AHC: Bigger Hispanic America

[Taunay]

Is it possible, with a POD of 1550, to have more of the continent become part of Hispanic America?
By Hispanic America, I mean a region where:

• The majority of the population speaks Spanish as a first-language in the modern-day, and was colonized by Spain, even if lightly

As an additional challenge, can you have the ENTIRE continent become Spanish-speaking?

 

[LuckyLuciano]

If Spain gets to the mouth of the Amazon first (they had claim under tordesillas), Portugal has little room to expand without the basin. Thats a big chunk right there geographically speaking. With control over that and Venezuela, they could easily overrun the Guyanas at some point.

In North America, you need a more stable Mexico. If the conspiracy of the Machetes (1799) is successfulI, and say it coincides with a famine like 1785, the rebels could easily get British help since theyd be fighting Spain and Napoleon. They’d be fighting for Louisiana and Florida too and would probably get them. With the British navy who knows maybe even Cuba and Santo Domingo. If you want to make it a little more spicy, you could have Spain winning the war of Jenkins Ear, extending Florida up into Georgia, Mississippi and Alabama, maybe even South Carolina and Tennesee.

If theres a Mexican American war, who knows what a victorious Mexico might take. Maybe everything west of the Rockies, splitting the pie with Canada. Maybe they get a free hand in the Pacific Northwest, they had a claim after all.

DR conquers Haiti and unifies Hispaniola, not the other way around. Spain grabs some of the more smaller islands in the Caribbean, maybe focusing more on the Lesser Antilles. Oh and this is just for fun, but there was a real possibility that Hawaii could’ve become a Spanish protectorate.

 

[Arkenfolm]

De Soto or one of the other 16th/17th century expeditions in the modern South finds the gold belt that stretches from Georgia-North Carolina and sparks a greater settlement in the area. Probably it is centered around fortified missions and whatever mining center emerges in northern Georgia. There would be Spanish settlements/forts on either side of the Tennessee River, but they'd be constantly raided by natives, so I doubt there'd be anything permanent north of the Chattanooga TN/Florence AL area. They'd certainly run into conflicts with French Louisiana in the area of modern Alabama and Mississippi. The core territory would be in upland Georgia where the gold mines are. As for the Carolinas, I think South Carolina will inevitably become Spanish and probably North Carolina too.

 

[Taunay]

If Spain gets to the mouth of the Amazon first (they had claim under tordesillas), Portugal has little room to expand without the basin. Thats a big chunk right there geographically speaking. With control over that and Venezuela, they could easily overrun the Guyanas at some point.

In North America, you need a more stable Mexico. If the conspiracy of the Machetes (1799) is successfulI, and say it coincides with a famine like 1785, the rebels could easily get British help since theyd be fighting Spain and Napoleon. They’d be fighting for Louisiana and Florida too and would probably get them. With the British navy who knows maybe even Cuba and Santo Domingo. If you want to make it a little more spicy, you could have Spain winning the war of Jenkins Ear, extending Florida up into Georgia, Mississippi and Alabama, maybe even South Carolina and Tennesee.

If theres a Mexican American war, who knows what a victorious Mexico might take. Maybe everything west of the Rockies, splitting the pie with Canada. Maybe they get a free hand in the Pacific Northwest, they had a claim after all.

DR conquers Haiti and unifies Hispaniola, not the other way around. Spain grabs some of the more smaller islands in the Caribbean, maybe focusing more on the Lesser Antilles. Oh and this is just for fun, but there was a real possibility that Hawaii could’ve become a Spanish protectorate.

Thanks! I think that you need to prevent Portugal from having Belém, since once they get to it, the Amazon will inevitably become Portuguese

De Soto or one of the other 16th/17th century expeditions in the modern South finds the gold belt that stretches from Georgia-North Carolina and sparks a greater settlement in the area. Probably it is centered around fortified missions and whatever mining center emerges in northern Georgia. There would be Spanish settlements/forts on either side of the Tennessee River, but they'd be constantly raided by natives, so I doubt there'd be anything permanent north of the Chattanooga/Florence area. They'd certainly run into conflicts with French Louisiana in the area of modern Alabama and Mississippi. The core territory would be in upland Georgia where the gold mines are. As for the Carolinas, I think South Carolina will inevitably become Spanish and probably North Carolina too.

Makes sense

 

[Taunay]

@Mitridates the Great @Sardar @Paladín Wulfen
What's your opinion on this?

 

[Taunay]

@Socrates @Nivek @Leonidas
Could Hispanic America be bigger? Or would you say that OTL is already a Hispanic-wank in the Americas?

 

[TheKutKu]

I imagine you can probably a lot of brazil hispanophone with a 17th century POD if it somehow slipped away from Portuguese rule, since so much of it didn’t speak Portuguese but rather linguas Gerais and creoles, a Hispanophile elite could promote it instead of Portuguese, some of the north east would be hard to Hispanise but I guess that just like the North American North East it could become bilingual due to the economic and political influence of the Hispanic America

after the first decades of the 18th century this seems a tremendously harder challenge, if possible at all , but to me it definitely seems quite possible with a pod in the 17th century, particularly first half of it

 

[Taunay]

a Hispanophile elite

Personally I don't think any elite in the history of Brazil was hispanophile to the point that they would promote Spanish
But with an early POD, you could have Southern Brazil up to São Paulo become a Hispanic region. It would be very hard but it's possible

 

[riggerrob]

Spanish would need to change their attitudes towards commerce. Instead if a medieval extractive economy, they would need to compete better with French and English traders.

 

[Taunay]

Spanish would need to change their attitudes towards commerce. Instead if a medieval extractive economy, they would need to compete better with French and English traders.

Well, I don't know if a POD of 1550 could result in this. It's been some years since the conquests of Mexico and Peru, and the Monarchs would not see too much benefit in changing their economic structure when it seemed to be working so well

 

[Mitridates the Great]

Spanish would need to change their attitudes towards commerce. Instead if a medieval extractive economy, they would need to compete better with French and English traders.

The only reason of English "success" in this period is only because the existence of many countries who are using the merchantilism. So, probably many countries doing the same will drive to a many speculative bubbles, not to a success...

And also the question for the colonization is keep strategic points under control. Mantain some of this and the rest will be gained.

 

[Taunay]

So, probably many countries doing the same will drive to a many speculative bubbles, not to a success

That's interesting

 

[EnzoLux]

Could Spain have beaten the nomad Native Americans before their empire falls apart? IIRC, they were the reason Spain had trouble securing the northern parts of New Spain and basically all of Patagonia. They wouldn't have some of the advantages that other nations had later, like bigger numbers and good rifles.

 

[TheKutKu]

I don’t get why people would vote no, this isn’t about Spain ruling all the Americas at the same time and settling it, but separately Spain even having a vaguely recognised claim on it and all the Americas being hispanophone today

even say the 13 colonies, it’s easy to imagine Spain helping independence in exchange for some light protectorate status. As for the language it’s easy to imagine a disunited and poor anglo-america getting influenced by successful post-independence Latam countries and eventually adopting Spanish as lingua Franca. We have a lot of century to work with

 

[Elfwine]

It's possible to imagine a set of circumstances where something like that is the result of something like the American Revolution, I'm not sure it's viable as a "with a POD in the 1760s or 1770s."

That feels like one of the key things here.

"I don't think Spain can have all of the Americas fall under 'The majority of the population speaks Spanish as a first-language in the modern-day, and was colonized by Spain, even if lightly.', I think it can have more of the Americas." is my vote for this in general.

 

[Jiraiyathegallant]

Spain had restrictive migration policies OTL. If they were less restrictive and far more Europeans moved there, and those Europeans eventually adopted Spanish, they could greatly expand in certain areas overtime at the expense of English and Portuguese ambitions while fulfilling the POD.

 

[Taunay]

It's possible to imagine a set of circumstances where something like that is the result of something like the American Revolution, I'm not sure it's viable as a "with a POD in the 1760s or 1770s."

That feels like one of the key things here.

"I don't think Spain can have all of the Americas fall under 'The majority of the population speaks Spanish as a first-language in the modern-day, and was colonized by Spain, even if lightly.', I think it can have more of the Americas." is my vote for this in general.

Agreed

Spain had restrictive migration policies OTL. If they were less restrictive and far more Europeans moved there, and those Europeans eventually adopted Spanish, they could greatly expand in certain areas overtime at the expense of English and Portuguese ambitions while fulfilling the POD.

This is a good POD. La Plata could be filled with more migrants (Peru and Mexico did not require much immigration because of their already high native population)

 

[Taunay]

@सार्थक (Sārthākā) @EMT @iddt3
What's your opinion on this?

 

[Taunay]

and all the Americas being hispanophone today

That's very unlikely IMO
Even when Spain ruled Brazil through the Iberian Union, there was not the smallest chance that Brazil would turn Hispanophone. Personally, outside of Spain keeping the northern territories of Mexico, colonizing the Carolinas and Florida and keeping the Misiones Orientales and Guayrá and annexing Belize, I think OTL was pretty much the best Spain could have done. Even in our world Spain was already overstretched, which explains why the Andean nations still kept their native languages up to today.
Also on immigration, it cannot be incentivized without ending the Casta system. A casta system meant that Spanish kings had no interest in upsetting the status quo of political balance in the colonies.
But there is an exception: Louisiana under Spanish rule incentivized immigration to it.
(Although it would take a much longer time for it to turn Hispanophone. In our world Spain ruled it for 41 years yet the French-speaking population of Louisiana is much bigger than the 18th-century-descendant Spanish-speaking population)

 

[The Laughing Hyenas]

I look at it as how to not nerf Hispanic North America. Look at the attached map. It's from Wikipedia.
At the time of the American Revolution, they had most of North America, up to and including a lot of Canada, going up to the Arctic Circle. If they had held it out to the discovery of gold in California, who knows how far they could have gone.
Sooner or later, the Czar of Russia will sell off Alaska. Imagine Mexico literally going from Guatemala to the North Pole.
Then add the chaos of the US Civil War period. Would Mexico have stepped in and traded actively fighting for the Union for part of the vanquished Confederacy or other areas like the part of North Dakota outside the Louisiana Purchase line? Or would they have given the Confederacy the boost they needed for a Southern victory and taken much of the North?

History of Mexico - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/Imperios_Espa%C3%B1ol_y_Portugu%C3%A9s_1790.svg