DWBI: No Vinland

I know this is going to sound pretty strange, but what would the long term impacts have been if the Norse colony in Vinland had failed (let's say they all left or died)? Would Europeans just not learn about the New World for several centuries? Who would have discovered it?

Obviously this butterflies away the country I currently live in, the Norse Empire and my entire heritage dating back a thousand years. It's hard to imagine the past millenium without that initial turn of the millenium event.

I'm wondering if it's even possible for the Greenlanders to miss the looming continent right next to the for centuries, maybe it would take preventing the settlement of Greenland to prevent Vinland.

The worship of the Aesir might have died out completely. As things stood, though it dwindled in Europe, it stayed pretty heavily entrenched in Vinland...and spread among the Skraeling population.

Skraeling empires and Christian converts/settlers fighting it out over centuries. I wonder who'd win.

Chances are that without the domination of most of a continent by the Vinlandic Old Families, they wouldn't have the international clout they wield today.

Potentially a good thing for the democrats of the world.

Another plus would be erasing the Harrying of Portugal during Island Wars. It is shocking how little Norse students get taught about it, considering its the root cause of our diplomatic struggles with them.

However, we would also likely have lost the Mexica and Incan states - which would be a shame for modern Geometric Art - and their international aid grants. That and the Silver Palace in Cuzco may never have been built - and that would have been a great loss.

OOC : Essentially, since Vinland had only a few families early on - I'm expecting them to reach mega-oligarch status over a 1000 years, just to really mix up the world.

GdwnsnHo said:

However, we would also likely have lost the Mexica and Incan states - which would be a shame for modern Geometric Art - and their international aid grants. That and the Silver Palace in Cuzco may never have been built - and that would have been a great loss.

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Yes but for centuries the Mexica and Inca were literal Spanish puppet states. They were nominally independent but if their Spanish "advisers" said jump, they jumped. It's estimated that at its height half of Mexica's GDP was being sent to Spain as tribute. They would have been better off if the Spanish had conquered them outright, that way Spain would have some incentive to invest back in the country and modernize and industrialize. Since Spain could simply drain Mexica's coffers and offer nothing in return it wasn't until the 1800s that Mexica could match Spain militarily.

The question is how would you prevent it? The Norse of the era were starved for land, and the discovery of literally an entire continent where the only opposition was stuck in the stone age drew settlers from across the like Nordic world like moths to flame.

Essentially, how do you keep that lightning in the bottle?

Escape Zeppelin said:

Yes but for centuries the Mexica and Inca were literal Spanish puppet states. They were nominally independent but if their Spanish "advisers" said jump, they jumped. It's estimated that at its height half of Mexica's GDP was being sent to Spain as tribute. They would have been better off if the Spanish had conquered them outright, that way Spain would have some incentive to invest back in the country and modernize and industrialize. Since Spain could simply drain Mexica's coffers and offer nothing in return it wasn't until the 1800s that Mexica could match Spain militarily.

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But that was after centuries of occupation by the plains tribes. How strange would Mexica look if some guy from the Blackfoot hadn't risen to power and conquered half the continent?

Escape Zeppelin said:

Yes but for centuries the Mexica and Inca were literal Spanish puppet states. They were nominally independent but if their Spanish "advisers" said jump, they jumped. It's estimated that at its height half of Mexica's GDP was being sent to Spain as tribute. They would have been better off if the Spanish had conquered them outright, that way Spain would have some incentive to invest back in the country and modernize and industrialize. Since Spain could simply drain Mexica's coffers and offer nothing in return it wasn't until the 1800s that Mexica could match Spain militarily.

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Oh, of course! Unless you remember that each colonising power (especially Moroccans in S.America) only industrialized their homelands - not the colonies!

I don't expect the Spanish to do anything different, especially as they spent all that lovely Mexican gold on fruitless Italian adventures rather than modernize their own country (or even defend it - there is a reason that Andalusia is an independent Farajite state rather than part of Spain (hint : Morocco used to own it)).

Regarding the Blackfoot - I'm assuming you're referring to the 2nd Blackfoot Empire rather than the 1st or the Confederacy? Who knew you could conquer so much if you only had horses and flat lands to begin with . It really only existed because of Freyagard trading horses with them.