Shipbucket

I've been working on a AU recently. As Psilander didn't like the idea of another Swedish AU, I've constructed a "new" country. He also provided me with some advice for it.
The timespan beginns in the early 13th century(I know, bloody early, but there are some reasons for it). If any of you have seen Arn the Templar or read the books you will have a good idea of what I've changed from reality, in terms of the beginning.
The language is somewhat of a mix of Swedish and Danish(That means I deform Swedish word so that they seem bit more Danish, but still keep the Swedish speech pattern).
Despite not originaly planned as such, this ended up a super power-AU.

During the wars between the houses of Sverker, Erik and Folkung for the power in Västra Götaland, the House of Sverker would with the help of the Danes emerge victorious. The House of Sverker and Denmark kept their alliances, pushing the few remaining Eriks and Folkungs north, where the country of Erikrike would later be created. With the Calmar Union during the 14th century, Norway was pulled in as well. The CU would however have a sudden end in 1467, when Johan Sverkersson IV gathered his political opponents in Copenhagen, and executed them all, either by beheading or hanging. This would later become known as The Bloodbath of Copenhagen(Blubade i København). Even though Norway tried to pull herself out off the Union, she was held on to. Later though, the north half of Norway would break free, with some help of Erikrike.
In 1540 an expedition was sent to retake Iceland and Greenland. Despite initial difficulties, the two Islands were conquered.
During year 1573 a prince of the House of Württemberg was married into the Royal family of the nation now bearing the name of Gotrige. This led to a fairly large part of Germany being effectively "Gotrigized", even though their influence would greatly decrease during the following centuries. A small piece of land on the German coast would however remain under Gotrigian control even until these days.
In the middle 17th century an interesst for colonies in the New World was suddenly appearing in the goverment. As Gotrige allready had Greenland fairly close to The New World, initial expeditions to close island, and later the continent, would almost allways start from there. In the end, a fairly large part of what might otherwise have been Canada, ended up under the Sceptre of Gotrige. Colonies around Africa was later obtained as well, as well as some in the East Indies. There, a pact with the Dutch would be sealed in 1728 as to avoid fighting between the two nations, and to easier defend against other intruders. This pact would last until WW2, when both countries were more or less forced from their colonies.
During the Napoleonic Wars, Gotrige managed to keep somewhat neutral, with the exception of some border skirmishes, none being big or serious enough to make any of the involved countries want to engage a full scale war.
The following century would go on relatively peacefully, no serious danger to Gotrige's empire really happening untill WW1 started.

MAP OF THE GOTIRIGAN EMPIRE DURING THE WW-ERA:


So yeah. This is a very bulky description off the Empire of Gotrige. I've tried to be as plausible as possible, but I will gladly take any advice to make the story better.

The flag of Gotrige is basicaly the Danish flag, but with a chess-pattern of red and white squared in the top right corner, along with the head of a crowned griffon. I'm probably going to work more with that flag, but it'll do for now.

In general, my designs(at least the first ones)will go through the Beginners Forum before posting them in this thread. The plausability/functionability of the designs will however be greatly increased since I've got Springsharp now, so I will hopefully not give you a design that will tip over each time it fires her guns. But the drawings themselves might be noobish.

Hope you'll like both the AU and the upcoming designs!

EDITS:
1) I have now mentioned the actuall date of the map, as to avoid confusion.
2) Further editing of the map. See my post on page 2 for mor info.

That map is wrong for pre-world war one.

This is 13th century APDAF" not before WW1

I think I should stop drinking that beer.

That is even more wrong for the 13th century.

I'm not sure when this is. I don't think its 13th century (yeah, this is wrong for that)...
It looks more like WW2 pre or post...

And this is a AU "Alternate universe" = "Alternate history"

No this is a pre-world war one map not 13th century.

AU means that anything can happen, it does not mean that he needs to follow the real world history to the letter, but if he wants some points in its history from the real world, he can change it too if he will , and that means he can change and draw the world map just like he wants it.

so the map can look like a pre-world war one map with all the changes we have him in it. That he could have done all the Africans, the United States, Canada, etc. to "Gotridge" or just delete them out of the world just for fun!

But before you say anything more, you should rather wait for "KHT" can say what he thought of the map.

APDAF fuck off.

Have I ever mentioned this map being the map of the 13th century?

No, I should really have made it clear that this map is a map of the WW-era empire. I'm probably going to further edit the map and take away all the other countries colours/colonial markings. After all, Gotrige is the only thing interessting on this map.
I will fix it so that I mention the year in the first post.