Sakan migrants have arrived in Northeast Asia on the Liaodong Peninsula and Central Plain. These settlers followed by waves of others will overtime become the Old Hvatnese. These regions are considered a crown jewel of the Empire and in the immediate future the Khotanese will prioritise consolidating lands on the North-east frontier and either assimilating or displacing Tunguskic and Koreanic peoples in the region. Conflicts with Gogueryo and Buyeo.
263: Khotan invades Shu and conquers it. It is incorporated into the Empire.
280: Khotan conquers Wu and incorporates it into the Empire. The Chinese War of Three Kingdoms is over with the pretenders, Wei, Shu and Wu, broken and defeated by an opportunistic outside power, the Khotanese Saka. Chinese scholars would refer to this Sakan dynasty as the Hatan Dynasty, Sacu Dynasty and would carry the Sakan name Hvatana which overtime evolved into Hvatna.
 
A rundown of the regional history leading up to the Tang Dynasty:

280-420: The First Hatan Dynasty rules over a united China in relative peace. It is credited with spreading Buddhism to China through the efforts of Sakan and Tocharian monks and supporting continued settlement of early Hvatnese in the Dongbei region.
420-581: The decline of the Hatan, first in the South China where the Liu Song and Qi Dynasties struggle for power. The Hatan hold North China for a century and a half more and govern somewhat effectively due to being more entrenched.
581: The Sui Dynasty conquerors North China following a popular Han Chinese rebellion again Hatan rule and leaves the remaining Hatan territories fragmented. Khotan is relegated to it's original Tarim homeland in the west, Sacna is an independent Sakan kingdom in the Upper Yellow Valley and Hvatna is the large North-eastern territory of Dongbei populated by Saka and Tocharians from the west.
618>: The Tang Dynasty succeeds the Sui as overlords of a united China. The nations of the 'Redhairs' are developing their own distinct identities with different destinies. Khotan will be conquered by the Gokturks and it's people assimilated into the Uyghur nation, now speaking a Turkic language. Sacna would be a subject of China for most of it's subsequent history and the Sacnese a minority ethnic group living in Gansu and Amdo regions. Hvatna would, with the notable exceptions of a period of Tang vassalisation and subjugation under the Mongol Empire, remain a powerful independent state throughout most of it's history. On two subsequent occasions it would once again conquer China and establish a second and third Hatan dynasty.
 
How come the Mongolian or Central Asia was not affected by those migrations? I feel like if anything a lot of Mongolia and historical Dzungaria would be Iranified by that point.
 
Mmm, they kind of went around the Mongol heartlands and skirted the Great Wall so the Mongols can be as they were. The Khitans, Gokturks and Uyghurs and the like only turn up after 600 AD anyway, migrating from north of the Altai. They hit Dzungaria, and Central Asia really hard. The reason Central Asia is Turkic today is because beginning with the Gokturks, up till the Mongols, wave after wave of Turkic tribes eroded Iranic dominance over the region and killed a lot of people. Entire nations like the Khwarizmi, Sogdians and of the course Tocharians have all seized to exist as separate entities due to these bloody invasions.
 
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