What if the Hundred Years' War ended in 1429 with the secession of the Plantagenet-recognizing area?

Well, that ignores the conquest of Navarre in the 1500s, which was a pretty naked act of aggression on the part of the Spanish.

Sure. But Navarra was smaller than many counties.

France's population fluctuated between 15 and 20 million and was by far the most populated kingdom of Europe. More than the whole HRE.
 
I agree that the winning solution shall be political first. 1429 was way to late to get one. Blame for that mainly the chevaucees. They galvanised the Frenchmen around their hate for the English...
 
What does the chinese civilization has to see with the european countries ? Not much.

And England is an exception. England is one of the rare european countries which was so lately conquered by a foreign dynasty (in 1066 and in 1688).

If you consider Europe, you will realize that only legitimate inheritance or election made new dynastic establishments succeed.

Portugal prefered coroning bastard than being conquered : with the Aviz and with the Braganza.

Scotland was united with England when the Stuarts inherited the English crown.

The Luxemburgs and Habsburgs inherited all their crowns.

The aragonese succeeded in establishing in Sicily not only because they conquered it but because they were seen as the legitimate heirs of the Hohenstaufen.
Just because this happened exclusively in England, it does not mean that this could not have occurred elsewhere in Europe. Social/political conditions in England were no different than anywhere else. Its a mere coincidence that only England experienced this.
 
Just because this happened exclusively in England, it does not mean that this could not have occurred elsewhere in Europe. Social/political conditions in England were no different than anywhere else. Its a mere coincidence that only England experienced this.

But when you have such series in other countries, it's not a coincidence.

Now of course, the thread is yours. It is up to you to define it. Credibility however, is open to debate.

My point of view, already expressed in quite many recurring threads of this forum, is that french leadership was so incompetent during the HYW that if the Plantagenet/Lancaster did not win, it's that they just could not win on the field they chose.

Even if Charles VII died somewhere between 1422 and 1429, with the duke Orleans prisoner and childless, the Armagnac party would rally around around the Valois Anjou, who were the key support of Charles VII and who were next in line of succession after the Valois Orleans.

If Joan of war ever was to a certain extent set-up by a behind the scene political godfather, guess who was this political godfather. It was the house of Valois Anjou. Joan of Arc came from a region that was loyal to the house of Valois Anjou and sent to Bourges by local nobles that were clients of the Valois Anjou (and especially Yolande of Aragon, who happened to be the mastermind of the party and the mother in law of Charles VII).

One can't force someone else to want something it rejects without being able to crush any opposition.

The french would opt for any alternative solution rather than submit to the one who established himself as their arch-enemy : the king of England.

Same as for the portuguese who set up bastards or collateral branches as national kings. Same for sicilians-napolitans. Same for those who invented succession rules that would prevent the crown going to someone outside the male line of the dynasty. Same for the Dutch who rallied around a new dynasty when their legitimate dynasty began to force on them policies they rejected and considered alien. Same for the poles who organized the wedding of Hedwig of Anjou with the Lithuanian Jagellon in order to avoid being captured by the Habsburgs.

I more or less said all I had to say.

Good luck with your thread.
 
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Were the Qing not recognized as the new dynasty of China after conquering the Ming lands? Was Maximilian I not the legitimate emperor of Mexico? Was Henry Tudor not recognized as the new king of England after defeating Richard III at the battle of Bosworth Field? There are many examples of military victories being used to secure a political victory, and much later than the Hundred Years' War. I'm certain the Plantagenet could have accomplished a similar victory over the Valois. I also refuse to accept that Henry VI was not at fault for England's defeat.
For the Qing, it was more of the collapse of central authority and the Ming's ineffectuality that led many to accept the stability and opportunities the Manchu brought. The Manchu, after all, didn't win China with battles so much as through defections, bribes, and the general disarray of the Ming dynasty on its deathbed (famines, revolts, nomadic raids). And there were still plenty of Ming loyalists decades after the conquest.

Plenty of Mexicans didn't accept Maximilian as their emperor, I would say, seeing as they fought a civil war and executed him in the end.

In East Asia during the Imjin War (immediately prior to the example of the Qing), the Japanese scored huge military victories against the Koreans and secured most of the peninsula within the second year of war. They weren't accepted as the legitimate rulers despite their strength (rather, their brutality galvanized the Korean resistance). The Spanish never saw Joseph Bonaparte as their king, hence the Peninsular War.

Military success helps but you still need to deal with the population. Appease them and make them your own (Qing), wipe them out and replace them completely (William the Bastard), or something in between, but just military force and brutality isn't going to make for long term support. For France, the latter option is not an option so viable.
 
But when you have such series in other countries, it's not a coincidence.

Now of course, the thread is yours. It is up to you to define it. Credibility however, is open to debate.

My point of view, already expressed in quite many recurring threads of this forum, is that french leadership was so incompetent during the HYW that if the Plantagenet/Lancaster did not win, it's that they just could not win on the field they chose.

Even if Charles VII died somewhere between 1422 and 1429, with the duke Orleans prisoner and childless, the Armagnac party would rally around around the Valois Anjou, who were the key support of Charles VII and who were next in line of succession after the Valois Orleans.

If Joan of war ever was to a certain extent set-up by a behind the scene political godfather, guess who was this political godfather. It was the house of Valois Anjou. Joan of Arc came from a region that was loyal to the house of Valois Anjou and sent to Bourges by local nobles that were clients of the Valois Anjou (and especially Yolande of Aragon, who happened to be the mastermind of the party and the mother in law of Charles VII).

One can't force someone else to want something it rejects without being able to crush any opposition.

The french would opt for any alternative solution rather than submit to the one who established himself as their arch-enemy : the king of England.

Same as for the portuguese who set up bastards or collateral branches as national kings. Same for sicilians-napolitans. Same for those who invented succession rules that would prevent the crown going to someone outside the male line of the dynasty. Same for the Dutch who rallied around a new dynasty when their legitimate dynasty began to force on them policies they rejected and considered alien. Same for the poles who organized the wedding of Hedwig of Anjou with the Lithuanian Jagellon in order to avoid being captured by the Habsburgs.

I more or less said all I had to say.

Good luck with your thread.
I respect your opinion.
 
But when you have such series in other countries, it's not a coincidence.

Now of course, the thread is yours. It is up to you to define it. Credibility however, is open to debate.

My point of view, already expressed in quite many recurring threads of this forum, is that french leadership was so incompetent during the HYW that if the Plantagenet/Lancaster did not win, it's that they just could not win on the field they chose.

Even if Charles VII died somewhere between 1422 and 1429, with the duke Orleans prisoner and childless, the Armagnac party would rally around around the Valois Anjou, who were the key support of Charles VII and who were next in line of succession after the Valois Orleans.

If Joan of war ever was to a certain extent set-up by a behind the scene political godfather, guess who was this political godfather. It was the house of Valois Anjou. Joan of Arc came from a region that was loyal to the house of Valois Anjou and sent to Bourges by local nobles that were clients of the Valois Anjou (and especially Yolande of Aragon, who happened to be the mastermind of the party and the mother in law of Charles VII).

One can't force someone else to want something it rejects without being able to crush any opposition.

The french would opt for any alternative solution rather than submit to the one who established himself as their arch-enemy : the king of England.

Same as for the portuguese who set up bastards or collateral branches as national kings. Same for sicilians-napolitans. Same for those who invented succession rules that would prevent the crown going to someone outside the male line of the dynasty. Same for the Dutch who rallied around a new dynasty when their legitimate dynasty began to force on them policies they rejected and considered alien. Same for the poles who organized the wedding of Hedwig of Anjou with the Lithuanian Jagellon in order to avoid being captured by the Habsburgs.

I more or less said all I had to say.

Good luck with your thread.

I would caution against reading in an anachronistic nationalist viewpoint, such is wholly alien to the era. To the extent that a "native" ruler could be expected to actually reside in the region, favor native princes at court, understand and respect the liberties and customs of the native state, and be more lklely to inherit via traditonal succesison laws, they might be preferred; on the other hand, a foreigner can offer more protection (as for example with the case of the Habsburgs in Hungary, and the Poles in Lithuania- both unions were created as a consequence of an alliance against a third party), could be free of any existing rivalries or blood ties (the crab bucket syndrome- better that some foreigner rule me than those good for nothings a few acres over), and could, as an absentee Lord, be expected to devolve more power to local functionaries. As for instance occurred with 9th and 10th century Italy, the nobility would not infrequently appeal to foreign nobles to free them from the "tyranny" of their native king. Think also of the Barons revolt, where Prince Louis of France was invited in by the English nobility to take up the crown. Or the very fact that the Danes and Norwegeians had held England for a time prior to the Norman Conquest.

Spain in the Netherlands was a combination of religion- which is a whole different kettle of fish- and the Spanish levying excessive taxation, staffing the administration with Spaniards (thus denying the local elites opportunity for advancement), cut them off from English trade (long a major concern for Flanders at the very least), incurred frequent invasion by France and generally not respecting or seeming to respect the local liberties. Basically the Spanish treated the Dutch as a cash cow they could milk indiscriminately and paid the price for this hubris.

The HYW, by its nature, did indeed engender anti-English sentiment in certain area, in,the same mnner that the Thirty Years War led many Germans to despise the Swedes and the French, and the italian wars led men loe Machiavelli to openly call for unification. But this was not uniform and cettainly not a national project- Gascony, largely, remained loyal if autonomous and had to be forcefully conquered by France. Moreover do not forget the importance of local dynastic disputes within the house of Valois.
 
We touched on this briefly, but why is the centralization of the French state inevitable?
Nothing is certain but death and taxes.

Frances cwntralziation owed to a combination of skilled leadership at key moments and luck. Paradoxically England's fortunes aided them, as they were able to claim many English fiefs for the crown via attainment.

It is easy to say that the Capetians, the Habsburgs, etc had a successful dynastic strategy, because, well, theu succeded. Yet we need only look at comparable strategies to realize that there is no magic bullet- the Ottonians, for instance, likewise set up cadet lines in Germany, and also used the imperial title as a powerful legitimizing tool even as they exploited the church to create an alternate nobility of the cloth. That this failed owed less to an innate problem the. The dynastic failure of the Ottonians (and then the Salians and Hohenstaufen after them) and the fallout of the Investiture controversy. In France moreover we see that the cadet lines were not so loyal as might appear, often pursuing their own ambitions and rivalries even against the king.

The centralization of France is also somewhat overstated and owes to the developments of the early modern era and especially of the revolutionary period. The regional assemblies retained considerable influence prior to Richilieus reforms.
 
We touched on this briefly, but why is the centralization of the French state inevitable?[/QUOT

I wouldn't call it inevitable; indeed one of the great fallacies of historical thinking is to assume that just
because something happened it HAD to happen. As this board & its many many posters demonstrates,
there were many ways history could have turned out differently. Let's just say that with monarchs in
Western Europe(with the huge exception of course of Germany)investing so much energy, for many
years, in smashing the power of the nobility & investing themselves with all(or @ least most of)the
power of the state, France's centralization was highly probable.
 
I never quite understood why the English never quite utilized French resources effectively.The French outnumbered the English and had more resources,but by the time they conquered Northern France,that advantage should have been lost,with the English having gained them.
 
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