James VI and I of Scotland, Denmark, Norway, England and Ireland

Ingemann over in the British Family on a European Throne thread brought up the idea of Frederick II of Denmark's eldest son and daughter both dying without heirs so that the throne was instead inherited via Anne of Denmark by James VI of Scotland, fifteen years before he went on to also inherit the crowns of England and Ireland as well. As this would have re-created the North Sea Empire by a five-way union of the crowns and amuses me I'm currently looking into how things would work. Since it isn't really my period though it's taking a fair amount of work. For the moment though assume that things go as in our timeline and that with Christian IV either not appearing or dying early and Elizabeth of Denmark likewise being out of the picture that the thrones are both inherited via Anne who still marries James. Also that as with Hanover roughly 125 years later that Denmark and Norway are granted a certain amount of leeway to run internal matters themselves with a viceroy being appointed by the monarch. Looks as though the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein will be lost since I don't believe the Holy Roman Empire would allow inheritance via the female line. Does have the benefit of removing the Question, avoiding the two associated wars and removing the temptation to get involved in the politics of the Empire though.

If Charles I grows up roughly as in our timeline and gets the chop which way would Norway and Denmark go? They both seems to have much less of a parliamentary strength with the king having more powers than England, especially Denmark with things like the Sound Dues providing an alternate source of funding. I'm thinking that Charles II when he does a bunk 1646 towards the end of the Civil War ends up in Denmark rather than the United Provinces and sits it out there until the restoration.

The other big question I was wondering about was if and when James II 'abdicates' and William and Mary come to the throne as joint monarchs. Denmark and Norway have been Lutheran for about 150 years at this point so how friendly are they likely to be to a Catholic monarch and one that's like James? I did have the idea for the crowns to split with William and Mary getting what would become the UK and James getting Denmark and Norway, but that's probably unlikely to happen. Aside from the religious angle it's likely that they've probably grown to like having an absentee monarch rather than one living there and trying to interfere. Or would they take a more traditionalist approach and still recognise him as king? But then with the various people that won't exist or new ones compared to our timeline and the various changed marriages everything could be completely different. :)
 
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