Atlas Altera
is an Alternate History project based on a world with much more cultural, linguistic, ethnic, and religious diversity than our own (as well as a few geographical changes).
It provides examples of:
- Alternate History Wank: This could be considered a wank for the concept of diversity itself, but also for all the stateless nations today — this world has dozens of Australian Aboriginal and Native American states, not to mention the rest of the world. In terms of religion, pretty much every religion other than Christianity and Islam gets wanked (and even Islam spreads further than in our world, being the majority in several states in South America, Australia, and Papua).
- This world has 23 Jewish states (more than half of which are in Africa).
- All around the world, indigenous peoples managed to hold on to and revitalize their original religions and cultures; the Hauniuism of Polynesia, Incanism of South America, Toltecism of Central America, the Kachinaism, Wakandaism, and Kappism of North America, the Sarnaism of India, and the Donipoloism of Southeast Asia, to name a few. All of these are state or at least majority religions in several countries.
- Zoroastrianism (here called Mazdaism) has a much more extensive reach, dominating Central Asia and reaching as far west as Anatolia and the Balkans.
- Gnostic religions like Druze, Manichaeism, Mandaeism, and Bogomilism all have their own states.
- Likewise for Jains, Sikhs, Yazidis, and Yarsanis.
- African diasporic religions like Vodou and to a lesser extent Rastafari are also widespread, and many nations back in Africa follow Vodou or a related tradition.
- Hinduism is prevalent across the Indian Ocean, from Mozambique and Madagascar to Papua and Australia.
- Buddhism has spread throughout East Asia, including far-east Siberia, and the Pacific Northwest of North America.
- Alternative Calendar: The Society of Nations uses one based on the positivist calendar, though with the months named simply by number rather than after people.
- Author Appeal: The creator, Telamon Tabulicus, is very into languages and history, and it shows in the maps and lore.
- Balkanize Me: This world has more than one thousand countries, not to mention subnational divisions. Mainland Papua and Australia alone each have more than 50 countries, not including islands surrounding them. The British Isles alone have nine countries.
- Cadre of Foreign Bodyguards: The Illiya (the Old City of Jerusalem) has a force similar to the OTL Vatican Guard, composed of Samaritans (who are native to the region, but have no religious connection to Jerusalem themselves, making them a perfect neutral force).
- Common Tongue: The international auxiliary language is a Signed Language based on Plains Indian Sign Language.
- Culture Chop Suey: Most of the countries are distinct real-world cultures, but many are vastly different from the ones we know. For instance, most of Tamiria (Australia) follows Hinduism, but still speaks their native languages. The author has also mentioned that some Hindus back in Indea have incorporated deities based on the Rainbow Serpent into their cosmology.
- Easter Egg:
- In Central Asia, you'll find a country named Narnia. This is completely supported by historical linguistics, though."From the Mongol or Khalkinese word nariin or naryn, meaning “narrow,” referring to the narrow fertile lands of this country, or perhaps to the chokepoints in the parts of the silk road that run through it."
- Also in Central Asia, one of the scripts used is tengwar.
- In Central Asia, you'll find a country named Narnia. This is completely supported by historical linguistics, though.
- Fictional United Nations: The Society of Nations has somewhat more power than our world's UN, and administers several regions covered under The Neutral Zone.
- Istanbul (Not Constantinople): Many countries have completely different names than the ones we know, and some names we're familiar with are used for other locations. For example, Brittany in this world is called "Wales", and "Iceland" is the name for the Svalbard islands. The "Black Sea" refers to the giant gulf dividing Europea from Siberea, while what we know as the Black Sea is called the Sperian Sea. Australia is called Tamiria, while the name Australia is used for a large island where the underwater Kerguelen Plateau is in our world.
- Modern Mayincatec Empire: Many indigenous peoples of the Americas (which are collectively called Gemina in this timeline) were able to achieve or maintain their own independence, leading to states like the Tawantinsuyu of Peru and the Chicuexcan of Nicaragua (stretching from mid-Mexico to mid-Panama).
- The Neutral Zone:
- Several regions, most notably Xingu in Crucea (South America) and Jagana in central Africa, are special reserves administered by the Society of Nations to preserve the indigenous peoples and wildlife.
- Holy places of some major world religionsnote are their own independent city-states.
- Other regions like Antarctica and some Arctic islands have Society of Nations research stations as their only population.
- Chernobyl is surrounded by the "Zone of Alienation", uninhabitable because of the nuclear disaster there.
- The Suez and Panama Canal Zones are also Society of Nations territories.
- Never Was This Universe: The geographic changes (large seas in the middle of Australia and Siberia, enlarged lakes in Africa and North America, and extra islands scattered around the world) make it clear this world has been different from the beginning of its history.
- Phantasy Spelling: Some continents and regions are spelled slightly different, like "Europea" and "Asea" (which here refers only to the Middle East).
- Point of Divergence: Atlas Altera does not involve a single POD, but instead many ways history might have gone different.
- Vestigial Empire: Chernorus is a Russian state east of the "Black Sea" (the giant gulf in the middle of Siberia) that is The Remnant of the White (anti-communist) forces. It's not a monarchy, though. Similarly to Taiwan in OTL, it still claims the entirety of Russia and is technically still at war with Russia.
- Vikings In America: The Norse founded the country of Windmark in what would have been Newfoundland.
- Willing Suspension of Disbelief: The authors acknowledge that they're not going for realism so much as highlighting the world's rich ethnolinguistic diversity.
