Tudor Variations

[oldgringo2001]

Henry the Inquisitor: Arthur lives a little longer and leaves an heir, also named Arthur. Prince Henry follows his father's original career plan and takes holy orders. As the regent for his young nephew, he stamps out any traces of heresy he can find in England, and he finds plenty. England remains a staunch ally of Spain and its Hapsburg relations, and takes part in the religious wars on the continent on the side of the Pope. No specifically English colonies are developed, though many English emigrate to the Spanish colonies. By the middle of the 17th Century, Protestantism has been suppressed everywhere in Europe south of the Baltic Sea.

Mary, Protestent Queen of Scots: The Rough Wooing succeeds, and the infant queen is seized by the English instead of being spirited away to France. Raised as a Protestant, Mary fulfills Henry VIII's fondest posthumous hope by marrying Edward VI and producing a Prince of Wales after Edward's death. The thrones of England and Scotland are united by blood and Calvinism. Henry of Navarre decides Paris does not require a mass, and marries Elizabeth the Princess Royal (Daughter of Jasper I, King of England, Scotland, and the Isles) instead of Marie d'Medici. He promises to respect Catholic rights to worship in the Edict of Paris in 1598, but his grandson, a rather different Louis XIV, revokes the edict in 1685, leading to an diaspora of French Catholics.

[combatmedic]

Interesting stuff.
I find the second scenario to be a bit implausible. The sheer numbers of Catholics in France, and the power of the nobles before the Fronde, would suggest that your Calvinist monarchs would end up as merely kings of part of France or just dead/deposed. A fractured France would be a big change, and would have major ramifications for the future history of Europe and the world.

[Polydamas]

A few years back there was a thread about an alternate-history Border Reaver campaign designed to extend the Golden Age of Reaving after 1606. It is probably relevant.

[LoneWolf23k]

Here's a simple concept for a Tudor variation... ...What if Henry VIII DID manage to get a male heir?

[combatmedic]

Originally Posted by LoneWolf23k

Here's a simple concept for a Tudor variation... ...What if Henry VIII DID manage to get a male heir?

He did in OTL.
His son Edward (by Jane Seymour) ruled after him.


Or did you mean 'what if he had a son by his first wife, a boy who lived to adulthood?'

[JCurwen3]

Originally Posted by LoneWolf23k

Here's a simple concept for a Tudor variation... ...What if Henry VIII DID manage to get a male heir?

I'm not sure of the details, but that (a Henry IX son of Henry VIII) was at least one of the historical differences in the alternate Earth of the anime Code Geass, where there is this massive empire called Britannia that encompasses much of the world, including the Americas. Japan is controlled as a conquered territory as well. If you ignore the mechs and powers of the setting the alternate history is pretty interesting.

[Phantasm]

Originally Posted by combatmedic

He did in OTL.
His son Edward (by Jane Seymour) ruled after him.


Or did you mean 'what if he had a son by his first wife, a boy who lived to adulthood?'

Edward having a male heir himself: possible, if he lived long enough to get a wife and have her have the kid before he dies.

I wonder how England would have been if Mary, Henry's eldest, had been raised Protestant instead of Catholic. Certainly you wouldn't have had the behind-the-scenes attempt to place their cousin, Jane Grey, on the throne (which lasted for 9 days, IIRC; one of the tactics used was to declare Mary - and sadly for them, Elizabeth as well - illegitimate and therefore ineligible for the throne).

[combatmedic]

Originally Posted by JCurwen3

I'm not sure of the details, but that (a Henry IX son of Henry VIII) was at least one of the historical differences in the alternate Earth of the anime Code Geass, where there is this massive empire called Britannia that encompasses much of the world, including the Americas. Japan is controlled as a conquered territory as well. If you ignore the mechs and powers of the setting the alternate history is pretty interesting.

I like the mechs and the powers. :)
I've only watched the first season.

I'm fairly sure that England was a republic and part of the EU in that setting, because the royals had been exiled to their American possessions.

Possessions from whence they proceeded to kick major ass, it seems.

[oldgringo2001]

Responding to combatmedic, England was thoroughly Catholic before Henry VIII, but became majority Protestant in only one generation. Given the even greater share of the wealth of France in the hands of monastic orders, the opportunity to put that wealth in the hands of the nobility and the crown would have encouraged a lot of Protestant leanings, as they did in England. And lest we forget that Philip the Fair had already suppressed perhaps the strongest order of all, the Templars, three centuries earlier. It's also of interest to note that Anne Boelyn, who infected Henry with the Protestant bacillus, was educated in the French court.

Besides, a corresponding Catholic exodus occurring exactly when French Protestant families emigrated after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes is right in there with the style of other Infinite Worlds. I don't think that many ASBs (Alien Space Bats) need to be involved.

[combatmedic]

Originally Posted by oldgringo2001

Responding to combatmedic, England was thoroughly Catholic before Henry VIII, but became majority Protestant in only one generation. Given the even greater share of the wealth of France in the hands of monastic orders, the opportunity to put that wealth in the hands of the nobility and the crown would have encouraged a lot of Protestant leanings, as they did in England. And lest we forget that Philip the Fair had already suppressed perhaps the strongest order of all, the Templars, three centuries earlier. It's also of interest to note that Anne Boelyn, who infected Henry with the Protestant bacillus, was educated in the French court.

Besides, a corresponding Catholic exodus occurring exactly when French Protestant families emigrated after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes is right in there with the style of other Infinite Worlds. I don't think that many ASBs (Alien Space Bats) need to be involved.

Yes, brutal use of force was enough to make a break with Rome. But England did not become 'Protestant' all that quickly. The 'English Reformation' wasn't a simple 'Catholic or Protestant' choice. At one point, Henry was burning Catholics and Protestants. He wavered on what sort of church he wanted, with the main constant point being that he would be the head. His reforms/looting of the Church did provoke massive resistance in some parts of the realm. And one of his daughters tried to restore the previous order.