Muslim areas in Emperor

[Omar2000]

Hi guys,
Hope the EU4 developers can see this and make some minor changes to Emperor DLC.
First, I find it very strange that places like Ningxia and Lanzhou are classified as Confucian. Historically, and until now, these places always had Muslim Sunni majority of its population, even since the Yuan empire, before Ming was established. During Ming era specifically, the whole Western side of China, including places like Chengdu, Xi'an, Yunnan, and Dali specifically, had big Muslim minorities, Dali even had a Muslim majority since the Yuan era. These places populations embraced Islam during Yuan time after the return of millions of Mongol fighters who fought in the Middle East, and whose leaders became Sunni Muslims. It is quite interesting that in Mandarin, the character for "Hui", which means to go back or to return, is the same character denoting the Muslim ethnicity. I believe this might add more accuracy to the game's historical side.
So, if religion in Lanzhou, Ningxia and Dali changes to Muslim, and the culture in Ningxia and Lanzhou changes to Hui, this will be more accurate. Hui and Mongol are somehow related, but certainly not the same.

P.S. If you guys need reference, a book like "China's Muslim Hui Community: Migration, Settlement and Sects", https://www.amazon.com/Chinas-Muslim-Hui-Community-Settlement/dp/0700710264. A faster reference however can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hui_people , quoting from that Wikipedia link "The Hui people are more concentrated in Northwestern China (Ningxia, Gansu, Qinghai, Xinjiang), but communities exist across the country, e.g. Beijing, Xi'an, Inner Mongolia, Hebei, Hainan and Yunnan". More details are available within the article.

I am pretty sure there must be some Chinese developers within your team, but having lived myself in north west China for some time, I know this area is quite unknown to many people, including so many in China itself.
Thanks,

 

[AirikrStrife]

emperor only deals with europe.

On the actual suggestion, you talk about muslim minorities, not muslim majorities. Dali, the center of Bai culture most likely had Bai majority and very few bai are muslims.

I agree that there might be some provinces in china that would have muslim majority, but I think you need to do better job proving that certain provinces would be muslim majority.

I also think Ningxia was still populated by mongols at this time and chinese speakers came later. I'm not 100% sure but I know that it has not always been sunni muslim, the capital of western xia/tangut empire was in ningxia, which were buddhist and while tanguts were gone in 1444, it laid just on the mongolian frotnier

 

[Omar2000]

Thanks,
Technically, Ningxia official name is "Ningxia Hui Autonomous region", not likely to have Hui in the name if it is just a minority.
Since the early 1300s, this area was heavily Muslim populated. Western Xia empire was gone during the era of Genghis Khan, centuries before the Ming Dynasty was present.
Official figures put the Hui as the majority population in Ningxia, not a massive majority, just 54%, but it's still Muslim dominated.
Bearing in mind that official Chinese figures underestimate numbers of minority populations, especially those linked to specific religious groups, the correct figures might be even higher than this.
As per Lanzhou, officially it is 38% Hui, while this doesn't make it a Muslim majority province, it's still a big minority, which might be actually a real majority without official representation. In both Ningxia and Gansu there are mosques in almost every street, you can google map it, you will find hundreds of mosques in Ningxia, with many more not even recorded in the Google Maps records ...
As per Dali, when the Muslims revolted against the Qing in the 19th century, they established the Sultanate of Dali, something very unlikely if that place wasn't originally Muslim dominated. Bai culture is quite dominant in Dali for sure, but Muslim presence there is currently 12%. Noting that the Dali Sultanate was crushed and Muslims involved in it were annihilated in 1873, it would be easy to perceive that before the war this place was predominantly Muslim. The civil war there took 20 years to be over, something that wouldn't have happened if Muslim were just the current 12% officially present there ...
Dillon's book is very good in tracing Hui history, but his book focuses mainly on the north western part of China.

 

[AirikrStrife]

You're not providing any data relevant for 1444 or around there, that's what matters, I know Ningxia is a hui autonomous provicne today, and has had muslim population for a long time.

I'm not saying that you are necessarily wrong, just that it's a good idea to look at better sources for the time

 

[Omar2000]

I checked Dillon, who said in his book that government annals (Yuan then Ming) mentioned a continuous increase of Muslim population in the Gansu and Ningxia areas, since the late 13th century until the early 15th century. He also mentioned an increase in Yunnan, but apparently the numbers were not as big.
Although there are no statistical figures, details mentioned in the book give clear indication that Muslim presence in those areas was bigger than a minority. Change of marriage laws for example, the point mentioned in the book, shows that Muslims became somehow a majority there, I don't think minorities had the same rights back then as they have now.
Please bear in mind that in the early 15th century there were no official ethnic statistics like what we have now. So we are mainly dealing with estimates, which cannot be totally accurate, but they give strong indications.
I might need to contact my Hui friends to provide some details about that, but I think Dillon opinion here is good, the man is a big name in Chinese history.

 

[JKiller96]

It's kind of hard to gauge Muslim majority areas in western China at this time. These populations were mostly segregated. From what I've read, most areas west of Hami (Karadel) are Muslim, including Karadel itself which had just experienced Muslim Uyghur rule under Khalil Sultan, who is the current ruler of Karadel in game. We discused this more in-depth in another thread. As for Ningshia, that's a harder guess. Dali was never Muslim majority but it was governed by Muslims under the Yuan.

I did some brief reading and it looks like Ningxia may have been Muslim majority after the Ming took over from the Yuan: "The Great Mosque in Tongxin, a predominantly Hui town in central Ningxia, was a Buddhist temple during the Mongol conquest and has that appearance. It was rededicated as a mosque when it was taken over by local Muslims after the expulsion of the Mongols..."

China's Muslim Hui Community: Migration, Settlement and Sects by Michael Dillon, pg 172.

So there was Muslim control to a large extent in Ningxia since the end of the Yuan dynasty, so there is some reason for a Sunni province in Ningxia.

 

[Omar2000]

I did some brief reading and it looks like Ningxia may have been Muslim majority after the Ming took over from the Yuan: "The Great Mosque in Tongxin, a predominantly Hui town in central Ningxia, was a Buddhist temple during the Mongol conquest and has that appearance. It was rededicated as a mosque when it was taken over by local Muslims after the expulsion of the Mongols..."

China's Muslim Hui Community: Migration, Settlement and Sects by Michael Dillon, pg 172.

So there was Muslim control to a large extent in Ningxia since the end of the Yuan dynasty, so there is some reason for a Sunni province in Ningxia.

I guess this covers that part, we are 2 people with information supporting this suggestion, at least for Ningxia.
I hope to see Ningxia as Sunni in the next update, which will be released in a few hours, hopefully.