Would an English Mexico become as Mestizo as Spanish Mexico?

Would an English Mexico become as Mestizo as Spanish Mexico?

  • Yes

    Votes: 46 43.4%
  • No

    Votes: 60 56.6%

  • Total voters
    106
England at this point is smaller, has around 1/3 as many people and is less used to the heat. They would not be able to replace the locals and would probably be forced to make more use of native allies, vassals and puppets. The population would seem less mestizo, because they would have a larger pure native contingent.

1) The Portuguese weren't much bigger than England in population but look what they accomplished...
2) How hot do you think Spain is? Only about 1/4 of the country is even hot Mediterranean in climate (let alone arid) and largely only along parts of the coast, most of it being either continental or oceanic (especially in Galicia, which historically exported disproportionate numbers of Spaniards to the New World AND bearing the same climate as Britain). Furthermore, the bulk of Mexico's population lives (and has almost always lived) in the Altiplano highlands of the Center, which generally means less heat, disease vectors or stagnant water bodies. Even if it's a tad warmer than England, it's hardly a tropical swamp in those parts either.
- I picture it looking like Peru, with either mestizos or natives being the biggest group followed by the other one TBH.

EDIT: @Gloss, I agree on the German states (not to mention Scotland, Ireland and perhaps Flanders), though Scandinavia may or may not be too cold-climate inclined; there's a world of difference between, say, London and Stockholm.
 
1) The Portuguese weren't much bigger than England in population but look what they accomplished...
2) How hot do you think Spain is? Only about 1/4 of the country is even hot Mediterranean in climate (let alone arid) and largely only along parts of the coast, most of it being either continental or oceanic (especially in Galicia, which historically exported disproportionate numbers of Spaniards to the New World AND bearing the same climate as Britain). Furthermore, the bulk of Mexico's population lives (and has almost always lived) in the Altiplano highlands of the Center, which generally means less heat, disease vectors or stagnant water bodies. Even if it's a tad warmer than England, it's hardly a tropical swamp in those parts either.
- I picture it looking like Peru, with either mestizos or natives being the biggest group followed by the other one TBH.

EDIT: @Gloss, I agree on the German states (not to mention Scotland, Ireland and perhaps Flanders), though Scandinavia may or may not be too cold-climate inclined; there's a world of difference between, say, London and Stockholm.
Galician emigration was big in the XIX century not during the colonial era. Basques,Castillians (specially those of La Mancha),Andalusians and Extremadura were the main settlers in America. For the most part those are the warmest regions in Spain. The Basque country has a similar climate to England but Basques mostly settled in Chile,what we know as Argentina and the andean regions of Colombia which precisely have a very temperate weather.
Either way I agree with you that English could have settle in Mexico. Most of the country has for the lost part temperate weather
 
Galician emigration was big in the XIX century not during the colonial era. Basques,Castillians (specially those of La Mancha),Andalusians and Extremadura were the main settlers in America. For the most part those are the warmest regions in Spain. The Basque country has a similar climate to England but Basques mostly settled in Chile,what we know as Argentina and the andean regions of Colombia which precisely have a very temperate weather.
Either way I agree with you that English could have settle in Mexico. Most of the country has for the lost part temperate weather

Hrm, thought it was pretty steady emigration from the beginning, my mistake. Still, there's no "special sauce" inherent to the Spanish when it comes to tropical survival or disease, they were as vulnerable to high humidity, yellow fever, malaria, etc as anybody. It boils down to where exactly one settles. And of course, the above makes intermarriage with the locals just that likely.
 
Hrm, thought it was pretty steady emigration from the beginning, my mistake. Still, there's no "special sauce" inherent to the Spanish when it comes to tropical survival or disease, they were as vulnerable to high humidity, yellow fever, malaria, etc as anybody. It boils down to where exactly one settles. And of course, the above makes intermarriage with the locals just that likely.
Gallego is how Spaniards called any none Spanish romance speaker in America like French,Italians,Asturians,Catalans and the likes. But most people who entered into Mexico were Andalucians,followed by Castillians and Extremadurans in the XVI century
 
Gallego is how Spaniards called any none Spanish romance speaker in America like French,Italians,Asturians,Catalans and the likes. But most people who entered into Mexico were Andalucians,followed by Castillians and Extremadurans in the XVI century

I didn't know that, reminds me of how Brazilians use "Galego" to refer to someone with light eyes, hair and features (or like how we call blue-eyed blondes in the States "Nordic"/"vikings" regardless of their ethnic origin).

Really the only place I can't see Europeans significantly settle in the 16th-19th centuries (whether they be Spanish, British, French, Portuguese, Dutch, etc) for any climatic reason is southern India, the Oriental tropics, and Africa between the Sahara and the Zambezi River. It's just a matter of who gets where first (assuming the Age of Discovery goes as unchallenged by non-Euros as OTL of course). And any of those people, if faced with an ethno-gender imbalance like that of the Spanish and Portuguese empires of OTL, could end up mixing with whoever the natives are.
 
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América Was pretty disease free until the european arrive so i don't see where come this idea that América was hostil to the european settlers, these was not malaria, Yellow fever or any of the other tropical diseases so apart of the hot climate three are little that stop a englishman start a family With a mexica woman.
Going so far in the past You could butterfly away the England reformation, maybe even make some of the Azteca or Mayan princess as a wife(s) or lover(s) of Henry VIII.
 
Might India be a model though, with mixing being common in early generations, but then white purity becoming more valued once conditions are more settled?

I think British colonization of India started off with taking Indian wives being more common and the India Company officials adopting some local customs, but as company dominance became more secure, there was peer pressure to "get a proper English wife" and "live the proper English way" that reinforced racial segregation.

My guess would be population growth is probably a big difference here. Mexico's population crashed, and then resumed New World style high population growth (supranormal compared to Europe), with relatively little migration afterward. Nothing like that in India. That is, it doesn't matter so much if after the initial colonization, there is upswing in concern about "limpeza de sangre", if the population has a high population growth as a share of country, and there is relatively little migration. (Anglo-Indians were a small share and stayed small).

I'd agree that I'd see was nothing special about England or Spain that would've stopped the same dynamics unfolding, with men from England disproportionately being part of the wave of colonisation and marrying up, etc. with Mexican indigenous people.

Where you might see a divergence is, if other economic trends roll out as in our history, and this leads to Mexico becoming more like the United States, or even Argentina, as a prosperous society that attracted lots more subsequent migration during the 19th century. That would "dilute" the country as a mestizo nation (again, Argentina might be an example?).

But it's hard to predict if that would happen, and there arguments why and why not - for instance, depending on whether there is a view that England's geography relative to the NW of Europe linked it into other economic trends in history (proximity to some of the regions where some interesting developments were happening, even by the 16th century), or whether that's all very contingent on later events.
 
What if England decides to use the native Mexicans as slaves rather than importing Africans? Everyone keeps going on and on about the high native population... but what if it got depopulated to work on sugar and tobacco plantations in the Caribbean?
 
What if England decides to use the native Mexicans as slaves rather than importing Africans? Everyone keeps going on and on about the high native population... but what if it got depopulated to work on sugar and tobacco plantations in the Caribbean?
Because that is exactly what the Spanish crown do in Mexico, and in general all america, well they weren´t really slave they where "encomendados" in a Encomienda so there is little difference that is an English colonization, And the Spanish import a lot of Black Slave to the Americas mostly in the late XVII century and mostly in the Caribbean region that where depopulated of Indians
 
Because that is exactly what the Spanish crown do in Mexico, and in general all america, well they weren´t really slave they where "encomendados" in a Encomienda so there is little difference that is an English colonization, And the Spanish import a lot of Black Slave to the Americas mostly in the late XVII century and mostly in the Caribbean region that where depopulated of Indians

Yeah but the Spanish also stopped enslaving the natives in the 1500s after the Church pushed for it. Would the English Church be as amenable to Native American wellbeing ?
 
Yeah but the Spanish also stopped enslaving the natives in the 1500s after the Church pushed for it. Would the English Church be as amenable to Native American wellbeing ?
No, not really the practices continue until well entered the independence of america with the Repartimiento System and abuse of Mita system, they are only "technically" not slavery, is more like a form of Serfdom, but the effect were the same as they create "slavery-like conditions"
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
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So we seem to have a split decision so far, with a majority of votes saying less Mestizo and a majority of articulated posts saying just as Mestizo.

I wonder if it would vary over time and place.

For sure an early infusion of Mexican and Caribbean (and maybe Peruvian) wealth to England will alter English history, but perhaps not beyond all recognition. The Caribbean and central-Mexico through Peru region could see widespread mestizaje. But, eventually migration of religiously motivated dissenters becomes a thing by the 1600s anyway, and they seek out frontiers like California, Texas, New Mexico, Florida and La Plata, where because they come as family units, there is less mixing.
 

Teejay

Gone Fishin'
It wasn't so much that it became very easy to bring your wife and children to India as opposed to raising a family with an Indian paramour.

In Colonial Australia and New Zealand the only reason why the majority of the population became White instead of Mixed White and Aboriginal was pretty much of the extremely low Aboriginal population. Even now something like around 2% of the Australian population are essentially of mixed Aboriginal and European ancestry. Not to mention now 15% of the New Zealand population are Maori (many being of mixed European/Maori descent).

Mexico was way more densely populated than even pre-European New Zealand and even with a massive decline in the native population, an English mexico is going to as ethnically mixed as the OTL one.
 
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@Optical_Illusion in my third post I threw out a disclaimer that outside factors couldv'e led an English Mexico to diverge from the OTL Spanish trend of mixing, and your possible divergence is exactly what I meant by that. I imagine that mestizos would still be numerous unless that divergence happened early on, but it could skew demographics into a middle ground between OTL America and Mexico at least.

@Teejay my thoughts exactly. Looking at OTL English colonization as a guide for how they'd always settle a colonial empire is fallacious due to their mostly settling sparsely populated areas by and large, or deliberately skewing demographics for economic reasons a la Jamaica (which did have a larger white and mixed population early in its history anyway), or taking over pre-existing colonies like the Cape.

@Tripledot interesting point. On one hand, if Mexico is built up as a key colony it could have knock-on effects in England or its other colonies towards accepting miscegenation by way of that colony's relative prestige. On the other hand, OTL Spanish limpieza de sangre laws did create a de-facto racial caste system that kept mixed people lower on the social ladder than whites. It could go either way IMO.
 
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