Challenge: Celtic Survival

The challenge is to keep at least Scotland and Ireland seperate and independant from England. How could such a thing come about? Bonus points for Welsh independance as well.

My personal suggestion is have the English Civil War be a less clear cut affair, but more geographically divisive, heavily weakening England before eventually dividing it into two states: The Puritan English Commonwealth and the Kingdom of England. During the chaos you could have Irish and Scottish rebellions that gain outside support, cementing them as independant. The Welsh could rebel too but I doubt they could succeed. Any other suggestions? Comments?
 
Well, you could always bite Rome in the bud with, say, a defeat by Carthage, delaying the spread of sedentary civilization into northern Europe. Carthage would impose all sorts of limits on Rome without outright conquest, keeping them out of the northwest. Eventually, Europe would develope, but more gradually and equally across the board, giving the Celts a better chance of survival. The Angles/Jutes/Saxons might invade eventually, but without a chance of Norman invasion and the establishment of the English Court and all it's organization and military prowess, the rest of the British Isles might stay out of their sphere of influence.
 
The challenge is to keep at least Scotland and Ireland seperate and independant from England. How could such a thing come about? Bonus points for Welsh independance as well.

My personal suggestion is have the English Civil War be a less clear cut affair, but more geographically divisive, heavily weakening England before eventually dividing it into two states: The Puritan English Commonwealth and the Kingdom of England. During the chaos you could have Irish and Scottish rebellions that gain outside support, cementing them as independant. The Welsh could rebel too but I doubt they could succeed. Any other suggestions? Comments?

Well since the English had at least some control of Ireland in the Anglo-Norman days, it is difficult to see how Ireland remains completely free of the English.

As for Scotland, well, the simplest solution would involve one of Henry VIII's children actually successfully producing an heir. If Elizabeth had gotten married and had a child, then England remains under the Tudors and the Stuarts remain in Scotland.

--
Bill
 
As for Scotland, well, the simplest solution would involve one of Henry VIII's children actually successfully producing an heir. If Elizabeth had gotten married and had a child, then England remains under the Tudors and the Stuarts remain in Scotland.

That still wouldn't result in a Celtic Scotland/Alba. I'm not sure if that's one of the rules of the challenge.
 
That still wouldn't result in a Celtic Scotland/Alba. I'm not sure if that's one of the rules of the challenge.

Sorry if I wasn't clear, I put celtic in the title more for effect than anything. For all I care you could leave the Picts in charge of Scotland. Also, I guess it is sort of impossible for Ireland to always be completely independant but I was thinking that there's always at least some part of the island that remains free of the english, possibly reclaiming the rest in later wars. It is pretty difficult to keep all of their territory independant from England as long as England is so powerful. After all, England has the most people, the most land, the most support and the best infrastructure, which is why I suggested splitting it into two feuding nations. Any other suggestions?
 

Valdemar II

Banned
Sorry if I wasn't clear, I put celtic in the title more for effect than anything. For all I care you could leave the Picts in charge of Scotland. Also, I guess it is sort of impossible for Ireland to always be completely independant but I was thinking that there's always at least some part of the island that remains free of the english, possibly reclaiming the rest in later wars. It is pretty difficult to keep all of their territory independant from England as long as England is so powerful. After all, England has the most people, the most land, the most support and the best infrastructure, which is why I suggested splitting it into two feuding nations. Any other suggestions?

I think he meant that Scotland, while the name come from a Celtic tribe, is as Celtic as France is Germanic*.

*I would say even less so for while France is linguistic Latin, cultural it has kept a lot of Germanic traits.
 
I think he meant that Scotland, while the name come from a Celtic tribe, is as Celtic as France is Germanic*.

*I would say even less so for while France is linguistic Latin, cultural it has kept a lot of Germanic traits.

I was trying to find a term that could encompass the nations on the british isles that were swallowed whole by England, all of whom had large Celtic traditions in their history. I could not think of any other term(What else was I supposed to say, Other British survival?) so, yeah, you get the idea.
 
Why is it everyone says it's impossible for Ireland to remain independent? If a strong Irish ruler(say, Brian Boru) succeeded in creating a stable dynastic state that maintained friendly relations with the english court, I see no reason that Ireland couldn't remain independent.
 
Why is it everyone says it's impossible for Ireland to remain independent? If a strong Irish ruler(say, Brian Boru) succeeded in creating a stable dynastic state that maintained friendly relations with the english court, I see no reason that Ireland couldn't remain independent.
Because that predates the time where people are saying it'd be impossible.
And its not 'independance' that would be impossible but 'Celtic' independance, the Anglo-Normans are there to stay and they're strong.

Scotland...Scotland is weird. What is today thought of as its core lands are the only part of 'England' to avoid being swallowed up by Wessex in the founding England. They've never been Gaelic.

This whole folk history of big nasty England conquering the poor peaceful free celts...its just wrong.

Nonetheless having a independant Scotland is quite easy. It can be done many, many ways. The trouble with a independant Scotland is the stronger you make it the more English you have to make it. If you want a totally celtic Scotland you have to keep it a really poor nation up in the hills, if you want a super power...well that OTL really. It takes over England.
 
It's quite difficult to do

In order to have the 'Celtic' nations stay independent there's actually a very small window of opportunity.

Lets assume by 'Celtic' we mean Brythonic and Gaelic speakers. Let's also assume, for the sake of argument that the Picts spoke a Brythonic language

For them to remain independent we need a pre 1066 POD. It's quite probable we need a POD between the Romans withdrawing and the start of the Viking era

So we have the following entities:

Pictland - The eastern half of modern Scotland north of the Forth and Clyde valleys
Dal Riada - The western half of modern Scotland + parts of ulster
British Kingdoms - modern wales, cornwall and brittainy
Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms - The rest of modern England + Eastern Scotland up to the Forth and Clyde valleys

Lets stop the Viking raids (a nice little epidemic in the viking lands should do it). That should keep England as a collection of squabbling kingdoms and allow the 'Celtic' nations to retain their independence

Of course, you can argue that England itslef is partially celtic. There's still a lot of celtic culture buried there
 

King Thomas

Banned
Have the English Civil War end with a compromise, where Charles the First keeps Wales but loses everything else.
 
Scotland...Scotland is weird. What is today thought of as its core lands are the only part of 'England' to avoid being swallowed up by Wessex in the founding England. They've never been Gaelic.

In my "Ethelred" TL, I have the proto-Scottish Gaelic state of Alba rushing in to protect the rump of Northumbria while the rest of England is conquered by Vikings. Northumbria is Celtified gradually... voila.

FWIW, Scotland, Ireland, Cornwall, Man, and Brittany are often called the "Six Celtic Nations", nothing wrong with that. I think that several people were unsure whether this thread was looking for independent "Celtic nations" in that general sense, or in the more specific "Celtic language survival" sense. In the first sense, Ireland has, in fact, become an independent nation. So... voila.

I like the "division of England" idea following the Civil War, but it doesn't seem too likely to me. For the first phase of the war, everyone said they were loyal to the king, anyway - unlikely anyone would have consented to dividing the realm. By the time people started seriously talking about doing without the king, he was powerless, essentially a prisoner.
 
In my "Ethelred" TL, I have the proto-Scottish Gaelic state of Alba rushing in to protect the rump of Northumbria while the rest of England is conquered by Vikings. Northumbria is Celtified gradually... voila.
How would it be 'celtified' though? IOTL even with a tiny fragment of Northumbria it was Scotland that was Anglofied.
With Scotland taking over Northumbria the centre of power would likely shift even further south and make the country even more English.
 
Guys

Best way for Ireland would be to have the Normans defeated in 1066. It was their lust for land that took them into Ireland and with a Saxon England, which had good relations with the Irish it is quite possible that no serious and lasting conflict occurs.

Similarly with Scotland and Wales, although they often attacked their English neighbours - and probably to a lesser degree vice-versa, the monarchy established by the House of Wessex, while it sought official overlordship and peace never really wanted to conquer them. It was the Norman monarchy in England and the various knights and nobles invited into Scotland by the Scots monarchy that really led to attempts to impose English/Norman control over both sets of peoples.

To keep Scotland Celtic, as Lee said you would probably have to have England keep Lothian, or regain it, and probably take over the kingdom of Strathclyde. That gives a relatively short border against the northern 'barbarians' to minimise their raiding. As such it largely gets cordoned off and ignored. Remains poor but far more Celtic.

Also removing a Norman victory removes the Franco-Scottish axis. Without English involvement in internal wars in France the French are not bribing the Scots to attack England. As such, although there is still an argument attacks would occur to gain wealth, they would probably be less and more controllable. Relations would be rocky occasionally either due to such raids or the more powerful and wealthy English state taking their Celtic neighbours for granted but probably a lot less conflict. [Might even see a solution where whatever wars England engage in on the continent, bound to be some, Celtic mercenaries form a significant and feared part of the forces. This gives them employment and funds and removes the main chance of conflict inside the island. Although may undermine Celtic identity as a lot of returning veterans with exposure to English and continental culture will tend to result in changes].

Steve
 
The challenge is to keep at least Scotland and Ireland seperate and independant from England. How could such a thing come about? Bonus points for Welsh independance as well.

The "England conquered by France in the early thirteenth century" TL I'm sort-of-maybe working on would probably result in this, but it is a long way from seeing the light of day.
 
Alexander waits for 1 night before heading back to his wife, doesn't fall off his horse in the storm and there's no succession crisis in 1292. Longshanks has no pretence to make a claim for Scotland, the list of kings of scotland is completely different and there's no union of the crowns 300 years later, no act of union 100 years after that.
 
I'd say the Brian Boru PoD, complete with gradual conquest of Scotland (The Isles, then the then-smaller-and-weaker mainland state). This Gaelic kingdom would be capable of defending itself, of inundating southern Scotland with Gaelic settlers, maybe some colonial excursions, but not much else. Once, i imagined an Irish Canada, but it'd probably turn out like Quebec, neglected and then conquered. Later than the 1500s Ireland doesn't really have a chance, and Wales was doomed once England as we know it had solidified. Scotland could remain independent, but probably with only marginal celtic culture.
 
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