Impact if the Norman Conquest of England fail or never begin in the first place

Impact (especially on the Mediterranean) if the Norman Conquest of England fail or never begin in the first place?

How would later Norman exploits(Norman kingdom in Southern Italy) be affected by this POD?
 
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Honestly, I've always figured that the Normans are still gonna go somewhere. Sicily is still a possibility, but they may also turn their attention to neighboring territories within France. IF they are able to consolidate Brittany and more of the North, its feasible that they become major contenders within French politics and could even help to weaken the French kingship (I mean, Paris is juuuuussst to the South and within easy strikign distance.)
 
Honestly, I've always figured that the Normans are still gonna go somewhere.
That is my take too.
Sicily is still a possibility, but they may also turn their attention to neighboring territories within France. IF they are able to consolidate Brittany and more of the North, its feasible that they become major contenders within French politics and could even help to weaken the French kingship (I mean, Paris is juuuuussst to the South and within easy strikign distance.)
Normans had been active in Southern Italy since 999, more than 60 years before the Norman conquest of England. Additionally Norman lords had by 1060 established states. Moving to Sourthern Italy would probably be the easiest since the path there had already been trotted. From Southern Italy we might see more Norman expansion elsewhere into the mediterranean.

More Norman activity in France is also likely.
 
Honestly, I've always figured that the Normans are still gonna go somewhere. Sicily is still a possibility, but they may also turn their attention to neighboring territories within France. IF they are able to consolidate Brittany and more of the North, its feasible that they become major contenders within French politics and could even help to weaken the French kingship (I mean, Paris is juuuuussst to the South and within easy strikign distance.)

The king is already pretty weak at this time. IIRC the French monarch is still officially elected in the XI century - it became hereditary OTL because the Capétiens incredibly had an unbroken line of fathers and sons for 340 years. ITTL you could see the dukes of Normandy make a serious challenge for the crown, perhaps leading to civil war.
 
Honestly, I've always figured that the Normans are still gonna go somewhere. Sicily is still a possibility, but they may also turn their attention to neighboring territories within France. IF they are able to consolidate Brittany and more of the North, its feasible that they become major contenders within French politics and could even help to weaken the French kingship (I mean, Paris is juuuuussst to the South and within easy strikign distance.)

IMHO the option of a failed invasion of England seems more likely than no Norman invasion. After that fails ITTL, well more Normans would go to southern Italy and possibly ITTL the Iberian peninsula. Of course some will go to the Holy Land too, but their impact will be greater in the former two regions. As for England, no Norman conquest might be better short term, long term is a wild card, moreover IMHO Anglo-Saxon is likely to adopt some French (Norman) ideas on their own, in a way it would be not too distant from the Low Countries and the rest of the western HRE in terms of French cultural influence. Would this England be a bit closer to Scandinavia, probably, but it's hard to see England not being influenced by much closer Western Europe either, though ITTL instead of a Norman conquest, it would be much closer to an English Davidian Revolution. In fact AFAIK there already was a Norman presence in England before the conquest of duke William of Normandy.
 
IMHO the option of a failed invasion of England seems more likely than no Norman invasion. After that fails ITTL, well more Normans would go to southern Italy and possibly ITTL the Iberian peninsula. Of course some will go to the Holy Land too, but their impact will be greater in the former two regions. As for England, no Norman conquest might be better short term, long term is a wild card, moreover IMHO Anglo-Saxon is likely to adopt some French (Norman) ideas on their own, in a way it would be not too distant from the Low Countries and the rest of the western HRE in terms of French cultural influence. Would this England be a bit closer to Scandinavia, probably, but it's hard to see England not being influenced by much closer Western Europe either, though ITTL instead of a Norman conquest, it would be much closer to an English Davidian Revolution. In fact AFAIK there already was a Norman presence in England before the conquest of duke William of Normandy.
The Davidiqn revolution would be far too much Norman influence that you could expect in this scenario.
 
The Davidiqn revolution would be far too much Norman influence that you could expect in this scenario.

That really depends. Besides I wrote that it would be more like an English Davidian Revolution, not that it would be exactly the same. Continental, mostly French (including, but not only Norman) cultural influence could and will probably still spread, but instead of by conquest, it would be more gradual, by invitation and less complete. TTL England in terms of said influence would resemble OTL Scotland more than OTL England; though it's likely to be a bit less than OTL Scotland, but IMHO it would still make OTL Scotland a better comparison.
 
Well for one, linguistically English would be more germanic wordwise as well as gramatically. There would probably still be quite a bit of French influence though due to geographic proximity.
 
Well for one, linguistically English would be more germanic wordwise as well as gramatically. There would probably still be quite a bit of French influence though due to geographic proximity.

So a bit closer to its' continental cousins Dutch and German, both had French influence (the former arguably a bit more than the latter), but both are still more Germanic than OTL English.
 
Eh it probably more like Frisian since English is put into the Anglo-Frisian Dialects of the West Germanic languages, but yeah pretty much.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Frisian_languages

So? Frisian is an acknowledged minority language with Dutch, German and Danish varieties. The two main other languages in the West Germanic group are German and Dutch. Personally as Brabantian I can understand most (not all) Frisian, even though my Brabantish dialect has Frankish roots.
 
So? Frisian is an acknowledged minority language with Dutch, German and Danish varieties. The two main other languages in the West Germanic group are German and Dutch. Personally as Brabantian I can understand most (not all) Frisian, even though my Brabantish dialect has Frankish roots.

Well yes, but Frisian (more like West Frisian since its considered the closest relative to English outside Scots) and English have developed some sound changes for some to consider it a separate dialect. Gramatically it would definitely be pretty similar to the continental Germanic languages that would make someone from the Netherlands or Germany have a much easier time learning it I'd imagine. Though with over a 1000 years of butterflies its hard to predict how English would really develop by the modern day. Since English is on a island, it would be relatively isolated and develop differently.

I've seen this posted before in similar threads, but here's one guys' interpretation of how English would develop without the Normans: http://jbr.me.uk/allo.html.
 
Well yes, but Frisian (more like West Frisian since its considered the closest relative to English outside Scots) and English have developed some sound changes for some to consider it a separate dialect. Gramatically it would definitely be pretty similar to the continental Germanic languages that would make someone from the Netherlands or Germany have a much easier time learning it I'd imagine. Though with over a 1000 years of butterflies its hard to predict how English would really develop by the modern day. Since English is on a island, it would be relatively isolated and develop differently.

I've seen this posted before in similar threads, but here's one guys' interpretation of how English would develop without the Normans: http://jbr.me.uk/allo.html.
On the other side no Normans could entail a stronger contact between England and the Netherlands-German region, meaning that the special position Frisian enjoys through common ancestry could be superceded by the increasing amount of Dutch-Low German loanwords and contact.
 
On the other side no Normans could entail a stronger contact between England and the Netherlands-German region, meaning that the special position Frisian enjoys through common ancestry could be superceded by the increasing amount of Dutch-Low German loanwords and contact.

Don't forget there was also quite a bit of norse influence on English too, if Harald Hadrada won the day and took over England, could've seen a more hybridized English-Norse Language. The core of the language would be Anglo-Saxon or West-Germanic in nature but perhaps a lot of governmental and military terms could be borrowed from the Norse. And if the Dutch become quite the naval power I can see quite a bit of Dutch enter English as well, I know Dutch influenced quite a bit of naval terms in English.
 
Don't forget there was also quite a bit of norse influence on English too, if Harald Hadrada won the day and took over England, could've seen a more hybridized English-Norse Language. The core of the language would be Anglo-Saxon or West-Germanic in nature but perhaps a lot of governmental and military terms could be borrowed from the Norse. And if the Dutch become quite the naval power I can see quite a bit of Dutch enter English as well, I know Dutch influenced quite a bit of naval terms in English.
I'm doubtful that Scandinavian influence would be by any extent even close to French influence IOTL.
 
I'm doubtful that Scandinavian influence would be by any extent even close to French influence IOTL.

Maybe not since Scandinavia didn't have the population nor the political and military power/influence that France would possess, but I think there could be more of it in English in a Harald victory scenario.
 
Maybe not since Scandinavia didn't have the population nor the political and military power/influence that France would possess, but I think there could be more of it in English in a Harald victory scenario.
True but it probably wouldn't be to point of being a hybrid.

That depends whether you think the simplification of Old English, which began before the Normans, is a result of the Danelaw or not.
Most likely not, there weren't many Norse people demographically speaking, they didn't control the core of the English territory, they didn't remain for long.

Not sure why it makes sense to believe that, language change all the time without such outside forces.
 
Most likely not, there weren't many Norse people demographically speaking, they didn't control the core of the English territory, they didn't remain for long.

Not sure why it makes sense to believe that, language change all the time without such outside forces.
Because there was a fair bit of settlement by the Danish Norse - Anglo Danes were an actual thing - and lasting contact with a language that has similar words but different inflections has an affect. Look at Afrikaans for example.
 

Zen9

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On the subject of English, there are several phases of borrowing post 1066. We ignore the massive latinisms of the 1700s among the educated that took things to extremes. More than now.

The near complete removal of the upper echelons of Anglo-Saxon society, also removes the formal use of English and an increasingly defined version of the language.
English becomes a language without a head restlessly sucking in other words in what is best described as a 'Cultural cringe', foreign is educated and superior.

So no Normans means the Elite remain Anglo-Saxon, and their definition of formal and technical language will continue.

Example: guided-missile system
Could be : recstral gefegn
The word 'fegn' being 'composition'.

Prior to the Conquest, English eyes were focused on the source of the threat, Scandinavia.
But even if the Normans are defeated, England's focus will turn to this growing threat.
 
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