Challenge - "Balkanised" means "united"

Thande

Donor
How can we have a long-lasting Balkan state (not a state which includes the Balkans as part of it, like the OTL Byzantine and Ottoman Empires, but a state that consists only of the Balkans) to the extent that, in the idiom of the timeline in question, 'Balkanised' would suggest 'unified'?
 
Well, I think if there was just a state that was the Balkans and it lasted for a long time the term wouldn't really come into use. It would be sort of like calling a unified country a "Franced" country. Sure, it's been unified for a long time... So what?

What you need is to have the Balkans be split up but not by their own will -- perhaps by the Ottoman Empire or something, but then unite -- but, importantly, before Italy and Germany, so it can be seen as a precursor. Then, maybe when Italy unites, politicians and other people recognize it as doing something similar to the Balkans.
 

Thande

Donor
Well, I think if there was just a state that was the Balkans and it lasted for a long time the term wouldn't really come into use. It would be sort of like calling a unified country a "Franced" country. Sure, it's been unified for a long time... So what?

It doesn't have to be an actual idiom in that TL - I mean, it's just that if they overheard someone from OTL say 'Balkanised', they would not associate it with 'disunited'.
 
Perhaps if you balkanise it even more?
Then you wouldn't have your Serbs and your Croats and whatnot but your Belgradians and all that. This could then lead to a unification like Germany and Italy,.

But then that wouldn't give you the word meaning united....I guess some sort of balkan centred byzantium is the only way.
 
Any time line where most or all of the Balkans was united into one political unit with relatively little ethnic tension would work. It could be the Ottomans, Byzantines, Hapsburgs, or some group that never even existed in OTL.
 
Maybe they get a unified culture due to Roman or Ottoman influence? Then it would probably be easier to unite.

Or perhaps a brilliant politician named Balkan puts Europe together into a stable republic...
 
Actually, I could see something like this. Germany and Italy unified themselves by creating a 'nation state', a state that held most people who considered themselves that ethnicity. A Balkan union (encompassing Catholic, Orthodox & Muslim), Slavs, Greeks, Romanians, Hungarians, oh, and Albanians, of course, would be an anti-nation state, to coin a phrase. If they were to unite, it would have to be for fear of bigger enemies all around them. So to 'balkanize' could be to 'unite in desperation' or 'unite despite all the reasons not too'.
Mr. Algernon Cholmondely Brooke-Smythe and Ms. Petunia Whitetrash will be balkanized with their wedding next week:)
 
Austria Hungary annexes bosnia, romania, serbia, bulgaria, montenergo, and albania

Then rename renames themselves the united states of the Balkans. Austria's congolmeration becomes a verb "Balkanization" much like "pulling a Japan".
 
Basil II the Bulgaroktonos has a son that ends up being a better ruler than his brother, and holds conquered Bulgaria (as well as the rest or most of the rest of the Byzantine Empire together). He even adds the remaining portions of the Balkans. In time, "balkanization" refers to "together."
 
Hm, the South Slavs push more down towards the very south of the Balkan Peninsula, eventually coming to dominate Greece instead of Illyria. As the most thoroughly Latinized of Roman Provinces, Illyria would have, for the most part, a single culture and language. Perhaps it could survive in a feudal, broken up state for a long period before finally being united in the early modern period (bonus points if they also unite and unite with Italy, I suppose, considering how much in common they would have culturally).
 
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