Egypt conquers the Mediterranean
- Thread starter acgoldis
- Start date
Plausible but only if you somehow change Egypt's philosophy about the world and about its military. I don't even know where you would start with the POD.
I don't know would it be technically possible for Egypt to conquer Mediterranean region. But you should at least change mindset of Egyptians greatly so they would are more militaristic, expansionists and them too should really develope their army, not only just developing better weapons than them had but too new tactics and different thinking on warfare.
And Egyptians should too create new kind of governing structure getting such empire to work.
And Egyptians should too create new kind of governing structure getting such empire to work.
During the "New Kingdom" period, the Egyptians conquered a number of territories from the Euphrates to the Sixth Threshold of the Nile. However, in order for the Egyptians to have an opportunity, it is necessary to rewrite at least a thousand years of history.
Didn't the ancient Egyptians think that if they died outside of Egypt their souls would not go to the afterlife? Otherwise, I think it would be difficult for them to conquer if you're talking about Old/New kingdom Egypt. Things weren't developed and you'd assume they would start colonizing different areas and settling them into towns.
It would probably have to happen during the reign of the Diadochi where everyone fighting over bits and pieces of Alexander's Empire each claiming to be his successor. This could potentially work if say the Egyptians manage to try and take over Greece, but this leaves them vulnerable in the East from a potential Seleucid or Antigonid attack.
How far south does their homeland go? I would also say it is easier for the Italians to have the Roman Empire given their location. Having Egypt with the Byzantine Empire would probably suffice. Though are they still ruled by Pharaohs and where would the dynasty be from? Something Alexandrian might work, with lots of viceroyalties and protectorates. Maybe have it that you need some of the Egyptian blood in your veins, so local bigshots marry distant cousins for legitimacy,
They would be more likely to use demotic script. They might have hieroglyphs on some public buildings, depending on how sacred they consider the text, or they might use it the same way we use Latin. As for an online forum, look at the Chinese and Japanese. They know there is only so much room on a keyboard so they have phonetic as well as romanized versions of their languages to make it easier to use keyboards, be they electronic or mechanical.
Dagoth Ur
Banned
Implausible at best. The Nile was always the center of Egyptian civilization and political focus. Once an Egypt spreads to encompass Tunisia and Greece, it is far more likely to go for Mesopotamia than Italy or Spain. You being up Rome, but Rome was always at the center. Middle along the Italian peninsula, in the middle of the Mediterranean. It spread pretty evenly to the east and west, north and south. Once the demographic and economic center of the empire shifted east, so too did its capital, culture, religion, etc. Egypt would have a really hard time of it, being a Kemetic culture trying to spread itself over such a great Indo-European population. Nobody around them except for maybe the Kushites to the south were Kemetic too.
I think the whole med. would be fairly implausible, given the transport costs involved in supporting imperial projects on the opposite end; Rome and Carthage were the most plausible candidates, lying as they do smack dab in the middle of the sea. I do think an Egyptian Empire encompassing the Eastern med. is plausible enough from a logistical standpoint, but idk if its political organization would be up to snuff. Rome got as far as it did because it had a strong core of warlike citizens with a share in the state, as did its allied tribes and cities. They had the manpower to maintain large parallel deployments in multiple theaters, and the resilience to come back from heavy losses. I don't know much about Egypt's political culture, but an absolute monarchy would presumably have a disadvantage when it came to raising and sustaining the vast armies necessary for pan mediterranean conquest.
I think the big problem is that Egypt traditionally didn't move much in the western Mediterranean but usually focused their power in the fertile crescent where various Empires had stood for millenia. What was 'new' with Rome in comparision to the other Empires of antiquity was that it pulled the whole western mediterranean with it into that sphere. A way to get Egypt interested in westwards ventures might be if a foreign dynasty (from further west than Greece or Libya) seizes power and already has those western connections, a Phoenecian dynasty perhaps that can unify the Egyptian and Carthaginian spheres of interest.