New Wessex 776

The POD for this ATL is the colonization of the Wiko Miki River in what woulod have been southern Maryland in 776.

=History=

776-1000
In 776. a group of West Saxons tired of the rule of Offa of Mercia. They had heard of a land across the sea that Brendan the Irishman had (allegedly) reached in 642. Therefore the men and their (Roman Rite) bishop landed by the grace of God upon the shores of Brendans Shore. The bishop had a dream telling him that they would find their home on a great bay with a narrow entrance; so they travelled south along the coast until they discovered Bishop's Bay.

The timing of their departure meant that they had no knowledge of the following things: the Viking raids on England; the expansion of Wessex to rule all England; the rise of the Carolingians.

The New English expanded from their initial base to dominate the area of the Lenape (Delaware) tribe in OTL. They brought wheat-based horticulture with them, which became a stimulus for the expansion of wheat-based horticulture in opposition to maize-based horticulture, which started in Mexico. The expansion of horticulture induced a growth in the Saxon and the "Welsh" (non-Saxon) population and led to the early agricultural settlement of the northeastern tribes.

Year 1000
By 1000, when the Norse landed in the northern regions, a series of petty Saxon kingdoms stretched from the initial settlement of Wick in the south to what is *here* Long Island Sound. The kingdoms had a small merchant fleet which could be used as the beginning of a military fleet.

There was a thriving Christian community among the Saxons, but 'Welsh' converts were few. The bishops had temporal and spiritual power and were often indistinguishable from their secular counterparts (partly due to the Saxon habit of old kings retiring to become highly placed clergy). The bishops administered themselves through a conciliar system. The bishops had adopted a provision that only one bishop needs to survive to consecrate others as a palliative to the Saxon penchant for chopping up pagan sacred objects and killing sacred animals.

Contact between Saxon and Norse
Leifr Eiriksson's crew was composed of both Christian and pagan followers. The Norsemen were astonished when they encountered a Skraeling who could communicate in rudimentary Anglo-Saxon, since they had been expecting Welsh if anything at all. Leifr sent a party down the coast in 1001 to investigate. This party reached the northern boundaries of the Saxon kingdoms. Since the Saxons had left before the Viking raids on England, they were more open to negotiations. The Norsemen informed the Saxons of recent European history, including the resurrection of the Western Empire under the Carolingians. Some of the Saxons interpreted the rise of a new power as a sign of the Millennium and therefore did not want to alert other Europeans to their existence. The Saxons, displaying a stereotypical lust for shiny objects, agreed to sell grain to the Norse colonists in exchange for northern exotic materials and the exposed iron of the north. The Norse also kept the existence of the Saxon kingdoms from Europe in order to lock the market. They used the grain they purchased to lure settlers to Greenland and then Vinland, which grew up around the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. Greenland's population, therefore thrived more than *here*.

Further Effects and Events
Knowledge of iron smelting and weaponry spread to the 'Welsh' or Skraeling nations, who therefore formed a force equal to that of the coastal Christian kingdoms. The Algonquin tribes became sedentary grain farmers, but the need to create iron weapons initiated a program of deforestation. The introduction of the horse by the New West Saxons had already led to an earlier and greater expansion of the Plains Culture under the aegis of the Mound Builders. The use of iron allowed the Mound Builders to make iron tipped arrows.

Plague
Although in OTL the Plague had little effect on Greenland, in this ATL, the larger number of colonists in Greenland and the continuation of the colony in Vinland allowed the Plague to spread to the 'Welsh' population. This devastation in numbers weakened all the chiefdoms and kingdoms on or near the coast. The most salient effects of this plague were the general adoption of an isolationist policy regarding Greenland and points west and the establishment of parity of technology among the kingdoms, which could no longer depend on numbers.

Horses
The reintroduction of the horse into the New World also produced dramatic effects. Although the Skraelings of the East Coast did not take to horses, tribes living closer to the Great Desert did. Raiding became a viable lifestyle.

Basque Discovery
At some point, Basque fishermen discovered the lands across the sea, but kept the knoweldge to themselves so that they had no competition for the abundant cod. Vinlanders who caught the Basque fisherman would kill them on sight. Therefore a legend arose of terrifying monsters in the western sea.

1492
By 1492, the Kingdom of New Wessex extended from the territories around Bishop's Bay to Manatan. Some tributary chieftainships had been established on the far side of the semi-stripped Appalacean Mountains, since the introduction of iron into the competing chieftainships of the Mound Builder civilization had accelerated its rise and decline, as well as its geographical expansion. The Hereditary Chieftainship of Vinland controlled the entire coast of the Vinland Bight, while the 'Welsh' nations of the Haudenausee, the Abenaki, and the Pequod lay between Vinland and New Wessex. The Southeast 'Welsh' nations were well-armed and well-organized. The Mound Builder-descended Plains Culture was amorphous but powerful. The Mescica (Azteks) controlled a greater swathe of territory than OTL. None of the native nations thought much anymore of a white man coming from overseas.