the death of any series character, although they all have to be long dead by the end of the History;
the end of the League;
the Fall of the Terran Empire;
what became of the Merseian Roidhunate.
We reasonably infer that Terra and Merseia wore each other out. We are repeatedly told that Terra is decadent and we see definite signs of Merseian demoralization.
A beginning that I forgot: The Game of Empire (1985) is the beginning of Diana Crowfeather's career, whatever that is going to be.
7 comments:
I think what Poul had in mind was the way the Roman/Byzantine empire and the Sassanid Pesian empire wore each other out.
Of course, that set the stage for the early Arab conquests of the 7th century.
What's often missed about the Sassanids is that first, they established a much more tightly governed state than their Parthian predecessors, and second, they were fanatically convinced Ahura-Mazda wanted them to restore the pre-Alexander Persian Empire.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
How contingent human affairs are! If a strong and able Emperor like Maurice (r. 582-602) had not been overthrown by a cruel and incompetent usurper, Phocas (r. 602-10), the Eastern Empire would not have fallen into confusion and chaos. It was that internal turmoil which allowed the Sassanid king, Chosroes II (d. 628) to make a serious attempt at conquering the Empire. The long war fought by Heraclius (r. 610-41) after overthrowing Phocas against Persia, while eventually victorious, exhausted both powers.
An Empire which remained strong under Maurice and his eldest son means this disastrous war with Sassanid Persia would probably have been avoided. I can see either the Empire or Persia squashing Mohammed before he got too dangerous, preventing Islam from arising. We would have been better off if that had happened!
Ad astra! Sean
See a series of short stories by Harry Turtledove about an intelligence agent of the (East) Roman Empire, set centuries after a certain Arab merchant named Mohammed immigrated to the empire, converted to Christianity and wrote some of the favorite hymns of the protagonist intelligence agent.
Kaor, Jim!
A good example! I should have mentioned how I've read Turtledove's AGENT OF BYZANTIUM, collecting all but one of the Basil Argyros stories you mentioned. Yes, if during one of his trading journeys to Byzantine Syria/Palestine, Mouamet/Mohammed had converted to Christianity, that too would have drastically changed history. Frankly, I believe a world where Islam was not founded would have been better.
But Stirling warned that altho his TURN THE TIDE "alternate history" would have so changed the world there would have been no Mohammed/Islam, some other "prophet" could have arisen founding a religion with the worse features of Islam.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: yes, but the way that history plays out is utterly unpredictable, except to me of course because I'm God there... 8-).
Dumping 1600 years of technical (and ideational) progress into the High Empire will have unpredictable consequences, to put it mildly!
So will dumping the 'Age of Exploration' into it -- but the Roman explorers in their cannon-armed 19th-century style frigates will know where all the geography is!
'Age of Exploration'
I take it that aside from the location of the lands, the Roman also get told about the wind patterns and how to use them to reliably cross oceans in both directions.
This was the really crucial discovery:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volta_do_mar
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Ha! Of course writers are like gods or God to the characters of their stories. You reminded me of Fr. Andrew Greeley's novel, THE GOD GAME, playing with that idea. Greeley's character found out being "God" to his creations was exhausting and strenuous!
And the gnostic/theosophist Church Universal and Triumphant of your Emberverse books was far nastier than Islam.
I look forward, hopefully, to reading about might happen from dumping 1600 years of technological/ideational advances on the Rome of Marcus Aurelius in your Antonine books!
Ad astra! Sean
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