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sorry, even though it is good, I disagree and believe there were much more Slavic majority areas. For example entire Kursk area
It was just an approximate sketch, but yes, to avoid different images in the feedback I have redrawn it based on your and Slime's research and suggestions, and added those clusters mentioned by Rubruck and archaelogical data in the south of Ukraine.

Also, I have added the approximate extent of the Kipchak cultures.

Extents of the Slavic cultures.
Majority (
yellow + pink) and presence (blue).
Extents of the Slavic (yellow current and proposed)
and Kipchak (
red) cultures
Slavic.png
Slavic and Kipchak.png
-
 
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So, we saw a lot of proposals for different clans of the Turkic people in steppe. I propose a different view, which is more inclined with what we currently have
1753187678890.png

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I do not state it is based on history in any way... I only tried to follow the most common descriptions of who were where

Nogai formed between Yaik(Ural) and Caspian lowlands
Tatars absorbed Mishary as even now there is no significant difference. And Mishary will form from Tatars
All Turkic people near Kazakstan bekame Kazakh and Siberian represents Siberian tatars + Kerait people
 
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So, we saw a lot of proposals for different clans of the Turkic people in steppe. I propose a different view, which is more inclined with what we currently have
View attachment 1337358
View attachment 1337359

I do not state it is based on history in any way... I only tried to follow the most common descriptions of who were where

Nogai formed between Yaik(Ural) and Caspian lowlands
Tatars absorbed Mishary as even now there is no significant difference. And Mishary will form from Tatars
All Turkic people near Kazakstan bekame Kazakh and Siberian represents Siberian tatars + Kerait people

I think the difficulty with views like this is that most of these cultural groups form long after the game start. For example, you have a large culture there called the Nogai. The Nogai are named after Nogai Khan, and the reason for that is that the Nogai Horde was formed by Edigu, who was not of patrilineal Borjigin descent but claimed descent on the maternal line from Nogai. The difficulty is it that Edigu doesn't attain relevance until... the 1380s, a good 50 years after the start date. There is no Nogai culture in 1337. In fact, Nogai Khan himself only died in 1300. If Edigu never rises to power, there probably never is a Nogai Horde, and therefore no Nogai identity.

Realistically, in the 1300s, all of the key political players in the area see themselves as contesting for the throne of the Ulus of Jochi, or what the game calls the Golden Horde. They were not separating into culturally distinct entities. Arguably, this process did not happen until early 1500s, because it took two distinct historical steps. First, the Golden Horde had to be fully and completely collapsed and irrelevant as a cultural entity for reference, so that former participants no longer saw themselves as vying for a singular throne but as operating distinct and permanent divisions, and secondly the inhabitants of those divisions then needed time to identify with them (to say "I am Crimean", rather than "I am a member of the Golden Horde"). Even the first step is a good hundred years after the start date - the Crimean Khanate doesn't emerge until 1441.

I think the Paradox culture model has a big problem with the Steppes, which is that: political identity was very rapidly shifting in the context of nomadic pastoralist societies and new identities emerged, died, and were replaced all within the span of a few hundred years. It isn't well suited to a model where there's a set of cultures in 1337 which also describes the situation when the game ends. If there's any room for dynamic cultures in EU5, this would be one of the prime locations for it.

Alternatively, one step might be to just make the whole area "Kipchak", and have mechanics specific to nomadic pastoralist societies which help shatter them from time to time, distinct from the usual cultural mechanics of separatists and so on.
 
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There is a case to be made that areas west of the Yaik/Ural can be classified as "Cuman" and east of that as Kipchak, this is based on archaeological differences and historical realities, with the Cumans assimilating Pecheneg and Oghuz nomads which is visible in their burial rite and being heavily involved in the internecine wars of the Rus' princes. Kazani can be seen as Kipchakized Bulgars which already existed at this time as evidenced by epitaphs having two languages in Volga Bulgaria. It's hard to divide the Cumans beyond that, although a case can be made for Volga Cumans being distinct from the western Cumans thanks to the influence of Golden Horde Urban culture on the Cumans in that area distinct from the one in the Black sea region.

Personally, I would simply have one big Cuman culture which already exists in Hungary, and have it develop into new cultures after the horde collapses and the Cuman pops convert to Islam which reflects the reality of Tatar ethnogenesis.
 
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Yea it is a good question of what can be done

But I have just looked into the current trend of what is done, and even in China there are now cultures smaller than a province

I think every step like this makes it much harder to argue that one Cumman/Kipchak culture should exist

Perhaps it is a great territoriy for a DLC like the one in Vic3 about Latin America where every independent country could create a separate culture.


But yeah I also didn’t try to argue for my map, because nearly majority of it just a guesswork of how people there are described
 
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If there is a split it should be done based on dialects / linguistic classification, since that's how it's being done basically everywhere else. Trying to figure out everyone's self identity at the time is more complex, and isn't really being done anhwhere on the map. I also don't really see a problem with having a "Nogai" culture for example (even if the name is anachronistic) because that's just the standard academic name of a language/dialect
 
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Idk if it sounds dumb, but for the discussion:
  • What if in 1337, we could use culture names like Pontic (Western) Kipchak, Itil Kipchak, Itil Bulgar, Yaik Kipchak (you may suggest better names, I'm not a big expert) and so on. This would be a bit less anachronistic while still being quite flavorful and relevant.
  • Then, when the Golden Horde disintegrates (hopefully into more or less historical entities), those cultures can simply be renamed to later ones like Crimean, Mishari, Tatar, Astrakhani, etc.
  • This way, we're not limited to just one name. That was also used in EU4 for some cultures.
  • I'm also quite OK with Nogay in 1337 because at least he lived 50 years before the game start.
 
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If we were to go with linguistic splits, which... well, I'm not always convinced they're the best for various reasons but I can see why they might just have to work here, in the absence of anything better, then it seems to me the above map is fine, but the names could be tweaked. "Kazakh" is probably okay - although it wasn't used until after 1337, the etymology is generic and not dated chronologically the way Nogai is, nor is it geographically bound the way "Crimean" is (consider the alt history where the Crimean peninsula is lost but a Khanate persists in the Crimean culture area - it'd be very odd to call its culture Crimean not having the actual Crimean peninsula). "Tatar" is probably applicable without too much issue - it is in use at the start date even if not prescriptively and despite the continued existence of the Bulgars.

I'd perhaps suggest just changing "Crimean" to "Kuman" and "Nogai" to "Kipchak", for:

Tatar
Kuman
Kipchak
Kazakh
 
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Kazakh is more anachronistic than Uzbek and also encompasses a larger area so I don't think it is appropriate for 1337 at least.
I agree Kazakh is slightly anachronistic but the etymology of it is at least not time-constrained - it isn't named after a place or a person, but a concept ("qazgaq", wanderer) and theoretically the label could have arisen at any time. The trouble with Uzbek is that I think a lot of players will be confused that the "Uzbeks" in EU5 will actually be the predecessors of the modern Kazakhs and have nothing to do with the modern Uzbeks (even if that is a historical truth!). I can see Paradox wanting to avoid that confusion.
 
I agree Kazakh is slightly anachronistic but the etymology of it is at least not time-constrained - it isn't named after a place or a person, but a concept ("qazgaq", wanderer) and theoretically the label could have arisen at any time. The trouble with Uzbek is that I think a lot of players will be confused that the "Uzbeks" in EU5 will actually be the predecessors of the modern Kazakhs and have nothing to do with the modern Uzbeks (even if that is a historical truth!). I can see Paradox wanting to avoid that confusion.
I have less issue with the name and more with the concept itself, Kazakhs wouldn't form until the late 15th century as a people. I don't think Uzbek shouldn exist either as a culture since it is associated with a still very much alive Khan, applies to Tengri pops which makes no sense considering the ethnonym is associated with Islam and initially applied to all nomads of the Golden Horde.
 
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Yeah, I agree. I think we're all stumbling around the same problem again - there are no good cultural names available for 1337 because the area wasn't culturally split the way it would be in 1550, you have no options but anachronisms. I guess there will have to be a few names that are "close enough" unless there are any secrets in the Culture mechanic we don't know about yet.
 
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I would not call Tatars living up from Beldjamen Astrakhani

Ukek is directly mentioned as a place of Mishary/Kazani Tatars.

But I believe you can mitigate it if you call them just Tatars
Technically Volga Tatar would encompass both Kazani, Mishary, Kasimov and Astrakhani Tatars, and it would allow uniting the Kazani culture with it.
 
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Technically Volga Tatar would encompass both Kazani, Mishary, Kasimov and Astrakhani Tatars, and it would allow uniting the Kazani culture with it.
Yeah I agree with you. I just don’t know how widespread is the term Volga Tatar. And as I am aware Tinto will not make a culture name out of two words, so only adjective can be a solution and Volgan doesn’t work at all tbh

So I would just go with simply Tatar