Another nation in "Mainland" UK?

hehe, nice. I think you're missing a few of the implications of a divided England - small if extant empire; unlikely to have a socially important civil war; therefore no platform or receptors from which to make social and political emancipation an increasingly-global phenomenon, therefore no no Presidential system or socialist attitudes in the 20th century etc, but I like it all the same.

I agree, with much of your post - however while the english civil war would not have happened, that doesn't mean we couldn't have something similar happen, and certainly democratic, emancipatory, and even socialistic ideas, and desires have a habit of appearing in all sorts of societies, at different times for all different sorts of reasons.

I have obviously glossed over a hell of a lot of events...

Acts of union - You're absolutely right, but these acts of union I see as having been basically signed between local overlords/parliaments with tiny electorates, who had been appointed by the dominant nation anyway, and where probably even just local offshoots of the relevent royal family already, a defacto union would have existed for years beforehand between the aristocracies of the nations involved.

In the wider world I think Albion and Jorvik would have established smaller, more scattered overseas empires like the OTL Dutch, and Belgians. TTL would have seen a bigger Spanish Empire being superceded by the French Empire as the worlds largest, and french probably taking the place of english as primary language, thanks to the substantial french influence on North America...

In Ireland I see a messy situation with scottish and jorvise protestant settlers dominant in the north and eastern counties, with much resentment from the catholic irish minority, and in the south anglisc catholic settlers taking great swathes of land in sparser numbers, but serving as slightly more sympathetic landlords. Ireland by the 20th C would probably be divided into two seperate independent states, but with the north eastern one basically being a client of Jorvik.

In terms of technology and wealth I think that Jorvik could have become a real financial and industrial power house, with the money raised from wool, mining, oil, textiles etc actually not being sucked into London, while Albion would have a poorer than OTL rural farming based ecnomy in the west, bolstered by the south Wales mining industry and successfully turning London into a financial centre, by remaining outside the great continental struggles between France and the United Kingdoms (Germany-Austria-Switzerland), and indeed with french being widely spoken in London, thanks to many catholic refugees arriving in the 18th century from France and Belgium. Broadly speaking I think TTL Brtiain would end up margnially poorer than OTL without a massive empire to loot, but not that much.

ETA: I might actually draw up a timeline for this...
 
Edinburgh as a Northumbrian fort is pretty well established fact.

That's not what I said. It's more or less accepted that Edinburgh was taken by the Northumbrians, and that they pursued campaigns agains the Picts, but how successful they were at controlling Goddodin/Lothian is a bit more debatable - what control there was was certainly not for a long period, relatively speaking. The Lowlands are more likely to have been what they were under the Romans, a loose client area, rather than any sort of core territory.

when Scotland took over the area it was full of English

Have you got a source for this? That small section of the population which was literate would likely have been extensively bilingual - northerners populated the early Northumbrian church. But then again, quite a few Northumbrian kings were bilingual as well. What people on the ground were speaking is a different matter.

I don't think the evidence is there to support your idea that the area was all that thoroughly Anglicised - not to any deep extent, anyway. More likely it was caught in a cultural crossover between native Brythonic, Scots/Irish influence, and the Angles, and the inhabitants interacted freely between them. If Northumbria/the English had established themselves properly in the lowlands, they could probably have made their influence dominant, but the idea that the Scots came in and overturned a flawless Anglian cultural settlement seems a bit ropey to me.
 
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In terms of technology and wealth I think that Jorvik could have become a real financial and industrial power house, with the money raised from wool, mining, oil, textiles etc actually not being sucked into London,

'Powerhouse'? Early on they would have far less people than the south, and with reduced access to Southern finance, foodstuffs and trade networks they'd have a much harder time developing than the OTL British north.

Not to mention during pre-industrial times the vast majority of Wool production and a very sizable chunk of mining took place in the south (Anglia and the West Country for woolens, Wales and Sussex for metals), it was only after the rise of the North coal towns that the southern producers shifted to foodstuffs due to increased demand. Also the main manufacturing hub was around london prior to 1750, which after all held over 10% of the OTL Kingdom's population, London added value - it wasn't a "drain" till vastly later. Split apart the south is going to be like Flanders and poorer than the OTL, but the North is going to suck or be trapped in overdependence on coal extraction.

while Albion would have a poorer than OTL rural farming based ecnomy in the west, bolstered by the south Wales mining industry and successfully turning London into a financial centre, by remaining outside the great continental struggles between France and the United Kingdoms (Germany-Austria-Switzerland), and indeed with french being widely spoken in London, thanks to many catholic refugees arriving in the 18th century from France and Belgium. Broadly speaking I think TTL Brtiain would end up margnially poorer than OTL without a massive empire to loot, but not that much.
 
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Have you got a source for this? That small section of the population which was literate would likely have been extensively bilingual - northerners populated the early Northumbrian church. But then again, quite a few Northumbrian kings were bilingual as well. What people on the ground were speaking is a different matter.

I don't think the evidence is there to support your idea that the area was all that thoroughly Anglicised - not to any deep extent, anyway. More likely it was caught in a cultural crossover between native Brythonic, Scots/Irish influence, and the Angles, and the inhabitants interacted freely between them. If Northumbria/the English had established themselves properly in the lowlands, they could probably have made their influence dominant, but the idea that the Scots came in and overturned a flawless Anglian cultural settlement seems a bit ropey to me.

Where are you getting this idea that I originally said the lowlands were totally Anglicised? You are the one who brought this up.
And the Scots overturned a flawless Anglian cultural settlement?....that's a different history of Scotland to the one I know. Its far more a case that the conquerers were assimilated by the conquered. The Lowlands were never Gaelic, they went from Welsh to English (both in the non-modern sense of course).

And bilingual? With Gaelic? Doubtful except for those who lived near Gaelic areas and perhaps some traders. The main bilingualism would be in Latin for the educated few and at later times Danish (though saying bilingual with two so similar languages as old norse and anglian is iffy)

I'll have to have a look somewhere but I certainly remember a source of some priest around the Norman conquest calling himself a Englishman ruled by Scotland and speaking of the situation in the area. edit- a quick glance doesn't bring him up but its not so important, I fail to see why there's even argument on this.
 
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'Powerhouse'? Early on they would have far less people than the south, and with reduced access to Southern finance, foodstuffs and trade networks they'd have a much harder time developing than the OTL British north.

Not to mention during pre-industrial times the vast majority of Wool production and a very sizable chunk of mining took place in the south (Anglia and the West Country for woolens, Wales and Sussex for metals), it was only after the rise of the North coal towns developed that southern the producers shifted to foodstuffs due to increased demand. Also the main manufacturing hub was around london prior to 1750, which after all held over 10% of the OTL Kingdom's population, London added value - it wasn't a drain till vastly later. Split apart the south is going to be like Flanders and poorer than the OTL, but the North is going to suck or be trapped in overdependence on coal extraction.

Hmm, you're right actually:eek:
 
BTW, I agree with Nugax in respect of the unlikeliness of any permanent north-south split. The south has, since Roman times, if not before, had most of the population, the best agricultural land, and the best trade potential.

On that basis, it's hard if not impossible to see how a northern state (certainly a post-Saxon one) could survive for that long without continued Alexander-like political and military leadership. As such, there was absolutely no benefit in Harald and William coming to a truce. 1066 was only ever going to end in one of three ways, and none of them would have been by treaty.
 
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God knows.



2 was after you brought it up, not what you were replying to. And it was very late on that Scotland finally did take over. And of course (yet more) full of still doesn't mean 100%.
1 was fact. They were English owned. That doesn't mean 100% English ethnically though (even today the country isn't that)

They weren't, but then again I never said they were. Hence my use of the term "native Brythonic".

Along with Scots/Irish.
 
I'm not sure an industrial revolution could happen in the north, oe wether it would even happen in Great Britain until other countries had expanded enough that they could provide foodstuffs to the countries.

Indeed, the south is more fertile, with moire pasture land, but without large amounts of workers that aren't already working, (This happened OTL because of the Act of Enclosure, as many peasants were let free, with many in the North with not many other, certainly few better options than to work in the factory.) then large factories can't operate, so industrialization isn't taken as such a grand thing in Great Britain.

And, without the industrial revolution, Great Britains treasury would not be so large as it was. Without the huge revenues, a navy that dominated the 18th and 19th century (apart from the Dutch navy in the early 18th century, but they were exceptionally brilliant.) could never exist. Without a large navy, colonization is less likely, especially with less in the treasury, some of the governments mauy well think trying for an island in the New World would cost to much at such a high risk.

I'd also be surprised to see the nations survive as they are in my previous map. They would almost certainly come under pressure from the Europeans, and warring may well happen for hundreds of years after the borders are set out.

If Great Britain weren't to colonize, then the world would be almost entirely different, there'sa chance for modern history to be completely changed. The french could hold all of North america, with Mexico and the Carribean becoming "New Spain". Also, the "Rush for Africa" would be dominated by the French and the Dutch, as the dutch had a rather spiffing navy, and the French would have "coffers big enough for the palace to fit inside", so could easily outweigh any of it's other european rivals.

This, of course, is being nice to the french.
 
This is a really interesting problem if you want to have a dis-unified Great Britain that lasts until today because the rest of the Europeans are going to be doing their darnedest to take advantage of the situation. When GB was a bunch of independent celtic nations, the Romans took advantage and annexed most of the island. When it was divided between the Saxons, Mercians, Northumbrians, etc, the Danes came in. Then the French continually supported whomever they liked in the constant infighting and bickering between Scot, English, and Irish.

The only way for them to really repel these outside forces would be to unify their strength, and the best way to do that is to unify the governments.

That being said, I can certianly see them being a part of another Kingdom and becoming independent later, say Alfred the Great dies before he can rally the Saxons against the Danes, the Vikings conquer the British isles and eventually view themselves as a scandinavian culture, but distinct from the others. A few centuries later Great Britainians are allowed to set up their own nations, as Norway was in 1905.
 
An interesting theory. I don't want to believe that two successful invasions of England could split the state but the more I think about it, the more I can kind of see a stalemate causing two Kingdoms. That said, the two states are going to be at each others' necks for a good long while, and you're probably going to need Nordam (I have to say I think that it would revert to "Jorvik" but who knows...where does Nordam come from anyway, OOI?) to be in union with Denmark and/or Norway for a time for them to fight off the Normans, at least at first while the two leaders can only properly rely on the support and loyalty of non-English troops.
The Normans have two advantages over the Norwegians which means that they can roll further north than the map shows.

1) Knights give them the advantage in any field action

2) Castles for controlling any territory against internal and external enemies.

The Norwegians will eventually adopt the technology as the Scandinavians did on OTL, but not until the Normans have conquered Mercia and East Anglia. There is no reason why Marcher Lords could not carve out baronies in southern Wales as on OTL.
 
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