WI Angles and Saxons Barely Migrate

Sandmannius

Banned
Near the end of the Great Germanic Migration Period, the 5th and 6th centuries AD to be precise, the Anglo, Frisian, Juti and Saxon tribes migrated to the island of Britain in massive numbers, with the Saxons being the most numerous migrants, the Angles being the second most numerous, the Jutes the third, and the Frisians being the least numerous. This eventually led to a unified Germanic state in 927, England.

Now, what if the Frisians migrated to Britain with more people than any other tribe, the Jutes being the second most numerous migrating peoples, the Angles this third most numerous, and the Saxons barely migrating at all?

What kind of differences would we see in TTL England? What differences shall we see in Germania?

After using the search button quite a few times I couldn't find much dealing with ancient Germanic peoples, but there are quite a few English people (as well as people from other nationalities of course) on the board that must be interested in this. ;)
 
Even without the Saxons and Jutes there's still going to be an England{or British, at least}, and the English language will still exist,{It may not be called that, though............what about British?} there just won't be any 'Germanic' influence, that's all.
 
Well, Sandman. You can hardly say what happens if you don't post some more assumptions.

Does it mean more or less migrants over all?
Would they cope as good with the native (Romano-) Celtic entities? Will the latter be pushed as far westwards as in OTL or have the chance to develop better than in OTL?
Will it hinder or faciliate the spread of Christianity?

Even without the Saxons and Jutes there's still going to be an England{or British, at least}, and the English language will still exist,{It may not be called that, though............what about British?} there just won't be any 'Germanic' influence, that's all.

Are you kidding me? You wouldn't remotely understand an *English without Germanic "influence". English is basically a Germanic language melting-pot with a high degree of French vocabulary post-1066 and a tendency to simplify the grammar in modern times (loss of cases).

British (Brythonic, Britonnic) would be a Celtic language. Ever tried to learn Welsh? I did and gained the impression that the closest thing on earth is Clingon. Oh, wait, that isn't on earth...
 

yourworstnightmare

Banned
Donor
Balkanized Britain!!!! Or just the Frisians taking the leading role. Who knows the British Isles could be called West Friesland or just Frisia, and the language considered Frisian.
 
Well, one might posit that they would either drown or starve - there were reasons they migrated after all! If you mean, they went somewhere else, then I guess they won't be all that successful as the advantage they had in coming to Britain was that they were able to use ships for transport, and to land in the rear of the enemy.

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
No Sex Please, We're British?!

My ancestors were Angles from southern Jutland and Frisia, who moved (as far as I can work out) to the Gloucestershire Cotswolds in 700-800 AD. This would mean a land journey from East Anglia down Peddar's Way and Icknield Way into the Wychwood/Selwudu area. The Anglian tribe was the Hwicce (no, not Wicca) which has lead to various neo-pagan jokes.

No Saxons means no Wessex (no Cerdic the Saxon ancestor of QE2), no Sussex, Essex or Middlesex. That's a lot of land and a lot of sex, as Lurkalot says. If Arthurian-era Kinglets can force the Saxons out of their settlements, you may not get a Saxon settlement.

Then my ancestors can slip in behind the fighting and hog the best settlement land in the English Midlands and establish an earlier Mierce (Mercia). The Jutes went to Northumbria and Kent, the Anglians spread as far as SW Scotland (IOTL, very amusing).

Hope this amuses you ...
 
That still says nothing over other Germanic groups like the Jutes or the Frisians settling down in Britannia. You might just get a Balkanized Britain with various Germanic, Celtic and Romance-speaking kingdoms and states fighting each other.
 
*Deep Sigh*

Angles segue into Frisians, was what I said, for they would travel west along the Frisian Islands to the jump-off point for the hard row (or sail) to East Anglia. I see a lot of west-travelling Angles gaining recruits from younger sons of Frisian Islanders 'Going West, young Man'.

As for the Jutes - Heaven alone knows where they might go to. Maybe the Thames Valley. Danish London sounds nice. The beer might be greatly improved.
 

Sandmannius

Banned
Thank you for your replies everybody, I'll try to adress some points here.

Say for whatever reason the Angles and Saxons expand into a different direction and do not expand into Britain, while instead there is a massive immigration of Jutes and Frisians. Maybe the Saxons pushed into Jutland and the Angles into Frisia, who knows? They won't just die off. :p

Things will go pretty similar to OTL I suppose, but with the most numerous invaders, the Anglo and the Saxons, being Frisians and Jutes instead, with only a small number of Angles and Saxons.

Concerning the treatment of the Celtic and Roman peoples, there were a fair amount of Frisian and Juti immigrants in OTL, so I don't know if things would go much different, although these two tribes were not very violent or aggresive historically. Concerning a balkanized England, with Celtic, Germanic and Roman kingdoms respectively, I don't know about that, could we perhaps see a Frisii-Jutii merge, much like the OTL Anglo-Saxon one?

I'm sure that most of OTL territory would be taken and Germanified much like our OTL, and "English" would be even more Frisian, lol.

Edit: The Frisians were a very pagan people, and did not like Christianity at all, so I don't know how that would affect the Christianization of Britain.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
I suspect you'd end up with a Balkanized Britain and still a number of germanic early kingdoms on the East Coast, although their dialects would be more scandinavian (i.e. Jutish). They would probably not cover the West Saxon areas with the exception of Wight and some presence in the coast nearby (the Withwara). Their language would borrow much more on British than OTL English did, and probably remind some people more of west country dialects of english: which basically means your small english kingdoms would be full of people who basically talk like pirates :p

The British would probably have spread less on the continent and Brittany might be smaller or not exist at all (but that's not entirely certain; migration was a huge aspect of it but british-raised legions also influenced) - it could probably end up like another mythical kingdom in the future.

The balance of population would not necessarily favour the Jutes, but they would be settled in the densest parts of the country (Kent, Lindsay, Norfolk and Suffolk are likely even if you said no Angles - I think they first wave of frisian arrivals would be around there anyway as these germanic kingdoms far predate the saxons :p - Essex and Sussex might flow from there too) - the core of the british kingdoms would probably still be more the Severn with the capital having arguably been either Cirencester or Wroxeter. The Thames valley would be something of a Juto-Brythonic melting pot. If the Justinian plague hits just as OTL the Jutes would also gain a more solid economic position especially with less regular warfare in the middle of the island. Trade links established between the two on a regular basis could probably make the region interesting as a counterweight to, say, Flanders.
 
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Christianity and clothing...

...Some odd things occurred, for in the time of the Roman authors, the northern Germanic tribeswomen wore a sleeveless dress similar to a Grecian chiton - a tube of fabric fastened at the top or front of the shoulders by round or horsehead brooches, sometimes linked by a necklace. Similar styles remained in then-pagan Norway and Denmark right up to the Viking period. This is significant.

The point is that burials show a change in style of brooches and their placement after Christianisation, indicating an adoption of a sleeved dress with clasps at the wrists. Then in the Viking period, the double brooches (now tortoise-shell shaped) reappear in British graves, indicating a change back to pagan styles. The tube may by then have been replaced by a pair of shoulder-straps down to a tabard-like over-dress.
 
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