Looking for Real World pantheons and cultures to build a setting...

[KarlMarx]

So I'm working on some preliminary details for a setting I'm going to be building this summer. I've always enjoyed patterning my campaigns off of real world cultures and to some extent pantheons, and am trying to put a spin on this by creating a realistic culture heavily influenced by elements of two different ones. Here are the combos I've considered thus far, along with some notes as to how well I think the cultures could be synthesized:

Quecha/Late Roman(c. Diocletian): Similar societal power structures, similar ideas of the gods, similar architectural and engineering styles and prowess. However, it may be difficult to reconcile the vastly different tech levels.

Celtic/early Chinese: I think that there's a similar general philosophical outlook in a lot of ways in the relationships between concepts like Yin and Yang and this world and Tir na nOg. I also like some elements of the aesthetic I think that such a setting conjures. However, I don't think there's as much cultural synthesis as above and I'm really not sure I could synthesize them well.

Celtic/Suomi/Turkic: Again, lots of cultural synthesis, more than the two above. Similar conceptions of the gods, similar lifestyles, somewhat similar social orders. Even similar tech levels. However the latter two are definitely hard for me to research.

So, does anyone have any advice on such a project? Any ideas for individual cultures or cultural combinations to consider? Any advice? I'd like to avoid the issue of simply cloning the culture and using it, rather, I'd like to honestly consider a culture I'm interested in and how that culture might interact with a fantasy setting. Has anyone else tried a similar project?

[ParanoidAndriod]

Greek, Norse, Egyptian

[Eldan]

I've tried this before. One I had was heroic age Greek and Norse. Perhaps a bit more informed by legends of both societies than any kind of reality, but basically, a society that put a lot of importance on Young Heroes going out, mostly by ship, and doing Heroic Deeds. Whcih involve a lot of raiding, stealing, enslaving and killing things. On the ground level, city states and villages, ruled over by petty kings, who occasionally band together against larger threats. An underclass of farmers, fishers and craftsmen, led by warrior-nobles.

[jqavins]

Hello, champion buttinsky here, sticking his nose where he has neither experience nor knowledge.

If I were attempting this, I'd start by picking the tech level I want in the end. Since tech defines in many ways what a culture can do, it has a huge influence on what a culture does do. Synthesizing a culture which does this with a culture which does that will be a lot easier and come out with a more coherent result, I suspect, if this and that are supported by the same (or at least similar) tech levels. So for early seafaring, just as one example, combine the Minoans or Phoenicians of the second millennium BC with early Chinese sailors of a millennium later.

[ArlEammon]

So I'm working on some preliminary details for a setting I'm going to be building this summer. I've always enjoyed patterning my campaigns off of real world cultures and to some extent pantheons, and am trying to put a spin on this by creating a realistic culture heavily influenced by elements of two different ones. Here are the combos I've considered thus far, along with some notes as to how well I think the cultures could be synthesized:

Quecha/Late Roman(c. Diocletian): Similar societal power structures, similar ideas of the gods, similar architectural and engineering styles and prowess. However, it may be difficult to reconcile the vastly different tech levels.

Celtic/early Chinese: I think that there's a similar general philosophical outlook in a lot of ways in the relationships between concepts like Yin and Yang and this world and Tir na nOg. I also like some elements of the aesthetic I think that such a setting conjures. However, I don't think there's as much cultural synthesis as above and I'm really not sure I could synthesize them well.

Celtic/Suomi/Turkic: Again, lots of cultural synthesis, more than the two above. Similar conceptions of the gods, similar lifestyles, somewhat similar social orders. Even similar tech levels. However the latter two are definitely hard for me to research.

So, does anyone have any advice on such a project? Any ideas for individual cultures or cultural combinations to consider? Any advice? I'd like to avoid the issue of simply cloning the culture and using it, rather, I'd like to honestly consider a culture I'm interested in and how that culture might interact with a fantasy setting. Has anyone else tried a similar project?

By the time certain Celtic tribes had already lived many years in China, the Chinese discovered the fertile mountain valleys and other areas of that part of East Asia. Just have your Celtic locals and Chinese coexist.

[KarlMarx]

Oh, and I'd like to avoid using the more cliche cultures. I've already built a rather large setting off of Roman culture, and it's so similar to Greek that I'd rather branch out into something less well known.

And it does make sense to use tech level to determine what societies might be "compatible" for this approach. I'll keep that in mind as I start building. However, I am increasingly leaning towards using a pre-Christian Finnish model with Celtic and Turkic influences. I think that there's a good compatability in tech level and the Finnish culture is one I've never seen done in this context.