I know France is the centerpiece of this TL but I think Scandinavia might emerge as the big winner in all of this in terms of TTL colonization.
l'Antarctique: A French Brazil TL
- Thread starter Kurd Gossemer
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We'll see how they turn out, there's still a lot of story left to tell after all a successful/big colonial empire doesn't mean there can't be trouble back home, especially when it comes to war
I won't spoil much but Portugal will definitely have a better hand dealt to them compared to OTL, they won't be a massive world power but they'll be able to have a good amount of influence in the East as well as some in Europe, since they'll mostly focus on the empire instead of getting dragged into trouble, especially with Sebastian not dying like OTL
I agree with you, the biggest problem for Sweden will be its small population. With all the neighbors being more populated. So Sweden has to play the diplomatic game well in Europe. But assuming they focus on having a big navy they (and maybe the danes) could be important players in the colonial question (perhaps on the scale of otl portugal)
Well portugal got its dream. An empire in Asia. They just had to drop everything else and focus on that. They will earn a lot of money from it, from the production and sale of spices to the control of the Strait of Malacca (The or one of the most important sea routes in the world).
Him not dying is good for portugal, but at the same time he's kind of an idiot (in relation to diplomacy). He rejected an alliance with France (declaring that he was unimpressed by the mild suppression of the Huguenot Protestants in France). Maybe he will marry his cousin Elisabeth of Habsburg, the daughter of Emperor Maximilian II or his first cousin Isabella Clara Eugenia, daughter of his maternal uncle Philip II of Spain. He has his good points : he has made military reforms , regulated the action of lawyers/scribes/court officials and created fines for delays; he also created institutions intended to help poor farmers when farm production decreased, giving credit, lending seeds and commodities to the needy. His biggest problem was that he was basically a religious fanatic wanting to be a crusader. He's going to do something stupid about religion in Asia I'm sure.
Yep, not to mention neither the Danes and especially the Poles after they pulled out of Livonian war want to be friendly with them, Russia is quiet for now but that's only because Russia has more to win by playing nice with Sweden while they deal with the Ottomans and Poles, something that will not last forever, I will get to them in future updates but let's just say the successor will have some difficult choices to make when it comes to diplomacy.
Here with Sebastian being more tampered by taking the throne a little bit later as well as growing up seeing his mother do some heavy lifting when it came to expanding the empire, he isn't much focused on being a modern day crusader despite being so devout(given the way the Malaca Inquisition is going) as much as he is focused on administering the empire and doing some reforms. He has enough smarts(and influence) from his mother to not go against Spain but also not being subservient to them, so he'll foster diplomatic relationships with other countries and try and expand his reach while trying to not get caught up in the local political plays that could damage Portugal directly even if he will be a champion of Catholicism.
I frankly can’t see Sweden keeping their colony. They are too small in population size, too poor and constantly at war with their wealthier, more populated neighbors to maintain S.A. Assuming they somehow kept it for an extended time I would presume that SA would be more German than Swedish.
We'll see how their story goes, there's still a lot to tell and Sweden was dominant on the Baltics for a reason, especially since as with the exception of Jamaica/Krilla, there will be natural growth for the colony as well as those Swedes who willingly move there although they will definitely bring other protestants over to help flee oppression or are dissatisfied with the status quo and want their own little country made up of Protestants, and what better place than the new world where there's a whole of frontier to tame?
Hence more Germans in the colony instead of Swedes. There simply ain’t enough of them and the Swedes desperately needed bodies back in Europe to fight [insert name neighbouring country]. The key to success of such a colony would be to siphon colonists from Protestants of the HRE to migrate to the colony instead of sending people in Swedish ruled territories there.
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True but for now, both Denmark and Poland are exhausted from their recent wars and Russia is content with the status quo in the Baltics, meaning the Swedes will have a few decades of peace to grow the colonies before getting dragged into another war.
It really doesn't matter the original ppl's language tho. The US of A was really more a mix of English and Germans and Huguenots and they all eventually switched to English.
Okay while probably a strongly religious person, he's not going to be a crusader wannabe. This will do wonders for Portugal. Although I still think he'll be less tolerant than his mother for sure.
I tend to think that if the colony succeeds (which is not always certain). Most of the settlers will be Germans from the north of the hre (or refugees from the rest of the hre/northern Europe) wanting a place to practice their religion in peace. so yes most people will probably be german but the structure of the colony will be swedish. So in the long run the majority of the population will speak Swedish (but it will probably have more German characteristics than Scandinavian Swedish).
Once the colony reaches a similar size to around 5,000 people, it will probably run on its own and fend off the natives. Considering that these next few decades are going to be very violent, there will be no shortage of protestant refugees. The colony will likely expand into non-malaria areas in particular.
the colony of Brazil in OTL only started to speak Portuguese around 1700 so a language transition is not strange.
Actually only in the Southeast, in the Northeast and Rio portuguese had been spoken ever since Portugal discovered these regions.
Keypoint is any of the maritime powers could just snipe the fledging colony and there is nothing Sweden could do to stop it.Sweden had no blue water navy and they are occupying a very strategic gateway to Asia. Plus any movement past the Sound could easily be blocked by whatever hostile power.
Only because there’s enough English settlers around. If 90% of the early US settlers were German, this prospect would be very unlikely.
Yeah I agree, if the Swedish colony survives I defo see the local dialects being german influenced. tbf if we get Swedish domination of northern north america things would get very interesting, after all a Scandinavian North America would be fun to see especially if the Danes tap into the fur trade and make it big that way. Hell, maybe we get a Denmark that takes over Northern North America ittl.
If we have a denmark that's controlling all of Quebec to the mid-atlantic I defo see German being the main language until we get more Danish settlers and a good education system would push the colonists to speak Danish eventually.
I defo see the French colony having a bunch of Tupi speakers too, but considering France's population, I don't see the French not being the main language eventually.
The best way to stamp out languages is to have an educational system that teaches only one language and force ppl to learn it. I think its defo plausible that most ppl learn the language eventually.
tbf I wonder how will Angola and Mozambique develop ittl. I defo could see a bunch of Javans and Sri Lankan Buddhists being in these colonies, and it'd be interesting how the native Bantus react to this, and considering we'd get Swedish South Africa (Interesting. Are we getting like a South African port that's open to all trade? I defo could see the Portugese feeling uncomfortable that the Swedes have so much power over their empire tho...)
Problem is that outside of Denmark and Poland(neither country with the reach into SA) Sweden has cordial relations with both England and France and Portugal is far too busy in India and Indonesia as well as the Red Sea to promptly crush the Swedes for whatever reason, in Jamaica the Swedes have Krilla that can be defended with the help of Sipang and their NA colony is still miles away from the Danish colony, so far, their colonial empire is safe, for now.
tbf I think eventually the Swedish colonial empire will fall though, I could defo see the Portugese striking a deal with the Danes with the Danes taking over Swedish America while Portugese takes Swedish Africa. It's not something the Swedes could keep long term considering how spread out their colonial empire is compared to their navy.
I think the swedes losing their colonies in the future is defo plausible.
The colony in SA is still rather small and mainly serves as a friendly port for Swedish ships to go into India, there's been some talks about having a permanent presence in there but King John is still trying to be wise with money and wants a few years before they try and find a suitable port that won't be too close to Portuguese territory(so already the Western coast is out), in fact with the Dutch already (somewhat)independent, the French seeking to expand their empire, the English trying to do the same to guarantee their supremacy in the coming union of crowns, the Danes wanting a new venue for cash now that they realize just how much worth sugar brings and Spain seeking a extra route of money, India will certainly see a lot of "visitors"