What would be the Socio-economic and Geopolitical Consequences of a French HRE and a Royal Germany?

@John7755 يوحنا
I can imagine this as a potential map of this. What do you think?
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I agree with you here about this. I could see what become Aragon becoming tied more to Francia as a nominal vassal of sorts.


When do you see the conflict arising with East Francia potentially asserting its independence from the Emperor much like how the French Kings did in otl?

Where do you see the capital of the Western Empire being? Would it be Paris, Lyon, Milan, Reims ?


By Charles II you mean Charles the Bald right? Do you think Charles the Bald could have secured the Imperial Crown within West Francia potentially making some sort of arrangement with Louis the German?

The map looks good from my perspective, though I am not sure about Sardinia.

Aragon yes, even in otl, it was a nominal vassal of the French kingdom in Paris until the Papacy began to refer to the Kings of Aragon as true kings, rather than as little kings, thus separating them from the French crown fully.

I am not sure as to when the East Franks will attempt to redress the situation. In otl, the West Franks gained success over the HRE due to the internal issues that Otto IV had with the Papacy and the Papacy made sure to balance the French against the HRE as long as the HRE remained its foe. It is possible that there is no rebellion or war, only that the East simply progressively pushes free and in a later date we have wars internally that lead to a thorough separation similar to otl Netherlands or the Austrian realm after the rise of Prussia. Many things can happen, one just needs to reason them based on prior events.

There may not be a capitol. Though, my guess is that a capitol will be manifold.

Something like this:

Chancellors of the Empire form the technical capitols. Those are in theory:

-Mainz
-Rheims
-Cologne
-Trier
-Rome (the Papacy was the guardian of the kingdom of Italy in theory alongside Cologne, which held a ceremonial role in otl)

That rules out Rheims as it is the domain of the Chancellor of the West Frank. Milan would be quite odd I would presume for the Papacy, they would feel safer holding their lands a bit away. Indeed too, there is existing nobility ruling Lombardy in the period, they cannot simply revoke lands and settle there. They could move court there, but that may cause issues and lead to disruptions. So, my preferences would be:

-Lyon --- Fairly centrally located and not far enough to have court and easily return to the north on regular occasions. Likewise, the emperor can go to Italy pretty rapidly and enforce order. Ideally though, the Emperor will use the Papacy to enforce order as it was ideally supposed to be in the Reform Papal motif.

-Paris --- The traditional capitol and the most well located in terms of fertile farmlands. This will make the nobles happy in every region. Those far away will be left be more so, while those close will enjoy having the king of kings near them.

-Metz --- A good option if we are to emulate the Merovingians. It is well located to the east, able to survey all of Middle Francia and West Francia easily and also well positioning to every Chancellor. Papacy will be comfortable also, as it will be able to do as it pleases without an eye of the emperor around every pillar.
 
The Frankish empire could even give their official support to the expansions east and hence lessen tension between the two as the East is focused on expansion, whilst the West and Middle is focused on internal politics and views the east as its great shield and expanding sword.
I wonder how this would affect East frankish relations with Poland and Great Moravia?

I do believe that in a different thread we talked about the possibility of the HREmperor & the pope incorporating them as another kingdom; a Wendish crown to go along with the German and Italian crowns. With a west francian HRE taking the frankified rhineland & burgundy, i imagine that a king of Germany would like to have a wendish crown to compensate the loss. The pope might like having the catholic realms all put together under frankish hegemony. Were this the case, the only real outliers would be Scandinavia and the British isles, which brings up another interesting point:

Is norman/angevin England still a likely possibility in this situation?

If it is, what is its standing vis a vis the HRE? Is it like OTL where its a separate kingdom whose king just aldo happens to be a vassal to the Emperor or is it a definite part of the empire? Or is that just a bit hazy and as such leads to internal squabbling?
 
Chancellors of the Empire form the technical capitols. Those are in theory:
Could you explain the concept of Imperial Chancellors? Was this how the various electorates were eventually formed?

The map looks good from my perspective, though I am not sure about Sardinia.
Sardinia gravitated historically under the HRE's sphere of influence from time to time, though it generally was loosely controlled by it.

-Mainz
-Rheims
-Cologne
-Trier
-Rome (the Papacy was the guardian of the kingdom of Italy in theory alongside Cologne, which held a ceremonial role in otl)
I think these cities could probably become major city centers as well.

-Lyon --- Fairly centrally located and not far enough to have court and easily return to the north on regular occasions. Likewise, the emperor can go to Italy pretty rapidly and enforce order. Ideally though, the Emperor will use the Papacy to enforce order as it was ideally supposed to be in the Reform Papal motif.

-Paris --- The traditional capitol and the most well located in terms of fertile farmlands. This will make the nobles happy in every region. Those far away will be left be more so, while those close will enjoy having the king of kings near them.

-Metz --- A good option if we are to emulate the Merovingians. It is well located to the east, able to survey all of Middle Francia and West Francia easily and also well positioning to every Chancellor. Papacy will be comfortable also, as it will be able to do as it pleases without an eye of the emperor around every pillar.
I think Lyon and Paris would probably be the two "capitals" of the Empire. Though the court would probably be itinerant for a while as the Emperor would have to focus on Italian and Frankish affairs. I think Lyon would probably be a likely capital just so that the Emperor would be close enough to Italy.

Though how do you think the Frankish Emperor could really "centralize" his realm? Keep in mind when I say centralize, I mean it in a more looser sense as if to provide some structure and internal cohesion such the Empire while decentralized doesn't fragement?

What do you think could be done to improve literacy and urbanization? Could a Frankish Emperor in ttl here try and pull an Otto III to try and re-introduce a more "roman character" to the Empire restoring old Roman institutions, laws, and governing styles?

With a west francian HRE taking the frankified rhineland & burgundy, i imagine that a king of Germany would like to have a wendish crown to compensate the loss. The pope might like having the catholic realms all put together under frankish hegemony. Were this the case, the only real outliers would be Scandinavia and the British isles, which brings up another interesting point:
I could probably see Bohemia likely subsumed into it as well as some sort of Duchy/Grand Duchy. Though the Wendish Crown would probably be something a more ambitious East Francian King would strive for.

Is norman/angevin England still a likely possibility in this situation?
Probably not. If anything a stronger Francia would probably dissuade a lot of Vikings from attacking. Or you could have the Franks crush the Vikings with it being seen by contemporaries as a victory over pagans similar to how Otto I defeated the Magyars. Though I could see the Norse instead focus on England instead.
 
Actually BOTH Eleanor of Aquitaine and Bertha of Burgundy are possibilities due to their Bosonid heritage but Margaret of Provence is too weak to assert her claims in her lands even if she has a similar heritage.
 
@Basileus_Komnenos

Theoretically, the idea of an Imperial Chancellor is a system wherein the Emperor utilizes certain major prelates within the Church as governors so to speak in the particular kingdoms of the Empire. In the case of Charles I (Charlemagne) and into the Middle Ages, these are:

-Mainz, the Chancellor of the East Franks or Germany
-Trier, the Chancellor of the Middle Franks
-Rheims, the Chancellor of the West Franks or France
-Cologne and the Papacy, the Chancellor and Guardian of the Kingdom of Italy.

A side note is that at times there was a similarly powerful prelate in Arles, but we will discount this for now. These positions were clerical always as they could in theory be more trusted with not using the position to usurp the Emperor and furthermore, the position act as concessions made by Pepin II to the Papacy in accordance with the older Merovingian custom of permitting the clergy in these cities to be governors and representatives before the Frankish court.
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The issue with urbanization is that the peasantry is generally against urbanization of a forced kind and manorialism makes the society more stable in the form of autonomous communal villages interconnected by mutual exchange networks and overlordship by the feudal overlords. This system was also supported by the Papacy and its clerical institutions, which abhorred the notion of profit making and of 'greed.' The Frankish nobility were traditionally similar, they saw profit as somewhat polluting and this led to the system of manorialism becoming so predominant in Frankish Europe. Villages often did not exceed 300 inhabitants and each time a village did exceed this number, the population would split and form a new village, thus internally colonizing the available land with an ever growing network.

By 1050 this situation was beginning to change due to the development of larger scale and finer quality wool making conglomerates in Flanders and the rise of a certain class of urban merchants and money lenders in France, the Rhineland and in Lombardy. Peasants who came into debt to said merchants and lenders due to their naivety, began to transition away from autonomous collective farming essentially to integrating themselves into a market based profit economy tied to cities. This was seen as perverse and evil by the Holy See and the Church as a whole, who attempted to overturn this change in society, especially in the form of preaching constantly the sin of greed and avarice and conflating it as the greatest evil in terms of sins as it dehumanized human interaction.

This of course led to a wave of lynchings, lootings and attacks upon merchants and money lenders, most especially Jewish communities. As I have said elsewhere, this is one situation wherein the Holy See and the Church was unable to control the peasantry and sustain their rage at being essentially pulled into urbanized economic models.

Anyway, this is to say, that urbanization in Europe post-500 CE in France and Germany, must be done with a certain caution. Literacy is the realm of the Church, it will increase as the Papacy and the Church establishes seminaries and after this, universities across Europe. Though, I suppose an Emperor could embark upon policies to improve literacy by creating a bureaucracy not tied directly to the Clergy. I have discussed this before in a thread on the Merovingian kingdom in the form of using uniquely the Jewish population in the Frankish empire to occupy a role as bureaucrats and representatives of the Emperor.
 
Could the german dialects in the rhineland develop into a mix of latin and german?
They already did. At least in Dutch there are plenty of French and Latin words. I suspect the same is true for German.

But is not what you are suggesting. You are asking if the language in the rhineland would Frenchify since they belong to France now. My answer is probably not more than OTL. At least if we are looking at the Middle Ages or even the Early Modern period. Simply look at the county of Flanders. It managed to keep its own language during the Middle Ages, even though it had been ruled by France during the Middle Ages. Or look at Waalonia, which had been part of the HRE and still continued to speak its own language. Even Dunkirk spoke Dutch at the time of the French revolution (which is why it harboured a significant number of Dutch political refugees at tat time, they could speak thei own language).

So I suspect that the Rhineland would continue to speak their German dialects well into the 19th century and probably even longer*, although I am willing to admit that it might have some more French loanwords than OTL. And that the linguistic border between France and Dutch might be a bit to the north from OTL. Although, I kind of doubt it. OTL it did creap north already and still Calais spoke largely Dutch in the late middleages.

The thing to remember is that language was not a part of the national identity in the Middleages or the Early Modern Period. So people generaly were left alone to speak their own language. Why would anyone care about the language people speak as long as they are loyal?

*It realy depends on what happens in this timeline. I could easily see them breaking away from the French HRE at some point in time, just like the Netherlands Czechia, Switserland, etc broke away from OTL HRE>
 
Would the traditional 12 peers be the electors then or would there be others?

Would Flanders be something like Bohemia OTL?
 
Perhaps Brittany would be closer to a Bohemia analogue.
What OTL analogue would Flanders then be? With the whole Low Countries part of Empire, I can see the Flemish counts expanding even more than in OTL, especially in the years before 1000AD, when the other parts of the Low Countries didn't form any strong counters against the Flemish Counts. Or Margrave Baldwin I might just get the other pagus east of Scheldt as well
 
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Would the traditional 12 peers be the electors then or would there be others?
The French traditional peers appear to have been set by Louis VII, father of Phillip II Augustus, so while I think some sort of pairie crossed with the Prince Electors would form it will depend how the TTL HRE forms and how the imperial throne is attained.
Worth pointing out that OTL Prince Electors weren't fully set until after the Hohenstaufens including which Archbishops were Electors.
Though it's kind of a given by the mid mediaeval period that the most prominent bishop/prelate in a Christian kingdom would be Chancellor of that kingdom it's not clear which bishop would become prominent. Especially if the kingdom covers more than one archdiocese.
 
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Would the traditional 12 peers be the electors then or would there be others?

Would Flanders be something like Bohemia OTL?

Bohemia was a bit of an odd addition to the realm of the Empire due to its non-Frankish character. However, Flanders was a fundamental part of the French monarchy, as it was indeed one of the heartlands of the Merovingian Franks and it was seen very seriously as the same folk and people as those living in Paris. A difference in language like this was not taken as seriously then as such things were taken in the later Renaissance where linguistics and other sorts of identifiers came to supersede a concept of lineage in defining a folk.
 
Probably not. If anything a stronger Francia would probably dissuade a lot of Vikings from attacking. Or you could have the Franks crush the Vikings with it being seen by contemporaries as a victory over pagans similar to how Otto I defeated the Magyars. Though I could see the Norse instead focus on England instead.
No normans at all? That has some pretty big knock on effects not just for France & the British isles, but also for southern Italy and Sicily...unless you have Bjorn Ironside's Mediterranean expedition fulfill that role for you. He had planned to attack rome but ended up attacking a smaller city near pisa (luna?). If he had actually made it to rome he's pretty unlikely to take it, but the pope might make a deal with him. Fight the muslims in Italy & Sicily in exchange for land and wealth.

Also with no Normandy and a stabe empire able to repel vikings, Brittany has a chance to recover and likely keeps the eastern territories it had aquired
 
No normans at all? That has some pretty big knock on effects not just for France & the British isles, but also for southern Italy and Sicily...unless you have Bjorn Ironside's Mediterranean expedition fulfill that role for you. He had planned to attack rome but ended up attacking a smaller city near pisa (luna?). If he had actually made it to rome he's pretty unlikely to take it, but the pope might make a deal with him. Fight the muslims in Italy & Sicily in exchange for land and wealth.

Also with no Normandy and a stabe empire able to repel vikings, Brittany has a chance to recover and likely keeps the eastern territories it had aquired

I would suggest a Norman Mecklenburg as an ATL analogy, but that's a tad in the wrong direction.

Maybe a Norman Frisia?
 
I would suggest a Norman Mecklenburg as an ATL analogy, but that's a tad in the wrong direction.

Maybe a Norman Frisia?

I don't think we should forcefully search for analogues (while it makes things way more picturable) as dynamics could and would in most case be really different. Mecklenburg doesn't seem a good target and Frisia could depend. Expansion of viking raids has as a goal to find better sources of "richies" than the Baltic coast and has pillaging as its base and settling as an alternative. Normandy is a way to defend against further incursions through the Seine to Paris. The question is: Is Paris still the capital in this scenario ? Does the threat to it still call for giving those lands to these barbarians ? Are there other target along fluvial roads whose mouth could be given for protection ?

Before thinking about vikings descent on west european coasts, setting of nature, structure and relations of the polities along them is a must.
 
I don't think we should forcefully search for analogues (while it makes things way more picturable) as dynamics could and would in most case be really different. Mecklenburg doesn't seem a good target and Frisia could depend. Expansion of viking raids has as a goal to find better sources of "richies" than the Baltic coast and has pillaging as its base and settling as an alternative. Normandy is a way to defend against further incursions through the Seine to Paris. The question is: Is Paris still the capital in this scenario ? Does the threat to it still call for giving those lands to these barbarians ? Are there other target along fluvial roads whose mouth could be given for protection ?

Before thinking about vikings descent on west european coasts, setting of nature, structure and relations of the polities along them is a must.

Having Vikings raid down the Rhine would be fairly likely, IMO. Especially if Cologne is a major city.

In which case, having a Normandy analogue in the Zeeland-Brabant-South Holland area might be plausible. Maybe they get installed first as counts of Breda, then later as Dukes of Brabant?
 
Having Vikings raid down the Rhine would be fairly likely, IMO. Especially if Cologne is a major city.

In which case, having a Normandy analogue in the Zeeland-Brabant-South Holland area might be plausible. Maybe they get installed first as counts of Breda, then later as Dukes of Brabant?

I like it, but still, does some raid on border cities (having the Rhine as a border between the Empire and the Kingdom) justify giving them the lands ? Could be with Cologne as chancellor's seat and prestigious bishopric see, but I would better see a similar outcome with a threat on capital. I have no problems having this Empire being as able as the Kingdom of France OTL to deal with it, so by coming to terms. With an initial ruling from Paris you get Normandy with successive events bringing a more elective and itinerant rule.
 
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