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Tinto Maps #19 - 20th of September 2024 - India

Hello everyone, and welcome once again to another Tinto Maps! Today we will be taking a look at India! Yup, a whole subcontinent… Exciting!

Let me say a foreword before I start sharing with you some beautiful maps. Some of you may wonder why we decided to make the entire Indian subcontinent in just one DD, instead of spreading it a bit. There are two reasons for that. The first is the political situation: the Sultanate of Delhi is at its zenith, under Muhammad bin Tughlaq. You will soon see that it rules over more than half of the region, approximately; so splitting that polity into several DDs would have felt weird.

The other is that we felt that a more cohesive approach made sense in this region, as it’s sooo diverse compared to others, that the way we approached it, both for its setup and content, was from the generic to the particular; therefore, we think that it will also help us more when we tackle the review of the region. Speaking of that, don’t worry much about the time available to prepare suggestions; you may already know that we have a backlog of several regions, and therefore weeks, before we hit the Indian review, so you will have plenty of time to research and prepare them. In any case, as it’s a massive task (we know it firsthand), we’ll let you know a bit in advance when we plan to start the in-depth review of it, so you have time to wrap it up.

As a final say, I just want to mention that an old acquaintance of the community, @Trin Tragula , now Design Lead in CK3, helped us to map a big chunk of it. Thanks, mate! And now, maps!

Countries:
Countries.jpg

Colored Wastelands.png

As I just mentioned, the Sultanate of Delhi is at its zenith, under Muhammad bin Tughlaq, extending through the Indo-Gangetic Plain, including Bengal, and to the south, throughout the Deccan. There we have its toughest contender, Vijayanagar, a county that is a bulwark of Hinduism. Other important countries around it are Orissa and Sindh, but much smaller countries generally surround Delhi. You might wonder how it would be possible to stop Delhi from completely controlling the region, then. For this, two things are affecting its capability to achieve it. The first is the base game mechanics: ruling over so many different cultures and religions with low control will be hard. The second is a Situation that involves the Fall of the Sultanate; if Delhi wants to succeed, it will have to fight back against rebellions, which involves the potential independence of the Bengalese countries or newborn ones such as the Bahmanis, and the multiple Indian states around it, which are ready to take over it.

Dynasties:
Dynasties.jpg


Locations:
Locations.jpg

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Yes, we are making some adjustments to the coloring of the mapmodes!

Provinces:
Provinces.jpg

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Areas:
Areas.jpg

The bug is still there, yes… The area that is to the southwest is Malabar.

Terrain:
Climate.jpg

Topography.jpg

Vegetation.jpg

Here we have a new type of topography: Atolls. We added it some months ago, as we worked on finishing the map of the Pacific Ocean, and it will be the last one added to the game.

Development:
Development.jpg

A new map mode is born! Here you have the development of India. The most developed place is Delhi, which is part of the fertile Gangetic Plain.

Harbors:
Harbors.jpg


Cultures:
Cultures.jpg

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Not an entirely new map, but a glorious one. We chose it to be the one to present how the different cultures could be present in the game for a reason.

Religions:
Religions.jpg

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India is the birthplace of numerous religions, and that needs to be reflected in the religious map. The main religion is Hinduism, but don’t be deceived by its homogeneous look, as it will be quite deep feature-wise. We also have Buddhism, which is at a low point, after some centuries of prosecutions. Mahayana is a majority in Sindh, although that's not completely exact, as an earlier form of Buddhism was practiced there; we’re also not 100% convinced about it being a majority, as some sources and accounts set the Islamization of the region to be completed under the Ghaznavids, in the 11th and 12th century, while others delay it until the 14th century - we followed the later approach, but we're very open to feedback in this specific matter. Another form of Buddhism is Theravada, which is the most practiced religion in Sailan. Some interesting minorities present in the region are Jains (yellow stripes), Nestorians (the pink stripe in Malabar, which portrays the ‘Saint Thomas Christians’), Jews (which have their own separate culture, ‘Kochini’), and several Animist confessions, of which we’ve already split Satsana Phi, the traditional religion of Tai people, and Sanamahism, the religion of Meitei people. Oh, although it’s not strictly part of the region, the light blue stripes to the north is Bön religion.

Raw Materials:
Raw Materials.jpg

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India was for some time in the period the wealthiest region of the world, one of the main reasons being that it’s incredibly rich in very different types of resources, including some of the expensive ones. That will make for a very interesting economic gameplay.

Markets:
Markets India.png

There are several market centers in India that we think portray well the situation in 1337: Kabul (yes, it’s in Afghanistan, but it’s one for the area of Kashmir), Delhi, Khambat, Calicut, Pulicat, Varanasi, and Chittagong.

Population:
Population.jpg

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India has a big population. To be precise, around 95M pops. Delhi is the second largest country in the world in population, with 41M pops, which makes it a behemoth, with very serious governance challenges. I’m also showing this week the progress we’re making with the coloring of the population mapmode; the stripes on several locations mark that they’re overpopulated, as they have more pops living on them than the pop capacity available (something that may be reviewed, as balancing very densely populated regions such as India or China is really challenging).

And that’s all for today! We hope you enjoyed this massive Tinto Maps. Next week we will be taking a look at the Steppe. Which one, you might wonder? Well, the one ruled by the Golden Horde, from Ukraine in the west to Mongolia in the east. Cheers!
 
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IMG_3374.jpeg

Why is Kafiristan and Chitral more developed than Kabul and Balkh?

Kabul and Balkh were important cities where trade across Hindukush happened while Kafiristan and Chitral were extremely isolated areas with very little development even to this day.

I saw the same disparity in the other development map too where South Western China which was historically very underdeveloped having more Development than most of France
 
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Not really... It's better if you give us direct feedback on why they look more difficult, and what may we do to improve them


Exactly like this feedback, thanks!
Please keep the red-yellow-green scale cause it's in my opinion quite good looking.

Instead I think a colourblind setting in the options would be more appropriate.
 
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For colour feedback, the earlier map had brighter colours while recently everything seems more muted. I prefer having some bright colours too, the toothpaste colour of Sardinia-Piedmont is very popular for a reason!
 
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I'm definitely doing locations last, lol.

DEVELOPMENT
Mostly perfect, just increasing the development of Satgaon-Nabadwip tract, Khuna region and Barisal while reducing that of wooded areas of East Bengal as I've shown above would be great.

CULTURE
Nothing much to say for Assamese me and Marlin already haven't said, lol. Beyond that, having the Purnia region being Bengali instead of Kochi/Kamtapuri/Whatever y'all replace Assamese with would be more accurate.
AFAIK Santhalis were a majority in Santhal-Parganas i.e. Deogarh region of Jharkhand, and Bengalis were a large minority there.
Chittagong was definitely majority Bengali with a sizeable Arakanese population.
There should be a larger spread of Odiya minorities in Midnapore region of Bengal. Speaking of Odiya, renaming Orissan to Odiya or Oriya would be more appropriate.
Increasing the Dimasa pop in the Cachar-Barak Valley region to a sizeable minority would also be more accurate.
Finally, the region upto East Singbhum should be Bengali majority as it remained so till the British Raj.
 
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On Badakhshan and the Pamir:

I'm glad I refrained from posting this in the Iran thread, I thought the region was in risk of being on the corner of every map. But it seems most of it is included here. Some detailed maps of Afghanistan in a separate post, now that most of it is revealed to us, wouldn't be bad. Hint hint. But working with what we know, here's my thoughts:


Badakshan Shah as a vassal of the Chagatai Ulus:

While Suhrobsho (2006) claims (p. 38 and this is repeated on Wikipedia) part of the region was fully independent at this stage, he does so with the backing of an old Soviet source (Monogarova 1972). I managed to find the original and have translated the quoted pages with Google Translate, but they make the claim with the same carefree ease and lack of backing Suhrobsho does. Monogarova I think has one source for the claim, if I understand the somewhat wobbly translation, but I couldn't track that down (Iskandorov 1960 I think?). Regardless, this is wading around in the muck of tertiary sources commenting on each other - not very useful, not very clean, and not very accurate.
So, I will take the liberty of relying on Beben (2023) and Nourmamadchoev (2015), who seem to have actually done some legwork on finding primary or secondary sources.


Nourmamadchoev makes a complex picture: Eariler in the 1300s, rule was divided by a local Shah (but in-game terms more like duchy-level) who had de-facto control but answered to the Chagatai Khan, but being nominally under a Mongol Prince, Yasa'ur.


There is no mention of how long this arrangement lasted, so I will assume that the local Shah took over completely after the death of Yasa'ur in 1320, but it could be the the Yasa'uri army left behind still had some influence, or more likely they functioned as a semi-independent group of raiders / potential ABCs as those in Iran did (covered brilliantly by @SuperLexxe and others).

Beben mentions Marco Polo visiting the area in the 1270s, where it also had a local Shah, and a coins being minted with the name of Dawlatshah in the 1290s. He further uses newer Iranian sources (I assume analyzing the local histories written in an Iranian language, see further down this section) to back up the claim that the area was semi-independent in between initial Mongol rule and conquest by Timur. All of these facts together I think is the most solid case.

The numismatic source supporting Beben along with the Iranian tells of an Argunshah ruling in 1307 (likely dead in 1337), so that is a name that could be used, although to be completely accurate the ruler should be randomly generated, but almost certainly Ismaili Shia.

Nourmamadchoev also makes an important point (p. 10-13): We know that a first, original book of local history called "Taʾrīkh-i Badakhshān" (written in the 1600s) must have existed based on later references to it. Later books with the same name are based on oral histories or compilations of other works. So in summary: the Shah is known to have existed, though we don't know anything about how he looked or how he acted.

I made 2 rough estimates of the extent of this vassal state, one maximalist based on the map from the 1500s onwards (although there is reason to believe local rule had some deeper roots, this is very likely an over-estimation in 1337), and one minimalist based on place and region names in the sources.


"Maximalist" extent:

View attachment 1190054

"Minimalist" extent:

View attachment 1190056



Culture:


Pamiri (a slightly simplified term, but it works) is present, which is good, but there should be a significant exchange between Pamirs, Tajik and a smaller number of Mongols, especially to the West and Northwest.

According to Nourmamadchoev Kyrgyz settlement is later. I assume the Tengri is supposed to refer to some kind of Turkic or Mongolic group later becoming Kyrgyz? I haven't come across any sources that would make them a majority in any of the areas at this time.
View attachment 1190003
p.38


Out of date map for geographic reference:
View attachment 1190034

Religion:

It should primarily be Ismaili and Sunni. I would say conservatively 35-35 %, that's the most reasonable guesstimate that doesn't go to far in either direction. I.e. tries to pretend the Islamic conquest wasn't that long ago or that Islamic rulers had completely white-washed every village with anti-"heathen" teleportation magic the moment they arrived in a radius of 100 km. According to Nourmamadchoev, in the early to mid 1300s, a power struggle between Sunnis and Ismailis had concluded (and an Orthodox-like extremely nitpicky nerdy theological dispute had just happened within the Ismaili community, but that I think is completely outside the scope of the game), and the local ruler attempted to force convert people to Ismaliism. We don't know how that went, except going by what happened later. There are significant minorities of Ismailis in both modern-day Tajikistan and the area in Afghanistan. What happened in between the Timurid collapse and now is too complex for me to use time on, and outside the scope of this post.

The remaining 30 % should be a mix of Mongol and possibly Qipchaq tengris, Zoroastrians (see the Soviet-Russian source, more likely a local religion that had Zoroastrian elements, but for simplicity's sake, Zoroastrian) and a few Buddhists left over from before the Caliphate.

Sources


Beben, Daniel (2023): The History of Badakhshan from the 7th to the 19th Century.

Nourmamadchoev, Nourmamadcho (2015): The Ismāʿīlīs of Badakhshan: History, Politics and Religion from 1500 to 1750.

Monogarova, L. F. (1972): Transformationof Pamiri ethnicities in mode and culture.

Album, Stephen: Newsletter of the Oriental Numismatic Society nr. 153 (1997): Coins of Arghunshah from Khost in Badakhshan.

Davlatshoev, Suhrobsho (2006): The Formation and Consolidation of Pamiri Ethnic Identity in Tajikistan.


View attachment 1190010
And the sources in the source:

View attachment 1190013

Of which I can only read 49.


Sweet, now i'm stoked for Indo-hellenic kingdom run, of Ismailli faith, becoeming the harbinger of ancient Humanistic enlightment as a direct descentand of Alexander the Great and the Supreme God Shiva herself.
 
RELIGION
Now, religion in Bengal is very tricky. Since you've said Hinduism will be internally differentiated, I'd hope the Shakti-Cults of Manasa and Chandi, on the periphery of Hinduism and straddling the border of animism are represented. In fact it is these Manasa worshipping semi-Hindu tribesmen of the woods of East Bengal along with other "Animist" non-Brahmanic religions - including those of the Kochis and Rajbongshis which form most of current Bengal's Muslim population. Were, say, a North Indian power have failed to conquer Bengal - thus fewer Sufi adventures being attracted to the region, East Bengal might've been majority Chaitanya Vaishnav or Christian or whatever. It is because Hindu and Muslim Zamindars employed these Sufi Mystics to clear the region that most of East Bengal is Muslim, since they set up Khanqahs and shrines and such as centres of community and preached a syncretic Hindu-influenced Islam that managed to convert swathes of these "Animist" tribesmen and Manasa-worshippers. Manasa too was appropriated by orthodox Hinduism.
The gist of my suggestion is that, differentiate the Devi-Shakti cultists of East Bengal, primarily tribesmen and the ancestors of majority of the population of Bengali Muslims from Vaishnav and Shaivite Hindus of West Bengal, and also add some animists to the wooded regions.
My source is, as on everything related to the rise of Islam in Bengal, Eaton's book.
 
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Hi @Pavía ,Thanks for covering my home country srilanka. You guys have done a pretty amazing job but i have a few suggestions as a native.

1)Why did you use sailan for the name of the island.I think thats a arabic name for the country mostly used by the foreigners but none of the big ethnic groups here didnt used that name.everyone used the name "sinhaladeepa" which means the island of sinhala or just simply "Sinhalaya". Or at least you could have gone with the name "thambapanni". So i would like to hear why did you choose that name

2)I see a bit of inaccuracy about ethnic compostion too.even in the modern times there is a substantial sinhala and srilankan moor population in gokanna and sinhala population in vavniya and also in the provice between vavniya and gokanna(i can read the name its not very clear but i assume its medavachchiya?).if you only consider the modern cencus then its not accurate as there was a mass exodus of srilankan muslim moors and sinhala people from the eastern and northern provinces beacuse of the terrorists.it feels weird to see areas around where first sinhala kingdoms were born and were massive population hubs such as anuradapura,Polonnaruwa has no sinhala population and in area like gokanna where a large number of sinhala moor people live have non of there people represented.

4)Also I would love to see if you can assign gokanna to pihiti and make phiti a split state among the two kingdoms because current borders looks bit ugly

5)Another thing i would like to know will dambadeniya have cores on kingdom of jaffna because its only little time passed since the pandyan invasion of dambadeniya and the subsequntial establishment of the kingdom of jaffana


but overall this is a very good depiction of my country and thank you for that and i can wait to do my first two playthroughs as both of the kingdoms
 
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Could we have Diu as either an Island or a water-enclosed location?
Indeed, Diu should probably be coded the same as Venice imo.

Apart from that, there seems to be a necessity to (heavily) increase location density in most of the map, to avoid rural locations with Paris-like populations...
 
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I'm not too sure about the Assamese culture in northern Bengal? It does not even correspond to the region of Assam. Even more so convoluting considering the Ahom people are already represented further to the east more accurately.
Yes, was about to ask about that. Also, shouldn't modern Assam have significant Hindu-Aryan communities, as right now it has none?
 
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Main issues with the map:

The location borders on the map-modes and the gradients that come with them give me a headache just looking at them, this is especially bad on the markets map, which looks bumpy and off-putting. I think anything that displays information on the location scale should be a flat colour.

The thick black drop shadow on the ocean areas in the terrain maps and on the impassable terrains on the location map just make everything look cluttered, and distracts from the actual information. I think they should be completly removed, or toned down majorly

The texture overlays on the terrain map which add colour variation should be removed, since information is parsed at a glance by the colour of the terrain, random varation just makes it look confusing. Likewise there shouldnt be gradients at the borders here either, just flat matte colours.

The hatching to delinialtate impassable terrain is a good desicion, but they are too thick when zoomed out, only adding to the visual clutter, so I think that should be toned down.

I think the brighter, softer look from previous maps was better than the harsh one.


Minor personal gripes:

The oceans and impassable terrain in general could do some work to make them look more pleasant since I'm personally not a fan of the grey pallete, but thats a minor issue down to preference compared to the other stuff.

Im not very partial on the Yuan Dyansty also being a light green blob right next to Delhi, I imagine they'll probably explode most of the time anyway, but I feel a red, purple, or a nice Mongol blue would suit them more.
 
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Sindh shouldn't be majority Buddhist. It was continuously ruled by Muslims since 8 century and Buddhist was in decline in both Sindh and Punjab all through 8-13 centuries.
Sindh being majority Buddhist but also have no single Muslim majority locality or even not full dashed with Muslim minorities is so weird