The Alternate Histories of Tony Jones

DISCLAIMER: The following is my opinion. You are free to disagree.

Tony Jones is perhaps the best author of alternate history on the Internet. His page can be found at:
http://www.wolfram.demon.co.uk/alternate_history_top.html

I do not know of a better author who publishes his alternate history scenarios online, available free of charge. Tony Jones vividly creates worlds, with detailed timelines and maps. Unfortunately, most of the worlds seem like hell to live in. Puritan World, and Superpunk (a cyberpunk Axis Powers victory scenario) both seem like a living hell. Monarchy World and Clive-Less World (where Robert Clive committed suicide before becoming the mighty British general who expelled the French from India) seem similarly unpleasant.

At first, Clive-Less World seemed to be a pleasant alternative, as the French supplanted the nefarious British Empire as an imperial power early on, but then when I remembered that the France was not the advanced, progressive, Revolutionary France, or the French Empire of Napoleon I. Rather, the alternate French Empire was the reactionary, absolutist pre-revolutionary France. In Clive-Less World, the French Revolution never occurs and Napoleon Bonaparte fades into obscurity. Nevertheless, Clive-Less World has a very fascinating and weird alternate technological development.

Tellus is so exotic, and foreign, and strange, that it almost appears downright silly. It is just too different from our world to compare. I can not decide if the world of Tellus would be a better place or worse place than OTL Earth.

The two more pleasant scenarios are Gurkani Alam and Wolfworld. In Gurkani Alam, the Mughal Empire survives much longer than it did OTL, and the Indian subcontinent is thus shielded from incurisions by European colonial empires. Mughal India becomes a counter to the Nations of Europe, but this more multipolar world leads to more cultural, political, scientific, social, and technological progress overall than OTL.

In Wolfworld, the last Ice Age never ends. Struggling Ice Age populations continue in the subglacial areas, but they must share the land with a species of sentient wolves called the Tathol. Further south, human cultures thrive in tropical and temperate climates. This is probably the most interesting of the Tony Jones alternate histories, but unfortunately, it is also the most premature. I wish he continued working on the scenario, providing more details about the human cultures, their society, their science and technology, and politics. While Tony Jones provided detailed timelines covering a few centuries of events, he rather briefly summarized over ten thousand years of history.

What became of the old Vahaplan Empire? How long did the sentient Tathol take to evolve in their present form? Did anyone ever attempt to domesticate the Tathol? These and other questions went unanswered. Also, the author mentioned "sixteen major wolf groupings," four in Eurasia and eight in North America. (That is only twelve, where are the other four?) Errors like that indicate that Wolfworld is a work in progress prematurely discontinued by the author. Apparently North America is uninhabited by humans. If the POD is merely a continuation of the last Ice Age, then it is probably too late to prevent human migrations across the Bering Strait into the New World. (The ancestors of the Amerinds arrived in North America before the Last Glacial Maximum, probably between 20,000 and 30,000 years ago. (Perhaps a little earlier?) But maybe in Wolfworld, humans never permanently inhabited most of North America due to competition with the Tathol so they continued southward.)

I am curious if anyone else is familiar with the works of Tony Jones, and I would like to hear some opinions on the various scenarios.

Personally, I found something very odd about the Gurkani Alam scenario. See if you can spot a rather obvious oddity on the map below:

mughal_world_map14.png






Anybody notice it? The Ottoman Empire somehow managed to survive AND thrive despite the fact that the Holy Russian Empire managed to annex Anatolia, now known as TURKEY, which the Russians conquered from Persia, and the Persians in turn conquered from the Ottomans. I can not imagine how an Ottoman Empire would survive, let alone thrive if Asia Minor was taken from the Turks. Perhaps an Ottoman successor state would rule much of the Middle East including Egypt, northern Sudan, and Lybia (the green area on the map so labeled Ottoman Empire), but there is no way they would hold the Southern Balkans after losing Anatolia, the stronghold of Ottoman/Turkish power.

In such a scenario, one would expect the Southern Balkans to break away almost instantaneously and the land to be divided between Greeks and Bulgarians. A super-Bulgaria and super-Greece would emerge, with Greece annexing all lands it did IOTL (though the northeastern frontier would look different) plus Cyprus, part of the Turkish Balkans (OTL) and perhaps the southern part of Albania. Bulgaria would keep the indigo area on the map plus FYROM, its OTL lands (though its southern border with Greece would look different) formerly occupied by Ottomans, and part of the Turkish Balkans. Essentially, Greece and Bulgaria would divide up Balkan Turkey in such a scenario and Greeks would claim Constantinople. Would war ever break out between a restored Greece and a resurgent Bulgaria? I am not sure as the author avoids that possibility, keeping the Southern Balkans as an Ottoman territory.

...Unless the Hellenic and Slavic people of the Southern Balkans were converted to Islam and assimilated into the Turkish population. That is the only way I can see such an Ottoman Empire existing. Apparently, in the world of Gurkani Alam all the Greeks were Turkicized.
 
I'm sure when he logs on to see this, he'll be quite flattered. :p

But seriously, Tony Jones's stuff is genius and quite well done if done a bit differently than how Thande and Jared do thier TLS, but when I'm working on something and I need a particular idea I look into Tony's body of work, which is creative and insightful.

But he should get on making another scenario. Something with a big germany, he seems to be missing those in most of his stuff.
 
Tony Jones is actualy a contributer to the boards here:D:p

His timelines are excellent, only made better by the amount of them. I myself can never finish them, and instead just like reading his descriptions on what the world looks like in modern times (map, politics, and technology).

But most of us do know who he is. Whenever he makes a new timeline, he usualy links us to it.

I myself have Monarchy World linked in my favourites:cool:
 
I'm sure when he logs on to see this, he'll be quite flattered. :p

But seriously, Tony Jones's stuff is genius and quite well done if done a bit differently than how Thande and Jared do thier TLS, but when I'm working on something and I need a particular idea I look into Tony's body of work, which is creative and insightful.

But he should get on making another scenario. Something with a big germany, he seems to be missing those in most of his stuff.

What are you talking about...look at this HRE!
puritan_world_europe2.png

ITS HUGE:D
 
Well yeah but it's merely a member of the octuple alliance and probably only a plurality German speaking and pocesses few to no colonies. Not an uber germany. But now I'm starting to sound like Susano...

What Tony Jones needs to have instead of uber Germany is uber Poland:cool:

Better, uber Germany and uber Poland in the same timeline:eek:. It can be done I tell you:D
 
I am curious if anyone else is familiar with the works of Tony Jones, and I would like to hear some opinions on the various scenarios.
Familiar? I’m certified fan of Tony Jones timelines.
Tony Jones is perhaps the best author of alternate history on the Internet.
He definitely is one of the best. His timelines were the first ones I read and for me they defined what a well written timeline is. Clive-less World is still one of my all-times favorite timelines.
Tony Jones vividly creates worlds,
It’s such a shame that other authors often neglect to write commentaries on differences in society and daily life.
with detailed timelines
While there are timelines with greater detail and deeper understanding of history, they are either not finished (Thande’s LTTW) or covering only a brief period of history (EdT’s Greater Britain.)
At first, Clive-Less World seemed to be a pleasant alternative, […]
Not to mention the Panopticon, eugenics and the threat of biological warfare.

(I have to get off the computer now, if you’re interested I can review the timelines in more detail later.)

BTW, I wonder whether Tony Jones is working on another timeline?
 
On the map of the world, why is Xhosaland in OTL's central Mozambique, when Xhosas come from what is OTL's south-eastern South Africa? In this ATL were the migration patterns of the Bantu people changed?
 
Originally Posted by Troyer IV
The Ottoman Empire is what you find strange about that map? Seriously?

Okay...

Actually, Troyer, I think it VERY strange. Let's break down the reasons.

Large (in area and population), powerful, advanced Ottoman Empire that survives to present day? Unusual, but by no means bizarre, impossible, or unthinkable.

Turkey gets conquered by a foreign power. (First Persia, then Russia.)
WEIRD!
Even IOTL, when the Ottoman Empire, at its weakest, was cannibalized by foreign imperial powers after the First World War, the Turks managed to keep foreign imperial ventures out of Anatolia.

But if any foreign powers can conquer Turkey, one would expect said conquest to be the end of the Ottoman Empire.

Ottoman Empire remains strong long after losing Turkey?
WEIRD!
I can't even think of a good analogy. How could the Ottomans be so powerful yet lose a centerpiece of their Empire. IOTL, the Ottomans lost everything except Turkey. TTL, the Ottomans kept everything except Turkey.

That would be like if the British Isles were invaded by a Gallo-German force in the 18th or 19th century, but a powerful British Empire survived, which never attempted to retake Britannia. How can any entity be powerful enough to maintain and even expand their empire but not powerful enough to defend their homeland.

Of course, one can imagine maybe, an Ottoman successor state that moves out of Anatolia in the event of invasion and continues elsewhere, but one that also controls a region where Muslims are the minority separated by water? That is borderline ASB. How could an Ottoman Empire lose Anatolia but keep the Southern Balkans. Remember that the Turks were a land power, and never a naval power.

Were such a scenario to occur, Greeks and Bulgarians would declare their independence overnight... unless in this TL the Greeks were converted to Islam and the Turkicization of the Hellenic peoples in Anatolia continued to the entire population. Perhaps what I find most bizarre, and dare I say, disturbing is that Gurkani Alam is a world without Greeks. It HAS to be for the TL to work.


Originally Posted by Fenrir_Angerboda
what appeared to be some sort of Giant Russia Controling Turkey, Japan, Korea and Alaska, and a 'Holy Chinese Empire' is what I found strange.

I agree. That too is very unusual. However, at least it is consistent. An uber-Russia of that magnitude is quite unexpected, but there is an internal consistency.

An Ottoman Empire that is both very powerful and very weak (so much so that they can not keep their homeland out of Persian or Russian hands) is not so consistent. Overall, I find this timeline to be very fascinating, but the particular piece I was talking about did not make sense.

Now that you mention it, the Russian conquest of Turkey is a common element, one might say cliche, in the Tony Jones scenarios, as seen on the map from Puritan World with the uber-Deutschland and the uber-Russia. HurganPL would throw a fit if he saw that map!
 
Ottoman Empire remains strong long after losing Turkey?
WEIRD!
I can't even think of a good analogy. How could the Ottomans be so powerful yet lose a centerpiece of their Empire. IOTL, the Ottomans lost everything except Turkey. TTL, the Ottomans kept everything except Turkey.
How about: It would be like Heraclius deciding to focus on defending Egypt, thereby losing Byzantium whilst keeping the African and Italian parts of the Byzantine Empire.
 
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