MotF 89: In My Benevolent Shade

Rome's history and destiny have always been in the east. The very history of Rome itself shows a continuing and nearly inexorable trend of the Roman State to constantly shift its center further and further east, following the riches within its grasp. The foundation of a new capital at Constantinople began this trend. The dark ages in the West, partially healed by the reconquest of the 7th century, would push the Empire further east. Persia however stood as an ever present foe which made the Romans advance no further. As the western states discovered more trade routes, eventually around Africa itself and an entire new world to the west across the Atlantic, Rome knew it had to acquire territory. On its long quest for territories Rome created a series of economically dependent client states while seizing the vast majority of lucrative territories, offering a unique and light-handed alternative to Hispanian, Persian, or Scandinavian Imperialism. Rome's Second Empire along the Indian Ocean would not be as great or influential as the first stretching from Mesopotamia to Hibernia, but it would bequeath unto the world the current international norm of loose political superiority, the Federal System uniting an Empire from Italy to Formosa, and the deliberate decentralization of power, and the global intertwining of trade and economies. Rome's Second Empire gave the world another set of gifts.

O Cervo Na Torre is a Galician novel written as a total wish fulfillment by the author, a member of a well known communist-reintegrationist-galicianist party, Dario Xohan Cabana.

Still, the book has literary merit, and i had fun reading it.

The story starts an undetermined number of years (anywhere between 15 and 25) after a nuclear WWIII and the subsequent nuclear winter. Most of Galicia and Portugal have reunited thanks to a nation created around a town built on top of the border. This nation is led by the members of a political party (the Communist Party of the North) that had been formed like 2 days before the holocaust.

Yeah, it's crazy
So, here we go!

Just a quick one here: Mansa Abubakari II of Mali (known as Manden in this world) manages to put his nautical interests to better use by sending expeditions up the coast of Africa instead of sailing off the edge of the world and never coming back. Under his successors, Manden merchants establish further trade links with North Africa, both by sea and across the Sahara. This strengthens the Genoese trading empire relative to OTL, as they happen to be the next link in that chain, but an analogue to the War of Chioggia leaves Genoa as the lesser partner in a Manden-Genoese alliance against the Ottomans and the Castilians. Meanwhile, Manden consolidates its hold over the western Sahel and the small states to its south. As the year 1500 dawns, a certain Genoese explorer has arrived in Niani to petition the Mansa for funds for an expedition to the west, hoping to find a new route to the Orient beyond Ottoman control...

While the New World was the initial epicenter of the Age of Colonialism it would follow that soon after that several of the European powers would look East as well as West.

The first colonies in Asia were in India and the adjacent islands and archipelagos, however as the European powers moved Eastward more regions would gradually fall under their sway as the decades and centuries progressed.

While many of the European colonial powers had both directly ruled colonies and Protectorates the situation that would develop in what would become French Varunesia was among the most unique, complex and, for some, equal of the colonial era.

The initial French exploration of the region was not out of a desire for conquest but rather economic opportunity, however overtime the region would draw more and more of France's attention and through a mixture of diplomacy much of the archipelago would fall under the dominion of France, both directly and indirectly.

The first French colony in the region was the island of Batam (one of the few islands of the French Riau Islands to retain its traditional name), which was ceded to France in 1536 by the beleaguered Sultanate of Malacca which, given its experience with the Portuguese with whom they were fighting a quasi-war with, feared that it would lose the island, and possibly more, without any compensation if it refused.

The second colony would itself be founded unintentionally; in 1575 a small trade ship was making its way to the trading port of Nouvelle-Montpellier on Batam when it was caught-up in a storm which through it off course; after sailing for a week longer than they'd though they'd be and running out of supplies they finally spotted land and took refuge on the island, which they named Île de Sauveur (Island of Saviour).
After gathering fresh water and food from the island they set off again and, relatively soon after came to realize that they were very close to the West coast of Sumatra, which quickly allowed them to get back on course.
When the ship reached port and began its trade the captain, believing the island would be of use, sought out the Governor of the colony, whom he himself knew; after a lengthy discussion the governor agreed to send an expedition and, if it was successful, would send a letter back to France describing the situation and officially suggesting that the island be claimed.

Over the next few centuries France would come to control more and more of the region, sometimes through diplomacy, sometimes through war, in a few cases the result of the local leader leaving his domain to the French Emperor and in three interrelated cases (1850, 1861 and 1868), the local population petitioning the French to annex the area, though it would ultimately never gain control of the entire archipelago.

By 1910 French Varunesia had reached its territorial height, split between sixteen Associate States and nine Integrated Regions (themselves often split into subunits).

Portuguese Republic of Angola: