The Greater Norman Empire and its successor states.

It does sound interesting, but you will need a much different POD for this 'Greater Norman Empire' TL, to work.

OH, I actually think it works pretty well. My goal was a still English England with ties to the British continent and beyond, while William, freed from the need to govern England closely, could look further afield for his conquests. I thought then--and still do--that William landing first and fighting Harld Godwineson, then having to march all the way up to Northumbria to fight Hardrada, while worrying about the boy king Edgar behind him, makes this plausible. I suggest you keep reading to see if you agree. I agree that my POD could have resulted in a far different outcome--partition of England for example--but this is the one I thought was most interesting, and I believe it's workable.
 
OH, I actually think it works pretty well. My goal was a still English England with ties to the British continent and beyond, while William, freed from the need to govern England closely, could look further afield for his conquests. I thought then--and still do--that William landing first and fighting Harld Godwineson, then having to march all the way up to Northumbria to fight Hardrada, while worrying about the boy king Edgar behind him, makes this plausible. I suggest you keep reading to see if you agree. I agree that my POD could have resulted in a far different outcome--partition of England for example--but this is the one I thought was most interesting, and I believe it's workable.

I reckon it works fine AJ - hope to see more of it.
 
OH, I actually think it works pretty well. My goal was a still English England with ties to the British continent and beyond, while William, freed from the need to govern England closely, could look further afield for his conquests. I thought then--and still do--that William landing first and fighting Harld Godwineson, then having to march all the way up to Northumbria to fight Hardrada, while worrying about the boy king Edgar behind him, makes this plausible. I suggest you keep reading to see if you agree. I agree that my POD could have resulted in a far different outcome--partition of England for example--but this is the one I thought was most interesting, and I believe it's workable.

Well, in any case, I have enjoyed reading it so far. :D
 
AJNolte

Good to see this back, although I've forgotten so much I'll probably have to read it through again. Can do that tomorrow however.

Sounds like some rough times ahead for several powers. A bitter civil war in the Muslim ME and "the Years when God's Angel's Wept Blood" doesn't sound very nice. Also a Briton resurgence possibly and suggestions that the surviving Icelanders ending up in Vineland. Hopefully a fairly peaceful and happy time for Ethipioa and possibly the Christian Nubian kingdoms.

Steve
 
AJNolte

Good to see this back, although I've forgotten so much I'll probably have to read it through again. Can do that tomorrow however.

Sounds like some rough times ahead for several powers. A bitter civil war in the Muslim ME and "the Years when God's Angel's Wept Blood" doesn't sound very nice. Also a Briton resurgence possibly and suggestions that the surviving Icelanders ending up in Vineland. Hopefully a fairly peaceful and happy time for Ethipioa and possibly the Christian Nubian kingdoms.

Steve
I'd say that's all a fair guess. The Muslim ME is not going to so much be a civil war as a conflict between the Baghdad Caliphate and the Fatimids, and once the Icwan comes to predominence, a really nasty Sunni-Shiah religious war. I illuded in some earlier posts to the events which will make up the "years when God's Angels Wept". Hint: they are analogous to the "years when Christ and his Saints Slept" OTL, but with far larger scope and implications. Ethiopia will definitely be one to watch.
 
I am glad your back AJ. Are you going to make a Version 2.0 or just restart updating from where you left off?
Actually, I'm hoping to do both. I'll be updating the timeline here while I work on reworking and retconning. I would eventually like to give the GNE timeline it's own sight, complete with some associated fiction, and I still hope to solicit some cooperation from people interested in taking a portion of it. For right now, though, I want to move things forward.
However, I am going to almost certainly make a few changes. For example, I'll probably change the name of the Republic of Tunisia, as this is a big anachronism. I _don't_ want to call it Carthage, simply because every Christian or vaguely Christian state in North Africa surviving past the advent of Islam is invariably called Carthage. I'm debating names such as Vandalia, Numidia or the Republic of Africa. However I'm also open to suggestions on the name change. I'm also not going to screw France quite as hard. I don't think a Kingdom of Anjou really makes sense, at least not long-term. I've got a bunch of medieval rulers acting like proto-nationalists right now, instead of...dynastic medieval princes. Not a problem for the Normans, and I still think Aquitaine would try to go it's own way, but I'm not convinced some of the other French magnates would just abandon France as dramatically as they did. Other retcons are going to be more minor: changing Nills to Knud, and stuff like that.
 
Jammy: check out the 1100 update I just posted. Lots of spoilage.

Well bugger me - i missed that at hte bottom of page 16 :eek::D

My take on the spoilage then :D

The year 1100 was a consequential one in medieval history. In Scandinavia, this year marked Valdemar I's successful expedition to Iceland, and the conquest of this last pagan hold-out for the now Christian Scandinavian kingdom.

Interesting but the kind of thing we suspected would be happening, anyway

As a result of this conquest, the surviving pagans, many of whom were already refugees from the mainland, decided to take ship west in the hope of finding a land there. Rumors abounded of a land west of the ocean, and even these pagans had doubtless heard of the Voyage of Saint Brendan, a popular medieval manuscript of the time. In their desparation, these pagans took all they had--their livestock, weapons, and those tools they could not easily replicate, and sailed westward in several large ships, landing at Greenland in 1101.

This is even more interesting, as it means that when the rest of Europe starts sailing east it won't be a bunch of completly disorganised tribes waiting, will be a bunch of fairly disorganised tribes but with a history of fear and hatred for the West they fled from.

Of course could also go the other way and have a much earlier exploration of the west as the pagans are persued, but i personally can't see that - out of sight, out of mind etc.


Meanwhile, in Normandy, 1100 also saw great upheavals. Robert Curthose, the Norman emperor, died in a hunting accident in the summer of this year, leaving his younger brother Edward Beauclerc as his likely successor. Later chroniclers remain uncertain what role Edward played in this accident, and it has not been proven that he was directly responsible, but suspicion swirled around this beneficiary of his brother's misfortune. There was some talk of offering the crown to Richard the Moor, but he refused it, preferring to focus all his considerable talent on Jerusalem. It also seems likely that many of the Normans were wary of Richard because of his open embrace of many eastern ways. Edward would be crowned in 1101 at Rouin.

Think the main bit here is that despite the family relations and the descent from William the West and the East branches are already distrusting each other because of the differences they have. Could lead to an interesting future.

1100 also saw the formal corronation of Conrad as Holy Roman Emperor, and his investiture with real temporal power. Conrad would quickly establish a reputation as very different from his father, seeking close relations with both the Norman Empire and the Pope, and focusing his talents on the internal reorganization of the Empire's affairs.

Interesting, interesting a more powerful closer HRE could have strong reverberations for the GNE down the years.

First, however, Conrad faced a war with King Stephen of France, who sought to recover the county of Champagne. The Champagne War, beginning in 1101, would demonstrate to the world that the rumors of France's death had been exagerated. Though France was eventually defeated, largely due to the fact that all of her neighbors proved entirely unwilling to help, the conflict was not nearly so lopsided as wars during the French Partition had been. The princes of northern Europe were forced to recognize that King Stephen was a much more able French monarch than his Capetian predecessors.

Thats a shame :p

In Europe, the other consequential event of this year was the birth of a son to Owein ApBleddyn and Constance of Britany. The boy, christened Idris ApOwein, or Arthur to his Breton subjects, would prove one of the most consequential European princes of the mid twelfth century, particularly in the period known throughout the successor states of the Greater Norman Empire as the Years when God's Angel's Wept Blood.

Certainly sounds a brutal few years, but i'm personally hopeing for a King Arthur of united Western Norman Empire :D

In far-off Abysinia, this year saw Dawit RazAmman, son of Edgar the Atheling and Princess Deborah of Abysinia, formally invested as Nagus of Ethiopia, thus beginning the long-running and effective Davidic dynasty. Dawit's star had been rising throughout the thirteen years since his return from England, and he was entrusted by the then Nagus with many key missions, such as the reorganization of the Ethiopian army and a number of missions to the Nubian kingdoms of Macuria, Noubatia and Elodia-Alwa. Thus, at age 32, it was perhaps not surprising that the vigorous and exceptional young Ethiopian prince was named Nagusa Nagus by near unanimous acclamation.

Looking forward to hearing more, with reorganisation he should hopefully be able to fend of the comming muslim attacks on Ethopia, maybe comeing to the aid and then swollowing Christian Nubia etc.

Also - wasn't the Ark of Covenant suppose to be in Ethopia? Could work that in maybe ;)

The Fatimid Caliphate also saw a change-over in leadership, as Mustafa Ibn-Ali died, to be succeeded by his son Hussein Ibn-Mustafa. Hussein the Lion would spend most of his long Caliphate at war with the vastly superior forces of the Caliphate of Baghdad, first in a series of low-level border wars, or fitna, and later in the mailstrom that was the Jihad of the Icwan Al-Islam. In this battle for the soul of Islam, and, so many thought, for it's very survival, Hussein was perhaps the most pivotal figure over his nearly half century of rule.

This is going to be painfull and either way it ends i think will see a more militant Islam. Whilst its going on though you could have some fleeing to hte Kingdom of Jersulam (or whatever its called, conquerored by William) as Muslims are generally treat alright there, that would aid the kingdon for the future.

Looking forward to this being continued though.
 
From: Edward Beauclerc, A life:

Thus, in 1101, Edward was crowned at Rouin. Leaving the Kingdom of Syria in the hands of Baldwin FitzHildebrand, the Duke of Antioch, Edward took up residence in Normandy for the first three years of his reign. It was at this time that he is believed to have uttered that phrase which would one day prove so injurious to the Empire he sought to rule: "He who controls Normandy controls the Empire". Edward seems to have meant this to refer not so much to the physical territory of Normandy, but to her people. He reasoned that the essential ingredient for a successful emperor was direct control over, and loyalty from, the Normans themselves, while letting more hybred kingdoms like Jerusalem, Syria and England have their head (Sicily and Britany were notable exceptions from this policy of autonomous rule; Edward paid very close attention to these domains, and their rulers, by turns flattering them and stepping on their every conceivable rebellious impulse). It is no slur on Edward's character to note that he was loved best in those lands where his reign touched least. England was one of Beauclerc's staunchest bases of support. The English considered him one of their own, both through his marriage to Edgar the Atheling's niece and his willingness to take the regnal name Edward IV in England, in deference to the Saxon Edwards who had preceded him. in Jerusalem, first under the rule of Richard and later his half-Arab son John the Left-handed, Edward was viewed with distant respect and affection, particularly after he consented without fuss to John's designation as heir. In the Kingdom of Syria, Edward--the crowned king of that complex land--was nearly idolized. Yet in Sicily, Normandy and Britany, sentiment was not so favorable to the Emperor throughout his reign. The Normans resented his tight grip on their land and persons, but rebellions here were few and far-between. Yet the Sicilians and Bretons, as a chronicler of the time put it, "made rebellion a sport and a way of life". Edward's nephew Roger II DeCoatville was doubtless the worst offender, but his niece Constance of Britany-- "that Breton harlot" as she is called in many pro-Edward chronicles--had her hand in a fair number of schemes, intrigues and rebellions. Despite the unrest in these two provinces, it is not without reason that Edward's reign would ever after be known as "the years of peace".
 
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