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The Ghost of Prester John

@patocrator.bsky.social

356 followers 227 following 19 posts

I'm not actually here. I like making fake maps.

Posts Replies Media

The Ghost of Prester John @patocrator.bsky.social · 23/11/2024

Big map of an on-going series. What if the Arabs took Constantinople in AD 718/AH 100? Through the eyes of a fictional Islamic geographer, Al-Bayuri, this map explores a world completely remade. I had a lot of fun with place-names in this one. Full Post: www.reddit.com/r/imaginarym...

Hi-res alternate history map of "the House of Islam" at the close of the 8th Century, about 80 years after the fall of Constantinople to the Arabs in AD 718. The map is divided into light areas (under the power of the Caliphate), and dark areas outside of the Islamic world. In this timeline, most of the old Roman Empire is under Arab rule. Only a few areas remain independent: (using modern names) Transylvania, the Alps, Corsica, Sardinia, Brittany, the Basque lands, Asturias, Galicia, and the British Isles. In some places the Arabs advanced further than the Romans, taking lands north and east of the Danube (modern Hungary, Romania, and Czechia, as well as Bavaria and Franconia in Germania).

Most of the advances were in Europe, but this map includes deep Arab expansion into the Sahara, the Punjab, Afghanistan, and into the Western Tarim Basin.

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The Ghost of Prester John @patocrator.bsky.social · 22/11/2024

We didn't need a whole movie for Tacticool Christmas. This 5-min bit from 1994 was more than adequate.

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The Ghost of Prester John @patocrator.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

What if Russia was big? A small cabal of Russian nobles force Empress Anna to sign "The Conditions" of 1730, ushering in a very different 19th Century. Cossacks, freed serfs and European investment drive Russian expansion into the "Wild East." Full post: www.reddit.com/r/imaginarym...

Large political map of Eurasia and northeastern Africa in an alternate timeline circa 1867. Russia (in dark green) has annexed the former Qing Chinese territories of Eastern Turkestan, Mongolia, and Manchuria (in light green).

Other major changes to the map are in Europe, where the French Republic has survived under the Sieyes Constitution (General Bonaparte died in Egypt), the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth survived (albeit reorganized after a French-supported Revolution), Prussia does not exist, and the Ottoman Turks are experiencing a revival.

In Africa, the Ottomans hold large segments of the north, the Omani Empire has significant influence over the East African coast, and indigenous polities speckle the interior. European colonial enterprises, though present, have not yet pushed into the continent.

In Central Asia, the British and Russians (largely cooperating against the French-dominated Republican Bloc) have divided the region between themselves. The British Raj is organized slightly differently, and the Viceroy occupied the Tibetan State in retaliation for the 1866 Treaty of St. Petersburg (where the Russians converted the Governates of East Turkestan, Mongolia, and Manchuria from Russo-Chinese condominiums into formal Russian possessions). Tensions were diffused by the Treaty of Peking (1867).

In Southeast and East Asia the French have been particularly aggressive in their expansion, taking over Aceh and Cochinchina, and gaining Hainan and Formosa from the Peking agreement. Burma, Siam, Dai Nam, Johor, Brunei, Sulu, Bulungan, and Maguindanao remain independent in spite of European inroads. All three major European powers agreed to assist Qing against the massive Taiping rebellion. The Shogun of Japan and the Emperor of Korea are under increasing diplomatic and kinetic pressure to open their countries to Western influence. Australia (through colonization) and Alaska (through the Treaty of Peking) are the latest additions to the British Empire.

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The Ghost of Prester John @patocrator.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

What if Prester John was real? A scenario exploring a world where the medieval tales of a priestly king in the East weren't just a fiction. Full post: www.reddit.com/r/imaginarym...

Infographic map of The Crusade of Saint John of Cathay. In this scenario the Khitan Western Liao Dyansty defeats the Seljuk rump states in Khorasan under the leadership of Yelu Yokhan, a Nestorian Christian king. As the demands of his wars against the Turks draw his armies westwards, Yokhan is possessed by a sense of destiny to take Jerusalem from the Muslims shortly after the failed Fourth Crusade.

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The Ghost of Prester John @patocrator.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Alternate History scenario where Ottokar II beat the Habsburgs at Marchfeld. Though he successfully gains the assent of the German princes to become King of the Romans, he never comes to terms with the Pope and is never crowned Holy Roman Emperor. Full post: www.reddit.com/r/imaginarym...

Alternate History map showing the German lands of the Holy Roman Empire circa AD 1300. In gold are the lands of the Czech Premyslids: Bohemia, Moravia, Austria, Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, Friuli, Krakow, and scattered estates in Swabia and the Rhineland. Also illustrated are:

-the Wettins in Thuringia and Saxony (green)
-the Brandenburg branch of the Ascanians in Brandenburg, Saxony, and Pomerania (brown)
-the Wittelsbachs in Bavaria and the Palatinate (pale blue)
-the Habsburgs in Upper Swabia (red)
-the Luxembourgs in Upper Lotharingia (white)
-the Wassenbergs in Guelders and Limburg (dark blue)
-the Dampierres of Flanders (dark grey)

See my post on Reddit for the full narrative!

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