WI: Britain is settled by the Franks instead of the Anglo-Saxons

Furthermore, this is not a dissertation, you cannot just demand citations
If you're making an assertion and want to convince I damn well can.
@Professor
I have always found the idea that the Frankish dialect spoken in Low Land and Germany weren't real Frankish really really weird and lacking a understanding how language work. Frankish as any other language was made out of a dialect continuum, and there wasn't any real Frankish especially because it hadn't been standardized, there was just a lot of dialects, some with more prestige than other, and there's no reason to think the dialects spoken in Franconia in what's now Northern Bavaria were any less Frankish than any other Frankish dialects, especially as it's geographic connected to the Frankish Rhineland rather than with Bavarian or Thuringian speaking speaking regions.
I'm not claiming the opposite though.
My point is that the dialects we label as Frankish can't be claimed to be the whole of OHG. Since not only did OHG come after Frankish but it also includes dialects outside what we call Frankish. It's like claiming Ingvaeonic was Old English.
A important aspect to remember is that just because some Franks settle in England doesn't mean that the mainland Frankish state won't exist. The Saxons survived as a much stronger factor in northern Germany than they were in England. I think the main importance as someone else also have brought up is that Frankish and Anglo-Jutish is much more distinct than the later two are from Saxon. It also raise the question would the Jutes settle the same region, if not for the relative closely related Saxons living near by? Could we see a different settlement pattern of these Germanic groups?
The Angle pattern is going be very close to OTL as they crossed the North Sea without interaction with the Franks. We can get away with saying it would look like what we see OTL.
I see your point about the Jutes though. Could they stay put in northern Gaul? Would they join the continental Saxons?
 
If you want to involve Charlemagne with the goings on in Britain the easiest way is for him to actually go to war with Offa of Mercia.

The two got in a tiff when Chuck took offense to a marriage proposal from Offa (not sure why), and he started harboring offa's enemies like Ecgberht, the future king of wessex (and Alfred's grandfather). Tensions only eased after Alcuin was able to talk Charlie down.

I asked in a different thread about the likely outcomes, and people didn't give Charles good odds

An eventual intervention of Charlemagne in Britain has been discussed in several threads I can remember and it has been usually agreed that it was quite unlikely.

But even if this could have happened, the result is an Anglo-Saxon territory under Frankish rule, like Italy was a Lombard territory under Frankish rule or northwestern Germany was a Saxon territory under Frankish rule. By the time of Charlemagne, there were no massive replacement of Germanic populations. If we want to see a true Frankish Britain (meaning, settled by Franks), the PoD should be quite earlier.
 
I see your point about the Jutes though. Could they stay put in northern Gaul? Would they join the continental Saxons?

A interesting settlement for the Jutes would be Brittany, it’s a peninsula dominated by heathland and swamps, which is pretty much the same as the northern Jutish peninsula where the Jutes originated. Of course it raise the question where the Bretons settle instead, Maybe they could create a bigger settlement in Galicia, maybe one strong enough to survive.
 
WI Attila's Empire hangs together for another generation or two?

If so, Romans, Franks and Visigoths probably do likewise, sticking together to maintain their independence from the Huns. So the WRE gats a few more decades of life. But the Franks, especially, are in a very uncomfortable position, with the Huns right on their doorstep. So maybe Clovis or someone decides to invade Britannia and make that the core of his kingdom. Could we get a Frankish Kingdom comprising what are now England, Belgium and bits of Germany and Holland.

One thought. Does that mean that TTL's England would now be called "France"? :confounded: Oh dear.
 
An eventual intervention of Charlemagne in Britain has been discussed in several threads I can remember and it has been usually agreed that it was quite unlikely.

But even if this could have happened, the result is an Anglo-Saxon territory under Frankish rule, like Italy was a Lombard territory under Frankish rule or northwestern Germany was a Saxon territory under Frankish rule. By the time of Charlemagne, there were no massive replacement of Germanic populations. If we want to see a true Frankish Britain (meaning, settled by Franks), the PoD should be quite earlier.

I'm not sure that replacement of population, as such, is the main shift to look for with Charlemagne in Mercia (whatever the odds). I'm looking more at Charlemagne's rather more dynamic and forward-thinking leadership, including kicking off a crude version of public education, an effort that I think has been built upon rather than started up again later. This is someone who certainly was capable of doing mass Baptisms by stampede on the one hand, but also capable of having all the Germanic legends written down by monks for posterity on the other. While I would rate the eventual Alfred the Great as the more learned and scholarly, Charlemagne, for his time and place had more to offer in that way than anyone around him.
How might that have taken root in Britain? Similarly, his more sophisticated administration style might well have taken root there as well. These are not the kind of bold strokes that make for a brighter-shinier counterfactual, but they matter.

As to the odds of it happening? I think the main thing, as always, is crossing the Channel. Every other such occasion has seen Britain in bad shape had this-or-that would be conqueror landed. the ones who did, with the exception of Bonny Prince Charlie, generally found their worst troubles behind them. Past the Channel, that is what I would see here. I tend to feel that at the time, Britain would simply not have had the material reward to offer. If William the Bastard had not wanted a Kingship to supplement his Dukedom, I wonder whether he would have bothered..
 
I tend to feel that at the time, Britain would simply not have had the material reward to offer. If William the Bastard had not wanted a Kingship to supplement his Dukedom, I wonder whether he would have bothered..
Well, before everyone and his dog fought to gain it iirc England was actually doing alright for money, had a fairly centralised administration, and was well positioned to trade with the periphery of Europe.
 
There is another important thing to be considered regarding the eventual intervention of Charlemagne in Britain.

Apart of the territories held directly by Charlemagne, there were some peripheral realms that have acknowledged him as Christian leader (later Emperor), and these included Mercia before that episode of the misunderstanding for that marriage between Charles and Offa. Charlemagne would not intervene in Mercia, Benevento or Asturias because, if these realms were indeed not part of Charles' Empire they had a) acknowledged him as supreme (civil) leader of Christian (Western) Europe and b) they were firmly Nicene Christian and the Church no need to be saved there. They were not rival people like the Lombards or Pagan ones like the Saxons, and these couple of facts were enough for Charlemagne, as he was obviously aware that he could not hold all Western Europe under his direct rule, so that indirect overlordship was fairly enough.

Even if he was pissed off by Offa, I don't think this reason would be enough for a large scale invasion; in fact, IOTL the mediation of Alcuin was enough for the reconciliation of both monarchs.
 
There is another important thing to be considered regarding the eventual intervention of Charlemagne in Britain.

Apart of the territories held directly by Charlemagne, there were some peripheral realms that have acknowledged him as Christian leader (later Emperor), and these included Mercia before that episode of the misunderstanding for that marriage between Charles and Offa. Charlemagne would not intervene in Mercia, Benevento or Asturias because, if these realms were indeed not part of Charles' Empire they had a) acknowledged him as supreme (civil) leader of Christian (Western) Europe and b) they were firmly Nicene Christian and the Church no need to be saved there. They were not rival people like the Lombards or Pagan ones like the Saxons, and these couple of facts were enough for Charlemagne, as he was obviously aware that he could not hold all Western Europe under his direct rule, so that indirect overlordship was fairly enough.

Even if he was pissed off by Offa, I don't think this reason would be enough for a large scale invasion; in fact, IOTL the mediation of Alcuin was enough for the reconciliation of both monarchs.
It's worth adding that acknowledging Charlemagne as the paramount Christian ruler is not the same as acknowledging him as one's direct overlord.
 
It's worth adding that acknowledging Charlemagne as the paramount Christian ruler is not the same as acknowledging him as one's direct overlord.

Obviously not, but I think that from Charles' perspective it was enough for him that neither the King of Mercia, nor the King of Asturias nor the Duke of Benevento would discuss his hegemony, even if none of them was his vassal.
 
Obviously not, but I think that from Charles' perspective it was enough for him that neither the King of Mercia, nor the King of Asturias nor the Duke of Benevento would discuss his hegemony, even if none of them was his vassal.
Oh indeed I just don't want anyone to mistake acknowledged higher power and higher rank for acknowledgement of being higher in the SAME HIERARCHY. Which occasionally happens in these types of threads.
 
Oh indeed I just don't want anyone to mistake acknowledged higher power and higher rank for acknowledgement of being higher in the SAME HIERARCHY. Which occasionally happens in these types of threads.
Of course.

The problem I always find with the Carolingian era it's that it is somehow a transitional era between the late Classical organization of state and the early Medieval system of vassals, so maybe sometimes it is a bit blurry to determine who really depended on who.

The core of the Frankish kingdom was still divided in counties where the counts were still state officers (like in the Classical system), but i.e. Italy was a sub-kingdom where the King Bernard, the grandson of Charles, had a typical Medieval relationship of lord-vassal with his grandfather the Emperor. This relationship is clearly under the same Frankish state organization, as Charles directly appointed him as King.

The cases of Offa of Mercia and Benevento were clearly, as you said, simple cases of acknowledgement of higher power or symbolical leadership of the Western Christendom, but they had any kind of vassal relationship with Charles. However, there are examples which could be more debated, like the case of Asturias, where Alfonso II submitted voluntarily to Charles in order to make him and the Pope to validate his reign in Northern Spain. It is not a typical lord-vassal relationship, and Asturias was never considered part of Francia, but this relationship is way closer to that model than the cases of Mercia or Benevento, and surely Charles considered that he had more influence over Alfonso's decisions than over Offa's decisions.
 
Of course.

The problem I always find with the Carolingian era it's that it is somehow a transitional era between the late Classical organization of state and the early Medieval system of vassals, so maybe sometimes it is a bit blurry to determine who really depended on who.

The core of the Frankish kingdom was still divided in counties where the counts were still state officers (like in the Classical system), but i.e. Italy was a sub-kingdom where the King Bernard, the grandson of Charles, had a typical Medieval relationship of lord-vassal with his grandfather the Emperor. This relationship is clearly under the same Frankish state organization, as Charles directly appointed him as King.

The cases of Offa of Mercia and Benevento were clearly, as you said, simple cases of acknowledgement of higher power or symbolical leadership of the Western Christendom, but they had any kind of vassal relationship with Charles. However, there are examples which could be more debated, like the case of Asturias, where Alfonso II submitted voluntarily to Charles in order to make him and the Pope to validate his reign in Northern Spain. It is not a typical lord-vassal relationship, and Asturias was never considered part of Francia, but this relationship is way closer to that model than the cases of Mercia or Benevento, and surely Charles considered that he had more influence over Alfonso's decisions than over Offa's decisions.
So long as you're clear it was never "blurry" in the case of Mercia or any of the other states in Britain.
 
Well, returning to the Original question, perhaps the best/most likely option would be for the ripuarian franks to decide they'd rather rule themselves than be under the salian franks' thumb, and perhaps have fewer saxons going to Britain and instead having them pressuring the ripuarians on their other flank?
 
So long as you're clear it was never "blurry" in the case of Mercia or any of the other states in Britain.

No, in that case it is pretty clear. I think Charles did not care much about British affaires, because most of the island was Nicene Christian by his time and their leaders were far from a position that they could challenge Charles' policies in the continent at any level. He was more worried about Benevento, and he tried a couple of times to subdue it into a more direct rule, something he never tried in Britain.
 
It seems everyone is pretty much ignoring the OP-from the title "Britain is settled by Franks instead of Anglo-Saxons." And glancing over the facts (which seem to be pretty murky actually) it seems there is good reason for this.

For perspective:
1) Rome ordered the last legion out of Britain in 410. The intention was I believe for them to return pretty soon, but that never happened.
2) By 500, OTL, a diverse group of probably not too well organized Germanic peoples we might as well loosely call "Saxons" were in effective occupation of at least the eastern half of modern England.

That's our time window, and to totally preempt the "Saxons," or anyway limit their incursion to small foederati groups held to the coasts and prevented from the wholesale overturn of the whole island south of Hadrian's Wall, we'd better have the OP's imagined "Franks" preempting them with strong effective organization and political control all the way from Dover to Eboricum.

The OP assumes
"A Frankish Britain would have kept Nicene Christianism and maybe Celtic and British Latin dialects had survived for longer. "

If in fact a highly organized, large Frankish force with the intention of systematically replacing the entire Roman organization of the island, leaning as the mainland Frankish takeover in Gaul did on coopting surviving Roman institutions wholesale for their own profit, were available, and accepted by the Britons as the lesser evil, I'd not only endorse but amplify the latter clause; my expectation is such a Frankish Britannia would wind up some centuries down the line speaking a language fundamentally Britannic-Celtic in its grammar and commonest words, strongly influenced both by Germanic Frankish and by Latin--in fact the latter would have the greater influence and the language might be mistaken at a cursory hearing for a Romance language.

But I think the numbers are all wrong for this.

OTL for instance, the first mention I can find for any "Franks" adopting any Christian rite is the conversion of king Clovis, around 500. We can guess individual Franks here and there converted earlier than this, but there is no mention of any wholesale adoption of any brand of Christianity by them before this. 500 is far too late! These Franks on the Continent certainly did Romanize, but by the time they did, Britain is well on the way to becoming "England" as we know it.

In order to justify the OP's optimism a semi-Romanized band of Germanics with the intention of perpetuating (for their own use) Roman institutions including the established Church, rather than steamrollering right over it and setting themselves up as free Germanic bands instead, the best I can do is suggest a POD in the 4th century where some ATL Roman initiative attempts to both Romanize and Christianize the Salian Franks on their far north. But I think one would look in vain for a compelling reason for Roman authorities in the later 300s to try such a thing and it is an even longer shot they'd succeed!

The probable thing, or more probable, is that some "Franks" of the early 5th century indeed opportunistically invade Britain, with the same means, and same ends, as the OTL disparate bunch forming what are retrospectively called "Saxons" and which the Catholic Church of later generations collectively called "Angles." The upshot of that is one or two groups of Germanic invaders of OTL would be preempted by these Franks, and thus the melting pot of disparate but related groups is stirred a bit, with one dialect replacing one or two others. But fundamentally, the character of this ATL mix with Franks in it instead of someone else is going to be pretty similar! The upshot is going to be driving the native Britons, at least those who keep their language and cultural distinctness intact, west to "Wales" or to other refuges overseas, with non-Christian Germanic pagan kingdoms accreting into the Heptarchy more or less as OTL, for Irish Celtic Rite and continental Roman Rite missionaries to seek to Christianize anew. The ATL amalgam might or might not be called "England" and I suppose the linguistics of 'Old English' would be somewhat different, but of a similar character and content.

Actually the Wikipedia article on the Salian Franks mentions that there seems to be little distinction to make between "Franks" and "Saxons" in the 4th century--any meaningful distinction would boil down to the degree to which "Franks" have assimilated aspects of Roman civilization they intend to perpetuate.

I suppose it makes sense people are mainly talking about events in the time of Charlemagne then, but it makes little damn difference; by then the missionaries had done their work, England was collectively a Christian land, and any ATL claims of kinship to part of the crazy quilt forming England would be far fetched whims, offset by the realpolitik Charlemagne faced where a broad front of unsubdued continental Germanic pagans faced his Frankish realm, and he would prioritize that just as OTL, and cultivate the English as friends, not to muddy the waters with dubious lateral relationships putting an imperial foot in the island's door.

It is kind of cool to vaguely imagine WI some century-precocious gang of Franks all set to leapfrog right past the chaos of Merovingian Francia (straight into the chaos of post-Charles the Great Carolingian Imperial Francia, most likely!) were to 1) convert to Christianity, the Roman rite, a whole century before Clovis; 2) become Romanized enough, presumably as foederati, to appreciate the value of seizing control of some Romanized land wholesale; 3) seize the opportunity handed them by Rome pulling out the last legion in 410, perhaps also motivated by collectively being on the wrong side of some dynastic quarrel, perhaps the same one that yanked the Valeria Victrix out of Britain, and thinking, rather than face the music of a returning vengeful Emperor of the wrong faction, leap over the Channel to make the staggering Britons and remnant of Romanized persons there an offer they can't refuse.

If we Mary Sue the hell out of it, I can see the Britons rallying to such needed leadership, acclaiming the Frankish leader their king, the Franks (big Mary Sue Hail Mary Pass here!) revising their own customs and institutions to avoid the insane fragmentation of realms dividing them between the prior king's sons and instead planning a single unified succession, and this unified Frankish realm holds the line on both coasts--for even as "Saxons" were invading to lay the groundwork for "England" from the east, other invaders were raiding and settling from Caledonia and Hibernia; the Frankish unification of Romano-British potentials would have to face both fronts. And win.

Well, if they can do all that, I guess Britain as I said becomes a fundamentally Celtic-language remnant of the Classical order. Maybe such a kingdom can repel the Norsemen too. If it can endure 500 years it has to stand against a probable Norman conquest attempt.

Anyway, this would not be England at all, nor would it be known as a land of the "Franks," their cousins over the Channel have a lock on that.

It would be Britain.
 
It seems everyone is pretty much ignoring the OP-from the title "Britain is settled by Franks instead of Anglo-Saxons." And glancing over the facts (which seem to be pretty murky actually) it seems there is good reason for this.

For perspective:
1) Rome ordered the last legion out of Britain in 410. The intention was I believe for them to return pretty soon, but that never happened.
2) By 500, OTL, a diverse group of probably not too well organized Germanic peoples we might as well loosely call "Saxons" were in effective occupation of at least the eastern half of modern England.

That's our time window, and to totally preempt the "Saxons," or anyway limit their incursion to small foederati groups held to the coasts and prevented from the wholesale overturn of the whole island south of Hadrian's Wall, we'd better have the OP's imagined "Franks" preempting them with strong effective organization and political control all the way from Dover to Eboricum.

The OP assumes
"A Frankish Britain would have kept Nicene Christianism and maybe Celtic and British Latin dialects had survived for longer. "

If in fact a highly organized, large Frankish force with the intention of systematically replacing the entire Roman organization of the island, leaning as the mainland Frankish takeover in Gaul did on coopting surviving Roman institutions wholesale for their own profit, were available, and accepted by the Britons as the lesser evil, I'd not only endorse but amplify the latter clause; my expectation is such a Frankish Britannia would wind up some centuries down the line speaking a language fundamentally Britannic-Celtic in its grammar and commonest words, strongly influenced both by Germanic Frankish and by Latin--in fact the latter would have the greater influence and the language might be mistaken at a cursory hearing for a Romance language.

But I think the numbers are all wrong for this.

OTL for instance, the first mention I can find for any "Franks" adopting any Christian rite is the conversion of king Clovis, around 500. We can guess individual Franks here and there converted earlier than this, but there is no mention of any wholesale adoption of any brand of Christianity by them before this. 500 is far too late! These Franks on the Continent certainly did Romanize, but by the time they did, Britain is well on the way to becoming "England" as we know it.

In order to justify the OP's optimism a semi-Romanized band of Germanics with the intention of perpetuating (for their own use) Roman institutions including the established Church, rather than steamrollering right over it and setting themselves up as free Germanic bands instead, the best I can do is suggest a POD in the 4th century where some ATL Roman initiative attempts to both Romanize and Christianize the Salian Franks on their far north. But I think one would look in vain for a compelling reason for Roman authorities in the later 300s to try such a thing and it is an even longer shot they'd succeed!

The probable thing, or more probable, is that some "Franks" of the early 5th century indeed opportunistically invade Britain, with the same means, and same ends, as the OTL disparate bunch forming what are retrospectively called "Saxons" and which the Catholic Church of later generations collectively called "Angles." The upshot of that is one or two groups of Germanic invaders of OTL would be preempted by these Franks, and thus the melting pot of disparate but related groups is stirred a bit, with one dialect replacing one or two others. But fundamentally, the character of this ATL mix with Franks in it instead of someone else is going to be pretty similar! The upshot is going to be driving the native Britons, at least those who keep their language and cultural distinctness intact, west to "Wales" or to other refuges overseas, with non-Christian Germanic pagan kingdoms accreting into the Heptarchy more or less as OTL, for Irish Celtic Rite and continental Roman Rite missionaries to seek to Christianize anew. The ATL amalgam might or might not be called "England" and I suppose the linguistics of 'Old English' would be somewhat different, but of a similar character and content.

Actually the Wikipedia article on the Salian Franks mentions that there seems to be little distinction to make between "Franks" and "Saxons" in the 4th century--any meaningful distinction would boil down to the degree to which "Franks" have assimilated aspects of Roman civilization they intend to perpetuate.

I suppose it makes sense people are mainly talking about events in the time of Charlemagne then, but it makes little damn difference; by then the missionaries had done their work, England was collectively a Christian land, and any ATL claims of kinship to part of the crazy quilt forming England would be far fetched whims, offset by the realpolitik Charlemagne faced where a broad front of unsubdued continental Germanic pagans faced his Frankish realm, and he would prioritize that just as OTL, and cultivate the English as friends, not to muddy the waters with dubious lateral relationships putting an imperial foot in the island's door.

It is kind of cool to vaguely imagine WI some century-precocious gang of Franks all set to leapfrog right past the chaos of Merovingian Francia (straight into the chaos of post-Charles the Great Carolingian Imperial Francia, most likely!) were to 1) convert to Christianity, the Roman rite, a whole century before Clovis; 2) become Romanized enough, presumably as foederati, to appreciate the value of seizing control of some Romanized land wholesale; 3) seize the opportunity handed them by Rome pulling out the last legion in 410, perhaps also motivated by collectively being on the wrong side of some dynastic quarrel, perhaps the same one that yanked the Valeria Victrix out of Britain, and thinking, rather than face the music of a returning vengeful Emperor of the wrong faction, leap over the Channel to make the staggering Britons and remnant of Romanized persons there an offer they can't refuse.

If we Mary Sue the hell out of it, I can see the Britons rallying to such needed leadership, acclaiming the Frankish leader their king, the Franks (big Mary Sue Hail Mary Pass here!) revising their own customs and institutions to avoid the insane fragmentation of realms dividing them between the prior king's sons and instead planning a single unified succession, and this unified Frankish realm holds the line on both coasts--for even as "Saxons" were invading to lay the groundwork for "England" from the east, other invaders were raiding and settling from Caledonia and Hibernia; the Frankish unification of Romano-British potentials would have to face both fronts. And win.

Well, if they can do all that, I guess Britain as I said becomes a fundamentally Celtic-language remnant of the Classical order. Maybe such a kingdom can repel the Norsemen too. If it can endure 500 years it has to stand against a probable Norman conquest attempt.

Anyway, this would not be England at all, nor would it be known as a land of the "Franks," their cousins over the Channel have a lock on that.

It would be Britain.
I Don't think the Franks would speak Britonnic a few centuries down the line. One of the main reasons that the franks started speaking latin was because they wanted to integrate roman elite and administration, why didn't the anglo-saxons do this? because roman administration had broken down before the anglo-saxons invaded britain (note they did raid before that) so unless the franks arrive in britain while the roman infrastructure and societal structure is still intact OTL england will end up speaking an germanic language.
Edit: NVM read the entire thing
 
Well, if they can do all that, I guess Britain as I said becomes a fundamentally Celtic-language remnant of the Classical order. Maybe such a kingdom can repel the Norsemen too. If it can endure 500 years it has to stand against a probable Norman conquest attempt.

Of course if the Norsemen are beaten off there may never *be* a Normandy.

OTOH if the Saxons can't invade Britain may they sail further down the Channel and settle in the areas which became Normandy OTL.
 
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