What PODs will have Sweden retain its status as a major European power?
Bonus if it becomes a significant colonial power.
Bonus if it becomes a significant colonial power.
It needs a larger population.I can't see that happening even if it succeeds in uniting Scandinavia,so it might have to conquer quite a bit of fertile lands to the south.What PODs will have Sweden retain its status as a major European power?
Bonus if it becomes a significant colonial power.
Keeping sway over the Baltic coast, especially Riga and maybe the Duchy of Prussia (the latter presumably as somesort of vassal), would seem a critical first step.
What about a royal marriage between Christina and the Duke of Brandenburg?
The two don't exclude eachother, obviously. But all of Brandenburg is a pretty big chunk of Germany (it's post-Cleves-inheritance, and all, right?). Add in the Duchy of Prussia, and you have a state that probably has more Germans than Swedes already. If it persists, it's going to become German eventually.
obvious rematch on the horizon, protestant powers vs. catholic powers, Sweden/Denmark/north Germany vs. Austria/France/Spain, two very shaky coalitions with with far more than enough reason to fall out among themselves as happened in the later Thirty Years' War anyway;
And that's the catch 22.
No rule, but it might go against the spirit or intent of the original post.
But all the examples you gave, the language that died out was a small minority. In Austria, the plurality of language in the Empire was always German, most of the slavic languages were all very small localized speakers.
In this case, it would be the majority of speakers in the empire speaking German. It would be Swedish that either dies out, or becomes heavily Germanized.
Regarding this, Denmark had a sizable German majority in northern Germany (Holstein) but I seem to recall that they were far from accepted by the Danish elites: being called "German" was almost an insult.It would be interesting if the German parts of the Swedish empire define themselves as "Nordic" or maybe even "Swedish" (albeit a heavily Germanized Swedish) in order to reinforce their Protestant identity against the southern Catholic Germans. Adolphus was planning on conquering most of the Northern Protestant states, so a pan-Germanic and Protestant identity might be feasible for such a state; although it would probably also be anti-Polish as a result.
Have the King/Queen speak German.Regarding this, Denmark had a sizable German majority in northern Germany (Holstein) but I seem to recall that they were far from accepted by the Danish elites: being called "German" was almost an insult.
What could make Swedish elites react differently in case of such a large German minority in its Empire?