One King of the Isles

The British Isles weren't united under one monarch until the 17th century, though not for lack of trying. The political disunity had all sorts of enervating effects on the strength of the monarchs therein, and cemented a Celt-Romano-Saxon cultural gap between various parts of the archipelago.

With all that in mind, what's the earliest possible point post 500AD a single ruler could hold the entirety of the British Isles within his (or her, presumably) feudal domain? Only somewhat separate, could this perhaps largely personal union remain an enduring feature?

It seems a messy business given the divisions of Great Britain and Ireland in the early middle ages, with axe-wielding vikings for flavor. England itself didn't consolidate until the mid 900s, so presumably a POD could leave the political landscape quite strongly altered.

Hazarding a guess, Cnut might be the model to work with, if he can establish claims through marriage, war, or fealty elsewhere in the islands. It may help this process if by happenstance or folly Cnut is unable to gain the throne of Denmark, and keep his interest (and heirs) focused on British holdings.

Can anyone put together a better reasoned (or earlier) consolidation?
 
I suppose it's just about possible that some form of reasonably strong High King could develop as overlord of the British kingdoms in response to Saxon pressure if they successfully beat them off. Later on, eastern Ireland could possibly (but really quite unlikely), be brought into the fold to crack down on Irish piracy, and as Viking raiding weakens the Irish disunited kingdoms more than the more unitary British state lead to a consolidation of the rest of Ireland.

The Highlands and Islands would take quite a lot longer.
 
What about a celtic High King figure? An absolute ruler over a group of lesser monarchs. It would not be a stable monarchy, with countless civil wars and sucessions of powerful and powerless kings, but then the OTL feudal system wasn't much stable either. A equivalent of the House of Lords (the House of Kings) could be created, and eventually evolve into a more or less modern parlamentary structure like the House of Lords did. The British Islands would be federalized into dozens of states, but you did not state than the king had to be an aboulute ruler or the Islands a homogenous nation, after all.

(on second though, the Holy Roman Empire seems like a better example than the Irish High Kings -britian would have an equal chance of uniting like Germany or exploding into warring nations like, well, Germany)

Edit... well, Alratan beat me to the punch...
 
The question is what do we mean by "in control"? Taxes, a unified code of laws, the ability to call people to war...probably not.

If we just mean having some sort of High King to whom all the other petty lords are willing to occasionally bend knee, we could probably get one of the Saxons doing it.

Hell, I've never been able to figure out why William didn't just keep going to Scotland. With all of Britain beneath him, the Normans might be able to go over to Ireland after a couple generations.
 
I suppose it's just about possible that some form of reasonably strong High King could develop as overlord of the British kingdoms in response to Saxon pressure if they successfully beat them off.

Sorry I couldnt resist.

How about a marriage between the Prince of Caledonia and the Princess of Cymru. Then their united kingdom invades and conquers England before island jumping to Ireland.

I really have no Idea what im talking about but it seems pretty cool to me.
 
With all that in mind, what's the earliest possible point post 500AD a single ruler could hold the entirety of the British Isles within his (or her, presumably) feudal domain? Only somewhat separate, could this perhaps largely personal union remain an enduring feature?

Arguably you could point at Henry II as an OTL unification of the Isles as part of a feudal domain. It's nothing like a unified state, but whatever. Then you just need to have his sons be a bit more competant at actually being Kings, and preferably removal the annoying tendency to instantly dismember any empire that forms by divided inheritances and the infeasible idea of having brothers as Kings of almost federated states, and then jimmy the TL so that a few kings get a bit lucky (and let's face it, kings getting lucky did happen frequently IOTL) and it could potentially last...
 
Why not go with Edward I? He did manage to conquer Scotland for a while, before the place became unmanageable.
 
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