List of monarchs III

As a thought - maybe when a line is finished we could add a threadmark to the final post?

It might be nice to thread mark a couple of the finals for the various lists. It would make them easier to find.

I was thinking we should add a quote of the set up to the OP of the list- give credit to the originator. It means a little more work, you have to copy the quote part and paste it in, not just quote it. But I think it is worth it to credit the creator of the line.
 
I was thinking we should add a quote of the set up to the OP of the list- give credit to the originator. It means a little more work, you have to copy the quote part and paste it in, not just quote it. But I think it is worth it to credit the creator of the line.

Now that I think about it, we don't have to do all that. Just the first person who adds to the list names the creator and the post #.

EX:

@wwbgdiaslt in #5,067 set up: What If ... Edward the Black Prince dies in 1361
 
What If ... Edward the Black Prince dies in 1361

Kings of England
1327-1377: Edward III (House of Plantagenet)
1377-1399: Lionel I (House of Plantagenet) [1]
1399-1405: Percy I (House of Plantagenet) [2]
1405-1441: Edward IV (House of Plantagenet) [3]
1441-1479: Richard II (House of Plantagenet) [4]
1479-1492: Henry IV (House of Plantagenet) [5]
1492-1496: William III (House of Plantagenet) [6]

Kings of England and Ireland
1496-1516: William III (House of Plantagenet) [7]
1516-1536: Constantine I (House of Plantagenet) [8]
1536-1545: Charles I & Constance I (House of Plantagenet) [9]
1545-1567: Charles I (House of Plantagenet) [9]
1567-1579: Charles II (House of Plantagenet) [10]
1579-1587: James I (House of Plantagenet) [11]

Kings of England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland
1587-1613: James I & VII (House of Plantagenet) [11]
1613-1618: Nicholas I (House of Plantagenet) [12]

Emperors of the British Isles
1618-1624: Nicholas I (House of Plantagenet) [12]
1624-1695: James II & VIII (House of Plantagenet) [13]
1695-1698: Richard III (House of Plantagenet) [14]
1698-1734: James III & IX (House of Plantagenet) [15]
1734-1783: August I (House of Plantagenet) [16]
1783-1820: Philippa I (House of Plantagenet) [17]
1820-1871: James IV & X (House of Plantagenet) [18]


[1] Lionel of Antwerp/Clarence was the second son of Edward III, married to Elizabeth, Countess of Ulster, and subsequently widowed in 1363. Upon his elder brothers death in 1361, he became Prince of Wales and Heir Apparent. Upon being widowed, he had only one child - a daughter who survived to adulthood - and his father looked for a new wife for him. In 1366, he was married to Catherine of Luxembourg, the widowed daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles IV and the pair had four more children.

His reign saw the Peasants Revolt and the end of the Fifty Years War which lasted for almost 50 years after starting in 1337. This ended because Lionel was concerned about further peasant rebellions and the ensuing difficulties he was facing with Ireland and Scotland. Edward III had attempted to conquer Scotland and place Lionel's brother John on the Scottish throne, but this had ultimately failed and Lionel dispatched John to Ireland to put down unrest.

Lionel died in 1399 and was succeeded by his son, Percy I.

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A drawing of King Percy I of England
[2] Born in 1368, Percy was the first child and son of King Lionel I and Catherine of Luxembourg. A stubborn and prideful boy, who viewed that nearly all were beneath him, Percy showed great aspirations to become a military commander. He even once proclaimed to his father that he would be able to quash any revolt for him.

King Lionel I died in 1399, Percy became the new King of England. His style of governing was much more harsh and hotheaded than his father and frequently stamped down on those who opposed him. Percy soon adopted a new title, Sovereign of the English, as in the people of England, which he intended to become as synonymous as the title of King.

Three years after the Glyndŵr Rising had erupted in 1400, Percy personally led an army to the Welsh marches. Despite a cruel and long campaign of terror and death, the rebellion continued, however, the King was satisfied believing that the rebels would soon be defeated.

When he finally returned to the capital, he made plans to invade France. But, before he could set his plans into motion, Percy was found dead in his bed, most likely poisoned in his sleep. He was succeeded by his son, Edward.

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Kenneth Branagh as Edward IV in BBC's "The Plantagenets."
[3] Edward was the only son of Percy, born to him when he was still Prince of Wales in 1387. In 1386 Prince Percy married Joanna of Lorraine, daughter of John I, Duke of Lorraine. Joanna was the younger sister of Maria of Lorraine who was married to the Dauphin of France, who later would be Charles VIII of France. This marriage to the sister-in-law of the future king was an attempted rapprochement with France to build the peace at the end of the Fifty Year war by Edward's grandfather, King Lionel. Both Percy and Joanna were just 17 at their marriage.

Edward was born nine months later. His mother, the Princess of Wales doted on him. His father had little to do with him, in fact he had little to do with his wife also. The Prince and the Princess had separate apartments in the royal residence of Richmond Palace. The estrangement increased when Percy became King and many believed Queen Joanna was behind his poisoning in order to stop his intended invasion of her homeland.

Edward was 19 when he took the throne and he immediately ended the plans for his father's invasion of France. His mother, the Dowager Queen Joanna, was a main advisor during the first years of his reign. She was only 37 and soon remarried to Richard Mortimer, the 4th Earl of March (OOC: not OTL's Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl, as Philippa never married Edmund, the 3rd Earl in TTL.) Edward made Richard the Duke of March.

In 1407 Edward married Richard's cousin-once-removed on his mother's side, Lady Elizabeth FitzAlan of Arundel, who'd been fostered by Richard and his first wife, Claire of Kent, who'd been a lady-in-waiting to the Queen and died of the sweating sickness in 1401. (Duke Richard and Clair had had no children of their own.)

Edward was not like his father at all. His father's arrogance had assumed the rebellion in Wales was over after his personal intervention and cruelty. The truth was that it continued. King Edward now sent emissaries to meet with the Welsh rebels and listen to their grievances.

The solution offered by the King was that the Welsh would be given the same rights as the English, their lords seated in the House of Lords, and the burghers in the Commons, but Owain Glyndŵr must bend the knee. Owain refused. But the other Welsh lords were insistent that they take this victory and they forced him to accept. Edward was asked to let Owain continue his claim as the Prince of Wales if he submitted. Edward countered with offering him the title of the Duke of Powys. He reluctantly accepted after his Tudor relatives insisted.

From this point on, Edward's kingdom was at peace. Edward and Elizabeth had many children and England and Wales prospered in his reign. He died after a reign of near 36 years and was succeeded by Richard, Prince of Wales.

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Hugh Bonneville and Sally Hawkins playing Richard II with his wife, Maria of France, in BBC’s series, “The Plantagenets”
[4] Born in 1410 and named after his godfather, Richard Mortimer, the 1st Duke of March, as a child, Richard, Prince of Wales, enjoyed a happy childhood, with his parents and siblings.

His father, had a strong bond with his children, many future psychiatrists, believe that Edward was compensating for his own relationship with his father.

His education was a mixture of administrative training, learning Latin, French and Welsh, set to be an inclusive of all his people as well as military, with Edward instilling in him that war was only to be used as a last option, stating that God does not wish for his Christian soldiers to kill one another.

In 1430, his father arranged double wedding, with a marriage for 20 year old Richard, with 19 year old, Maria of France, a granddaughter of Charles VIII of France and Maria of Lorraine, via their eldest son, Charles, Grand Dauphin of France, along with his elder sister, Princess Joanna, marrying Charles, Petit Dauphin of France.

The pair would be as fertile as their parents, resulting in seven births before the death of his father, when Richard became king at the age of thirty one.

For his children and other children of nobility, Richard, wanting the future generations to have an outstanding education, he would commission a number of education facilities including a college on a town on the outskirts of Richmond, known as Kew College (In OTL Henry VI sets up Eton College near Windsor castle) and then later setting up another at Oxford, known as King’s College in his honour. (In OTL Henry VI sets up Kings College at Cambridge)

Richard reign was one of prosperity, with no wars resulting in a basic tax rate being collected from a large populated country, meant the treasury had additional funds at its disposal.

As well as education, Richard would see stones laid for St. George Cathedral, in Gloucester as well as St. David Cathedral, in Powys.

Richard was able to invest in the Cinque Ports in the Kent coast, converting them from joint military and trade purposes, to solely trade. While in the north, he arranged for better fortifications along the Scottish border.

Richard also improved infrastructure across the nation including roads that connected all major cities and towns in England and Wales.

In 1479, 68 year old, Richard collapsed during a meeting with Parliament, he was rushed to nearby bed, however had been found to have succumbed to a heart attack. He was succeeded by his son, Henry.

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Jacob Collins-Levy & Jodie Comer as King Henry IV & Queen Guinevere of BBC's "The Plantagenets."*
[5] Henry Plantagenet was the third child and second son of Richard, the then Prince of Wales, and his wife, Princess Maria. His older sister, Princess Eleanor, was born in 1431. He and his slightly older identical twin, Edward, were born in 1433. His younger siblings were Arthur, born in 1437, John, born in 1439, and another set of twins, Isabel and Joanna, born in 1441, only a few weeks before Richard ascended to the throne. Isabel and Joanna were not identical.

From birth, Prince Henry was the Earl of March, as his father had inherited the Duchy from his godfather, Richard Mortimer. When Richard became king, he granted the title of the Duke of March to Henry, making him the 3rd Duke at the age of seven. His older brother was made the Duke of Cornwall and Prince of Wales. All the princes and princesses were given intense education at Richmond Palace. In 1450, the two twin princes were the first royal children to attend University as they attended Oxford at King College.

After Oxford in 1455 the two princes married. Edward married a French Princess, Catherine Valois. Henry married Guinevere Tudor, the oldest daughter of the current Duke of Powys, Owain Tudor, who was five years his junior. As the Duchy of the March included Welsh lands (it was the Welsh March,) it made sense for Henry to marry a Welsh Princess. Harry and Gwen (as they were known) set up their household in the March and had no idea that he'd become King one day. By 1561 they had a number of children and it seemed their marriage, although arranged for political purposes, had quickly become a love match.

The same was not true for Edward and Catherine. Catherine and Edward just didn't like each other from the start. They did their marital duty and she conceived, but had a miscarriage. After that they went their separate ways. Although Edward had several mistresses, when rumors spread that the Princess was entertaining in her bed a French Knight who was visiting the court with the Princess' brother, the Dauphin Louis, he felt compelled to confront him, expecting the Knight, the Chevalier Pierre Flambeau, to deny and leave the court. Instead he admitted it, insulting the Prince, pointing out his own affairs, and calling him a 'louse.' Edward had no choice but to challenge him. They met on the tourney field in one of the last jousts in England. Edward died at the age of 28 in 1461 on the field when Flambeau's knobbed lance broke and a shard pierced the prince's chest. Catherine fled back to France with her brother and Flambeau, with whom she continued her affair.

Harry and Gwen were at the tourney and he witnessed his beloved brother's death. Suddenly he was the heir to the throne. When Harry, Gwen, and their children returned to the March, he was now the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cornwall as well as the Duke of the March. They were both young, she was 23 and he was 28, and continued to have children.

(Peace was preserved with France by a formal apology from the Dauphin, the Princess, and Flambeau, claiming the death of the Prince of Wales was an unfortunate accident and not the intent of the Chevalier.)

Eighteen years later, the 46 year old Harry became King Henry IV.

The most important event of King Henry's reign did not occur in England or Wales. It occurred half a world away when the "Admiral of the Seas," Cristoforo Colombo, sailing for the Empire of the Republic of Genoa, succeeded in crossing the Atlantic Ocean to what he thought was the Indies with a fleet of twenty ships.

Genoa was the dominant power in the Mediterranean, having taken parts of the former Byzantine Empire when it fell including Crimea, Cyprus, Crete, several Aegean Islands, and parts of the Peloponnese. During the 15th Century Genoa had also added Sicily, Malta, and conquered Granada (Including Gibraltar) and Western Morocco to their Empire, which had already included Corsica, Sardinia, and the northeast coast of Italy. Genoa and Portugal had been racing to see who could sail around Africa first and Genoa had also discovered the Canary Islands and colonized them. Colombo had been an important part of this exploration and expansion for Genoa. in 1483, he'd convinced the Doge and the Great Council of the Republic to finance his voyages to the West.

When Colombo returned to Europe in 1484 with his discovery of islands in the west, the news spread like wildfire and the race to explore was on. England and Wales was already ahead on this race, having worked to increase it's infrastructure for trade under Henry's father. He'd continued that, building ships and ports. While the other European powers of Castile, France, the Netherlands, and Norway rushed to establish themselves, England had the infrastructure.

In 1485, Henry commissioned his own exploration fleet of 35 ships to sail west, using the northern route that had led to Iceland and Greenland and the fabled Vinland. Hugo Montgomery was the Admiral of the Fleet and after sailing to Iceland, then Greenland, he sailed west and charted the east coast of Neustralia, as Montgomery named the new Continent. He charted it from across the strait separating Neustralia from Greenland down past the island he named New Caledonia, in the large bay he named the Caledonian Sea, then along the coast until he reached the end of the land and sailed into the Genoan Sea. He found several rivers and named them from native names: the Mohikun (Hudson), the Leneypea (Delaware), the Keshapik (James), and the Rickohawk (Savanah). His voyage took three years and he claimed the entire continent of Neustralia for England & Wale and left behind trading forts at the Caledonian Sea, the Mohikun, the Leneypea, and the Rickohawk. He returned to England with his ships laden with beaver pelts and astonished all with his stories.

In 1489 Montgomery sailed with a fleet of 100 ships and this time sailed southwest from Iceland and discovered the fishing banks in the seas east of New Caledonia, resupplied the trading forts, and explored further into the Caledonian Bay, discovering the Magna Huron River (St. Lawrence). He returned to England in 1492 to report to the King.

But the King had died when he'd been thrown off his horse while fox hunting in the March. So it was the news of the Fishing Banks and the Magna Huron were reported to his son, William of Dublin.

*The actors appeared younger than they should have in this scene as they had played Harry & Gwen from when they were young adults.

[6] The man who would one day grow to become the third of England's William was born in a quiet day of march in 1465 to then Prince Henry and Princess Guinevere, in a visit of the Princely couple to the Pale of Ireland. He would be the second and last of Henry's sons, led by a brood of five surviving older sisters and followed by other two. His brother Edmund would die as a young boy, which would see William quickly take up the mantle of Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall. Henry would be destined to a firm and varied education, as he learned almost six languages in his life and comprehended a few more. Following the footsteps of his father, William boud attend King's College in Oxford, where he would receive a secondary education in law, dialectics and diplomacy.

William would grow to be a man of beastly size, reaching almost two meters. He was, as recorded by historians, a handsome man, who held his hair short and his beard long, being also reported to be hairy. His first months as prince of Wales, residing in Ludlow had come to show the type of man he would be, brazen but loyal, intelligent and talented, but luckless. A very ambitious lad from a young age, William would use his prerogative as Prince of Wales to start what would be recorded in history of the "Welsh conquest of Ireland" (A obvious play of jokes, as Ireland, was conquered by England, but by the Prince of Wales and his "Welsh" army) as he would invade Leister and Connacht in early 82, conquering much of it in a fell swoop. The Irish campaign would where William would spend most of his time as Prince of Wales. perhaps his greatest personal achievement. It would serve as the stamp of approval that most of the English nobility would unusually stamp upon him, as William's conquests by 1492 were more than assured, and, his appeasement of both the Irish, who would come to see their future King in a new light after his conquest, and the many English nobles who got rewards on the island.[/B]

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William of Dublin, in his official portrait in his investiture as King of Ireland
The sudden death of his father, in 1492, would see William of Dublin, as he had been known until then, become William the III, of the House of Plantagenet. It was in this time that the news from the new world would come back to William as he was crowned - with England quickly hopping on breaking apparently rising Genoan domination of Columbia, as German cartographers would soon name the full continent, which, the English would in time adopt as well. William, as his close Portuguese-soon-to-be-Spanish cousins, would share with him. William would prepare many colonial ventures, sending many English, Welsh and Irishmen over the sea to England's new colonies in the Columbian East. The English would attempt to spread their colonists all over the East coast, with the majority settling in below the Hudson and the Rickohawk river. The further anglicized river bays of Mohican, Lenape, Kespeak and Rickhaw would see major the first and major settlements, with the Mohican river becoming home to the fledling city of New York, as the venture was done under the patronage of the Dukes of York, the Lenape river home to Williamston, Kespeak home to Montgomery and the Rickohaw home to Hudson, named after another English explorer of the time named Liam Hudson, with many more settlements spread in between.

It was also in the first year of his reign that William had his third child by his wife, Madalena, Infanta of Spain. The marriage had been done to cement relations with the soon to burst Empire of Spain, ruled under the reign of Henrique the I, son of the now both deceased Alfonso the V of Portugal-Castille and Isabel of Aragon, Madalena's brother. The Capet-Burgundians of Portugal had in less than a generation united the lands of the Castillian Lancasters and the Barcelona's of Aragon, and the patriotic fervor felt against Morocco and Genoa itself would see the newly risen Spanish Empire (A fun fact found by later Historians, William of England and Henry of Spain would both acquire their second royal and their imperial title, in that order, at the same time) conquered much of the west Mediterranean and the Canarias from Genoa, which would see the unified Spain sending their famous conquistadors into New Castille (Mexico and Central America), New Vizcaya (Colombia, Venezuela and Panama) alongside Pizzaro's conquest of the Inca Empire, establishing the third colony of New Navarre.

The Genoan themselves had only kept the island of Antonina (Puerto Rico), with the French settling Saint Domingue and the Spanish Cuba, with the English settling the Bahamas. The other two rising players in Colonial Columbia would be the United Kingdom of Sicily under the Angevins, and France under the recently crowned Burgundians, by far the richest state of Europe. The French would settle the aforementioned Saint Domingue, alongside Canada and Acadia above the Mohican colonies and Antartique by the platine river (Uruguay, Argentina, Chile).

This heavy rush of European states to America would see the birth of the short-lived Atlantic slave trade, as the Mediterranean Christian states would prefer the enslave the Muslim north Africans than the slowly Christianising Africans below the Sahara, with Jolof, Benin, and the Kongo all adopting Christianity on missions organized by the Pope and the Emperor of Spain.

The arisal of these all these settlements over all these vast lands would be fueled by an extreme population boom in France, England and Spain, but by this time most of these colonies, especially those dependent more on settlers, would be bare bones, but this would be a start and it would be these settlements and claims that the various European power would bring to the pope in the treaty of Oviedo, where the New World would be divided between the various powers with colonies in America.

William's reign would also face one of the greatest defeats of the English monarchy with the final loss on their land on the continent. The death of the last Valois's would see the Burgundian Dukes rise to the throne of France, uniting a vast realm with already another vast realm, making France extremely rich and powerful. An opportunity of alliance with the Habsburg Emperors of the Holy Roman Empire would be wasted by William, something which would want him to the rest of his days, with France defeating both powers separately. The Burgundian François of Charolais, also known as François the I of France, would be responsible for bringing Aquitaine, Gascony and Calais back into the French crown, defeating William in the battle of Talmond in 1507, handing William the greatest humiliation of his reign. It would see William turn an eye to the consolidation of his rule in England and Ireland, and continued expansion overseas.

William would thus die in 1516, succeeded by his son, Constantine.

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A painting of Constantine I
[8] Constantine was born in 1492, the last son of King William III and Infanta Madalena of Spain. Many at the court believed that the prince was insane as he showed various levels of obsessiveness when participating in his habits and interests. At that, he was often even compared to King Percy I of England. Although Constantine never seemed to pay attention to these people, in fact, he showed very little interest in people at all. He would frequently not be seen for several days and would only appear if his father or mother asked him to.

After he heard of his father’s defeat at the Battle of Talmond, it seemed that Constantine showed even more coldness towards the King. In one of his entries in his diary, Constantine stated that his father may have been a successful man in the isles, but that he had failed his people in the European mainland and the new world.

When he unexpectedly ascended to the throne, after that his elder brothers died in a ship explosion, Constantine immediately went to work and micro-managed nearly all aspects of running the functions of the state. He also showed a particular focus on expanding the English colonies. With the promises of land and titles, he encouraged people to go west, fight Indians, and take their lands. And, back at home, Constantine commenced a military build-up of the army and the navy to combat the French. During the process, he fired many generals who did not meet his standards, which were quite high.

Finally, in 1521, Constantine sent a declaration of war, which urged King François I to surrender his lands in Acadia and Canada. However, the King refused, still competent upon his victory over the English in 1507. Two years later, he was singing a different tune in the city of Carlsruhe, whereby treaty he was forced to give up most of France's colonial possessions. Though, some considered that he was quite lucky as Constantine made no attempt in taking France’s profitably Caribbean colonies.

For the rest of his reign, Constantine continued to improve the manners of producing value from England's new world colonies. In 1536, he died having never married or produced any heirs. He was succeeded by his younger sister, Constance, and her husband, Charles, their second cousin once removed, the Duke of York.

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Natalie Portman & Eric Bana as Constance & Charles in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[9] Constance Plantagenet was the first official reigning queen of England, Wales & Ireland, but only because the number two person in line for her brother's throne insisted on it; he was the Duke of York, her husband, the heir of the senior Plantagenet cadet line descended from Prince Arthur, the third son of Richard II, and oldest of Henry IV's two younger brothers. Richard had created the Duchy of York for his third son (and granted Henry the Duchy of March and his fourth son, John, the Duchy of Kent, also a new creation.)

The son of Arthur, Prince Charles, was the 2nd Duke of York and was Charles' grandfather. It was Prince Charles who was the Duke of York who financed the settlement of Neustralia, a term still used for England's colonial endeavor in eastern North Columbia, and had New York named after him. He also was close to King William's older sons, Prince William and Prince Henry, and a major supporter of William's efforts to retain their French provinces. He and his son, Arthur the Earl of March, were with the two princes in France and all of them died in the explosion of the ship that was transporting them home in 1507. The young Charles, only four years old, now was the 3rd Duke of York and the richest individual in the kingdom besides the King. He and his mother were brought into Richmond Palace to live with William. There he became close to the youngest child of William, his young daughter, Constance, also only four, eleven years younger than Constantine.

When Charles returned to his estates in York in 1523, he had married Constance, uniting the main Plantagenet line and the cadet line, with Constantine's blessings.

As Constantine had no children, the heir to his throne was Constance if women were allowed to inherit and Charles was if they followed Salic Law. It had never been an issue in the kingdom before. Now it became a matter for Parliament to settle. Those who wanted to follow the Salic Law used the precedent of Stephen of Blois succeeding Henry I, his uncle, instead of Maud, his daughter. Charles was adamant for the rights of his wife and convinced her brother the King to agree. So it was that Parliament decreed that women were eligible to inherit the throne after the male heirs took precedence. This was intentionally vague as it didn't define how distant a male heir needed to be to take precedent. But it was close enough for Constantine to issue a royal decree in 1528 that his sister and her husband were his joint heirs if he had no children.

Charles and Constance had three children in their marriage, all of them surviving to adulthood, all born before they took the throne in 1536.

The major issue before the King and Queen in their joint reign was religion. Many of the English had been interested in reform since the Wycliffe attempts to translate the Vulgate into English. Now that the Reformation had swept across the Continent and then divided into three versions (Lutheranism, Swiss Reformed, Anabaptists) there were sects in England, Wales, and Ireland (not so much in Ireland) who wanted the kingdom to follow suit. Charles and Constance were devout Catholics and Charles as a young man had written a treatise refuting the thinking of Luther and been granted the honorary title of "Defender of the Faith" by the Pope for it. On the throne they took this seriously and did their best to remove the Protestants from England. Unlike on the continent where this meant warfare and persecution, Charles & Constance followed a two fold path. Those who kept their religion private would not be investigated, even if someone accused them of holding heretical views. Those not able to do so were peacefully invited to leave the kingdom. Points of departure were the Netherlands where the Swiss Reformed option had taken over or Scotland, which also had moved in that direction. But another option was one of the provinces of Neustralia. Up the Mohican River from New York was an empty land (the natives didn't count in European eyes) and there these Protestants could settle, remain loyal English subject, yet pursue a divergent faith.

When Queen Constance died in 1545 at the age of 41 it was a shock to everyone. She died in childbirth as she'd gotten with child again at this late age. The child was still born and now the King was a widower. He never married again nor had a mistress. For the rest of his life, King Charles wore a Franciscan monk's habit and lived as if he had taken vows in his personal life, eschewing all luxuries.

He continued the policies he had pursued with Constance of building the navy, continued exploration of Columbia beyond Neustralia, including financing an explorer to sail around South Columbia and to the west coast of North Columbia. He also created a company to work for colonization in the West Indies Sea (what had originally been called the Genoan Sea) and the southeast coast of South Columbia. The colony there was called Constancia.

He died in his sleep. He hadn't been eating well in his last few months and had lost a lot of weight.

[10] Charles Plantagenet was the oldest child of his parents, born in 1526. He was ten-years-old when his uncle died, and his mother and father took the thrones. He was made the Prince of Wales shortly after their joint coronation. When Charles turned sixteen, he went to a university in Italy. It was there he met his lifetime friend, Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. It would be Cosimo who would encourage Charles' future patronage of the arts. Charles would eventually arrange a marriage between their houses.

Three years later, Charles would learn of his mother's passing and return to England. He became his father's trusted advisor for twelve years, taking over most of his duties when his health began to fail.

In the meantime, Charles arranged the marriages of his siblings and himself. In 1547, he would marry Mary of Scotland, who was nearly five years his senior, hoping to make peace with Scotland after years of tension. Despite their age difference, the two managed to have a happy marriage and a healthy sex life, managing to have eleven children, seven of whom lived to adulthood.

When he became king, Charles was eager to sponsor as many artists, composers and playwrights as he could. He was determined to make English renaissance successful, taking inspiration from both Italy and France.

As for the question of religion, Charles remained resolutely silent. It was well known that his wife was a member of the Swiss reform and practiced her religion openly. When it was remarked upon, Charles only stated "She prays to the same God." His refusal to even continue his parents' policies, instead letting heretics pray openly as long as they made no war. This lack of action caused a Catholic uprising. At the end, the Duke of Richmond famously declared "if they were hoping to force my brother's hand, it backfired badly." Indeed, Charles was increased at what he said was a most unchristian act. He lead the troops himself to crush the rebellion.

Sadly, this would be his undoing as he would be captured and executed by the rebel leaders. He was succeeded by his oldest son, James.

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Alan Cumming as James I & VII in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[11] Prince James, born in 1549, was the firstborn child of Charles and Mary. From birth he was the heir to the English, Welsh, and Irish throne and second in line for the Scottish throne behind his mother Mary, as her older brother, James VI Stewart, of whom he was named after, had never married to have legitimate issue. King James was twelve years older than his sister and had been more a parental figure from the death of their father, King James V, in 1530, when Mary was nine and James VI was 22 and became king of Scotland. When James VI died in 1680 at the age of 72, James Plantagenet was 31 and had been King of England, Wales, and Ireland for a year. His mother, the dowager Queen now became the reigning Queen of Scotland; James Plantagenet was first in line to the Scottish throne and was formally the Duke of Rothesay.

James had married a Medici, like his uncle the Duke of Richmond. His bride wasn't a niece of Cosmo like his uncle's wife, but his daughter, Jessica de' Medici, who was 15 when they married in 1566 when James was 17. Jessica was said to be the most beautiful woman in Europe and James doted on her. She was a northern Italian, blonde beauty. They had several children and James doted on them too.

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Gwyneth Paltrow as Queen Jessica in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
As King of England with a nominal Catholic bride, related to popes, but raised by his mother as a Presbyterian in the Church of Scotland's faith, the couple were a perfect example of the vision of England as a multi-religious community. One of James' first acts as King was to have Parliament formalize the idea that England was a place of religious toleration. The entire kingdom except the few rebels, supported this enthusiastically.

James was actually on the field of battle when he requested Parliament to pass the Act of Toleration for England and Wales. He didn't request the Irish Parliament to do this, but it was clear he intended to do so in the future as there was a large minority of Protestants in Ireland, mainly Anglo-Normans in the southeast and Scots Presbyterians in the north. (Ireland and England/Wales were not one united kingdom but two in personal union since William III.) As the dispatches were sent, he turned his attention to fight the remaining rebels and mounted battle.

The stronghold of the rebels was in Kent, where John Marlowe, the archbishop of Canterbury, the most important bishop in Catholic England, sat, where he had been supported by James' 4th cousin, Duke David Plantagenet, the 4th Duke of Kent, whom had been killed in battle against Charles II. But it was David's son, John, the 5th Duke, who had then led the rebels and captured and killed his king. However, his uncle, the younger brother of David, William Plantagenet, although as fiercely Catholic as the rest of the Kent Plantagenets, had remained loyal and was with James on the field when word reached them that John had committed regicide. It was the archbishop himself who brought the news and explained that despite his council, the young Duke had done the horrid deed. The archbishop now bowed the knee and swore loyalty, claiming his aim had never been regicide but simply to protect the rights of Catholics. James promised him their rights would be protected, which he did in the Act of Toleration.

The Battle of Canterbury in 1579 was a fierce battle and the victory of the King and his loyalists was overwhelming as many across the kingdom, Catholic as well as Protestant, had flocked to join the new King. The Archbishop John Marlowe blessed the royal forces and many of the rebels fled from the superior numbers.

Duke John was captured and arrested, as were those who'd assisted him in killing Charles II instead of opposing him. The rest were granted pardons if they swore loyalty to the King and accepted that England/Wales was going to be a land of religious toleration. Most did.

The trial of Duke John was not like the trial he'd done on his king where he was judge, jury, and executioner. James insisted it be the fairest trial ever. It wasn't until June of 1580 that it ended, the Duke was found guilty of murder, and beheaded. James granted the Duchy to William Plantagenet, who became the sixth Duke. This generosity of the King to the former rebels and other members of the Kent Plantagenet cadet line ended the religious divisions in the kingdom. It was clear to the Catholics that religious toleration meant everyone, Catholic and Protestant (and Jew) would be respected, treated as full Englishmen or Welsh with full rights.

By 1584, his Irish kingdom had followed suit, despite the Catholic majority being much larger than in England/Wales where it was only a slight majority. Scotland was the opposite. There the nation was Presbyterian and all other forms of worship were required to be in secret. After Ireland passed its Act of Toleration, James journeyed to Scotland and spoke to the Parliament, making it clear if he became king on his mother's death he would ask for a similar act there and would not enforce any persecution of Catholics, other kinds of Protestants, or Jews. It was a long debate, but in 1587, as Queen Mary lay dying in her chambers, the Scots Parliament passed their Act of Toleration and extended an invitation to James to be their King on his mother's death. It was only a few weeks later that James became the seventh of his name to be King of Scotland, with him now being the monarch of three kingdoms in personal union. (England and Wales were one kingdom with two ethnicities.)

The British renaissance moved full ahead under James, he supported play-writes and often attended the theatre. He continued his father's sponsorship of the arts, and focused on architecture. His biggest building project was a new palace to replace the decaying Richmond Palace. Built in the heart of London, Plantagenet Palace was a magnificent structure of marble that became the most significant building in London.

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Plantagenet Palace with the Thames behind it.
The other important part of his reign was the tension between the English colonial expansion and the Spanish one. Both empire claimed Florida, the Spanish name given to the peninsula in the southeast of North Columbia. Finally in 1603 this tension broke into open warfare in Florida and that expanded into a general colonial war in not only the West Indies Sea but in Europe as nations divided up between which side they supported. Genoa, Tuscany, the Papal States, and Morocco took the side of England. France and Sweden took the side of Spain, hoping this might be their opportunity to weaken their main rival.

This became known as the Twelve Years War due to its length. King James died before it was done, although by 1613 it was clear that northern Florida was in English hands and the island chain to the east of lower Florida, the Bahamas.

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Emperor Nicholas I out for a walk
[12] Born in 1570, Prince Nicholas was the second son of King James I & VII and Princess Jessica de' Medici. Upon the death of his baby brother, William, Nicholas became the first in line to the throne of the kingdoms. Nicholas, a smart child with the propensity to learn, greatly enjoyed participating in the social aspects of the royal court, though he always maintained an allure of honour, respectability, and seriousness. He never took part in things that he labelled to be ''morally depraved''.

At his own suggestion to improve relations with the Holy Roman Empire, a marriage was arranged between him and Princess Anna Maria, who was the sole child of Francis II, King of the Romans and son of Emperor Frederick VI. Soon after their marriage, in 1590, Nicholas and his wife were blessed with their first child. Later on, Nicholas' marriage to Anna Maria would help maintain neutrality from Austria and most of the Holy Roman Empire during the Twelve Years' War.

Speaking of which, when the war dragged on, Nicholas began to paint several paintings, most of which typically depicted great victories against the Spanish and their allies. His father was so impressed by these paintings that the King ordered the construction of what would later become the National Museum of the Arts, so they could be exhibited. During this time, Nicholas also began to be influenced by the writings of John Dour, a British Renaissance writer and advocate for Unional Nationalism, which called for a more centralized form of government, opposed regionalism, and would promote a sense of patriotism to the Isles as a whole.

When his father died, Nicholas was left to oversee the end of the Twelve Years' War. Two years later, Florida was completely secured and with this, Nicholas renamed it to Campestris (meaning Flatland in Latin), to rid it of its Spanish name. And, the following years, Nicholas and his supporters began to work on executing John Dour’s ideas. Although, in the end, they did not succeed in ridding the isles of regional parliaments, they successfully implemented their wanted form of nationalism, Nicholas I proclaiming himself, Emperor of the Isles.

The Emperor died in 1624 and was succeeded by his grandson, Prince James.

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Rufus Sewell as the King Emperor James II & VIII in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[13] James, Prince of Wales, Duke of the March, Cornwall, Rothesay and Cork, became the heir to the various thrones of the British Isles in 1611 when he was not yet a year old when his father, Prince William, the previous Prince of Wales, Duke of the March, Cornwall, Rothesay and Cork, died in the last battle of the 12 Years War. Prince William was only 20 years old and his young bride was a year younger. They'd married in 1609. She was Hilde of Brunswick-Lüneburg, one of the small duchies of the Holy Roman Empire, which was an ally of the British Kingdoms in the war.

It was Swedish forces that had invaded the Holy Roman Empire, hoping to recover control of the southern shore of the Baltic Sea that had once been part of their Empire, which at this point included Finland, Norway, Denmark, and the lands on the southeastern shore of the sea. William's father, King Nicholas, had allied with the Germans and had sent William to the German lands often as a child to visit his mother's relatives and cement the relationship. Hilde and William were a love match and William along with her older brother Ernst, and William's best friend, the slightly older Earl of Kent, Richard Plantagenet of Kent, were a trio of drinking friends, gamblers, and soldiers. (Richard was the son of Harold Plantagenet, the 6th Duke of Kent, who'd fought alongside his father, William the Loyal, the 5th Duke, for King James I against his cousin the Regicidal Duke.)

These three led a combined Brunswickian/British force to face the Swedes in Saxony. The Battle was a decisive victory for the various German and British forces against the Swedes, who fled back across the Baltic. But even in victorious battles there are losses and in this battle it was the young heir to the British Thrones who was one of them. Ernst and Richard brought Hilde the news as she waited back at home with Richard's wife, the very pregnant Lady Childia Northrop of Sussex.

So it was that young James never knew his father. He also was distant from his grandfather, as Princess Hilde chose to live with Richard the Earl of Kent and her best friend Lady Childia, in Canterbury with Duke Harold. In 1611 Childia gave birth to a girl they named Elizabeth.

It was in 1618, when James was not yet eight years old, that the various British Kingdoms' thrones were consolidated into one Imperial Throne. Although the kingdoms remained separate with separate Parliaments and ministers, the union was no longer personal, but a permanent feature of one Emperor ruling all the Kingdoms. By this point, it was clear the two young children were inseparable and the parents and grandparents were already talking about a future marriage. Nicholas approved of uniting the ruling Plantagenets with the Kent line that had served him and his father so well during and after the rebellion. Duke Harold, as his father before him, was a leading figure in the kingdom, often serving as the Chancellor of the Treasury and always as an advisor to the King, which was a main reason that the King's heir was fostered to him. A marriage between James and Elizabeth seemed both politically right as well as right in that the two youngsters had already had a 'play marriage'.

Both were trained and educated to someday be future rulers of the Empire. They learned not only their English letters, but also Welsh, Irish Gaelic, Scots Gaelic, Italian, and German. They received the best scientific education of the time and a philosophical instruction in the values of beauty, reason, and tolerance. They were instructed by Catholic Priests, Presbyterian Ministers, and Lutheran Pastors from Hilde's home.

When his grandfather died, James was 14 and he was by then formally betrothed to Lady Elizabeth, age 13. There was no question who should be regent and that was Duke Harold. He and his entire family moved into Plantagenet Palace with the Dowager Queen Ann Marie, and James and Elizabeth's education continued. James had desired to go to Oxford like his ancestors and study at King's College, but now that he was the King of King's College, it was not feasible. Instead his education in history, governance, law, and the geography of the world took place inside the vast complex that was Plantagenet Palace.

In 1628 on his 18th Birthday, the young King formally took control of his Empire, although in truth little changed. The last four years of his education had included his future grandfather-in-law often discussing with him all matters before the throne before making a decision. As he got older more and more he was making decisions to then be approved or not by the Regent. After Harold was no long the Regent, but just the Chancellor of the Treasury, the final choice was supposedly James' decision, but he still relied heavily on the old man.

In 1632 James and Elizabeth were wed and they immediately started a family. Early the next year, only days after Elizabeth announced she was with child, Duke Harold died at the age of 78. Now James could only turn to his foster grandfather for advice in his imagination, which he did for the rest of his life.

There were no more major wars in his reign, but there were colonial skirmishes. It seemed, however, the powers of Europe did not want to fight each other at home, having been traumatized by the horrors of the 12 Years War. But a War with the Spanish was fought in the late 1630s over Constancia in South Columbia . In the end the British had to surrender this distant colony to the Spanish Empire, who renamed it for the redwood trees that grew there as "Brazil". In balance, the Spanish islands in the West Indies Sea of Hamica and Hispaniola were taken by the British, renamed Jamaica and Bethania, after the King and Queen. However, twenty years later, the western part of Bethania was lost to the French who'd been using the large bay there since before the British took it as a harbor for their privateers.

In the 1660s James sent explorers to the north to chart the large bay there and seek a northwest passage. One was not found then but the Bay was charted and determined to be another route to the fur lands of upper Canada. It was named James Bay. James also sent explorers up the Magna Huron River to explore the great lakes of the interior. By the 1680s they had discovered the upper reaches of the great inland river that flowed into the Gulf of Florida (OTL Gulf of Mexico) of which the Spanish had discovered its mouth and named it the Mizzizzippi, from the local native term. The British called the same river the Minnesota and the land drained by its upper reaches by the same name.

These colonial enterprises brought vast wealth to the British Empire. From the West Indies Sea came sugar, molasses, and rum. From the southern provinces of Neustralia came tobacco and indigo, while from the northern provinces came maple syrup and cod from the East New Caldonian Banks. But the biggest source of wealth was from the fur trade.

Not only did the British Isles have the Canadian Fur trade, especially in beaver, they also had another source of fur that no one else in Western Europe had. When King James sent out explorers to the north and west to find a Northwest Passage in the 1660s, he also sent out explorers to the north and east to find a Northeast Passage. Like those who went west, they couldn't find a passage taking them all the way to the Far East, but again they discovered a new sea- in this case the White Sea north of Russia and east of Scandinavia. The Russian Muscovites had already reached the White Sea and built a port when in 1667 British ships sailed into their port and established a special relationship with Russia, which still was distant from the west, having not reached either the Black Sea to its south nor the Baltic to its west. Russia was expanding east across the Urals into Siberia and by the end of James' reign would reach the Pacific. This was a source of fur too that rivaled Canada. Britain had a monopoly on the Russian fur trade of beaver, sable, and once the Russian reached the Pacific, sea otter. For Russia it meant the manufactured goods of Britain, its textiles, the Cod of the Atlantic, tobacco and rum. Once Britain reached India, it meant tea also. Both nations grew rich by this trade and Russia began to become more and more European.

If the Kings before James had wanted to make Britain, and especially London, a place of grandeur and glory, James II now had the means and wealth to do so. Plantagenet Palace became a Mecca of beauty and wealth. Vast gardens with magnificent lawns for croquet, tennis, lawn bowling, and golf were created in the courtyards of the Palace and the lands surrounding it.

James had a vast and magnificent building created to match the Palace for Parliament and a Cathedral in London with a myriad of chapels in it so all the faiths of the Empire, including Judaism, could meet and worship along side each other in separate places in the same vast complex. Using the new science a real clock tower was added to the Tower of London, that now became a museum. This had a giant clock that could be seen by all below that was lit at night like a lighthouse and great bells that rang the hours. London Bridge was rebuilt and the shores of the Thames were changed from mud banks to stone with walk ways along it.

Inside Plantagenet Palace it was all silk, satin, fine crystal, porcelain, art, and gold. Especially gold. Music was everywhere and fashion was vital. The nobility from the three kingdoms spent most of their time at the Palace instead of their estates.

James was called the King Emperor of Gold and Elizabeth was called the Goddess of Beauty.

James lived until he was 85 and when he died he had many grandchildren and great grandchildren and the British Empire was the most powerful and wealthiest nation in Europe.

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George Blagden as Richard III Plantagenet in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[14] Born the third child of six but the oldest son, his parents named him after the Duke of Kent and close advisor (the second king to be named Richard after a Duke close to the throne); they never expected it would be a perfect match for his nickname, “Rich Richard”.

As the son and heir to the King Emperor of Gold, as well as the nickname, he gained the title, Prince of Wealth.

Growing up, the Prince surrounded himself with a variety of young attractive nobility of all genders indulging in immoral conduct, particularly promiscuity. He was famed for taking many lovers, often elevating them to high positions for as long as they held his interest and then pensioning them off with gifts of titles, positions and estates.

In 1666, the philandering Prince Richard was forced to marry and chose as his bride, Duchess Amelia Dorothea of Hesse-Saxe-Gotha (1639–1709), daughter of Grand Duke Albert II and Charlotte Bourbon of Saint-Cloud (cadet of the Orléans branch.)

The marriage was an unhappy one, Amelia was shocked by her husband’s lifestyle, with the couple drifting and eventually living apart. Amelia would reside with her children at Winchester, avoiding the sinful acts happening in London, although the pair would share mutual respect at prestigious events and share a few solitary nights together to have more children.

His time as Prince of Wales was spent supporting the arts, becoming patrons of many artists, composers, musicians and writers, magnifying the beauty around him.

In 1695, 60 year old, Richard became Emperor, however by this point, he was showing the tertiary effects of syphilis and his body has began to waste away, at his coronation in 1696, many commented how it looked more like a gaunt skeleton had be crowned, rather than the most powerful man in the world.

Years of living fast had caught up and the Emperor would be dead within a couple of years from his succession. His death was mourned by his favorites, who soon found a cold future was upon them, with the succession of his son, James.

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Emperor James III & IX of the British Isles in 1721
[15] Prince James was born in 1667 as the first child of Richard, the then Prince of Wales, and Duchess Amelia Dorothea of Hesse-Saxe-Gotha. During his childhood, James spent more time with his mother and siblings at Winchester than with his father in London, which would have an influence on his personal life. He attended King's Collage at Oxford where he became one of the most intelligent people of his time, and would tell his friends a lot of facts.

In 1690, James married Sophia of Brunswick-Hanover (1665-1748), the daughter of Duke Maximilian Augustus and Elizabeth of Bavaria. Unlike his parents marriage, his own marriage was much more happy, as the couple loved each other and would have seven children together.

Upon becoming Emperor of the British Isles in 1698, James continued the fur trade that started in his grandfather's reign and used the vast wealth he got from it to build palaces that showed off the magnificence of Britain, including the Jacobite Palace, which has a blend of western and Russian styles of construction.

Europe during James’ reign saw many changes, including the spread of Unional Nationalism in countries like Sweden (which renamed itself as Scandinavia in 1721) and the Holy Roman Empire (which started a process of centralizing), and the Ottoman War (1703-1714), where the Ottoman Empire was defeated and the city of Constantinople taken by the Genovese (Now known as the Republic of Genoa-Byzantine).

Meanwhile in the New World, the British fought a war against the Spanish in the mid 1720s. In the end, Britain managed to take back the southern part of Brazil from Spain, which they renamed back to Constancia. This meant that Britain now had a colony bordering the French colony of Antartique, which Constantine I had wanted to take from the French back in the 1500's.

James died in 1734 at the age of 67, surrounded by his family. He was succeeded by his son, Augustus.

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Rip Torn as Augustus I Plantagenet in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[16] Augustus was born in the year 1700 on Epiphany Day. He was the fourth child and first son of King James and Queen Sophia and was named after his grandfathers as Maximillian Augustus Richard Plantagenet, but was known as Augustus and to those close to him, 'Gus.' He was the first of the heirs to the throne to study at university at the University of Edinburgh instead of Oxford.

He took a commission in the Imperial Navy and insisted he serve as a real officer. Although the Russians now had a port on the Baltic Sea, in fact it was their capital, St. Thomasburg, founded by Tsar Thomas I the Great Romanov in 1703, the Russian Fur trade still was for the British Empire more profitable in the northern route to the White Sea as the Scandinavian Empire charged tolls for all ships of other nations entering or exiting the Baltic and high tariffs on all trade goods on those ships. So it was that as a young officer he served on the HMS Hugo Montgomery from 1722 until 1725. When the Russians realized the Prince of Wales was regularly visiting them at Arcangel, the Tsar Thomas II, journeyed there to meet him in 1724 along with his family, including his 21 year old daughter Princess Natasha Romanov. The Prince spent a few days with the Romanovs and a marriage was arranged, if approved by King James, between the Princess and the Prince. James approved and in 1726, the Princess journeyed to London from St. Thomasburg. (It was more economical for non-traders to use the Baltic route and pay the toll.)

The couple wed the following year and took up residence in a luxurious set of apartments in Plantagenet Palace. The extravagance of decorations and furnishings still were a part of that Palace, but the extravagance in lifestyle had diminished tremendously in the reign of King James. By the time Augustus became king at the age of 34 upon his father's death, he and Natasha had four children. The new Queen spoke perfect English (in fact all Russians spoke the other European languages with a British accent as English was the second language of the St. Thomasburg Court.)

It was during Augustus' reign that the forces of Unional Nationalism finally united the three kingdoms into one united empire in the Act of Imperial Unity of 1738. One Parliament now met in London with members from all three kingdoms. (Neustralia, Canada, and Constancia did not send members to Parliament, but had their own local legislative bodies and appointed Imperial Governors for each province [Neustralia had several provinces as did Canada.])

It was also in this period that the Prime Minister became a tradition that it always was held by the majority leader of the Parliament and all ministers in the Imperial Government were members of the House of Commons of the majority party.

The Emperor organized the various trading companies that traded with India, the East Indies, China, and Japan (which remained open to the West) into one Company with an Imperial Charter: The British Oriental Trading Company.

During the reign of Emperor Augustus, the burgeoning Industrial Revolution took off with more and more manufacturing of textiles being done with steam powered machines.

Despite being a land of religious tolerance, or maybe due to it, the mid 18th Century saw what came to be called "The Great Revival" sweep the land. It started in the English Lutheran Church under the Wesley Brothers, Henry the Preacher and Geoffrey the Hymn Writer, and spread to all faiths. Those holding these new religious views were known as Methodists due to their insistence on strict methods of personal piety in prayer, meditation, and study.

There were several wars that the Empire fought during his reign, but they all were limited affairs of small armies facing each other on the field of battle and didn't affect most folk. Britain fought for the Independence of Savoy from Burgundy-France in the Savoy War of 1744, which saw Burgundy-France defeated. In 1767-1770, the Empire supported the Portuguese in their attempt to separate from the Spainish. Although it failed in Iberia, the Spanish Empire's colony of Northern Brazil, Constancia's neighbor , declared itself independent. As most of its settlers were Portuguese and not Aragonese, Catalonian, or Castilian, they had joined the war for separation and they achieved it. Finally there was the War of 1782 in which the Empire and Burgundy-France fought over rights in India. This was an easy victory for the Empire and the British Oriental Trading Company now had a monopoly on trade with the Sub-Continent.

When the news reached the court, the Emperor listened attentively and then interrupted the proceeding with a coughing fit. He had to retire to bed and from then on he was bed ridden. Seven months later in early 1783, just past his 83rd birthday, he died. During that time his granddaughter, Philippa, Princess of Wales, who then succeeded him, had acted as Regent.

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Golda Rosheuvel as Empress Philippa in Season 3, Episode 4 of the BBC production, "The Plantagenets"

(17) Philippa of Wales, born in 1762 was granddaughter of Augustus by his son, Augustus, Prince of Wales. Married at 18 to a second cousin, Leopold of Sweden, they shared the same great grandfather James and thus their children would members of the House of Plantagenet. In honour of his future role as consort and father of future monarchs, Augustus created Leopold as Duke of Plantagenet.

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Luke Newton as Leopold Plantagenet of Sweden, Duke of Plantagenet, in season 3, Episode 4 of the BBC production, "The Plantagenets"

Philippa father Augustus had married Clara of Constancia, a minor Portuguese noble who may have had African heritage. This was contested at the time but later research has confirmed that she did have African heritage. She became Regent for her grandfather after his convalescence, and acquited herself remarkably well, when she became empress she petitioned for Leopold to become Emperor Consort but Parliament refused, agreeing only to give him precedence over everyone except the infant Prince of Wales, their first of ten children.

Philippa ruled from 1783 to 1820 and presided over a period known as The Philippine Age, whilst her grandfather had put much focus on international status, Philippa put much effort into national infrastructure, including canal networks and a network of new shipyards, sponsored farming and animal husbandry projects in a determination that the home nation would be virtually self sufficient.

By 1820, Leopold had died and Philippa was showing signs of exhaustion. In a surprising move, she voluntarily abdicated in favour of James, Prince of Wales and retired to Scotland before her death in 1825.

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[18] James, was born in 1782, the eldest of 10 children born to Prince Leopold, Duke of Plantagenet and Princess Regent, Philipp of Wales, being named after their common ancestor. Like their mother, James and his siblings, had matching complexions, inherited from their African heritage.
Although ailing in health, Emperor Augustus, from his royal bedchamber would dote on his great grandson, naming him Duke of Cambridge and seeing him on the days he felt able to entertain.

A year after his birth, his elderly great grandfather, died and his mother, became Empress and James was elevated to Prince of Wales.
At 16, James attend King’s College, Oxford and in 1802, left becoming the first member of the royal family to receive Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

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Dev Patel and Rosalind Eleazar playing James and Theodora.

In 1806, James married Theodora, Grand Duchess of the Genoa-Byzantine Empire, the pair had be corresponding with each other for years, after James had befriended her brother, Grand Duke, Alexander, during their time at Oxford. James and Theodora, would enjoy a happy marriage, similar to his own parents, although not as many children we

This wedding would be followed in quick succession by marriages of his sisters, in 1807, Princess Natasha married, Theodora and Alexander’s older brother, Emperor Constantine of Genoa-Byzantine and Princess Clara would marry their cousin James, Crown Prince of Sweden/Scandinavia (Can we check as I believe that Ultranationalist changed the names in a previous post), while in 1808, Princess Augusta married Charles, Dauphin of Burgandy-France and Princess Emily married John, Hereditary Prince of Portugal.

With these marriages, James, soon became known as Uncle James, to many future leaders of Europe and would see peace not only for his empire but also amongst the great powers.

Upon the abdication of his mother, 38 year old, James held, thank giving celebrations in her honour and vowed to continue the Philippine Age.
Not even then could people imagine how the next 51 years, which became (/began incase the next monarch is a James) the Jacobite Era.
Significant innovations in science, engineering and technology during this era, would see many commenting how this felt like the second renaissance, with prominent figures such as Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Charles Darwin, showing how great the empire was.

With his mother, retiring to Scotland, James would invest money into the railway industry, purchasing the royal family their own locomotive, which would allow James to do day visits to his mother on a weekly basic and being back to London the next day. The railway industry also opened up Britain to the average citizens to travel and visit all over.

At 89 years old, Emperor James had overseen great develops in his own Empire as well as across the world and would die peacefully, succeeded by his _____________, ____________.
 
TheBeanieBaron's Index of Lists
Nice! Could you post it?
Sure! (although I have tweak it from the original.)

What if William Adelin survived the White Ship disaster? (POD: 1120) [Set up by Shiva in #1]
What if Duke Francesco Sforza I annexed Genoa to the Duchy of Milan in 1461? (POD: 1461) {Set up by CaptainAmerica in #38]
What if Nyatsimba Mutota didn't abandon Great Zimbabwe after conquering Mutapa? (POD: 1430) [Set up by Ikny in #65]
Charlotte still dies in 1817, but her son survives infancy (POD: 1817) [Set up by PoorBoy in #87]
What if Henry Tudor and Richard III both died at the Battle of Bosworth Field? (POD: 1485) [Set up by Shiva in #86]
What if Du'a Khan successfully conquers the Delhi Sultanate? (POD: 1287) [Set up by Badshah in #113]
What if King Erik VII of Denmark and the Union of Kalmar was able to solidify his rule? (POD: 1412) [Set up by CaptainAmerica in #146]
What if Louis VII and Eleanor of Aquitaine's second child was a son? (POD: 1151) [Set up by AngelQueen in #167]
What if Otto II was killed during the War of the Three Henries (977-978)? (POD: 977) [Set up by Jonathan in #217]
What if Henri III of France managed to have a son? (POD: 1575) [Set up by Shiva in #267]
What if Stephen didn't usurp the throne of England? (POD: 1135) [Set up by KingofArkham in #285]
Duke FRIEDRICH II (Duke of Babenberg) had a son who succeeded him in 1246 - Butterflying away the Hapsburgs (in Austria). (POD: 1229) [Set up by KingofArkham in #334]
What if the daughter of Juan and Margaret, the Prince and Princess of Asturias, was born live in December 1497, instead of stillborn, leaving the girl as the heir to her grandparents, Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon? (POD: 1497) [Set up by AngelQueen in #366]
Lothair doesn't divide the Holy Roman Empire between his sons (POD: 813, ED: 1366) [Set up by Baconheimer in #396]
Charles II never reachs maturity (POD: 1672, ED: 1857) [Set up by HappyCommie in #425]
Bezprym is granted Nitra (POD: 1032) [Set up by kasumigenx in #436]
What if Lambert Simnel's rebellion was successful? (POD: 1487)
Gustav Adolf survives the battle of Lützen (POD: 1632, ED: 1927)
What if Charles II escaped to America? (POD: 1649)
Austria, Castile-Aragon, and England more robustly defend Anne of Brittany's marriage to Maximilian of Austria (POD: 1490)
The Lineage of William de Bohun, Earl of Northampton continues (POD: 1337)
What if Casimir IV and Margaret of Masovia had issue? (POD: 1369, ED: 1934) [Set up by kasumigenx in #631]
Casimir III dies an decade earlier (POD: 1360)
What if William III of Sicily fled to Malta? (POD: 1194)
Richard, Duke of York, survives and escapes the Lancastrian attack at Sandal Castle in 1460. His son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland, is still murdered, and his eldest son, Edward, still takes London and is able to proclaim his father as King there. (POD: 1460)
Constantine XI Palaiologos was able to live (POD: 1453)
Æthelwold, nephew of Alfred the Great, becomes King of Wessex (POD: 871)
Alfonso IX did not have a son with Queen Berengaria of Castile (POD: 1196)
Guthrum is successful in conquering Wessex (POD: 878)
William Adelin survives (POD: 1120)
Henri d'Artois, Comte de Chambord agress to the compromise flag with both the tricolour and fleur de lys. (POD: 1871)
Henri I, Duke of Guise won the War of the Three Henrys (POD: 1588)
Ferdinand II's son, John of Girona survived infancy (POD: 1509)
King Henry V does not die at the siege of Meaux (POD: 1422)
What if Mary I of England managed to have a single son? (POD: 1555, ED: 2012)
Edward, the Black Prince of Wales survives (POD: 1376)
Christopher of Bavaria survives (POD: 1448, ED: 1955)
George Washington accepts the crown after a pro-Monarchy coup. (POD: 1783)
The Crusader Kingdom of Armenia defeats the Mamluks with assistance from the Catholic nations (POD: 1375, ED: 1915)
What if John of Brandenburg survived childhood? (POD: 1454, ED: 1838)
What if Harold Godwinson defeated William of Normandy and Harald Hardrada? (POD: 1066)
A different Belgian monarchy (POD: 1830)
What if Austria won the War of the Spainsh Succession, decisively. (POD: 1701)
An independent Ukrainian monarchy (POD: 1855)
What if William Stanley, 6th Earl of Derby (whose maternal great-great-grandparents were Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York via their daughter, Mary Tudor) becomes king of England? (POD: 1603)
Charles the Bold won the Burgundian Wars (POD: 1477)
WI Justinian II was able to defeat Leontios in 695 AD? (POD: 695, ED: 1798)
The Gun powder plot goes off as planned killing King James along with Prince Henry of Wales (POD: 1605)
After the revolutionary war, George Washington becomes absolute monarch of the United Kingdom of America (POD: 1782, ED: 1901)
Catherine of Aragon was born a boy. (POD: 1485)
What if Hans Hermann von Katte assassinated Frederick William I? (POD: 1730)
Charlotte, Princess of Wales survives (POD: 1817)
Anne Boleyn has a second daughter in 1535 (POD: 1535)
Frederick, Prince of Wales lives longer (POD: 1751)
James II, his family and most of his loyal followers fled to Ireland after the Glorious Revolution of 1688. (POD: 1688)
An independent Corsica following the Congress of Vienna (POD: 1815)
Edward the Black Prince survives (POD: 1376)
What if Charles II of Spain and Maria Anna of Neuburg had a "son"... (POD: 1691) [Set up by Shiva in #1,893]
What if smallpox hadn't hit the Bourbon royal family in 1711? (POD: 1711) [Set up by Josh Poynter in #1,908]
The Miracle of House Bathory (POD: 1577) [Set up by marcinL in #1,920]
What if Sancho of Majorca had surviving issue? (POD: 1325) [Set up by The_Last_Plantagenet in #1,922]
Christina, Queen of Sweden marries Gaston, Duke of Orleans (POD: 1654)
Stephen I of England recovers from the illness that killed him (POD: 1154)
Oliver Cromwell is made King of the British Commonwealth (POD: 1649)
What if the Constitutional Convention of the United States had established a monarchy as the Executive Branch instead of a presidency and George Washington had been made the first king of the United States? (POD: 1787)
What if Emperor Napoleon III had won the Franco-Prussian War and not been disposed? (POD: 1870)
What if Henry V was killed at the Battle of Agincourt? (POD: 1415)
What if Dom Pedro II hadn't been deposed but had died during his trip abroad while Isabel was regent and she'd became Empress and defeated the Republican coup? (POD: 1888) [Set up by Asharella in #2,220]
What if Richard III had won the Battle of Bosworth Field? (POD: 1485)
What if Louis Phillipe, Duke of Orleans was invited to be the King of Italy in 1815? (POD: 1815)
What if Emperor Napoleon I of France was married to Anna Pavlovna of Russia, in 1810, after failing to secure her elder sister Ekaterina. (POD: 1810)
What if Alexander the Great had not died a young man, but had lived to secure his Empire and pass it to his son, Alexander IV? (POD: 323 BC, ED: 63 BC)
What if Prince William, Duke of Glouchester, the son of Queen Anne, had not been born infected with meningitis and had been healthy? (POD: 1689, ED: 1919)
What if the Kingdom of Naples defeated France and Spain in the Second Italian War? (POD: 1499)
What if Princess Charlotte's child born in 1817 hadn't been still born? (POD: 1817)
What if George Washington was declared King of America when the revolution was over? (POD: 1788)
What if Edward Seymour, Lord Beauchamp of Hatch, had taken the throne instead of James VI Stuart of Scotland on the death of Queen Elizabeth? (POD: 1603)
The Constitution Act of 1867 proclaims Canadian Federation under an invited constitutional monarchy. (POD: 1867)
What if Albert Kamehameha had lived to adulthood. (POD: 1862)
What if Queen Victoria died in 1857? (POD: 1857)
What if Prince Philippe of Belgium, Count of Flanders accepted the invitation to become Domnitor of Romania in 1866? (POD: 1866)
What if Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield had given birth to a son in 1819? (POD: 1819)
What if Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon's son had survived? (POD: 1511)
What if...the United States went monarchical? (POD: 1786) [Set up by JMT in #2,963]
What If Henry VIII successfully had Henry Fitzroy made King of Ireland in 1529? (POD: 1529)
What If ... Louis Egalite and his sons all died during the French Revolution, so the French crown passes to Carlos, Count of Molina in 1830. (POD: 1789)
What if Edward VI lived just long enough to produce an heir? (POD: 1553)
Catherine of Howard faithfully bares Henry VIII a son. (POD: 1541)
An independent Quebec following a Napoleonic Victory (POD: 1805)
What if the uniting of the Britons by Arthur of the Brythonic sub-Roman people after the Battle of Mons Baden had resulted in a united kingdom that didn't dissolve after his death? (POD: c. 500; ED: 1317)
What If ... Henry III, King of Navarre, dies in Early 1589 ... (POD: 1589)
What if Queen Victoria died before she became Queen? (POD: 1830s)
What if Napoleon stayed on Elba? (POD: 1815)
What if Napoleon died in the Invasion of Russia in 1812 and the French continued the Empire with Tallyrand as the 2nd Emperor? (POD: 1812)
What if Frederick was removed from the line of succession due to the Katte Affair? (POD: 1730)
What if Queen Emma won the Hawai'ian Royal Election of 1874? (POD: 1874) [Set up by Mina-van-Mako in #4,053]
What If ... the Principality of Waterloo was established in 1831 ... (POD: 1831) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #4,058]
What if Prince Frederick Augustus, the second son of King George III and his wife, Princess Frederica Charlotte of Prussia, had issue? (POD: 1792) [Set up by Asharella in #4,096]
What If ... Parliament had allowed William, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh to accept the Swedish throne in 1812? (POD: 1812) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #4,129]
What if... the Confederation of the Rhine had adopted a system of elective monarchy? (POD: 1806) [Set up by Records in #4,123]
What if... James II fled to America? (POD: 1688) [Set up by TheBeanieBaron in #4,193]
What if the first child of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragorn, Henry, Duke of Cornwall, hadn't died in infancy but became king? (POD: 1511) [Set up by Asharella in #4,200]
What if Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales lived? (POD: 1502) [Set up by RedKing in #4,295]
Isabella Jagiellon lives long enough to arange the marriage of John Sigismund Zapolya and Joanna of Austria (POD: 1559) [Set up by Cate13 in #4,392]
What If... the Principality of Andorra was created following the defeat of Emperor Napoleon... (POD: 1815) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #4,449]
What if John, Prince of Asturias lived? (POD: 1497) [Set up by RedKing in #4,519]
Mary, Queen of Scots is born male. (POD: 1542) [Set up by Jonathan in #4,662]
Queen Christina of Sweden is born a boy (POD: 1626) [Set up by Whiteshore in #4,742]
Basil II marries and has a son and heir instead of refusing to marry (POD: 976) [Set up by Whiteshore in #4,521]
Warwick wins the Battle of Barnet (POD: 1471; ED: 1836) [Set up by Cate13 in #4,786]
What if Tallyrand retained the Principality of Benevento, after the Congress of Vienna? (POD: 1815) [Set up by Records in #4,820]
What if the Prussian Scheme Happened (POD: 1788) [Set up by VickyivofFrance in #4,971]
Frederick Prince of Wales dies after the birth of his daughter Augusta. (POD: 1737) [Set up by VickyivofFrance in #5,010]
Anne of Hungary born a boy (POD: 1503; ED: 1919) [Set up by Whiteshore in #4,949]
What If ... Edward the Black Prince dies in 1361 (POD: 1361) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #5,067]
Alexios Philanthropus successfully overthrows Andronicus II (POD: 1295) [Set up by Whiteshore in #5,039]
What If ... Charles VIII and Anne of Britanny's first son lived? (POD: 1495) [Set up by Mina-van-Mako in #5,241]
Barbara Radziwill lives long enough to have a child before dying in childbirth (POD: 1551) [Set up by Whiteshore in #5,416]
The treaty of Cordoba goes through, and lacking a Bourbon candidate, the Mexicans take up Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen, as Emperor. (POD: 1821) [Set up by Reyne in #5,505]
Charles the Bold of Burgundy has a son with Margaret of York (POD: 1471)
What If... Charles Peter Ulrich of Holstein Gottorp dies early ... (POD: 1740s)
What if Henry Plantagenet, son of Edward I, survives childhood to become king. (POD: 1274)
What if the Rough Wooing was Successful? (POD: 1547)
What if Isabella II fled to Spain's holdings in the Americas? (POD: 1868) [Set up by TheBeanieBaron in #5,854]
High King Ruaidri Ua Conchobair managed to repel the Norman Invaders. (POD: 1169) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #5,682]
When Henry II begins his 1171 conquest in Ireland it goes even better than OTL, so instead of recognizing Rory O'Coner as High King, Henry takes the throne himself, naming his youngest son John as heir. (POD: 1171, ED: 1401) [Set up by Cate13 in #5,904]
What If ... George I's Will is not suppressed (POD: 1756) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #5,953]
What If ... the "California Republic" succeeded in 1846 and elected Waldemar of Prussia as monarch (POD: 1846) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #6,004]
Anne Boleyn does not miscarry her son. (POD: 1536) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #6,045]
George Mouzalon remains John IV's regent instead of getting killed by the future Emperor Michael VIII (POD: 1258)
Alfred, Duke of York allowed to take the Greek throne after the 1862 plebiscite. (POD: 1862) [Set up by Whiteshore in #6,215]
Fyodor Godunov successfully beats the agents of False Dmitry sent to kill him. (POD: 1605) [Set up by Reyne in #6,200]
Süleyman Pasha (son of Orhan) does not die in a hunting accident and becomes the Third Ottoman Sultan (POD: 1357) [Set up by Sarthaka in #6,227]
Sebastian, the "desired" King of Portugal, is victorious in the Battle of Alcácer-Quibir. (POD: 1578) [Set up by Reyne in #6,356]
Jean I of France and Navarre the Posthumous survives. (POD: 1316) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #6,291]
Prince William of Glouchester is born a strong and healthy Prince and succeeds Queen Anne after her death (POD: 1689) [Set up by Whiteshore in #6,460]
What If ... the Act of Settlement didn't disallow Catholic succession, just the line of James II ... (POD: 1701) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #6,502]
King Albert of Sweden is not deposed, thus not forming the Kalmar Union (POD: 1389) [Set up by Sarthaka in #6,491]
Henry, Duke of Cornwall outlives his father and becomes king. (POD: 1511) [Set up by 1-800-wandsthetic in #6,555]
What if... Norway managed to keep their independence in 1814? (POD: 1814) [Set up by TheBeanieBaron in #6,720]
The one where Charles II de Valos, Duke of Orléans isn't a moron. (POD: 1545) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #6,733]
What If ... Richard the Lionheart had been succeeded by his nephew, Arthur of Brittany (POD: 1199) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #6,913]
Charles V marries Mary Tudor. (POD: 1515) [Set up by KaiserGenghis in #7,021]
Henry VIII dies in 1510 (POD: 1510) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #7,082]
Alexios Branas successfully overthrows Isaac II (POD: 1187) [Set up by Whiteshore in #7,136]
The American attempt at forming a Republic failed, instead the Constitutional Convention agreed to form an American Monarchy. BUT the American Crown is elective and remains so for the entire list. (POD: 1787) [Set up by Shiva in #7,331]
Jane Grey is queen for nine years instead of nine days. (POD: 1553) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #7,422]
The Spanish Conquest of the Inca goes awry with Atahualpa successfully leading a resistance against Spain before settling down, having a family, ruling and then dying. (POD: 1533) [Set up by Sarthaka in #7,550]
What If ... France Develops A Matriarchy (POD: 1585) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #7,600]
Alfonso, Prince of Portugal survived. (POD: 1491) [Set up by ordinarylittleme in #7,650]
Francois I dies at the Battle of Pavia (POD: 1525, ED: 1950) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #7,722]
Charlotte of Wales does not die after giving birth to a stillborn son. (POD: 1817) [Set up by Violet Rose Lily in #7,837]
What lf ... William of Hatfield survives (POD: 1337) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #7,901]
What if... Christian the II's landing in Norway was more successful. (POD: 1531) [Set up by Reyne in #7,959]
James VI dies in 1609 (POD: 1609) [Set up by FalconHonor in #8,147]
Charles Emil, Electoral Prince of Brandenburg-Prussia survives Alsace (POD: 1674) [Set up by Reyne in #8,256]
The Miguelists retain the throne (POD: 1828) [Set up by wwbgdiaslt in #8,307]
 
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What if Alexander the Great had not died a young man, but had lived to secure his Empire and pass it on to his son, Alexander IV?

The Great Kings of the Hellenistic World
336 - 287: Alexander III the Great (House of Argead) [1]
287 - 254: Alexander IV the Consolidator (House of Argead) [2]
254 - 214: Seleucus I the Farmer (House of Nicator) [3]
214 - 189: Alexander V (House of Nicator) [4]
189 - 156: Phillip III the Mad (House of Nicator) [5]
156 - 133:
Philip IV the Feeble (House of Nicator) [6]
133 - 108:
Philip V the Spaniard (House of Nicator) [7]
108 - 101: Perdiccas IV the Brute (House of Nicator) [8]
101 - 63:
Seleucus II (House of Nicator) [9]


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[1] At first only the King of Macedonia, Alexander III rose to become the great king, in fact a god-king, when he conquered the Persian Empire and then went on to conquer Central Asia and northwest India. He returned to Babylon in 323 and almost died from illness before his son, Alexander IV, was born by his new princess wife, Roxana of Bactria. But Alexander survived the illness and then became a robust and hearty man. He added Arabia to his empire and North Africa all the way to Cyrene. Once he had conquered the world, he set his sights on securing his Empire with good governance and raising his son to continue after him. Still robust in his late 60s it was a shock to the world that the God-King died. It was probably from a heart attack. Alexander IV was now 36 when he became the next God-King.

[2] Alexander IV, the Consolidator began his reign putting down rebellions from would be Kings, most notably from Ptolemy the Younger successfully and Bindusara unsuccessfully resulting in the formation of Maurya Empire in India far from the center of his realm. Still, once his throne was secure he tried to build a reputation as a conquerer by invading Italy.

Here he ran straight into the Roman mandible system which shredded his forces. Despite this, he won battles by his strength of numbers and would have won the war but for the Roman alliance with Carthage, which fearing they were next and for a free hand in Sicily, provided naval support and destroyed the Imperial Navy in a series of engagements, cutting Alexander off from reinforcements and resupply. Blockaded by the Roman Army and the Carthaginian Navy at Naples, Alexander was forced to ransom himself in order to prevent his brother Perseus from seizing the throne back home. After executing his brother, and loosing Egypt to a native revolt (funded with Carthaginian money) he seemed to realize that perhaps he wasn't meant to be conqueror and instead worked very hard at tying what was left of the empire together, a task he was much more successful at. As a result he was able to pass a stable Empire to his son in law, Seleucus.


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[3] Seleucus was the son in law of Alexander IV, married to his daughter, Roxana, named after her grandmother. He was also the grandson of Seleucus Nicator, one of Alexander the Greats generals, for whom he was named. Alexander IV had several sons but most died in battle or young or rapidly showed themselves to be devious and unworthy. Seleucus had shown himself to be an admirable warrior and incredibly fertile - over the course of their marriage, Roxana gave birth over twenty times. Despite his warrior background, he knew that at some point the kingdom would over extend its capability to both support and defend itself and therefore committed to creating stability, transport routes and agriculture (earning him the honorific of The Farmer) to feed his troops. After forty years on the throne, he was succeeded by his seventh son and thirteenth child, Alexander
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[4] On the death of Seleucus it was chaos. Not only did generals rebel, but most of the sons of Seleucus also claimed the throne and battled each other. Roxana's favorite was her youngest surviving son, named Alexander after her father and grandfather, he was the seventh son and thirteenth child. She spread the story that on his death bed Seleucus had given the throne to him with his last word, "Alexander!" Some said it was entirely made up. Others said that Selecus wasn't naming his heir but speaking the name of Alexander the Great as he saw a vision of him. But this was enough for Alexander to be crowned in Babylon and secure the capital. He immediately went to war with his five older brothers who claimed the throne. (One older brother, Philip, was feeble minded and cared for by Roxana.)

One by one he defeated them. The last was Achilles who was based in the homeland of Macedonia. Alexander by then had lost Bactria, Thrace, and Greece from the Empire to locals rebelling. By this time Carthage and Rome were at war with each other, leaving Alexander a free hand to restore the most important province of Egypt. As he secured Egypt, the Parthians revolted. So next was a long war for Iran. By the year 190 BCE a stalemate led to central and eastern Iran now in the new Parthian Empire and only western Iran in the Empire of Alexander. He died a few years later and his Eldest Son, Phillip took the throne.


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[5] A proven warrior and commander in the campaigns against Egypt and Parthia, Phillip was seen at the time as a man of great potential, someone Truly worthy of the legacy of Alexander the great. Indeed, his greatest achievements would come in 178 when he set out to take on the weakened Rome and Carthage. For six years (178-172) his empire would battle the Romans, but he would never land on the Italian peninsula. After conquering the Adriatic coast up to modern day Tyrol he would sign peace with the Roman republic. His war against Carthage however would fare much better. From 177 to 171 Hellenic forces would rampage across North Africa, but instead of directly conquering the Carthaginians Phillip would create a puppet council to rule over these new far flung possessions.

With the west secured Phillip turned to Persia, the land that remained unconquered. From 169 to 167 Phillip led forces into the Parthian empire, but during one of his later campaigns he was struck with a strange illness that nearly took his life. Fearing for him his generals took him back to Babylon. But for the Hellenic kingdoms things were about to change drastically. When Phillip recovered he was not the same man, he was paranoid, spiteful, and had become possessed of odd hobbies and beliefs. As the years wore on he increasingly neglected the empire, not helped by his execution of several generals and governors for 'treason'. As he lay on his death bed many of his own achievements would lay in ruin. The Adriatic was in revolt, Carthage had been free for several years, Egypt stood defiant in her rebellion and the Parthian empire encroached in the east. But Phillips last strike would debilitate the empire, fearing his sons would remove him him from the throne he ordered them slain, and not three days later did the Mad King Phillip die, leaving the empire devoid of a clear ruler for the second time in half a century.


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[6] Phillip III, the one with the unusual spelling for his name in the Greek language, killed all his heirs before he died. But like everyone before him, his father and his uncles, he ignored his 'feeble' uncle Philip, still living in the Imperial Palace in Babylon long after his mother, Roxana, had passed. He was now 77 and considered odd, stupid, and barely able to care for himself. The imperial guard were in turmoil after the death of the Mad King and afraid that they might be set upon by the people taking revenge on them for the terror done by the king they had protected. In roaming the palace they came upon Uncle Philip in his bed chamber, his head buried in scrolls that were all upon his bed, totally oblivious to the chaos sweeping the palace. Realizing he was a descendant of Alexander the Great and the older brother of Alexander V, they too him to the throne room, wrapped him in the royal purple robes, crowned him with the golden crown of laurels, and proclaimed him the Great God King, Philip IV.

The head of the guard, Ajax, expected he'd be his puppet as he was feeble minded. It turned out that Philip was anything but feeble minded. He just had been cursed from childhood with a terrible stutter and had withdrawn from trying to express himself. When nervous he basically shut down and just stuttered. When his father had died and all his brothers had gone to war with Alexander V, Philip had decided at the age of 19, (Alexander V was 17,) he was more likely to survive if he never challenge the perception of him all had. Some years into his brother's reign he'd lost the stutter and was more secure in expressing himself to those he trusted, which included the King and their mother. Alexander knew his brother was not feeble but actually very intelligent, in fact what later would be called a genius savant, as did his mother. They kept secret this fact, but Philip was a secret adviser to his brother.

When his nephew took the throne, he was 44 and no one now knew the truth about him except his aged mother, who died shortly thereafter. Philip knew in his gut that he shouldn't trust his nephew Phillip, so he played the feeble fool to him. Most left him alone in his chambers where he devoted himself to studying history.

But as the new God King he was now confidant to find allies he could trust and maneuver them into places of power until he was able to have Ajax arrested and tried for the crimes he'd done for Phillip the Mad. Now Philip was able to secure his Empire and rule it.

Unfortunately this took some time. During these early years the Parthians moved west and north to the caucuses, the Romans conquered the east shore of the Adriatic and Carthage, and made 'alliances' with the Greek city states. A noble family descended from some of Alexander's companions took Macedonia and western Asia Minor out of the Empire and then quickly fell apart into several smaller states. Egypt secured itself as a separate state and the southern part of the Arabian peninsula broke away too.

One thing that Philip IV did was realize that with Parthia having moved into western Iran that Babylon was too close to the border to be a central capital and relocated the capital to Damascus.

Even though he was 77 on taking the throne and had never had a romantic relationship or even just a sexual one, he married the much younger Helen, his nephew's daughter, who gave him five children in the next seven years, three of them sons.

Philip turned out to be a robust man and lived until he was 100 years old. The two major issues he had to deal with during that time was a problem with the Jews in Judaea who rebelled and the other was who would be the major influence in the Greek and Asia Minor states, the Hellenistic Empire or Rome. Philip's final solution in Judaea was to set up an autonomous 'kingdom' there that swore fealty to the Empire. Philip himself went to Jerusalem and prayed in the outer courtyard to the God of the Jews. This pacified the Jews. Unfortunately things didn't go so well with Rome and the states of Greece and Asia Minor. By his death it was clear that Rome was the dominant power in those areas, having won a war with the Hellenistic Empire in 146 in Pergamun. Rome was at the northern border of the Empire, even though officially those states were only 'allies' of Rome. But Roman troops were there.

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[7] Philip V was Philip IV adopted son - a handsome and ruthless military strategist, from a minor family, adopted when it became clear that Philip IV would not provide further legitimate issue (After the handful he did produce in his seventies died in infancy or as young adults with no issue of their own) and none of the other possible Nicator heirs were really dream candidates. There were rumours across his life that Philip V was actually Philip the Feebles illegitimate son from a liaison with a palace slave from modern day Spain - and later historical and DNA evidence suggests that to be the truth (he is the earliest Hellenistic King with a known tomb). The most scandalous thing about Philip V was that he married a Roman woman - Furia - (daughter of a Roman consul, Lucius Furius Philus) in an attempt by Philip the Feeble to mollify the aggression of the Romans.

It seemed to work for the most part as the two settled into what might be later termed a cold war - armies faced each other across the border but no actual conflict erupted to, despite occasional brief escalation such as the Incident of the Capable Archer where Roman troops were seen to be practising formations and the Hellenistic leaders on the border almost interpreted it as the build up to an invasion. It was only the intervention of a capable archer and lookout that prevented all out bloodshed and invasion.

After twenty five years on the throne, he was found dead in a seemingly locked room and his death has become one of the greatest unanswered murder mysteries of the world. He was replaced by Royal-General Perdiccas Nicator, a younger nephew of Philip IV the Feeble and a cousin of Phillip III.

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[8] During the culling of Philip III, Perdiccas moved himself north and based himself in Sintike, commanding a small force to defend the city from the armies of Medike which was held by the powerful Thracian tribe of Medi.

He married a young noble woman from the Getae Kingdom, producing a stable family.

His line to the throne went as this, he was the son of a "Seleucus the posthumous", a small time politician by trade, the youngest of all the children, the brother of Alexander V and Philip "the Feeble" IV, making Perdiccas, nephew of these two Kings and unknowingly "cousin" of Philip "the Spaniard" V.

When news of his second uncle, became King Philip "the Feeble" IV, reached Perdiccas, he sent word of his success in the north, and was rewarded with a higher wage and title of Royal-Commander.

He was called to the capital by his adopted-cousin Philip V, as an adviser regarding defending from potential Roman invasion, however within a months of Perdiccas, presence.

Perdiccas, himself would only live to see seven years in office, before dying of what many historians believe was the first documented heart attack.

His succession by Seleucus II, and supported by the majority.

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[9] Seleucus II was the last of Alexander the Great's heir to rule the Hellenistic Empire, which by that time had been reduced to little more than Syria. There was still a Hellenistic kingdom in Egypt that lasted a dozen or so more years before Julius Caesar conquered it. But that actual empire that Alexander began, not an offshoot, ended in the year 63 BCE when Seleucus II surrendered to the victorious Pompey the Great of Rome, who marched on Damascus after conquering another offshoot kingdom, Armenia in the eastern part of the Anatolian Plateau.

Seleucus great grandfather, Seleucus the Posthumous was born in 213. He died at a young 57 in 156 as part of Phillip III's mad purge. Seleucus' grandfather was Perdiccas IV who was 24 when he fled north. His father, Perdiccas' son, was Alexander Philohippus (158-110), the lover of horses, who, ironically, died from brain trauma after a horse he was training reared back and stuck him on the head with both front hoofs. Thus Seleucus, became third in line for the throne and heir when his grandfather took the throne. He was Alexander Philophippus' only son, from his third marriage, born later in life in 114 when Philohippus was 44. Thus he was only 6 when he became heir and only 13 when he took the throne. Until he was 18 his mother, Doris of Damascus, was regent. At 18 he took control of the Empire.

In another time Seleucus might have been a capable ruler, but in this time there was little he could do to stop the forces of history. Both Rome and Parthia were growing in power. It was during his grandfather's reign that Parthia conquered Mesopotamia, proving Philip the Feeble's decision of moving the capital a wise choice. Mecca also revolted and all of Arabia was lost to the Empire. Meanwhile the supposed independent but subservient Kingdom of Judaea became independent in reality as well. So it was that Seleucus inherited an Empire that now was Syria. (In that time what is now Lebannon was simply part of Syria.)

The Empire clearly was next on Rome's list of nations to be conquered. Seleucus' saavy as a ruler was not to conquer and add to the Empire, an impossible task in that time period, but to delay after delay, through politics and bribes and alliances, Rome's moving in.

But that was unable to stop the Great Pompey who moved to the East to establish himself as the real ruler of Rome. (He did for a while, but he wasn't able to stop Julius Caesar.) Pompey marched from Armenia into Syria and conquered the entire country easily, laying siege to Damascus for six months until Seleucus surrendered. Seleucus was 49 when Pompey took his surrender. Shortly after that Seleucus was a captive in Pompey's Triumph in Rome, showing that the conqueror had bested the heir of Alexander the Great. Seleucus lived for nineteen more years in Rome in luxury as a former king and quite popular with the people. He made alliances with Julius Caesar and when Caesar defeated Pompey, he made promises to set Seleucus up as a puppet king in Syria. But that never happened and he was murdered on the Ides of March when his patron also will murdered. Thus ended the last of Alexander the Great's line of rulers.

OOC: As finisher I will start a new one soon.
This and others aren’t in the database
 

Deleted member 147978

Sure! (although I have tweak it from the original.)

What if William Adelin survived the White Ship disaster? (POD: 1120)
What if Duke Francesco Sforza I annexed Genoa to the Duchy of Milan in 1461? (POD: 1461)
What if Nyatsimba Mutota didn't abandon Great Zimbabwe after conquering Mutapa? (POD: 1430)
---Alternate Ending
Charlotte still dies in 1817, but her son survives infancy (POD: 1817)
What if Henry Tudor and Richard III both died at the Battle of Bosworth Field? (POD: 1485)
What if Du'a Khan successfully conquers the Delhi Sultanate? (POD: 1290s)
What if King Erik VII of Denmark and the Union of Kalmar was able to solidify his rule? (POD: 1412)
What if Louis VII and Eleanor of Aquitaine's second child was a son? (POD: 1151)
What if Otto II was killed during the War of the Three Henries (977-978)? (POD: 977)
What if Henri III of France managed to have a son? (POD: 1575)
What if Stephen didn't usurp the throne of England? (POD: 1135)
---Alternate Ending
Duke FRIEDRICH II (Duke of Babenberg) had a son who succeeded him in 1246 - Butterflying away the Hapsburgs (in Austria). (POD: 1229)
What if the daughter of Juan and Margaret, the Prince and Princess of Asturias, was born live in December 1497, instead of stillborn, leaving the girl as the heir to her grandparents, Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon? (POD: 1497)
Charles II never reachs maturity (POD: 1672; ED: 1857)
What if Lambert Simnel's rebellion was successful? (POD: 1487)
Gustav Adolf survives the battle of Lützen (POD: 1632; ED: 1927)
What if Charles II escaped to America? (POD: 1649)
Austria, Castile-Aragon, and England more robustly defend Anne of Brittany's marriage to Maximilian of Austria (POD: 1490)
What if William III of Sicily fled to Malta? (POD: 1194)
Richard, Duke of York, survives and escapes the Lancastrian attack at Sandal Castle in 1460. His son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland, is still murdered, and his eldest son, Edward, still takes London and is able to proclaim his father as King there. (POD: 1460)
Constantine XI Palaiologos was able to live (POD: 1453)
Alfonso IX did not have a son with Queen Berengaria of Castile (POD: 1196)
William Adelin survives (POD: 1120)
Henri d'Artois, Comte de Chambord agress to the compromise flag with both the tricolour and fleur de lys. (POD: 1871)
---Joke Ending
Henri I, Duke of Guise won the War of the Three Henrys (POD: 1588)
Ferdinand II's son, John of Girona survived infancy (POD: 1509)
What if Mary I of England managed to have a single son? (POD: 1555; ED: 2012)
Edward, the Black Prince of Wales survives (POD: 1376)
Christopher of Bavaria survives (POD: 1448; ED: 1955)
George Washington accepts the crown after a pro-Monarchy coup. (POD: 1783)
A different Belgian monarchy (POD: 1830)
What if Austria won the War of the Spainsh Succession, decisively. (POD: 1701)
An independent Ukrainian monarchy (POD: 1855)
What if William Stanley, 6th Earl of Derby (whose maternal great-great-grandparents were Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York via their daughter, Mary Tudor) becomes king of England? (POD: 1603)
Charles the Bold won the Burgundian Wars (POD: 1477)
WI Justinian II was able to defeat Leontios in 695 AD? (POD: 695; ED: 1798)
The Gun powder plot goes off as planned killing King James along with Prince Henry of Wales (POD: 1605)
After the revolutionary war, George Washington becomes absolute monarch of the United Kingdom of America (POD: 1782; ED: 1901)
Catherine of Aragon was born a boy. (POD: 1485)
What if Hans Hermann von Katte assassinated Frederick William I? (POD: 1730)
Charlotte, Princess of Wales survives (POD: 1817)
Anne Boleyn has a second daughter in 1535 (POD: 1535)
Frederick, Prince of Wales lives longer (POD: 1751)
James II, his family and most of his loyal followers fled to Ireland after the Glorious Revolution of 1688. (POD: 1688)
An independent Corsica following the Congress of Vienna (POD: 1815)
Edward the Black Prince survives (POD: 1376)
What if Charles II of Spain and Maria Anna of Neuburg had a "son"... (POD: 1691)
What if smallpox hadn't hit the Bourbon royal family in 1711? (POD: 1711)
The Miracle of House Bathory (POD: 1577)
What if Sancho of Majorca had surviving issue? (POD: 1325)
Christina, Queen of Sweden marries Gaston, Duke of Orleans (POD: 1654)
Stephen I of England recovers from the illness that killed him (POD: 1154)
Oliver Cromwell is made King of the British Commonwealth (POD: 1649)
What if the Constitutional Convention of the United States had established a monarchy as the Executive Branch instead of a presidency and George Washington had been made the first king of the United States? (POD: 1787)
What if Emperor Napoleon III had won the Franco-Prussian War and not been disposed? (POD: 1870)
What if Henry V was killed at the Battle of Agincourt? (POD: 1415)
What if Dom Pedro II hadn't been deposed but had died during his trip abroad while Isabel was regent and she'd became Empress and defeated the Republican coup? (POD: 1888)
What if Richard III had won the Battle of Bosworth Field? (POD: 1485)
What if Louis Phillipe, Duke of Orleans was invited to be the King of Italy in 1815? (POD: 1815)
What if Emperor Napoleon I of France was married to Anna Pavlovna of Russia, in 1810, after failing to secure her elder sister Ekaterina. (POD: 1810)
What if the Kingdom of Naples defeated France and Spain in the Second Italian War? (POD: 1499)
What if Princess Charlotte's child born in 1817 hadn't been still born? (POD: 1817)
What if George Washington was declared King of America when the revolution was over? (POD: 1788)
What if Edward Seymour, Lord Beauchamp of Hatch, had taken the throne instead of James VI Stuart of Scotland on the death of Queen Elizabeth? (POD: 1603)
The Constitution Act of 1867 proclaims Canadian Federation under an invited constitutional monarchy. (POD: 1867)
What if Albert Kamehameha had lived to adulthood. (POD: 1862)
What if Queen Victoria died in 1857? (POD: 1857)
What if Prince Philippe of Belgium, Count of Flanders accepted the invitation to become Domnitor of Romania in 1866? (POD: 1866)
What if Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield had given birth to a son in 1819? (POD: 1819)
What if Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon's son had survived? (POD: 1511)
---What if Prince Xavier, Duke of York succeeded his brother as King of the United Kingdom?
What if...the United States went monarchical? (POD: 1786)
What If Henry VIII successfully had Henry Fitzroy made King of Ireland in 1529? (POD: 1529)
What If ... Louis Egalite and his sons all died during the French Revolution, so the French crown passes to Carlos, Count of Molina in 1830. (POD: 1789)
What if Edward VI lived just long enough to produce an heir? (POD: 1553)
Catherine of Howard faithfully bares Henry VIII a son. (POD: 1541)
An independent Quebec following a Napoleonic Victory (POD: 1805)
What If ... Henry III, King of Navarre, dies in Early 1589 ... (POD: 1589)
What if Queen Victoria died before she became Queen? (POD: 1830s)
The Elba List: What if Napoleon stayed on Elba? (POD: 1815)
What if Napoleon died in the Invasion of Russia in 1812 and the French continued the Empire with Tallyrand as the 2nd Emperor? (POD: 1812)
What if Frederick was removed from the line of succession due to the Katte Affair? (POD: 1730)
What if Queen Emma won the Hawai'ian Royal Election of 1874? (POD: 1874)
What If ... the Principality of Waterloo was established in 1831 ... (POD: 1831)
What if Prince Frederick Augustus, the second son of King George III and his wife, Princess Frederica Charlotte of Prussia, had issue? (POD: 1792)
What If ... Parliament had allowed William, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh to accept the Swedish throne in 1812? (POD: 1812)
What if... the Confederation of the Rhine had adopted a system of elective monarchy? (POD: 1806)
What if... James II fled to America? (POD: 1688)
What if the first child of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragorn, Henry, Duke of Cornwall, hadn't died in infancy but became king? (POD: 1511)
What if Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales lived? (POD: 1502)
Isabella Jagiellon lives long enough to arange the marriage of John Sigismund Zapolya and Joanna of Austria (POD: 1559)
What If... the Principality of Andorra was created following the defeat of Emperor Napoleon... (POD: 1815)
What if John, Prince of Asturias lived? (POD: 1497)
Mary, Queen of Scots is born male. (POD: 1542)
Queen Christina of Sweden is born a boy (POD: 1626)
Basil II marries and has a son and heir instead of refusing to marry (POD: 976)
Warwick wins the Battle of Barnet (POD: 1471; ED: 1836)
What if Tallyrand retained the Principality of Benevento, after the Congress of Vienna? (POD: 1815)
What if the Prussian Scheme Happened (POD: 1788)
Frederick Prince of Wales dies after the birth of his daughter Augusta. (POD: 1737)
Anne of Hungary born a boy (POD: 1503; ED: 1919)
Alexios Philanthropus successfully overthrows Andronicus II (POD: 1295; Ongoing)
What If ... Edward the Black Prince dies in 1361 (POD: 1361; Ongoing)
Bravo for archiving all the Lists. I applaud you.
 
Sure! (although I have tweak it from the original.)

What if William Adelin survived the White Ship disaster? (POD: 1120)
What if Duke Francesco Sforza I annexed Genoa to the Duchy of Milan in 1461? (POD: 1461)
What if Nyatsimba Mutota didn't abandon Great Zimbabwe after conquering Mutapa? (POD: 1430)
---Alternate Ending
Charlotte still dies in 1817, but her son survives infancy (POD: 1817)
What if Henry Tudor and Richard III both died at the Battle of Bosworth Field? (POD: 1485)
What if Du'a Khan successfully conquers the Delhi Sultanate? (POD: 1290s)
What if King Erik VII of Denmark and the Union of Kalmar was able to solidify his rule? (POD: 1412)
What if Louis VII and Eleanor of Aquitaine's second child was a son? (POD: 1151)
What if Otto II was killed during the War of the Three Henries (977-978)? (POD: 977)
What if Henri III of France managed to have a son? (POD: 1575)
What if Stephen didn't usurp the throne of England? (POD: 1135)
---Alternate Ending
Duke FRIEDRICH II (Duke of Babenberg) had a son who succeeded him in 1246 - Butterflying away the Hapsburgs (in Austria). (POD: 1229)
What if the daughter of Juan and Margaret, the Prince and Princess of Asturias, was born live in December 1497, instead of stillborn, leaving the girl as the heir to her grandparents, Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon? (POD: 1497)
Charles II never reachs maturity (POD: 1672; ED: 1857)
What if Lambert Simnel's rebellion was successful? (POD: 1487)
Gustav Adolf survives the battle of Lützen (POD: 1632; ED: 1927)
What if Charles II escaped to America? (POD: 1649)
Austria, Castile-Aragon, and England more robustly defend Anne of Brittany's marriage to Maximilian of Austria (POD: 1490)
What if William III of Sicily fled to Malta? (POD: 1194)
Richard, Duke of York, survives and escapes the Lancastrian attack at Sandal Castle in 1460. His son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland, is still murdered, and his eldest son, Edward, still takes London and is able to proclaim his father as King there. (POD: 1460)
Constantine XI Palaiologos was able to live (POD: 1453)
Alfonso IX did not have a son with Queen Berengaria of Castile (POD: 1196)
William Adelin survives (POD: 1120)
Henri d'Artois, Comte de Chambord agress to the compromise flag with both the tricolour and fleur de lys. (POD: 1871)
---Joke Ending
Henri I, Duke of Guise won the War of the Three Henrys (POD: 1588)
Ferdinand II's son, John of Girona survived infancy (POD: 1509)
What if Mary I of England managed to have a single son? (POD: 1555; ED: 2012)
Edward, the Black Prince of Wales survives (POD: 1376)
Christopher of Bavaria survives (POD: 1448; ED: 1955)
George Washington accepts the crown after a pro-Monarchy coup. (POD: 1783)
A different Belgian monarchy (POD: 1830)
What if Austria won the War of the Spainsh Succession, decisively. (POD: 1701)
An independent Ukrainian monarchy (POD: 1855)
What if William Stanley, 6th Earl of Derby (whose maternal great-great-grandparents were Henry VII of England and Elizabeth of York via their daughter, Mary Tudor) becomes king of England? (POD: 1603)
Charles the Bold won the Burgundian Wars (POD: 1477)
WI Justinian II was able to defeat Leontios in 695 AD? (POD: 695; ED: 1798)
The Gun powder plot goes off as planned killing King James along with Prince Henry of Wales (POD: 1605)
After the revolutionary war, George Washington becomes absolute monarch of the United Kingdom of America (POD: 1782; ED: 1901)
Catherine of Aragon was born a boy. (POD: 1485)
What if Hans Hermann von Katte assassinated Frederick William I? (POD: 1730)
Charlotte, Princess of Wales survives (POD: 1817)
Anne Boleyn has a second daughter in 1535 (POD: 1535)
Frederick, Prince of Wales lives longer (POD: 1751)
James II, his family and most of his loyal followers fled to Ireland after the Glorious Revolution of 1688. (POD: 1688)
An independent Corsica following the Congress of Vienna (POD: 1815)
Edward the Black Prince survives (POD: 1376)
What if Charles II of Spain and Maria Anna of Neuburg had a "son"... (POD: 1691)
What if smallpox hadn't hit the Bourbon royal family in 1711? (POD: 1711)
The Miracle of House Bathory (POD: 1577)
What if Sancho of Majorca had surviving issue? (POD: 1325)
Christina, Queen of Sweden marries Gaston, Duke of Orleans (POD: 1654)
Stephen I of England recovers from the illness that killed him (POD: 1154)
Oliver Cromwell is made King of the British Commonwealth (POD: 1649)
What if the Constitutional Convention of the United States had established a monarchy as the Executive Branch instead of a presidency and George Washington had been made the first king of the United States? (POD: 1787)
What if Emperor Napoleon III had won the Franco-Prussian War and not been disposed? (POD: 1870)
What if Henry V was killed at the Battle of Agincourt? (POD: 1415)
What if Dom Pedro II hadn't been deposed but had died during his trip abroad while Isabel was regent and she'd became Empress and defeated the Republican coup? (POD: 1888)
What if Richard III had won the Battle of Bosworth Field? (POD: 1485)
What if Louis Phillipe, Duke of Orleans was invited to be the King of Italy in 1815? (POD: 1815)
What if Emperor Napoleon I of France was married to Anna Pavlovna of Russia, in 1810, after failing to secure her elder sister Ekaterina. (POD: 1810)
What if the Kingdom of Naples defeated France and Spain in the Second Italian War? (POD: 1499)
What if Princess Charlotte's child born in 1817 hadn't been still born? (POD: 1817)
What if George Washington was declared King of America when the revolution was over? (POD: 1788)
What if Edward Seymour, Lord Beauchamp of Hatch, had taken the throne instead of James VI Stuart of Scotland on the death of Queen Elizabeth? (POD: 1603)
The Constitution Act of 1867 proclaims Canadian Federation under an invited constitutional monarchy. (POD: 1867)
What if Albert Kamehameha had lived to adulthood. (POD: 1862)
What if Queen Victoria died in 1857? (POD: 1857)
What if Prince Philippe of Belgium, Count of Flanders accepted the invitation to become Domnitor of Romania in 1866? (POD: 1866)
What if Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield had given birth to a son in 1819? (POD: 1819)
What if Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon's son had survived? (POD: 1511)
---What if Prince Xavier, Duke of York succeeded his brother as King of the United Kingdom?
What if...the United States went monarchical? (POD: 1786)
What If Henry VIII successfully had Henry Fitzroy made King of Ireland in 1529? (POD: 1529)
What If ... Louis Egalite and his sons all died during the French Revolution, so the French crown passes to Carlos, Count of Molina in 1830. (POD: 1789)
What if Edward VI lived just long enough to produce an heir? (POD: 1553)
Catherine of Howard faithfully bares Henry VIII a son. (POD: 1541)
An independent Quebec following a Napoleonic Victory (POD: 1805)
What If ... Henry III, King of Navarre, dies in Early 1589 ... (POD: 1589)
What if Queen Victoria died before she became Queen? (POD: 1830s)
The Elba List: What if Napoleon stayed on Elba? (POD: 1815)
What if Napoleon died in the Invasion of Russia in 1812 and the French continued the Empire with Tallyrand as the 2nd Emperor? (POD: 1812)
What if Frederick was removed from the line of succession due to the Katte Affair? (POD: 1730)
What if Queen Emma won the Hawai'ian Royal Election of 1874? (POD: 1874)
What If ... the Principality of Waterloo was established in 1831 ... (POD: 1831)
What if Prince Frederick Augustus, the second son of King George III and his wife, Princess Frederica Charlotte of Prussia, had issue? (POD: 1792)
What If ... Parliament had allowed William, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh to accept the Swedish throne in 1812? (POD: 1812)
What if... the Confederation of the Rhine had adopted a system of elective monarchy? (POD: 1806)
What if... James II fled to America? (POD: 1688)
What if the first child of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragorn, Henry, Duke of Cornwall, hadn't died in infancy but became king? (POD: 1511)
What if Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales lived? (POD: 1502)
Isabella Jagiellon lives long enough to arange the marriage of John Sigismund Zapolya and Joanna of Austria (POD: 1559)
What If... the Principality of Andorra was created following the defeat of Emperor Napoleon... (POD: 1815)
What if John, Prince of Asturias lived? (POD: 1497)
Mary, Queen of Scots is born male. (POD: 1542)
Queen Christina of Sweden is born a boy (POD: 1626)
Basil II marries and has a son and heir instead of refusing to marry (POD: 976)
Warwick wins the Battle of Barnet (POD: 1471; ED: 1836)
What if Tallyrand retained the Principality of Benevento, after the Congress of Vienna? (POD: 1815)
What if the Prussian Scheme Happened (POD: 1788)
Frederick Prince of Wales dies after the birth of his daughter Augusta. (POD: 1737)
Anne of Hungary born a boy (POD: 1503; ED: 1919)
Alexios Philanthropus successfully overthrows Andronicus II (POD: 1295; Ongoing)
What If ... Edward the Black Prince dies in 1361 (POD: 1361; Ongoing)
Dude... 😲

I'm just going to threadmark this post, since you worked a lot harder on archiving all this madness than I ever could...
 
What If ... Edward the Black Prince dies in 1361

Kings of England
1327-1377: Edward III (House of Plantagenet)
1377-1399: Lionel I (House of Plantagenet) [1]
1399-1405: Percy I (House of Plantagenet) [2]
1405-1441: Edward IV (House of Plantagenet) [3]
1441-1479: Richard II (House of Plantagenet) [4]
1479-1492: Henry IV (House of Plantagenet) [5]
1492-1496: William III (House of Plantagenet) [6]

Kings of England and Ireland
1496-1516: William III (House of Plantagenet) [7]
1516-1536: Constantine I (House of Plantagenet) [8]
1536-1545: Charles I & Constance I (House of Plantagenet) [9]
1545-1567: Charles I (House of Plantagenet) [9]
1567-1579: Charles II (House of Plantagenet) [10]
1579-1587: James I (House of Plantagenet) [11]

Kings of England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland
1587-1613: James I & VII (House of Plantagenet) [11]
1613-1618: Nicholas I (House of Plantagenet) [12]

Emperors of the British Isles
1618-1624: Nicholas I (House of Plantagenet) [12]
1624-1695: James II & VIII (House of Plantagenet) [13]
1695-1698: Richard III (House of Plantagenet) [14]
1698-1734: James III & IX (House of Plantagenet) [15]
1734-1783: August I (House of Plantagenet) [16]
1783-1820: Philippa I (House of Plantagenet) [17]
1820-1871: James IV & X (House of Plantagenet) [18]
1871-1894: James V & XI (House of Plantagenet) [19]


[1] Lionel of Antwerp/Clarence was the second son of Edward III, married to Elizabeth, Countess of Ulster, and subsequently widowed in 1363. Upon his elder brothers death in 1361, he became Prince of Wales and Heir Apparent. Upon being widowed, he had only one child - a daughter who survived to adulthood - and his father looked for a new wife for him. In 1366, he was married to Catherine of Luxembourg, the widowed daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles IV and the pair had four more children.

His reign saw the Peasants Revolt and the end of the Fifty Years War which lasted for almost 50 years after starting in 1337. This ended because Lionel was concerned about further peasant rebellions and the ensuing difficulties he was facing with Ireland and Scotland. Edward III had attempted to conquer Scotland and place Lionel's brother John on the Scottish throne, but this had ultimately failed and Lionel dispatched John to Ireland to put down unrest.

Lionel died in 1399 and was succeeded by his son, Percy I.

Jean de Touraine, dauphin of France.jpg

A drawing of King Percy I of England
[2] Born in 1368, Percy was the first child and son of King Lionel I and Catherine of Luxembourg. A stubborn and prideful boy, who viewed that nearly all were beneath him, Percy showed great aspirations to become a military commander. He even once proclaimed to his father that he would be able to quash any revolt for him.

King Lionel I died in 1399, Percy became the new King of England. His style of governing was much more harsh and hotheaded than his father and frequently stamped down on those who opposed him. Percy soon adopted a new title, Sovereign of the English, as in the people of England, which he intended to become as synonymous as the title of King.

Three years after the Glyndŵr Rising had erupted in 1400, Percy personally led an army to the Welsh marches. Despite a cruel and long campaign of terror and death, the rebellion continued, however, the King was satisfied believing that the rebels would soon be defeated.

When he finally returned to the capital, he made plans to invade France. But, before he could set his plans into motion, Percy was found dead in his bed, most likely poisoned in his sleep. He was succeeded by his son, Edward.

kenneth-branagh-signed-photo-henry_360_8c8712185b30b7b3942e3d228c48cf1a.jpg

Kenneth Branagh as Edward IV in BBC's "The Plantagenets."
[3] Edward was the only son of Percy, born to him when he was still Prince of Wales in 1387. In 1386 Prince Percy married Joanna of Lorraine, daughter of John I, Duke of Lorraine. Joanna was the younger sister of Maria of Lorraine who was married to the Dauphin of France, who later would be Charles VIII of France. This marriage to the sister-in-law of the future king was an attempted rapprochement with France to build the peace at the end of the Fifty Year war by Edward's grandfather, King Lionel. Both Percy and Joanna were just 17 at their marriage.

Edward was born nine months later. His mother, the Princess of Wales doted on him. His father had little to do with him, in fact he had little to do with his wife also. The Prince and the Princess had separate apartments in the royal residence of Richmond Palace. The estrangement increased when Percy became King and many believed Queen Joanna was behind his poisoning in order to stop his intended invasion of her homeland.

Edward was 19 when he took the throne and he immediately ended the plans for his father's invasion of France. His mother, the Dowager Queen Joanna, was a main advisor during the first years of his reign. She was only 37 and soon remarried to Richard Mortimer, the 4th Earl of March (OOC: not OTL's Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl, as Philippa never married Edmund, the 3rd Earl in TTL.) Edward made Richard the Duke of March.

In 1407 Edward married Richard's cousin-once-removed on his mother's side, Lady Elizabeth FitzAlan of Arundel, who'd been fostered by Richard and his first wife, Claire of Kent, who'd been a lady-in-waiting to the Queen and died of the sweating sickness in 1401. (Duke Richard and Clair had had no children of their own.)

Edward was not like his father at all. His father's arrogance had assumed the rebellion in Wales was over after his personal intervention and cruelty. The truth was that it continued. King Edward now sent emissaries to meet with the Welsh rebels and listen to their grievances.

The solution offered by the King was that the Welsh would be given the same rights as the English, their lords seated in the House of Lords, and the burghers in the Commons, but Owain Glyndŵr must bend the knee. Owain refused. But the other Welsh lords were insistent that they take this victory and they forced him to accept. Edward was asked to let Owain continue his claim as the Prince of Wales if he submitted. Edward countered with offering him the title of the Duke of Powys. He reluctantly accepted after his Tudor relatives insisted.

From this point on, Edward's kingdom was at peace. Edward and Elizabeth had many children and England and Wales prospered in his reign. He died after a reign of near 36 years and was succeeded by Richard, Prince of Wales.

667283

Hugh Bonneville and Sally Hawkins playing Richard II with his wife, Maria of France, in BBC’s series, “The Plantagenets”
[4] Born in 1410 and named after his godfather, Richard Mortimer, the 1st Duke of March, as a child, Richard, Prince of Wales, enjoyed a happy childhood, with his parents and siblings.

His father, had a strong bond with his children, many future psychiatrists, believe that Edward was compensating for his own relationship with his father.

His education was a mixture of administrative training, learning Latin, French and Welsh, set to be an inclusive of all his people as well as military, with Edward instilling in him that war was only to be used as a last option, stating that God does not wish for his Christian soldiers to kill one another.

In 1430, his father arranged double wedding, with a marriage for 20 year old Richard, with 19 year old, Maria of France, a granddaughter of Charles VIII of France and Maria of Lorraine, via their eldest son, Charles, Grand Dauphin of France, along with his elder sister, Princess Joanna, marrying Charles, Petit Dauphin of France.

The pair would be as fertile as their parents, resulting in seven births before the death of his father, when Richard became king at the age of thirty one.

For his children and other children of nobility, Richard, wanting the future generations to have an outstanding education, he would commission a number of education facilities including a college on a town on the outskirts of Richmond, known as Kew College (In OTL Henry VI sets up Eton College near Windsor castle) and then later setting up another at Oxford, known as King’s College in his honour. (In OTL Henry VI sets up Kings College at Cambridge)

Richard reign was one of prosperity, with no wars resulting in a basic tax rate being collected from a large populated country, meant the treasury had additional funds at its disposal.

As well as education, Richard would see stones laid for St. George Cathedral, in Gloucester as well as St. David Cathedral, in Powys.

Richard was able to invest in the Cinque Ports in the Kent coast, converting them from joint military and trade purposes, to solely trade. While in the north, he arranged for better fortifications along the Scottish border.

Richard also improved infrastructure across the nation including roads that connected all major cities and towns in England and Wales.

In 1479, 68 year old, Richard collapsed during a meeting with Parliament, he was rushed to nearby bed, however had been found to have succumbed to a heart attack. He was succeeded by his son, Henry.

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Jacob Collins-Levy & Jodie Comer as King Henry IV & Queen Guinevere of BBC's "The Plantagenets."*
[5] Henry Plantagenet was the third child and second son of Richard, the then Prince of Wales, and his wife, Princess Maria. His older sister, Princess Eleanor, was born in 1431. He and his slightly older identical twin, Edward, were born in 1433. His younger siblings were Arthur, born in 1437, John, born in 1439, and another set of twins, Isabel and Joanna, born in 1441, only a few weeks before Richard ascended to the throne. Isabel and Joanna were not identical.

From birth, Prince Henry was the Earl of March, as his father had inherited the Duchy from his godfather, Richard Mortimer. When Richard became king, he granted the title of the Duke of March to Henry, making him the 3rd Duke at the age of seven. His older brother was made the Duke of Cornwall and Prince of Wales. All the princes and princesses were given intense education at Richmond Palace. In 1450, the two twin princes were the first royal children to attend University as they attended Oxford at King College.

After Oxford in 1455 the two princes married. Edward married a French Princess, Catherine Valois. Henry married Guinevere Tudor, the oldest daughter of the current Duke of Powys, Owain Tudor, who was five years his junior. As the Duchy of the March included Welsh lands (it was the Welsh March,) it made sense for Henry to marry a Welsh Princess. Harry and Gwen (as they were known) set up their household in the March and had no idea that he'd become King one day. By 1561 they had a number of children and it seemed their marriage, although arranged for political purposes, had quickly become a love match.

The same was not true for Edward and Catherine. Catherine and Edward just didn't like each other from the start. They did their marital duty and she conceived, but had a miscarriage. After that they went their separate ways. Although Edward had several mistresses, when rumors spread that the Princess was entertaining in her bed a French Knight who was visiting the court with the Princess' brother, the Dauphin Louis, he felt compelled to confront him, expecting the Knight, the Chevalier Pierre Flambeau, to deny and leave the court. Instead he admitted it, insulting the Prince, pointing out his own affairs, and calling him a 'louse.' Edward had no choice but to challenge him. They met on the tourney field in one of the last jousts in England. Edward died at the age of 28 in 1461 on the field when Flambeau's knobbed lance broke and a shard pierced the prince's chest. Catherine fled back to France with her brother and Flambeau, with whom she continued her affair.

Harry and Gwen were at the tourney and he witnessed his beloved brother's death. Suddenly he was the heir to the throne. When Harry, Gwen, and their children returned to the March, he was now the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cornwall as well as the Duke of the March. They were both young, she was 23 and he was 28, and continued to have children.

(Peace was preserved with France by a formal apology from the Dauphin, the Princess, and Flambeau, claiming the death of the Prince of Wales was an unfortunate accident and not the intent of the Chevalier.)

Eighteen years later, the 46 year old Harry became King Henry IV.

The most important event of King Henry's reign did not occur in England or Wales. It occurred half a world away when the "Admiral of the Seas," Cristoforo Colombo, sailing for the Empire of the Republic of Genoa, succeeded in crossing the Atlantic Ocean to what he thought was the Indies with a fleet of twenty ships.

Genoa was the dominant power in the Mediterranean, having taken parts of the former Byzantine Empire when it fell including Crimea, Cyprus, Crete, several Aegean Islands, and parts of the Peloponnese. During the 15th Century Genoa had also added Sicily, Malta, and conquered Granada (Including Gibraltar) and Western Morocco to their Empire, which had already included Corsica, Sardinia, and the northeast coast of Italy. Genoa and Portugal had been racing to see who could sail around Africa first and Genoa had also discovered the Canary Islands and colonized them. Colombo had been an important part of this exploration and expansion for Genoa. in 1483, he'd convinced the Doge and the Great Council of the Republic to finance his voyages to the West.

When Colombo returned to Europe in 1484 with his discovery of islands in the west, the news spread like wildfire and the race to explore was on. England and Wales was already ahead on this race, having worked to increase it's infrastructure for trade under Henry's father. He'd continued that, building ships and ports. While the other European powers of Castile, France, the Netherlands, and Norway rushed to establish themselves, England had the infrastructure.

In 1485, Henry commissioned his own exploration fleet of 35 ships to sail west, using the northern route that had led to Iceland and Greenland and the fabled Vinland. Hugo Montgomery was the Admiral of the Fleet and after sailing to Iceland, then Greenland, he sailed west and charted the east coast of Neustralia, as Montgomery named the new Continent. He charted it from across the strait separating Neustralia from Greenland down past the island he named New Caledonia, in the large bay he named the Caledonian Sea, then along the coast until he reached the end of the land and sailed into the Genoan Sea. He found several rivers and named them from native names: the Mohikun (Hudson), the Leneypea (Delaware), the Keshapik (James), and the Rickohawk (Savanah). His voyage took three years and he claimed the entire continent of Neustralia for England & Wale and left behind trading forts at the Caledonian Sea, the Mohikun, the Leneypea, and the Rickohawk. He returned to England with his ships laden with beaver pelts and astonished all with his stories.

In 1489 Montgomery sailed with a fleet of 100 ships and this time sailed southwest from Iceland and discovered the fishing banks in the seas east of New Caledonia, resupplied the trading forts, and explored further into the Caledonian Bay, discovering the Magna Huron River (St. Lawrence). He returned to England in 1492 to report to the King.

But the King had died when he'd been thrown off his horse while fox hunting in the March. So it was the news of the Fishing Banks and the Magna Huron were reported to his son, William of Dublin.

*The actors appeared younger than they should have in this scene as they had played Harry & Gwen from when they were young adults.

[6] The man who would one day grow to become the third of England's William was born in a quiet day of march in 1465 to then Prince Henry and Princess Guinevere, in a visit of the Princely couple to the Pale of Ireland. He would be the second and last of Henry's sons, led by a brood of five surviving older sisters and followed by other two. His brother Edmund would die as a young boy, which would see William quickly take up the mantle of Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall. Henry would be destined to a firm and varied education, as he learned almost six languages in his life and comprehended a few more. Following the footsteps of his father, William boud attend King's College in Oxford, where he would receive a secondary education in law, dialectics and diplomacy.

William would grow to be a man of beastly size, reaching almost two meters. He was, as recorded by historians, a handsome man, who held his hair short and his beard long, being also reported to be hairy. His first months as prince of Wales, residing in Ludlow had come to show the type of man he would be, brazen but loyal, intelligent and talented, but luckless. A very ambitious lad from a young age, William would use his prerogative as Prince of Wales to start what would be recorded in history of the "Welsh conquest of Ireland" (A obvious play of jokes, as Ireland, was conquered by England, but by the Prince of Wales and his "Welsh" army) as he would invade Leister and Connacht in early 82, conquering much of it in a fell swoop. The Irish campaign would where William would spend most of his time as Prince of Wales. perhaps his greatest personal achievement. It would serve as the stamp of approval that most of the English nobility would unusually stamp upon him, as William's conquests by 1492 were more than assured, and, his appeasement of both the Irish, who would come to see their future King in a new light after his conquest, and the many English nobles who got rewards on the island.[/B]

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William of Dublin, in his official portrait in his investiture as King of Ireland
The sudden death of his father, in 1492, would see William of Dublin, as he had been known until then, become William the III, of the House of Plantagenet. It was in this time that the news from the new world would come back to William as he was crowned - with England quickly hopping on breaking apparently rising Genoan domination of Columbia, as German cartographers would soon name the full continent, which, the English would in time adopt as well. William, as his close Portuguese-soon-to-be-Spanish cousins, would share with him. William would prepare many colonial ventures, sending many English, Welsh and Irishmen over the sea to England's new colonies in the Columbian East. The English would attempt to spread their colonists all over the East coast, with the majority settling in below the Hudson and the Rickohawk river. The further anglicized river bays of Mohican, Lenape, Kespeak and Rickhaw would see major the first and major settlements, with the Mohican river becoming home to the fledling city of New York, as the venture was done under the patronage of the Dukes of York, the Lenape river home to Williamston, Kespeak home to Montgomery and the Rickohaw home to Hudson, named after another English explorer of the time named Liam Hudson, with many more settlements spread in between.

It was also in the first year of his reign that William had his third child by his wife, Madalena, Infanta of Spain. The marriage had been done to cement relations with the soon to burst Empire of Spain, ruled under the reign of Henrique the I, son of the now both deceased Alfonso the V of Portugal-Castille and Isabel of Aragon, Madalena's brother. The Capet-Burgundians of Portugal had in less than a generation united the lands of the Castillian Lancasters and the Barcelona's of Aragon, and the patriotic fervor felt against Morocco and Genoa itself would see the newly risen Spanish Empire (A fun fact found by later Historians, William of England and Henry of Spain would both acquire their second royal and their imperial title, in that order, at the same time) conquered much of the west Mediterranean and the Canarias from Genoa, which would see the unified Spain sending their famous conquistadors into New Castille (Mexico and Central America), New Vizcaya (Colombia, Venezuela and Panama) alongside Pizzaro's conquest of the Inca Empire, establishing the third colony of New Navarre.

The Genoan themselves had only kept the island of Antonina (Puerto Rico), with the French settling Saint Domingue and the Spanish Cuba, with the English settling the Bahamas. The other two rising players in Colonial Columbia would be the United Kingdom of Sicily under the Angevins, and France under the recently crowned Burgundians, by far the richest state of Europe. The French would settle the aforementioned Saint Domingue, alongside Canada and Acadia above the Mohican colonies and Antartique by the platine river (Uruguay, Argentina, Chile).

This heavy rush of European states to America would see the birth of the short-lived Atlantic slave trade, as the Mediterranean Christian states would prefer the enslave the Muslim north Africans than the slowly Christianising Africans below the Sahara, with Jolof, Benin, and the Kongo all adopting Christianity on missions organized by the Pope and the Emperor of Spain.

The arisal of these all these settlements over all these vast lands would be fueled by an extreme population boom in France, England and Spain, but by this time most of these colonies, especially those dependent more on settlers, would be bare bones, but this would be a start and it would be these settlements and claims that the various European power would bring to the pope in the treaty of Oviedo, where the New World would be divided between the various powers with colonies in America.

William's reign would also face one of the greatest defeats of the English monarchy with the final loss on their land on the continent. The death of the last Valois's would see the Burgundian Dukes rise to the throne of France, uniting a vast realm with already another vast realm, making France extremely rich and powerful. An opportunity of alliance with the Habsburg Emperors of the Holy Roman Empire would be wasted by William, something which would want him to the rest of his days, with France defeating both powers separately. The Burgundian François of Charolais, also known as François the I of France, would be responsible for bringing Aquitaine, Gascony and Calais back into the French crown, defeating William in the battle of Talmond in 1507, handing William the greatest humiliation of his reign. It would see William turn an eye to the consolidation of his rule in England and Ireland, and continued expansion overseas.

William would thus die in 1516, succeeded by his son, Constantine.

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A painting of Constantine I
[8] Constantine was born in 1492, the last son of King William III and Infanta Madalena of Spain. Many at the court believed that the prince was insane as he showed various levels of obsessiveness when participating in his habits and interests. At that, he was often even compared to King Percy I of England. Although Constantine never seemed to pay attention to these people, in fact, he showed very little interest in people at all. He would frequently not be seen for several days and would only appear if his father or mother asked him to.

After he heard of his father’s defeat at the Battle of Talmond, it seemed that Constantine showed even more coldness towards the King. In one of his entries in his diary, Constantine stated that his father may have been a successful man in the isles, but that he had failed his people in the European mainland and the new world.

When he unexpectedly ascended to the throne, after that his elder brothers died in a ship explosion, Constantine immediately went to work and micro-managed nearly all aspects of running the functions of the state. He also showed a particular focus on expanding the English colonies. With the promises of land and titles, he encouraged people to go west, fight Indians, and take their lands. And, back at home, Constantine commenced a military build-up of the army and the navy to combat the French. During the process, he fired many generals who did not meet his standards, which were quite high.

Finally, in 1521, Constantine sent a declaration of war, which urged King François I to surrender his lands in Acadia and Canada. However, the King refused, still competent upon his victory over the English in 1507. Two years later, he was singing a different tune in the city of Carlsruhe, whereby treaty he was forced to give up most of France's colonial possessions. Though, some considered that he was quite lucky as Constantine made no attempt in taking France’s profitably Caribbean colonies.

For the rest of his reign, Constantine continued to improve the manners of producing value from England's new world colonies. In 1536, he died having never married or produced any heirs. He was succeeded by his younger sister, Constance, and her husband, Charles, their second cousin once removed, the Duke of York.

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Natalie Portman & Eric Bana as Constance & Charles in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[9] Constance Plantagenet was the first official reigning queen of England, Wales & Ireland, but only because the number two person in line for her brother's throne insisted on it; he was the Duke of York, her husband, the heir of the senior Plantagenet cadet line descended from Prince Arthur, the third son of Richard II, and oldest of Henry IV's two younger brothers. Richard had created the Duchy of York for his third son (and granted Henry the Duchy of March and his fourth son, John, the Duchy of Kent, also a new creation.)

The son of Arthur, Prince Charles, was the 2nd Duke of York and was Charles' grandfather. It was Prince Charles who was the Duke of York who financed the settlement of Neustralia, a term still used for England's colonial endeavor in eastern North Columbia, and had New York named after him. He also was close to King William's older sons, Prince William and Prince Henry, and a major supporter of William's efforts to retain their French provinces. He and his son, Arthur the Earl of March, were with the two princes in France and all of them died in the explosion of the ship that was transporting them home in 1507. The young Charles, only four years old, now was the 3rd Duke of York and the richest individual in the kingdom besides the King. He and his mother were brought into Richmond Palace to live with William. There he became close to the youngest child of William, his young daughter, Constance, also only four, eleven years younger than Constantine.

When Charles returned to his estates in York in 1523, he had married Constance, uniting the main Plantagenet line and the cadet line, with Constantine's blessings.

As Constantine had no children, the heir to his throne was Constance if women were allowed to inherit and Charles was if they followed Salic Law. It had never been an issue in the kingdom before. Now it became a matter for Parliament to settle. Those who wanted to follow the Salic Law used the precedent of Stephen of Blois succeeding Henry I, his uncle, instead of Maud, his daughter. Charles was adamant for the rights of his wife and convinced her brother the King to agree. So it was that Parliament decreed that women were eligible to inherit the throne after the male heirs took precedence. This was intentionally vague as it didn't define how distant a male heir needed to be to take precedent. But it was close enough for Constantine to issue a royal decree in 1528 that his sister and her husband were his joint heirs if he had no children.

Charles and Constance had three children in their marriage, all of them surviving to adulthood, all born before they took the throne in 1536.

The major issue before the King and Queen in their joint reign was religion. Many of the English had been interested in reform since the Wycliffe attempts to translate the Vulgate into English. Now that the Reformation had swept across the Continent and then divided into three versions (Lutheranism, Swiss Reformed, Anabaptists) there were sects in England, Wales, and Ireland (not so much in Ireland) who wanted the kingdom to follow suit. Charles and Constance were devout Catholics and Charles as a young man had written a treatise refuting the thinking of Luther and been granted the honorary title of "Defender of the Faith" by the Pope for it. On the throne they took this seriously and did their best to remove the Protestants from England. Unlike on the continent where this meant warfare and persecution, Charles & Constance followed a two fold path. Those who kept their religion private would not be investigated, even if someone accused them of holding heretical views. Those not able to do so were peacefully invited to leave the kingdom. Points of departure were the Netherlands where the Swiss Reformed option had taken over or Scotland, which also had moved in that direction. But another option was one of the provinces of Neustralia. Up the Mohican River from New York was an empty land (the natives didn't count in European eyes) and there these Protestants could settle, remain loyal English subject, yet pursue a divergent faith.

When Queen Constance died in 1545 at the age of 41 it was a shock to everyone. She died in childbirth as she'd gotten with child again at this late age. The child was still born and now the King was a widower. He never married again nor had a mistress. For the rest of his life, King Charles wore a Franciscan monk's habit and lived as if he had taken vows in his personal life, eschewing all luxuries.

He continued the policies he had pursued with Constance of building the navy, continued exploration of Columbia beyond Neustralia, including financing an explorer to sail around South Columbia and to the west coast of North Columbia. He also created a company to work for colonization in the West Indies Sea (what had originally been called the Genoan Sea) and the southeast coast of South Columbia. The colony there was called Constancia.

He died in his sleep. He hadn't been eating well in his last few months and had lost a lot of weight.

[10] Charles Plantagenet was the oldest child of his parents, born in 1526. He was ten-years-old when his uncle died, and his mother and father took the thrones. He was made the Prince of Wales shortly after their joint coronation. When Charles turned sixteen, he went to a university in Italy. It was there he met his lifetime friend, Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. It would be Cosimo who would encourage Charles' future patronage of the arts. Charles would eventually arrange a marriage between their houses.

Three years later, Charles would learn of his mother's passing and return to England. He became his father's trusted advisor for twelve years, taking over most of his duties when his health began to fail.

In the meantime, Charles arranged the marriages of his siblings and himself. In 1547, he would marry Mary of Scotland, who was nearly five years his senior, hoping to make peace with Scotland after years of tension. Despite their age difference, the two managed to have a happy marriage and a healthy sex life, managing to have eleven children, seven of whom lived to adulthood.

When he became king, Charles was eager to sponsor as many artists, composers and playwrights as he could. He was determined to make English renaissance successful, taking inspiration from both Italy and France.

As for the question of religion, Charles remained resolutely silent. It was well known that his wife was a member of the Swiss reform and practiced her religion openly. When it was remarked upon, Charles only stated "She prays to the same God." His refusal to even continue his parents' policies, instead letting heretics pray openly as long as they made no war. This lack of action caused a Catholic uprising. At the end, the Duke of Richmond famously declared "if they were hoping to force my brother's hand, it backfired badly." Indeed, Charles was increased at what he said was a most unchristian act. He lead the troops himself to crush the rebellion.

Sadly, this would be his undoing as he would be captured and executed by the rebel leaders. He was succeeded by his oldest son, James.

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Alan Cumming as James I & VII in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[11] Prince James, born in 1549, was the firstborn child of Charles and Mary. From birth he was the heir to the English, Welsh, and Irish throne and second in line for the Scottish throne behind his mother Mary, as her older brother, James VI Stewart, of whom he was named after, had never married to have legitimate issue. King James was twelve years older than his sister and had been more a parental figure from the death of their father, King James V, in 1530, when Mary was nine and James VI was 22 and became king of Scotland. When James VI died in 1680 at the age of 72, James Plantagenet was 31 and had been King of England, Wales, and Ireland for a year. His mother, the dowager Queen now became the reigning Queen of Scotland; James Plantagenet was first in line to the Scottish throne and was formally the Duke of Rothesay.

James had married a Medici, like his uncle the Duke of Richmond. His bride wasn't a niece of Cosmo like his uncle's wife, but his daughter, Jessica de' Medici, who was 15 when they married in 1566 when James was 17. Jessica was said to be the most beautiful woman in Europe and James doted on her. She was a northern Italian, blonde beauty. They had several children and James doted on them too.

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Gwyneth Paltrow as Queen Jessica in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
As King of England with a nominal Catholic bride, related to popes, but raised by his mother as a Presbyterian in the Church of Scotland's faith, the couple were a perfect example of the vision of England as a multi-religious community. One of James' first acts as King was to have Parliament formalize the idea that England was a place of religious toleration. The entire kingdom except the few rebels, supported this enthusiastically.

James was actually on the field of battle when he requested Parliament to pass the Act of Toleration for England and Wales. He didn't request the Irish Parliament to do this, but it was clear he intended to do so in the future as there was a large minority of Protestants in Ireland, mainly Anglo-Normans in the southeast and Scots Presbyterians in the north. (Ireland and England/Wales were not one united kingdom but two in personal union since William III.) As the dispatches were sent, he turned his attention to fight the remaining rebels and mounted battle.

The stronghold of the rebels was in Kent, where John Marlowe, the archbishop of Canterbury, the most important bishop in Catholic England, sat, where he had been supported by James' 4th cousin, Duke David Plantagenet, the 4th Duke of Kent, whom had been killed in battle against Charles II. But it was David's son, John, the 5th Duke, who had then led the rebels and captured and killed his king. However, his uncle, the younger brother of David, William Plantagenet, although as fiercely Catholic as the rest of the Kent Plantagenets, had remained loyal and was with James on the field when word reached them that John had committed regicide. It was the archbishop himself who brought the news and explained that despite his council, the young Duke had done the horrid deed. The archbishop now bowed the knee and swore loyalty, claiming his aim had never been regicide but simply to protect the rights of Catholics. James promised him their rights would be protected, which he did in the Act of Toleration.

The Battle of Canterbury in 1579 was a fierce battle and the victory of the King and his loyalists was overwhelming as many across the kingdom, Catholic as well as Protestant, had flocked to join the new King. The Archbishop John Marlowe blessed the royal forces and many of the rebels fled from the superior numbers.

Duke John was captured and arrested, as were those who'd assisted him in killing Charles II instead of opposing him. The rest were granted pardons if they swore loyalty to the King and accepted that England/Wales was going to be a land of religious toleration. Most did.

The trial of Duke John was not like the trial he'd done on his king where he was judge, jury, and executioner. James insisted it be the fairest trial ever. It wasn't until June of 1580 that it ended, the Duke was found guilty of murder, and beheaded. James granted the Duchy to William Plantagenet, who became the sixth Duke. This generosity of the King to the former rebels and other members of the Kent Plantagenet cadet line ended the religious divisions in the kingdom. It was clear to the Catholics that religious toleration meant everyone, Catholic and Protestant (and Jew) would be respected, treated as full Englishmen or Welsh with full rights.

By 1584, his Irish kingdom had followed suit, despite the Catholic majority being much larger than in England/Wales where it was only a slight majority. Scotland was the opposite. There the nation was Presbyterian and all other forms of worship were required to be in secret. After Ireland passed its Act of Toleration, James journeyed to Scotland and spoke to the Parliament, making it clear if he became king on his mother's death he would ask for a similar act there and would not enforce any persecution of Catholics, other kinds of Protestants, or Jews. It was a long debate, but in 1587, as Queen Mary lay dying in her chambers, the Scots Parliament passed their Act of Toleration and extended an invitation to James to be their King on his mother's death. It was only a few weeks later that James became the seventh of his name to be King of Scotland, with him now being the monarch of three kingdoms in personal union. (England and Wales were one kingdom with two ethnicities.)

The British renaissance moved full ahead under James, he supported play-writes and often attended the theatre. He continued his father's sponsorship of the arts, and focused on architecture. His biggest building project was a new palace to replace the decaying Richmond Palace. Built in the heart of London, Plantagenet Palace was a magnificent structure of marble that became the most significant building in London.

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Plantagenet Palace with the Thames behind it.
The other important part of his reign was the tension between the English colonial expansion and the Spanish one. Both empire claimed Florida, the Spanish name given to the peninsula in the southeast of North Columbia. Finally in 1603 this tension broke into open warfare in Florida and that expanded into a general colonial war in not only the West Indies Sea but in Europe as nations divided up between which side they supported. Genoa, Tuscany, the Papal States, and Morocco took the side of England. France and Sweden took the side of Spain, hoping this might be their opportunity to weaken their main rival.

This became known as the Twelve Years War due to its length. King James died before it was done, although by 1613 it was clear that northern Florida was in English hands and the island chain to the east of lower Florida, the Bahamas.

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Emperor Nicholas I out for a walk
[12] Born in 1570, Prince Nicholas was the second son of King James I & VII and Princess Jessica de' Medici. Upon the death of his baby brother, William, Nicholas became the first in line to the throne of the kingdoms. Nicholas, a smart child with the propensity to learn, greatly enjoyed participating in the social aspects of the royal court, though he always maintained an allure of honour, respectability, and seriousness. He never took part in things that he labelled to be ''morally depraved''.

At his own suggestion to improve relations with the Holy Roman Empire, a marriage was arranged between him and Princess Anna Maria, who was the sole child of Francis II, King of the Romans and son of Emperor Frederick VI. Soon after their marriage, in 1590, Nicholas and his wife were blessed with their first child. Later on, Nicholas' marriage to Anna Maria would help maintain neutrality from Austria and most of the Holy Roman Empire during the Twelve Years' War.

Speaking of which, when the war dragged on, Nicholas began to paint several paintings, most of which typically depicted great victories against the Spanish and their allies. His father was so impressed by these paintings that the King ordered the construction of what would later become the National Museum of the Arts, so they could be exhibited. During this time, Nicholas also began to be influenced by the writings of John Dour, a British Renaissance writer and advocate for Unional Nationalism, which called for a more centralized form of government, opposed regionalism, and would promote a sense of patriotism to the Isles as a whole.

When his father died, Nicholas was left to oversee the end of the Twelve Years' War. Two years later, Florida was completely secured and with this, Nicholas renamed it to Campestris (meaning Flatland in Latin), to rid it of its Spanish name. And, the following years, Nicholas and his supporters began to work on executing John Dour’s ideas. Although, in the end, they did not succeed in ridding the isles of regional parliaments, they successfully implemented their wanted form of nationalism, Nicholas I proclaiming himself, Emperor of the Isles.

The Emperor died in 1624 and was succeeded by his grandson, Prince James.

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Rufus Sewell as the King Emperor James II & VIII in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[13] James, Prince of Wales, Duke of the March, Cornwall, Rothesay and Cork, became the heir to the various thrones of the British Isles in 1611 when he was not yet a year old when his father, Prince William, the previous Prince of Wales, Duke of the March, Cornwall, Rothesay and Cork, died in the last battle of the 12 Years War. Prince William was only 20 years old and his young bride was a year younger. They'd married in 1609. She was Hilde of Brunswick-Lüneburg, one of the small duchies of the Holy Roman Empire, which was an ally of the British Kingdoms in the war.

It was Swedish forces that had invaded the Holy Roman Empire, hoping to recover control of the southern shore of the Baltic Sea that had once been part of their Empire, which at this point included Finland, Norway, Denmark, and the lands on the southeastern shore of the sea. William's father, King Nicholas, had allied with the Germans and had sent William to the German lands often as a child to visit his mother's relatives and cement the relationship. Hilde and William were a love match and William along with her older brother Ernst, and William's best friend, the slightly older Earl of Kent, Richard Plantagenet of Kent, were a trio of drinking friends, gamblers, and soldiers. (Richard was the son of Harold Plantagenet, the 6th Duke of Kent, who'd fought alongside his father, William the Loyal, the 5th Duke, for King James I against his cousin the Regicidal Duke.)

These three led a combined Brunswickian/British force to face the Swedes in Saxony. The Battle was a decisive victory for the various German and British forces against the Swedes, who fled back across the Baltic. But even in victorious battles there are losses and in this battle it was the young heir to the British Thrones who was one of them. Ernst and Richard brought Hilde the news as she waited back at home with Richard's wife, the very pregnant Lady Childia Northrop of Sussex.

So it was that young James never knew his father. He also was distant from his grandfather, as Princess Hilde chose to live with Richard the Earl of Kent and her best friend Lady Childia, in Canterbury with Duke Harold. In 1611 Childia gave birth to a girl they named Elizabeth.

It was in 1618, when James was not yet eight years old, that the various British Kingdoms' thrones were consolidated into one Imperial Throne. Although the kingdoms remained separate with separate Parliaments and ministers, the union was no longer personal, but a permanent feature of one Emperor ruling all the Kingdoms. By this point, it was clear the two young children were inseparable and the parents and grandparents were already talking about a future marriage. Nicholas approved of uniting the ruling Plantagenets with the Kent line that had served him and his father so well during and after the rebellion. Duke Harold, as his father before him, was a leading figure in the kingdom, often serving as the Chancellor of the Treasury and always as an advisor to the King, which was a main reason that the King's heir was fostered to him. A marriage between James and Elizabeth seemed both politically right as well as right in that the two youngsters had already had a 'play marriage'.

Both were trained and educated to someday be future rulers of the Empire. They learned not only their English letters, but also Welsh, Irish Gaelic, Scots Gaelic, Italian, and German. They received the best scientific education of the time and a philosophical instruction in the values of beauty, reason, and tolerance. They were instructed by Catholic Priests, Presbyterian Ministers, and Lutheran Pastors from Hilde's home.

When his grandfather died, James was 14 and he was by then formally betrothed to Lady Elizabeth, age 13. There was no question who should be regent and that was Duke Harold. He and his entire family moved into Plantagenet Palace with the Dowager Queen Ann Marie, and James and Elizabeth's education continued. James had desired to go to Oxford like his ancestors and study at King's College, but now that he was the King of King's College, it was not feasible. Instead his education in history, governance, law, and the geography of the world took place inside the vast complex that was Plantagenet Palace.

In 1628 on his 18th Birthday, the young King formally took control of his Empire, although in truth little changed. The last four years of his education had included his future grandfather-in-law often discussing with him all matters before the throne before making a decision. As he got older more and more he was making decisions to then be approved or not by the Regent. After Harold was no long the Regent, but just the Chancellor of the Treasury, the final choice was supposedly James' decision, but he still relied heavily on the old man.

In 1632 James and Elizabeth were wed and they immediately started a family. Early the next year, only days after Elizabeth announced she was with child, Duke Harold died at the age of 78. Now James could only turn to his foster grandfather for advice in his imagination, which he did for the rest of his life.

There were no more major wars in his reign, but there were colonial skirmishes. It seemed, however, the powers of Europe did not want to fight each other at home, having been traumatized by the horrors of the 12 Years War. But a War with the Spanish was fought in the late 1630s over Constancia in South Columbia . In the end the British had to surrender this distant colony to the Spanish Empire, who renamed it for the redwood trees that grew there as "Brazil". In balance, the Spanish islands in the West Indies Sea of Hamica and Hispaniola were taken by the British, renamed Jamaica and Bethania, after the King and Queen. However, twenty years later, the western part of Bethania was lost to the French who'd been using the large bay there since before the British took it as a harbor for their privateers.

In the 1660s James sent explorers to the north to chart the large bay there and seek a northwest passage. One was not found then but the Bay was charted and determined to be another route to the fur lands of upper Canada. It was named James Bay. James also sent explorers up the Magna Huron River to explore the great lakes of the interior. By the 1680s they had discovered the upper reaches of the great inland river that flowed into the Gulf of Florida (OTL Gulf of Mexico) of which the Spanish had discovered its mouth and named it the Mizzizzippi, from the local native term. The British called the same river the Minnesota and the land drained by its upper reaches by the same name.

These colonial enterprises brought vast wealth to the British Empire. From the West Indies Sea came sugar, molasses, and rum. From the southern provinces of Neustralia came tobacco and indigo, while from the northern provinces came maple syrup and cod from the East New Caldonian Banks. But the biggest source of wealth was from the fur trade.

Not only did the British Isles have the Canadian Fur trade, especially in beaver, they also had another source of fur that no one else in Western Europe had. When King James sent out explorers to the north and west to find a Northwest Passage in the 1660s, he also sent out explorers to the north and east to find a Northeast Passage. Like those who went west, they couldn't find a passage taking them all the way to the Far East, but again they discovered a new sea- in this case the White Sea north of Russia and east of Scandinavia. The Russian Muscovites had already reached the White Sea and built a port when in 1667 British ships sailed into their port and established a special relationship with Russia, which still was distant from the west, having not reached either the Black Sea to its south nor the Baltic to its west. Russia was expanding east across the Urals into Siberia and by the end of James' reign would reach the Pacific. This was a source of fur too that rivaled Canada. Britain had a monopoly on the Russian fur trade of beaver, sable, and once the Russian reached the Pacific, sea otter. For Russia it meant the manufactured goods of Britain, its textiles, the Cod of the Atlantic, tobacco and rum. Once Britain reached India, it meant tea also. Both nations grew rich by this trade and Russia began to become more and more European.

If the Kings before James had wanted to make Britain, and especially London, a place of grandeur and glory, James II now had the means and wealth to do so. Plantagenet Palace became a Mecca of beauty and wealth. Vast gardens with magnificent lawns for croquet, tennis, lawn bowling, and golf were created in the courtyards of the Palace and the lands surrounding it.

James had a vast and magnificent building created to match the Palace for Parliament and a Cathedral in London with a myriad of chapels in it so all the faiths of the Empire, including Judaism, could meet and worship along side each other in separate places in the same vast complex. Using the new science a real clock tower was added to the Tower of London, that now became a museum. This had a giant clock that could be seen by all below that was lit at night like a lighthouse and great bells that rang the hours. London Bridge was rebuilt and the shores of the Thames were changed from mud banks to stone with walk ways along it.

Inside Plantagenet Palace it was all silk, satin, fine crystal, porcelain, art, and gold. Especially gold. Music was everywhere and fashion was vital. The nobility from the three kingdoms spent most of their time at the Palace instead of their estates.

James was called the King Emperor of Gold and Elizabeth was called the Goddess of Beauty.

James lived until he was 85 and when he died he had many grandchildren and great grandchildren and the British Empire was the most powerful and wealthiest nation in Europe.

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George Blagden as Richard III Plantagenet in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[14] Born the third child of six but the oldest son, his parents named him after the Duke of Kent and close advisor (the second king to be named Richard after a Duke close to the throne); they never expected it would be a perfect match for his nickname, “Rich Richard”.

As the son and heir to the King Emperor of Gold, as well as the nickname, he gained the title, Prince of Wealth.

Growing up, the Prince surrounded himself with a variety of young attractive nobility of all genders indulging in immoral conduct, particularly promiscuity. He was famed for taking many lovers, often elevating them to high positions for as long as they held his interest and then pensioning them off with gifts of titles, positions and estates.

In 1666, the philandering Prince Richard was forced to marry and chose as his bride, Duchess Amelia Dorothea of Hesse-Saxe-Gotha (1639–1709), daughter of Grand Duke Albert II and Charlotte Bourbon of Saint-Cloud (cadet of the Orléans branch.)

The marriage was an unhappy one, Amelia was shocked by her husband’s lifestyle, with the couple drifting and eventually living apart. Amelia would reside with her children at Winchester, avoiding the sinful acts happening in London, although the pair would share mutual respect at prestigious events and share a few solitary nights together to have more children.

His time as Prince of Wales was spent supporting the arts, becoming patrons of many artists, composers, musicians and writers, magnifying the beauty around him.

In 1695, 60 year old, Richard became Emperor, however by this point, he was showing the tertiary effects of syphilis and his body has began to waste away, at his coronation in 1696, many commented how it looked more like a gaunt skeleton had be crowned, rather than the most powerful man in the world.

Years of living fast had caught up and the Emperor would be dead within a couple of years from his succession. His death was mourned by his favorites, who soon found a cold future was upon them, with the succession of his son, James.

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Emperor James III & IX of the British Isles in 1721
[15] Prince James was born in 1667 as the first child of Richard, the then Prince of Wales, and Duchess Amelia Dorothea of Hesse-Saxe-Gotha. During his childhood, James spent more time with his mother and siblings at Winchester than with his father in London, which would have an influence on his personal life. He attended King's Collage at Oxford where he became one of the most intelligent people of his time, and would tell his friends a lot of facts.

In 1690, James married Sophia of Brunswick-Hanover (1665-1748), the daughter of Duke Maximilian Augustus and Elizabeth of Bavaria. Unlike his parents marriage, his own marriage was much more happy, as the couple loved each other and would have seven children together.

Upon becoming Emperor of the British Isles in 1698, James continued the fur trade that started in his grandfather's reign and used the vast wealth he got from it to build palaces that showed off the magnificence of Britain, including the Jacobite Palace, which has a blend of western and Russian styles of construction.

Europe during James’ reign saw many changes, including the spread of Unional Nationalism in countries like Sweden (which renamed itself as Scandinavia in 1721) and the Holy Roman Empire (which started a process of centralizing), and the Ottoman War (1703-1714), where the Ottoman Empire was defeated and the city of Constantinople taken by the Genovese (Now known as the Republic of Genoa-Byzantine).

Meanwhile in the New World, the British fought a war against the Spanish in the mid 1720s. In the end, Britain managed to take back the southern part of Brazil from Spain, which they renamed back to Constancia. This meant that Britain now had a colony bordering the French colony of Antartique, which Constantine I had wanted to take from the French back in the 1500's.

James died in 1734 at the age of 67, surrounded by his family. He was succeeded by his son, Augustus.

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Rip Torn as Augustus I Plantagenet in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[16] Augustus was born in the year 1700 on Epiphany Day. He was the fourth child and first son of King James and Queen Sophia and was named after his grandfathers as Maximillian Augustus Richard Plantagenet, but was known as Augustus and to those close to him, 'Gus.' He was the first of the heirs to the throne to study at university at the University of Edinburgh instead of Oxford.

He took a commission in the Imperial Navy and insisted he serve as a real officer. Although the Russians now had a port on the Baltic Sea, in fact it was their capital, St. Thomasburg, founded by Tsar Thomas I the Great Romanov in 1703, the Russian Fur trade still was for the British Empire more profitable in the northern route to the White Sea as the Scandinavian Empire charged tolls for all ships of other nations entering or exiting the Baltic and high tariffs on all trade goods on those ships. So it was that as a young officer he served on the HMS Hugo Montgomery from 1722 until 1725. When the Russians realized the Prince of Wales was regularly visiting them at Arcangel, the Tsar Thomas II, journeyed there to meet him in 1724 along with his family, including his 21 year old daughter Princess Natasha Romanov. The Prince spent a few days with the Romanovs and a marriage was arranged, if approved by King James, between the Princess and the Prince. James approved and in 1726, the Princess journeyed to London from St. Thomasburg. (It was more economical for non-traders to use the Baltic route and pay the toll.)

The couple wed the following year and took up residence in a luxurious set of apartments in Plantagenet Palace. The extravagance of decorations and furnishings still were a part of that Palace, but the extravagance in lifestyle had diminished tremendously in the reign of King James. By the time Augustus became king at the age of 34 upon his father's death, he and Natasha had four children. The new Queen spoke perfect English (in fact all Russians spoke the other European languages with a British accent as English was the second language of the St. Thomasburg Court.)

It was during Augustus' reign that the forces of Unional Nationalism finally united the three kingdoms into one united empire in the Act of Imperial Unity of 1738. One Parliament now met in London with members from all three kingdoms. (Neustralia, Canada, and Constancia did not send members to Parliament, but had their own local legislative bodies and appointed Imperial Governors for each province [Neustralia had several provinces as did Canada.])

It was also in this period that the Prime Minister became a tradition that it always was held by the majority leader of the Parliament and all ministers in the Imperial Government were members of the House of Commons of the majority party.

The Emperor organized the various trading companies that traded with India, the East Indies, China, and Japan (which remained open to the West) into one Company with an Imperial Charter: The British Oriental Trading Company.

During the reign of Emperor Augustus, the burgeoning Industrial Revolution took off with more and more manufacturing of textiles being done with steam powered machines.

Despite being a land of religious tolerance, or maybe due to it, the mid 18th Century saw what came to be called "The Great Revival" sweep the land. It started in the English Lutheran Church under the Wesley Brothers, Henry the Preacher and Geoffrey the Hymn Writer, and spread to all faiths. Those holding these new religious views were known as Methodists due to their insistence on strict methods of personal piety in prayer, meditation, and study.

There were several wars that the Empire fought during his reign, but they all were limited affairs of small armies facing each other on the field of battle and didn't affect most folk. Britain fought for the Independence of Savoy from Burgundy-France in the Savoy War of 1744, which saw Burgundy-France defeated. In 1767-1770, the Empire supported the Portuguese in their attempt to separate from the Spainish. Although it failed in Iberia, the Spanish Empire's colony of Northern Brazil, Constancia's neighbor , declared itself independent. As most of its settlers were Portuguese and not Aragonese, Catalonian, or Castilian, they had joined the war for separation and they achieved it. Finally there was the War of 1782 in which the Empire and Burgundy-France fought over rights in India. This was an easy victory for the Empire and the British Oriental Trading Company now had a monopoly on trade with the Sub-Continent.

When the news reached the court, the Emperor listened attentively and then interrupted the proceeding with a coughing fit. He had to retire to bed and from then on he was bed ridden. Seven months later in early 1783, just past his 83rd birthday, he died. During that time his granddaughter, Philippa, Princess of Wales, who then succeeded him, had acted as Regent.

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Golda Rosheuvel as Empress Philippa in Season 3, Episode 4 of the BBC production, "The Plantagenets"

(17) Philippa of Wales, born in 1762 was granddaughter of Augustus by his son, Augustus, Prince of Wales. Married at 18 to a second cousin, Leopold of Sweden, they shared the same great grandfather James and thus their children would members of the House of Plantagenet. In honour of his future role as consort and father of future monarchs, Augustus created Leopold as Duke of Plantagenet.

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Luke Newton as Leopold Plantagenet of Sweden, Duke of Plantagenet, in season 3, Episode 4 of the BBC production, "The Plantagenets"

Philippa father Augustus had married Clara of Constancia, a minor Portuguese noble who may have had African heritage. This was contested at the time but later research has confirmed that she did have African heritage. She became Regent for her grandfather after his convalescence, and acquited herself remarkably well, when she became empress she petitioned for Leopold to become Emperor Consort but Parliament refused, agreeing only to give him precedence over everyone except the infant Prince of Wales, their first of ten children.

Philippa ruled from 1783 to 1820 and presided over a period known as The Philippine Age, whilst her grandfather had put much focus on international status, Philippa put much effort into national infrastructure, including canal networks and a network of new shipyards, sponsored farming and animal husbandry projects in a determination that the home nation would be virtually self sufficient.

By 1820, Leopold had died and Philippa was showing signs of exhaustion. In a surprising move, she voluntarily abdicated in favour of James, Prince of Wales and retired to Scotland before her death in 1825.

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[18] James, was born in 1782, the eldest of 10 children born to Prince Leopold, Duke of Plantagenet and Princess Regent, Philipp of Wales, being named after their common ancestor. Like their mother, James and his siblings, had matching complexions, inherited from their African heritage.
Although ailing in health, Emperor Augustus, from his royal bedchamber would dote on his great grandson, naming him Duke of Cambridge and seeing him on the days he felt able to entertain.

A year after his birth, his elderly great grandfather, died and his mother, became Empress and James was elevated to Prince of Wales.
At 16, James attend King’s College, Oxford and in 1802, left becoming the first member of the royal family to receive Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

View attachment 669428
Dev Patel and Rosalind Eleazar playing James and Theodora.

In 1806, James married Theodora, Grand Duchess of the Genoa-Byzantine Empire, the pair had be corresponding with each other for years, after James had befriended her brother, Grand Duke, Alexander, during their time at Oxford. James and Theodora, would enjoy a happy marriage, similar to his own parents, although not as many children we

This wedding would be followed in quick succession by marriages of his sisters, in 1807, Princess Natasha married, Theodora and Alexander’s older brother, Emperor Constantine of Genoa-Byzantine and Princess Clara would marry their cousin James, Crown Prince of Scandinavia (sometimes still called Sweden), while in 1808, Princess Augusta married Charles, Dauphin of Burgandy-France and Princess Emily married John, Hereditary Prince of Portugal.

With these marriages, James, soon became known as Uncle James, to many future leaders of Europe and would see peace not only for his empire but also amongst the great powers.

Upon the abdication of his mother, 38 year old, James held, thank giving celebrations in her honour and vowed to continue the Philippine Age.
Not even then could people imagine how the next 51 years, which became the Jacobite Era.
Significant innovations in science, engineering and technology during this era, would see many commenting how this felt like the second renaissance, with prominent figures such as Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Charles Darwin, showing how great the empire was.

With his mother, retiring to Scotland, James would invest money into the railway industry, purchasing the royal family their own locomotive, which would allow James to do day visits to his mother on a weekly basic and being back to London the next day. The railway industry also opened up Britain to the average citizens to travel and visit all over.

At 89 years old, Emperor James had overseen great develops in his own Empire as well as across the world and would die peacefully, succeeded by his son, also named James.

[19] Born in 1808, Prince James was the second child but first son of James V & XI and Theodora of the Genoa-Byzantine Empire. He shared the complextions of his siblings and parents, which had become common among the royal familes of Europe due to marriages of his aunts. He became Prince of Wales in 1820 following the abdication of his grandmother Philippa, a title he would hold for over fifty years.

James married in 1831 to Princess Elizabeth of the Holy Roman Empire, daughter of Emperor Maximilian V. The couple loved each other every much, and had nine children togethe, almost as much as James' grandparents.

In 1871 James succeeded his father as Emperor of the British Isles at the age of 63, and continued the Jacobite Era. His reign was very peaceful but had many advancements in technology happen. In fact, he would have his photo taken, making him the second British monarch to be photographed (the first being his father). An important event that happened during this time period was the independence of Neutralia, Canada, and Constancia, with their first rulers chosen from James' cousins, although he would still have the title of Emperor.

James died in 1894 at the age of 86, his wife Elizabeth would die nine years later at the age of 95. James' funeral was attended by many world leaders, and was the first to be filmed. He was succeeded by his ________, ________.
 
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Just some points for correction
[19] Born in 1808, Prince James was the second child but first son of James IV & XI and Theodora of the Genoa-Byzantine Empire. He shared the complextions of his siblings and parents, which had also started to spread to the other European royal families thanks to the marriages of his sisters. He became Prince of Wales in 1820 following the death of his grandmother Philippa, a title he would hold for over fifty years.
It was James IV and X.
The complexions of foreign royal families would have began changing follow the marriages of his aunts.
Philippa only abdicated in 1820, she didn’t die until five years later.
An important event that happened during this time period was the independence of Neutralia, Canada, and Constancia, with their first rulers chosen from James' cousins.
Has the title Emperor changed with three major colonies declaring independence?
 
Kings of England
1327-1377: Edward III (House of Plantagenet)
1377-1399: Lionel I (House of Plantagenet) [1]
1399-1405: Percy I (House of Plantagenet) [2]
1405-1441: Edward IV (House of Plantagenet) [3]
1441-1479: Richard II (House of Plantagenet) [4]
1479-1492: Henry IV (House of Plantagenet) [5]
1492-1496: William III (House of Plantagenet) [6]

Kings of England and Ireland
1496-1516: William III (House of Plantagenet) [7]
1516-1536: Constantine I (House of Plantagenet) [8]
1536-1545: Charles I & Constance I (House of Plantagenet) [9]
1545-1567: Charles I (House of Plantagenet) [9]
1567-1579: Charles II (House of Plantagenet) [10]
1579-1587: James I (House of Plantagenet) [11]

Kings of England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland
1587-1613: James I & VII (House of Plantagenet) [11]
1613-1618: Nicholas I (House of Plantagenet) [12]

Emperors of the British Isles
1618-1624: Nicholas I (House of Plantagenet) [12]
1624-1695: James II & VIII (House of Plantagenet) [13]
1695-1698: Richard III (House of Plantagenet) [14]
1698-1734: James III & IX (House of Plantagenet) [15]
1734-1783: August I (House of Plantagenet) [16]
1783-1820: Philippa I (House of Plantagenet) [17]
1820-1871: James IV & X (House of Plantagenet) [18]
1871-1894: James V & XI
(House of Plantagenet) [19]
1894-1913: Maximilian I
(House of Plantagenet} [20]



[1] Lionel of Antwerp/Clarence was the second son of Edward III, married to Elizabeth, Countess of Ulster, and subsequently widowed in 1363. Upon his elder brothers death in 1361, he became Prince of Wales and Heir Apparent. Upon being widowed, he had only one child - a daughter who survived to adulthood - and his father looked for a new wife for him. In 1366, he was married to Catherine of Luxembourg, the widowed daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles IV and the pair had four more children.

His reign saw the Peasants Revolt and the end of the Fifty Years War which lasted for almost 50 years after starting in 1337. This ended because Lionel was concerned about further peasant rebellions and the ensuing difficulties he was facing with Ireland and Scotland. Edward III had attempted to conquer Scotland and place Lionels brother John on the Scottish throne, but this had ultimately failed and Lionel dispatched John to Ireland to put down unrest.

Lionel died in 1399 and was succeeded by his son, Percy I.

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A drawing of King Percy I of England
[2] Born in 1368, Percy was the first child and son of King Lionel I and Catherine of Luxembourg. A stubborn and prideful boy, who viewed that nearly all were beneath him, Percy showed great aspirations to become a military commander. He even once proclaimed to his father that he would be able to quash any revolt for him.

King Lionel I died in 1399, Percy became the new King of England. His style of governing was much more harsh and hotheaded than his father and frequently stamped down on those who opposed him. Percy soon adopted a new title, Sovereign of the English, as in the people of England, which he intended to become as synonymous as the title of King.

Three years after the Glyndŵr Rising had erupted in 1400, Percy personally led an army to the Welsh marches. Despite a cruel and long campaign of terror and death, the rebellion continued, however, the King was satisfied believing that the rebels would soon be defeated.

When he finally returned to the capital, he made plans to invade France. But, before he could set his plans into motion, Percy was found dead in his bed, most likely poisoned in his sleep. He was succeeded by his son, Edward.

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Kenneth Branagh as Edward IV in BBC's "The Plantagenets."
[3] Edward was the only son of Percy, born to him when he was still Prince of Wales in 1387. In 1386 Prince Percy married Joanna of Lorraine, daughter of John I, Duke of Lorraine. Joanna was the younger sister of Maria of Lorraine who was married to the Dauphin of France, who later would be Charles VIII of France. This marriage to the sister-in-law of the future king was an attempted rapprochement with France to build the peace at the end of the Fifty Year war by Edward's grandfather, King Lionel. Both Percy and Joanna were just 17 at their marriage.

Edward was born nine months later. His mother, the Princess of Wales doted on him. His father had little to do with him, in fact he had little to do with his wife also. The Prince and the Princess had separate apartments in the royal residence of Richmond Palace. The estrangement increased when Percy became King and many believed Queen Joanna was behind his poisoning in order to stop his intended invasion of her homeland.

Edward was 19 when he took the throne and he immediately ended the plans for his father's invasion of France. His mother, the Dowager Queen Joanna, was a main advisor during the first years of his reign. She was only 37 and soon remarried to Richard Mortimer, the 4th Earl of March (OOC: not OTL's Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl, as Philippa never married Edmund, the 3rd Earl in TTL.) Edward made Richard the Duke of March.

In 1407 Edward married Richard's cousin-once-removed on his mother's side, Lady Elizabeth FitzAlan of Arundel, who'd been fostered by Richard and his first wife, Claire of Kent, who'd been a lady-in-waiting to the Queen and died of the sweating sickness in 1401. (Duke Richard and Clair had had no children of their own.)

Edward was not like his father at all. His father's arrogance had assumed the rebellion in Wales was over after his personal intervention and cruelty. The truth was that it continued. King Edward now sent emissaries to meet with the Welsh rebels and listen to their grievances.

The solution offered by the King was that the Welsh would be given the same rights as the English, their lords seated in the House of Lords, and the burghers in the Commons, but Owain Glyndŵr must bend the knee. Owain refused. But the other Welsh lords were insistent that they take this victory and they forced him to accept. Edward was asked to let Owain continue his claim as the Prince of Wales if he submitted. Edward countered with offering him the title of the Duke of Powys. He reluctantly accepted after his Tudor relatives insisted.

From this point on, Edward's kingdom was at peace. Edward and Elizabeth had many children and England and Wales prospered in his reign. He died after a reign of near 36 years and was succeeded by Richard, Prince of Wales.

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Hugh Bonneville and Sally Hawkins playing Richard II with his wife, Maria of France, in BBC’s series, “The Plantagenets”
[4] Born in 1410 and named after his godfather, Richard Mortimer, the 1st Duke of March, as a child, Richard, Prince of Wales, enjoyed a happy childhood, with his parents and siblings.

His father, had a strong bond with his children, many future psychiatrists, believe that Edward was compensating for his own relationship with his father.

His education was a mixture of administrative training, learning Latin, French and Welsh, set to be an inclusive of all his people as well as military, with Edward instilling in him that war was only to be used as a last option, stating that God does not wish for his Christian soldiers to kill one another.

In 1430, his father arranged double wedding, with a marriage for 20 year old Richard, with 19 year old, Maria of France, a granddaughter of Charles VIII of France and Maria of Lorraine, via their eldest son, Charles, Grand Dauphin of France, along with his elder sister, Princess Joanna, marrying Charles, Petit Dauphin of France.

The pair would be as fertile as their parents, resulting in seven births before the death of his father, when Richard became king at the age of thirty one.

For his children and other children of nobility, Richard, wanting the future generations to have an outstanding education, he would commission a number of education facilities including a college on a town on the outskirts of Richmond, known as Kew College (In OTL Henry VI sets up Eton College near Windsor castle) and then later setting up another at Oxford, known as King’s College in his honour. (In OTL Henry VI sets up Kings College at Cambridge)

Richard reign was one of prosperity, with no wars resulting in a basic tax rate being collected from a large populated country, meant the treasury had additional funds at its disposal.

As well as education, Richard would see stones laid for St. George Cathedral, in Gloucester as well as St. David Cathedral, in Powys.

Richard was able to invest in the Cinque Ports in the Kent coast, converting them from joint military and trade purposes, to solely trade. While in the north, he arranged for better fortifications along the Scottish border.

Richard also improved infrastructure across the nation including roads that connected all major cities and towns in England and Wales.

In 1479, 68 year old, Richard collapsed during a meeting with Parliament, he was rushed to nearby bed, however had been found to have succumbed to a heart attack. He was succeeded by his son, Henry.

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Jacob Collins-Levy & Jodie Comer as King Henry IV & Queen Guinevere of BBC's "The Plantagenets."*
[5] Henry Plantagenet was the third child and second son of Richard, the then Prince of Wales, and his wife, Princess Maria. His older sister, Princess Eleanor, was born in 1431. He and his slightly older identical twin, Edward, were born in 1433. His younger siblings were Arthur, born in 1437, John, born in 1439, and another set of twins, Isabel and Joanna, born in 1441, only a few weeks before Richard ascended to the throne. Isabel and Joanna were not identical.

From birth, Prince Henry was the Earl of March, as his father had inherited the Duchy from his godfather, Richard Mortimer. When Richard became king, he granted the title of the Duke of March to Henry, making him the 3rd Duke at the age of seven. His older brother was made the Duke of Cornwall and Prince of Wales. All the princes and princesses were given intense education at Richmond Palace. In 1450, the two twin princes were the first royal children to attend University as they attended Oxford at King College.

After Oxford in 1455 the two princes married. Edward married a French Princess, Catherine Valois. Henry married Guinevere Tudor, the oldest daughter of the current Duke of Powys, Owain Tudor, who was five years his junior. As the Duchy of the March included Welsh lands (it was the Welsh March,) it made sense for Henry to marry a Welsh Princess. Harry and Gwen (as they were known) set up their household in the March and had no idea that he'd become King one day. By 1561 they had a number of children and it seemed their marriage, although arranged for political purposes, had quickly become a love match.

The same was not true for Edward and Catherine. Catherine and Edward just didn't like each other from the start. They did their marital duty and she conceived, but had a miscarriage. After that they went their separate ways. Although Edward had several mistresses, when rumors spread that the Princess was entertaining in her bed a French Knight who was visiting the court with the Princess' brother, the Dauphin Louis, he felt compelled to confront him, expecting the Knight, the Chevalier Pierre Flambeau, to deny and leave the court. Instead he admitted it, insulting the Prince, pointing out his own affairs, and calling him a 'louse.' Edward had no choice but to challenge him. They met on the tourney field in one of the last jousts in England. Edward died at the age of 28 in 1461 on the field when Flambeau's knobbed lance broke and a shard pierced the prince's chest. Catherine fled back to France with her brother and Flambeau, with whom she continued her affair.

Harry and Gwen were at the tourney and he witnessed his beloved brother's death. Suddenly he was the heir to the throne. When Harry, Gwen, and their children returned to the March, he was now the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cornwall as well as the Duke of the March. They were both young, she was 23 and he was 28, and continued to have children.

(Peace was preserved with France by a formal apology from the Dauphin, the Princess, and Flambeau, claiming the death of the Prince of Wales was an unfortunate accident and not the intent of the Chevalier.)

Eighteen years later, the 46 year old Harry became King Henry IV.

The most important event of King Henry's reign did not occur in England or Wales. It occurred half a world away when the "Admiral of the Seas," Cristoforo Colombo, sailing for the Empire of the Republic of Genoa, succeeded in crossing the Atlantic Ocean to what he thought was the Indies with a fleet of twenty ships.

Genoa was the dominant power in the Mediterranean, having taken parts of the former Byzantine Empire when it fell including Crimea, Cyprus, Crete, several Aegean Islands, and parts of the Peloponnese. During the 15th Century Genoa had also added Sicily, Malta, and conquered Granada (Including Gibraltar) and Western Morocco to their Empire, which had already included Corsica, Sardinia, and the northeast coast of Italy. Genoa and Portugal had been racing to see who could sail around Africa first and Genoa had also discovered the Canary Islands and colonized them. Colombo had been an important part of this exploration and expansion for Genoa. in 1483, he'd convinced the Doge and the Great Council of the Republic to finance his voyages to the West.

When Colombo returned to Europe in 1484 with his discovery of islands in the west, the news spread like wildfire and the race to explore was on. England and Wales was already ahead on this race, having worked to increase it's infrastructure for trade under Henry's father. He'd continued that, building ships and ports. While the other European powers of Castile, France, the Netherlands, and Norway rushed to establish themselves, England had the infrastructure.

In 1485, Henry commissioned his own exploration fleet of 35 ships to sail west, using the northern route that had led to Iceland and Greenland and the fabled Vinland. Hugo Montgomery was the Admiral of the Fleet and after sailing to Iceland, then Greenland, he sailed west and charted the east coast of Neustralia, as Montgomery named the new Continent. He charted it from across the strait separating Neustralia from Greenland down past the island he named New Caledonia, in the large bay he named the Caledonian Sea, then along the coast until he reached the end of the land and sailed into the Genoan Sea. He found several rivers and named them from native names: the Mohikun (Hudson), the Leneypea (Delaware), the Keshapik (James), and the Rickohawk (Savanah). His voyage took three years and he claimed the entire continent of Neustralia for England & Wale and left behind trading forts at the Caledonian Sea, the Mohikun, the Leneypea, and the Rickohawk. He returned to England with his ships laden with beaver pelts and astonished all with his stories.

In 1489 Montgomery sailed with a fleet of 100 ships and this time sailed southwest from Iceland and discovered the fishing banks in the seas east of New Caledonia, resupplied the trading forts, and explored further into the Caledonian Bay, discovering the Magna Huron River (St. Lawrence). He returned to England in 1492 to report to the King.

But the King had died when he'd been thrown off his horse while fox hunting in the March. So it was the news of the Fishing Banks and the Magna Huron were reported to his son, William of Dublin.

*The actors appeared younger than they should have in this scene as they had played Harry & Gwen from when they were young adults.

[6] The man who would one day grow to become the third of England's William was born in a quiet day of march in 1465 to then Prince Henry and Princess Guinevere, in a visit of the Princely couple to the Pale of Ireland. He would be the second and last of Henry's sons, led by a brood of five surviving older sisters and followed by other two. His brother Edmund would die as a young boy, which would see William quickly take up the mantle of Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall. Henry would be destined to a firm and varied education, as he learned almost six languages in his life and comprehended a few more. Following the footsteps of his father, William boud attend King's College in Oxford, where he would receive a secondary education in law, dialectics and diplomacy.

William would grow to be a man of beastly size, reaching almost two meters. He was, as recorded by historians, a handsome man, who held his hair short and his beard long, being also reported to be hairy. His first months as prince of Wales, residing in Ludlow had come to show the type of man he would be, brazen but loyal, intelligent and talented, but luckless. A very ambitious lad from a young age, William would use his prerogative as Prince of Wales to start what would be recorded in history of the "Welsh conquest of Ireland" (A obvious play of jokes, as Ireland, was conquered by England, but by the Prince of Wales and his "Welsh" army) as he would invade Leister and Connacht in early 82, conquering much of it in a fell swoop. The Irish campaign would where William would spend most of his time as Prince of Wales. perhaps his greatest personal achievement. It would serve as the stamp of approval that most of the English nobility would unusually stamp upon him, as William's conquests by 1492 were more than assured, and, his appeasement of both the Irish, who would come to see their future King in a new light after his conquest, and the many English nobles who got rewards on the island.

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William of Dublin, in his official portrait in his investiture as King of Ireland

The sudden death of his father, in 1492, would see William of Dublin, as he had been known until then, become William the III, of the House of Plantagenet. It was in this time that the news from the new world would come back to William as he was crowned - with England quickly hopping on breaking apparently rising Genoan domination of Columbia, as German cartographers would soon name the full continent, which, the English would in time adopt as well. William, as his close Portuguese-soon-to-be-Spanish cousins, would share with him. William would prepare many colonial ventures, sending many English, Welsh and Irishmen over the sea to England's new colonies in the Columbian East. The English would attempt to spread their colonists all over the East coast, with the majority settling in below the Hudson and the Rickohawk river. The further anglicized river bays of Mohican, Lenape, Kespeak and Rickhaw would see major the first and major settlements, with the Mohican river becoming home to the fledling city of New York, as the venture was done under the patronage of the Dukes of York, the Lenape river home to Williamston, Kespeak home to Montgomery and the Rickohaw home to Hudson, named after another English explorer of the time named Liam Hudson, with many more settlements spread in between.

It was also in the first year of his reign that William had his third child by his wife, Madalena, Infanta of Spain. The marriage had been done to cement relations with the soon to burst Empire of Spain, ruled under the reign of Henrique the I, son of the now both deceased Alfonso the V of Portugal-Castille and Isabel of Aragon, Madalena's brother. The Capet-Burgundians of Portugal had in less than a generation united the lands of the Castillian Lancasters and the Barcelona's of Aragon, and the patriotic fervor felt against Morocco and Genoa itself would see the newly risen Spanish Empire (A fun fact found by later Historians, William of England and Henry of Spain would both acquire their second royal and their imperial title, in that order, at the same time) conquered much of the west Mediterranean and the Canarias from Genoa, which would see the unified Spain sending their famous conquistadors into New Castille (Mexico and Central America), New Vizcaya (Colombia, Venezuela and Panama) alongside Pizzaro's conquest of the Inca Empire, establishing the third colony of New Navarre.

The Genoan themselves had only kept the island of Antonina (Puerto Rico), with the French settling Saint Domingue and the Spanish Cuba, with the English settling the Bahamas. The other two rising players in Colonial Columbia would be the United Kingdom of Sicily under the Angevins, and France under the recently crowned Burgundians, by far the richest state of Europe. The French would settle the aforementioned Saint Domingue, alongside Canada and Acadia above the Mohican colonies and Antartique by the platine river (Uruguay, Argentina, Chile).

This heavy rush of European states to America would see the birth of the short-lived Atlantic slave trade, as the Mediterranean Christian states would prefer the enslave the Muslim north Africans than the slowly Christianising Africans below the Sahara, with Jolof, Benin, and the Kongo all adopting Christianity on missions organized by the Pope and the Emperor of Spain.

The arisal of these all these settlements over all these vast lands would be fueled by an extreme population boom in France, England and Spain, but by this time most of these colonies, especially those dependent more on settlers, would be bare bones, but this would be a start and it would be these settlements and claims that the various European power would bring to the pope in the treaty of Oviedo, where the New World would be divided between the various powers with colonies in America.

William's reign would also face one of the greatest defeats of the English monarchy with the final loss on their land on the continent. The death of the last Valois's would see the Burgundian Dukes rise to the throne of France, uniting a vast realm with already another vast realm, making France extremely rich and powerful. An opportunity of alliance with the Habsburg Emperors of the Holy Roman Empire would be wasted by William, something which would want him to the rest of his days, with France defeating both powers separately. The Burgundian François of Charolais, also known as François the I of France, would be responsible for bringing Aquitaine, Gascony and Calais back into the French crown, defeating William in the battle of Talmond in 1507, handing William the greatest humiliation of his reign. It would see William turn an eye to the consolidation of his rule in England and Ireland, and continued expansion overseas.

William would thus die in 1516, succeeded by his son, Constantine.

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A painting of Constantine I
[8] Constantine was born in 1492, the last son of King William III and Infanta Madalena of Spain. Many at the court believed that the prince was insane as he showed various levels of obsessiveness when participating in his habits and interests. At that, he was often even compared to King Percy I of England. Although Constantine never seemed to pay attention to these people, in fact, he showed very little interest in people at all. He would frequently not be seen for several days and would only appear if his father or mother asked him to.

After he heard of his father’s defeat at the Battle of Talmond, it seemed that Constantine showed even more coldness towards the King. In one of his entries in his diary, Constantine stated that his father may have been a successful man in the isles, but that he had failed his people in the European mainland and the new world.

When he unexpectedly ascended to the throne, after that his elder brothers died in a ship explosion, Constantine immediately went to work and micro-managed nearly all aspects of running the functions of the state. He also showed a particular focus on expanding the English colonies. With the promises of land and titles, he encouraged people to go west, fight Indians, and take their lands. And, back at home, Constantine commenced a military build-up of the army and the navy to combat the French. During the process, he fired many generals who did not meet his standards, which were quite high.

Finally, in 1521, Constantine sent a declaration of war, which urged King François I to surrender his lands in Acadia and Canada. However, the King refused, still competent upon his victory over the English in 1507. Two years later, he was singing a different tune in the city of Carlsruhe, whereby treaty he was forced to give up most of France's colonial possessions. Though, some considered that he was quite lucky as Constantine made no attempt in taking France’s profitably Caribbean colonies.

For the rest of his reign, Constantine continued to improve the manners of producing value from England's new world colonies. In 1536, he died having never married or produced any heirs. He was succeeded by his younger sister, Constance, and her husband, Charles, their second cousin once removed, the Duke of York.


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Natalie Portman & Eric Bana as Constance & Charles in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[9] Constance Plantagenet was the first official reigning queen of England, Wales & Ireland, but only because the number two person in line for her brother's throne insisted on it; he was the Duke of York, her husband, the heir of the senior Plantagenet cadet line descended from Prince Arthur, the third son of Richard II, and oldest of Henry IV's two younger brothers. Richard had created the Duchy of York for his third son (and granted Henry the Duchy of March and his fourth son, John, the Duchy of Kent, also a new creation.)

The son of Arthur, Prince Charles, was the 2nd Duke of York and was Charles' grandfather. It was Prince Charles who was the Duke of York who financed the settlement of Neustralia, a term still used for England's colonial endeavor in eastern North Columbia, and had New York named after him. He also was close to King William's older sons, Prince William and Prince Henry, and a major supporter of William's efforts to retain their French provinces. He and his son, Arthur the Earl of March, were with the two princes in France and all of them died in the explosion of the ship that was transporting them home in 1507. The young Charles, only four years old, now was the 3rd Duke of York and the richest individual in the kingdom besides the King. He and his mother were brought into Richmond Palace to live with William. There he became close to the youngest child of William, his young daughter, Constance, also only four, eleven years younger than Constantine.

When Charles returned to his estates in York in 1523, he had married Constance, uniting the main Plantagenet line and the cadet line, with Constantine's blessings.

As Constantine had no children, the heir to his throne was Constance if women were allowed to inherit and Charles was if they followed Salic Law. It had never been an issue in the kingdom before. Now it became a matter for Parliament to settle. Those who wanted to follow the Salic Law used the precedent of Stephen of Blois succeeding Henry I, his uncle, instead of Maud, his daughter. Charles was adamant for the rights of his wife and convinced her brother the King to agree. So it was that Parliament decreed that women were eligible to inherit the throne after the male heirs took precedence. This was intentionally vague as it didn't define how distant a male heir needed to be to take precedent. But it was close enough for Constantine to issue a royal decree in 1528 that his sister and her husband were his joint heirs if he had no children.

Charles and Constance had three children in their marriage, all of them surviving to adulthood, all born before they took the throne in 1536.

The major issue before the King and Queen in their joint reign was religion. Many of the English had been interested in reform since the Wycliffe attempts to translate the Vulgate into English. Now that the Reformation had swept across the Continent and then divided into three versions (Lutheranism, Swiss Reformed, Anabaptists) there were sects in England, Wales, and Ireland (not so much in Ireland) who wanted the kingdom to follow suit. Charles and Constance were devout Catholics and Charles as a young man had written a treatise refuting the thinking of Luther and been granted the honorary title of "Defender of the Faith" by the Pope for it. On the throne they took this seriously and did their best to remove the Protestants from England. Unlike on the continent where this meant warfare and persecution, Charles & Constance followed a two fold path. Those who kept their religion private would not be investigated, even if someone accused them of holding heretical views. Those not able to do so were peacefully invited to leave the kingdom. Points of departure were the Netherlands where the Swiss Reformed option had taken over or Scotland, which also had moved in that direction. But another option was one of the provinces of Neustralia. Up the Mohican River from New York was an empty land (the natives didn't count in European eyes) and there these Protestants could settle, remain loyal English subject, yet pursue a divergent faith.

When Queen Constance died in 1545 at the age of 41 it was a shock to everyone. She died in childbirth as she'd gotten with child again at this late age. The child was still born and now the King was a widower. He never married again nor had a mistress. For the rest of his life, King Charles wore a Franciscan monk's habit and lived as if he had taken vows in his personal life, eschewing all luxuries.

He continued the policies he had pursued with Constance of building the navy, continued exploration of Columbia beyond Neustralia, including financing an explorer to sail around South Columbia and to the west coast of North Columbia. He also created a company to work for colonization in the West Indies Sea (what had originally been called the Genoan Sea) and the southeast coast of South Columbia. The colony there was called Constancia.

He died in his sleep. He hadn't been eating well in his last few months and had lost a lot of weight. He was succeeded by his oldest son, Charles.

[10] Charles Plantagenet was the oldest child of his parents, born in 1526. He was ten-years-old when his uncle died, and his mother and father took the thrones. He was made the Prince of Wales shortly after their joint coronation. When Charles turned sixteen, he went to a university in Italy. It was there he met his lifetime friend, Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. It would be Cosimo who would encourage Charles' future patronage of the arts. Charles would eventually arrange a marriage between their houses.

Three years later, Charles would learn of his mother's passing and return to England. He became his father's trusted advisor for twelve years, taking over most of his duties when his health began to fail.

In the meantime, Charles arranged the marriages of his siblings and himself. In 1547, he would marry Mary of Scotland, who was nearly five years his senior, hoping to make peace with Scotland after years of tension. Despite their age difference, the two managed to have a happy marriage and a healthy sex life, managing to have eleven children, seven of whom lived to adulthood.

When he became king, Charles was eager to sponsor as many artists, composers and playwrights as he could. He was determined to make English renaissance successful, taking inspiration from both Italy and France.

As for the question of religion, Charles remained resolutely silent. It was well known that his wife was a member of the Swiss reform and practiced her religion openly. When it was remarked upon, Charles only stated "She prays to the same God." His refusal to even continue his parents' policies, instead letting heretics pray openly as long as they made no war. This lack of action caused a Catholic uprising. At the end, the Duke of Richmond famously declared "if they were hoping to force my brother's hand, it backfired badly." Indeed, Charles was increased at what he said was a most unchristian act. He lead the troops himself to crush the rebellion.

Sadly, this would be his undoing as he would be captured and executed by the rebel leaders. He was succeeded by his oldest son, James.

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Alan Cumming as James I & VII in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[11] Prince James, born in 1549, was the firstborn child of Charles and Mary. From birth he was the heir to the English, Welsh, and Irish throne and second in line for the Scottish throne behind his mother Mary, as her older brother, James VI Stewart, of whom he was named after, had never married to have legitimate issue. King James was twelve years older than his sister and had been more a parental figure from the death of their father, King James V, in 1530, when Mary was nine and James VI was 22 and became king of Scotland. When James VI died in 1680 at the age of 72, James Plantagenet was 31 and had been King of England, Wales, and Ireland for a year. His mother, the dowager Queen now became the reigning Queen of Scotland; James Plantagenet was first in line to the Scottish throne and was formally the Duke of Rothesay.

James had married a Medici, like his uncle the Duke of Richmond. His bride wasn't a niece of Cosmo like his uncle's wife, but his daughter, Jessica de' Medici, who was 15 when they married in 1566 when James was 17. Jessica was said to be the most beautiful woman in Europe and James doted on her. She was a northern Italian, blonde beauty. They had several children and James doted on them too.

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Gwyneth Paltrow as Queen Jessica in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
As King of England with a nominal Catholic bride, related to popes, but raised by his mother as a Presbyterian in the Church of Scotland's faith, the couple were a perfect example of the vision of England as a multi-religious community. One of James' first acts as King was to have Parliament formalize the idea that England was a place of religious toleration. The entire kingdom except the few rebels, supported this enthusiastically.

James was actually on the field of battle when he requested Parliament to pass the Act of Toleration for England and Wales. He didn't request the Irish Parliament to do this, but it was clear he intended to do so in the future as there was a large minority of Protestants in Ireland, mainly Anglo-Normans in the southeast and Scots Presbyterians in the north. (Ireland and England/Wales were not one united kingdom but two in personal union since William III.) As the dispatches were sent, he turned his attention to fight the remaining rebels and mounted battle.

The stronghold of the rebels was in Kent, where John Marlowe, the archbishop of Canterbury, the most important bishop in Catholic England, sat, where he had been supported by James' 4th cousin, Duke David Plantagenet, the 4th Duke of Kent, whom had been killed in battle against Charles II. But it was David's son, John, the 5th Duke, who had then led the rebels and captured and killed his king. However, his uncle, the younger brother of David, William Plantagenet, although as fiercely Catholic as the rest of the Kent Plantagenets, had remained loyal and was with James on the field when word reached them that John had committed regicide. It was the archbishop himself who brought the news and explained that despite his council, the young Duke had done the horrid deed. The archbishop now bowed the knee and swore loyalty, claiming his aim had never been regicide but simply to protect the rights of Catholics. James promised him their rights would be protected, which he did in the Act of Toleration.

The Battle of Canterbury in 1579 was a fierce battle and the victory of the King and his loyalists was overwhelming as many across the kingdom, Catholic as well as Protestant, had flocked to join the new King. The Archbishop John Marlowe blessed the royal forces and many of the rebels fled from the superior numbers.

Duke John was captured and arrested, as were those who'd assisted him in killing Charles II instead of opposing him. The rest were granted pardons if they swore loyalty to the King and accepted that England/Wales was going to be a land of religious toleration. Most did.

The trial of Duke John was not like the trial he'd done on his king where he was judge, jury, and executioner. James insisted it be the fairest trial ever. It wasn't until June of 1580 that it ended, the Duke was found guilty of murder, and beheaded. James granted the Duchy to William Plantagenet, who became the sixth Duke. This generosity of the King to the former rebels and other members of the Kent Plantagenet cadet line ended the religious divisions in the kingdom. It was clear to the Catholics that religious toleration meant everyone, Catholic and Protestant (and Jew) would be respected, treated as full Englishmen or Welsh with full rights.

By 1584, his Irish kingdom had followed suit, despite the Catholic majority being much larger than in England/Wales where it was only a slight majority. Scotland was the opposite. There the nation was Presbyterian and all other forms of worship were required to be in secret. After Ireland passed its Act of Toleration, James journeyed to Scotland and spoke to the Parliament, making it clear if he became king on his mother's death he would ask for a similar act there and would not enforce any persecution of Catholics, other kinds of Protestants, or Jews. It was a long debate, but in 1587, as Queen Mary lay dying in her chambers, the Scots Parliament passed their Act of Toleration and extended an invitation to James to be their King on his mother's death. It was only a few weeks later that James became the seventh of his name to be King of Scotland, with him now being the monarch of three kingdoms in personal union. (England and Wales were one kingdom with two ethnicities.)

The British renaissance moved full ahead under James, he supported play-writes and often attended the theatre. He continued his father's sponsorship of the arts, and focused on architecture. His biggest building project was a new palace to replace the decaying Richmond Palace. Built in the heart of London, Plantagenet Palace was a magnificent structure of marble that became the most significant building in London.

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Plantagenet Palace with the Thames behind it.
The other important part of his reign was the tension between the English colonial expansion and the Spanish one. Both empire claimed Florida, the Spanish name given to the peninsula in the southeast of North Columbia. Finally in 1603 this tension broke into open warfare in Florida and that expanded into a general colonial war in not only the West Indies Sea but in Europe as nations divided up between which side they supported. Genoa, Tuscany, the Papal States, and Morocco took the side of England. France and Sweden took the side of Spain, hoping this might be their opportunity to weaken their main rival.

This became known as the Twelve Years War due to its length. King James died before it was done, although by 1613 it was clear that northern Florida was in English hands and the island chain to the east of lower Florida, the Bahamas.


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Emperor Nicholas I out for a walk
[12] Born in 1570, Prince Nicholas was the second son of King James I & VII and Princess Jessica de' Medici. Upon the death of his baby brother, William, Nicholas became the first in line to the throne of the kingdoms. Nicholas, a smart child with the propensity to learn, greatly enjoyed participating in the social aspects of the royal court, though he always maintained an allure of honour, respectability, and seriousness. He never took part in things that he labelled to be ''morally depraved''.

At his own suggestion to improve relations with the Holy Roman Empire, a marriage was arranged between him and Princess Anna Maria, who was the sole child of Francis II, King of the Romans and son of Emperor Frederick VI. Soon after their marriage, in 1590, Nicholas and his wife were blessed with their first child. Later on, Nicholas' marriage to Anna Maria would help maintain neutrality from Austria and most of the Holy Roman Empire during the Twelve Years' War.

Speaking of which, when the war dragged on, Nicholas began to paint several paintings, most of which typically depicted great victories against the Spanish and their allies. His father was so impressed by these paintings that the King ordered the construction of what would later become the National Museum of the Arts, so they could be exhibited. During this time, Nicholas also began to be influenced by the writings of John Dour, a British Renaissance writer and advocate for Unional Nationalism, which called for a more centralized form of government, opposed regionalism, and would promote a sense of patriotism to the Isles as a whole.

When his father died, Nicholas was left to oversee the end of the Twelve Years' War. Two years later, Florida was completely secured and with this, Nicholas renamed it to Campestris (meaning Flatland in Latin), to rid it of its Spanish name. And, the following years, Nicholas and his supporters began to work on executing John Dour’s ideas. Although, in the end, they did not succeed in ridding the isles of regional parliaments, they successfully implemented their wanted form of nationalism, Nicholas I proclaiming himself, Emperor of the Isles.

The Emperor died in 1624 and was succeeded by his grandson, Prince James.

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Rufus Sewell as the King Emperor James II & VIII in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[13] James, Prince of Wales, Duke of the March, Cornwall, Rothesay and Cork, became the heir to the various thrones of the British Isles in 1611 when he was not yet a year old when his father, Prince William, the previous Prince of Wales, Duke of the March, Cornwall, Rothesay and Cork, died in the last battle of the 12 Years War. Prince William was only 20 years old and his young bride was a year younger. They'd married in 1609. She was Hilde of Brunswick-Lüneburg, one of the small duchies of the Holy Roman Empire, which was an ally of the British Kingdoms in the war.

It was Swedish forces that had invaded the Holy Roman Empire, hoping to recover control of the southern shore of the Baltic Sea that had once been part of their Empire, which at this point included Finland, Norway, Denmark, and the lands on the southeastern shore of the sea. William's father, King Nicholas, had allied with the Germans and had sent William to the German lands often as a child to visit his mother's relatives and cement the relationship. Hilde and William were a love match and William along with her older brother Ernst, and William's best friend, the slightly older Earl of Kent, Richard Plantagenet of Kent, were a trio of drinking friends, gamblers, and soldiers. (Richard was the son of Harold Plantagenet, the 6th Duke of Kent, who'd fought alongside his father, William the Loyal, the 5th Duke, for King James I against his cousin the Regicidal Duke.)

These three led a combined Brunswickian/British force to face the Swedes in Saxony. The Battle was a decisive victory for the various German and British forces against the Swedes, who fled back across the Baltic. But even in victorious battles there are losses and in this battle it was the young heir to the British Thrones who was one of them. Ernst and Richard brought Hilde the news as she waited back at home with Richard's wife, the very pregnant Lady Childia Northrop of Sussex.

So it was that young James never knew his father. He also was distant from his grandfather, as Princess Hilde chose to live with Richard the Earl of Kent and her best friend Lady Childia, in Canterbury with Duke Harold. In 1611 Childia gave birth to a girl they named Elizabeth.

It was in 1618, when James was not yet eight years old, that the various British Kingdoms' thrones were consolidated into one Imperial Throne. Although the kingdoms remained separate with separate Parliaments and ministers, the union was no longer personal, but a permanent feature of one Emperor ruling all the Kingdoms. By this point, it was clear the two young children were inseparable and the parents and grandparents were already talking about a future marriage. Nicholas approved of uniting the ruling Plantagenets with the Kent line that had served him and his father so well during and after the rebellion. Duke Harold, as his father before him, was a leading figure in the kingdom, often serving as the Chancellor of the Treasury and always as an advisor to the King, which was a main reason that the King's heir was fostered to him. A marriage between James and Elizabeth seemed both politically right as well as right in that the two youngsters had already had a 'play marriage'.

Both were trained and educated to someday be future rulers of the Empire. They learned not only their English letters, but also Welsh, Irish Gaelic, Scots Gaelic, Italian, and German. They received the best scientific education of the time and a philosophical instruction in the values of beauty, reason, and tolerance. They were instructed by Catholic Priests, Presbyterian Ministers, and Lutheran Pastors from Hilde's home.

When his grandfather died, James was 14 and he was by then formally betrothed to Lady Elizabeth, age 13. There was no question who should be regent and that was Duke Harold. He and his entire family moved into Plantagenet Palace with the Dowager Queen Ann Marie, and James and Elizabeth's education continued. James had desired to go to Oxford like his ancestors and study at King's College, but now that he was the King of King's College, it was not feasible. Instead his education in history, governance, law, and the geography of the world took place inside the vast complex that was Plantagenet Palace.

In 1628 on his 18th Birthday, the young King formally took control of his Empire, although in truth little changed. The last four years of his education had included his future grandfather-in-law often discussing with him all matters before the throne before making a decision. As he got older more and more he was making decisions to then be approved or not by the Regent. After Harold was no long the Regent, but just the Chancellor of the Treasury, the final choice was supposedly James' decision, but he still relied heavily on the old man.

In 1632 James and Elizabeth were wed and they immediately started a family. Early the next year, only days after Elizabeth announced she was with child, Duke Harold died at the age of 78. Now James could only turn to his foster grandfather for advice in his imagination, which he did for the rest of his life.

There were no more major wars in his reign, but there were colonial skirmishes. It seemed, however, the powers of Europe did not want to fight each other at home, having been traumatized by the horrors of the 12 Years War. But a War with the Spanish was fought in the late 1630s over Constancia in South Columbia . In the end the British had to surrender this distant colony to the Spanish Empire, who renamed it for the redwood trees that grew there as "Brazil". In balance, the Spanish islands in the West Indies Sea of Hamica and Hispaniola were taken by the British, renamed Jamaica and Bethania, after the King and Queen. However, twenty years later, the western part of Bethania was lost to the French who'd been using the large bay there since before the British took it as a harbor for their privateers.

In the 1660s James sent explorers to the north to chart the large bay there and seek a northwest passage. One was not found then but the Bay was charted and determined to be another route to the fur lands of upper Canada. It was named James Bay. James also sent explorers up the Magna Huron River to explore the great lakes of the interior. By the 1680s they had discovered the upper reaches of the great inland river that flowed into the Gulf of Florida (OTL Gulf of Mexico) of which the Spanish had discovered its mouth and named it the Mizzizzippi, from the local native term. The British called the same river the Minnesota and the land drained by its upper reaches by the same name.

These colonial enterprises brought vast wealth to the British Empire. From the West Indies Sea came sugar, molasses, and rum. From the southern provinces of Neustralia came tobacco and indigo, while from the northern provinces came maple syrup and cod from the East New Caldonian Banks. But the biggest source of wealth was from the fur trade.

Not only did the British Isles have the Canadian Fur trade, especially in beaver, they also had another source of fur that no one else in Western Europe had. When King James sent out explorers to the north and west to find a Northwest Passage in the 1660s, he also sent out explorers to the north and east to find a Northeast Passage. Like those who went west, they couldn't find a passage taking them all the way to the Far East, but again they discovered a new sea- in this case the White Sea north of Russia and east of Scandinavia. The Russian Muscovites had already reached the White Sea and built a port when in 1667 British ships sailed into their port and established a special relationship with Russia, which still was distant from the west, having not reached either the Black Sea to its south nor the Baltic to its west. Russia was expanding east across the Urals into Siberia and by the end of James' reign would reach the Pacific. This was a source of fur too that rivaled Canada. Britain had a monopoly on the Russian fur trade of beaver, sable, and once the Russian reached the Pacific, sea otter. For Russia it meant the manufactured goods of Britain, its textiles, the Cod of the Atlantic, tobacco and rum. Once Britain reached India, it meant tea also. Both nations grew rich by this trade and Russia began to become more and more European.

If the Kings before James had wanted to make Britain, and especially London, a place of grandeur and glory, James II now had the means and wealth to do so. Plantagenet Palace became a Mecca of beauty and wealth. Vast gardens with magnificent lawns for croquet, tennis, lawn bowling, and golf were created in the courtyards of the Palace and the lands surrounding it.

James had a vast and magnificent building created to match the Palace for Parliament and a Cathedral in London with a myriad of chapels in it so all the faiths of the Empire, including Judaism, could meet and worship along side each other in separate places in the same vast complex. Using the new science a real clock tower was added to the Tower of London, that now became a museum. This had a giant clock that could be seen by all below that was lit at night like a lighthouse and great bells that rang the hours. London Bridge was rebuilt and the shores of the Thames were changed from mud banks to stone with walk ways along it.

Inside Plantagenet Palace it was all silk, satin, fine crystal, porcelain, art, and gold. Especially gold. Music was everywhere and fashion was vital. The nobility from the three kingdoms spent most of their time at the Palace instead of their estates.

James was called the King Emperor of Gold and Elizabeth was called the Goddess of Beauty.

James lived until he was 85 and when he died he had many grandchildren and great grandchildren and the British Empire was the most powerful and wealthiest nation in Europe.

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George Blagden as Richard III Plantagenet in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[14] Born the third child of six but the oldest son, his parents named him after the Duke of Kent and close advisor (the second king to be named Richard after a Duke close to the throne); they never expected it would be a perfect match for his nickname, “Rich Richard”.

As the son and heir to the King Emperor of Gold, as well as the nickname, he gained the title, Prince of Wealth.

Growing up, the Prince surrounded himself with a variety of young attractive nobility of all genders indulging in immoral conduct, particularly promiscuity. He was famed for taking many lovers, often elevating them to high positions for as long as they held his interest and then pensioning them off with gifts of titles, positions and estates.

In 1666, the philandering Prince Richard was forced to marry and chose as his bride, Duchess Amelia Dorothea of Hesse-Saxe-Gotha (1639–1709), daughter of Grand Duke Albert II and Charlotte Bourbon of Saint-Cloud (cadet of the Orléans branch.)

The marriage was an unhappy one, Amelia was shocked by her husband’s lifestyle, with the couple drifting and eventually living apart. Amelia would reside with her children at Winchester, avoiding the sinful acts happening in London, although the pair would share mutual respect at prestigious events and share a few solitary nights together to have more children.

His time as Prince of Wales was spent supporting the arts, becoming patrons of many artists, composers, musicians and writers, magnifying the beauty around him.

In 1695, 60 year old, Richard became Emperor, however by this point, he was showing the tertiary effects of syphilis and his body has began to waste away, at his coronation in 1696, many commented how it looked more like a gaunt skeleton had be crowned, rather than the most powerful man in the world.

Years of living fast had caught up and the Emperor would be dead within a couple of years from his succession. His death was mourned by his favorites, who soon found a cold future was upon them, with the succession of his son, James.

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Emperor James III & IX of the British Isles in 1721
[15] Prince James was born in 1667 as the first child of Richard, the then Prince of Wales, and Duchess Amelia Dorothea of Hesse-Saxe-Gotha. During his childhood, James spent more time with his mother and siblings at Winchester than with his father in London, which would have an influence on his personal life. He attended King's Collage at Oxford where he became one of the most intelligent people of his time, and would tell his friends a lot of facts.

In 1690, James married Sophia of Brunswick-Hanover (1665-1748), the daughter of Duke Maximilian Augustus and Elizabeth of Bavaria. Unlike his parents marriage, his own marriage was much more happy, as the couple loved each other and would have seven children together.

Upon becoming Emperor of the British Isles in 1698, James continued the fur trade that started in his grandfather's reign and used the vast wealth he got from it to build palaces that showed off the magnificence of Britain, including the Jacobite Palace, which has a blend of western and Russian styles of construction.

Europe during James’ reign saw many changes, including the spread of Unional Nationalism in countries like Sweden (which renamed itself as Scandinavia in 1721) and the Holy Roman Empire (which started a process of centralizing), and the Ottoman War (1703-1714), where the Ottoman Empire was defeated and the city of Constantinople taken by the Genovese (Now known as the Republic of Genoa-Byzantine).

Meanwhile in the New World, the British fought a war against the Spanish in the mid 1720s. In the end, Britain managed to take back the southern part of Brazil from Spain, which they renamed back to Constancia. This meant that Britain now had a colony bordering the French colony of Antartique, which Constantine I had wanted to take from the French back in the 1500's.

James died in 1734 at the age of 67, surrounded by his family. He was succeeded by his son, Augustus.

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Rip Torn as Augustus I Plantagenet in BBC's "The Plantagenets"
[16] Augustus was born in the year 1700 on Epiphany Day. He was the fourth child and first son of King James and Queen Sophia and was named after his grandfathers as Maximillian Augustus Richard Plantagenet, but was known as Augustus and to those close to him, 'Gus.' He was the first of the heirs to the throne to study at university at the University of Edinburgh instead of Oxford.

He took a commission in the Imperial Navy and insisted he serve as a real officer. Although the Russians now had a port on the Baltic Sea, in fact it was their capital, St. Thomasburg, founded by Tsar Thomas I the Great Romanov in 1703, the Russian Fur trade still was for the British Empire more profitable in the northern route to the White Sea as the Scandinavian Empire charged tolls for all ships of other nations entering or exiting the Baltic and high tariffs on all trade goods on those ships. So it was that as a young officer he served on the HMS Hugo Montgomery from 1722 until 1725. When the Russians realized the Prince of Wales was regularly visiting them at Arcangel, the Tsar Thomas II, journeyed there to meet him in 1724 along with his family, including his 21 year old daughter Princess Natasha Romanov. The Prince spent a few days with the Romanovs and a marriage was arranged, if approved by King James, between the Princess and the Prince. James approved and in 1726, the Princess journeyed to London from St. Thomasburg. (It was more economical for non-traders to use the Baltic route and pay the toll.)

The couple wed the following year and took up residence in a luxurious set of apartments in Plantagenet Palace. The extravagance of decorations and furnishings still were a part of that Palace, but the extravagance in lifestyle had diminished tremendously in the reign of King James. By the time Augustus became king at the age of 34 upon his father's death, he and Natasha had four children. The new Queen spoke perfect English (in fact all Russians spoke the other European languages with a British accent as English was the second language of the St. Thomasburg Court.)

It was during Augustus' reign that the forces of Unional Nationalism finally united the three kingdoms into one united empire in the Act of Imperial Unity of 1738. One Parliament now met in London with members from all three kingdoms. (Neustralia, Canada, and Constancia did not send members to Parliament, but had their own local legislative bodies and appointed Imperial Governors for each province [Neustralia had several provinces as did Canada.])

It was also in this period that the Prime Minister became a tradition that it always was held by the majority leader of the Parliament and all ministers in the Imperial Government were members of the House of Commons of the majority party.

The Emperor organized the various trading companies that traded with India, the East Indies, China, and Japan (which remained open to the West) into one Company with an Imperial Charter: The British Oriental Trading Company.

During the reign of Emperor Augustus, the burgeoning Industrial Revolution took off with more and more manufacturing of textiles being done with steam powered machines.

Despite being a land of religious tolerance, or maybe due to it, the mid 18th Century saw what came to be called "The Great Revival" sweep the land. It started in the English Lutheran Church under the Wesley Brothers, Henry the Preacher and Geoffrey the Hymn Writer, and spread to all faiths. Those holding these new religious views were known as Methodists due to their insistence on strict methods of personal piety in prayer, meditation, and study.

There were several wars that the Empire fought during his reign, but they all were limited affairs of small armies facing each other on the field of battle and didn't affect most folk. Britain fought for the Independence of Savoy from Burgundy-France in the Savoy War of 1744, which saw Burgundy-France defeated. In 1767-1770, the Empire supported the Portuguese in their attempt to separate from the Spainish. Although it failed in Iberia, the Spanish Empire's colony of Northern Brazil, Constancia's neighbor , declared itself independent. As most of its settlers were Portuguese and not Aragonese, Catalonian, or Castilian, they had joined the war for separation and they achieved it. Finally there was the War of 1782 in which the Empire and Burgundy-France fought over rights in India. This was an easy victory for the Empire and the British Oriental Trading Company now had a monopoly on trade with the Sub-Continent.

When the news reached the court, the Emperor listened attentively and then interrupted the proceeding with a coughing fit. He had to retire to bed and from then on he was bed ridden. Seven months later in early 1783, just past his 83rd birthday, he died. During that time his granddaughter, Philippa, Princess of Wales, who then succeeded him, had acted as Regent.


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Golda Rosheuvel as Empress Philippa in Season 3, Episode 4 of the BBC production, "The Plantagenets"

(17) Philippa of Wales, born in 1762 was granddaughter of Augustus by his son, Augustus, Prince of Wales. Married at 18 to a second cousin, Leopold of Sweden, they shared the same great grandfather James and thus their children would members of the House of Plantagenet. In honour of his future role as consort and father of future monarchs, Augustus created Leopold as Duke of Plantagenet.


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Luke Newton as Leopold Plantagenet of Sweden, Duke of Plantagenet, in season 3, Episode 4 of the BBC production, "The Plantagenets"

Philippa father Augustus had married Clara of Constancia, a minor Portuguese noble who may have had African heritage. This was contested at the time but later research has confirmed that she did have African heritage. She became Regent for her grandfather after his convalescence, and acquited herself remarkably well, when she became empress she petitioned for Leopold to become Emperor Consort but Parliament refused, agreeing only to give him precedence over everyone except the infant Prince of Wales, their first of ten children.

Philippa ruled from 1783 to 1820 and presided over a period known as The Philippine Age, whilst her grandfather had put much focus on international status, Philippa put much effort into national infrastructure, including canal networks and a network of new shipyards, sponsored farming and animal husbandry projects in a determination that the home nation would be virtually self sufficient.

By 1820, Leopold had died and Philippa was showing signs of exhaustion. In a surprising move, she voluntarily abdicated in favour of James, Prince of Wales and retired to Scotland before her death in 1825.




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[18] James, was born in 1782, the eldest of 10 children born to Prince Leopold, Duke of Plantagenet and Princess Regent, Philipp of Wales, being named after their common ancestor. Like their mother, James and his siblings, had matching complexions, inherited from their African heritage.
Although ailing in health, Emperor Augustus, from his royal bedchamber would dote on his great grandson, naming him Duke of Cambridge and seeing him on the days he felt able to entertain.

A year after his birth, his elderly great grandfather, died and his mother, became Empress and James was elevated to Prince of Wales.
At 16, James attend King’s College, Oxford and in 1802, left becoming the first member of the royal family to receive Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)


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Dev Patel and Rosalind Eleazar playing James and Theodora.

In 1806, James married Theodora, Grand Duchess of the Genoa-Byzantine Empire, the pair had be corresponding with each other for years, after James had befriended her brother, Grand Duke, Alexander, during their time at Oxford. James and Theodora, would enjoy a happy marriage, similar to his own parents, although not as many children we

This wedding would be followed in quick succession by marriages of his sisters, in 1807, Princess Natasha married, Theodora and Alexander’s older brother, Emperor Constantine of Genoa-Byzantine and Princess Clara would marry their cousin James, Crown Prince of Sweden/Scandinavia (Can we check as I believe that Ultranationalist changed the names in a previous post), while in 1808, Princess Augusta married Charles, Dauphin of Burgandy-France and Princess Emily married John, Hereditary Prince of Portugal.

With these marriages, James, soon became known as Uncle James, to many future leaders of Europe and would see peace not only for his empire but also amongst the great powers.

Upon the abdication of his mother, 38 year old, James held, thank giving celebrations in her honour and vowed to continue the Philippine Age.
Not even then could people imagine how the next 51 years, which became (/began incase the next monarch is a James) the Jacobite Era.
Significant innovations in science, engineering and technology during this era, would see many commenting how this felt like the second renaissance, with prominent figures such as Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Charles Darwin, showing how great the empire was.

With his mother, retiring to Scotland, James would invest money into the railway industry, purchasing the royal family their own locomotive, which would allow James to do day visits to his mother on a weekly basic and being back to London the next day. The railway industry also opened up Britain to the average citizens to travel and visit all over.

At 89 years old, Emperor James had overseen great develops in his own Empire as well as across the world and would die peacefully, succeeded by his son, King James V and XII.

[19] Born in 1808, Prince James was the second child but first son of James V & XI and Theodora of the Genoa-Byzantine Empire. He shared the complextions of his siblings and parents, which had become common among the royal familes of Europe due to marriages of his aunts. He became Prince of Wales in 1820 following the abdication of his grandmother Philippa, a title he would hold for over fifty years.

James married in 1831 to Princess Elizabeth of the Holy Roman Empire, daughter of Emperor Maximilian V. The couple loved each other every much, and had nine children togethe, almost as much as James' grandparents.

In 1871 James succeeded his father as Emperor of the British Isles at the age of 63, and continued the Jacobite Era. His reign was very peaceful but had many advancements in technology happen. In fact, he would have his photo taken, making him the second British monarch to be photographed (the first being his father). An important event that happened during this time period was the independence of Neutralia, Canada, and Constancia, with their first rulers chosen from James' cousins, although he would still have the title of Emperor.

James died in 1894 at the age of 86, his wife Elizabeth would die nine years later at the age of 95. James' funeral was attended by many world leaders, and was the first to be filmed.
He was succeeded by his son, Emperor Maximilian.

[20] Born in 1840, Prince Maximilian was named for his maternal grandfather. As third son of the then Prince James and Princess Elizabeth, not many expected him to become his father's heir. However, his older brother James, died at age twenty, after catching malaria after a trip to Africa and his second brother Constance died two years before that after getting into a heated fight with a friend which ended in a duel that left both men dead.

Therefore, in 1853, at age thirteen, Maximilian would be trust into the position of heir. He was very unhappy about this, cursing his brothers for dying and leaving him to suffer the burdens of rulership. Over the years, he would grow to accept his new position. He began touring the country, wanting to get to know his future people.

In 1865, while he was staying in Ireland, he met a young woman by the name of Eileen Fitzgerald, a daughter of the Duke of Kildale. She was twenty-three and already a widow with a daughter, Grace and a son Colin. Legend has it that Eileen did not recognize the prince when she met him and scolded him for waking baby Colin by being too loud. Regardless of how it happened, the pair fell in love and within a year, Maximilian had proposed marriage.

Maximilian was a doting stepfather, counting Grace and Colin as much as his children as the five children he would go on to have with Eileen.

In 1871, Maximilian's grandfather died and his father became king. During his father's reign, Maximilian took trips abroad, even visiting Africa at one point. There was an urban legend that while there, he met an African whose features had a stunning resemblance to his late brother. Although, it is mostly thought to be a baseless rumor, it should be noted that he did donate money to the village, Prince James had been helping and making sure they had food and water.

He returned home in 1875, with his father granting him the position of Lord Chancellor.

In 1894, his father passed away and Maximilian took the throne. His life might have been exciting before he came to the throne, but his reign was short and brief. Dying of a heart attack just a few months before The Great World War. His____ ___would go on to lead England against____
 
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POD: Alexios Philanthropenos successfully overthrows Andronicus II

Emperors and Autocrats of the Romans
1282-1295: Andronicus II (House of Palaeologus)
1295-1341: Alexios VI (House of Tarchaneiotes) [1]
1341-1345: Alexios VII (House of Tarchaneiotes) [2]
1345-1374: Basil III (House of Laskaris) [3]
1374-1392: Oshin I (House of Lambron) [4]
1392-1402: Constantine XI (House of Lambron) [5]
1402-1432: Justinian III (House of Lambron) [6]
1432-1457: Maria I and Peter I (House of Lambron/House of Venatrovsky) [7]
1457-1481: Alexander II "The Conqueror" (House of Osmanos) [8]
1481-1482: Demetrios I (House of Osmanos) [9]
1482-1509: John V (House of Osmanos) [10]
1509-1521: Alexander III (House of Osmanos) [11]
1521-1573: Anastasia I (House of Osmanos) [12]
1573-1595: Nicephorus IV (House of Komnenoi) [13]
1595-1614: Constantine XII "The Pharaoh" (House of Komnenoi) [14]
1614-1678: Irene II (House of Komnenoi) [15]
1678-1713: Zoe II (Dynastic: House of Osmanos-Komnenoi/Agnatic: House of Medici) [16]
1713-1740: Alexios VIII (House of Osmanos-Komnenos) [17]
1740-1740: John VI ''The Ill-Fated'' (House of Osmanos-Komnenos) [18]
1740-1746: Alexander IV (House of Osmanos-Komnenos) [19]

[1] Alexios VI's reign would mark a "Second Alexiad" as he, after overthrowing the weak and incompetent leadership of Emperor Andronicus II, would spend his 46-year long reign as Emperor and Autocrat of the Romans trying his best to ensure that Rhomania, weakened by the Fourth Crusade, would regain a position as a major power in a long reign where the Emperor was largely on horseback, campaigning against Latin, Slav, rebel, or Turk. Amongst his greatest achievements as Emperor would be the conquest of the Despotate of Epirus and his crushing of the nascent Osmanli beylik, even if Rhomania by his death, while having recovered from the disaster of the Fourth Crusade, was a mere regional power.

Alexios VI would die in 1341 from ill health and would be succeeded by his son Alexios.

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A 16th-century depiction of Emperor and Autocrat Alexios VII
[2]
Born in 1300, Alexios was the first born son of Emperor Alexios VI’s second marriage. He was possibly made co-emperor in 1328, reigning alongside his father before being demoted once more, most probably to a defeat in battle against the Epirotes.

When his father died, Alexios succeeded him, though he had to put down a rebellion that was instigated by one of his younger brothers.

In early 1345, Alexios VII launched a campaign against the independent southern Greek states, however, due to his incompetence his army would soon be routed by a combined Greek army. A few days later succumbed to his injuries and was succeeded by his nephew-in-law, Basil Laskaris.

[3] Born in 1321, Basil Laskaris would be one of the last scions of the ancient Nicene house of the Laskarids, which had once ruled the Nicene Empire in Anatolia. Despite their fall to the Palaeologus, the recent rising of the Tarchaneiotes would see the Laskarids rise quickly in opportunity. The Laskarids had been famous for their deeds in Anatolia, beating back the turk often, and it was in this area that the Laskarids would expand and create a new base of power for themselves. The conquest of many Turkic beylics would see the Laskarids adquire many new lands in Bukellarion and Phlagonia. It would be through this that Ioannes Laskaris, strategos of Anatolikon, would see his son Basil married to the niece of Emperor Alexios VII.

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Basil and his wife, Irene, would have a fruitful companionship, marked by Irene's intelligence and Basil's respect for her. Despite being more of a friendly "relationship", Basil and Irene would have 7 recorded children. It would be through Irene's claim that Basil would rise to the throne, and this would show during his reign, with Irene being far more than a mere consort during the rule of her husband.

Basil would prove himself up to the task of generalship and emperor-ship. Appealing to Dynastic continuation, Basil would take up the wars of his predecessor and would advance deeply into Southern Greece, restoring it back to the Empire, but an intervention by Venice would see an almost decade of on and off warfare between both states, which the Rhomans would eventually win, restoring their rule to all Greek islands, including Crete, although Cyprus remained in Crusader hands. His warfare-orientated reign would see the rise of a new class of Rhoman soldiery, based on conscription and professional service, mainly rewarded through promises of land in the depopulated Anatolia. Basil would also be the first Emperor to force the Turkish populations of the Empire to pay a blood tax - by giving at least one of their male children in service to the Empire.

Basil's never ending martial energy would see much of Anatolia recovered - with the Empire for the first time in generations reaching the Taurus mountains, with the Rhomans once more asserting dominance over the black sea. Many missionaries were sent into Circassia to Transcausia, and to Tartaria in the Golden horde by him. Basil would transplant many Greeks, Bulgarian and Latin mercenaries, as well as converted fleeing tribes from the North and the Steppes into Anatolia, giving the land a new appeal to the Rhoman state.

Despite his many victories against the westerners and the muslims, Basil would fail in his grandest campaign - the reconquest of Trebizond. The smashing of his army on the Pontic Mountains would see the aged Emperor enter a depression that would eventually take him to his grave. He would be succeeded by his son-in-law, Oshin
.
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[4] Oshin, a Prince of Armenia, was son-in-law to Emperor Basil III by his eldest daughter, Rita. Having deemed all of his legitimate sons as lunatics and simpletons, systematically managing them off stage, Basil set Oshin up as defacto heir jure uxoris.

Born in 1341, married in 1369 and had already given Basil three grandchildren by the time he died in 1374. Despite some opposition to his rule from his brothers-in-law and nephews, collectively known as the Basilian Pretenders, Oshin had effectively secured his reign by 1380 which left the remaining decade of his rule for him to focus on civic improvements including reinforcing the defenses of Thessalonica and effectively moving the imperial seat from Constantinople to Thessalonica.

In 1390, Oshin would inherit the Kingdom of Armenian Cilicia from his elder brother and this claim, which could be inherited by a woman, would pass to his children even if they did not become Byzantine Emperor.

Empress Rita outlived her husband, to see him succeeded by their son, Constantine

[5] Constantine XI was born in 1370 as the oldest of Oshin's sons and would become Emperor in 1393 as a result of his father Oshin's death.

As Emperor, Constantine XI's reign, while short, would be one marked by the effective governance of the Empire, especially after returning the capital of the Empire to Constantinople during the first few years of his reign. His reign would also be marked by effective and competent administration, especially with the defeat of the Bulgarians and Serbs in the Haemus and continuation of the consolidation of the Rhoman presence in Anatolia.

While many have speculated about what would have happened had he had more time to be Emperor, it was not to be as he would be killed in Timur's invasion of Anatolia, leaving behind his brother, Justinian, as the new Emperor.

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[6] Justinian was the youngest child of Oshin and third son, born in 1384. When his older brothers, Emperor Constantine and Dux Augustine, (b. 1372,) were both killed in the Battle of Aydin in 1402, Justinian took the throne with the support of his mother, the Dowager Empress, Rita. He was not quite 18 years old.

His two older sisters, however, did not support him. Theodora, born in 1369, was the oldest child of Oshrin, and had been married to Empress Rita's nephew, _________________, the Dux of Epirus, in 1380, at that time the senior claimant of the Basilian Pretenders. This had confirmed their support for Oshrin's reign. But with the defeat of Constantine to Timur and the loss of Anatolia and Armenia to the Empire, Theodora and the Dux now proclaimed he was the rightful Emperor. Alexandria, born in 1379, was married to the Bulgarian Emperor, Ivan Umor. They threw their support to Epirus in exchange for a return of the Haemus to the Bulgarians.

The war with Timur was still occurring as the Amir was now battling for the northwest provinces of Asia Minor and the Black Sea coast and was besieging Nicaea. With a two-front war occurring with the Turco-Mongols to the east and south and the Epirus/Bulgaria alliance to the west and north, The Empire was not able to secure Crete, the Peloponnese, and up through the former Duchy of Athens and Venice swept in and swiftly conquered it.

Justinian saw his only hope for the Empire was to sue for peace with Timur. Surprisingly, the Amir was generous in his terms, as he wished to finish in the west and turn east to face China. He agreed to allow Christian pilgrims to visit the Holy Land, now part of the Timurid Empire, to cede the territory in northwest Asia Minor he was occupying in return for the Empire giving up its claims to the former Turkish Beyliks except the ones that bordered the Aegean or the Black Sea, yielding the interior of Anatolia again to Timur's Turkish vassals. (Timur championed the Ghuzz Turks of Mentese who now reformed the Sultanate of Rum in the interior of Anatolia and the southern Mediterranean coast.)

This allowed Justinian to invade the Haemus in 1403. Ivan Umor did not meet Justinian in battle but instead sent Alexandria to negotiate a peace. The Bulgarians sued for peace if they submitted to Constantinople, recognized Justinian as their Emperor, gave up the title Emperor for themselves but took the title of King of the Bulgarians. In return, Justinian recognized the Haemus Mountains as part of the Bulgarian Kingdom but as a vassal of Constantinople.

Now Justinian could turn his full attention to Epirus. Unlike Alexandria, Theodora did not encourage her husband to make peace. A bloody war followed from 1404 through 1408. A peace never was formed with a treaty, like with Timur or Bulgaria, but a ceasefire and truce ended hostilities in the late summer of 1408. All the territory that Epirus had taken from the Empire was restored, but a rump Epirus remained and was now de facto independent, although both sides claimed Epirus was part of the Roman Empire, they just disagreed which government was the legitimate government of the entire Empire.

All through this war, negotiations had occurred with Venice. They were formalized in the Treaty of Athens in 1410. The Greek Isles, except for Crete, were now under the direct control of Constantinople. The Duchy of Athens was restored to independence but formally a vassal of Constantinople, as was the new formed Duchy of the Peloponnese, but Venice was given full rights to trade and establish bases. In reality, the Duchies were under the control of Venice but officially were vassals of Rome. Crete itself was part of the Venetian Empire.

Finally, Justinian had peace on all borders and the Empire was secure, although much smaller than previously.

This was when the Dowager Empress died.

Justinian now knew he needed to marry. He was now 25 and expected many more years to reign. His bride was Anna Vasilievna of Moscow, daughter of Vasily I, the Grand Prince of Moscow. She was now 17 and Muscovy had been one of the only neighboring states to actually declare for Justinian when he took the throne. But now that all surrounding states did, it was to his first ally he turned for a marriage. (Even though that support had been nothing more than declaring a position.)

The Emperor and Empress started a family immediately and had a number of children.

Although it was humiliating that the Greek vassal states were only nominally vassals, the reality of peace with Venice and the presence of Venetian trade in them led to increase prosperity for the Empire. Also peace with the new Sultanate of Rum and the Timurid Empire, meant the Silk Road was re-opened and trade from there added to the Empire's prosperity.

However, the peace and prosperity of Justinian's reign was doomed to fail in 1432 on the death of the heir and grandson of Timur, Muhammad Sultan Mizra, who'd held all of Timur's empire together from Timur's death in 1405. The western portions of the Timurid Empire fell into chaos, the Silk Road closed again, the Ghuzz attacked the Empire's province of Trezibond, and a new threat demolished the Empire- the Black Plague.

Justinian died of the Plague in 1432 just as the Ghuzz attacked the Empire.

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Empress and Autocratess Maria I and Emperor and Autocrat Peter I
[7]
Born a sickly child in 1412, Maria was the first daughter and child of Emperor Justinian III and Princess Anna Vasilievna of Moscow. For most of Maria’s early life, she was confined indoors due to an unknown affliction that rendered her physically weak and nearly bald. Maria would often be the target of frequent insults by courtiers, which greatly affected the young girl. In 1428, she met Peter Venatrovsky, the son of one of the royal guards of Grand Prince Vasily I, who had previously visited Constantinople. They both fell in love, and Maria’s health rapidly improved, even though this is most probably a coincidence, and she remained near-bald for the rest of her life. At the age of 20, she and Peter finally married.

By the time of Justinian III’s death, Maria and her younger brother, John, were their father’s only surviving children. Briefly, it seemed that there was a possibility of a civil war between Maria and John. However, John, recognizing that he would hold many disadvantages if he waged war, struck a deal with Maria and Peter. John would relinquish his claim to the Roman throne, but, in exchange, he would become the King of Macedonia (roughly OTL Western Macedonia region in Greece and some parts of Central Macedonia).

The newly crowned imperial couple had to deal with the depopulation of the city of Constantinople and other surrounding areas caused by the Black Death. However, many lives were saved by the royal policy which was put in place which forced many inhabitants of cities to relocate to sparsely populated areas of the empire. A few years later, the Roman Empress and Emperor helped command a combined Roman-Macedonian-Timurid force which resulted in the Ghuzz being pushed out of the Roman Empire and the majority of the Timurid Empire’s eastern territories.

The remainder of their joint reign was relatively peaceful and prosperous, as Maria and Peter had implemented many policies that facilitated easier trade with the Venetians and other Italian maritime powers. During this time, Peter also introduced much Muscovite culture to the empire, especially in the imperial capital.

In 1457, Maria and Peter both died in their sleep together on the same day. They were succeeded by their nephew-in-law, Ioannes of the House of Osmanos.

[8] Alexandros of the Osmanoi would be the first-born son of Ioannes Dragases Osmanos, a famous governor of the Peleponese, born in early 1432. His family was of Turkish origin, as his family was itself descendant the defeated Ottoman Beylic two centuries before. His ancestors had entered Byzantine service and had rise steadily through the ranks, becoming great land-owners during the Anatolian reconquista. Alexandros himself had led his first contingent of troops by 1451 by the age of 19, defeating a raiding party of the Karamanid Sultanate of Syria in the battle of Adana, and led a contigent of Christian troops - a mixture of Greeks, Cilicians, Armenians and Turks all the way down to Antioch, city which he would swear to reconquer as a general one day. He would reconquer, not as a general, but as an Emperor.

Alexandros would rise to steady fame after this, joining the upper echelons of the Imperial military which would lead him to meet and marry Eudokia of Macedonia, only child of John of Macedon. It was Alexandro's first real thrust into the upper hierarchy of Imperial politics, and it would one in which he would not fail. The death of his father-in-law would have by all rights seen him rise to the occasion as King of Macedon, but Alexandros, a firm Imperialist, would refuse to take a title and land that "would disturb the law and power of the Empire". For many, it was seen as a moment of stupidity, as Macedonia held both Thessalonika and an immense spread of territory. But it was Alexandros' introduction to the Imperial family, who would grow to respect him. Maria and Peter never had children, and they would eventually decide to co-adopt Alexandros into their family and make him their successor, alongside their niece. Their deaths in 1457 would see Alexandros, perhaps the most important ruler of 15 century Byzantium, arise to the ocasion. Alexandros, who would come to be known in the future as the Conqueror, had just arisen to the purple.

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Alexandros was a firm unificacionists, the party of the Byzantine Empire which believed that the many "statelets" Byzantine noblemen had successfully carved for themselves within the Imperial frontiers be ended, and it had been this with this party of talented, loyal and young "new blood" that Alexandros had allied himself with, and truly, they would become one of the pillars of his reign.

Alexandros was, however, not the only one who was paying attention. In Epirus, the old age Laskarid Despots of the region had laid in wait, content with slowly expanding their rule over Thessaly, Attica and Southern Albania and Macedonia, but they were not foolish. Manuel Laskaris, the old and wise Despot of Epirus, knew that Alexandros would end up coming for him, and declared himself Emperor with support of many European and Anatolian magnates. It would lead to a two-year civil war, in which Alexandros' military talent would come to the fore. Alexandros would first see action in Anatolia, soundly defeating the Rhoman magnates in Pontus and in the Lycian themes of Kybyrrhaotai and Opsikion, while his brother Michael held off the Epirotes in Macedonia. Michael had plenty of military talent of his own, and would hold off the numerically superior Epirotes for months before the arrival of his brother over the Hellespont. At this point, Manuel and Simeon of Bulgaria entered into an alliance, but it would be too late for Epirus. Alexandros would lead his professional army of over 50000 men into Macedonia, defeating Manuel at every turn, quickly subduing his territories. Venice's attempt to harbor Manuel in their Aegean cities would see the Emperor conquer them - but this would start the Roman-Veneto-Bulgarian war, which would last for one more year.

Michael ambushed the Bulgarian army in the Rhodopes, however, and this would see the Byzantines imprison over 20000 Bulgarian soldiers. It was a military victory the likes of Basil the III and that of Caesar, and it would see the fall of Bulgaria once more to the Rhoman Empire. The Venetian counter-invasion of Epirus would also end in disaster - Alexandros handing them a handy victory in the battle of Naufpakos, which would see Venice lose it's holdings in the Roman Empire - including Crete.

The annexation of Bulgaria and the re-incorporation of the Venetian concessions would see a surge of popularity for Alexandros, making him one of the most popular and powerful Autocrats since Alexios the I, and it would give Alexandros the space to introduce his greatest ambitions - reform at all levels, which would be seen blessed by God as he and the Basilissa, Eudokia, would have their first child that year.

The Codex Osmanoi - the greatest code of law since the Codex of Justinian almost a millenia prior, would be one of the greatest books of law of the time and is considered by most of historians as the Roman Empire's first constitution, as it sodified very well the role each official would have in their servitude to the Emperor. The Roman laws of Succession - turning the Roman Autocracy into a primogeniture, male preference-based succession, with usurpation - made "illegal" and co-emperorship as well. It would also reform much of Byzantine bureaucracy, making it clear and consise for the first time in forever. It would also make Sebastos the title of the Crown Prince of the Empire.

His military reforms, however, are also famous. The birth of the Byzantine armies (Imagine a less corrupt, more gun-based and less raiding prone Ottoman army) of the 15th century, known as the Scholarii, as each Rhoman soldier was given a firm education in any art of his choosing and in Greek. It was to be the birth of one of the most professional forces of the age.

On other fronts, though, Alexandros after his reforms would quickly move to end the subdued Turkic beylics, as they had become rather powerless since many Turks and turcomans had converted to Christianity and integrated into the Imperial system, becoming one of the greatest sources of soldiers for the Empire. The swift integration of Bulgaria into the Empire would also be of great use to Rome - as the Bulgarians would quickly come to enjoy the rule of Rome - as the Tsardom of Bulgaria had been decentralized and in constant internal warfare between nobles - and it quickly became a source of both soldiers and officials for Constantinople.

The next few years of Alexandros' reign would be peaceful - with much coin flowing into the Imperial treasury due to his reforms after the increased spending of the civil war, but it was a time for personal growth for Alexandros - in the peace established after 1462, he and his wife would become the parents to seven more children, all the way into 1472, the year the Empire would go to war once more. One must denote, however, Alexandros and his wife roles as patrons of the arts - to them is often attributed the start of the Renaissance, as, during their reign, Constantinople (Which had extensively recovered and expanded since the fourth crusade) would become a center of art and culture, reuniting several Latin, Slavic, Arab, Persian and Roman artists, historians, architects, musicians, inventors and more in the city. But Alexandros' greatest passion would definitely be architecture - the Emperor would be the patron of over one hundred architecture projects, but the most famous would be the restoration of the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, the Parthenon of Athens and the Colossus of Rhodes, his greatest and most beloved project. He would build many new monuments, however, such as the Grand Mausoleum of Eudokia, named after his wife, which would become the resting ground of future Roman Emperors, the Grand Harbour of Thessalonika and Smyrna, the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Antioch and many statues of himself all over the Empire.

The following ten years of constant campaigning by Alexandros, which would earn him the title of the Conqueror, could be better explained, but the majesty and greatness of so many deeds would take much to explain. In less than 10 years, the Empire would expand into all directions, with the Emperor conquering deep into Serbia and Bosnia, winning the loyalty of the Danubian princes of Wallachia and Moldavia, the homage of the King of Hungary, while in the East, King David of Georgia would enter into Alexander's patronage, recognizing him as his sovereign, while the full extent of lower Caucasia and the Armenian lands would be integrated into the Empire. In the south, Basil would storm over the Cilician gates in 1476, while the Turkish Karamanid rulers of Syria were busy invading the remnants of the Mamluk caliphate in Egypt and Hejaz, bringing the whole of Syria under his control. The Emperor would have perhaps conquered further, but a bout of plague would take him, seeing him succeeded by his son Demetrios.

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A statue of Demetrios I outside the National Roman Museum of History
[9]
Demetrios was the second son but third child overall of Alexander II and Eudokia of Macedonia, born in 1460. A year after his birth, his elder brother, Alexios, died, and Demetrios became the first in line to the Roman throne. Unlike his father and most of the men at the royal court at the time, Demetrios held no interest in the military. However, his uninterest did not cause any problems for his father, but certainly for the army, as Demetrios was entirely hostile to it. In fact, when he became Emperor, he would try to restrict the army's power, but ultimately he did not live long enough to pursue his goal.

After his father died, Demetrios became Emperor of Rome. But, a month after he was crowned, he came ill with the plague. And, just like his father, died from it. Not much would be remembered from his short reign, one of the shortest in Roman history.

He was succeeded by his brother John.

[10] Born in 1465 as the third son and fifth child overall of Alexander II and Eudokia of Macedonia, John wasn't expected to become the next Roman Emperor, but with the death of his brother Demetrios just one year into his reign in 1482, he became Emperor at the age of 17. Unlike his brother, John was like most men of his time and had an interest in the millitary, and led an conquest of Rum in 1493, quickly followed by a war against the Crimean Khanate, which would see the annexation of the southern tip of Crimea.

John treated his now greatly expanded Muslim population fairly, allowing them to practice their religion in public, but some Muslims did leave the Roman Empire to other places, with an popular destination being the Mamluk Caliphate, which was focusing on spreading across the North African coast.

John married Maria of Naples, daughter of King Frederick II of Naples, which would start an alliance between Naples and Rhomania. John and Maria had an loving marriage and had five children together. John didn't died of the plauge like his father and brother, as he lived to the age of 54. He was succeeded by his eldest son, Alexander.


[11] Alexander was the third born child but first born son of John V and Maria of Naples, he was named after his maternal grandfather.

Like his father and grandfather, Alexander had a great interest for the military, however after two bad falls, during his early teenage years; the broken bones of his legs and right arm, never healed properly, and it became clear that it was permanent damage.

His large head and long torso were not helped by the crooked arm and shockingly bowed and stumpy legs. Many said if should have topped six feet, however his legs mean he barely reached over five.



On the day of his coronation, Alexander married Natia of Georgia, daughter of George XIV and his Turkish wife, Nazmiye Yakış. This was one of the rare occasions he was able to rise and walk unaided, although that night he managed only one dance with his wife, due to the pain that not even his usual drinking of wine could numb.



When it came to skirmishes along the borders, he left his bothers, to lead his men into battle, and wield the sword in his name.



His death at a relatively young age, was related to excessive alcohol poisoning and he was succeeded by his daughter Anastasia.

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[12]

Empress Anastasia was born in 1511 as the only child of Emperor Alexander III and as such was proclaimed Empress after her father's death at the age of ten. As such, her early years as Empress would be spent under her mother Natia's regency, even with how her reign would prove to be one of the longest in the history of the Roman Empire.

Her reign would actually begin in 1529 as upon her 18th birthday, she would fully assume the position of Empress and Autocratess of the Romans with her reign being marked by a "golden age" of the Empire as Serbia was annexed into the Empire in the 1530s, the Empire became increasingly wealthy during her reign, and a flourishing culture with the 16th Century marked by a golden age of culture.

Anastasia would marry Nicephorus Komnenos, one of the last surviving Komnenoi, in 1532 with the couple having six children. Anastasia would die in 1572 from a heart attack with her son Nicephorus as her successor.

[13] Prince Nicephorus, born in 1535, was the second son of Anastasia I and Nicephorus Komnenos. His older brother, Sebastos Alexander, died in 1567, after he married Anges of Hungary, the only daughter of Andrew VI. Which meant that Nicephorus and Agnes' eldest son would be the heir to both the Roman Empire and Hungary.

After becoming Emperor and Autocrat of the Romans, Nicephorus continued the "golden age" that started during his mother's reign with the continuing expansion of the Roman Empire with an brief war against Aragon that ended with Rhomania annexing the island of Sicily, and the death of Anges of Hungary in 1589 which resulted in the union of Rome and Hungary and the estabishment of the Principality of Transylvania under an relative of the Emperor.

Nicephorus was an patron of the arts and supported the building of various strutures arcoss the empire. And he would die one day after he had a portrait of himself painted in 1595 at the age of 60. He was succeeded by his eldest grandson, Constantine the Greatest.

[14] Sebastos Konstantinos was born in 1584, the first son of Sebastokrator Alexios, eldest son of Nicephorus, and his wife, Mary of Russia. The young lad would soon be remarked as special - Konstantinos was born prematurely, and what he would gain in mental health, he would never be sound of mind again. But, we would not, not be sound of mind either. As everything during his long reign, Konstantinos' mind would be in a brink between fall and rising, but despite all of these hamperings, Constantine would live his life as he ended it - in ecstasy.

Konstantinos would only be seven when his father died, and only eleven when his grandfather did - throwing him onto the Imperial purple in earnest. Constantine would be brought up in the regency of his mother, Mary of Russia, who would draft Constantine's marriage with Louisa of France, daughter of the French King, Jean IV de Evreux, perhaps at that time, the most powerful and prestigious ruler of Medieval western Europe due to his vast Kingdom west of the Rhine. This was done on purpose by the Empress as to solidify the frontier of Hungary, as the Austrian Habsburg had claims on the Hungarian and Croatian thrones, establishing an alliance with the Holy Roman Empire's natural enemy of France. Louisa and Constantine would enjoy their marriage in 1600, when they were both sixteen. It was to be the start of a tense relationship based around lust, madness, love and fury.

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Constantine's mental health issues would keep him off-balance on and off his reign - but his exceptionalism, his fascination with the classical age and his many strange, funny habits would endear him vastly to the population of Rhoma. Despite everything, Constantine would surround himself with a diverse, talented group of men, whose efforts into the reformation and continuation of the Roman state would be demarked in history as the "Second Komnenian Golden Age", which would last after Constantine's early death.

Constantine would get the news in early 1610 than he had developed an illness that would soon see him to heaven, and so the Emperor would summon the Imperial military in what he called "his great last show". In less than four years, the dying Autocrat of the Romans, King of the Hungarians and Croats, Sovereign of the Dacians and Georgians, Master of Syria and Bulgaria, Prince of Sicily and Cyprus, would invade and bulldoze through the armies of the Egyptian Sultanate, seeing, for the first time since the Muslim conquests, Egypt re-integrated into Rome. The Emperor, however, would follow his final victory with his own final defeat, dying of what modern historians and scientists attribute to a rare kind of cancer, leaving behind his daughter, Irene, as successor.

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Portrait of Empress Irene, c. 1625

[15] Born in 1601 to Emperor Constantine XII and Louisa of France as the oldest of their 5 daughters, Irene would prove one of Rhomania’s most divisive empresses. Raised under the care of her grandmother since shortly after her birth, Irene grew into a woman with a keen eye for who to form alliances with and who to carefully antagonize. When her father died in 1614, the 13-year-old Irene was quickly crowned Empress and Autocratissa of the Romans.

In 1617, the Empress would enter into a proxy marriage with Lorenzo de’ Medici, a son of the Grand Duke of Tuscany by his second wife, Anna Claudia of Poland-Lithuania. The marriage proper would occur in 1621, after Lorenzo came of age. Irene and Lorenzo had a far healthier marriage than that of her parents, and, although Irene struggled with fertility, they would have four children.

Irene had a touch of her father’s mental health issues, often having hallucinations that she thought were angelic visions. These visions drove her to declare war against the powers of Arabia, and reclaim the eastern boundaries of the Mediterranean sea. The wars of Imperial Reconquest, as they would widely be known, were Pyrrhic victories, but by 1650, the eastern borders of the empire resembled those of the glory days of Rome, at the cost of a large percent of the serving populace.

Irene’s greatest contribution to the “Second Komnenian Golden Age” would be in bringing the ideologies and artists of Western Europe to Constantinople and sponsoring colonial endeavors, establishing New Athens in the Asiménio Potámi region. (OTL Río de Plata)

In 1675, Irene found out that she had a terminal illness. She spent her last three years withdrawn from court life and spending time with her family. Finally, in 1678, Empress Irene died from ovarian cancer, and was succeeded by her granddaughter, Zoe.
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[16] Born as the older of two daughters to Prince Romanos in 1648, Princess Zoe would become heir to the throne in 1677 after Prince Romanos died at the age of 52 from a sudden hunting accident with many historians arguing that Irene's death was hastened by the depression caused by her son's death, being crowned Empress the next year after her mother's death.

Zoe II's reign would be marked by the consolidation of the realm that her grandmother and great-grandfather had built and the continuation of the golden age that they had forged for the Empire. As such, she would spend much of her reign in the Levantine and Egyptian portion of the Empire and would generally show a relatively open-minded and tolerant approach towards her Muslim subjects. However, her reign would see the loss of Mesopotamia after her grandmother's attempts at conquering it proved too much for the Empire's logistics train as the Safavids conquered it in the Battle of Baghdad of 1683.

In terms of culture, Zoe would prove to be a prominent patron of the culture and the arts, even being something of an artist herself during her reign. In her reign, she would also try to promote Rhomanian colonialism with an expansion of the colonies in the New World with the Southern Cone becoming known as the Hesperides during her reign as well.

In her personal life, Zoe would marry Alexander, third son of the Tsar of Russia, with whom she would have five children. Zoe would die from a stroke at the age of 65, being succeeded by her youngest child, Alexios the VIII.

[17] Alexios, Sebastrokator of Rome, would be born in 1692, the youngest child and only son of Empress Zoe Osmanos-Komnenos and Alexander Fyodorovich Godunov, Grande Duke of Russia. His birth was thoroughly celebrated in Constantinople as the nobility of the Empire, tired of the constant dynastic changes after the rise of the well-beloved Osmanoi and their matrilineal descendants in the second Komnenoi, had been thinking of pushing for a change of law that would forbid Alexios' elder sisters, Anna, Irene, Maria and Theodora from inheriting the throne due to their often rambuctious and infamous marriages - as Empress' Zoe's policy of marriages had been extremely unpopular, something that would deeply affect Alexios' reign.

Princess Anna, the eldest, had married Fernando, Duke of Badajoz, second son and regent of the Kingdom of Portugal-Leon in the Iberian Peninsula, with the intent of solidifying Constantinople's presence in Hesperida, as the general colony was now called after the expansion away in the Asiménio Pótami. Anna's marriage would secure the region, despite the loss of claims to the now Portuguese colony of Cisplatina (OTL Uruguay) and the loss of Parmenia to Portuguese Brasil as well (OTL North-Eastern Paraguay). The colony, would, however, continue to be problematic, as by this point Hesperida was dominated by Sicilian Catholic ranchers, whom had emigrated from Byzantine Sicily, one of the most problematic regions of the Empire due to the stern refusal of the locals to accept the Orthodox status quo the Constantinopolitan Church had attained in the region. Zoe, and then Alexios would attempt to calm the island, but the mark of oppression had been left there, which would eventually see Sicily sold to the Kingdom of Naples alongside a marriage between King Leopoldo de Berry, the widely popular first king of the Napolitan House of Evreux-Berry and Princess Irene. Princess Theodora would marry all the way into the Kingdom of Sweden-Norway, marrying Prince Sigismund Vasa, while princess Maria would marry into the longtime antagonists of the Romans in Hungary, the Austrian Habsburgs.


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As a Prince, Alexios would be famous for his many travels and the solitary life he lived with his wife, the daughter of the King of Dacia, a vassal and ally of the Roman Emperor, Vlad Draculesti, descendant of Michael the Brave which had united all three principalities under Greek rule. A shy woman, Mary of Dacia would prefer the Imperial families' many provincial palaces than the bustle of Constantinople, which would make the couple extremely popular in the provinces proper. They would, during this time until the ascension of Alexios to the throne, have many children, almost all of them born in different regions of the realm.

With the death of Empress Zoe, it was clear that change was in the horizon. Alexios was a quiet and unassuming man, with a simple austere lifestyle. He would, however, embrace the purple fully, taking on a much more abrasive step on the Imperial Throne.

Much of Alexios the VIII's recorded legacy as an Emperor is his effect of Syria, Assyria, Egypt and Cyrenaica. Once the center of the Empire, the Muslim conquests had seen the Romans relegated to Anatolia and the Balkans, which, even after the return of the Empire to these regions, had not shifted, with Anatolia and Europe becoming ever more important for the Romans. The dominance of Muslims in the Levantine and African promises, at a demographic level, and the refusal of previous Emperors to antagonize them, had led to the famous epoch of Byzantine tolerance, which would diminish effectively under Alexios. The Levant and Egypt of previous Emperors and that of Alexios were different, completely. While the native Christian populations of the area had been diminished for ages, they had bounced back under Byzantine rule, and were now starting to demand more attention from Constantinople, attention, Alexios, a devout Christian, was willing to give them:
- The Copts in Egypt, who now represent almost a third of Egypt's population, and the Orthodox community there, who represented 15% of Egypt's population, both descended from arab-coptic converts and descendants of mainly settled Greek, Turkish and Albanian soldiers, had allied each other, under the leadership of the Patriarch of Alexandria, Ioannes, a arab greek convert.
- In Cyrenaica, always a hotspot of Greek fishermen, the coast had been settled by Aegean, Cypriot and Ionian Hellenes, eager to get into the dye and olive trade, and despite the half-hazardous censuses of the time, it seems Christians were already a majority there by this time.
- In Syria and Assyria (OTL Jazira, aka, eastern Syria and North-western Iraq), muslims remained a majority, but a slim one, as the many native christian sects had expanded under Roman Guidance, with the Maronites receiving many funds in western Syria and expanding, while the Assyrians, under their patriarch, in essence governed Upper Mesopotamia. Many settled veterans, especially Bulgars, Pontics and Cappadocians (Both turks and greeks) were also in the region. Armenians were also prevalent in the region.

This complete demographic change, with a strong christian block in the Balkans, Anatolia, Georgia and Armenia (Both greater and lesser), saw a need of change in the way the Empire handled it's muslims. Muslims had been exempt from many taxes as a way to keep them happy, but had been blocked from offices of power and the military. During Alexios reign, muslims would allowed to go into politics and the military, but would have to pay hefty taxes, which would be used to replenish Roman coffers.

But there was one essential component to Alexios' desire as an Emperor - to break away from geographic limitations, and to dominate the Mediterranean sea and the Indian Ocean. It to do so that he fought a series of wars against Persia, defeating them in both, which would see Mesopotamia and Shirvan added to the Empire in the first, and the Persians themselves pushed all the way to the Zagros mountains, which would be the new Perso-Roman frontier. The access to the Indian Ocean through the Persian gulf was also guaranteed, and Basra and the newly founded "Nicatomani" (The Port of the Victor, in Alexios' honour), the first Roman deep water port in Mesopotamia.

However, there was one project that fascinated Alexios - just like his ancestor Alexander the II had rebuilt many treasures of antiquity and built many himself, Alexios had one single great ambition - to connect the mediterranean to the Red sea. During his reign, thousands of workers and slaves would begin a huge project that Alexios had envisioned, a single canal that directly connected the two seas. Alexios himself, however, would never see the result of it.

Alexios would further secure the allegiance of the Hejazi Hashimids, securing a new wave of income for Constantinople as the first Custodian of the two Holy cities of Islam. He would die in early 1740, after a fall that would cripple his legs and spine.

Ferdinand Karl, Airchduke o Austrick-Este - Wikipedia

Emperor and Autocrat John VI, who would be remembered as The Ill-Fated

[18] Prince John was born in 1718, the first, but third child of Emperor Alexios VIII and Princess Mary of Dacia. As he grew, there was great expectation for him to live up to his father and his image. However, it seemed that the anxious John always failed no matter how much he tried. Failing many attempts to reform the navy or provincial administration even with the aid of his dying father, which frustrated the aging Emperor.

When his father died it was popularly rumoured that he had attempted to exclude John, singularly him, from the line of succession. Although, in the end, John VI did not reign for long as he was assassinated by an Protestant extremists.

Leaving almost no legacy the short-reigning Emperor was succeeded by his brother Alexander.

[19] Alexander was born in 1720, the second son and fourth child of Alexios VIII and Mary of Dacia. He was seen as an more appropriate successor to his father than his older brother John, as he was an expert in both the millitary and goverment administration. Some even thought he would become Alexios' heir in the event of him removing his brother's place in the line of succession.

Alexander became Roman Emperor after his brother's death by an Protestant extremist, and forced Protestants to pay hefty taxes that are similar to the ones that Muslins pay. His reign had not much happen expect in 1742 when his brother Peter became King of Bohemia following the death of the childless Wenceslaus VI, starting the Catholic branch of the House of Osmanos-Komnenos.

In his personal life, Alexander married Princess Elene of Georgia in 1741, but had only two children with her before dying of food poisoning in 1746. He was succeeded by __________.
 
POD: Alexios Philanthropenos successfully overthrows Andronicus II

Emperors and Autocrats of the Romans
1282-1295: Andronicus II (House of Palaeologus)
1295-1341: Alexios VI (House of Tarchaneiotes) [1]
1341-1345: Alexios VII (House of Tarchaneiotes) [2]
1345-1374: Basil III (House of Laskaris) [3]
1374-1392: Oshin I (House of Lambron) [4]
1392-1402: Constantine XI (House of Lambron) [5]
1402-1432: Justinian III (House of Lambron) [6]
1432-1457: Maria I and Peter I (House of Lambron/House of Venatrovsky) [7]
1457-1481: Alexander II "The Conqueror" (House of Osmanos) [8]
1481-1482: Demetrios I (House of Osmanos) [9]
1482-1509: John V (House of Osmanos) [10]
1509-1521: Alexander III (House of Osmanos) [11]
1521-1573: Anastasia I (House of Osmanos) [12]
1573-1595: Nicephorus IV (House of Komnenoi) [13]
1595-1614: Constantine XII "The Pharaoh" (House of Komnenoi) [14]
1614-1678: Irene II (House of Komnenoi) [15]
1678-1713: Zoe II (Dynastic: House of Osmanos-Komnenoi/Agnatic: House of Medici) [16]
1713-1740: Alexios VIII (House of Osmanos-Komnenos) [17]
1740-1740: John VI ''The Ill-Fated'' (House of Osmanos-Komnenos) [18]
1740-1746: Alexander IV (House of Osmanos-Komnenos) [19]
1746-1760: Regency of Alexios IX (House of Osmanos-Komnenos)
1760-1834: Alexios IX (House of Osmanos-Komnenos) [20]

[1] Alexios VI's reign would mark a "Second Alexiad" as he, after overthrowing the weak and incompetent leadership of Emperor Andronicus II, would spend his 46-year long reign as Emperor and Autocrat of the Romans trying his best to ensure that Rhomania, weakened by the Fourth Crusade, would regain a position as a major power in a long reign where the Emperor was largely on horseback, campaigning against Latin, Slav, rebel, or Turk. Amongst his greatest achievements as Emperor would be the conquest of the Despotate of Epirus and his crushing of the nascent Osmanli beylik, even if Rhomania by his death, while having recovered from the disaster of the Fourth Crusade, was a mere regional power.

Alexios VI would die in 1341 from ill health and would be succeeded by his son Alexios.

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A 16th-century depiction of Emperor and Autocrat Alexios VII
[2]
Born in 1300, Alexios was the first born son of Emperor Alexios VI’s second marriage. He was possibly made co-emperor in 1328, reigning alongside his father before being demoted once more, most probably to a defeat in battle against the Epirotes.

When his father died, Alexios succeeded him, though he had to put down a rebellion that was instigated by one of his younger brothers.

In early 1345, Alexios VII launched a campaign against the independent southern Greek states, however, due to his incompetence his army would soon be routed by a combined Greek army. A few days later succumbed to his injuries and was succeeded by his nephew-in-law, Basil Laskaris.

[3] Born in 1321, Basil Laskaris would be one of the last scions of the ancient Nicene house of the Laskarids, which had once ruled the Nicene Empire in Anatolia. Despite their fall to the Palaeologus, the recent rising of the Tarchaneiotes would see the Laskarids rise quickly in opportunity. The Laskarids had been famous for their deeds in Anatolia, beating back the turk often, and it was in this area that the Laskarids would expand and create a new base of power for themselves. The conquest of many Turkic beylics would see the Laskarids adquire many new lands in Bukellarion and Phlagonia. It would be through this that Ioannes Laskaris, strategos of Anatolikon, would see his son Basil married to the niece of Emperor Alexios VII.

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Basil and his wife, Irene, would have a fruitful companionship, marked by Irene's intelligence and Basil's respect for her. Despite being more of a friendly "relationship", Basil and Irene would have 7 recorded children. It would be through Irene's claim that Basil would rise to the throne, and this would show during his reign, with Irene being far more than a mere consort during the rule of her husband.

Basil would prove himself up to the task of generalship and emperor-ship. Appealing to Dynastic continuation, Basil would take up the wars of his predecessor and would advance deeply into Southern Greece, restoring it back to the Empire, but an intervention by Venice would see an almost decade of on and off warfare between both states, which the Rhomans would eventually win, restoring their rule to all Greek islands, including Crete, although Cyprus remained in Crusader hands. His warfare-orientated reign would see the rise of a new class of Rhoman soldiery, based on conscription and professional service, mainly rewarded through promises of land in the depopulated Anatolia. Basil would also be the first Emperor to force the Turkish populations of the Empire to pay a blood tax - by giving at least one of their male children in service to the Empire.

Basil's never ending martial energy would see much of Anatolia recovered - with the Empire for the first time in generations reaching the Taurus mountains, with the Rhomans once more asserting dominance over the black sea. Many missionaries were sent into Circassia to Transcausia, and to Tartaria in the Golden horde by him. Basil would transplant many Greeks, Bulgarian and Latin mercenaries, as well as converted fleeing tribes from the North and the Steppes into Anatolia, giving the land a new appeal to the Rhoman state.

Despite his many victories against the westerners and the muslims, Basil would fail in his grandest campaign - the reconquest of Trebizond. The smashing of his army on the Pontic Mountains would see the aged Emperor enter a depression that would eventually take him to his grave. He would be succeeded by his son-in-law, Oshin
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[4] Oshin, a Prince of Armenia, was son-in-law to Emperor Basil III by his eldest daughter, Rita. Having deemed all of his legitimate sons as lunatics and simpletons, systematically managing them off stage, Basil set Oshin up as defacto heir jure uxoris.

Born in 1341, married in 1369 and had already given Basil three grandchildren by the time he died in 1374. Despite some opposition to his rule from his brothers-in-law and nephews, collectively known as the Basilian Pretenders, Oshin had effectively secured his reign by 1380 which left the remaining decade of his rule for him to focus on civic improvements including reinforcing the defenses of Thessalonica and effectively moving the imperial seat from Constantinople to Thessalonica.

In 1390, Oshin would inherit the Kingdom of Armenian Cilicia from his elder brother and this claim, which could be inherited by a woman, would pass to his children even if they did not become Byzantine Emperor.

Empress Rita outlived her husband, to see him succeeded by their son, Constantine

[5] Constantine XI was born in 1370 as the oldest of Oshin's sons and would become Emperor in 1393 as a result of his father Oshin's death.

As Emperor, Constantine XI's reign, while short, would be one marked by the effective governance of the Empire, especially after returning the capital of the Empire to Constantinople during the first few years of his reign. His reign would also be marked by effective and competent administration, especially with the defeat of the Bulgarians and Serbs in the Haemus and continuation of the consolidation of the Rhoman presence in Anatolia.

While many have speculated about what would have happened had he had more time to be Emperor, it was not to be as he would be killed in Timur's invasion of Anatolia, leaving behind his brother, Justinian, as the new Emperor.

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[6] Justinian was the youngest child of Oshin and third son, born in 1384. When his older brothers, Emperor Constantine and Dux Augustine, (b. 1372,) were both killed in the Battle of Aydin in 1402, Justinian took the throne with the support of his mother, the Dowager Empress, Rita. He was not quite 18 years old.

His two older sisters, however, did not support him. Theodora, born in 1369, was the oldest child of Oshrin, and had been married to Empress Rita's nephew, _________________, the Dux of Epirus, in 1380, at that time the senior claimant of the Basilian Pretenders. This had confirmed their support for Oshrin's reign. But with the defeat of Constantine to Timur and the loss of Anatolia and Armenia to the Empire, Theodora and the Dux now proclaimed he was the rightful Emperor. Alexandria, born in 1379, was married to the Bulgarian Emperor, Ivan Umor. They threw their support to Epirus in exchange for a return of the Haemus to the Bulgarians.

The war with Timur was still occurring as the Amir was now battling for the northwest provinces of Asia Minor and the Black Sea coast and was besieging Nicaea. With a two-front war occurring with the Turco-Mongols to the east and south and the Epirus/Bulgaria alliance to the west and north, The Empire was not able to secure Crete, the Peloponnese, and up through the former Duchy of Athens and Venice swept in and swiftly conquered it.

Justinian saw his only hope for the Empire was to sue for peace with Timur. Surprisingly, the Amir was generous in his terms, as he wished to finish in the west and turn east to face China. He agreed to allow Christian pilgrims to visit the Holy Land, now part of the Timurid Empire, to cede the territory in northwest Asia Minor he was occupying in return for the Empire giving up its claims to the former Turkish Beyliks except the ones that bordered the Aegean or the Black Sea, yielding the interior of Anatolia again to Timur's Turkish vassals. (Timur championed the Ghuzz Turks of Mentese who now reformed the Sultanate of Rum in the interior of Anatolia and the southern Mediterranean coast.)

This allowed Justinian to invade the Haemus in 1403. Ivan Umor did not meet Justinian in battle but instead sent Alexandria to negotiate a peace. The Bulgarians sued for peace if they submitted to Constantinople, recognized Justinian as their Emperor, gave up the title Emperor for themselves but took the title of King of the Bulgarians. In return, Justinian recognized the Haemus Mountains as part of the Bulgarian Kingdom but as a vassal of Constantinople.

Now Justinian could turn his full attention to Epirus. Unlike Alexandria, Theodora did not encourage her husband to make peace. A bloody war followed from 1404 through 1408. A peace never was formed with a treaty, like with Timur or Bulgaria, but a ceasefire and truce ended hostilities in the late summer of 1408. All the territory that Epirus had taken from the Empire was restored, but a rump Epirus remained and was now de facto independent, although both sides claimed Epirus was part of the Roman Empire, they just disagreed which government was the legitimate government of the entire Empire.

All through this war, negotiations had occurred with Venice. They were formalized in the Treaty of Athens in 1410. The Greek Isles, except for Crete, were now under the direct control of Constantinople. The Duchy of Athens was restored to independence but formally a vassal of Constantinople, as was the new formed Duchy of the Peloponnese, but Venice was given full rights to trade and establish bases. In reality, the Duchies were under the control of Venice but officially were vassals of Rome. Crete itself was part of the Venetian Empire.

Finally, Justinian had peace on all borders and the Empire was secure, although much smaller than previously.

This was when the Dowager Empress died.

Justinian now knew he needed to marry. He was now 25 and expected many more years to reign. His bride was Anna Vasilievna of Moscow, daughter of Vasily I, the Grand Prince of Moscow. She was now 17 and Muscovy had been one of the only neighboring states to actually declare for Justinian when he took the throne. But now that all surrounding states did, it was to his first ally he turned for a marriage. (Even though that support had been nothing more than declaring a position.)

The Emperor and Empress started a family immediately and had a number of children.

Although it was humiliating that the Greek vassal states were only nominally vassals, the reality of peace with Venice and the presence of Venetian trade in them led to increase prosperity for the Empire. Also peace with the new Sultanate of Rum and the Timurid Empire, meant the Silk Road was re-opened and trade from there added to the Empire's prosperity.

However, the peace and prosperity of Justinian's reign was doomed to fail in 1432 on the death of the heir and grandson of Timur, Muhammad Sultan Mizra, who'd held all of Timur's empire together from Timur's death in 1405. The western portions of the Timurid Empire fell into chaos, the Silk Road closed again, the Ghuzz attacked the Empire's province of Trezibond, and a new threat demolished the Empire- the Black Plague.

Justinian died of the Plague in 1432 just as the Ghuzz attacked the Empire.

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Empress and Autocratess Maria I and Emperor and Autocrat Peter I
[7]
Born a sickly child in 1412, Maria was the first daughter and child of Emperor Justinian III and Princess Anna Vasilievna of Moscow. For most of Maria’s early life, she was confined indoors due to an unknown affliction that rendered her physically weak and nearly bald. Maria would often be the target of frequent insults by courtiers, which greatly affected the young girl. In 1428, she met Peter Venatrovsky, the son of one of the royal guards of Grand Prince Vasily I, who had previously visited Constantinople. They both fell in love, and Maria’s health rapidly improved, even though this is most probably a coincidence, and she remained near-bald for the rest of her life. At the age of 20, she and Peter finally married.

By the time of Justinian III’s death, Maria and her younger brother, John, were their father’s only surviving children. Briefly, it seemed that there was a possibility of a civil war between Maria and John. However, John, recognizing that he would hold many disadvantages if he waged war, struck a deal with Maria and Peter. John would relinquish his claim to the Roman throne, but, in exchange, he would become the King of Macedonia (roughly OTL Western Macedonia region in Greece and some parts of Central Macedonia).

The newly crowned imperial couple had to deal with the depopulation of the city of Constantinople and other surrounding areas caused by the Black Death. However, many lives were saved by the royal policy which was put in place which forced many inhabitants of cities to relocate to sparsely populated areas of the empire. A few years later, the Roman Empress and Emperor helped command a combined Roman-Macedonian-Timurid force which resulted in the Ghuzz being pushed out of the Roman Empire and the majority of the Timurid Empire’s eastern territories.

The remainder of their joint reign was relatively peaceful and prosperous, as Maria and Peter had implemented many policies that facilitated easier trade with the Venetians and other Italian maritime powers. During this time, Peter also introduced much Muscovite culture to the empire, especially in the imperial capital.

In 1457, Maria and Peter both died in their sleep together on the same day. They were succeeded by their nephew-in-law, Ioannes of the House of Osmanos.

[8] Alexandros of the Osmanoi would be the first-born son of Ioannes Dragases Osmanos, a famous governor of the Peleponese, born in early 1432. His family was of Turkish origin, as his family was itself descendant the defeated Ottoman Beylic two centuries before. His ancestors had entered Byzantine service and had rise steadily through the ranks, becoming great land-owners during the Anatolian reconquista. Alexandros himself had led his first contingent of troops by 1451 by the age of 19, defeating a raiding party of the Karamanid Sultanate of Syria in the battle of Adana, and led a contigent of Christian troops - a mixture of Greeks, Cilicians, Armenians and Turks all the way down to Antioch, city which he would swear to reconquer as a general one day. He would reconquer, not as a general, but as an Emperor.

Alexandros would rise to steady fame after this, joining the upper echelons of the Imperial military which would lead him to meet and marry Eudokia of Macedonia, only child of John of Macedon. It was Alexandro's first real thrust into the upper hierarchy of Imperial politics, and it would one in which he would not fail. The death of his father-in-law would have by all rights seen him rise to the occasion as King of Macedon, but Alexandros, a firm Imperialist, would refuse to take a title and land that "would disturb the law and power of the Empire". For many, it was seen as a moment of stupidity, as Macedonia held both Thessalonika and an immense spread of territory. But it was Alexandros' introduction to the Imperial family, who would grow to respect him. Maria and Peter never had children, and they would eventually decide to co-adopt Alexandros into their family and make him their successor, alongside their niece. Their deaths in 1457 would see Alexandros, perhaps the most important ruler of 15 century Byzantium, arise to the ocasion. Alexandros, who would come to be known in the future as the Conqueror, had just arisen to the purple.

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Alexandros was a firm unificacionists, the party of the Byzantine Empire which believed that the many "statelets" Byzantine noblemen had successfully carved for themselves within the Imperial frontiers be ended, and it had been this with this party of talented, loyal and young "new blood" that Alexandros had allied himself with, and truly, they would become one of the pillars of his reign.

Alexandros was, however, not the only one who was paying attention. In Epirus, the old age Laskarid Despots of the region had laid in wait, content with slowly expanding their rule over Thessaly, Attica and Southern Albania and Macedonia, but they were not foolish. Manuel Laskaris, the old and wise Despot of Epirus, knew that Alexandros would end up coming for him, and declared himself Emperor with support of many European and Anatolian magnates. It would lead to a two-year civil war, in which Alexandros' military talent would come to the fore. Alexandros would first see action in Anatolia, soundly defeating the Rhoman magnates in Pontus and in the Lycian themes of Kybyrrhaotai and Opsikion, while his brother Michael held off the Epirotes in Macedonia. Michael had plenty of military talent of his own, and would hold off the numerically superior Epirotes for months before the arrival of his brother over the Hellespont. At this point, Manuel and Simeon of Bulgaria entered into an alliance, but it would be too late for Epirus. Alexandros would lead his professional army of over 50000 men into Macedonia, defeating Manuel at every turn, quickly subduing his territories. Venice's attempt to harbor Manuel in their Aegean cities would see the Emperor conquer them - but this would start the Roman-Veneto-Bulgarian war, which would last for one more year.

Michael ambushed the Bulgarian army in the Rhodopes, however, and this would see the Byzantines imprison over 20000 Bulgarian soldiers. It was a military victory the likes of Basil the III and that of Caesar, and it would see the fall of Bulgaria once more to the Rhoman Empire. The Venetian counter-invasion of Epirus would also end in disaster - Alexandros handing them a handy victory in the battle of Naufpakos, which would see Venice lose it's holdings in the Roman Empire - including Crete.

The annexation of Bulgaria and the re-incorporation of the Venetian concessions would see a surge of popularity for Alexandros, making him one of the most popular and powerful Autocrats since Alexios the I, and it would give Alexandros the space to introduce his greatest ambitions - reform at all levels, which would be seen blessed by God as he and the Basilissa, Eudokia, would have their first child that year.

The Codex Osmanoi - the greatest code of law since the Codex of Justinian almost a millenia prior, would be one of the greatest books of law of the time and is considered by most of historians as the Roman Empire's first constitution, as it sodified very well the role each official would have in their servitude to the Emperor. The Roman laws of Succession - turning the Roman Autocracy into a primogeniture, male preference-based succession, with usurpation - made "illegal" and co-emperorship as well. It would also reform much of Byzantine bureaucracy, making it clear and consise for the first time in forever. It would also make Sebastos the title of the Crown Prince of the Empire.

His military reforms, however, are also famous. The birth of the Byzantine armies (Imagine a less corrupt, more gun-based and less raiding prone Ottoman army) of the 15th century, known as the Scholarii, as each Rhoman soldier was given a firm education in any art of his choosing and in Greek. It was to be the birth of one of the most professional forces of the age.

On other fronts, though, Alexandros after his reforms would quickly move to end the subdued Turkic beylics, as they had become rather powerless since many Turks and turcomans had converted to Christianity and integrated into the Imperial system, becoming one of the greatest sources of soldiers for the Empire. The swift integration of Bulgaria into the Empire would also be of great use to Rome - as the Bulgarians would quickly come to enjoy the rule of Rome - as the Tsardom of Bulgaria had been decentralized and in constant internal warfare between nobles - and it quickly became a source of both soldiers and officials for Constantinople.

The next few years of Alexandros' reign would be peaceful - with much coin flowing into the Imperial treasury due to his reforms after the increased spending of the civil war, but it was a time for personal growth for Alexandros - in the peace established after 1462, he and his wife would become the parents to seven more children, all the way into 1472, the year the Empire would go to war once more. One must denote, however, Alexandros and his wife roles as patrons of the arts - to them is often attributed the start of the Renaissance, as, during their reign, Constantinople (Which had extensively recovered and expanded since the fourth crusade) would become a center of art and culture, reuniting several Latin, Slavic, Arab, Persian and Roman artists, historians, architects, musicians, inventors and more in the city. But Alexandros' greatest passion would definitely be architecture - the Emperor would be the patron of over one hundred architecture projects, but the most famous would be the restoration of the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, the Parthenon of Athens and the Colossus of Rhodes, his greatest and most beloved project. He would build many new monuments, however, such as the Grand Mausoleum of Eudokia, named after his wife, which would become the resting ground of future Roman Emperors, the Grand Harbour of Thessalonika and Smyrna, the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Antioch and many statues of himself all over the Empire.

The following ten years of constant campaigning by Alexandros, which would earn him the title of the Conqueror, could be better explained, but the majesty and greatness of so many deeds would take much to explain. In less than 10 years, the Empire would expand into all directions, with the Emperor conquering deep into Serbia and Bosnia, winning the loyalty of the Danubian princes of Wallachia and Moldavia, the homage of the King of Hungary, while in the East, King David of Georgia would enter into Alexander's patronage, recognizing him as his sovereign, while the full extent of lower Caucasia and the Armenian lands would be integrated into the Empire. In the south, Basil would storm over the Cilician gates in 1476, while the Turkish Karamanid rulers of Syria were busy invading the remnants of the Mamluk caliphate in Egypt and Hejaz, bringing the whole of Syria under his control. The Emperor would have perhaps conquered further, but a bout of plague would take him, seeing him succeeded by his son Demetrios.

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A statue of Demetrios I outside the National Roman Museum of History
[9]
Demetrios was the second son but third child overall of Alexander II and Eudokia of Macedonia, born in 1460. A year after his birth, his elder brother, Alexios, died, and Demetrios became the first in line to the Roman throne. Unlike his father and most of the men at the royal court at the time, Demetrios held no interest in the military. However, his uninterest did not cause any problems for his father, but certainly for the army, as Demetrios was entirely hostile to it. In fact, when he became Emperor, he would try to restrict the army's power, but ultimately he did not live long enough to pursue his goal.

After his father died, Demetrios became Emperor of Rome. But, a month after he was crowned, he came ill with the plague. And, just like his father, died from it. Not much would be remembered from his short reign, one of the shortest in Roman history.

He was succeeded by his brother John.

[10] Born in 1465 as the third son and fifth child overall of Alexander II and Eudokia of Macedonia, John wasn't expected to become the next Roman Emperor, but with the death of his brother Demetrios just one year into his reign in 1482, he became Emperor at the age of 17. Unlike his brother, John was like most men of his time and had an interest in the millitary, and led an conquest of Rum in 1493, quickly followed by a war against the Crimean Khanate, which would see the annexation of the southern tip of Crimea.

John treated his now greatly expanded Muslim population fairly, allowing them to practice their religion in public, but some Muslims did leave the Roman Empire to other places, with an popular destination being the Mamluk Caliphate, which was focusing on spreading across the North African coast.

John married Maria of Naples, daughter of King Frederick II of Naples, which would start an alliance between Naples and Rhomania. John and Maria had an loving marriage and had five children together. John didn't died of the plauge like his father and brother, as he lived to the age of 54. He was succeeded by his eldest son, Alexander.


[11] Alexander was the third born child but first born son of John V and Maria of Naples, he was named after his maternal grandfather.

Like his father and grandfather, Alexander had a great interest for the military, however after two bad falls, during his early teenage years; the broken bones of his legs and right arm, never healed properly, and it became clear that it was permanent damage.

His large head and long torso were not helped by the crooked arm and shockingly bowed and stumpy legs. Many said if should have topped six feet, however his legs mean he barely reached over five.
On the day of his coronation, Alexander married Natia of Georgia, daughter of George XIV and his Turkish wife, Nazmiye Yakış. This was one of the rare occasions he was able to rise and walk unaided, although that night he managed only one dance with his wife, due to the pain that not even his usual drinking of wine could numb.
When it came to skirmishes along the borders, he left his bothers, to lead his men into battle, and wield the sword in his name.

His death at a relatively young age, was related to excessive alcohol poisoning and he was succeeded by his daughter Anastasia.

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[12]

Empress Anastasia was born in 1511 as the only child of Emperor Alexander III and as such was proclaimed Empress after her father's death at the age of ten. As such, her early years as Empress would be spent under her mother Natia's regency, even with how her reign would prove to be one of the longest in the history of the Roman Empire.

Her reign would actually begin in 1529 as upon her 18th birthday, she would fully assume the position of Empress and Autocratess of the Romans with her reign being marked by a "golden age" of the Empire as Serbia was annexed into the Empire in the 1530s, the Empire became increasingly wealthy during her reign, and a flourishing culture with the 16th Century marked by a golden age of culture.

Anastasia would marry Nicephorus Komnenos, one of the last surviving Komnenoi, in 1532 with the couple having six children. Anastasia would die in 1572 from a heart attack with her son Nicephorus as her successor.

[13] Prince Nicephorus, born in 1535, was the second son of Anastasia I and Nicephorus Komnenos. His older brother, Sebastos Alexander, died in 1567, after he married Anges of Hungary, the only daughter of Andrew VI. Which meant that Nicephorus and Agnes' eldest son would be the heir to both the Roman Empire and Hungary.

After becoming Emperor and Autocrat of the Romans, Nicephorus continued the "golden age" that started during his mother's reign with the continuing expansion of the Roman Empire with an brief war against Aragon that ended with Rhomania annexing the island of Sicily, and the death of Anges of Hungary in 1589 which resulted in the union of Rome and Hungary and the estabishment of the Principality of Transylvania under an relative of the Emperor.

Nicephorus was an patron of the arts and supported the building of various strutures arcoss the empire. And he would die one day after he had a portrait of himself painted in 1595 at the age of 60. He was succeeded by his eldest grandson, Constantine the Greatest.

[14] Sebastos Konstantinos was born in 1584, the first son of Sebastokrator Alexios, eldest son of Nicephorus, and his wife, Mary of Russia. The young lad would soon be remarked as special - Konstantinos was born prematurely, and what he would gain in mental health, he would never be sound of mind again. But, we would not, not be sound of mind either. As everything during his long reign, Konstantinos' mind would be in a brink between fall and rising, but despite all of these hamperings, Constantine would live his life as he ended it - in ecstasy.

Konstantinos would only be seven when his father died, and only eleven when his grandfather did - throwing him onto the Imperial purple in earnest. Constantine would be brought up in the regency of his mother, Mary of Russia, who would draft Constantine's marriage with Louisa of France, daughter of the French King, Jean IV de Evreux, perhaps at that time, the most powerful and prestigious ruler of Medieval western Europe due to his vast Kingdom west of the Rhine. This was done on purpose by the Empress as to solidify the frontier of Hungary, as the Austrian Habsburg had claims on the Hungarian and Croatian thrones, establishing an alliance with the Holy Roman Empire's natural enemy of France. Louisa and Constantine would enjoy their marriage in 1600, when they were both sixteen. It was to be the start of a tense relationship based around lust, madness, love and fury.

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Constantine's mental health issues would keep him off-balance on and off his reign - but his exceptionalism, his fascination with the classical age and his many strange, funny habits would endear him vastly to the population of Rhoma. Despite everything, Constantine would surround himself with a diverse, talented group of men, whose efforts into the reformation and continuation of the Roman state would be demarked in history as the "Second Komnenian Golden Age", which would last after Constantine's early death.

Constantine would get the news in early 1610 than he had developed an illness that would soon see him to heaven, and so the Emperor would summon the Imperial military in what he called "his great last show". In less than four years, the dying Autocrat of the Romans, King of the Hungarians and Croats, Sovereign of the Dacians and Georgians, Master of Syria and Bulgaria, Prince of Sicily and Cyprus, would invade and bulldoze through the armies of the Egyptian Sultanate, seeing, for the first time since the Muslim conquests, Egypt re-integrated into Rome. The Emperor, however, would follow his final victory with his own final defeat, dying of what modern historians and scientists attribute to a rare kind of cancer, leaving behind his daughter, Irene, as successor.

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Portrait of Empress Irene, c. 1625

[15] Born in 1601 to Emperor Constantine XII and Louisa of France as the oldest of their 5 daughters, Irene would prove one of Rhomania’s most divisive empresses. Raised under the care of her grandmother since shortly after her birth, Irene grew into a woman with a keen eye for who to form alliances with and who to carefully antagonize. When her father died in 1614, the 13-year-old Irene was quickly crowned Empress and Autocratissa of the Romans.

In 1617, the Empress would enter into a proxy marriage with Lorenzo de’ Medici, a son of the Grand Duke of Tuscany by his second wife, Anna Claudia of Poland-Lithuania. The marriage proper would occur in 1621, after Lorenzo came of age. Irene and Lorenzo had a far healthier marriage than that of her parents, and, although Irene struggled with fertility, they would have four children.

Irene had a touch of her father’s mental health issues, often having hallucinations that she thought were angelic visions. These visions drove her to declare war against the powers of Arabia, and reclaim the eastern boundaries of the Mediterranean sea. The wars of Imperial Reconquest, as they would widely be known, were Pyrrhic victories, but by 1650, the eastern borders of the empire resembled those of the glory days of Rome, at the cost of a large percent of the serving populace.

Irene’s greatest contribution to the “Second Komnenian Golden Age” would be in bringing the ideologies and artists of Western Europe to Constantinople and sponsoring colonial endeavors, establishing New Athens in the Asiménio Potámi region. (OTL Río de Plata)

In 1675, Irene found out that she had a terminal illness. She spent her last three years withdrawn from court life and spending time with her family. Finally, in 1678, Empress Irene died from ovarian cancer, and was succeeded by her granddaughter, Zoe.
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[16] Born as the older of two daughters to Prince Romanos in 1648, Princess Zoe would become heir to the throne in 1677 after Prince Romanos died at the age of 52 from a sudden hunting accident with many historians arguing that Irene's death was hastened by the depression caused by her son's death, being crowned Empress the next year after her mother's death.

Zoe II's reign would be marked by the consolidation of the realm that her grandmother and great-grandfather had built and the continuation of the golden age that they had forged for the Empire. As such, she would spend much of her reign in the Levantine and Egyptian portion of the Empire and would generally show a relatively open-minded and tolerant approach towards her Muslim subjects. However, her reign would see the loss of Mesopotamia after her grandmother's attempts at conquering it proved too much for the Empire's logistics train as the Safavids conquered it in the Battle of Baghdad of 1683.

In terms of culture, Zoe would prove to be a prominent patron of the culture and the arts, even being something of an artist herself during her reign. In her reign, she would also try to promote Rhomanian colonialism with an expansion of the colonies in the New World with the Southern Cone becoming known as the Hesperides during her reign as well.

In her personal life, Zoe would marry Alexander, third son of the Tsar of Russia, with whom she would have five children. Zoe would die from a stroke at the age of 65, being succeeded by her youngest child, Alexios the VIII.

[17] Alexios, Sebastrokator of Rome, would be born in 1692, the youngest child and only son of Empress Zoe Osmanos-Komnenos and Alexander Fyodorovich Godunov, Grande Duke of Russia. His birth was thoroughly celebrated in Constantinople as the nobility of the Empire, tired of the constant dynastic changes after the rise of the well-beloved Osmanoi and their matrilineal descendants in the second Komnenoi, had been thinking of pushing for a change of law that would forbid Alexios' elder sisters, Anna, Irene, Maria and Theodora from inheriting the throne due to their often rambuctious and infamous marriages - as Empress' Zoe's policy of marriages had been extremely unpopular, something that would deeply affect Alexios' reign.

Princess Anna, the eldest, had married Fernando, Duke of Badajoz, second son and regent of the Kingdom of Portugal-Leon in the Iberian Peninsula, with the intent of solidifying Constantinople's presence in Hesperida, as the general colony was now called after the expansion away in the Asiménio Pótami. Anna's marriage would secure the region, despite the loss of claims to the now Portuguese colony of Cisplatina (OTL Uruguay) and the loss of Parmenia to Portuguese Brasil as well (OTL North-Eastern Paraguay). The colony, would, however, continue to be problematic, as by this point Hesperida was dominated by Sicilian Catholic ranchers, whom had emigrated from Byzantine Sicily, one of the most problematic regions of the Empire due to the stern refusal of the locals to accept the Orthodox status quo the Constantinopolitan Church had attained in the region. Zoe, and then Alexios would attempt to calm the island, but the mark of oppression had been left there, which would eventually see Sicily sold to the Kingdom of Naples alongside a marriage between King Leopoldo de Berry, the widely popular first king of the Napolitan House of Evreux-Berry and Princess Irene. Princess Theodora would marry all the way into the Kingdom of Sweden-Norway, marrying Prince Sigismund Vasa, while princess Maria would marry into the longtime antagonists of the Romans in Hungary, the Austrian Habsburgs.


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As a Prince, Alexios would be famous for his many travels and the solitary life he lived with his wife, the daughter of the King of Dacia, a vassal and ally of the Roman Emperor, Vlad Draculesti, descendant of Michael the Brave which had united all three principalities under Greek rule. A shy woman, Mary of Dacia would prefer the Imperial families' many provincial palaces than the bustle of Constantinople, which would make the couple extremely popular in the provinces proper. They would, during this time until the ascension of Alexios to the throne, have many children, almost all of them born in different regions of the realm.

With the death of Empress Zoe, it was clear that change was in the horizon. Alexios was a quiet and unassuming man, with a simple austere lifestyle. He would, however, embrace the purple fully, taking on a much more abrasive step on the Imperial Throne.

Much of Alexios the VIII's recorded legacy as an Emperor is his effect of Syria, Assyria, Egypt and Cyrenaica. Once the center of the Empire, the Muslim conquests had seen the Romans relegated to Anatolia and the Balkans, which, even after the return of the Empire to these regions, had not shifted, with Anatolia and Europe becoming ever more important for the Romans. The dominance of Muslims in the Levantine and African promises, at a demographic level, and the refusal of previous Emperors to antagonize them, had led to the famous epoch of Byzantine tolerance, which would diminish effectively under Alexios. The Levant and Egypt of previous Emperors and that of Alexios were different, completely. While the native Christian populations of the area had been diminished for ages, they had bounced back under Byzantine rule, and were now starting to demand more attention from Constantinople, attention, Alexios, a devout Christian, was willing to give them:
- The Copts in Egypt, who now represent almost a third of Egypt's population, and the Orthodox community there, who represented 15% of Egypt's population, both descended from arab-coptic converts and descendants of mainly settled Greek, Turkish and Albanian soldiers, had allied each other, under the leadership of the Patriarch of Alexandria, Ioannes, a arab greek convert.
- In Cyrenaica, always a hotspot of Greek fishermen, the coast had been settled by Aegean, Cypriot and Ionian Hellenes, eager to get into the dye and olive trade, and despite the half-hazardous censuses of the time, it seems Christians were already a majority there by this time.
- In Syria and Assyria (OTL Jazira, aka, eastern Syria and North-western Iraq), muslims remained a majority, but a slim one, as the many native christian sects had expanded under Roman Guidance, with the Maronites receiving many funds in western Syria and expanding, while the Assyrians, under their patriarch, in essence governed Upper Mesopotamia. Many settled veterans, especially Bulgars, Pontics and Cappadocians (Both turks and greeks) were also in the region. Armenians were also prevalent in the region.

This complete demographic change, with a strong christian block in the Balkans, Anatolia, Georgia and Armenia (Both greater and lesser), saw a need of change in the way the Empire handled it's muslims. Muslims had been exempt from many taxes as a way to keep them happy, but had been blocked from offices of power and the military. During Alexios reign, muslims would allowed to go into politics and the military, but would have to pay hefty taxes, which would be used to replenish Roman coffers.

But there was one essential component to Alexios' desire as an Emperor - to break away from geographic limitations, and to dominate the Mediterranean sea and the Indian Ocean. It to do so that he fought a series of wars against Persia, defeating them in both, which would see Mesopotamia and Shirvan added to the Empire in the first, and the Persians themselves pushed all the way to the Zagros mountains, which would be the new Perso-Roman frontier. The access to the Indian Ocean through the Persian gulf was also guaranteed, and Basra and the newly founded "Nicatomani" (The Port of the Victor, in Alexios' honour), the first Roman deep water port in Mesopotamia.

However, there was one project that fascinated Alexios - just like his ancestor Alexander the II had rebuilt many treasures of antiquity and built many himself, Alexios had one single great ambition - to connect the mediterranean to the Red sea. During his reign, thousands of workers and slaves would begin a huge project that Alexios had envisioned, a single canal that directly connected the two seas. Alexios himself, however, would never see the result of it.

Alexios would further secure the allegiance of the Hejazi Hashimids, securing a new wave of income for Constantinople as the first Custodian of the two Holy cities of Islam. He would die in early 1740, after a fall that would cripple his legs and spine.

Ferdinand Karl, Airchduke o Austrick-Este - Wikipedia

Emperor and Autocrat John VI, who would be remembered as The Ill-Fated

[18] Prince John was born in 1718, the first, but third child of Emperor Alexios VIII and Princess Mary of Dacia. As he grew, there was great expectation for him to live up to his father and his image. However, it seemed that the anxious John always failed no matter how much he tried. Failing many attempts to reform the navy or provincial administration even with the aid of his dying father, which frustrated the aging Emperor.

When his father died it was popularly rumoured that he had attempted to exclude John, singularly him, from the line of succession. Although, in the end, John VI did not reign for long as he was assassinated by an Protestant extremists.

Leaving almost no legacy the short-reigning Emperor was succeeded by his brother Alexander.

[19] Alexander was born in 1720, the second son and fourth child of Alexios VIII and Mary of Dacia. He was seen as an more appropriate successor to his father than his older brother John, as he was an expert in both the millitary and goverment administration. Some even thought he would become Alexios' heir in the event of him removing his brother's place in the line of succession.

Alexander became Roman Emperor after his brother's death by an Protestant extremist, and forced Protestants to pay hefty taxes that are similar to the ones that Muslins pay. His reign had not much happen expect in 1742 when his brother Peter became King of Bohemia following the death of the childless Wenceslaus VI, starting the Catholic branch of the House of Osmanos-Komnenos.

In his personal life, Alexander married Princess Elene of Georgia in 1741, but had only two children with her before dying of food poisoning in 1746. He was succeeded by his only son, Alexios.

[20] Alexios, was been in 1744, the second child but only son born to Alexander and Princess Elene of Georgia, at birth he was a sickly boy and many suspected his health would only deteriorate.

Just before his second birthday, his father died of food poisoning, striking fear among the royal family fearing that Alexander had been deliberately poisoned.
Elene quickly claimed the title of Empress Regent and locked down the Imperial Palace in Constantinople, only allowing unarmed allies to enter, Alexios and his older sister, Mary had a lonely childhood, with only themselves for company as Elene, didn’t trust any other child to infiltrate the palace.
Regarding his health, fearing that a single physician could assassinate her son, Elene, arranged for a wide range of doctors to care for him, this included three Chinese doctors, who brought with them ideas such as vaccinations and herbal medicine that were common in their homeland. While the head doctor, was Georgian physician, Giorgi Ioseb Jughashvili. Under these wise medical council, Alexios’s health greatly improved. This council would grow overtime would set up the Hippocratic Hospital in a former palace donated to the council in honour of their hard work.

Upon his 10th birthday, Alexios was able to attend council meetings, watching how his mother was able to use ministers against each other, acting as the levelheaded compromiser.

This would continue until 1760, when Alexios declared his majority on his 16th birthday, with his mother acting as royal advisor up until her death.

In 1761, his sister, Mary married their cousin, Peter II, King of Bohemia, in a magnificent ceremony, that was attended by many members of foreign royal families. It was during this wedding that Alexios would look for his future bride.

This came in the form of a distant cousin, Princess Katherine of Portugal-Leon, a beautiful and intelligent woman. The match was also chosen as it didn’t bring any disputes between neighbouring nations.
Their wedding took place a few years later in 1766 and was a happy marriage, resulting in twelve healthy births, due to the help of physicians and midwives, trained at the Hippocratic Hospital.

When it came to the military, Alexios took the same style as his mother’s regency council, rather than favouriting a few individual generals, Alexios chose to have a large staff of military minded men from all over the empire discuss their foreign policies, defence strategy as well as their army and naval reforms.

Major military events during Alexios’s reign include:
- 1770, support his cousin/brother-in-law, Peter II against aggression from Austrian Habsburg
- Putting down a rebellion led by Mehmet Nasser, who tried occupying the Alexios Canal (named after Alexios VIII)
- Naval assaults on pirates, who were active around the Red Sea and Arabian Sea.

His use of military staff and their reforms, the Imperial Navy and Army, became a force to fear, allowing the empire to stretch comfortably over the three continents.

In 1804, war would irrupt following a revolution in the Holy Roman Empire, saw a Prussian born individual, who came to prominence following strong victories against the Imperial forces, Johann von Yorck declare himself, High Chancellor of Germany, uniting the Germanic cultures, before dominating northern and central European affairs for nearly two decade while leading his German Republic against a series of coalitions in the Twenty Years Wars, winning most of these wars and the vast majority of his battles, presiding over a large nation before its final collapse in 1825.
Alexios would find, having to join coalitions with former enemies like Austrian Habsburg to keep the Germanic Republic from pushing toward the Balkan region.

His wife, Empress Katherine, had died in 1810 and Alexios spent the remaining life, widowed, never remarrying, instead taking solace from spending time with his children, grandchildren as well as great grandchildren, claiming their youthfulness made him feel young.

During the last two years of his reign, his great health had started to show signs of breaking and on his 88th birthday, he declared that his successor, ____________, would serve as co-emperor(/ess) along side him, allowing Alexios, time to rest without fully abdicating, stating that his longevity was due to God’s support.
The death of Alexios in 1834, came two months before his 90th birthday, both his solo reign of 73 years, and full reign of 88 years, have been record breaking reigns.
His co-emperor(/ess), _____________, now took over full control.
 
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