Personal DisUnion: Ferdinand and Isabella don't marry?

POD: Mary of Burgundy marries Ferdinand of Aragon instead, Isabella marries Maximilian, Castile is drawn into the Habsburgs while the Burgundies become Trastamara. Spain remains disunited for longer, and Portugal becomes a contender for Uniter instead. The Iberian rulers end up haphazardly semi-colonising Europe - Castile has Austria (Bohemia and Hungary too, if Pressburg goes as OTL), while Aragon has the various Burgundies.

So, let's say that things don't work out between Spain's Golden Couple. Ferdinand marries... say, Mary of Burgundy instead, uniting the Aragonese possessions and the Burgundian inheritance, while Isabella marries, er, well, Maximilian would be around at the moment.

So, Castile is now Habsburg, in union with Austria while Burgundy is resolutely Trastamara. How does this change things?
 
Not sure, but I believe in OTL, Isabella was set to marry King John of Portugal. She ran away and married the handsome Ferdinand instead uniting Castille and Aragon. I think it'd be more interesting to have a Portuguese-Castilian Union. Limiting Aragon to a Mediterranean kingdom and (we'll call it Galicia) a Galician Empire expanding the globe.

Of course things to consider:

- Is there a Galician/Castilian/Aragonic Armada to attack Britain? If not you could get away with a much larger Empire.
- Conquistadors born in Castile (almost all were) would advance the Castilian/Galician Army and not the Aragonic one.
- Would those conquistadors accomplish similar feats ITTL? Or expand on new ones with Portuguese map makers?
- Is Portugal/Galicia limited by a Line of Demarcation? Without two Iberian kingdoms competing in the New World, it seems like all of South America would be theirs and probably half or more of North America.
 

Susano

Banned
Are you kidding? France is in an excellent position due to that. No combining of Austria, Burgnundy, Aragon and Castile within two generations means that no rval power to France will come into existance. Moreover, with Burgundy being the other side of France from Aragon, hence France most likely will conquer it all...

yeah, that PoD is good for France and hence bad for Europe ;)
 
Assuming the Tudors ITTL maintain an anti-Castilian policy, this could be bad for England with no ally in Portugal. England's colonialism in North America could be limited to a few small settlements. Maybe no headway - or significantly less - in the Caribbean. They could still look to India, but Portugal/Castile is active there as well.
 
Are you kidding? France is in an excellent position due to that. No combining of Austria, Burgnundy, Aragon and Castile within two generations means that no rval power to France will come into existance. Moreover, with Burgundy being the other side of France from Aragon, hence France most likely will conquer it all...

Why to conquer? Just let Ferdinand have a female heir. She would be the most important heiress of Europe, and if the French king marry her then France would gain Aragon, Burgundy, Sardinia and Sicily almost without a fight. Of course, the nobles in Aragon might argue that their kingdom follows the Salic law, but the French can deal with it.
 
I do not see Isabel becoming queen of Castilla because Juana would be the queen wining the civil war easily (in fact, if a civil war occurs) so the unification of Castile and Portugal would be inevitable. Would be interesting consider the potential consequences of this in the world (colonization, the Treaty of Tordesillas, relations with Europe ...).
About Ferdinand, I don´t know much about that, but I don´t see a personal union betwen Aragon and Burgundy if only because Burgundy would be indefensible. I see Aragon, Portugal and Castilla unified in this TL
 
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