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

[Pavía]

I hope it will be impossible to save Delhi/Yuan without at least losing half of its territory,

Fighting rebels seem easy to avoid any territorial loss tbh, and I am afraid that playing as Delhi will make unifying India super easy if we succeed situation without any loss of lands

It's not easy, and its initial iteration, the situations for the Fall of Delhi and the Red Turbans Rebellion, coupled with the core game mechanic, made them extremely punishing (something we're finetuning through constant playtesting and iterating).

 

[Aurelio123]

I can already tell that AI is going to ruin Delhi which would make sense, but the player can make it busted just like the timurids.

 

[Pavía]

And we're saying they did not. The Assamese did not migrate, they were formed by the confluence of the Ahoms, Bodos and other tribes of the Brahmaputra valley. Which source says the Assamese migrated from North Bengal?

It's a complex topic, and we partially agree with you, as the modern Assamese culture was formed as a hybridization of some cultures. However, what we are representing with the Assamese culture that is present in our game is the Indo-Aryan core that formed the Early Assamese language and culture, which would later expand towards current Assam, merging with Ahom and other cultures in the process.

We're open for review on this matter, nonetheless.

 

[systemlvl]

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.

Yasa'ur - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

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. I tried to draw it as best I could, but the names are really hard to read on the zoomed out version, and the detailed version cuts half of it off. It is possible I may have included too much.


"Maximalist" extent:

"Minimalist" extent:

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.

p.38


Out of date map for geographic reference:

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.

RGOs+Economy

The region is fabulously famous for its mineral wealth (truly outrageous). Lapis lazuli, rubys and other gems, different heavy metals - not a wonder with mountains all around. I think the RGO setup is quite good, it could all be Gems/Iron/Stone, but in the interest of game balance it is fine to include some livestock.


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.

Spoiler: The Ismāʿīlīs of Badakhshan: History, Politics and Religion from 1500 to 1750

Spoiler: The History of Badakhshan from the 7th to the 19th Century

And the sources in the source:

Of which I can only read 49.

Spoiler: Coins of Arghunshah from Khost in Badakhshan

Spoiler: Transformationof Pamiri ethnicities in mode and culture

p. 34-35

p. 27

On religion:

Spoiler: The Formation and Consolidation of Pamiri Ethnic Identity in Tajikistan

 

[Znikii]

That's Sugar, and there's plenty (just checked in-game, and India is the region in the world with the most Sugar sources).

eeeeh, my eyes are tired, and missed eh out at first.

Maybe a different coloure scheme for crops that share ideal climate and topography for its cultivation. So crops like sugarcane, cotton, spices, rice, which are all found in large numbers is relatively small but condesend geographically area to have a bit more difference betwen each other please.

 

[Pavía]

Are the Parsi Zoroastrians represented as minorities?

Yes, I forgot to mention them!

 

[Pavía]

View attachment 1190036
Do the Laccdaive islands all belong in 1 province or aare they divided in 2?

Two, Aminidive and Laccadive.

 

[PerhapsItsChondoLal]

I'm skipping locations, provinces and areas for now and skipping straight to terrain. I'll also add this the Bengal master-post.

TOPOGRAPHY

The topography of Bengal, Bihar and Jharkhand seems to be unnaturally flat.
Let's start with the east:
You've added Teliagarhi - which I loved to see - but you've not added the reason why it was important. There are three primary routes into Bengal from North India: North of the Ganges through Tirhut, having to ford multiple rivers and streams; south of the Ganges through the Rajmahal Hills, having only one proper pass guarded by Teliagarhi - or going south through thickly forested Jharkhand, and emerging near Purulia.
Roy, Yogendra P. “SIGNIFICANCE OF TELIAGARHI FORT DURING THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.” Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, vol. 62, 2001, pp. 1069–77. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/44155847. Accessed 20 Sept. 2024.
Where's the Rajmahal Hills, then???? See below (I've marked Teliagarhi in red)

VEGETATION
Now this is a tricky one.
In Jharkhand, the Rajmahal hills south of Teliagarhi were thickly forested.

The entire southern regions of the fort was jungle." Rajmahal hills was covered by a wild jungle and formed a terra incognita even in the days of Rennell's survey (1773). The revenue records in regional languages furnish names of the trees and cultivation of hilly tracts, where Akbar's regulation was not extended. 52 The manuscript gives the total area under various crops as well as the number of trees. The trees that are recorded in the document are mahua (Madhuca Indica). Sal (Shorea Robusta), Arjuna (Terminalia Arjuna), white teak (Gmeline Arbirea), Palmyrapalm (Borassus Flabellifer), Sissoo (Dalbergia Sisso). Silk Cotton tree (Salmalia malabarica), Tiril (Diosptros malanoxvion). Mango, Kookoo (Albizia lebbecck), Khirni (Manilkara hexandra) and bamboo. Due to jungle and hilly tracts, transport of heavy commercial items, such as woods through land route was a problem, the river routes were easy and practical.

Jharkhand itself was variously sparsely and thickly forested:

Following this situation Bakhtyar might have left this route and planned a surprised attack on Nadia (‘Nodia' of Minhaj) by a difficult and unpopular route through 'bar jungles' of Jharkhand.25 This route was used by Sher Shah against Humayun in 1538, when Sher Shah returned from Gaur by as well as, Mir Jumla in March 1659, while chasing Shah Shuja with the help of Bahroz Singh, a zamindar of Kharagpur.26 A 18th century document27 compiled by Browne shows that this route was good for carrying of the field artillery.

Here's where a larger problem arises. Referring to Eaton's wonderful work "The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier":

In this way the main course of the Ganges, which had formerly flowed down what is now the Bhagirathi-Hooghly channel in West Bengal, was replaced in turn by the Bhairab, the Mathabhanga, the Garai-Madhumati, the Arialkhan, and finally the present-day Padma-Meghna system. “When the distributaries in the west were active,” writes Kanangopal Bagchi, “those in the east were perhaps in their infancy, and as the rivers to the east were adolescing, those in the west became senile. The active stage of delta formation thus migrated southeastwards in time and space, leaving the rivers in the old delta, now represented by Murshidabad, Nadia and Jessore with the Goalundo Sub-Division of Faridpur, to languish or decay.”[2] As the delta’s active portion gravitated eastward, the regions in the west, which received diminishing levels of fresh water and silt, gradually become moribund. Cities and habitations along the banks of abandoned channels declined as diseases associated with stagnant waters took hold of local communities. Thus the delta as a whole experienced a gradual eastward movement of civilization as pioneers in the more ecologically active regions cut virgin forests, thereby throwing open a widening zone for field agriculture. From the fifteenth century on, writes the geographer R. K. Mukerjee, “man has carried on the work of reclamation here, fighting with the jungle, the tiger, the wild buffalo, the pig, and the crocodile, until at the present day nearly half of what was formerly an impenetrable forest has been converted into gardens of graceful palm and fields of waving rice.”

But this implies large parts of East and North-East Bengal had thick jungles, something not represented in EU4. Now, we don't have any extant records of forest cover - but what we can do is take not of major cities, take a 2-ish province area around it then make the rest various degrees of forested. But before that areas we DO have records of forest cover of.

The Sunderbans should definitely be jungles, I don't know why they aren't already.

I went from Bengala into the country of Couche (Koch), which lieth 25. dayes iourny Northwards from Tanda.2 The king is a Gentile, his name is Suckel Counse : x his countrey is great, and lieth not far from Cauchin China : for they say they haue pepper from thence. The port is called Cacchegate (Kochighatt?) (not pinpointed yet)
From thence I returned to Hugeli, which is the place where the Portugals keep in the country of Bengala which standeth in 23. degrees of Northerly latitude, and standeth a league from Satagan : they cal it Porto Piqueno.1 We went through the wildernes, because the right way was full of thieues, where we passed the countrey of Gouren, where we found but few villages, but almost all wildernes, & saw many buffes, swine & deere, grasse longer then a ma, and very many Tigers.

- Ralph Fitch
By the above we can presume that there was a region of wilderness between Koch and Satgaon-Hughli. It can be a safe bet to add various forested areas in Rangpur and Rajshahi till Jessore, though cities must be kept intact.

Sinnergan is a towne sixe leagues from Serrepore, where there is the best and finest cloth made of cotton that is in all India. The chiefe king of all these countries is called Isacan, and he is chiefe of all the other kings, and is a great friend to all Christians. The houses here, as they be in the most part of India, are very litle, and couered with strawe, and haue a fewe mats round about the wals, and the doore to keepe out the Tygers and the Foxes

Isa Khan ("Isacan") was the famous Baro-Bhuiyan chief with his capital at Katrabo, somewhat near Barisal (Bakla). By the presence of of tigers and foxes, we can also presume the existence of forests in the Sonargaon (Sinnergan)-Barisal region (Presumably both the Sundarbans south of Barisal and the uncultivated regions north of Sonargaon).

Further forested areas include parts of Mymensingh, Sylhet and North Bengal. Roughly a third to maybe even half of East Bengal's grasslands should be forested, according to Eaton's book.

 

[Pavía]

Shouldn't ivory exist in Asia too?

It's not needed, there's a building that can exploit any of them for economic benefits, with different production methods.

 

[Flower_Marlin]

It's a complex topic, and we partially agree with you, as the modern Assamese culture was formed as a hybridization of some cultures. However, what we are representing with the Assamese culture that is present in our game is the Indo-Aryan core that formed the Early Assamese language and culture, which would later expand towards current Assam, merging with Ahom and other cultures in the process.

We're open for review on this matter, nonetheless.

And that's fine, if you consider all the resources me and @PerhapsItsChondoLal sent in here, Assamese as a culture SHOULD be represented - it's just extremely inaccurate to do it in North Bengal. The Indo-Aryan stock population ALREADY existed within the borders of Assam/Kamrup region as more and more tribal peoples assimilated into this population. The best representation of Assamese would be in Assam, as an overlapping culture with the various tribal peoples - and not in North Bengal. This is basically the core point we're both pressing.

Please do review this matter. Thank you for your hard work!

 

[PerhapsItsChondoLal]

However, what we are representing with the Assamese culture that is present in our game is the Indo-Aryan core that formed the Early Assamese language and culture, which would later expand towards current Assam, merging with Ahom and other cultures in the process.

Sorry if I've been a bit too aggressive, lol. But there's a fundamental misconception here - Early Assamese language and culture arose in Assam itself. If this was say CK3, there'd still be some leeway - but by 1337 Early Assamese was well established in the Brahmaputra Valley. Only the Ahoms were yet to arrive; besides that, all the "ingredients", once could say, were in place. And the cultures of North Bengal had certainly little in common with either the Early or the Modern Assamese culture.

 

[fredrikslicer]

Also no Vajrayana buddhism in tibet? How come?

 

[Pavía]

And that's fine, if you consider all the resources me and @PerhapsItsChondoLal sent in here, Assamese as a culture SHOULD be represented - it's just extremely inaccurate to do it in North Bengal. The Indo-Aryan stock population ALREADY existed within the borders of Assam/Kamrup region as more and more tribal peoples assimilated into this population. The best representation of Assamese would be in Assam, as an overlapping culture with the various tribal peoples - and not in North Bengal. This is basically the core point we're both pressing.

Please do review this matter. Thank you for your hard work!

Sorry if I've been a bit too aggressive, lol. But there's a fundamental misconception here - Early Assamese language and culture arose in Assam itself. If this was say CK3, there'd still be some leeway - but by 1337 Early Assamese was well established in the Brahmaputra Valley. Only the Ahoms were yet to arrive; besides that, all the "ingredients", once could say, were in place. And the cultures of North Bengal had certainly little in common with either the Early or the Modern Assamese culture.

Thanks for your input on this matter. There are two different things to review here, I think. First would be if we could potentially rename what we named as 'Assamese' into something different, to portray that Indo-Aryan stock; maybe something on the line of 'Kamarupa', although we're not sure if this would be correct. The other would be potentially 'moving' it eastwards, towards the Bramahputra Valley. Let us know what do you think that would work better.

 

[dracoadu2187]

I have several questions and points.
1. Are there zoroastrians along the western coast of India? There should be, but I couldn't see any blue
2. How is wootz steel represented along the southern coast of india? Not a raw resource but still
3. Shouldn't Sindh be muslim by this time or am I missing some part of history.
4. Also there should be elephants in kerala. I say this as a malayali.
5. The region that is the transition from the gangetic plains to the himalayas are not subtropical. The same point can be made for the "tropical" western ghats.
6. Should northern Kerala have those two provinces be muslim dominated. I know the history but I always thought that there were larger events in history that took place way after this game even starts that caused this change to take place.

A more general questions I have is if two cultures are similar how does that impact gameplay.

 

[Daniel the Finlander]

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!

Yeah, imo the gradient colors make it harder to differentiate between the various colors especially when every location has a different one. Before, the solid colors were clear and distinct, making it easy to read information at a glance.

 

[Daniel the Finlander]

Important question: are Andaman islands part of this map review? Important, because I need to know if the North Sentinel Island people are included in the game, of course! I can’t tell if North Sentinel Island is a location atm.

 

[Flower_Marlin]

Thanks for your input on this matter. There are two different things to review here, I think. First would be if we could potentially rename what we named as 'Assamese' into something different, to portray that Indo-Aryan stock; maybe something on the line of 'Kamarupa', although we're not sure if this would be correct. The other would be potentially 'moving' it eastwards, towards the Bramahputra Valley. Let us know what do you think that would work better.

I'd strongly suggest to keep the name Assamese, that is not the primary issue anyway. Moving this stock population to the Brahmaputra Valley and have them overlap with the Bodo, Khasi, Garo and Ahom people would actually simulate the historical shifting and changing of the Assamese culture. Remember that all the sources so far only suggest the Tai Migrations from the east during this period, and no significant Indo-Aryan migration from Bengal in the middle of the 14th century is seen.

So to summarize:
- Assamese (Indo-Aryan culture group) stays, moves into the Brahmaputra valley region overlapping with the tribal (Austro-Asiatic cultures or Tibeto-Burman cultures) people fighting for dominance
- North Bengal becomes majority Bengali with significant Koch, Newari and Magadhi minorities

 

[perceval350]

Great map as always ! Still I think it really suffers from not having a variety of spices. Having a single spice good is only good to represent the spice flow from south and east Asia to Europe (and even for that there are arguable flaws) but it makes it completely impossible to portray the trade of spice between spice producing nations in the Indian ocean during that period.

For example, in the XVIIIth and XIXth century, cloves produced in Zanzibar were exported in comparable numbers towards Europe and India. This situation is not gonna happen in PC because India already produces enough spices so it won't need to import them.

So an additional argument to having several spice good (in addition to it not being an optimal way to represent european need for asian spices) is that having a single spice good kind of shows a eurocentric game design that takes content away from Asia, whereas having several spices would make both the portrayal of spice trade with Europe and spice trade internal to Asia more accurate and flavourful

 

[PerhapsItsChondoLal]

First would be if we could potentially rename what we named as 'Assamese' into something different, to portray that Indo-Aryan stock; maybe something on the line of 'Kamarupa', although we're not sure if this would be correct. The other would be potentially 'moving' it eastwards, towards the Bramahputra Valley. Let us know what do you think that would work better.

I mostly agree with Marlin, but personally having Kamatapuri/expanding Kochi into roughly this region:

while the rest of Bengal becomes Bengali, the "Assamese" regions not included in the circle having large Kamta/Kochi minorities should be sufficient for Bengal; while for Assam - I'm fine with Marlin's proposal.

 

[bokorthedust]

Ivory is used for African elephants, which can't be used for military units

Hannibal in shambles.