AHC: French Wars of Religion lead to partition?

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
Is there any way the French Wars of Religion could lead to a geographic partition that lasts beyond the wars?

From the maps I've seen the Huguenots had more military dominance in the south and the the Catholics had more military dominance in the north.

Could outside powers tweak their participation to cause prolonged statement and partition?

My thinking is the Habsburgs prioritize breaking France up over a national victory by the Catholic League. Perhaps with England having similar priorities, prioritizing the break up of France over a national victory by Huguenots.

In essence for the Habsburgs it would be turnabout for French support of Protestant German nobles and for the English turnabout for France's Auld Alliance with Scotland.
 
Is there any way the French Wars of Religion could lead to a geographic partition that lasts beyond the wars?

From the maps I've seen the Huguenots had more military dominance in the south and the the Catholics had more military dominance in the north.

Could outside powers tweak their participation to cause prolonged statement and partition?

My thinking is the Habsburgs prioritize breaking France up over a national victory by the Catholic League. Perhaps with England having similar priorities, prioritizing the break up of France over a national victory by Huguenots.

In essence for the Habsburgs it would be turnabout for French support of Protestant German nobles and for the English turnabout for France's Auld Alliance with Scotland.

That's gonna probably make things worse for Spain TBH, the dependence of the League on a traditional ennemy of France was already very much a liability for her and having Spain go for a territorial division would most likely only make the ultra catholic cause look even worse and the stampede of desertions toward Henri IV after his conversion be even bigger.

As for the challenge, its definitely a hard one but I'd put the POD latter: during the troubles of Louis XIII minority and early reign they're was definitely some talks among the Hugenots that maybe the Dutch had the right idea and that if Amsterdam did it La Rochelle could do it. Mind you, it was more likely far from a dominant opinion among the Hugenots nobility and burghers in the southwest but it could eventually come to that.

To succeed they'll need foreign assistance tough. Britain is the obvious source of such help but, ironically, Spain might very well prove more decisive in that regard. While definitely still an ultra-catholic catholic country and the leading supporter of violent countereformation in Europe the Spain of Philip IV and Olivares was considerably less fanatical and more pragmatic and nationalistic then the Spain of Philip II. They're was actually some talks of spanish support for the Hugenots when Richelieu initiated the war who would break their political power in OTL, in the name of weakening Spain most dangerous rival in Europe. Its far from a stretch that it could become a reality in some circumstances.
 
If the Valois do not die out, it is possible. Henri de Navarre profited from the unusual circumstance of all of Henri II's sons (François II, Charles IX, Henri III and François d'Alençon/Anjou) dying out without producing a legitimate heir. If any of them can produce a son with his wife, Henri de Navarre is shut out of the succession. At some point, perhaps he decides to protect the territory he has under his control and focus on ruling it as an expanded Kingdom of Navarre, rather than continue to strive for being king of France.

Henri de Navarre is a skilled enough commander that I think he could make this succeed during his lifetime, but I think France would eventually conquer Navarre in the XVII century.
 
Geography is a BIG issue here, due to the religious demographics in France being a far greater (proportional and in terms of detachment from the national "core" that makes partition a palatable alternative to a death struggle for dominance) being a class and urban/rural split rather than regional. The Hugonaughts were highly concentrated in and around large regional centers and the coast, with the rural peasentry FAR more likely to be majority Catholic, meaning drawing a clear line that produces a "reformed" and "catholic" state that aren't poised for conflict or produce an economic nightmare is neigh impossible. This leads to a million local disagreements that make long term peace... Unlikely
 
Is there any way the French Wars of Religion could lead to a geographic partition that lasts beyond the wars?

From the maps I've seen the Huguenots had more military dominance in the south and the the Catholics had more military dominance in the north.

Could outside powers tweak their participation to cause prolonged statement and partition?

My thinking is the Habsburgs prioritize breaking France up over a national victory by the Catholic League. Perhaps with England having similar priorities, prioritizing the break up of France over a national victory by Huguenots.

In essence for the Habsburgs it would be turnabout for French support of Protestant German nobles and for the English turnabout for France's Auld Alliance with Scotland.

In short, no. The concept of a strong French royal State was very much rooted since the end of the HYW. The map of Protestantism/Catholic League was due to the influence of each party's leaders, but even in the south, the Protestants did not control large continuous areas. Most notably, they did not control any large city.

The Kings, each one of them, prioritize the unity of the realm before religious issues. Henri III was certainly not a closet Protestant, but he worked with the Protestant against the League. Henri IV was Protestant-educated, but he understood the necessity of a catholic conversion. The all idea of the 16th c. was to create a co-existing political state, with many short-lived edicts of Toleration, of which Nantes was the latest.
 
In short, no. The concept of a strong French royal State was very much rooted since the end of the HYW. The map of Protestantism/Catholic League was due to the influence of each party's leaders, but even in the south, the Protestants did not control large continuous areas. Most notably, they did not control any large city.

The Kings, each one of them, prioritize the unity of the realm before religious issues. Henri III was certainly not a closet Protestant, but he worked with the Protestant against the League. Henri IV was Protestant-educated, but he understood the necessity of a catholic conversion. The all idea of the 16th c. was to create a co-existing political state, with many short-lived edicts of Toleration, of which Nantes was the latest.

This is why I suggest having the Valois survive. If Henri de Navarre has no realistic chance at the French throne, he has no reason for rapprochement with Henri III and instead can focus on trying to conquer territory for Navarre instead.
 
This is why I suggest having the Valois survive. If Henri de Navarre has no realistic chance at the French throne, he has no reason for rapprochement with Henri III and instead can focus on trying to conquer territory for Navarre instead.

except if Henry III has legitimate male sons, Henry of Navarre will find Ann agreement with him.

The point is : can anyone mention any example of a country partitioning over religious divide ?

A quick answer is none, but I haven’t checked so if anyone has a clue, please remind us.

The only case close to partition over religious divide was the 17 provinces of the circle of Burgundy, that is the Low Countries, including Luxemburg.

But this divide occurred only because of massive foreign intervention : the Spanish catholic government, whose head happened to be the legitimate heir of the Low Countries, militarily forced partition.

No such way can be replicated in France because France is a much bigger piece and is in fact to big to swallow for any neighbor country.

Besides, the Protestants in France were concentrated in the south-west of the country, that is close to Spain.

And the divide was in fact not geographic, contrary to Germany where the princes quickly enforces the cujus regno ejus religio principle.

So you have no favorable ground for partition but for perpetual civil strife, with Catholics and protestants attacking and persecuting one another.
 
This is why I suggest having the Valois survive. If Henri de Navarre has no realistic chance at the French throne, he has no reason for rapprochement with Henri III and instead can focus on trying to conquer territory for Navarre instead.

"Navarre" is an empty title for Henri. The fully independent Navarre was a small and poor Pyrenean valley (the Basse Navarre). The rest of Henri's vast possessions were fiefdoms of the french crown, with a claim of sovereignety for Béarn. Only in Béarn and Basse-Navarre were the Protestant a majority, at least among the elites, and even there, they did not dominate (Saint Jean Pied de Port, capital of Basse-Navarre was a catholic city and rebelled against Henri). If Henri of Navarre wanted and planned to create a "Protestant country", he could do it only in Béarn and Navarre, forfeiting all his other estates. Even if he managed to keep the French King at bay, no way the Habsurgs would ever tolerate an independent protestant realm on their doorstep.
 

That was as much about national identification (Loyalty to the Empire vs. wanting to be independent from the Perfidious Albion), especially since many of Ulster's Protestants-Loyalists weren't diden't exactly come from lines that have been culturally or linguistically Irish for some time. Same thing with the Sudan. The British Raj is the only example I can think of, and that involved some pretty major migrations of people to make the border between populations somewhat stable.
 
The point is : can anyone mention any example of a country partitioning over religious divide ?

India/Pakistan

Ireland (already mentioned)

Israel/Palestine (ok, it arguably wasn't a "country" before the UN partition plan, but it still split)

Bosnia

Greece and Turkey from the Ottoman Empire (also a bit of a stretch I admit)

I'm sure there are more
 

Even that one is a bit more complicated then that. They're was definitely a Calvinist presence in much is today Belgium during the early parts of the 80 years war, even if it wasn't as strong as it was in today Netherlands. It is simply that Spain success in quashing the revolt in the south made the local protestants flee in masses and the remaining ones either converted (often under the implicit or explicit threat of violence) or where purged by the inquisition latter on (mainly during the twelve year truce for the latter) while the victories of the Dutch in the north allowed them to beat back the spaniards and create a new country where the protestants numbers where boosted by refugees from the south and the rest of Europe, and where will the catholics where definitely not threatened with violence they where still discriminated against and held in suspicion, hence why many there converted to Calvinism.

Basically its was less a case of a war resulting in partitions among pre-existent religious lines and more a case of war creating said religious lines to began with.
 
"Navarre" is an empty title for Henri. The fully independent Navarre was a small and poor Pyrenean valley (the Basse Navarre). The rest of Henri's vast possessions were fiefdoms of the french crown, with a claim of sovereignety for Béarn. Only in Béarn and Basse-Navarre were the Protestant a majority, at least among the elites, and even there, they did not dominate (Saint Jean Pied de Port, capital of Basse-Navarre was a catholic city and rebelled against Henri). If Henri of Navarre wanted and planned to create a "Protestant country", he could do it only in Béarn and Navarre, forfeiting all his other estates. Even if he managed to keep the French King at bay, no way the Habsurgs would ever tolerate an independent protestant realm on their doorstep.

Well yes, I don't think this state would be very large, just covering part of the southwest. Henri de Navarre would need to focus on consolidating this territory, at the expense of the rest of France, and encourage Protestants from other regions to flee there as their other territories are not defensible.

The location next to Spain is a problem, I acknowledge. It would need foreign support.
 
Basically its was less a case of a war resulting in partitions among pre-existent religious lines and more a case of war creating said religious lines to began with.
Agreed the border between the Netherlands and Flanders was basicly the border at the end of hostilities of the 80-year war. If the Dutch had captured Antwerp, it would have been as Dutch as Den Bosch. If the Dutch would not have captured Den Bosch, it would have been as Belgian as Antwerp.

The religious border is roughly the border at the time of the 12 year truce, when the Spanish managed to eradicate protestantism from the southern Netherlands, while the calvinists in the north managed to consolidate their the north. Flanders and much of Brabant (especialy Antwerp) were basicly as protestant as most northern provinces. Actualy the Dutch reformation started in Flanders.

Mind you this basicly proves Matteo's point. Very few countries broke up in the age of the reformation. The Netherlands oonly did so because of outside influences, Spain who managed to recapture half of the revolting Netherlands. England, Scotland, France, Sweden, Denmark all other countries did not split.I would say there was only one country that more or less split and that would be Germany, which was barely a country at all, it split because of internal conflicts not directly related to the reformation and actualy did not even split. So the chances of France breaking up because of the reformation are unlikely.
 
India/Pakistan

Ireland (already mentioned)

Israel/Palestine (ok, it arguably wasn't a "country" before the UN partition plan, but it still split)

Bosnia

Greece and Turkey from the Ottoman Empire (also a bit of a stretch I admit)

I'm sure there are more

Pompejus already answered to the examples you mentioned.

In Ireland, the religious divide mainly was but one of the characteristics of a national divide : English and scot conquerors and settlers who grabbed land.

Same for Israel/Palestine. The Israelis and Palestinians never divided because they never were united. Most Israelis were immigrants coming from Europe and North Africa. They bought lands, settled it, and then conquered more lands.

Greece and Turkey were most of all about nationalist antagonisms. They had never been united. The Greeks had been conquered, like the bulgars, serbs, romanians, ... etc.

As for India/Pakistan, the fact that the area then was a British colony was decisive in the way to partition.

Bosnia may be the closest case of what we are discussing. But as you can notice, Bosnia never partitioned. It is still a single country reckoned on the international stage, although a loose federation. And this happened only after half a millenium of religious divide.

So definitely, France is highly unlikely to partition over religious divide as it faced in the second half of 16th century : much more unlikely than England, Scotland, Germany, Bohemia, or Hungary, were the the balance of powers between catholicism and protestantism was much less unbalanced than in France (where protestants never accounted for more than 10% of the population of the kingdom).
 

Maoistic

Banned
Got a study that gives a basis for this Spanish edge over French, Germans etc. ?
https://books.google.com.gt/books?id=aPcQY1CeW4IC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Spanish+science&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjrkdqn05DZAhXkx1kKHb_iDCYQ6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q=Spanish science&f=false
-Spanish mining methods were industrial.
-Spain cemented handheld firearms.
-Invented the galleon.
-The Casa de Contratación was a veritable house of knowledge of nautical engineering, cartography and astronomy.
-Its botanical knowledge and experimentation was unrivalled in the 16th century (see the introduction of American crops to Europe and experimentation with them for a variety of uses).

France was the only effective rival of Spain after the Spanish absorbed the Germanic Holy Roman Empire, and its partitioning would lead to Spain not decaying since the Franco-Ottoman and Franco-Protestant alliances were among the deciding factors of Spain's fall. Without a strong France, you would have a different Germany since the Protestant duchies that rebelled from the HRE and formed Prussia wouldn't have the French as allies and thus wouldn't be as successful. This Germany could still be prominent in scientific thought, but it would be dependent on Spanish science and technology just like how France ended up depending on British science and technology.
 
Top