alternatehistory.com

There are plenty of threads about a surviving Danelaw or an entirely Norse Britain, but the only thread I've found about the Danelaw never existing is this one.

There are so many questions: how long would the Heptarchy continue? What would happen as to the development of an English national identity (which I understand became a thing because of the Great Heathen Army's invasion)? Might there be distinct Northumbrian, Mercian, and West Saxon identities, and what could those look like? Could English nationalism end up looking like German nationalism? What might be the effects on Anglo-Saxon culture? On politics?

There are more than a few interesting ideas raised in that thread, such as this:

On the other hand, OTL unification of "Englaland" under the Wessex hegemony was a direct consequence of the Danish invasions, as the invaders broke the northern kingdom and East Anglia, and curbed Mercia into accepting southern suzerainty. England will probably remain disunited for some generations, but I do believe that a trend towards unification was already on course since the reign of King Offa. Possibly the Mercians (which so far had the upper hand over the West Saxons) manage again to submit East Anglia and Wessex into vassalage (or, even better, a royal alliance between Mercia and Wessex, à la the Iberian Union between Castille and Aragon) through the 9th/10th centuries.

One important consequence of the Danish invasions was that it integrated the fairly "isolated" British kingdoms into the fledgling trading and cultural exchanges through the North and Baltic seas. Without Danelaw, maritime commercial development might be somewhat delayed. The more significant commercial ties will be those across the Channel, with Francia, Flanders and Frisia.

And as for the English language:

Wikipedia said:
Another source of loanwords was Old Norse, which came into contact with Old English via the Scandinavian rulers and settlers in the Danelaw from the late 9th century, and during the rule of Cnut and other Danish kings in the early 11th century. Many place-names in eastern and northern England are of Scandinavian origin. Norse borrowings are relatively rare in Old English literature, being mostly terms relating to government and administration. The literary standard, however, was based on the West Saxon dialect, away from the main area of Scandinavian influence; the impact of Norse may have been greater in the eastern and northern dialects. Certainly in Middle English texts, which are more often based on eastern dialects, a strong Norse influence becomes apparent. Modern English contains a great many, often everyday, words that were borrowed from Old Norse, and the grammatical simplification that occurred after the Old English period is also often attributed to Norse influence.

The influence of Old Norse certainly helped move English from a synthetic language along the continuum to a more analytic word order, and Old Norse most likely made a greater impact on the English language than any other language. The eagerness of Vikings in the Danelaw to communicate with their southern Anglo-Saxon neighbours produced a friction that led to the erosion of the complicated inflectional word-endings. Simeon Potter notes: "No less far-reaching was the influence of Scandinavian upon the inflexional endings of English in hastening that wearing away and leveling of grammatical forms which gradually spread from north to south. It was, after all, a salutary influence. The gain was greater than the loss. There was a gain in directness, in clarity, and in strength."

What might the differences between the dialects look like? Was the lesser presence of palatalisation ("church"/"kirk") in the northern dialect(s) due to Old Norse influence, or was it from before the Norse arrived? What might the English language look like without Old Norse?

(and, of course, the Norman conquest would never happen)
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