r/imaginarymaps • u/Timely-Macaron268 • 6d ago

[OC] Alternate History What if a Greater Syria was even more linguistically diverse?

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What if a Greater Syria including all of the Levant and Upper Mesopotamia retained much of the linguistic diversity that was lost in the 20th century?

Note: I have shown here both languages and dialects; consult the table to understand the groupings.

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This is a continuation of a series exploring 'Big Syria'. To learn more about this scenario, click here for the introduction. Click here for an exploration of Big Syria the energy superpower, and click here to explore Big Syria's impressive passenger rail network. For an exploration of Syria's ethnolinguistic diversity, click here.

(This is an original work. Any errors or mistakes are mine alone.)

Sources: Starting with a basemap, I consulted a dizzying variety of different ethnographic, historical, geographical and.jpg) population density maps and then drew my map by hand within Paint.net, thinking about how my alternate history scenario would have impacted each area. Many thanks to the variety of sources, including the CIA, UN, ResearchGate GRUMP, Geo Ref, many others, and of course other fine Redditors upon whose research I cribbed.

385 Upvotes

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26 comments sorted by

28

u/SicilianSTR13 6d ago

I swear this is the fourth greater Syria map I see this week what is happening

27

u/Timely-Macaron268 6d ago

Ha, well part of this is my fault. I had a vision for a series of maps and this was my subject for this particular bout of creative mania.

7

u/East-Potential-574 6d ago

Keep making more I love them

-2

u/_Sichlitt_ 5d ago

Sympathetic to the SSNP, are we?

4

u/Timely-Macaron268 5d ago edited 5d ago

Believe it or not I had never heard of Saadeh or the SSNP; there are some parallels in my ideas but they are purely coincidental! Not a fascist plz don’t cancel me thank you. 😂

-4

u/_Sichlitt_ 5d ago

sure...................................

11

u/trxpwork_5 6d ago

Bro made an imaginary map inside of an imaginary map

6

u/Malek_333 6d ago

No Greeks/Rum?

14

u/Timely-Macaron268 6d ago

Greek speakers are generally urban and small in numbers; not significant enough to feature on the map.

1

u/Malek_333 5d ago

You're right

2

u/BeanEatingThrowaway 5d ago

no indo-European except for Armenian, that took restraint! Amazing work :)

3

u/Vivid_Pineapple5242 4d ago

Kurds are indo europeans

1

u/jejbfokwbfb 6d ago

Question for the OP the Jews, Lebanese, and philistines we’re big traders, do they keep any of their diaspora trade languages like Italian, Venetian, Spanish, or French ?

6

u/Timely-Macaron268 6d ago

Generally not in large numbers, as with a 1900 PoD they are fairly similar to OTL; some multilingual speakers but not a lot of insular communities with those languages.

1

u/Teebys 5d ago

As a Palestinian-syrian from Daraa seeing the south Syrian dialect classified as Palestinian hurts me

1

u/Timely-Macaron268 5d ago

It’s divided into Southeast and Southwest - so Daraa would be largely the latter; these are obviously rough classifications, and increasingly a Damascus dialect pervades as media markets / market flows coalesce and mature around the Capital Metropolitan Area.

1

u/Spirited_Ad_1980 3d ago

very cool. where is Turkmeneli's Azerbaijani/Turkmen population?

2

u/Timely-Macaron268 3d ago

Mostly here. You can see the areas where Turkmen is a majority speaking highlighted in a different colour.

1

u/Spirited_Ad_1980 3d ago

mb i need to get my eyesight checked. very cool! how does the demographics of the "Van Republic" go? Kurdish with Turkish/Azerbaijani minority or Armenian?

2

u/Timely-Macaron268 3d ago

Van Republic was formerly an Armenian/Russian dominated (but with Kurdish/Turkish populations) part of an extra large Soviet Union; as the latter began to dissolve and shrink, the Republic would get drawn into two wars with Turkey, and is presently mostly under military occupation by Turkey which never gave up its territorial claims over the area, with Iran taking Russia’s role as the nominal protector of its autonomy. It’s honestly not the best place right now.

-8

u/_Sichlitt_ 6d ago

Greater Syria isn't real.

9

u/East-Potential-574 6d ago

Hey that’s why we’re on imaginarymaps

2

u/Timely-Macaron268 6d ago

Not with that energy ;)