What do you see as overused settings in Alternate History

Or in North America... if L'Anse aux Meadows hadn't been deserted...!

 

I assume you mean after a period of Saxon rule, like after the battle of Stamford bridge (1066) when the english throne was in shambles, because there is already a Norse settlement in the north of England and was part of the Viking rule for a while, its called York (or Yorvik in Norse). The norse ruled Northern England for quite along time. That's why Norfolk and areas around there is known as Anglia as that was the original England. Up north after the 9th century invasion was known as Danelaw. Later it also became Northumberia as viking control waned. However around 937 it fell to Wessex rule (another english kingdom. The kingdoms of East Anglia, Mercia, Wessex and Northumbria)
If the country became totally under continuted Norse rule that would be interesting.
However I may have got my history wrong. Last time I looked into that I was 15.

 

Pretty much anything involving the Axis/Allies in WWII

 

played a mod to a war game - the general thrust of the mod was the Phillipines vs. the USA. Using a canoe and 7 spear throwers I invaded just south of San Francisco to avoid the harbor and military installation. When the AI loaded up to sail off for an invasion I attacked the base, destroyed everything and absconded with a captured destroyer. Eventually I forced the USA into peace talks Was a great mod. Unbalanced.

 

I agree that recent history should be avoided because it has already been done, redone then done some more. It would be interesting to take some pivotal point in ancient history and change things around. Your idea about re-writing the events between Carthage and the Romans is a good one.

 

It would be interesting although it would take a lot of work to make it seem at least someway plausible to take a point in history e.g. Carthage defeating Rome, and then bringing it forward a little. Like I'd imagine, although not 100% my area of expertise, but a suppressed Rome would lead to a significantly different medieval Europe, with the Mediterranean becoming yet more influenced by North African culture.

Axis vs Allies might be so popular a setting because of how recent the events are and it is easy from our point of view to map out what could have happened if the Allies lost. Also, very opposite ideologies are easy to extrapolate.

 

For me, anything involving an apocalypse, swarms of zombies, alternative histories, global warming and teenagers suddenly discovering they have a magical power or inherited a powerful talisman of some description are all done to death. ESPECIALLY if somebody thinks they have a new take on it.

If you like pivot points in history, possibly one of the greatest is the establishment of the library of Alexandria from 300BC.
For the first time knowledge was accumulated and shared rather than jealously guarded. This lead to a revolution in thought, philosophy and learning. More importantly it led to a change in attitudes towards knowledge. Would the development of the civilisations that sprung from the Mediterranean have evolved the same attitudes and philosophies without the patronage that supported it? I have spotted that this could be an alternative history scenario - which is fine if it isn't a, what if somebody else had won WWI or WWII.

 

I would like Alternative History pivoting on the Middle East/Asia; as it has been said, Europe/America tends to be the popular route.

I think the only alternative histories I've read are generally focused on US or Great Britain

I think it would be interesting if something changed with perhaps the Silk Road (with the cultural and religious exchanges from the far to near East & back again). Like what would China and Japan look like without the incredible influences of (Mahayana) Buddhism?

 

For an alternate history outside of the usual "Nazis won "WWII/ The South won the American Civil War" tropes, check out Kim Stanley Robinson's The Years of Rice and Salt. It's a world where the Black Plague basically made white people extinct, so everything takes place driven by Asia, Africa, and the New World.

 

I've been working on an alternative history/fantasy project that involves our contemporary world with a stagnant technology - steam powered trains and ships, electricity, and infrastructure that have not progressed since the 1920s or so; largely because the discovery and development of magic like abilities a hundred years ago undermined further emphasis on technology, so that the 21st century is still largely steam powered with magical enhancement. I have the idea that our current transport system was already in place by the 1960s (interstate highways, high speed rail , 747s, space travel including manned flights to the moon). In other words we get around today much like we did fifty years ago; aside from s few enhancements and increases in scale. Suppose this stagnation with transport and other forms of technology occurred a hundred years ago so that steamtrains, Steam powered ocean liners, and the like became permanent.
History progressed differently - some of the nineteenth century empires still exist, the world wars never happened, and the fascist and communist movements never quite became as prominent as they did in reality. But this is more of a backdrop for a plot centered on a community in this alternate world.

 

That sounds interesting. Did your world not have an IT revolution, or has the equivalent developed through magic?

 

Hey! Every time I play Civilization Revolution, it is Aztecs for the win!

Looks like the overused ones have been listed. Here's one I think about- What if civilizations did not disappear alone (each culture/civ meets another before it dies & the other has it's history, or part, things have not been lost to time, legendary ancient libraries are still intact), and if technology was not forgotten.

 

Iain:

I haven't decided about the computers yet. The combustible engine and the use of fossil fuels never caught on because inherent magical powers in conjunction with steam are used in place of that. I am debating if I want more sophisticated communications like cell phones and computers, or if I want to keep that at a lower tech level - telegraph, telephone and perhaps radio, like what was state of the art in 1920 - with maybe some rudimentary computing for coding or managing databases. Perhaps telepathy or other mental capabilities will make it unnecessary.

 

Will there be a faction somewhere that stayed away from magic and stayed mechanical? As far as mobile phones go, they were patented and used before Bell (or whoever) gave us the landline, they were very low tech. For a rudimentary computing system, you may want to look into the Babbage machine, and think about a mechanical memory and print system.

 

So ... question. (I know this thread hasn't been touched in 8 years, but please bear with me).

I wrote several novel-sized stories that include the Romans. One is a political conspiracy, with jokes, set in the Rome of Vespasian. Another is set right after the war with Hannibal, where a reluctant gladiator discovers his true destiny and eventually escapes Italy. (Of course, it's never as simple as that!)

Is this "way overdone"? I wouldn't have thought so!

As Oscar Leigh pointed out, the Roman period is huge - from the 8th century BC to the 4th century AD. That's 1,200 years to play with. Why not write a novel set during the Roman Republic? Or even the period where Rome had kings? Or earlier?

There are always new ways to freshen up a period that everybody uses.

 

There is an Alternative History website. Most of the posts are from amateur authors who want to replicate the relative success of John Jakes and Eric Flint.

I'm not linking it - it's easily found.

 

Harry Turtledove, who some have called the master of alternate history, has done the World War series where WWII was interrupted by an alien invasion. His multi-series world on American history starting with a different outcome for the civil war. Or his Atlantis series where the discovery of American goes very differently from history.

As for suggestions. What if Rome discovered American, and clashed with the Aztec, or Inca civilization? Or the Mongols don't pull back because of the death of Genghis, and conquer Europe? There are an infinite numerous of seeming minor events in history that could ripple into major changes in outcome.

 

Yes, but the important question about alternate history is: is it plausible? In other words, could it have happened without supernatural or alien interference?

Of course there are infinite suggestions, but "Rome discovering America" is not plausible because, given their existing technology, they could never have crossed the Atlantic. Besides, the Romans were proverbially very poor sailors.

The Mongols not pulling back upon Genghis Khan's death? Slightly more plausible, but you're not giving enough credence to Mongol tradition and human inclination to fight over power.

Alien invasion and Atlantis clearly go out the window, especially as Atlantis was never a real place. The only mention of Atlantis is in Plato's works, Timaeus and Critias. It literally means 'the island of Atlas'. It is a fictional island, mentioned as part of an allegory on the hubris of nations. It doesn't exist, and never has.

Examples like these are not alternate history; they're either fantasy or wish-fulfilment, like the Aztecs suddenly having nuclear weapons.

Alternate history is a different, and much more rigorous, discipline. It seeks to focus on a particular tiny point in history and ask: how would this have changed the bigger picture?

There are numerous points in history where this could've happened. For instance, consider Annie Oakley, the famous sharpshooter. For years and years, she and her husband ran a show that promoted her as a sharpshooter. She was so accurate that she could blow the ashes off his cigar.

In the Butler and Oakley act, Annie often shot corks out of bottles, snuffed out candle flames, and shot the ashes off of cigarettes. One such performance took place in St. Paul, Minnesota, in March of 1884, with Chief Sitting Bull in the audience.

While the Wild West show was performing in Europe in 1890 and 1891, Crown Prince Wilhelm visited several times and watched Annie shoot the ashes off of cigarettes which Frank held in his mouth. Intrigued, Wilhelm asked Annie to shoot his cigarette. Annie put the cigarette in Wilhelm's hand and not his mouth.

Some uncharitable people later ventured that if Annie would have shot Wilhelm and not his cigarette, she could have prevented World War I. Indeed, after WWI started, Annie is known to have written to Wilhelm and asked for a repeat performance. He never answered.

Would World War I have started under a different German ruler? Probably not. Of course, it's impossible to say for certain whether World War I would have happened anyway, even if Wilhelm had been removed from the picture. Historical events are shaped by numerous complex factors. But his leadership and foreign policy decisions certainly played a significant role in the lead-up to the war. His aggressive and expansionist policies, as well as his strained relationships with other European powers, contributed to the tensions that ultimately led to the outbreak of the war. If a different leader with different policies had been in power, the course of history might have been very different.

 

Please don't. I'm dealing with this exact argument on another forum that's been going on for weeks.

 

If only Archie Duke hadn't shot that ostrich because he was hungry.

 

Atlantis was the series name. The scenario was an English fishing ship got blow off course and discovered America. Of course I could be wrong I read the series about twenty years ago.

 

How few remain by Harry Turtledove. Uses Lee's general order 183, his battle plan. Which was discovered by the union wrapped around three cigars.

Mr. Turtledove is one of the few people who is uniquely qualified in this area.He is a student of history and completed his PhD in Byzantine history.

 

I like his Ruled Brittainia about England losing the First Armada fight. As a historian of the period, I think he did a fairly good job.