Frederick Barbarossa Survives - Pre-TL Discussion

Eurofed

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Or, it leads to further bloodshed as the Hedgemon seeks to actually recreate the Roman Empire and dominate all of its neighbors in brutal conflict. This leads to restive populations, and further brutal crackdowns as cultures, languages, or peoples seen as contrary to Imperial unity are wiped out or relocated.

Oh, please. This is not WWII, and it's half a millennium and more before the rise of European nationalism (which would likely lessened substantially by a successful HRE), so let's leave the proto-ethnic cleansing stuff in the ASB drawer where it belongs. Back in the High Middle Ages and Early Modern Areas, all that a monarchy needed to win the stable ownership of a region was to secure the loyalty of the local ruling classes. On a cultural-linguistic level, Europe at large was simultaneously much more fragmented and united than in the modern age. Educated ruling and middle classes shared a common Roman-Christian cultural heritage, and had a common Latin lingua franca. OTOH, European peasant masses typically spoke dialects that were substantially different 100 km in any direction. More or less all that a successful HRE needed to do to ensure the cultural-linguistic unity of the educated upper classes (all that really matters in a pre-modern empire) is to foster Latin as an imperial lingua franca even more than it was already used spontaneously as the language of the Church and culture. And Romance languages had already diverged far enough from Latin (ask Dante) that it would be a genuine imperial lingua franca and not cultural imposition of Italian section on German section (cultured Germans and German clergy used Latin like everyone else). In modern age, with a tradition of political unity lasting half a millennium and building up on the weighty Roman precedent, two things are quite plausible: either the HRE keeps using Latin as a lingua franca, and post-industrialization public-school mass education entrenches its use among the masses, or the HRE embraces German-Romance multilingualism, and it becomes a giant Switzerland.

As it concerns the bloodshed arising from a HRE success, certainly its unity would abolish all future conflicts within Central Europe. It is of course quite likely that it would attempt to expand at the expense of its neighbors. Where it is successful (and at least in some cases, it is bound to be to: e.g. a successful HRE almost surely leads to a rather more extensive expansion in and assimilation of Poland, Hungary, and Croatia, and at the very least, the border with France is likely to stay where it was in the 1400s), assimilation leads to less future nationalistic conflicts. When it is, then recurring wars with other European great powers are not likely going to be any worse than OTL.

But we aren't talking about Gallia, which was reached by sea, but Germany beyond the Rhine, which the Romans never controlled.

We are talking about the Alps (not) being a substantial barrier to the exercise of political control across them. Since neither the Romans in their control of northern Europe nor France or Austria in their control of (parts of) Italy did everything by sea, the point is quite relevant.

How do we know that. If its going to refraim itself as Roman, it probably lead to it being culturally dominant Italian as these pseudo romans reset Rome as the Imperial capital, and you have a german problem all over again.

Educated German upper classes and clergy used Latin and classical culture and venerated the Roman heritage like all the other counterparts of theirs in the rest of Europe. As I said, by the 13th century, Romance languages had already diverged substantially from Latin in wholly different languages, so using Latin and neo-Roman ideology to bind the empire together is not going to to lead to "Italian" dominance. As it concerns the capital, the Imperial court is likely going to move among various locations on a regular basis during the Middle Ages, and anyway the Middle Age monarchies did not pour big amounts of money in the capital. If and when the HRE does build its Versailles equivalent sometime in the Early Modern Age, by then the empire is going to be rather well entrenched.

But wherever the central government is, that is where the money will flow. That imperial capital will be site of grandoise building projects, and they'll use the church method to pilfer the middle class. Same situation, different recievers of the money is all.

Last time I checked, the building of Versailles did not lead to the fragmentation of France. :rolleyes:

Who then, seeing itself threatened by that gigantic thing on their new french border, begin to conspire against them.

Quite possibly, but the plotting is then going to be reciprocal, and likely not that effective beyond a certain point.

It is more likely that a very strong amount of colonial competition unfolds between a successful HRE and a successful Angevin Empire. There would be great power competition, and recurrent wars, but not that different from OTL Anglo-French competition.

I think Europe would beg to differ;).

OTL hubris. :p
 
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What I am protesting is your belief that hedgemons will make Europe better.

Why is assimilation preferable. It destroys languages, cultures, and beliefs while replacing it with some boring common replacement.

Also your claim that being unified will abolish all bloodshed in central Europe is ridiculous. Numerous and bloody civil wars such as the Fronde resulted in brutal devastation.

Also, just because it has half a millenium of toleration under its belt doesn't even begin to guarrantee its survival.

I will give the Kingdom of Hungary as the example. First off, don't mix up the Magyars and Hungarians. Hungary was a multi cultural Kingdom with the Magyars in the lead, but almost every nation around them makes the differentiation between the Magyars and the Kingdom. It was only in the 19th century that Magyar intelectuals deliberately tried to make Hungarian and Magyar interchangeable as the sole culture.

They tried to assimilate the other cultures around them. It has almost been universally regarded as a bad thing to do.

The state was almost actualy founded on the same concepts you are giving. The official language of the Kingdom of Hungary was LATIN up unto the 18th century. St Stephen even wrote a letter to his son Imre praising multiple cultures and its strengths, and this was held true for most of the history of the Kingdom of Hungary.

But it all fell apart. Magyaria (that small state called Hungary in English) is the result of all of that and most of its neighbours dislike it for its attempts to assimilate them.

So just because you establish a large, unified Kingdom in the middle ages doesn't even begin to guarrantee its survival, or the lack of bloodshed.

That is what I'm argueing. Your assumption that a large unified neo-Roman German-Italo-whatever nation established in the middle ages is the desirable thing, and that everything will work out for the best and nothing bad will happen to it.

OTL hubris. :p

No, OTL experimental evidence:p.
 
The Mongols are going to be knocking whatever happens down a peg. Best bet is for the Holy Roman Emperor to side with them against the Mamelukes, but we all know that wouldn't happen. :D
 
What I am protesting is your belief that hedgemons will make Europe better.

Why is assimilation preferable. It destroys languages, cultures, and beliefs while replacing it with some boring common replacement.

Also your claim that being unified will abolish all bloodshed in central Europe is ridiculous. Numerous and bloody civil wars such as the Fronde resulted in brutal devastation.

Also, just because it has half a millenium of toleration under its belt doesn't even begin to guarrantee its survival.

I will give the Kingdom of Hungary as the example. First off, don't mix up the Magyars and Hungarians. Hungary was a multi cultural Kingdom with the Magyars in the lead, but almost every nation around them makes the differentiation between the Magyars and the Kingdom. It was only in the 19th century that Magyar intelectuals deliberately tried to make Hungarian and Magyar interchangeable as the sole culture.

They tried to assimilate the other cultures around them. It has almost been universally regarded as a bad thing to do.

The state was almost actualy founded on the same concepts you are giving. The official language of the Kingdom of Hungary was LATIN up unto the 18th century. St Stephen even wrote a letter to his son Imre praising multiple cultures and its strengths, and this was held true for most of the history of the Kingdom of Hungary.

But it all fell apart. Magyaria (that small state called Hungary in English) is the result of all of that and most of its neighbours dislike it for its attempts to assimilate them.

So just because you establish a large, unified Kingdom in the middle ages doesn't even begin to guarrantee its survival, or the lack of bloodshed.

That is what I'm argueing. Your assumption that a large unified neo-Roman German-Italo-whatever nation established in the middle ages is the desirable thing, and that everything will work out for the best and nothing bad will happen to it.



No, OTL experimental evidence:p.

True true but they would just need to expand the national identity. And due to this assimalation their would be much blood shed yes but what we must know that ROme is one of the greatest examples of how to assimalate provinces. And eventually the muli ethnic empire would be able to identify themselfs as citizens of this empire and not their ethnicity.
 
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