POD

Point of Divergence is a term used in alternate history to refer to the event which caused the alternate timeline to diverge from our timeline (OTL).

Anthony Mayer, the creator of the Submission Timeline, places the original point of divergence from our own history at the Battle of Uhud of 23 March 625 CE (which is the year 147 before the start of the Standard Era in the Submission Timeline). The Battle of Uhud was fought between a Muslim army led by Muhammed and an anti-Muslim army from Muhammed's home city of Mecca. In OTL the Muslim army was defeated by the Meccans, but was able to withdraw back to their home city of Medina. In the Submission Timeline the Muslims suffer a more serious defeat which reduces their numbers and power. The Muslims are eventually able to gain control of Mecca, but after Muhammed's death in 632 CE a revolt against Muslim rule of Arabia is successful, and the creation of OTL's Muslim Arab Empire never takes place.

In the Submission Timeline, most of people of Arabia remain Christian or adopt various non-Muslim prophetic religions. Arab armies go on to conquer Syria, Egypt, and Persia in the century after Muhammed's death as they did in OTL, but they do not bring the Muslim religion with them. In Syria and Egypt the Christian Arabs merge with the local Christian populations, while in Persia the Arabs form a Nestorian Christian ruling class in control of a country with large Zoroastrian and Jewish minorities. There is no Arab conquest of North Africa, Central Asia, and India.

A secondary point of divergence occurs in 772 CE when a Norse trader named Ragnar the Prophet founds a monotheistic religion called Submission that resembles Islam in both doctrine and history. All the people of Scandinavia convert to Submission, then go on to conquer Northern and Eastern Europe and settle in Eastern North America and the Cape of Good Hope.