I’m going to quote the OP from the last thread because it sums up the issue pretty well, but if anyone has any suggestions to add I’ll add them to this new OP:
Northumbria is currently part of the United Kingdom, but once upon a time it was the dominant power in the British Isles. Northumbrians were doing stuff elsewhere, too. The calendar that says the year is 2019 was made popular by the efforts of first Bede and later Alcuin, both Northumbrians. Alcuin was a close associate of Charlemagne, and indeed there were a lot of Northumbrians around Charlemagne, and that's no surprise, because Northumbria was a centre of culture and learning.
In short, things were going pretty well for Northumbria.
Unfortunately, there were several civil wars and countless Norse raids. So when the Great Heathen Army invaded because some fierce Norse warrior supposedly got killed by an adder (hmm), Northumbria was defeated. Narrowly, of course. Despite being in the middle of a civil war (which we halted to fight off the invaders) we nearly won at York and if we had won York wouldn't be called York because that's the Norse name for the place. And Northumbria would have remained strong.
So, yeah. We lost. Northumbria was split in two once more, into the old divisions of Bernicia and Deira, which became a rump Northumbria and Yorkshire respectively. Yorkshire was then Norsified. This rump Northumbria was later separated into Northumberland and County Durham but Yorkshire stayed together and decided the Norse were actually cool and based its entire identity around that.
But even today there is a movement that seeks to give the Northumbrian people their voice, identity, and independence back. The Northumbrian independence movement.
What are your thoughts on Northumbrian independence, NSG? Personally, as a Northumbrian, I support it.
So yeah - what say ye, NSG? Please try to provide your reasons for supporting or opposing Northumbrian independence if you choose to reply, it makes for a much better discussion for everyone involved.
