What Became of the [Former] Silesian Confederacy worlds?

kzt wrote:

TheMonster wrote:The Manticoran Constitution requires the heir to the throne to marry a commoner. No one in the Andermani succession could be considered a "commoner".

Do they hold a title in Manticore? If not. ...

One would have to consider the reasoning for the provision. It's supposed to tie the monarchy to the people and keep it from being too close to the peerage. It makes every Manticoran monarch have one parent who was born a common Manticoran citizen.

Allowing a marriage to someone in the Andermani succession would hardly suit that purpose. It would instead repeat a pattern seen all to often in the history of imperial/royal/noble marriages, which produced the situation before WWI where the UK, Germany, and Russia were nominally ruled by cousins. Arguably, these interlocking family trees make these people closer to each other than to their own subjects.

Elizabeth I was not ignorant of this history, and deliberately set this restriction on the House of Winton. It is difficult for me to imagine that anyone would want to overturn it.

The closest I could imagine would be if Roger and Rivka have a son who marries a daughter of one of the Gustavs, since their succession does not currently allow a woman to become Kaiser. But even then, I'd expect Parliament to insist she formally renounce any claim to Andermani titles as a condition of marrying someone in the direct line of succession.

This is why traditionally, the younger sons of ruling nobility were not encouraged to marry and have children. Cadet branches of ruling houses can provide dangerous uncertainty in the succession of a system that relies upon primogeniture. Medieval nobles used to send their younger sons to take holy orders rather than risk this kind of confusion.

Werrf wrote:This is why traditionally, the younger sons of ruling nobility were not encouraged to marry and have children. Cadet branches of ruling houses can provide dangerous uncertainty in the succession of a system that relies upon primogeniture. Medieval nobles used to send their younger sons to take holy orders rather than risk this kind of confusion.

There was another option, many nobles encuraged their younger sons to go on cruisades or join the military, where they had a good chance of getting killed.

darrell wrote:

Werrf wrote:This is why traditionally, the younger sons of ruling nobility were not encouraged to marry and have children. Cadet branches of ruling houses can provide dangerous uncertainty in the succession of a system that relies upon primogeniture. Medieval nobles used to send their younger sons to take holy orders rather than risk this kind of confusion.

There was another option, many nobles encuraged their younger sons to go on cruisades or join the military, where they had a good chance of getting killed.

Or to become a monk or priest.

SWM wrote:

darrell wrote:

Werrf wrote:This is why traditionally, the younger sons of ruling nobility were not encouraged to marry and have children. Cadet branches of ruling houses can provide dangerous uncertainty in the succession of a system that relies upon primogeniture. Medieval nobles used to send their younger sons to take holy orders rather than risk this kind of confusion.

There was another option, many nobles encuraged their younger sons to go on cruisades or join the military, where they had a good chance of getting killed.

Or to become a monk or priest.

Becoming a Monk or priest is taking holy orders. Not that this stopped the second son from causing trouble every time.

A problem with sending the second son out to join the military was that if he thought his older brother should not become ruler he often had a ready made cadre to support him in his coup. Sending the younger sons on crusades often worked by them gaining lands by conquest who administration could prevent them from trying to overturn the succession. Prior to modern communications, many empires had to be divided because administering them had become too clunky, although this also tended to causes wars between the sections of the empire within 40 years.

darrell wrote:

Werrf wrote:This is why traditionally, the younger sons of ruling nobility were not encouraged to marry and have children. Cadet branches of ruling houses can provide dangerous uncertainty in the succession of a system that relies upon primogeniture. Medieval nobles used to send their younger sons to take holy orders rather than risk this kind of confusion.

There was another option, many nobles encuraged their younger sons to go on cruisades or join the military, where they had a good chance of getting killed.

Or live and do something good/crazy enough to grab more land and titles for the family :)

Manticore recognises foreign titles.

Helen Zilwicki was noted to be a princess on her Middy cruise. Abigail Hearns (aka Miss Owens) was also rated as such, being a Steadholders daughter.

Therefore, any member of a Non-Manticoran royal house would be recognised by Manticore as Nobility, and thus would not be eligable to marry the Heir.

Michael Everett wrote:Manticore recognises foreign titles.

Helen Zilwicki was noted to be a princess on her Middy cruise. Abigail Hearns (aka Miss Owens) was also rated as such, being a Steadholders daughter.

Therefore, any member of a Non-Manticoran royal house would be recognised by Manticore as Nobility, and thus would not be eligable to marry the Heir.

Maybe, maybe not.

Manticore may officially (and legally) recognize foreign titles and honors, sure. Whether this is by being signatory to some interstellar convention, or via individual bilateral treaties (or possibly both) I'm not sure. But if the Manticoran Constitution specifically defines a "commoner" as being based solely on ONLY Manticoran titles for marriage purposes then you should be able to have it both ways.

Otherwise, you can run into situations in interstellar politics where the semantics could really cause problems. For example, you have an heir but no spare and the current state of interstellar affairs means a diplomatic marriage is the only viable option. If one of the potential allies has an overt monarchy/aristocracy while the other has a "Most Beloved Leader" who is the great great grandson of the "Perpetual and Revered President" but isn't technically "nobility", well that could be a bad thing.

jchilds wrote:Maybe, maybe not.

Manticore may officially (and legally) recognize foreign titles and honors, sure. Whether this is by being signatory to some interstellar convention, or via individual bilateral treaties (or possibly both) I'm not sure. But if the Manticoran Constitution specifically defines a "commoner" as being based solely on ONLY Manticoran titles for marriage purposes then you should be able to have it both ways.

Otherwise, you can run into situations in interstellar politics where the semantics could really cause problems. For example, you have an heir but no spare and the current state of interstellar affairs means a diplomatic marriage is the only viable option. If one of the potential allies has an overt monarchy/aristocracy while the other has a "Most Beloved Leader" who is the great great grandson of the "Perpetual and Revered President" but isn't technically "nobility", well that could be a bad thing.

There's been no sign that I can recall that Manticore has any history or tolerance of diplomatic marriages - quite the contrary, everything has pointed towards Manticoran princes and princesses making up their own minds about who they will marry, and tending to do a decent job of it.

Werrf wrote:

jchilds wrote:Maybe, maybe not.

Manticore may officially (and legally) recognize foreign titles and honors, sure. Whether this is by being signatory to some interstellar convention, or via individual bilateral treaties (or possibly both) I'm not sure. But if the Manticoran Constitution specifically defines a "commoner" as being based solely on ONLY Manticoran titles for marriage purposes then you should be able to have it both ways.

Otherwise, you can run into situations in interstellar politics where the semantics could really cause problems. For example, you have an heir but no spare and the current state of interstellar affairs means a diplomatic marriage is the only viable option. If one of the potential allies has an overt monarchy/aristocracy while the other has a "Most Beloved Leader" who is the great great grandson of the "Perpetual and Revered President" but isn't technically "nobility", well that could be a bad thing.

There's been no sign that I can recall that Manticore has any history or tolerance of diplomatic marriages - quite the contrary, everything has pointed towards Manticoran princes and princesses making up their own minds about who they will marry, and tending to do a decent job of it.

I don't think its a question of diplomatic/dynastic marrigage more if a member of the Royal Family falls for a member of the Andermani Royal Family