Your Favorite Medieval Dynasty to Survive, But Didn't

Cryostorm

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I second the suggestion of the Macedonians. Either Basil or Constantine having male heirs could be huge. Aside from being the most successful post-Islam Roman dynasty, it was also the only one to naturally die out and not be replaced via a coup/invasion. It would be very interesting to see how far they can make it, and if a shogunate type system could form around the Emperor (looking at the sheer number of non-biologically related Emperors who either married into the family or were adopted: Romanos I, John I,Nikepheros II etc).
Yeah, I think the Makedons are likely the best hope for a surviving Byzantium that stays a powerful nation and having an actual dynastic succession that matters, anything to improve stability. Honestly give them another century or two and we would likely still have a Greek Constantinople.
 
Lovely to see some love for Cerdic of Wessex and his descendents.

Other soft spots include the already mentioned Barcelona and (Valois) Burgundy.

Add in votes for (Breton) Dreux and, despite myself, York.
 
Plantagenets - but for more fun, let's make it specifically the main line, rather than their cadet branches Lancaster and York. I can think of a couple ways to manage it - Richard II's elder brother Edward of Angouleme survives (he died at age 5, so there's as much chance as not he's a better heir) or Richard and Anne of Bohemia leave a son and the overthrow goes the way Edward II's did, replaced by his son.

I suppose the Black Prince could live longer too, but unless you butterfly away his illness that seems unwise unless it's only a couple years combined with his elder son living.
 
The Plantagenets, specifically the House of York. I get that the Tudors descend from the Yorks via Elizabeth of York, but I've always been obsessed with what might have happened if Richard III had defeated Henry Tudor at Bosworth and what might have come after. Would he have married Elizabeth of York to combine the two lines - not so out of the realm of possibility if one considers the Habsburgs and their tradition of uncles marrying their nieces. It would likely have had a similar result that the York-Tudor marriage had - if you supported Edward IV's children over Richard, Elizabeth of York would have been Queen and would have passed her claim on to her sons, if you supported Richard then the rightful King was on his throne and had survived two deadly rebellions against him. By the time the next generation came along, things would have largely been smoothed out (though I imagine there would be some exceptions - would the de la Poles have caused trouble? etc). Or, alternatively, would Richard have sought international recognition through a foreign bride and perhaps kept his nieces close, perhaps pushing them into convents to prevent that bloodline from propagating?
 
All The Way Across the World in China: The Song Dynasty. Their advancements in a time of stagnation are astounding beyond words and surpass all such similar attempts elsewhere outright. They have the added bonus of not burning books older than their entire people. Which is a pretty big thing for me.

In Europe, though the Song are contemporary to the Middle-Ages, The Carolingians. For a singular brief moment, light shined out again... and then it was gone.
 
Kastrioti and Arianiti families in Albania. The former faded to irrelevance, which is kinda sad because Skanderbeg was in a good position to do a coup against the Ottomans and get Hungarian and Albanian support with it. The idea of a Kastrioti dynasty ruling Constantinople is...well..breathtaking.

Paleologos family were in northern Italy as well, potentially they could've taken over Savoy/Milano and whopped some Kebab ass.
 
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House of Wessex because fuck the greedy and backstabbing Godwins and William the Bastard.

House d'Hauteville because the Italo-Normans were bloody cool and what they achieved in Sicily was amazing.

House of Valois-Burgundy with Charles the Bold succeeding and becoming King of Burgundy, because a middle power dominating the Rhine and separating France and Germany would have been fascinating.

Ragnarrsons because Ragnarr Lodbrok may have been mythical but he was cool and who doesn't want the a family tree to start with people like Bjorn Ironside, Ivar the Boneless or Sigurd Snake-in-the-Eye.
 
Hmm.. what about giving a son (instead of two daughters) to Mathilde of Canossa's father? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boniface_III,_Margrave_of_Tuscany
Suddenly Center-North Italy is not as fragmented as OTL.
The d'Hauteville of Sicily (and I include their last scion, the Stupor Mundi) were also one of those dynasties with power and the potential for more.

Boniface had a son Frederick (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick,_Margrave_of_Tuscany), if he lives to adulthood and has sons he can then past on his realm.
 
I will be throwing my support in for the Hohenstauffens as well, such a fascinating dynasty.

Also it would be interesting if the Babenbergs of Austria had survived as well.
 
I also want the original dynasty of Tondo/Selurong and Majapahit to remain in lime light, they weren't because the Lakandula descendants seem to have outshined them..
 
Personally I would like the Jagiellons managed to survive. The fix is relatively simple, have Louis II not die at Mohacs. When Sigismund Augustus dies without issue, then Louis gets the Throne of Poland and Lithuania, as well as Hungary, Bohemia, and Croatia.

This should allow for a Jagiellon Ruled Superpower in Central Europe, provided Louis doesn't fuck up badly enough to get overthrown, which is a possibility. Apparently the Man was something of a Fop. . .
 
The Tudors could have really interesting had they survived, especially by Edward's or Elizabeth's descendants. Another Interesting one could be the House of Foix in Navarre by Francis Phoebus, or the house of Orange: true version.
 
The Tudors could have really interesting had they survived, especially by Edward's or Elizabeth's descendants. Another Interesting one could be the House of Foix in Navarre by Francis Phoebus, or the house of Orange: true version.

Good idea with the Tudor but the descendant of Elisabeth wouldn't be Tudor and if they took the name they would just create the second house of Tudor as House were generally passed down via the male line.
 
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