There hasn't been a good wank around here for awhile. This one is on the Flemish. Keep in mind that part of Flanders wound up in France. Try to make the Flemish at least as successful as the Dutch.
There hasn't been a good wank around here for awhile. This one is on the Flemish. Keep in mind that part of Flanders wound up in France. Try to make the Flemish at least as successful as the Dutch.
It depends on what you mean with succesful. If you want a country that is as rich or influential as the current Netherlands, you are basicly looking at OTL (although you could make them independent from Wallonia, I guess). If you want them to have a large colonial empire and a place in world history? Then it depends on who you mean with the Flemish. Just the county of Flanders? That would be impossible, too small. If you mean the area that is now considered Flanders (basicly the Dutch speaking part of Belgium), that would be historically unlikely (for example why exclude Wallonia, or the northern part of the duchy of Brabant). If you do not mind expanding Flanders somehow, at which point is it still Flanders. We could simply call Belgium Flanders (Belgium was/is pretty succesful after all), but I am sure that was not what you meant by your POD. We could add various parts of the Netherlands to it (Zeeland, Brabant, Liburtg, etc), but at some point it becomes more or less a different form of the Netherlands than a Flanders.There hasn't been a good wank around here for awhile. This one is on the Flemish. Keep in mind that part of Flanders wound up in France. Try to make the Flemish at least as successful as the Dutch.
By definition that would only include Flanders since Flemish is the Low Franconian dialect spoken in Flanders, Dutch being the more general term for the common dialects.I mean a Flemish country, with no elites speaking other languages involved, incorporating all the places where Flemish has ever been spoken, and as wealthy as the area is currently, with either the largest city in Europe and/ or having had a colonial empire at least as impressive as the Dutch empire. Bonus points if Flemish is a major language in at least one non-European country.
Who are the Flemish exactly? The people living in the former county of Flanders or the region that is now considered Flanders? The first one is in my opinion too small. It is like asking Luxembourg to become a major power. The last part is problematic since it would create an anachronism. That area only became its own entity with its own identity when Belgium was formed.Correct, and there can be minorities speaking other languages as long as the Flemish are clearly in charge.
Well if you expand Flanders early on you could just have the areas they conquer in the Netherlands identify as Flemish long-term as well.Who are the Flemish exactly? The people living in the former county of Flanders or the region that is now considered Flanders? The first one is in my opinion too small. It is like asking Luxembourg to become a major power. The last part is problematic since it would create an anachronism. That area only became its own entity with its own identity when Belgium was formed.