In 1120, the White Ship left port at Barfleur, Normandy and set off across the Channel. A few hours out of port it strikes a rock and swiftly sinks, killing almost everyone on board- including the heir and spares of Henry I of England, leading directly to the Anarchy.

In 1066, only 54 years earlier, the Mora left port from Normandy and set off across the Channel. It was carrying William the Conqueror.

What if, in 1066, the Mora hit that very same rock, sank swiftly, and William drowned before ever setting foot in England? What if that Norman yoke was never placed around the English neck?

I've been rolling around this idea in my head for a while, but being a linguistics nerd I've mostly been thinking about it in terms of a more Germanic evolution for the English language. What about the politics of the time? Would England remain Anglo-Saxon? Without the English monarch directly owning lands in France, when, where, and how would England get involved with affairs on the Continent?
 
It's possible that one of his sons or descendants might take up the claim - they would inherit it, of course.

I wonder if Denmark might also try to reconquer England?
 
I wonder if Denmark might try to reconquer England?

They were both parts of Knut's Great North Sea Empire, and that had a lot of fallout around Northern Europe. Enough that the King of Norway felt he had a right to the English and Danish thrones, even though he wasn't even a blood relative of Knut. So it's entirely possible that Denmark might express an interest in conquering land in the British isles....

And a Danish invasion of Great Britain, rather than a French one, would keep the English language very Germanic indeed. It'd probably be more like Old Norse than anything, after a few centuries.
 
Oh sorry, you asked about linguistics not the effects on the politics of England, sorry I didn't see you were onto something interesting there. my apologies
 
I can't imagine the language would become extremely Danish. In OTL, Anglo-Saxon didn't become very Frenchlike. It stole a lot of French and Latin vocabulary, but structurally it more or less just fell apart.
 
Didn't the Count of Bologne also have dreams of invading England?
I haven't ever heard of anything about this, but after a cursory online search it looks like it would make sense- apparently Bologne had been very close with King Edward the Confessor, the previous King of England, and for at least a decade had been a political rival of the Godwinsdons, the family controlling most of England by the time of the Conquest. So even if William died, would Bologne have continued the invasion?

Of course, from what I know (which admittedly isn't much), a lot of the "legitimacy" factor of the invasion came from the fact that the Pope confirmed William's claim on the English throne. Would the Pope have backed up Bologne as well? I don't know what the political ramifications of something like that would be.
 
Some of the legitimacy factor was that Edward supposedly promised the throne to William. This is more plausible that you might think because he was good friends with many Normans and in fact many were at his court (and were on bad terms with Godwin, although no beef with Harold Godwinson)

We're not sure of this, but at one point he did promise it to Bolonge defiantly. And he promised to other people. Seriously, he promised to 3-6 different people before he found out his relative Edgar was alive (defiantly 3, possibly 6). This gives 3-6 people some legitimacy on the throne of England (no, you can't will England, but it's better than "I want it"). Then on his deathbed, he supposedly changed his designated heir to Harold so long as Harold gave Edgar a good fief and marriage.

His rule was weak. He kind of reminds me of Henry VI plus sanity. And obviously he made too many promises he couldn't keep (not just the throne, he made promises to do stuff that required approval of the nobles)
 
Some of the legitimacy factor was that Edward supposedly promised the throne to William. This is more plausible that you might think because he was good friends with many Normans and in fact many were at his court (and were on bad terms with Godwin, although no beef with Harold Godwinson)

We're not sure of this, but at one point he did promise it to Bolonge defiantly. And he promised to other people. Seriously, he promised to 3-6 different people before he found out his relative Edgar was alive (defiantly 3, possibly 6). This gives 3-6 people some legitimacy on the throne of England (no, you can't will England, but it's better than "I want it"). Then on his deathbed, he supposedly changed his designated heir to Harold so long as Harold gave Edgar a good fief and marriage.

His rule was weak. He kind of reminds me of Henry VI plus sanity. And obviously he made too many promises he couldn't keep (not just the throne, he made promises to do stuff that required approval of the nobles)

It's plausible only in the context of Edward having little actual power and promising his throne to various people seems to have been one of his go-to moves. But that's where it ends. For one thing, after he allegedly promised William the crown he did things like send across Europe for the Hungarian-raised kin/heirs and seems to have promised it to them. Whether just as a political fait-accomplis or w/e, he was said to have promised it to Harold both before and at his death, and in the many years between the alleged 'Norman promise' and his death Edward is never again recorded commenting on it or acting as though succession was in any way resolved for anyone, let alone a maternal cousin.

Moreover the entire concept of his being able to arbitrarily dispose of royal authority never held any political currency in England. Before the Conquest the king's wishes or procolations were one of several factors ultimately decided by the Witan and after the Conquest there's no clearly identifiable pattern other than might makes right until you get a looong way in, and even then 'rules' of succession make much more effective scorecards after the fact than regulations determining policy beforehand until you get pretty post-medieval.
 
Top