Map WtWSMS data to CK3 Map

[LT-Rascek]

This ticket is building on the culture/religion mapping of the WtWSMS map to the new CK3 map.

In my view the religion map will have to be done at the lowest level to reflect minorities, so I would suggest working on a map based upon baronies, not counties. There are several areas where baronies would be of different religions.

For reference, religion/culture is determined by the county level, not barony, as much as I'd like to set culture/religion at the barony level. Unless someone has worked out how to do it at the barony level, but I can't find a way to do it; my attempts lead to the county religion matching the capital barony religion.

If you want to I can start drawing out that. On reviewing your changes, I disagree with any Christian heresy being removed, the Zoroastrian heresies will have to be reconsidered together with India and Africa and on the Mandeans Basra is Nestorian in the mod.

The below is the religion map from the previous work I did, and should not be considered complete by any means. I will be reworking the map in line with @loup99's feedback this week.

Religion_Key.xlsx

[loup99]

For reference, religion/culture is determined by the county level, not barony, as much as I'd like to set culture/religion at the barony level. Unless someone has worked out how to do it at the barony level, but I can't find a way to do it; my attempts lead to the county religion matching the capital barony religion.

My bad then, this was what I thought initially too based upon vanilla, but since you linked the barony map in the other thread I thought that was somehow possible. Sorry for the confusion.

[LT-Rascek]

Current status:

Started going over the WtWSMS map extant 476 counties/baronies to map the info to the new map. Far from complete and will take longer than I thought, but proceeds apace. Note: some WtWSMS baronies have become full-fledge counties and others have been shifted around, hence why it's good to go through baronies as well as counties. Also note it's not a 1-to-1 mapping, so I expect there to be a few white spots even if every barony in WtWSMS was mapped.

Culture and Religion are being done simultaneously. Colors taken from WtWSMS. For the sake of convenience, I differentiated Norse religion from Germanic religion for my own tracking purposes but that can easily rewritten.

Some of the counties were ultimately split between two WtWSMS counties; the colored square in a county indicates this. Examples in the religion map include Nikea, Tadjora, and Metz.

The white square for the provinces in the far east indicate provinces that were on the Eastern border in the WtWSMS map. Some of the names/spellings changed slightly but I think I've mapped those correctly as well. Unsurprisingly, from the Euphrates to the Hindu Kush appears a little sparse; I've found it hard to map the county names in Persia to their CK3 equivalents.

Religion Map:

Key_religion.xlsx

Culture Map:

Key_culture.xlsx

[loup99]

Impressive work, don't hesitate to ask if you encounter any specific issue. On the Norse-Germanic split I don't see a justification for separating them, unless someone has a very convincing case I think the setup from CK2 will be kept. The main difference would be in terms of localisation.

[LT-Rascek]

On the Norse-Germanic split I don't see a justification for separating them, unless someone has a very convincing case I think the setup from CK2 will be kept. The main difference would be in terms of localisation.

I split them just because it made my mapping job easier. It's not really an argument for splitting the religion.

Alright, I'd say Phase 1 is finished with these maps. Ran through the extant counties everywhere and filled in to match WtWSMS.
Phase 2 will be backfilling obvious areas with religion/culture (e.g. Italy), putting back in some obvious correspondences back in (e.g., Alan counties in the Caucuses), fixing some issues ported in from the WtWSMS map (e.g., that Aremean county in Persia surrounded by Persian counties) and starting research on the more blank areas of the map.

Key_religion.xlsx

Key_culture.xlsx

[loup99]

Ok, if you encounter any specific issues or have questions during the process you can post them here and I will do my best to respond.

[LT-Rascek]

@loup99: Okay, I've gotten about as far as I can get cross-referencing the WtWSMS map. If you have any preferred sources for late 4th century barbarian information, that'd be helpful moving forward. Otherwise, I can start looking through my own sources.

I'd also like some insight on how to break up Jainism, Buddhism, and Hinduism since in CK3 vanilla they are divided by sects on the base map. While some regions (Sri Lanka/Maldives) will be easy, most of it will be difficult to do.

Some other things I noticed is that some things ended up getting moved because of the finer province detail:
1). The Slavic province surrounded by Barsil provinces
2). The Areamean province surrounded by Persian provinces
3). The Frankish province bounded by Romano-Gallic and Alemannian provinces.

It think, since those are just products of the changed map scale, they should be replaced with the religion/cultures that surround them to better make continuous blocks of culture. Note that some, the the Adanite province, shouldn't change.

Hot pink on both maps indicates regions that weren't in the WtWSMS map and thus will need some original research to fill out (Tibet, Burma, West Africa, Central Africa).

Key_religion.xlsx

Key_culture.xlsx

[loup99]

@loup99: Okay, I've gotten about as far as I can get cross-referencing the WtWSMS map. If you have any preferred sources for late 4th century barbarian information, that'd be helpful moving forward. Otherwise, I can start looking through my own sources.

No problems, I have a lot of sources and ressources, but do you want a map or a book? What information is it that you seek more specifically?

I'd also like some insight on how to break up Jainism, Buddhism, and Hinduism since in CK3 vanilla they are divided by sects on the base map. While some regions (Sri Lanka/Maldives) will be easy, most of it will be difficult to do.

To be perfectly honest I haven't done the research on this myself. @herkles can maybe help you out with that?

[LT-Rascek]

No problems, I have a lot of sources and ressources, but do you want a map or a book? What information is it that you seek more specifically?

Maps would be ideal, but I can make use of either.

To be perfectly honest I haven't done the research on this myself. @herkles can maybe help you out with that?

Understood.

[herkles]

To be perfectly honest I haven't done the research on this myself. @herkles can maybe help you out with that?

Yes. In regards to Jainism it won't need to be broken up. The three sects that exist in Vanilla were formed in the BCE era during the timespan of Imperator. So they are good.

Now Buddhism and Hinduism are different matter all together. Lets tackle Buddhism. This will be long btw.

Buddhism

the time frame of this mod is set is still well within the period known as the Early Schools of Buddhism, of which Theravada is the last surviving school from that area. The exact number of early schools differs depending on the source, its roughly around 18 to 20. The Chinese monk and pilgrim, Xuanzang, described the following schools existing in India at this time:

• Sarvāstivāda school
• Vibhajyavāda schools
• Mahāsāṃghika
• Pudgalavāda
• Dharmaguptaka

Thankfully wiki has a pretty decent map for where they are located so that should be helpful. Beyond those schools were a few others. Theravada itself derives from the Vibhajyavāda schools in Sri Lanaka. I am not sure if at this time the Theravada was a separate school or sub tradition within Vibhajyavāda.

Mahayana Buddhism was around in this era forming not long before WTWSTMS, Xuanzang was a Mahayana Buddhist specifically of the Yogacara school. For Mahayana Buddhists in particular I think these sub-schools such as Yogacara could be schools you take when the character is on either theology focus or the scholarship focus.

Then there is Vajrayana which came about in this era, though scholars debate as to when. The earliest book is in the 3rd century, however the term Vajrayana doesn't really come into use as a school till around the 7th or 8th centuries. So we would have to decide when we want it to appear.

Nang Chos, the Tibetan form of Buddhism, should be in the mod because it became established with the Tibetan Empire that arises during the time frame of the mod. Songtsen Gampo the founder of the Tibetan Empire was also the one to help bring in Buddhism and establish it, even if the native Bon Religion was still practiced by most people

That leaves Ari Buddhism or Burmese Buddhism, which should stay in there. To reflect the particular conditions of Burmese worship such as worshipping Nat Spirits and Bodhisattvas. This form of Buddhism should also give access to a patron deity mechanic to reflect the worship of Nat Spirits and Bodhisattvas in Burma.

So in total we would have the following branches of Buddhism: - Sarvāstivāda, Vibhajyavāda, Mahāsāṃghika, Pudgalavāda, Dharmaguptaka, Mahayana, Vajrayana, Nang Chos, and Ari.

Hinduism

Hinduism is important during this period since thanks to the Gupta Empire heavily patronized it. It is during this time period that the major Hindu denominations emerge. So Shaivism, Vaishnavism, Shaktism, and Smartism took shape and form during this era as the distinct denominations that we are familar with; though worship existed much earlier.

Beyond those four denominations there were others during the reign of the Guptas. There was Saura/Suryaism, which focused on the worship of Surya and as the concept of the Trimurti became developed either denied that concept or placed Surya above it.

It was during the reign of the Gupta that many of the various Purana texts were written down, though some were not written down to after WTWSMS. These puranic texts were there to help provide legitimacy to the Hindu Gupta Emperors.

Now in CK2's version of the mod, there is Dravidian Paganism which I don't think fits this era at all. Now obvioulsy there is a lot of folk beliefs in the south that are different due to the Hindu Synthesis but by this time period synthesized with local beliefs to become the predominate beliefs. Now we could split Shaivism in two similar to how in vanilla CK3 Shaktism is split. But I think a better thing would be to use the more flexible localization in CK3 as well events and decisions to account for some of the local differences between north and south.

Now to reflect the synthesis and transformation, I think that the 'denomination' of Shruatism would be included. This branch is the most orthodox and rejects the Puranas, focusing on the earlier vedic texts only and vedic rituals in particular such as the Srauta rituals(hence their name). While later on they become a tiny minority, I think that they should be much more wide spread though with few rulers actually following them as the newer forms of Hinduism are in vogue and becoming much more popular.

In CK2 WTWSMS as faiths there is the philosophies of Bhakti, Tantric, and Mimamsa, When it comes to the Āstika Philosophies such as Mimamsa, my thought is to make it part of the Learning lifestyle, specifically theology or scholarship focus. So you would pick either Nyaya, Vaiśeṣika, Samkhya, Yoga, Mīmāṃsā, and Vedanta as a philosophy to focus on.

For Tantric because of its role in Buddhism and Hinduism, I had thought that it would have some events and decisions attached to it for those branches that have the Esotericism tenet. Perhaps another lifestyle thing.

For the Bhakti movement, during this era it was mostly a southern India thing, especially among the Tamil people. It is not till much later in the medieval era that CK vanilla covers that it spread from southern India northwards. So my thought is that Bhakti would be an innovation southern Indian cultures can adopt in the Late Antiquity era, as it came about during the 500s and 600s.

Finally there is Sramana, Carvaka and Ajivika in CK2's WTWSMS. Now Sramana refers to the Sramanic movement, and that covered several religions including Janism and Buddhism as well as Carvaka and Ajivika. However Carvaka and Ajivika are tricky since we know so little about them especially for this era. They did exist and would last well beyond WTWSMS even if they were by that point very much a minority position. The tricky thing is just how little we know of them. Adding to this difficulty is the fact that they got incorporated into Hinduism as Hindu philosophies. Currently my thought is to have them be philosophies, especially since religion is determined at the county level not provincial level.

Finally we come to the tribal religions of Sarnaism, Sanamahism, and Bathouism. CK3 already includes the tribal religions of Donyi-Polo and Mundhum. I think the other three tribal religions should be included. Further more that all the Eastern 'pagan' religions should be moved into the Eastern religion to reflect that they co-exist with the other religions here.

[LT-Rascek]

Yes. In regards to Jainism it won't need to be broken up. The three sects that exist in Vanilla were formed in the BCE era during the timespan of Imperator. So they are good.

Agreed; remaining question is how were the sects distributed? Currently, they are all represented with "Jainism". It's a similar question for Buddhism and Hinduism as well, although you cover some of those somewhat in particular.

I'll be quoting subportions of your response, but it was very informative, fyi. I only have a cursory grasp of Buddhist/Hindu history, so only a few comments.

Buddhism
Thankfully wiki has a pretty decent map for where they are located so that should be helpful. Beyond those schools were a few others. Theravada itself derives from the Vibhajyavāda schools in Sri Lanaka. I am not sure if at this time the Theravada was a separate school or sub tradition within Vibhajyavāda.

1). Has there been any significant churn/change since the Fifth Century to change where the Buddhist sects are from those maps?
2). For the purposes of the scenario, is separating the two important?

Mahayana Buddhism was around in this era forming not long before WTWSTMS, Xuanzang was a Mahayana Buddhist specifically of the Yogacara school. For Mahayana Buddhists in particular I think these sub-schools such as Yogacara could be schools you take when the character is on either theology focus or the scholarship focus.

Modeling as a decision for Mahayana characters might be easier as a first cut. Unless we can have religion-specific lifestyle focuses that are exclusionary.

Songtsen Gampo the founder of the Tibetan Empire was also the one to help bring in Buddhism and establish it, even if the native Bon Religion was still practiced by most people

Either have an event-driven Tibetan conqueror (not my preferred choice) or an option to adopt Nang Chos for sufficiently powerful Tibetans (my preferred choice) should cover that.

This form of Buddhism should also give access to a patron deity mechanic to reflect the worship of Nat Spirits and Bodhisattvas in Burma.

Ari is in game already, so we just have to override it.

So in total we would have the following branches of Buddhism: - Sarvāstivāda, Vibhajyavāda, Mahāsāṃghika, Pudgalavāda, Dharmaguptaka, Mahayana, Vajrayana, Nang Chos, and Ari.

Agreed.

Hinduism
Now we could split Shaivism in two similar to how in vanilla CK3 Shaktism is split. But I think a better thing would be to use the more flexible localization in CK3 as well events and decisions to account for some of the local differences between north and south.

Agreed.

In CK2 WTWSMS as faiths there is the philosophies of Bhakti, Tantric, and Mimamsa, When it comes to the Āstika Philosophies such as Mimamsa, my thought is to make it part of the Learning lifestyle, specifically theology or scholarship focus. So you would pick either Nyaya, Vaiśeṣika, Samkhya, Yoga, Mīmāṃsā, and Vedanta as a philosophy to focus on.

If we can make lifestyles work as per Mahayana Buddhism I agree. Otherwise, decisions are quicker and easier.

For the Bhakti movement, during this era it was mostly a southern India thing, especially among the Tamil people. It is not till much later in the medieval era that CK vanilla covers that it spread from southern India northwards. So my thought is that Bhakti would be an innovation southern Indian cultures can adopt in the Late Antiquity era, as it came about during the 500s and 600s.

What should be the impact of the innovation?

Finally there is Sramana, Carvaka and Ajivika in CK2's WTWSMS. Now Sramana refers to the Sramanic movement, and that covered several religions including Janism and Buddhism as well as Carvaka and Ajivika. However Carvaka and Ajivika are tricky since we know so little about them especially for this era. They did exist and would last well beyond WTWSMS even if they were by that point very much a minority position. The tricky thing is just how little we know of them. Adding to this difficulty is the fact that they got incorporated into Hinduism as Hindu philosophies. Currently my thought is to have them be philosophies, especially since religion is determined at the county level not provincial level.

Agree as per my previous notes about philosophies.

Finally we come to the tribal religions of Sarnaism, Sanamahism, and Bathouism. CK3 already includes the tribal religions of Donyi-Polo and Mundhum. I think the other three tribal religions should be included. Further more that all the Eastern 'pagan' religions should be moved into the Eastern religion to reflect that they co-exist with the other religions here.

That should work just fine, if you add an "unreformed" doctrine to them. See Hepthalitism in #6 Mazdan implementation I did.

@herkles If you can get a map patch covering the Indian subcontinent, that'd be very helpful. I've got a bit done on Tibet/Nepal from what I know about the dispositions of Tibetan sub-cultures (and having them practice Khyarwé Bön from what I understand).

[herkles]

1). Has there been any significant churn/change since the Fifth Century to change where the Buddhist sects are from those maps 2). For the purposes of the scenario, is separating the two important?

1.) Not that I can tell. Though the Northern schools start to merge into Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism as they become popular IIRC.

2.) For the sake of the Mod? not really, especially since the Vibhajyavāda schools are located in southern India/Sri Lanka and they became Theravada as time went on. Not sure when they started to call themselves Theravada though.

Modeling as a decision for Mahayana characters might be easier as a first cut. Unless we can have religion-specific lifestyle focuses that are exclusionary.

Honestly I haven't tried religious specific lifestyles but theoretically it might be possible but also it might not be possible. We have to try I guess.

Either have an event-driven Tibetan conqueror (not my preferred choice) or an option to adopt Nang Chos for sufficiently powerful Tibetans (my preferred choice) should cover that.

Yea, I agree with your choice as well.

What should be the impact of the innovation?

Probably better popular opinion and culture conversion resistance are two ideas I have atm.

@herkles If you can get a map patch covering the Indian subcontinent, that'd be very helpful. I've got a bit done on Tibet/Nepal from what I know about the dispositions of Tibetan sub-cultures (and having them practice Khyarwé Bön from what I understand).

This is where things become tricky, because of the fact that currently things are done on a county level. India is pluralistic and highly mixed, the cities even more so then the country side. For example Gujarat was a center for Jainism, It was here where several Jain councils would be held. Its also here where the Pudgalavada school of Buddhism was the strongest. At the same time there are ancient temples dedicated to Shiva and Krishna here, and the worship of Surya was popular here as well IIRC.

This sort of goes for most of India which makes things complicated.

[loup99]

Maps would be ideal, but I can make use of either.

Are these maps for 450 helpful? Mid 5th century, so not end of the 4th but contains details.

395 with tribes:

[LT-Rascek]

Back after a semi-forced break due to life circumstances.

Another map update based on map 2 (and a little bit of map 1) you provided;

Changes to note:

• Clean up and fill in in Europe with the Germanic Tribes.
• Romano-Noric was fixed to be mostly south of the Danube with German settlement north.
• A little bit of the Garamantes found mostly by cross-referencing google maps with ruin sites.
• Some Assyrian fill-in.
• Some research into Tibet prior to the rise of the Tibetan Empire. Most of the culture groups map from CK3 and the religion is Bon (specifically Khyarwe Bon which seems to be the pre-Nangchos Buddhism version of Bon)

Concerning the maps provided:

• Crimean Goths have a few provinces settled (that are likely ruled by Turkic speakers)
• From map 1 there's a rump presence of Samartians in the Sea of Azov amongst the Turkic tribes that weren't fully assimilated by 476.
• I noted the Turkic tribes weren't broken up by language groups (Sabirs/Utigurs/Kutigirs/&c) which are listed in the WTWSMS culture files (but unused), so I resuscitated them to show how things should be broken up. I can remap them all the Bolghar/Barsil culture easily. In particular the Barsils were moved farther south than WTWSMS, and were a lot smaller.
• I also noted the (WTWSMS) Bolghar groups were practicing Sarmatian paganism. This map doesn't reflect that as I can't find any resources to support that; they still practiced Tengrism near as I could find.
• To the west of the Bolghars are the Magyars with Taltosism/Magyar paganism (included since its part of base CK3, but that can be changed).
• South of the Magyars are the Avars and North are the Bashkirs, in line with map 2.
• The Venedi seemed still extant ca. 476, so they replaced the Southern Slavic groups between the Dniester and the Carpathians.
• The blank region on map 2 was left for Hunnic settlement in line with WTWSMS.

Moving forward, I should do more reading on the blank spots on the map in Asia, but they are probably going to be (very crude) educated guesses at best. Very, very little attested about Finno-Urgic peoples of the time, or Turkic speakers of Central Asia circa 450, and so forth.

I also need to incorporate @herkles comments about India; I've wanted to get the map filled in first before digging deeply into the finer details and debates about how that will shake out.

Culture Map:

Religion Map:

Edit: fixed religion map error with Magyar.

Key_culture.xlsx

Key_religion.xlsx

[loup99]

No problems, I hope you are all well. I don't know if you have had the time to look at Discord, but we had Sir Diesalot doing research to implement new Altaic cultures on the basis of more academic sources (Rouran and Kirghiz), (and another contributor has offered to add more religion icons). Those should fill in the blank spots Eastern Steppe and Mongolia. I have very little material and knowledge myself about this area so I don't think it would be helpful.

[LT-Rascek]

No problems, I hope you are all well. I don't know if you have had the time to look at Discord, but we had Sir Diesalot doing research to implement new Altaic cultures on the basis of more academic sources (Rouran and Kirghiz), (and another contributor has offered to add more religion icons). Those should fill in the blank spots Eastern Steppe and Mongolia. I have very little material and knowledge myself about this area so I don't think it would be helpful.

Alright, I'll check in with him later about the Eastern portions of the steppe.

Did some more research and considerations:

• Amalgamated all the various Oghur tribes back into Bolghar culture to reduce number of Altaic cultures.
• Moved Vistula-Venti into Slavic culture/religion, as they were an Indo-European (probable) Slavic people [see Europe's Barbarians AD 200-600]
• Expanded Old Slavic presence in Ukraine as they were settled pretty well at this time and seemed to have mostly displaced the Samartians north of the Donets.
• Added the Adyghes (Circassians) and Caucasian Avars (new culture) to represent the extant cultures at the time thanks to improved province resolution in CK3.
• Moved the Amardians to be consolidated along the Caspian coast as per information and maps I can find.
• Added the Daylamites along the Caspian coast as they were extant during this time. Mostly practiced indigenous Iranian paganism, but also had Christian communities. Also left one province of the Daylamites as Manichean in line with WTWSMS map.
• Replaced some of the Aramean provinces in Persia and Kurdistan with Kurds, since a distinct Persian-speaking peoples lived in the region south of Lake Van during 476 that (depending on the scholar you ask) were Kurdish ancestors. Mixture of indigenous paganism and (Nestorian) Christianity was practiced at the time as well.
• Some of the empty provinces in Mesopotamia were replaced with Zoroastrian Persians as they had a presence in Asoristan during this period. In the same vein, Nestorian Assyrian presence in the North around Mosul should probably be larger unless you disagree.
• After finding little other information to fill in the empty Anatolian provinces, I filled them in based on scant maps of the region as best I could. Some of the provinces differ slightly from what was transcribed in WTWSMS to make more contiguous ethnic/religious blocs (for the Melchisdecians and Galatian Celts most notably).
• Digging up some references linked on Wikipedia and cross-referencing the CK3 map with Google maps, I filled out the Volga-Finnish and Balto-Finnish provinces along with fixing the isolated (Baltic) Galindians. A fair bit from CK3 867 seemed to match what I could find for Fins in 476, so around Muscovy is mostly the same as CK3 (all the Finnish cultures listed in CK3 were extant during 476 for the Balto-Finns). Also added Karelian culture to Karelia, as they were extant then.
• Galindians came close to but didn't occupy Moscow at time, so they seem to jut out a bit toward Moscow but just short (based on corresponding CK3 map, references to Galindians, and Google Maps).
• The Udmerts, who live along the Kama River (in today what are sizable numbers for indigenous Finno-Uralic speakers), were placed between the Magyars and the Kamma river to fill out the "Balto-Finnish people" listed on one of your previous maps. This helps keep the Finno-Uralic speaking groups physically connected vis-a-vis previous maps.
• Fixed placement of the Khanty and Mansi peoples from the WTWSMS transcription.
• As Bjarmanians aren't a real known culture and the location seems to correspond in WTWSMS, CK3 Bjarmanians are replaced with WTWSMS Samoyeds.

Culture Map:

Religion Map:

Edit: fixed map upload

Key_culture.xlsx
Key_religion.xlsx

Some path forward stuff:
Moving the Vistula-Venti back into the Slavic group seems to match as they were the the likely forebears of other distinct groups like the Sclaveni, Wends, and Antes. Which raises the question: do we want to have a single overarching cultures for these groups (aka Old Slavic) or differentiate them? From what I can see, we might be able to break up the large "Old Slavic" culture into distinct components that become the likely ancestors to the Western Slavs (Wends/Vistula-Venti), Southern Slavs (Sclaveni), and Eastern Slavs (Antes, who historically were conquered by the [Pannonian] Avars and thus didn't seem to migrate). I know this might be a controversial take, so I wanted to get some feedback before pushing it through.

As for the Garamantes, rather than expanding the map as in WTWSMS, I'm thinking a cultural innovation "Qanat Irrigation" during Late Antiquity, raising their maximum development (at least in desert if it can be coded that way) better models their society. From what I can read, they were very advanced, but not great in number, while the WTWSMS map really sizes to inflate their power. That way, we don't need to overhaul the map too much to give them their due.

Since it came up with the Oghurs, I should probably also put together a political map for to transcribe WTWSMS to the new map. At the highest level (i.e., independent duchies, kingdoms, empires), at least, it's essentially a concurrent effort and I can fill in a good bit of the map right now.

[loup99]

While there are changed map scales with baronies appearing as provinces, I'm not convinced that we should completely remove minorities that we had in CK2.

After finding little other information to fill in the empty Anatolian provinces, I filled them in based on scant maps of the region as best I could. Some of the provinces differ slightly from what was transcribed in WTWSMS to make more contiguous ethnic/religious blocs (for the Melchisdecians and Galatian Celts most notably).

Doesn't that mean the Galatians disapear entirely? If we want to attest that minority still being present in the area I'm not convinced of this being the best solution. Same for the Melchisedechians.

As Bjarmanians aren't a real known culture and the location seems to correspond in WTWSMS, CK3 Bjarmanians are replaced with WTWSMS Samoyeds.

The website historyfiles suggests that the Bjarmians were the Permians.

The Permians (formerly known as Bjarmians) include the Komis (once known as Zyrians) and Udmurts.

Moving the Vistula-Venti back into the Slavic group seems to match as they were the the likely forebears of other distinct groups like the Sclaveni, Wends, and Antes. Which raises the question: do we want to have a single overarching cultures for these groups (aka Old Slavic) or differentiate them? From what I can see, we might be able to break up the large "Old Slavic" culture into distinct components that become the likely ancestors to the Western Slavs (Wends/Vistula-Venti), Southern Slavs (Sclaveni), and Eastern Slavs (Antes, who historically were conquered by the [Pannonian] Avars and thus didn't seem to migrate). I know this might be a controversial take, so I wanted to get some feedback before pushing it through.

The Old Slavic group is used for the Slavic Migration event chain which later splits it, meaning some of the cultures you mention appear later on.

As for the Garamantes, rather than expanding the map as in WTWSMS, I'm thinking a cultural innovation "Qanat Irrigation" during Late Antiquity, raising their maximum development (at least in desert if it can be coded that way) better models their society. From what I can read, they were very advanced, but not great in number, while the WTWSMS map really sizes to inflate their power. That way, we don't need to overhaul the map too much to give them their due.

Agreed, I want to avoid modifying the map too extensively. If a few oasises or corridors need to be added that can be done however.

[LT-Rascek]

While there are changed map scales with baronies appearing as provinces, I'm not convinced that we should completely remove minorities that we had in CK2.
Doesn't that mean the Galatians disapear entirely? If we want to attest that minority still being present in the area I'm not convinced of this being the best solution. Same for the Melchisedechians.

I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. Both minorities still exist (pink for the Melchisedechians in Anatolia in the religion map, green for the Galatians in Anatolia in the culture map). I just changed one or two provinces from how they were in WTWSMS to make those groups contiguous.
Quite the opposite, the latest map/key version includes some new minorities (Daylamites, Caucasian Avars, Adyghes, proto-Kurds) that weren't in WTWSMS (but in some cases were included in the culture file (Adyghes)).

To reiterate, a small number of counties in Anatolia were changed from WTWSMS to make blocs contiguous.

The website historyfiles suggests that the Bjarmians were the Permians.
In that case, the Samoyeds would probably cease to exist in this map as their WTWSMS provinces don't readily map to the new map.
We may also want to split the Finno-Uralic cultures like CK3 into Balto-Finnic (Chuds,Estonian, Finnish, Karelian, Sami, Vepsian), Volga-Finnic (Mari, Merya, Meschera, Mordvin, Muroma), Urgo-Permian (Komis, Udmurts,Bjarmians), and Ugric-Magyar (Magyer,Hungarian,Khanty,Mansi) in line with the increased province count.

The Old Slavic group is used for the Slavic Migration event chain which later splits it, meaning some of the cultures you mention appear later on.

I'm sorry I wasn't clear; I understand the Slavic Migration event chain splits them in WTWSMS.

I was more approaching the idea that the Antes/Venedi are the progenitors of the East Slavic cultures, the Vistula-Venti are the progenitors of the West Slavic cultures, and the Sclavi are the progenitors of the South Slavic cultures. Other cultures like Bohemian, Polish, Bosnian, Croatian, &c become melting pots (e.g., Croatian/Bosnian as a Sclavi rulers+Romano-Illyrian substrate culture, Polish = Vistula-Venti rulers+East German substrate culture). That would be more in line with the idea of keeping things dynamic instead of event-driven in this project.

If a few oasises or corridors need to be added that can be done however.

Agreed

[loup99]

I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. Both minorities still exist (pink for the Melchisedechians in Anatolia in the religion map, green for the Galatians in Anatolia in the culture map). I just changed one or two provinces from how they were in WTWSMS to make those groups contiguous.
Quite the opposite, the latest map/key version includes some new minorities (Daylamites, Caucasian Avars, Adyghes, proto-Kurds) that weren't in WTWSMS (but in some cases were included in the culture file (Adyghes)).

To reiterate, a small number of counties in Anatolia were changed from WTWSMS to make blocs contiguous.

Ok, I had misunderstood you.

In that case, the Samoyeds would probably cease to exist in this map as their WTWSMS provinces don't readily map to the new map.

The Samoyeds are more a group, at least linguistically. I presume those are the Nenets, Enets etc.

We may also want to split the Finno-Uralic cultures like CK3 into Balto-Finnic (Chuds,Estonian, Finnish, Karelian, Sami, Vepsian), Volga-Finnic (Mari, Merya, Meschera, Mordvin, Muroma), Urgo-Permian (Komis, Udmurts,Bjarmians), and Ugric-Magyar (Magyer,Hungarian,Khanty,Mansi) in line with the increased province count.

@AvalonXD ported those splits in the culture files.

I'm sorry I wasn't clear; I understand the Slavic Migration event chain splits them in WTWSMS.

I was more approaching the idea that the Antes/Venedi are the progenitors of the East Slavic cultures, the Vistula-Venti are the progenitors of the West Slavic cultures, and the Sclavi are the progenitors of the South Slavic cultures. Other cultures like Bohemian, Polish, Bosnian, Croatian, &c become melting pots (e.g., Croatian/Bosnian as a Sclavi rulers+Romano-Illyrian substrate culture, Polish = Vistula-Venti rulers+East German substrate culture). That would be more in line with the idea of keeping things dynamic instead of event-driven in this project.

I see what you mean, but I will point out that the Slavic Migration events are already somewhat dynamic in the sense that they can spread and move differently, nothing is scripted geographically so they tie political and cultural development with options to settle the migrating tribes. I don't know if just replacing that with melting-pot events would be sufficient if the political settlement events aren't integrated into it.

[LT-Rascek]

The Samoyeds are more a group, at least linguistically. I presume those are the Nenets, Enets etc.
Alright I'll keep that in mind.

@AvalonXD ported those splits in the culture files.
Okay, I hadn't fully read all the culture changes; there are a lot (which is a good thing!)

I see what you mean, but I will point out that the Slavic Migration events are already somewhat dynamic in the sense that they can spread and move differently, nothing is scripted geographically so they tie political and cultural development with options to settle the migrating tribes. I don't know if just replacing that with melting-pot events would be sufficient if the political settlement events aren't integrated into it.

Understood, then I'll leave Old Slavic as a large bloc and remove Venedi culture and replace with Old Slavic.

Updated Maps (focus on Near East/Persia):

• Moved cultures around in the key to represent Urgo-Permian (Bjarmian,Komi,Udmurt)
• Changed religion of Bjarmian, Komi, Udmurt provinces to Turumism in line with CK3
• Slavic cultures consolidated to Vistula-Veneti and Old Slavic, in line with CK3. [Note WTWSMS, Visutla-Veneti were Baltic, but from what I've read, they were Indo-European Speakers and very likely Slavic]
• Increased Assyrian presence to encompass their homeland in Mosul/Nineveh (it remains Nestorian provinces)
• Found mapping for additional South-Semitic cultures.
• Filled out Arabia and Near East with some correspondences of ruins and CK3 maps with modern maps.
• Added Parthian provinces to North East Persia in line with William Robert Shepards historical Atlas
• Also cross-referenced Bactrian, Sogdian, and Sakkan culture based on historical distribution of the Kingdom of Khotan and the Shule Kingdom. Both were Buddhist so the Saka provinces in the Tarim Basin are (generic) Buddhist; more detail should be added after conferring with @herkles (probably Mahayana in my estimation)
• South of Parthia, Persian, Indo-Parthian, and Pasthun provinces were filled in. Pashtun remains in the mountains (as per history), while Indo-Parthian expanded based on historical presence. Persian filled in the reset.
• Added Zurvanism based on observations from Mary Boyce's article "Some Reflections on Zurvanism" in Persian culture provinces in the South and West and with some correspondence to
  CK3 867 map. After the rise of the Parthians, Zurvanism seemed to retreat somewhat and as such does not occupy provinces that would make up the core of the Sassanid Empire.
• Arewordik replaced Hellenism in Cacuasian Albania, as the region fell under Sassanid cultural hegemony and everything I've seen seems to indicate Arewordik better reflects the reality of the region than Hellenism.

Culture Map:

Religion Map:

Key_culture.xlsx
Key_religion.xlsx

What seems to remain on my end is cleaning up East Africa (Nubia et al), North Africa (Garamantes et al), and India based on @herkles data. You said others are working on the Eastern and African portions of the map, so when I finish those portions it can be handed off to them to finish up.

[LT-Rascek]

Got some more time so to get back into working on this, I started with more map polishing, focusing on Africa.

Big notes:
In less well-documented regions, faiths tend to be synonymous with cultural/linguistic blocks (i.e., all Yoruba-speaking groups follow Yoruba relgion, even if Paradox put them in another group [e.g., Nupe]). Seemed the best way to deal with the general lack of information in various parts of the continent.

Siguism is really specific to the Dogon people, and as such doesn't make sense to spread across half of West Africa. Instead, a generic "West African" faith placeholder is there right now. There's very little information on specific West African Pagan customs/traditions, so I kept it as a placeholder faith for those various not-well-defined belief systems in West Africa that don't match CK3's odd faith distribution. Bidaism remains the religion of Mande-speakers, regardless of how their are grouped culturally.

North Africa
To start of with, the Berbers and the general situation in Numidia, Africa, Mauretania Tinitana, Mauretania Casariensis, Libya, and the Sahara:

All the Berber cultures now have assigned provinces (mostly) matching their previous and current distributions. Central African in the key is no more, now broken into other groups (with the Berber cultures their own block). For each, here's a quick rundown:

• Guanches: Same as previously (Canary Islands)
• Tashellhit: Cross-referenced here [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shilha_language]
• Tamazight: Assumed to mean Central-Atlas Tamazight. Filled in to the coast where the Arabs colonized. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Atlas_Tamazight]
• Riffian: Replaced some Tamazight to the coast [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rifians]
• Shenwa: Replaced mediterranean coastal berber provinces between Moraccan border and Algiers. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenwa_language]
• Taqbaylit: Moved south somewhat to better match historical distribution and make room for Romanization. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabyle_language]
• Tacawit: placed at its current historical position south of Constantine and kept African Solar. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shawiya_language]
• Nafusi moved to NW Libya where they became Ibadi (476: African Solar). Replaced by Garamantes. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nafusa_Mountains#/media/File:Libya_ethnic.svg]
• Mzab Wargla: Fits in with Emirate of Mzab. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mzab%E2%80%93Wargla_languages]
• Tuareg: This was more difficult. Based on the historical breadth of the Taureg, I found some anchor points (Timbuktu, Gao, Zinder, Agades), then filled in the partially desert provinces. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuareg_people]
• Zaghawa: Think these are the mis-identified "Tuareg" on this map [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2b/East-Hem_500ad.jpg]. Filled in on the desert provinces near lake Chad; most of their presence isn't represented on the map, as well as roughly matching the CK3 distribution.

Religion-wise, the old Central African Paganism replaces the West African Paganism in the Canaries and is the religion of choice for the Tuareg and Zaghawa. Mastimani was confined to the highland provinces with Anti and Cybellian in the more low-land regions of Morocco/Mauretania Tingitana. Christianity and Valentinianism were pared down slightly to remain more coastal, as was noted here [https://books.google.com/books?id=rN0tBQAAQBAJ&pg=PT272&dq=christianity+mauretania&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiDpYTIsYriAhUBTo8KHeaWD1UQ6AEIHDAA#v=onepage&q&f=false], where Romanization was much more light in the interior of the continent. Likewise, African Romance is pared down to better match colonia the Romans set down.

The Garamantes remain Kemetic.

Side note: I'm thinking the Nafusi and some of the other Berbers (that later embraced Kharijitism) should be Donatist as well, since it seems likely they influenced the later development of Islam in the region. But that point is clearly debatable.

East Africa
Some polish since the last version: The Welayta/Omotic peoples are better defined to be beyond the Blue Nile in the corner of the Horn of Africa. Christanity is pared down slightly in the Horn to avoid converting Sidamo, Afar, and Welayta provinces. East African paganism replaces Waaqism in the Somali, Sidamo, and Afar provinces, since Waaqism is more specifically a Oromo custom, not a Somali custom.
Daju people follow the Kemetic faith, based on the supposition that they are descended from Nubians who migrated after the fall of Meroe/Kush. Given the similarity between the Daju languages and Nobiin, that seems reasonable and it reduces the number of new faiths to be introduced.

As for where to draw the line for Christians in Nubia:
Nobatia - Christian North of Faras, Pagan south circa 476 [https://www.academia.edu/462120/The_Rise_of_Nobadia_Social_Changes_in_Northern_Nubia_in_Late_Antiquity]

West Africa:
I'm not sure how good Paradox's research has been, but from what I can see, it's not exactly great. I've left most of the culture groups alone and focused on roughly matching the linguistic maps given here [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/db/Map_of_the_Niger%E2%80%93Congo_languages.svg] for the Kru, Senufo, Gur, Mande, Dogon, Yoruba, and Volta-Niger languages. If they have better information on historic distributions of peoples in West Africa, I'd love to read it!

Yoruba cultures:
Yoruba cultures were slightly tweaked to better match Yorubaland proper, and the Nupe people's follow Yoruba paganism instead of Bori (but are still a Hausa culture)

Guinean Uplander Cultures:
Gur is an overarching language family and I used it to represent the various other language groups besides Bobo and Marka.

Mel was left alone, as it actually represents the various proto-farming groups in the region that were somewhat related to Mel languages. Follows generic West African Paganism/Animism.

Malinke is a Mande culture and follows Bidaism. Senufo is a new culture that speaks a separate language family from other Niger-Congo groups and follows generic West African Paganism/Anamism.

Akkan cultures:
Guan is tiny and was removed. Akkan and Kru pretty much match their CK3 distributions with no tweaks and follow Akkom faith.

Senegambian:
Serer is given its current historical distribution and the remaining is as per CK3 and other map studies. Roog Sene is the religion.

Sahelian Group:
This is really the Mande culture group. Mostly from CK3, which agrees with what maps I can find. Only big change is adding the Dogon people in a few provinces, who follow Singuism instead of Bidaism.

Hausa Group:
Mostly the same as before. Sao is fine as it represents the pre-16th century people in that river basin. All in this group follow Bori except the Yoruba-speaking Nupe peoples, who follow Yoruba Paganism.

Culture Map

Key_culture.xlsx

Religion Map

Key_religion.xlsx

Next is India and I'll be referencing @herkles notes on the matter. Has Sir Diesalot made progress on the Altaic cultures?

[loup99]

I will contact Sir Diesalot directly, to my knowledge he was doing research on Africa and had finished work on the Altaic cultures.

[LT-Rascek]

I will contact Sir Diesalot directly, to my knowledge he was doing research on Africa and had finished work on the Altaic cultures.

Alright. I'm open to changes/patches/fixes that people have.

As mentioned previously, here's the India/Tibet patch; first, I want to mention I built this from @herkles Dharmachakra mod, which he mentioned is free to use so long as properly credited. It saved me some time trying to figure out how to better set up India as a whole.

Link: https://github.com/herkles/Dharmachakra

India
Here's a few notes on how this differs from Dharmachakra:

• Removed Rajbongshi as it appears to arise well after this mode (>1000 AD) as a split from Assamese/Bengali
• Removed Malvi as it appears to be more of a dialect of Rajasthani than its own culture; the Indo-Scythian presence in WtWSMS replaced it.
• Bhil was kept as the name seems to be a Dravidian exonym, which implies an older separation from the rest of Indo-Aryans.
• The older Buddhist schools mostly replaced Mahayana which is present only in a single Indian province (as well as two Nepalese provinces).
• Dharmaguptaka seems to have been the main branch of Buddhism west of the Indus as well as to the north, where it was later replaced with Mahayana. Other Buddhist schools have small presences listed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_Buddhism#/media/File:SectarianBuddhistschools.png and cross-referenced on Google Maps.
• In the Brahmaputra River basin, the proto-Assamese Kamarupa Kingdom was recently established within the Gupta Empire and as such I think Vashnavism would be the religion of the Assamese. The region is still mostly Tibeto-Burman with several Tibeto-Burman pagan religions dominating including Bathouism, Sanamahi, Donyi-Poloism, and Sedism.
• Lhomon culture seems to be the game term for the Tani/mountain Tibeto-Burman peoples and as such was left in the game. The Bodo people still have a few provinces and follow Sedism (the distinction between Sedism and Donyi-Poloism seems to be minor in any case.
• Bathousim and Sanamahi religions lie to the south with the Naga, Kachari, and Manipuri peoples.
• With the existence of the Afro-Asiatic Munda peoples (folowing Sarna sthal paganism), the Mon should probably be moved into the same culture group with them.
• Vibhajyavada was phased out in favor of Theravada for simplicity.
• Krishnaism appeared to first get a start in northern India and possesses a single province that appears to have been its historic center at the time.
• Nuristani paganism remains in Nuristani provinces.

Other suggestions by @herkles that we may want to follow

• With the ease of fusion of Hinduism with eastern paganism, we may want to move eastern pagan religions to be part of the Eastern family.
• The Alchon huns should probably be the ones ruling Punjab and practicing Zunbilism, which seems to be the progenitor faith for Surya Hinduism.

And some changes from default WtWSMS:

• Indo-Scythian is greatly reduced to three provinces.
• Since the Indo-Parthians didn't seem to settle down in the Indus Plain in a notable way, their Indus provinces were replaced with proto-Punjabi.
• Buddhism in North-East India is reduced in favor of Kalikula Shaktism, which seemed to be dominate at the time.
• Tibeto-Burman cultures (Manipuri, Bodo, Lhomon, Naga, Kirati, Kachari) should probably be separated from Tibetan cultures (Boda, Zhangzhung, Tsangpa, Sumpa) as the later eventually conquered and replaced the former (especially in Bhutan), considering the stark religious differences as well.

Tibet

• Doing some digging, it seems the Sumpa were bound by the Tongtian River [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumpa#Origins_and_territory], so I think I've gotten it properly bound on the map. The river is not explicitly marked, but that line should roughly match it based on my map cross-checking.
• To the north, the Tuyuhun occupy the land up north of the Sumpa and west of Qinghai Lake. Besides that, the Tangut and Qiang peoples fill in the remainder of the Tibetan region.
• Traditional religions in the region are culture bound, with Bon for the Tibetans, Vvluphixje for the Qiang, and Melie for the Tangut.

Key_culture.xlsx

Key_religion.xlsx

What remains on the map are the lands beyond the Tarim Basin and the Altaic regions, which Sir Diesalot should have research on. I don't want to step on too many toes with that, so when he can get those to me, I can finish this map.

[loup99]

I will contact Sir Diesalot directly, to my knowledge he was doing research on Africa and had finished work on the Altaic cultures.

What remains on the map are the lands beyond the Tarim Basin and the Altaic regions, which Sir Diesalot should have research on. I don't want to step on too many toes with that, so when he can get those to me, I can finish this map.

He is going to send in his file for the Altaic cultures. Quoting what he wrote to explain his works:

The newly added areas won't need much in the way of additional cultures from what was already present in the CK2 mod. One of the only cultures I would argue to add are the Nirun, who were the dominant tribe of the Rouran Khaganate (the CK2 version of the mod has the whole Rouran Khaganate as Xianbei, but that is anachronistic. The Xianbei by the 5th century had virtually entirely fallen from power in the steppes. The Xianbei moved south into northern China in the 3rd century and by the 5th century appear to have been highly Sinicized. Several Sino-Xianbei dynasties existed as part of the 16 Kingdoms, but they are outside of the game area. The only one of the Xianbei states that is inside the game area is the Tuyuhun Kingdom. Most of the newly added territories in this part of the map however were inhabited by groups already represented in the CK2 mod. The only other exception are probably the Kyrghyz, who lived in the Yenisei river area and who I'd argue are distinct enough from the Tiele tribes (or at least were seen as such by the few contemporary sources describing them) to warrant adding as a separate culture. A final change that I would argue for is to change "Chuyue" into "Yueban". Historically, the Yueban broke up into four smaller groups around the 480's, of which the Chuyue were one. Therefore it is weird to use the term "Chuyue" to describe the culture of the entire area. I suppose "Xiongnu" would be another alternative term, since the Yueban are commonly understood to be a remnant of the earlier Xiongnu, and the term Xiongnu is probably better known than Yueban.
TL;DR I propose adding the "Nirun" and "Kyrghyz" cultures and changing the name of the "Chuyue" culture to "Yueban" or "Xiongnu".

For the Rouran namelist I had to reconstruct the contemporary Chinese pronunciation of the characters used (almost all Rouran names were written in Chinese characters) and then transliterate it to a more Altaic orthography based on Mongolian (to which Rouran appears to have been closely related). Rouran female names were a challenge, since women were never named in Chinese written sources and thus no female Rouran names are known. In the absence of known names I filled the name list up with archaic Mongolian names. Kirghiz is a similar story. A few male Kirghiz names from this period are known, but far from enough to fill a list with. So I ended up just using the Kirghiz name list of a few centuries later. It is impossible to say how much Kirghiz names changed between the 5th and 9th centuries anyways.

[LT-Rascek]

He is going to send in his file for the Altaic cultures.

Alright, sounds good.

I also need to review @herkles notes on #10 for the map to make certain I didn't miss anything on that.

[loup99]

He is going to send in his file for the Altaic cultures.

Alright, sounds good.

I also need to review @herkles notes on #10 for the map to make certain I didn't miss anything on that.

Could you already map out the cultures that are going to be added (Nirun and Kyrghyz + Xiongnu rename)?

[LT-Rascek]

Could you already map out the cultures that are going to be added (Nirun and Kyrghyz + Xiongnu rename)?

I can give it a shot; I have a few maps like this from wikipedia:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fa/East-Hem_300ad.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rouran_Khaganate#/media/File:Nirun,_Tuyuhun,_Yueban,_Tuoba_Wei.jpg

If those work, it'll be pretty easy to put on the new map.

I was waiting to see if Sir Diesalot had specific maps he wanted to use.

[LT-Rascek]

Gave it a shot; no doubt it's highly debatable. In general, where details are really scarce, I followed CK3's duchy borders to delineate groups for lack of a better standard. Note that while the Khanty/Mansi are listed as Finno-Urgic Pagan, they should probably be moved to Siberian in line with CK3's delineation.

Duahuang/Yellow River Region - Colonized by Han at least between Liangzhou and Shazhou as part of an attempt to control the region. Large numbers of Han families seem to be recorded at this time, so provinces containing at least one dryland barony were made Han/Daoist. The Tiele peoples fill in the remainder of the region.

The Gushi seem to be an Iranian peoples that were partially conquered and colonized by the Han and others, so the region around Duahuang was made Gushi (who are Iranian Pagans for lack of any info on their beliefs). They fill the region called Indo-Arayans here: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/38/Nirun%2C_Tuyuhun%2C_Yueban%2C_Tuoba_Wei.jpg)

East and South of the Bakial and Selenge basin are the remains of the Xianbei as per (roughly) WtWSMS.

Nirun fills west of Bakial but not into the Yenisei river basin. Xiongu/Yueban fill in a large portion of what remains with some fixes in the Aral region. Tiele people are given another region wedged between the Urgics and the Kirgyz. From https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fa/East-Hem_300ad.jpg the Magyars appear to be historically larger before being displaced by the Goturks, so they expanded as well.

Key_culture.xlsx

Key_religion.xlsx

Looking into the putative origins of various Turkic groups, this map goes into more detail culturally.

I'm sure there's a lot that can be improved (especially NE Asia) but I think this can be considered complete for the purposes of rebuilding the map.

[loup99]

Ok, then the next step will be to transfer that into the mod files. I think the fine tuning can be done later on now that we have the big picture.

[LT-Rascek]

Closing due to opening #2 for review.