English capital at York

If the capital of England since 1066 had been at York, (lets say William the conqueror had wanted to keep his thumb over the rebellious north or something like that), how would britains demographic and economic geography be different?
I imagine York being a city of around 2 million people and a economic and finance hub but with more manufacturing in the surrounding cities of Leeds and Doncaster with most of OTL londons shipping jobs in Hull. York may, like Edinburgh be the bourgeois city while hull, Leeds, Sheffield and Doncaster are the industrial glasgows of Yorkshire which is divided up into many more council areas due to high population density. The southeast, like the West Country, remains rural and agricultural but on the Eurostar route from Paris to York.
 
Absolutely love the idea! Put the southern wimps in their rightful place:D
Unfortunately I can't see it working. Much as I hate to admit it the gravitational pull is towards the SE and the trade with Europe. I think the most that you could do is have the capital in Winchester whilst all the trade is still funnelled through a port on the Thames; over time that port would probably also be the political seat of power.

For this lovely idea to work then Englands trade has to be with Scandinavia and/or a Vinland analogue. Or the Scots be so bothersome that the Kings of England need to near permamently base themselves in the north so as to be able to react quicker.
 
Maybe the French invasion is more successful and lasts longer, destroying the southern economy and they never bother moving the capital south again?
 
But then where's your POD? The south was more densely populated and well-developed both commercially and where infrastructure is concerned in OTL; also, the Harrying of the North killed off a whole lot of workers in the north, and devastated quite a few towns and farms. Why would Slick Willy bother with York when London is closer to the center of England's power, and to his own holdings in Normandy, and further from the Welsh and Scottish threats?
 
London's attraction has always been its location, not the government. It sits on the trade route from Europe right where it reaches England. That's why it keeps coming back despite even having been destroyed during the Roman period. Especially by the industrial period I think London is still likely to be the real capitol of England even if the government is nominally elsewhere.
 
But surely london's location was the reason why it DID NOT make a good capital, as it is in one corner of the uk and I know you will all mention Europe but other ports (Norwich, dunwhich and Edinburgh) all thrived on European trade, and Dover, even closer to the continent didn't grow to London's size. Hundreds of years later in the industrial era, why would London have become the de facto economic capital, lacking in coal or iron? In the 19th century newspapers which sold to people all over the country located there inspite of its location in a corner, not because of it. If anything York would have been better served for the rest of the country but still benefitted from being near the Humber estruary and its trade with Europe, or not?
 
York would be better suited to a Norwegian conquest. The Nirdic presence there is greater and you're more likely to see the north triumphant under the Norwegian kings.
 
Actually London was midway between the Northern English and Southern Normandy boundaries. The way trade developed the capital of England and then the UK (if it came into existence) was always most likely to be London. It would have needed a bloody intransigent set of Monarchs for it to be otherwise with an overwhelmingly logical reason (at least for them) at the time for it to be York (or anywhere else).

Admittedly if you look at a map of England York would seem to make sense, the Ouse is tidal up to York, the Ouse/Humber offer an easy route to Europe, and its halfway to the Scottish border. However by 1066 all the wealth was already concentrated dahn sarth. To get York to be the capital of England you need not only Edwin, Oswald and Oswy to be even more successful but for the south to be ravaged several times by Cadwallon,then by the Mercians and Vikings and for the Vikings to leave Northumbria enough alone so that one of its kings can do an Alfred.

It would also help if the Britons won at Bedford(?) and Bath as well so circumventing Wessex.

As an adoptive northerner (born the wrong side of the Humber apparently despite living most of my life in York!) I love the idea (as I've mentioned before) I just don't think that it can happen with the Bastard.
 
The problem is that any capital is going to be decided in medieval era before the Industrial Revolution and it was the Industrial Revolution that super-charged Northern England. In 1500 England was much more southern dominated than now with 2/3rds of the population living south of the Wash-Severn line. And beyond that the most prosperous and densely settled counties of the south were in the south-east. Furthermore the Thames Valley was the premier trade route within England. Goods landed at Southampton had to be carried by cart. Goods landed at London could be transported by barge up the river past Oxford. So a Englands biggest city was inevitably going to be on its most important river in its richest and most densely populated region. With or without the influence of government and pre-1500 monarchs are naturally going to spend most of their time in the richest and most important bit of their Kingdom and that in turn is going to lead to the development of a capital city.

What you could do is change the location within the Thames Valley. While there are strong arguments for having the major city and port develop and the furthest downstream crossing point with a bit of handwavium you could have Henley or Richmond as the capital instead of Westminster.
 
So what If it had been on Sheppey island in Kent, could the city of Sheppey have become an island city more densely populated than OTL london due to the water constraints around?
 
It is possible to have multiple capitals or capitals that are not also the economic beating heart of a country. Sure that is less likely in pre modern times, but still possible.


Maybe have a tradition of York being a capital now and then for various monarchs who have a reason to do so, or a summer/winter capital arrangement. Then, as modern times arrive, a monarch makes the switch permanent (using Madrid/Wellington/Brasila logic).

Now it is my honest belief that in this glorious alternative future, the Eurostar will not go to York, however the trans Mare Germanicum hover-craft network will of course have a principal terminus on the golden sands of *Greater York (Scarborough as it is known IOTL) from whence both jarls and thralls alike shall then board the Pneumatic Express into the centre of the city.
 
IMHO you have to change the Viking conquest. Have Northumbria beat them off, and be the power to defend Mercia and Wessex against Viking invasions.

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
So what If it had been on Sheppey island in Kent, could the city of Sheppey have become an island city more densely populated than OTL london due to the water constraints around?

The Isle of Sheppey is a.) a swamp and b.) you can't cross the Thames there. London is the furthest downstream you can easily build a bridge and river crossings are natural cities. Add to that the depth and width of the Thames making a good sheltered port and a city is almost inevitable. Add the fact that's its on the biggest and most fertile river in the country in the most prosperous corner of the country and its pretty much inevitable that it'll be number one. You could move it a few miles upstream by having the major medieval bridge built at Richmond or Kingston and then have that develop as a city where you'd have all the same advantages but not downstream.

One idea is that in OTL you have a commercial capital (City of London), a royal/political capital (Westminster) and a religious capital (Southwark*). Now as it happens they are all within a mile of each of each other and merged together into one metropolis by 1600 at the latest, though they were administratively separate until the Victorian era. But what if you had the royal/political capital and the religious capital at Windsor? Its in a central enough location that it has a lot of the advantages of Westminster and it's semi-isolated from the City of London. Which at times of plague etc. could be very attractive. Windsor and the City of London are far enough apart that they wouldn't merge into a single city but would retain distinct identities.



*The Archbishop of Canterbury spent most of his time at Lambeth Palace not in Canterbury.
 
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London wasn't always the capital of England. One reason it is, is that it has good connections to Normandy, which was , obviously, important to the Norman kings.

Absent William pulling off Hastings, London might not have been the capital. It's nowhere near as good for connections to Scandinavia.


Or (here's a way left field thought), the English tell Augustine to take a hike at Whitby, and stick with their own haircuts. That means a LOT more connection with Ireland (which, then , was probably more advanced than England), much less interest in what's happening in Europe, and maybe a capital on the West coast.
 
I disagree. Certainly there were multiple capital cities in what is now England before Æthelstan united the country in 927 but from then on London began to assume primacy. Winchester was very important as the traditional base of the Kingdom of Wessex and York also carried weight because of the focus on the North. But the Thames Valley was the centre of Æthelstan's Kingdom and he was crowned at Kingston upon Thames.
By the time of Cnut London was very much the premier city of the country, it was a key target of his invasion and its capture enabled him to force a treaty on Edmund Ironside splitting the Kingdom and declaring Cnut the heir. While Cnut was the then buried at Winchester Cathedral, his son Harold Harefoot was buried at Westminster Abbey.
London's primacy was cemented by Edward the Confessor who was even more Londoncentric than his Danish predecessors. When he was looking for a major church building project to demonstrate his piety he chose Westminster Abbey and London area is the most common location (of the very rare) charters and documents that we have.
 
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