The Northern Dharma, Christian China, African Islam, Zoroastrian Persia, and the Viking Atlantic

Counterfactual timeline. Dates are approximate; “logically plausible” means using mechanisms that existed: merchant-monk networks, royal patronage of monasteries for literacy and medicine, absorption of local gods as protectors, Silk Road and maritime trade, steppe migration, and settler colonialism.

Core Structural Divergences

1. China becomes Christian. The Church of the East grows through Silk Road and maritime networks, survives Tang persecution as a popular movement, and becomes the court faith under the Cheng dynasty after 888. Buddhist and Taoist institutional elites flee west and by sea.
2. Buddhism and Taoism enter Europe from the north-east. Refugee monks and masters carry the Dharma and Taoist cultivation through Khazaria, the Volga, the Baltic, Scandinavia, Rus’, and Britannia. Local gods are promoted as bodhisattvas and dharmapalas. This becomes the Northern Dharma.
3. Islam turns south into Africa. After Egypt, the caliphate and Berber allies expand across the Sahara, Sahel, Nile, Horn, and Swahili coast. Iberia is never invaded. Persia survives as Zoroastrian; the Eastern Roman Empire survives as Christian.
4. Christianity is confined as a state civilization to the European provinces of the former Western Roman Empire—Gaul, Iberia, Italy, and the Alpine–Danubian marches—excluding Britannia, plus the surviving Eastern Roman Empire. North Africa is Muslim-ruled with Christian minorities.
5. The Americas are discovered and settled mainly by Norse, British, Irish, and Scandinavian peoples from the Northern Dharma Atlantic.

476–650: Collapse, Merchants, and First Footholds

• 476 — Europe: Western Roman Empire falls. Christianity remains the religion of bishops, cities, and landlords in Gaul, Iberia, Italy, and North Africa. Roman enforcement collapses in Britannia; Celtic and Anglo-Saxon politics are pagan or loosely Christian.
• c. 500–550 — Europe/Asia: Sogdian and Central Asian merchant communities establish small Buddhist chapels in Crimean, Khazar, and Volga river towns. These are merchant chaplaincies, not missions.
• c. 550–620 — Europe: The Khazar khagan adopts the Dharma as a court religion. Monks serve as scribes and diplomats; Tengri is reinterpreted as a dharmapala. The first steppe Buddhist state in Europe appears.
• 602–628 — Asia/Europe: Sassanid–Byzantine war exhausts both empires.
• 622 — Asia: The Hijra. Muhammad and his followers move from Mecca to Medina.
• 632 — Asia: Muhammad dies. Arab armies stand on the frontiers of two exhausted empires.
• 635 — Asia: Alopen arrives in Chang’an by the maritime route. He finds a small popular Christian movement already present among lower-class communities and maritime traders. The Tang court permits a monastery.
• 636–642 — Asia: The Persian Peace. Arab armies take Ctesiphon, but Sassanid forces hold the Zagros passes. A treaty fixes the frontier: Mesopotamia south of the Diyala to the Arabs; the Iranian plateau, Armenia, and Khorasan to Persia. Zoroastrian Persia survives.
• 639–642 — Africa: Egypt falls to the Arabs. Egypt becomes the caliphate’s African gateway.
• c. 650 — Europe: Buddhist houses reach Scandinavia and the Baltic through Volga and Norse trade. Kings patronize them for literacy, law, and medicine. Odin, Thor, and Freyja begin to be classified as bodhisattvas and dharmapalas.
• c. 650 — Asia: The popular Christian movement in China grows among lower-class communities, using Buddhist and Daoist vocabulary.

650–800: The Northern Opening and the African Turn

• 670 — Africa: Kairouan is founded as the base for the Islamization of North Africa and the Sahara.
• 680–750 — Africa: Berber conversions accelerate. Berber generals direct expansion south and west, not across the Strait of Gibraltar. Muslim merchants settle in Awdaghust, Walata, Gao, and Timbuktu. The Soninke kings of Ghana convert around 720.
• 711 — Europe/Africa: Iberia is never invaded. The Visigothic Christian kingdom fragments into rival Christian kingdoms, but Iberia remains Christian. Islam’s frontier runs along the Atlas and the Sahara.
• 717–718 — Europe/Asia: The Umayyads besiege Constantinople by land and sea. Greek fire, the Theodosian walls, and the Byzantine navy break the siege. Constantinople survives.
• c. 720–780 — Europe: Scandinavian and Baltic kings patronize Buddhist monasteries. Local assemblies—the thing—become lay institutions of the new religion. The old gods are promoted as bodhisattvas and protectors.
• c. 750–850 — Africa: The trans-Saharan golden age. Islam spreads among the Mande, Songhay, Kanuri, and Hausa. Kanem–Bornu converts around 800. The Sahara becomes a Muslim sea.
• c. 780 — Asia: A native Persian dynasty, the Karenids, reunifies the Iranian plateau and restores the Zoroastrian church. Fire temples are rebuilt; the Avesta is translated and commented on.
• c. 780–800 — Europe: The Thing of Uppsala formalizes the Northern Dharma. Kings are acclaimed by assemblies and consecrated by abbots—not by a pope. The Concord of Northern Abbeys links Uppsala, Novgorod, Bolghar, York, and Armagh.
• 800 — Europe: Charlemagne is crowned Emperor by the Pope in Rome. His Christian empire is powerful in Gaul and Italy, but it cannot conquer Saxony or the north: Saxon and Slavic chiefs have Buddhist monastic support and river-trade networks. The Rhine–Danube frontier hardens.

800–1000: Christian China, Northern Dharma, and the African Caliphates

• c. 820–900 — Europe: The Rus’ kings convert to the Northern Dharma. Monasteries at Novgorod and Kyiv become centers of Slavic letters, law, and medicine. Local gods are honored as bodhisattvas and protectors.
• 843 — Europe: The Treaty of Verdun partitions the Carolingian Empire. Regional monasteries become real centers of power in the Christian West.
• c. 850–880 — Asia: The Abbasid caliphate weakens in the east because Persia is Zoroastrian and outside the caliphate. The Islamic world divides into eastern and western caliphates; its center of gravity shifts toward Africa.
• 875–884 — Asia: The Huang Chao Rebellion devastates Tang China. Christian networks in Sichuan and the Huai valley provide mutual aid and militias.
• c. 882 — Asia: Li Kan, Prince of Shu, converts to the Church of the East. His conversion gives him access to Christian communal networks, hospitals, grain reserves, and militia organization.
• 883–888 — Asia: Li Kan raises the Compassionate Army, proclaims the Tang mandate forfeited, and promises toleration for Buddhists and Daoists who ally with him. Civil war is protracted and devastating.
• 888 — Asia: Li Kan is acclaimed Emperor Chengwu, founder of the Cheng dynasty. He is China’s first Christian emperor.
• 890 — Asia: Chengwu takes Chang’an. Christianity becomes the favored court religion under a triple formula: Christian worship and charity; Confucian rites and filial order; Buddhist and Daoist toleration.
• 893–910 — Asia: The Cheng state reverses the Huichang Suppression. Large Buddhist and Taoist monasteries are dissolved; lands go to Christian hospitals, schools, and the state. Clergy must convert, laicize, or leave. Baptismal registration gives Christians tax and office privileges.
• 896–1000 — Asia/Europe: The First and Second Exiles. Buddhist and Taoist abbots, canon-holders, alchemists, physicians, and printers flee west along the steppe road—Dunhuang, Turpan, Kucha, Khotan, Samarkand, Merv, the Volga–Khazar zone—and by sea to Srivijaya, India, Korea, and Japan. They carry sutras, Taoist canons, medical texts, alchemical manuals, printing blocks, and the memory of a destroyed civilization.
• c. 965 — Europe: The Khazar khagan grants land near Itil to Buddhist monks and Taoist masters. The First Abbey of the Steppe is founded: a walled compound with a Buddha hall, a Taoist shrine, a scriptorium, a hospital, and a paper mill. It teaches the Northern Dharma as a single tradition.
• c. 970–990 — Europe: The Volga Bulgars patronize a House of the Two Ways at Bolghar. Translation centers render Chinese medical texts into Arabic and Turkic, Taoist alchemical manuals into Arabic, and Buddhist sutras into Turkic. Paper and woodblock printing reach the Volga and Rus’ towns.
• 985–1010 — Europe: The Rus’ Conversion. Vladimir of Kyiv chooses the Northern Dharma. He is acclaimed by the druzhina, consecrated by the abbot of the First Abbey, and anointed by a Taoist master with the Two Seals. The Rus’ state becomes the first large European kingdom of the Northern Dharma.
• c. 1000 — Americas: Norse explorers reach Vinland. Early attempts at settlement are small and contested, but they leave knowledge of the western lands in Norse, Irish, and British maritime networks.

1000–1200: Mature Northern Dharma, Christian West, and the Viking Atlantic

• 1035 — Europe: The Synod of Uppsala formalizes the Northern Dharma. Thor is declared a protector-bodhisattva and thunder-dharmapala; Freyja a compassion-bodhisattva and mistress of healing elixirs; Odin a wisdom-bodhisattva and master of runes; Baldr a dying-and-returning bodhisattva; Hel a guardian of the dead; Loki is bound as a method. The Concord of Northern Abbeys is confirmed.
• c. 1000–1100 — Europe: The Christian West consolidates in the old Roman provinces. The papacy reforms itself into a territorial and moral power in Italy. Frankish, Iberian, and Italian Christian kingdoms defend the Rhine–Danube frontier.
• c. 1050–1100 — Europe: Britannia is integrated into the Northern Dharma through Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Irish Sea networks. The Synod of York confirms the old gods as bodhisattvas and dharmapalas. Christian minorities survive in Wales and Cornwall, but Britannia is no longer a Christian civilization.
• 1054 — Europe: The East–West Schism divides Rome and Constantinople. It matters less globally because the Latin West is confined to the old Roman West and the north is Buddhist.
• 1071 — Europe/Asia: Seljuk pressure damages the Eastern Roman Empire, but the Taurus passes and the Byzantine navy hold. Anatolia is raided, not conquered. There is no Latin Crusade, because there is no Latin Christian Europe beyond the old Roman frontier to launch one. The Eastern Roman Empire survives.
• c. 1100–1200 — Americas: Sustained Northern Dharma settlement of the North Atlantic begins. Population pressure, monastic landholding, and princely competition push Norse, Irish, Welsh, Scots, and English settlers westward through Iceland, Greenland, and Vinland. Settlements are small but permanent: fishing stations, monastic farms, trading posts, and mixed Norse–indigenous communities.
• c. 1100–1200 — Asia: Cheng China enjoys commercial and cultural efflorescence. Christianity is the court religion; Buddhist and Daoist institutions survive as tolerated minorities. The Chinese Church begins to develop vernacular liturgy and married clergy.
• c. 1100–1200 — Africa: Muslim empires expand in the Sahel. Timbuktu and Gao become centers of trade and Islamic learning. The Swahili city-states flourish on the East African coast.
• c. 1100–1200 — Asia: India remains mostly Hindu and Buddhist, with Muslim coastal communities and Zoroastrian Parsi communities. Japan and Korea receive Chinese Buddhist canons from the diaspora and resist Christian missions from China.

1200–1400: Mongols, Plague, and the Christian Ming Restoration

• 1206–1260 — Asia/Europe: The Mongol Empire rises. It conquers Rus’ and presses both Christian and Northern Dharma Europe, but it does not destroy either. The Mongol khans patronize Buddhist, Christian, Zoroastrian, and Muslim clergy for administrative reasons.
• 1254 — Asia: The Debate of Qaraqorum brings Buddhist, Taoist, Christian, Muslim, Zoroastrian, and Confucian scholars together. European Northern Dharma monks meet Chinese Christians and Chinese Buddhist and Taoist refugees. The first global religious exchange begins.
• 1258 — Asia: Baghdad falls to the Mongols, but Persia is not conquered: the Zoroastrian Karenid armies and the Zagros mountains check the Mongols. The Ilkhanate rules Mesopotamia and western Persia, patronizing Buddhism and Islam while leaving the Iranian plateau to the Zoroastrian monarchy.
• 1271–1290 — Asia: Kublai Khan conquers the Southern Cheng. The Yuan dynasty favors Tibetan Buddhism and Islam but tolerates and employs Church of the East Christians. Christianity in China is no longer the court religion, but it remains a large minority, especially in the south. The Chinese Church autocephalizes in practice.
• c. 1300–1400 — Americas: The Viking Atlantic expands. Scandinavian and British Isles kingdoms sponsor colonies along the North American coast and into the St. Lawrence and Mississippi corridors. Northern Dharma missionaries accompany settlers; local indigenous spirits and gods are classified as dharmapalas and local bodhisattvas.
• 1347–1351 — World: The Black Death devastates Europe, the Islamic world, Persia, and China. In the Northern Dharma, lay preachers teach meditation and lay ethics without monastic ordination. In the Christian West, penitential movements and papal reform strengthen the church’s grip on the old Roman provinces.
• 1368 — Asia: A native rebellion drives the Mongols out of China. Its leader—a Christian militia captain from the Huai valley—founds the Ming dynasty, is baptized, and takes the reign title Hongwu. The Ming court re-establishes Christianity as the favored court religion and reorganizes the Church of the East as the Great Luminous Church, with a Chinese patriarch at Nanjing, married clergy, vernacular liturgy, and Confucian civil rites.
• c. 1380–1400 — Asia: Christianity becomes the religion of the Chinese court, exam elite, and a large share of cities. Christian population in China proper reaches roughly 25–30 percent. Buddhist and Daoist institutions survive as tolerated minorities and rural practices.

1400–1500: Ming Christianity, Zoroastrian Persia, and the Surviving Eastern Roman Empire

• 1405–1433 — Asia/Africa: The Ming treasure fleets sail under Christian banners. They reach Southeast Asia, India, and East Africa. Diaspora churches are founded in Malacca, Calicut, and Mogadishu. The court presents itself as a universal Christian empire—not Catholic, not Orthodox, but Chinese Church of the East.
• c. 1400–1500 — Europe: The Northern Dharma and the Christian West coexist. Christian kingdoms in Gaul, Iberia, Italy, and the Alpine–Danubian marches accept papal spiritual authority and assemblies. Northern Dharma kingdoms accept abbatial consecration and legal toleration. Border wars along the Rhine–Danube are frequent but inconclusive.
• 1453 — Europe/Asia: A Muslim Anatolian coalition besieges Constantinople. The city does not fall. Greek fire, the Theodosian walls, Genoese and Venetian allies, and a Northern Dharma fleet that prefers a weak Christian Constantinople to a strong Muslim power astride the straits break the siege. The Eastern Roman Empire survives as a rump state around Constantinople, Thrace, the Aegean coast, and Egypt. Constantinople never falls to a foreign conqueror.
• c. 1480–1500 — Asia: The Ming state expands Christian schooling and printing. Christian population reaches 40–45 percent. A Buddhist–Daoist revival movement appears in the south, demanding toleration; it is suppressed but leaves a lasting folk-religious underground.
• c. 1480–1500 — Africa: The Adal Sultanate, a Muslim state of the Horn of Africa, with Mamluk and Yemeni support and firearms, conquers the Ethiopian highlands. The Ethiopian Empire falls; the Ethiopian Church survives as a protected minority under Muslim rule. With the fall of Ethiopia, the last Christian state in Africa is gone.
• c. 1500 — Americas: Northern Dharma settlement is permanent along the North Atlantic and into the North American interior. Mixed Norse–British–indigenous communities develop. Mesoamerican and Andean civilizations remain intact but are increasingly drawn into Atlantic trade networks.

1500–1600: The Chinese Church Reform and the Confessional Map

• c. 1520–1560 — Asia: The Chinese Church Reform standardizes vernacular liturgy, establishes seminaries, and defines a Chinese Christian theology that incorporates Confucian ethics and Buddhist-style compassion while rejecting rebirth and polytheism. The Church remains autocephalous, in loose communion with other Church of the East communities. It is not under Rome.
• c. 1550–1600 — Europe: Britannia is fully integrated into the Northern Dharma. Christian remnants in Wales and Cornwall are tolerated as minorities but have no established church. The Christian zone is now clearly the European provinces of the former Western Roman Empire—Gaul, Iberia, Italy, and the Alpine–Danubian marches—plus the Eastern Roman Empire.
• c. 1550–1600 — Africa: The Songhay Empire dominates the Niger bend. Timbuktu becomes a great center of Islamic learning. Kanem–Bornu dominates the Lake Chad basin. The Swahili city-states flourish. Muslim traders round the Cape and settle in Madagascar and the Cape of Good Hope. The Kongo adopts a syncretic Muslim royal cult. Coptic Egypt and Ethiopia survive as Christian minorities under Muslim rule.
• c. 1550–1600 — Asia: Japan receives the Chinese Buddhist canon and Taoist alchemical lineages from Southern Dharma refugees. By 1600 Japan is a Buddhist great power with a strong monastic establishment and a growing commercial economy. The Tokugawa shogunate limits contact with Christian China and Northern Dharma Europe.
• c. 1550–1600 — Americas: The Viking Atlantic expands into permanent settler commonwealths. Northern Dharma monasteries, farms, and trading posts dot the North Atlantic and North American interior. Indigenous religions survive in modified forms, blended with Northern Dharma and local bodhisattva cults.

1600–1776: Enlightenment, Empires, and the World of 1776

• c. 1600–1700 — Europe: The Christian West and the Northern Dharma both produce Enlightenments. Christian scholars in Italy, Gaul, and Iberia reconcile faith with science. Northern Dharma scholars historicize the Buddha, interpret the northern gods as bodhisattvas or culture-heroes, and develop comparative religion.
• c. 1600–1700 — Asia: The Qing conquer China in 1644. The Manchu ruling house converts to Christianity before entering Beijing and adopts the Ming Christian state church. Christianity remains the court religion; Buddhist, Daoist, and Muslim communities are tolerated. Christian population rises to 55–60 percent.
• c. 1600–1700 — Africa: The African Muslim empires consolidate. The Funj Sultanate dominates the Nile Sudan. The Swahili Confederation resists European and Persian pressure. The Cape Muslim settlements grow into a prosperous commercial colony. The Sahara is a Muslim sea; the Sahel is a zone of Muslim empires, trade, and scholarship.
• c. 1600–1700 — Americas: The Atlantic world is dominated by Northern Dharma powers from Scandinavia and the British Isles. Settler commonwealths expand in North America; mixed Northern Dharma–indigenous societies develop in the interior. Christian Iberian and Gaulish states focus on the Mediterranean and North Africa; they do not displace the Viking Atlantic.
• c. 1650–1750 — Asia: Zoroastrian Persia modernizes slowly, adopting gunpowder weapons, centralizing administration, and patronizing science. A Persian Enlightenment begins: Zoroastrian scholars reconcile faith with Greek philosophy and Indian science. The Avesta is printed; fire temples are built in every province.
• c. 1700–1776 — Europe: Constitutional settlements spread. Christian kingdoms accept assemblies and papal spiritual authority. Northern Dharma kingdoms accept assemblies, abbatial consecration, and legal toleration. The Eastern Roman Empire becomes a Christian constitutional monarchy.
• 1776 — World Map:   - Christian zone: Gaul, Iberia, Italy, and the Alpine–Danubian marches, plus the Eastern Roman Empire in the Balkans, western Anatolia, the Aegean, and Egypt. The West is papal; the East is Orthodox.   - Northern Dharma zone: Scandinavia, the Baltic, Rus’, northern Germania, and Britannia. Local gods are honored as bodhisattvas and dharmapalas. Kings are acclaimed by assemblies and consecrated by abbots.   - China: a Christian-majority empire under the Great Luminous Church of the East, with Confucian civil rites and tolerated Buddhist, Daoist, and Muslim minorities.   - Persia: a Zoroastrian monarchy, the great power of the Middle East.   - Africa: Muslim political hegemony from the Mediterranean to the Cape; Coptic and Ethiopian Christians survive as protected minorities.   - The Americas: discovered by Viking explorers and settled largely by peoples from the British Isles and Scandinavia. Northern Dharma settler commonwealths dominate the North Atlantic and North American interior.   - Oceania: Polynesian Buddhist chiefdoms in Hawaii, Tahiti, and Rapa Nui; Northern Dharma and Muslim trading posts along the coasts; Aboriginal Australian religions largely intact.

1776–1911: Revolutions, Industry, and the Multipolar World of 1911

• c. 1780–1800 — Americas: The Federated Commonwealth of Vinland and other Northern Dharma settler republics declare independence from Scandinavian and British crowns. They adopt constitutions with freedom of worship, abbatial representation, and lay assemblies. Indigenous nations negotiate treaties and retain internal autonomy in many regions.
• c. 1790–1810 — Europe: The Christian West experiences constitutional revolutions. The papacy accepts a constitutional Italian kingdom; the pope retains Rome and spiritual authority. The Eastern Roman Empire becomes a parliamentary monarchy under the Treaty of Pera, guaranteed by Northern Dharma and Zoroastrian powers.
• c. 1800–1850 — World: Industrialization begins in the Northern Dharma north—Scandinavia, northern Germania, Britannia, and Rus’—and in Christian Italy, Gaul, and Iberia. Zoroastrian Persia industrializes in Isfahan and Shiraz. Christian China industrializes in the Yangtze delta and Guangdong. Muslim African empires industrialize more slowly, but Timbuktu and Kano become centers of manufacturing and trade.
• c. 1820–1850 — Africa: The Sokoto Caliphate, Segu Empire, Kanem–Bornu, Funj Sultanate, Swahili Confederation, and Cape Muslim settlements expand. The scramble for Africa is a multipolar scramble among Northern Dharma, Christian, Zoroastrian, and Muslim powers—not a European monopoly.
• c. 1850–1870 — Asia: A Christian millenarian rebellion in China demands a constitutional Christian republic and land reform. It is crushed after a bloody civil war, but it forces the Qing to adopt a constitution in 1868: the emperor remains head of state and defender of the faith; a parliament is created; religious toleration is guaranteed for Buddhists, Daoists, and Muslims.
• c. 1850–1870 — Africa: The Sokoto Caliphate undergoes a reform movement that standardizes Islamic law, expands education, and promotes trade. The Swahili city-states form a confederation. Coptic and Ethiopian Christian minorities receive legal protection and religious toleration under Muslim rule.
• c. 1880–1900 — Asia: China is a Christian-majority nation: roughly 55–60 percent Christian, 20 percent Buddhist/Daoist, 15 percent Confucian/non-religious, and 5–10 percent Muslim and other. Christian institutions dominate higher education, charity, and law; Buddhist and Daoist institutions survive as tolerated minorities.
• 1893 — Europe: The Great Assembly of the Ways is held in Rome, hosted by the papacy. Northern Dharma, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist, Zoroastrian, Jewish, and indigenous delegates meet to discuss the future of religion in a world of empires, industry, and science. It establishes a permanent International Concord for dialogue, scholarship, and pilgrimage.
• c. 1900 — Americas: The Northern Dharma republics of North America are industrial and constitutional. Indigenous nations retain autonomy in several interior regions. Mixed Northern Dharma–indigenous religions flourish. Christian Iberian and Gaulish colonies in the Caribbean and South America remain marginal compared with the Northern Dharma Atlantic.
• c. 1900 — Oceania: Polynesian Buddhist kingdoms in Hawaii, Tahiti, and Rapa Nui are constitutional monarchies. Northern Dharma and Muslim trading posts dot Australia and New Zealand. Aboriginal Australian religions survive in modified forms after catastrophic frontier violence.
• 1905–1910 — Asia: The Qing introduce a constitutional assembly and a modern school system. Christian reformers, nationalist students, Buddhist and Daoist revivalists, and provincial elites demand a republic.
• 1911 — Asia: The Xinhai Revolution overthrows the Qing. The Republic of China is proclaimed as a secular plural republic with a Christian heritage: Christianity remains the largest religion and the heritage of the court, but the constitution guarantees freedom of worship and does not establish a state church. Confucian rites are retained as civil ceremonies; Buddhist, Daoist, and Muslim communities have legal protection and public representation.
• 1911 — Europe: The Christian West is a family of constitutional kingdoms and republics under papal spiritual authority. The Northern Dharma zone stretches from Ireland to the Urals, divided between Inner Way, Outer Way, and Broad Way interpretations of the northern bodhisattvas and Taoist cultivation. The Eastern Roman Empire still exists as a small Orthodox Christian constitutional monarchy around Constantinople, Thrace, and the Aegean. Constantinople has never fallen to a foreign conqueror.
• 1911 — Africa: Islam is the religion of the overwhelming majority from the Mediterranean to the Cape. The Sokoto Caliphate, Segu Empire, Kanem–Bornu, Funj Sultanate, Swahili Confederation, and Cape Muslim settlements are independent or semi-independent powers. Timbuktu is a global center of Islamic learning. Coptic Egypt and Ethiopia survive as ancient Christian minorities under Muslim rule.
• 1911 — Asia: Zoroastrian Persia is a constitutional monarchy and the great power of the Middle East, with a global Zoroastrian diaspora. India is mostly Hindu and Buddhist, with Muslim coastal communities, Zoroastrian Parsi communities, and St. Thomas Christian communities. Japan is a Buddhist great power. Tibet is a Buddhist theocracy. Southeast Asia is a patchwork of Buddhist kingdoms, Muslim sultanates, and Chinese Christian trading communities.
• 1911 — Americas: The Northern Dharma settler republics dominate North America. Indigenous nations retain internal autonomy in many regions. Mixed Northern Dharma–indigenous religions flourish. Christian Iberian and Gaulish states retain Caribbean and South American colonies, but the Atlantic is shaped mainly by the Viking settlement legacy.
• 1911 — Global Order: The world is multipolar. No single civilization, religion, or empire dominates. The great religious experiments of the post-Roman world have matured into enduring civilizations—Christian Romania in the West and East, the Northern Dharma in the north, Christian China, Zoroastrian Persia, and Muslim Africa—each with its own gods, scriptures, empires, and dreams of the future.