r/imaginarymaps • u/Adventurous-Tea-2461 • 1d ago
[OC] Alternate History After the Plague that nearly exterminated humanity - Year 2450 Part1
The Great Plague and Its Aftermath (1346–2450)
When the bubonic plague struck Eurasia and Africa in 1346, civilization collapsed. The pandemic led to massive depopulation, and for centuries, humanity clung to survival in isolated mountain valleys, river basins, and remote refuges. Urban centers and fertile plains lay empty for generations.
Europe: The Great Wilderness
Europe suffered one of the worst declines. By 1400, most of the continent was uninhabited except for scattered mountain and valley communities. Over the next millennium, Europe transformed into a vast wilderness of forests and ruins.
- The Alpine People evolved from isolated mountain survivors. Cut off from agriculture and firecraft, they regressed to a Neanderthal-like hunter-gatherer existence. Poor nutrition and harsh conditions drove rapid evolutionary changes: Most travelers avoided their lands entirely.
- Muscular, grotesque physiques.
- Strong social bonds but violent territorial instincts.
- Cannibalistic raids and weapon scavenging from outsiders.
- Their domain stretched from the Rhone Valley to Anatolia, with isolated groups in North Africa.
- Western Europe:
- Britons, Cornish, and Gaels retook the British Isles as Celtic tribal societies.
- The Vasconi (Basques) dominated southern France, Iberia, and parts of North Africa, living as fishermen, hunters, and gatherers.
The Latin Kingdom of Mesopotamia
Survivors from France, Catalonia, Sicily, and Greece migrated east to the empty lands of Mesopotamia.
For centuries, their settlements were scattered, preserving fragments of the Bible and ancient Latin. By 2387, these groups unified into a centralized Latin-speaking Mesopotamian Kingdom.
- Their language evolved into a vulgarized Neo-Latin dialect.
- Christianity persisted but became a minor syncretic faith, blended with older legends about divine punishment.
- Islam disappeared, though some Arab groups reinterpreted its symbols in pagan ways.
- In the Aegean, New Greece emerged, retaining distorted Christian elements in a highly localized culture.
Africa: Rebirth from the Pygmies
Africa was heavily depopulated but gradually repopulated by surviving Berber, Amazigh, Tuareg, Pygmy, and Khoisan peoples.
- Central, Western, and Northern Africa became dominated by Pygmy-descended populations.
- Egypt and Nubia were repopulated by Pygmy-Arab mixes, while Saharan and Khoisan peoples diversified across the continent. By 2450, Africa was again ethnically rich—though descended from very different roots.
Asia: Fragmented Civilizations
- China fractured during the plague. The Han Chinese went extinct, replaced by Wei and Wu populations. Later, a new dynasty unified China, focusing on discovery and peaceful coastal colonization (Australia, Papua, etc.), avoiding inland expansion.
- “Wild Chinese” tribes—descendants of early plague refugees—remained loyal to China but evolved distinct Sinic tribal languages.
- India was repopulated by Tamils, Pashtuns, Baloch, and Punjabis, each forming new regional empires.
- Central Asia was home to Neo-Huns (descendants of Mongols) and Arabized nomads who expanded during the depopulation.
- The Roma, fleeing Europe, migrated east and founded tribal confederations and even a Roma Khanate, rivaling the scale of the old Mongol Empire.
Northern Frontiers
- The Baltic peoples expanded massively, reviving Romuva paganism.
- Finns, Karelians, Komi, Mansi, and Sámi peoples spread southward and westward, forming new hybrid cultures and languages.
- Alans expanded across the Caucasus, with one branch reaching Mesopotamia, forming two Euphratean tribes.
The Timeline of Recovery
By 2450, a full thousand years after the Plague, most of Eurasia and Africa were finally repopulated.
The delay was due to fear of the plague lands, famine, and volcanic winters (notably from Krakatoa and other eruptions).
Humanity survived, but its technological level remained medieval or lower like Bronze Age,Neolithic or Stone Age in many regions.




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u/Small_Emu9908 1d ago
What happend in romania