A North Atlantic Hiberno-Scottish Gaelic colonial empire

Have a united Ireland and and a united independent Scotland unite through dynastic marriage to form a Gaelic super kingdom to rival England and any other adversary in the british isles at any time between 1014 and 1500. From there, have them expand and conquer the isle of Mann, Orkney, Shetland, The Faroes, Iceland and Greenland and possibly some colonies in North America.
In the post- Colombian colonial period, the Gaels are therefore a colonial power along with the Spanish, Portuguese, French, Dutch and English.

  • How can such a situation arise?
    Who will their main rivals and enemies be?
    Where will the capital be?
    Will the empire stay catholic or become Protestant?
    Would a Hiberno-Scottish split be on the cards?
    What about other causes of instability?
 
I found an interesting timeline called
William will always be a bastard...
that SEEMED to be getting at something like this. Not entirely sure how realistic its Scotland-England interactions were, but it talked about friendlier relations between the English and the Irish via Harold Godwinson and the King of Leinster, who, in the timeline was instituting a castle-building program to copy the English one, which was itself being copied off of the Norman castles that Harold would have seen in Normandy when he was a "hostage" there.


I thought it was a cool idea. But the timeline seemed to be going a little crazy with the concept of the power of the Kings of the Isles and what it called the "Investiture Wars". Maybe that's just me though...
 
I found an interesting timeline called that SEEMED to be getting at something like this. Not entirely sure how realistic its Scotland-England interactions were, but it talked about friendlier relations between the English and the Irish via Harold Godwinson and the King of Leinster, who, in the timeline was instituting a castle-building program to copy the English one, which was itself being copied off of the Norman castles that Harold would have seen in Normandy when he was a "hostage" there.


I thought it was a cool idea. But the timeline seemed to be going a little crazy with the concept of the power of the Kings of the Isles and what it called the "Investiture Wars". Maybe that's just me though...
I was a huge supporter of this series before it's author was banned. This can always be revived by any capable writer you know. ;)
 
Point being, you might be able to get something interesting off of a premise like that. The relationship between the Godwinsons and the kings of Leinster was pretty cosy at the time. If you could get some cultural diffusion sooner from England into Ireland/Scotland, something like what you're talking about is more plausible.


Without some kind of diffusion though, both countries are just so far behind and so pressed for resources that it's really hard to accomplish.
 
I love the idea but as I keep thinking about the idea, a problem arises. Ireland and scotland dont have the resources that England has. The english population is always going to be greater then either due to more fertile lands and greater wealth of metals and coal. Ireland has good lands for growing food scotland has good mineral resources but neither has both. If you want a great gaelic kingdom have a pre norman scottish king actually control northern ireland and extend that control over the whole of ireland, wales and cornwall. So dont let the english recover from the viking ravaging while having the vikings leave (a strong norse kingdom covering england will have the same effect as an anglo saxon kingdom or an anglo norman kingdom).
 
Ireland had hand metals too and coal and anthracite.
Mining in Ireland

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Ireland has a long association with mining. Records of mining date back to the Bronze Age (ca 2000 B.C.) when southwest Ireland was an important copper producer and alluvial gold was also worked for the production of gold artefacts. Although iron was worked from the eastern half of Ireland during the 16th and 17th centuries, it was not until the late 18th and 19th centuries, that the Irish metal mining industry really flourished, triggered by the needs of the Industrial Revolution in Britain. During this period, almost every county had at least one metal mine. Copper mining boomed, as did lead-silver extraction from numerous high grade, low tonnage vein deposits. Fortunes were made and lost, not least during the gold rush between 1795 and 1830 at the Gold Mines River (Co. Wicklow), where an estimated 7-9,000 oz of gold were extracted from alluvial gravels. This period also witnessed the most important episode of coal mining, slate quarrying and pyrite production in Ireland.



tara_underground.jpg
Today, Ireland is internationally renown as a major zinc-lead mining province. Over the last 40 years a string of significant base metal discoveries have been made, including the giant ore deposit at Navan (>70Mt). Zinc-lead ores are also currently exploited from two other underground operations in south-central Ireland: Lisheen and Galmoy. The combined output from these mines, make Ireland the largest zinc producer in Europe and the second largest producer of lead.

In addition to metal mining, Ireland has a rich heritage of industrial mineral and coal extraction. Both gypsum and brick shale are currently worked from open pit operations in Co. Cavan, whilst dolomite and fireclay are exploited from two sites in Co. Kilkenny. Other industrial minerals previously extracted in Ireland include barite, dimension stone, phosphate, silica sand and slate. During the early 1980s, the Ballynoe barite deposit was amongst the top 5 producers in the world. Coal was worked in Ireland as recently as the early 1990s, although it was most extensively worked in the 19th century.
The large demand for road and building construction aggregates in Ireland supports a thriving quarrying industry. Today crushed rock and sand and gravel are exploited from in excess of 400 sites across Ireland.

http://www.mineralsireland.ie/Mining+in+Ireland/

List of mines in Ireland historic.
http://www.mhti.com/minedetails.htm

http://www.mhti.com/mineinventory.htm
 
I love the idea but as I keep thinking about the idea, a problem arises. Ireland and scotland dont have the resources that England has. The english population is always going to be greater then either due to more fertile lands and greater wealth of metals and coal. Ireland has good lands for growing food scotland has good mineral resources but neither has both. If you want a great gaelic kingdom have a pre norman scottish king actually control northern ireland and extend that control over the whole of ireland, wales and cornwall. So dont let the english recover from the viking ravaging while having the vikings leave (a strong norse kingdom covering england will have the same effect as an anglo saxon kingdom or an anglo norman kingdom).
Irish_population.jpg


I do not think the land in Ireland was less fertile than England.
 
Why exactly do they NEED coal? I've recently fallen in love with the idea of Stirling engines powered by compost. Why does technology have to develop along the same lines?
 
I love the idea but as I keep thinking about the idea, a problem arises. Ireland and scotland dont have the resources that England has. The english population is always going to be greater then either due to more fertile lands and greater wealth of metals and coal. Ireland has good lands for growing food scotland has good mineral resources but neither has both.

Even if this is the case, and England is a much more weighty global force clearly superior to the Gaelic state, especially as industralization occurs, the OP can still be satisfied. Being less industrial and less populous all by itself is not going to foreclose prolonged independence from England at least into the age of discovery and the chance the establish some successful colonies. Greater success as a state, including more seaborne trade and successful colonies, could coincide with support of a variety of forms of higher culture (in Gaelic languages) that could at least result in far less displacement of Gaelic with English, regardless of whether Scotland and Ireland end up dominated, satellitized or even formally annexed and occupied for some centuries.
 
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