AH challenge; The five Reichs

Broz

a TL in wich the historicall territory of the Holy Roman Empire is up to this day divided into five(or more) nation states, with a long and intimate history of wars, political schemes, territorial pretensions, generation long grudges, bloody interreligious conflicts, nationalistic rezimes, ethnic clensing, forced linguistic and cultural diversification, and general animosity, that olnly starts to end around the 1980is, with a gradual move thovards a joint market, and perhaps a regional football league

id sugest some PODs in the 30 years war, napoleonic wars, or around 1848

ok the situation doesnt have to be that bad, but at least five nation states, thats the olnly real rule
 

Philip

Donor
OTL's Germany, Czechia, Netherlands, and (Northern) Italy almost get you there. If Mathias Corvinus holds onto Austria, perhaps a more Hungarian influenced Austria becomes your fifth state. If there is no Miracle of the House of Brandenburg, you could end up with a more Slavic-influenced Prussia. I doubt this gives enough time for the development of a true nation-state, but it is worth mentioning.
 

yourworstnightmare

Banned
Let's say slavic culture remain dominant in Mecklenburg and Pommerania, creating a Wendish nation. The duchy of Lorraine remain independent, creating the small modern duchy of Lorraine (with good relations with the Benelux nations). On HRE territory states like Germany, Austria, Czechia, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg and Slovenia appear. (IRL many European nations have been a part of HRE). Then there would be quite a few of them.
 

Broz

i was thinking somthing like Austria, Bavaria, maybe Saxony, Prussia, some kind of Rhineland nation, maybe a continuation of the Rhineland federation, a stronger Chekoslovakia/Moravia betveen prussian held Poland and Austria carving up all the territory, and Italy or more likely France trying to influence the whole thing to their favor
Loraine is a good idea too, there could be a few of small duchies trapped betveen larger neighbours

i think it would be fun if most nations spoke the same language
 

Philip

Donor
The idea of a nation-state is that it is a state that provides a home for a nation. It stems from the idea that each nation should have its own sovereign and self-determined territorial state.

Consider Germany. Throughout history, Germans were separated into several (at time, many) different states. There was no German nation-state. With the rise of nationalism, there was a trend towards unifying the German people (a nation) into a single state.
 

Broz

what about England, America, Ireland, and Canada?
what about Belorusia and Russia?
what about Bosna, Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo?
what about Venecuella, Panama, Mexico, Bolivia, Peru...?
what about Austria, Germany and Swicerland???

or do austrians speak Austrian?

certanly in such a TL, most german speaking nations or national goverments would try as hard as they can to prowe theres a big diference betveen how one nation speaks as oposed to the other, and there might be big dialectal diferences, but for some strange reason most people would understand each other more or less
 

Homer

Broz said:
a TL in wich the historicall territory of the Holy Roman Empire is up to this day divided into five(or more) nation states, with a long and intimate history of wars, political schemes, territorial pretensions, generation long grudges, bloody interreligious conflicts, nationalistic rezimes, ethnic clensing, forced linguistic and cultural diversification, and general animosity, that olnly starts to end around the 1980is, with a gradual move thovards a joint market, and perhaps a regional football league
Click to expand...

What's the difference to OTL?

Within the "historical territory" of the Holy Roman Empire we have today Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Northern Italy. And dependent on what historical territory you claim we'd even have large parts of France, and the whole of Slovenia and the Czech Republic. Thus we have plenty of nation states with plenty of wars, schemes and whatever you like:

a long and intimate history of wars: OK
political schemes: OK
territorial pretensions: OK
generation long grudges: Prussia vs. Austria, the Kaiser and the Pope
bloody interreligious conflicts: Thirty Years War
nationalistic rezimes: Nazi Germany
ethnic clensing: the Germans had to leave the Sudetenland
forced linguistic and cultural diversification: in Alsace, the French ensured dominance of the French language. The Germans did the same with the Poles and Czechs
general animosity: OK
that only starts to end around the 1980's: well, i'd say it ended earlier, but since the 80s the development increased in speed...
with a gradual move thovards a joint market: which is the EU
and perhaps a regional football league: which is frequently thought about by media enterprises and the large european football clubs.
 

Philip

Donor
Broz said:
what about England, America, Ireland, and Canada?
what about Belorusia and Russia?
what about Bosna, Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo?
what about Venecuella, Panama, Mexico, Bolivia, Peru...?
what about Austria, Germany and Swicerland???
Click to expand...

Some of them are not nation-states. What's you point?

certanly in such a TL, most german speaking nations or national goverments
Click to expand...
Are you sure you are using the term 'nation' correctly in this context? Remember that we are talking about nation-states. You seem to be conflating the idea of nation and state.

would try as hard as they can to prowe theres a big diference betveen how one nation speaks as oposed to the other, and there might be big dialectal diferences, but for some strange reason most people would understand each other more or less
Click to expand...
Remember, nationalism is primarily a populist movement. It may be co-opted by a state, but it is primarily a movement of the people (nation). What you are describing will not lead to a nation-state where the state's legitimacy is derived from providing a territorial home for a state.
 

rcduggan

What about no Otto the Great, so Germany is not in the Holy Roman Empire (instead it is just Italy)?

The German kings begin to lose authority over time, and the five stem duchies (Saxony, Bavaria, Swabia, Thuringia, and Lotharingia) begin to become independent. Eventually central authority totally collapses after the Mongol invasions and the Black Plague, and the five states become totally independent.
 
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