Religious changes to the Middle East(and some religious changes)

[TheMeInTeam]

Good points. I agree the game is too blob oriented. Hopefully with estates we see some of that taken away. Yes the missionary changes would have to come at a time where expanding and war arent the only things to do.

Many of us bought and play this game to blob in it, similar to why people play CK2 for its dynasty mechanics (and the option to do some...depraved things ) or Vicky for its management aspects.

Peace time is dull in this game, and crap like development does *nothing* to change that, because the frequency of decisions made at peace remains incredibly low compared to war. Short of a peacetime minigame or something of that nature, EU IV is by design a war/expansion/blobbing game straight up. It's not trivial to completely shift what a game is, to make a truly interesting "peace time mechanic" would be to create something on the order of city management in Civ, but in real time. You'd need intense, time-sensitive decisions to be made similar to what you get at war.

Can EU IV do that and still keep its war time mechanics? I don't think it would be easy to do, but the reality is a lot of these "peace time mechanics" are sufficiently shallow but obtrusive to the warmonger aspect at the same time such that their value to the game is questionable. You need to do a *lot* more to expand than click a button...but clicking a button to burn a resource is exactly what development entails, with a cost setup to make its usage pretty obviously constrained. There isn't much thought OR micro to development, so its contribution to gameplay is minimal. That was supposed to be a "peace time mechanic", in practice it's even less of one than improving relations with a diplomat (which you can also do at war).

People want this game to be something it isn't designed to do. If anything, the extra blob protectors being added only further incentivize the premise of taking land for development, since it's increasingly harder for blobs to fail.

 

[Chamboozer]

Just a couple of things until I can create a formal response.

So first, I used BBC as my main source and Wikipedia as a secondary source that I didnt quote at all. Second, I would estimate ~90% of my posts are related to elimination threads, so I struggle to see how they can be "full of errors". Also, I cannot remember doing a proposal like this before, outside of proposed changes to the counter-reformation which was more of a mechanic change supported with historical evidence. But I'm flattered you took the time to go through all my posts even if I cant understand how you came up with such a wack conclusion.

Well.. actually I wasn't talking about you. I was referring to the guy in the thread you linked - AndrejK. That thread was just a nightmare to read.

Anyway, BBC isn't a good source either. They're a news outlet, not historians. Statements like Shi'ism being "completely foreign to Iranian culture" are unequivocally false. Iran had Shi'ite dynasties as early as the tenth century, and the influence of Shi'ism there was significant long before Ismail's conquests.

On topic here, I will go more in depth for my research later, but I think it cannot he debated that the religious struggles and violence of the early safavisds are not represented at all. That was my main point in creating this thread. For the other changes, they were from another thread that seemed to be backed up strongly. Nom-Muslim religions are under represented in the middle east imo.
As for my missionary strength changes, my point is to make conversion a more difficult task, as right now I feel like it is wayyy to easy, especially between the abrahamic faiths. As long as your not TMIT making Rome an

Religious minorities are under-represented, yes. But that's not a problem with the map, that's a problem with the game itself. Every province can only contain one religion. So to be historically accurate, provinces should be represented with whatever religion had the largest percentage of the population. The problem with AndrejK and his thread is that he seems to be taking every instance of a noteworthy minority that he can possibly find and using it as an excuse to change the province's religion, without really being able to know what proportion of the province that minority actually consisted of.

 

[Grand Historian]

Religious minorities are under-represented, yes. But that's not a problem with the map, that's a problem with the game itself. Every province can only contain one religion. So to be historically accurate, provinces should be represented with whatever religion had the largest percentage of the population. The problem with AndrejK and his thread is that he seems to be taking every instance of a noteworthy minority that he can possibly find and using it as an excuse to change the province's religion, without really being able to know what proportion of the province that minority actually consisted of.

Hence why we need a way to simulate population/more than one culture/religion per-province in EU4.

 

[CrabHelmet]

Another idea here: Get rid I the -1 tolerance of heretics for Catholicism and -1 tolerance of heathens for Shinto. These religions were not inherently less tolerant than other religions. Replace Catholicism's negative with -5% tech cost(see buff Catholicism) and replace Shinto's with fort defense. These religions became intolerant through actions of rulers and religions figures. The counter-reformation and the various inquisitions should hike up intolerance in catholic countries, and the decision to close Japan should do the same for Shinto. This is #2 on racial/religious paradox fuck-ups for me, #1 being African unit spirits.

Why does Catholicism need buffing? It is either the best or second best religion in the game. You have access to PUs, which automatically puts it above any religion that doesn't have that, and is clearly better than Coptic and Reformed. There's an argument Protestant is better, but the difference is not significant (except perhaps in MP with a highly contested Europe). Shouldn't the focus on buffing for religions be aimed at the frankly atrocious Far Eastern religions?

 

[Shatterfury]

Why does Catholicism need buffing? It is either the best or second best religion in the game. You have access to PUs, which automatically puts it above any religion that doesn't have that, and is clearly better than Coptic and Reformed. There's an argument Protestant is better, but the difference is not significant (except perhaps in MP with a highly contested Europe). Shouldn't the focus on buffing for religions be aimed at the frankly atrocious Far Eastern religions?

In my opinion Reformed is very good for maritime, colonial powers.
It is good even for a land power who has a very rich trade node.A Reformed Netherlands who focuses on land warfare is quite viable.A nation centered around Lubeck node could also go for Reformed.

Orthodox needs some love, the whole patriarchal power thing is just lame, you have to max it so you can got the bonus, there should be gave between low and high patriarchal power, just like the muslims get.

 

[AndrejK]

That guy is mostly citing Wikipedia and nearly every post of his is full of serious errors. The amount of times he uses nineteenth and twentieth century sources as evidence for the situation five hundred years earlier is just shameful and ridiculous as a means of historical methodology. Sorry, but it has to be said.

I won't comment on that map except to say that Ottoman survey records show that no region of Western Anatolia was majority Christian during this time period. That's not to say that there weren't Christian populations, but that they didn't constitute a majority in any province as defined by EUIV.

Thanks for discreditting me @Chamboozer . The reason I cited late period sources about the population of some areas is the fact that in general the Middle East has experienced conversions from Christianity to islam (or decrease of the proportion of Christian populations and increase of Muslim population). Hence my implication- if the region had a significant Christian presence in 1800s then it indicates that 300 years earlier the region should have had a Christian majority (since as we know at 600 AD most of the Fertile Crescent was Christian and since then the proportion of Christians has been decreasing. So I thought all I had to verify were the "modern " proportions of minorities who have managed to survive.

Unfortunatelly, there was no worldwide census 1444 which would show us exact numbers and figures for religiouus and ethnic groups back then

 

[Dutchman251]

And... any noteworthy state will convert those few heathen provinces regardless. In my opinion, the Middle East would become more interesting

 

[AndrejK]

I can't say I'm a big fan of your proposed changes to Piety or Missionary Strength, and, while I personally like your idea behind Persia converting to Shiite, if only for the way the game is made, would prefer Greater Iran to simply stay Shiite at gamestart (this has been commented on by the devs a few times, who've said that in-game limitations have them preferring Iran/Iraq as Shiite).

As for your suggested Map Changes:

Albania - I can agree, but it really needs some new provinces.
Western Anatolia - Chamboozer pretty much sums it up, but to paraphrase, Timur happened.
Eastern Anatolia - While, again, thanks to Chamboozer's insight, I highly doubt Sinope was Pontic/Orthodox during this time, it is quite possible Canik was (though I'm iffy on it, I don't really see how it would screw up gameplay that much if it is switched). Ezrurum could possibly be Armenian/Coptic, and I don't think it would really screw up gameplay that much. Erzincan and Mush I can't make a judgment on, but I can't say I'm as enthusiastic about them. I don't have anything to say about the Shia provinces.
Levant - I can't say much about the Shiite province, but I'm pretty sure Antioch wasn't Orthodox during this period (Baibars pretty much massacred/enslaved the entire population of the city two centuries ago), and if Adana was still Armenian during this period, it was Coptic, not Orthodox (and even then I highly doubt it).
Egypt - Sources are pretty scarce on the religious make-up during 1444, but according to the few we have, the anti-Christian riots of the fourteenth century did their job and the region, which was formerly on a balancing act between Coptic and Sunni, shifted heavily to Islam (Openly practicing Copts were around 10% of the population). However, it is undeniable there was still a noticeable presence in Egypt, the question remains of which provinces it was centered at (undeniably, most, if not all of them, were in the south. Alexandria's iffy).
Greater Iran - Again, it should remain Shiite for gameplay reasons, but I don't really know what to say about the second Zoroastrian province.

Basically what youre saying is : Lets leave Anatolia as it was because we know it was Sunni so it should remain Sunni
Iran however was Sunni but saying it should be Shia "For gameplay reasons" leads to some kind of bias... (Do not forget the huge number of Byzzfans who will get a serious proplem when conquerring Sunni provinces)

 

[AndrejK]

@Clausewitz_
That guy is mostly citing Wikipedia and nearly every post of his is full of serious errors. The amount of times he uses nineteenth and twentieth century sources as evidence for the situation five hundred years earlier is just shameful and ridiculous as a means of historical methodology. Sorry, but it has to be said.
I guess @Chamboozer was referring to me

 

[gall]

Thanks for discreditting me @Chamboozer . The reason I cited late period sources about the population of some areas is the fact that in general the Middle East has experienced conversions from Christianity to islam (or decrease of the proportion of Christian populations and increase of Muslim population). Hence my implication- if the region had a significant Christian presence in 1800s then it indicates that 300 years earlier the region should have had a Christian majority (since as we know at 600 AD most of the Fertile Crescent was Christian and since then the proportion of Christians has been decreasing. So I thought all I had to verify were the "modern " proportions of minorities who have managed to survive.

Unfortunatelly, there was no worldwide census 1444 which would show us exact numbers and figures for religiouus and ethnic groups back then

Non-muslim were forced to pay Jizya taxes and in many cases we do know some tax numbers, which could give us raw (it would answer question 5% or 50%) approximation of non-muslim population. Other information would be lack of old big churches. These Christian majorities would be used against their overlords, at least mentioned by travellers. Don't get me wrong i do like sometimes guessing what really happens in X, what are origin of Y etc among my friends, but i wouldn't use them as base for serious conversation or argue that modern mainstream Historians are completely wrong.
Other thing is that when European came there in XIX they were looking for same justification or link to some local communities, which could be base for their power there. Christian communities were tolerated in Muslim world and don't eager to convert. Not to mention it is quite strange that official numbers drooped quickly when Christian powers leave this region.

 

[Clausewitz_]

Please everyone keep the people who have suffered in Paris in your prayers and thoughts.

@Chamboozer first i would like to point out that while criticizing others on their sources you yourself have provided none. Any person who is interested in getting acurate historical information knows that primary sources are just as good as secondary sources, and having a mix of both is ideal.

Iranian historian Morteza Motahhari, a influential figure in the Iranian Revolution, as his ideas were put into place in the government, claims that most of Iran was Sunni before the Safavids. While it is true there was 1 Shi'ite sultan, that was big exception. It is also true there were Shi'ite leanings in Iran and Iraq, but it is very important to note that the majority did identify themselves as Sunni's. There are reports of substantial Shi'ite communities in Tabaristan, Baghdad, and Kufah(In central Iraq). The entire clergy(Ulema) of pre-safavid iran was Sunni. I've done reletively extensive online research, and literally no sources claim Iran/Iraq had anything but a high Sunni majority with a few Shia outposts. Your claims are not backed by any facts, and frankly I do not know how you came to the conclusion that Iranians were more Shia than Sunni pre-safavids.

However, the biggest indicator that Iran/Iraq WERE NOT Shia at the time when the Safavids took power was the mass amount of carnage that took place against Sunni's. The destruction of many many Sunni mosques, the desecration of Sunni graves, and the mass murder of many Sunni's. The reason the Ottoman/Safavid rivarly emerged was becasue Ottoman sultan asked Ismail to stop and he refused. "

• Imposing Shiism as the state and mandatory religion for the whole nation and much forcible conversions of Iranian Sufi Sunnis to Shiism.[15][16][17]
• He reintroduced the Sadr (Arabic, leader) – an office that was responsible for supervising religious institutions and endowments. With a view to transforming Iran into a Shiite state, the Sadr was also assigned the task of disseminating Twelver doctrine.[18]
• He destroyed Sunni mosques. This was even noted by Tomé Pires, the Portuguese ambassador to China who visited Iran in 1511–12, who when referring to Ismail noted: "He (i.e. Ismail) reforms our churches, destroys the houses of all Moors who follow (the Sunnah of) Muhammad…"[19]
• He enforced the ritual and compulsory cursing of the first three Sunni Caliphs (Abu Bakr, Umar, and Uthman) as usurpers, from all mosques, disbanded SunniTariqahs and seized their assets, used state patronage to develop Shia shrines, institutions and religious art and imported Shia scholars to replace Sunni scholars.[20][21][22]
• He shed Sunni blood and destroyed and desecrated the graves and mosques of Sunnis. This caused the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid II (who initially congratulated Ismail on his victories) to advise and ask the young monarch (in a “fatherly” manner) to stop the anti-Sunni actions. However, Ismail was strongly anti-Sunni, ignored the Sultan's warning, and continued to spread the Shia faith by the sword.[23][24]
• He persecuted, imprisoned and executed stubbornly resistant Sunnis.[25][26]
• With the establishment of Safavid rule, there was a very raucous and colourful, almost carnival-like holiday on 26 Dhu al-Hijjah (or alternatively, 9 Rabi' al-awwal) celebrating the murder of Caliph Umar. The highlight of the day was making an effigy of Umar to be cursed, insulted, and finally burned. However, as relations between Iran and Sunni countries improved, the holiday was no longer observed (at least officially).[27]
• In 1501 Ismail invited all the Shia living outside Iran to come to Iran and be assured of protection from the Sunni majority.[28]"(Gutenburg)

Why would he need to use such violence to enforce his view of Shia Islam if they were already Shia?
Additional sources that are not wikipedia or BBC(even though they are completely fine resources):
http://self.gutenberg.org/articles/safavid_conversion_of_iran_to_shia_islam
http://iranian.com/posts/view/post/12877
Both of these sites have extensive citations in them, and would it be way to long to cite all of the. Everything they claim is backed up by a source.

Please provide sources to back up your claims because to me, they are now looking like giant steaming piles of bullshit right now. Take a bite of your own medicine and back up your claims. Ill be interested to see what you provide.

Overall/TLDR: While Iran was more Shi'ite leaning than other Sunni's in Arabia and the rest of the Muslim world, to call them anything but Sunni Muslims is incorrect. There were some Shia outposts, but it seems that in the areas they lived at the very most they were a substantial minority, never a majority.

 

[Chamboozer]

Thanks for discreditting me @Chamboozer . The reason I cited late period sources about the population of some areas is the fact that in general the Middle East has experienced conversions from Christianity to islam (or decrease of the proportion of Christian populations and increase of Muslim population).

There are many other factors that lead to population shifts aside from just conversion. Assuming that the period of 500 years between 1444 and 1944 involved a static population shift in which non-Muslim minorities slowly shrank literally ignores history - it assumes that no events of any significance ever disrupted this trend.

Hence my implication- if the region had a significant Christian presence in 1800s then it indicates that 300 years earlier the region should have had a Christian majority (since as we know at 600 AD most of the Fertile Crescent was Christian and since then the proportion of Christians has been decreasing. So I thought all I had to verify were the "modern " proportions of minorities who have managed to survive.

It's a faulty premise. To give two examples of population shifts which were unrelated to conversion: The seventeenth century was a period of particularly cold weather, referred to by some historians as the "Little Ice Age". This caused a migration of Armenians out of eastern Anatolia and toward Cilicia, in a similar fashion to what happened in the 11th century and created Cilician Armenia in the first place.

The other example, which I know rather better, is Western Anatolia and in particular Izmir.

The Turkification of Anatolia was not a continual process from 1071 until 1924. it was largely over by the end of the 14th Century, and Turks (i.e. Muslims, since ethnicity was not considered important and thus not recorded by contemporaries) were a majority in every province in Western Anatolia in 1444 according to the best estimates of modern historians. The last major population shakeup to hit the region was Timur's invasion, which was one of the catalysts that turned Smyrna Turkish as many of the remaining Greeks fled when he sacked the city. According to early 16th Century Ottoman censues, Smyrna (the whole district, not just the town) had 5900 Muslim households and 41 Christian. One modern estimate (Olnon) places the permanent Muslim percentage of the town in 1678 at 80%, and the largest minority were Jews at 15%. Censuses show Sinope province in the early 16th Century having 4,129 Muslim households and 552 Christian. However, the Pontic region was the section of the country where Greek Christian minorities remained the strongest, and many may have escaped the tax collectors due to the nature of the terrain. Nevertheless it seems to be the case that they were outnumbered even there by Muslims during this period.

Olnon is: Merlijn Olnon, "Brought under the law of the land: the history, demography and geography of crossculturalism in early modern Izmir, and the Köprülü Project of 1678" (PhD diss., Leiden University, 2014).

And the Ottoman survey record in question is as such: Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivi Genel Müdürlüğü 27, no. 166 Muhâsebe-i Vilâyet-i Anadolu Defteri.

The Greek population that one finds in 20th century surveys is a product of in-migration from expanding communities from the Aegean islands and mainland Greece during the 18th and 19th centuries, not a remnant from the Middle Ages.

Unfortunatelly, there was no worldwide census 1444 which would show us exact numbers and figures for religiouus and ethnic groups back then

Fortunately, there do exist better sources than what Wikipedia has to offer.

 

[Chamboozer]

However this is only one element of the problem: Even if the population trend did function as you imagine, there's still no way to know how much the population changed if all you have are the numbers from the 20th century. Let's look at an example:

Case number 5.
Canik. and Sinope

The provinces labelled as Canik and Sinope should have Pontic culture and Orthodox religion.

Reasoning:

• The Pontic Greek population survived through th early modern period and the Ottomoan rule and was numerous enough, that that at Paris Peace conference they actually wanted to create a Republic of Pontus for them.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_Pontus. The claimed area extended from Sinope almost to Batumi. Such a proposal could never have been made if the Greek-speaking population remained only in Trebizond.
• https://mediaevalmusings.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/800px-asiaminor1910.jpg.The majority of the debated area was Chrisitan äPontic and Laz)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trebizond_Vilayet. The Trebiyond Vilayet, which encompassed the provinces of Trebizond and Canik is :the region was populated mainly by Greek Orthodox Christian Pontic Greeks in the western half and Laz-speaking Muslims in the eastern half, although throughout the period of Ottoman rule there was a history of conversion to Turkish Islam of many of the region's Pontic Greeks - (The administrative unit existed 1867-1922.) -hence the western half Canik MUST HAVE BEEN PONTIC GREEK ORTHODOX BY 1444 AND CERTAINLY NOT TURKISH.
• Trebizond Eyalet (Ottoman Turkish: ایالت طربزون; Eyālet-i Ṭrabzōn‎)[2] was an eyalet of the Ottoman Empire.
  
  Established in 1461,[3] it remained a primarily Christian region into the 17th century, well after the rest ofAnatolia had been converted to Islam.
  
• As of 1920, Sinop was described as populated mainly by Greeks with an approximate population of 8,000. It was also considered the "safest" port "between Bosphorus and Batum," at the time. During this period, the port was exporting wheat, tobacco, seeds, timber and hides. They imported produce, coal and hardware.[10].https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinop,_Turkey
• A considerable Greek community remained in Samsun until WW1 http://gulf2000.columbia.edu/images/maps/Christians_of_ME_1914_lg.png
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontu...Christians_in_the_Black_Sea_region_(1896).JPG On this map we can see that Samsun had a Christian majority by 1896.
• And similar to my other posts I will also come once more with this map http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/4880/05l3.jpg where we can see that the coast from Sinope almost to Batumi was Christian Greek by 1500 so it had to be Christian Greek also by 1444.

So in your first point you establish that there was a Greek population in the Pontic region in the 20th century. That's certainly true, but doesn't reflect much upon the year 1444, same thing can be said about the 1910 map in the next point.

As for Trabzon: you're making an all-caps declarative statement about what 'must have been' based on a single uncited sentence on that Wikipedia article. But we don't even know what they're referring to in that sentence. The statement that "throughout the period of Ottoman rule there was a history of conversion to Turkish Islam of many of the region's Pontic Greeks" could refer entirely to people in the Trabzon region and not to Canik for all you know. And that is, in fact, the case, since unlike Trabzon, Canik was already Muslim, as it had been subject to the same population pressures as the rest of Anatolia in the preceding period. For Trabzon see Heath Lowry's recent work on this topic, The Islamization & Turkification of the City of Trabzon (Trebizond), 1461-1583. (2010). Whoever wrote the Wikipedia article on the Trebizond Eyalet, citing the Encyclopedia of Islam, has misunderstood his source when he said that the region was primarily Christian into the 17th century. The encyclopedia article said that the process of conversion continued into the seventeenth century, not that Christians remained a majority until then. You see the danger of relying on Wikipedia?

But leaving that aside, your statements on Sinop are the main problem I wanted to bring up. You point out, correctly, that in the late 19th century Pontic Greeks were majority in Sinop and Samsun and a significant presence in the countryside. You're assuming that you can project that backwards and imagine it as an even larger community in 1444, as if there is some rule that says that the percentage of the population which is Muslim ticks upwards by 0.1% each year. But even if that were the case, you just can't know to what degree the population did change. Even if it were larger in 1444 than in 1914, was it a majority? It's nothing but a guess.

Lastly, where does that final map come from anyway? What sources are it based on and what is the philosophy of the map's creator - does a color indicate an absolute majority or is it used also to represent minorities? It already directly contradicts all the evidence we have for the population distribution in western Anatolia.

 

[Chamboozer]

@Chamboozer first i would like to point out that while criticizing others on their sources you yourself have provided none. Any person who is interested in getting acurate historical information knows that primary sources are just as good as secondary sources, and having a mix of both is ideal.

Iranian historian Morteza Motahhari, a influential figure in the Iranian Revolution, as his ideas were put into place in the government, claims that most of Iran was Sunni before the Safavids. While it is true there was 1 Shi'ite sultan, that was big exception. It is also true there were Shi'ite leanings in Iran and Iraq, but it is very important to note that the majority did identify themselves as Sunni's. There are reports of substantial Shi'ite communities in Tabaristan, Baghdad, and Kufah(In central Iraq). The entire clergy(Ulema) of pre-safavid iran was Sunni. I've done reletively extensive online research, and literally no sources claim Iran/Iraq had anything but a high Sunni majority with a few Shia outposts. Your claims are not backed by any facts, and frankly I do not know how you came to the conclusion that Iranians were more Shia than Sunni pre-safavids.

If you read my post, you'll see that I claimed that Iran was by and large neither truly Sunni nor truly Shi'ite. The problem is that Paradox can't represent syncretism or heterodox religions.

Much of the formal social role of the Sunni 'Ulema had been usurped by heterodox Sufis who established vastly influential orders stretching across the region. While it's true that being Sufi doesn't necessarily preclude being Sunni, the fact of the matter is that ideas traditionally associated with mainstream Shi'ism (veneration of Ali, belief in the spiritual authority of the Twelve Imams, an increase in pilgrimages to Shi'ite holy places) were being spread by them. Iran was distinctly not Sunni in the same way that Egypt was. Ismail and his Safaviyya order were a part of this process, and he was able to take advantage of it when he launched his campaign to conquer the country. This is all explained in detail in B.S. Amoretti, "Religion in the Timurid and Safavid Periods" in The Timurid and Safavid Periods, vol. 6 of The Cambridge History of Iran, (Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 610-655.

However, the biggest indicator that Iran/Iraq WERE NOT Shia at the time when the Safavids took power was the mass amount of carnage that took place against Sunni's. The destruction of many many Sunni mosques, the desecration of Sunni graves, and the mass murder of many Sunni's. The reason the Ottoman/Safavid rivarly emerged was becasue Ottoman sultan asked Ismail to stop and he refused. "

Persecution against a religion is an indication that that religion must be a majority? I suppose Spain was a Muslim country then. Or was it Jewish?

Of course Sunnis don't need to be a majority in order to be persecuted. Ismail was just targeting the hardline Sunni elements which remained in the country.

• Imposing Shiism as the state and mandatory religion for the whole nation and much forcible conversions of Iranian Sufi Sunnis to Shiism.[15][16][17]
• He reintroduced the Sadr (Arabic, leader) – an office that was responsible for supervising religious institutions and endowments. With a view to transforming Iran into a Shiite state, the Sadr was also assigned the task of disseminating Twelver doctrine.[18]
• He destroyed Sunni mosques. This was even noted by Tomé Pires, the Portuguese ambassador to China who visited Iran in 1511–12, who when referring to Ismail noted: "He (i.e. Ismail) reforms our churches, destroys the houses of all Moors who follow (the Sunnah of) Muhammad…"[19]
• He enforced the ritual and compulsory cursing of the first three Sunni Caliphs (Abu Bakr, Umar, and Uthman) as usurpers, from all mosques, disbanded SunniTariqahs and seized their assets, used state patronage to develop Shia shrines, institutions and religious art and imported Shia scholars to replace Sunni scholars.[20][21][22]
• He shed Sunni blood and destroyed and desecrated the graves and mosques of Sunnis. This caused the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid II (who initially congratulated Ismail on his victories) to advise and ask the young monarch (in a “fatherly” manner) to stop the anti-Sunni actions. However, Ismail was strongly anti-Sunni, ignored the Sultan's warning, and continued to spread the Shia faith by the sword.[23][24]
• He persecuted, imprisoned and executed stubbornly resistant Sunnis.[25][26]
• With the establishment of Safavid rule, there was a very raucous and colourful, almost carnival-like holiday on 26 Dhu al-Hijjah (or alternatively, 9 Rabi' al-awwal) celebrating the murder of Caliph Umar. The highlight of the day was making an effigy of Umar to be cursed, insulted, and finally burned. However, as relations between Iran and Sunni countries improved, the holiday was no longer observed (at least officially).[27]
• In 1501 Ismail invited all the Shia living outside Iran to come to Iran and be assured of protection from the Sunni majority.[28]"(Gutenburg)

No one doubts that Ismail engaged in a campaign of forced conversion. But a campaign of forced conversion is not in and of itself evidence that Iran was mostly Sunni.

Why would he need to use such violence to enforce his view of Shia Islam if they were already Shia?

Because they were not all Shia.

Additional sources that are not wikipedia or BBC(even though they are completely fine resources):
http://self.gutenberg.org/articles/safavid_conversion_of_iran_to_shia_islam
http://iranian.com/posts/view/post/12877
Both of these sites have extensive citations in them, and would it be way to long to cite all of the. Everything they claim is backed up by a source.

You do realize that this second source you have linked is just copied from the first one? The text is 100% identical and they didn't even remove the (now broken) citations.

The section of the above source (for it really is only one) that refers to Iran as majority Sunni before the Safavids seems to come from Modern Iran: roots and results of revolution by Nikki R Keddie and Yann Richard. Both historians of modern and contemporary Iran, not the Middle Ages. It's not an entirely faulty source, of course, but it's just not what we need. We need citations from historians who actually study the period we're talking about.

Please provide sources to back up your claims because to me, they are now looking like giant steaming piles of bullshit right now. Take a bite of your own medicine and back up your claims. Ill be interested to see what you provide.

As mentioned, the Cambridge History of Iran. Also useful is Richard Bulliet's final lecture from his class "The History of Iran to the Safavid Period", where he states clearly that he believes Iran to have been Shi'ite-leaning before the arrival of the Safavids. You can find it for free on iTunes U - Bulliet recently retired from his position at Columbia, and is one of the world's most highly regarded historians of Medieval Islam and Iran in particular.

 

[Atlantians]

Next idea: Rebels should always automatically occupy and province they spawn from.
Not only will this make rebels much more of a threat(as they should be), if religious rebels control a province, even if it is the same religion, it should get the religious zeal modifier.

I love your ideas.

I only have one constructive objection, and it is to this idea.

Forts should prevent rebels from immediately sieging their spawning province, and rebels should immediately attempt to siege the closest fort, seizing provinces along the way.

Other than that, I agree.

I would also want to see rebels spawning in a province with a fort gain a bonus to sieging down that first fort.

 

[Clausewitz_]

Er, so despite all of the bashing you gave for not using reliable sources you simply use different historians than me? Seems... hypocritical to say the least. There will always be conflicting views on history. Its already been acknowledged that Iran was a mix between Shia and Sunni beliefs, but if you had to pick one, Sunni Islam fits much better. If i added a plus 1% missionary strength to the temporary bonus do you think it would cover the fact that a good part of the population was willing to convert easily? Basically, my point boils down to this: As there can only be one religion per province and mixed faiths aren't represented(yet), if you had to pick one Islamic denomination Iran/Iraq followed pre-Safavid it would clearly be Sunni. And the current religious situation in Iran does not even come close to representing the religious turmoil that occurred after Ismail took power.

 

[Clausewitz_]

Let me ask you a question @Chamboozer: Do you believe that the religious situation in Iran/Iraq?Azerbaijan is as accurately modeled as can be given the game restrictions?

 

[Chamboozer]

Er, so despite all of the bashing you gave for not using reliable sources you simply use different historians than me? Seems... hypocritical to say the least. There will always be conflicting views on history.

No, I use historians that actually study Medieval Iran. You're citing two websites, one copied from the other, that ultimately links back to a book on Modern Iran. Why would historians of Modern Iran need to understand the religious situation of pre-Safavid Iran, or to explain it in a nuanced way in the introduction (the cited pages were 19-20) of their book, which has as its topic the Iranian Revolution? Modernists are, naturally, much less well-read in the relevant Medievalist literature and more likely to stick to older and less factual ideas about Ismail's legendary formation of the Iranian nation through the conversion of the country.

I had recently edited this into my last post, maybe you missed it:

The section of the above source (for it really is only one) that refers to Iran as majority Sunni before the Safavids seems to come from Modern Iran: roots and results of revolution by Nikki R Keddie and Yann Richard. Both historians of modern and contemporary Iran, not the Middle Ages. It's not an entirely faulty source, of course, but it's just not what we need. We need citations from historians who actually study the period we're talking about.

Basically, my point boils down to this: As there can only be one religion per province and mixed faiths aren't represented(yet), if you had to pick one Islamic denomination Iran/Iraq followed pre-Safavid it would clearly be Sunni. And the current religious situation in Iran does not even come close to representing the religious turmoil that occurred after Ismail took power.

It's far from clear what Iran should be, but it is better to represent Iran's heterodox tendencies - de facto Shi'ite religious beliefs - as such rather than pretend Iran was the same as Egypt in religious makeup.

Let me ask you a question @Chamboozer: Do you believe that the religious situation in Iran/Iraq?Azerbaijan is as accurately modeled as can be given the game restrictions?

Not Iraq, for Iraq was largely Sunni outside of the shrine cities. I can't speak for every single province of Iran since I'm not an expert on it - I study the Ottoman Empire. But given what I know and what I have read, the current situation is fine as it is.

 

[Demetrios]

There are many other factors that lead to population shifts aside from just conversion. Assuming that the period of 500 years between 1444 and 1944 involved a static population shift in which non-Muslim minorities slowly shrank literally ignores history - it assumes that no events of any significance ever disrupted this trend.

Just out of curiosity, what about the region between the Bosphorus and Nicomedia/Izmit? That area was never meaningfully occupied by the Turks until its conquest by the Ottomans in 1333 - 1338 (The Seljuks only occupied the region for 20 years or so, and even then not fully, as at least the area immediately across from Constantinople seems to have remained Byzantine). Did the Turkification of that region happen fully within the first century?

 

[Clausewitz_]

I love your ideas.

I only have one constructive objection, and it is to this idea.

Forts should prevent rebels from immediately sieging their spawning province, and rebels should immediately attempt to siege the closest fort, seizing provinces along the way.

Other than that, I agree.

I would also want to see rebels spawning in a province with a fort gain a bonus to sieging down that first fort.

I would fully agree, but i think that the province in general should get the negative modifier of have being occupied. Yes they shouldn't be able to take forts instantly, but the province itself should suffer.