Albion, where the Sun never set

[Peppe]

And now to a completely different matter. This update have been cooking-up for a while, and now I have completed it (although, fair warning, it may read a bit wonky)​

The Mexican Cartels War (also known as the Mexican Crusade, Fourth Mexican Civil War or the Revenge War; Spanish: Guerra contra el narcotráfico, Cruzada legítima por el futuro de nuestros niños) was a 5-years-long partially-asymmetric military conflict between the Mexican government and various criminal (mainly drug trafficking) syndicates (or “cartels”) and separatist groups. Known for its dramatic legacy on both Mexican society, government and international relations, and for being the first open military conflict in the country since its third civil war in the 1960s, the war is also seen as in a way marking the de facto end of the Cold War, the rapprochement the Mexican government and the country’s autonomous crowns and the beginning of an era of more direct and antagonistic approaches by governments in relation to organized crime.

To begin explaining the war, one must firstly go to its background, and the state that Mexico saw itself in at the mid-1990s, the last decade of the so-called “Age of Crime”.

Existing ever since the Third Mexican Civil War, when the petty warlords of the North used drug-trafficking (at the time mainly opium and cannabis) as a source of income and continued with it and other manners of crime as one of the basis of their revenue following the reunification, the Mexican Cartels, during the reign of Empress Maria Josepha, only grew in power, using governmental oversight and endemic corruption to establish de facto fiefdoms throughout Mexico, and basically controlling the country’s north by the late 1980s.

In 1988 the empress died, and her son and successor, Maximillian III, saw the spread of organized crime and corruption throughout Mexico as both a stain on the nation’s honor and a sickness that needed to be cured, and soon took a strong stance against the cartels, becoming infamous for his fervent speeches condemning them and his’ and his sister’s increasingly-autocratic moves in their fight against both them and the corruption. This resulted on the emperor’s reign to be cut short, when he was assassinated by agents of The Federation (La Federación), the shadow alliance between most of the cartels, on his son’s 8th birthday, Joaquín, when they smuggled a rotary gun onto the party and opened fire, killing the emperor, 7 other people, and maiming dozens.

With her leg mangled by bullets, Maria Antônia became regent for her nephew, who, on the Christmas of that same year, abdicated in favor of his aunt, who, on the New Years’ Eve, made her infamous “Plagues” speech on the steps of the Metropolitan Cathedral of Mexico City, officially declaring war onto the cartels.

Already on the year of 1996, the first of the war, the conflict expanded outside of just the cartels and the government, as at the time most separatist groups within Mexico were also involved with the organized crime (as a source of revenue) and, funded and convinced by the cartels, separatist insurgencies and states sprung-up on the country, their main ones being the PAY (Popular Army of Yucatan) and the Tejan Insurgents, while in Veracruz a communist group rose and established a short-lived socialist dictatorship.

It is here that the autonomous crowns firstly came into play, as while some of their governments and militaries were actually in favor of becoming independent, most were also mortally against the groups supported by the cartels, causing the government of Yucatan, in special, to come fiercely to the side of the central government, sending their forces to help fight the cartels while locally fighting a de facto civil war with the backing of Mexico City.

From 1996 to 1998, the war saw its fighting mainly in the south of the country, occasionally even spilling into the nearby countries through skirmishes and assassinations, as the government, led by the Empress Maria Antônia herself together with Chancellor Floriano Orville Llamas, focused on squashing the minor separatist uprisings (doing an especially vicious suppression of the Neo-Zapatists and Veracruz) and ending the Gulf Cartel, who controlled most of the organized crime outside of the Federation, as well as any minor cartel who didn’t offer to surrender. On the North, fight was mostly in the way of police skirmishes and the occasional assassination and drug-busting, as the local cartels’ entrenchment made try to deal with them directly rather difficult, resulting on many massacres against the police and armed forces by the cartels during that time.

Some like to say that it was in 1998 that the war took a turn for the better for the government, when the Viceroy of Baja California, Frederico Walden, having been in secret talks with the cartels for months after they begun to stroke his ego and ambition, declared the secession of both Baja California and most of Northern Mexico with the support of most cartels, establishing the “Free Republic of Mexico” as a de facto narco-state led by him as a “provisional-president” and the cartels.

Nowadays, for us who have hindsight, the reaction that much of the population of the north had to this development may seem obvious and expected, seeing as how the fear of an American invasion has been a part of the northern Mexican psyche ever since the 19th century, but, we must remember, at the time said fear wasn’t as widely seen (and neither was the underrated loyalty many felt to the central government out of self-protection) and the cartels, possibly high in overconfidence due to their victories against the government, did not even take a time to think on how their “subjects” would perceive the action of separating from the rest of Mexico.

Said reaction was shock, horror, and then anger. Most civilians (and even some sicarios) were loyal to the cartels out of a mix of fear and gratitude (seeing as how many cartels engaged in public works for the poor to help raise their image), and to them the cartels deciding to completely abandon the central government (until then in the north the war was much more akin to a gang war than anything resembling a traditional conflict) was the deepest kind of betrayal, after all, now that they “broke away”, what could guarantee that “those damn Americans” wouldn’t ride south and do what they did in the 1840s and conquer them (and then probably expel them like they did with most Mexicans on Texas).

And so, in 1999, a new player, loyal to the government, appeared: the civil militias; and as the war died in the South, it became a true one in the North, with the “Free Republic” being dotted and patchworked by disputed territories. The atrocities committed by the cartels (and technically the Tejan Insurgents, but those had been dying down with Californian and Oregonian help), who rose steadily and then dramatically from 1995 to 1998, only helped diminish their reputation, as the death of civilians only fueled the feelings of anger and betrayal felt by people. The militias in many ways focused on guerilla and ambush tactics, taking out members of the cartels (now separatists) in small numbers that built-up over time, and in 1999 itself they managed to capture and brutally kill the “provisional-president”, their actions in the Sonoran Desert being retroactively made an official execution later on

Ironically, on the year 2000, it was the time for members of the Federation to turn sides, with a group of relatively minor cartels (led by the Familia Gaona of Sonora), most of whom were a mix of both legal and illegal businesses, offering to surrender to the government with as many secrets and resources as they could take in exchange of a level of amnesty, protection, and the help to turn the illegal possessions into legal ones (or exchange them for those confiscated from the still “rebelling” cartels). As the group, while minor in direct power, held the control of some of the most strategically located towns on the west of the cartel-controlled areas, the government accepted the deal. Nowadays most of those families are part of the northern Mexican aristocracy, and some even have entered politics.

With their power diminishing, the cartels became even more desperate as 2000 and early-2001 rolled on, becoming more vicious and discriminate in their attacks and even dabbling in mass-scale terrorism. The war finally ended in the middle of 2001, de facto doing so in the 15th of April of that year, when, on the Sunday of Easter, the La Muerte squadrons of the Imperial Special Forces of Mexico, under orders of the Empress, permission from the government and absolving from the Pope, attacked the center of command of the cartels, who, on that day, had their leaders, top-members and their families all together in the main estate of Héctor Salazar, the de facto leader of their forces. Across the cartel-controlled territories a few other attacks also occurred, many on the residences or places of worship of high-ranking sicarios and cartel and separatist leaders.

The Sunday Easter Massacres, as they came to be known, were a bloodbath, with the city of Torreón, the center of the cartels at the time, being marked by the blood running through the streets and the fires and smoke caused by the bombing of some of the buildings housing forces of the cartels.

The war officially lasted a few more months, as the last few stragglers were captured and/or killed and the army finished taking control over the region, with it being declared over by Empress Maria Antônia, through her speech “New Beginning” on the 3rd of August, 2001. Many members of the cartels and separatists were executed, and many more are in prison to this day, while a few leaders and their families, who either surrendered or (in the case of families) were given a greater pass, were exiled, most living in the Caribbean or Europe under Mexican watch to this day.

In the end, the war caused the almost complete death for the crime syndicates of Mexico, organized crime now being reduced to a few remaining minor cartels (most of whom disbanded or went legal) and gangs, while the military would remain in Northern Mexico until the mid-2010s, the economy, damaged greatly by the war and the crime before it, took a while to recover. In the government, the war saw the strengthening of the monarchy, with Empress Maria Antônia being called a dictator by many and the Constitution being rewritten to specifically give her much more overarching powers, and also saw the strengthening of ties between the nation at large and its autonomous crowns, a union created by fighting together for half a decade. Corruption was also tackled, with the constitutional rewrite making it “low-level-treason”, and the government of Baja California saw a complete overhaul as well as a purge of its political class, with the kingdom becoming a region run semi-absolutely by the Imperial House of Mexico for decades to come.

Today, nearly 20 years after the wars end, the Mexican Cartels War is remembered as both a high and a low in the country’s history (and it often depends on who you talk to), but one thing that most agree on is that its effects are still running their course and the direct legacy of the conflict will still take many years to be completed.

 

[Peppe]

So, @TheBeanieBaron, I followed your advice, and here is the first (of possibly three) posts listing the imperial kingdoms, showing the 10 that matter of the 11 created by Empress Victoria.

The Imperial Kingdoms, of the Creation of Empress Victoria

Note I: I’ll admit that initially I planned on having a Wikipedia box for every one of the kingdoms, but then I noticed that if I did that I would probably only post this update months from now or would end up losing the will to do this TL. So instead I’m placing the data usually on those boxes on the segments for each kingdom and later I’ll try and make the boxes to replace them
Note II: Just as a heads-up, many of the monarchs presented should have their name in other languages as well as their English iteration, many should have their religions specified, and at least half of them should also have a military career shown, but I forgot about both until it was too late (at least for me) to add them

Established a total of 22 times by the empresses and emperors of Albion between 1880 and 2015 (and serving as an inspiration for similar states within other powers like Japan, Russia, Germany and the UHE), the kingdoms are a somewhat[1] unique creation of Albion firstly presented on the Statute of Windsor in 1878, when the monarch was recognized the right to “grant at his or her pleasure domains and titles carved out of their realms beyond to sea, to whomever they should wish” (although an unspoken agreement was made that said “whomever” referred only to relatives of the monarch, preferably close ones, and that most of the carving would be done before any granting), creating what was in essence continuations of past colonies now under the rule of hereditary “local” monarchs in a plan of the government to use of the Royal Family’s own charisma to deal with more unruly or tense territories.
In modern times divided between the kingdoms in Bharat and Albion (while Oregon is no longer considered a part of the category after becoming a member of the Commonwealth), who respectively hold 8 and 13 of them[2].

As per the precedent established by George V of Bengal, the imperial kingdoms retroactively consider all monarchs of Britain, England, Scotland or Ireland[3] as being their predecessors up to said imperial kingdom’s establishment. Traditionally monarchs whose names ruled after the Union of Crowns will simply place themselves as the latest on the line (Like James VIII of Kiribati), while monarchs whose names came before that will add the numbers from all kingdoms before placing themselves at the latest (like Edward X of Lower Burma). Depending on the region they may also recognize rulers of previous iterations of the kingdom (like Cyprus) and/or recognize heirs after 1603 who while parents of monarchs never inherited their thrones.
It also needs to be clarified that any and all royal dukes made monarchs had their peerages absorbed back by the Crown; and imperial kingdoms whose founding monarch is still on the throne will show said monarch’s entire offspring instead of only the highest-ranked positions on its succession. Co-monarchs will be shown in italic and unless stated as being otherwise the succession of a monarch is from parent to child​

[1] When the idea was first proposed by Empress Victoria during talks to Prime Ministers Disraeli and Gladstone in 1875, she explained that it was in part inspired by the historical examples of granting “fringe” territories to family branches, like the Bourbons with the Three Sicilies or the Hapsburgs with Tuscany
[2] When the division of the Bharati and Albish Crowns occurred the numbers where 8 in Bharat and 5 in Albion
[3] In specific the historical High Kings of Ireland, from the 9th to the 12th centuries. It depends on the kingdom if only the exact Gaelic name counts or if the anglicized version is valid

BENGAL (বেঙ্গল এবং বিহারের কিংডম)
Officially the Imperial United Kingdom of Bengal and Bihar
Capital at the City of Calcutta, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of nearly 8 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Bengali, English and Sanskrit as its official languages, it also recognizes a total of 42 regional languages
It has a population of 326 million inhabitants, which are mainly ethnic Bengalis and are divided between 48% Muslim, 36% Hindu, and around 16% of other religions, mainly Hindu-Anglicanism, Buddhism, Jainism and Catholicism
Bengal is an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch having considerable executive powers while the legislative and judicial powers are held by the Parliament of Bengal and the High Court of Bengal
Bengal was established on September 20th, 1880, as the first ever imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the second son of Empress Victoria, was beforehand the Duke of York and Albany, having been created as such in 1866
The Monarchs’ List​

1880-1910: George V (b.1884:d.1910), born Prince George Ernst of the United Kingdom, and of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
1910-1926: George VI Vincent (b.1867:d.1926) born Prince George Vincent of York and Albany
1926-1934: Elizabeth II (b.1895:d.1934)
1934-1970: Elizabeth III (b.1915:d.1970)
George VII (b.1910:d.1967), ruled from marriage in 1938 until his death[1]
1970-2018: George VIII Valentine (b.1938:d.2018)
2018-: George IX Victor (b.1995)
Heir apparent; George Bhashkar, Crown Prince of Bengal and Nawab of Orissa (b.2017) son of George IX
2. Princess Maud Kasturi of Bengal (b.2018) daughter of George IX
3. Princess Elizabeth Falguni of Bengal (b.2019) daughter of George IX
4. Princess Margaret of Bengal, Princess-Abbess of Kolkata (b.1960) half-sister of George IX, a catholic nun
5. Princess Adelaide of Bengal, Begum of Murshidabad (b.1944) aunt of George IX

[1] Born Prince George Edward of Albion, son of Emperor Henry

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George IX Victor (George Victor Indrashis Matthew Bitan; born 4 June 1995) is the current King of Bengal and Bihar, ascending as the 7th monarch of Bengal and Bihar on April 17th, 2018, upon the death of his father, George VIII.

The only son and child of George VIII of Bengal by his second wife, Lady Vrishti FitzRoy-Windsor, who had been his mistress since 1956, George IX was born only four months after his parents’ marriage, which was motivated by his impending birth and in part by the recent entrance of Princess Margaret of Bengal’s to a convent. Born after a pregnancy of great risk, the king is another one on the long history of Victorian Hemophiliacs[1] among Windsor dynasts, in his case caused by genetic mutations on his mother’s gametes due to her age (the Queen Mother of Bengal being 64 at the time of the birth).

Heir apparent from birth, being the first surviving son and second surviving child of his father, and from an early age showing promise in his aptitude to the position, George IX actually became the ruler of Bengal 8 years before his inheritance, being made co-Regent with his mother and supported by his half-sister in 2010, when the rapid onset of dementia on his father made the late king incapable of continuing his duties.

Sole regent from 2013, when he reached majority, until his father’s death in 2018, George IX Victor has mostly been a competed, if perhaps rather uninspired, ruler, with his rule and reign being marked by the finishing of George VIII’s decades-long cleaning of the Ganges and by the nearly total restructuring of Calcutta’s West End[2], a project planned by his father and his half-sister[3] but started during his time as regent in 2016, being as of 2020 underway, with the main parts of the project expected to be finished by 2022[4]

Married in 2015 to his girlfriend of six years (and distant cousin), Princess Gayatri Devi of Koch Bihar, George IX Victor currently has three children, a son and two daughters, and the royal couple is currently expecting triplets

[1] Another name used for type-2 hemophilia, or Hemophilia B, which was first officially discovered among the descendants of Empress Victoria in the 1940s, although it was already a known fact that the hemophilia inherited through her line was remarkably worse than the more common type of the disease
[2] The OTL City of Howrah and the Kolkata Port Constituency, which with the industrialization of Bengal became a center for both slums and industry in Calcutta, with the slums then being replaced mainly by council houses after the Second World War, much of the restructuring was focused on that, seeing as how bad projecting and designing mixed with the decay of the years made them the poster child of urban decay on Bengal and much of Bharat
[3] Before becoming a nun, Princess Margaret of Bengal was an architect and an urban planner, and in great part decided to enter a religious order as a way of getting into the network of charity and social projects of the Catholic Church in Bengal (as her asexuality made her not be bothered by the chastity vows in the least), when George VIII begun his restructuring project, he knew she would be on board for that, and so invited her to help plan and design it (she even brought religious orders in, with the project being sort-of comically famous for the fact that there were buff nuns helping with building and demolishing things
[4] The project is in specific based around first demolishing the most decayed parts of the West End (which are often the most uninhabited) and rebuilding them (mainly on a “Nouvelle Belle Époque” style), expanding from there and shuffling the local inhabitants around (since most of the “council buildings” of the region are government-owned) so as to not leave people homeless while they are on the demolish and rebuild stages. Many have either called it the most ambitious or the most foolish housing and urban planning project ever seen in Albion (this was in part inspired by Brazil’s OTL urban reforms during the Belle Époque, only without simply forcing people out of the slums into even worse slums)

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MAHARASHTRA (महाराष्ट्राचे राज्य)
Officially the Kingdom of the Maharashtra, being until 1949 the Kingdom of Bombay
Capital in the City and Island of Bombay, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 12.5 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Marathi, English and Sanskrit as its official languages, it also recognizes 5 regional languages
The kingdom has a total population of 84 million inhabitants, which are divided among ethnic Marathas (which make the majority at around 80%) and over a dozen ethnic majorities, with Kannada, European, Konkani and Urdu ethnic groups making together about 18% of the population. Religiously the kingdom is majority Hindu, who make about 71% of the population, and has comprehensive Christian (mainly Hindu-Anglican), Muslim and Jain minorities, making 13%, 10% and 5% of the population respectively
Maharashtra is an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style as well as a bureaucratic state, with its monarch holding the executive power and having an overarching power over the legislative judiciary branches[1] while the bureaucracy of the country holds a considerable amount of power on both of said branches, with the Parliament of Bombay and the Marathi High Court having only partial control over the legislative and judiciary powers
Maharashtra was established on September 20th, 1880, as the second imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the third son of Empress Victoria, was beforehand the Duke of Connaught and Strathearn, having been created as such in 1879, and was also the first Lord of Kafiristan, which remained under a personal union with Maharashtra from 1882 to 1975
The Monarchs’ List​

1880-1932: Victor I (b.1849:d.1938), born Prince Victor Alfred of the United Kingdom and Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, abdicated
1932-1969: Albert Edward (b.1919:d.1969), son of Arthur, Crown Prince of Bombay and Kafiristan
1969-1975: Victor II (b.1940:d.1975), last Lord of Kafiristan to also be the ruler of Maharashtra
1975-2003: Rajaram (b.1944:d.2003), brother of Victor II, born Prince Henry Gustav Rajaram of Maharashtra and Kafiristan[2]
2003-: Tarabai (b:1960), illegitimate daughter of Rajaram, legitimized in 1969
Heir apparent: Rajaram, Crown Prince of Maharashtra and Prince of the Seven Islands (b.1983) son of Tarabai
2. Prince Ravi Shekhar of Maharashtra (b.2005) son of Rajaram
3. Princess Jayanti of Maharashtra (b.2009) daughter of Rajaram
4. Prince Roshan of Maharashtra (b.2010) son of Rajaram
5. Prince Anjaneya of Maharashtra (b.2015) son of Rajaram

[1] Similar to the Brazilian Moderator Power
[2] Stepped down from inheriting the throne of Kafiristan, which was inherited by his youngest brother, George (b.1952)

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Tarabai (Tarabai Apoorva Kishori Elinor; born 28 February 1960) is the current monarch of Maharashtra, ascending as the kingdom’s 5th ruler and first queen regnant upon her father’s death in September 9th, 2003.

Born illegitimate in 1960 during the reign of her grandfather, Tarabai has remarked that her childhood was rather an uninspiring and sheltered one, often self-mockingly joking about what she considered “naughty” and “thrilling” during her youth[1]. Her parent’s eldest child, Tarabai was 9 and already had 4 younger siblings when they married, having been forced to do so by her grandfather, who also retroactively recognized his son’s offspring as legitimate. She is a known smoker since her youth, and is often seen with a cigarette

Considered the unofficial heir of Maharashtra long before she was made such in 1980[2], in part due to her uncle, King Victor II,’s sterility, and in part due to her younger brother’s perceived incapacity to inherit the throne[2], Tarabai has answered many interviews on the subject of her training for the position, going in depth about the pressure and challenges she went through during that time.

Married in 1980 to the Prince Shivaji of Kolhapur, a descendant of the rulers of the Maratha Confederacy and her maternal cousin, Tarabai and him have become famous for their closeness, which some commentators have called “a sickeningly sweet affair”, with her own father once saying that it was like they “never left the honeymoon stage”

Made the First Minister of Maharashtra in 1990, having already served as her father’s assistant since 1985, Tarabai became then the de facto deputy ruler of Maharashtra, a position that rose de facto ruler as the decade went on and King Rajaram’s known weak health decayed steadily. She became Regent in 1999, and begun that same year the “Shadow CIty Project”, turning Bombay’s infamous seaborne slums[3] into an artificial island on Front Bay

Officially made Queen when king Rajaram died from a general systems failure in 2003, Tarabai has been a ruler whose reign has been an overall prosperous one, if marked by sorrowful and unfortunate events, like the 2008 and 2013 Cyclone and Monsoon seasons, Maharashtra’s de facto war with Rajputana during the 2010s, and her own long fight against cancer, which lasted for most of the 2000s and 2010s

Tarabai is also the most recent monarch of an imperial kingdom to have had to deal with an attempted coup d’état, with the aggravator of having to do so while recovering from a hysterectomy, quashing an attempted putsch in 2016

[1] She told a reporter once that she, from the ages of 11 to 18, thought, without an ounce of irony, that running through a field of wheat whose owner she did not know with her siblings would be the most thrilling experience in her life
[2] Of Tarabai’s three younger brothers, the eldest, Prince Alfred, one year her junior, was born with developmental problems, while the younger two, the twin princes Albert and Victor, were born congenitally blind. Although not officially, that was considered by most to de facto exclude them from any chances of inheriting the throne of Maharashtra, if not through law through force later on
[3] Called “Plankytown”

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CYPRUS (βασίλειο της Κύπρου/مملكة قبرص)
Officially the Serene Kingdom of Cyprus
Capital in the City of Nicosia, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 315 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has Greek, Turkish, Armenian, Arabic, Aramaic and English as its official languages[1]
The kingdom has a total population of 2.8 million inhabitants, which are comprised mainly of Greek Cypriots, who make about 75% of the population, and Turkish Cypriots, who make 16% of the population, while the remainder is mainly comprised of Cypriot Armenians, Maronites and Assyrians, who together make about 7% of the population. The kingdom follows mostly ethnic lines in relation to religion, with most Greek Cypriots being Orthodox Christians, Turkish Cypriots being Sunni Muslim, and the Armenians, Maronites and Assyrians all mostly being of their personal branches of Christianity
Cyprus is a semi-executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch holding the executive power but sharing it with his two Chief Ministers, while the Cypriot Parliament and High Court of Nicosia hold the legislative and judiciary powers
Cyprus was established on October 31st, 1880, as the third imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, a son of Empress Elizabeth of the Hapsburgs, was the first grandchild of Empress Victoria to be granted a kingdom. Unlike the other imperial kingdoms, it was nominally a part of another nation, in specific the Ottoman Empire[2], from 1880 to 1926, with its monarch being officially the Khedive of Cyprus until officially declaring independence with the collapse of the Ottomans
Unlike most other imperial kingdoms, Cyprus recognizes the Crusader Kingdom of Cyprus, which held the island from 1992 to 1489, as a direct predecessor, with its monarchy identifying itself as the official direct successor of the Lusignan Dynasty[3] and including them when counting the monarchs of Cyprus
The Monarchs’ List​

1880-1921: Alexander IV (b.1866:d.1921), born Archduke Franz Alexander of Austria, Prince of Hungary and Bohemia, etc.
1921-1940: Alexander V (b.1885:d.1940), last Ottoman Khedive of Cyprus from 1921 to 1926
1940-1953: Janus II (b.1918:d.1953)
1953-1976: Alexander VI (b.1941:d.1976)
1976-1992: Constantine IV (b.1960:d.1992)
1992-: Alexander VII (b.1990)
Heir apparent: Janus, Crown Prince of Cyprus, Archduke of Morphou, Duke of Thouars (b.2013) son of Alexander VII
2. Archduke Constantine of Cyprus (b.2016) son of Alexander VII
3. Archduke Maurice of Cyprus, Duke of Larnaca (b.1992) son of Constantine IV
4. Archduke Michael of Larnaca (b.2008) son of the Duke of Larnaca
5. Archduchess Olga of Cyprus (b.1993) daughter of Constantine IV, born Archduke Constantine of Cyprus

[1] All of them being in specific the local dialects of said languages, with Cypriot Greek, Turkish and Arabic being the most different from the “mainstream” of their respective languages
[2] Although Cyprus had become de facto a part of the Albish Empire in 1878 with the Congress of Berlin, it officially was still a part of the Ottoman Empire until said empire’s collapse in the 1920s
[3] The Cypriot Hapsburgs in specific consider themselves the seniormost heirs of the Cypriot House of Poitiers-Lusignan (and through them a variety of claims to Crusader titles) through the wife of Alexander IV, Princess Louise Charlotte Marie de La Trémoille, 10th Duchess of Thouars (1863-1925), who was the seniormost living descendant of Anne of Cyprus (1418-1462), daughter of King Janus I and wife of Louis I of Savoy, through all her lines, being Anne’s descendant by 14 generations through the eldest daughter (Anne of Savoy, wife of Frederick IV of Naples) of her eldest son (Amadeus IX of Savoy)

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Alexander VII (Alexander Julius Augustine Michael Philip Arcturus Louis Thomas Gustav Maximillian Maria Joseph; born 11 May 1990) is the sixth and current monarch of Cyprus, ascending to the throne with the death of his father in April 26th, 1992.

Born the first son and eldest child of Constantine IV of Cyprus, Alexander VII wasn’t even two when his parents died on a freak accident[1] and he became king, being the youngest person ever to inherit the throne of an imperial kingdom. Due to his extremely young age, Alexander’s paternal grandmother, the formidable Queen Augusta, became Regent for the second time[2], serving on the position until he was declared of age in 2006.

A Victorian Hemophiliac[3], Alexander VII was raised in a rather secluded lifestyle mainly at the Royal Palaces of Nicosia and Haspolat, which resulted on him becoming infamous through the Cypriot capital for his escapades as a teenager[4]. He, besides being groomed for his position, was schooled by tutors with his siblings, with the king being remarked for both his intelligence and thrive and for his somewhat childishly naïve and impulsive nature.

The 1990s and 2000s in Cyprus were marked by the Troubles[5], caused in great part by a dramatic downturn of the Cypriot economy, which saw the explosion of ethnic and social tensions in the kingdom, with their height during the early 2000s being marked as being de facto a civil war. In 2004 Alexander VII nearly became another casualty in them, being kidnapped by socialist insurrectionists and nearly dying from his injuries, saved only by a well-timed rescue.

Declared as having reached majority in 2006, at the age of 16, Alexander VII’s early direct rule was marked by the constant presence of his grandmother, who remained over his shoulder until 2009, and for the “end” of the Troubles with the entrance of the Albish Army in suppressing the insurrections, which had remained even after the Cypriot economy started to recover.

The 2010s have, in turn, been marked mainly by the aftermath of the Troubles, which although militarily ended by 2010 have causes still present in Cyprus and have left scars across the kingdom, with the Cypriot government being focused on both societal, infrastructural and internal reforms in an effort to recover. The kingdom has seen a growth in the economy, with the end of the Troubles and large investments causing a dramatic revitalization of the tourism and services industries.

Married in 2010 to his cousin, Princess Maria Clytemnestra of Pontus[6], after dating since 2004, the two have two sons together, their youngest causing the queen to have to go through an emergency hysterectomy. Although not officially, the couple has been, also since 2004, together with Artem Kadis, a mathematician

[1] Constantine IV of Cyprus and Queen Maria Erigone died when, during a surprise feast on the gardens of the Royal Palace of Nicosia to commemorate their wedding anniversary, they were thanking friends and relatives and kissed, just when the microphone they were holding suffered a short circuit and electrocuted both. The king died almost immediately, but the pregnant queen survived long enough to be brought to an ambulance before entering a short-lived vegetative state, with Archduke Michael of Cyprus being born hours after both of his parents were dead
[2] Augusta also served as Regent of Cyprus for her husband and then her son, from 1966 to 1982
[3] In a unique turn of events, both of his parents were hemophiliacs, with all of their children being hemophiliacs as well, with Archduchess Maria Augusta being marked for having the genes for both type-1 and type-2 hemophilia
[4] One of the more interesting factoid about said escapades being Alexander VII’s involvement with the more unsavory parts of Nicosia, befriending and later “converting” entire street gangs
[5] Not to be confused with the other historical periods called “Troubles”
[6] Daughter of Princess Maria Adriana of Lebanon (older half-sister of Maria Erigone) and Prince Serafeim of Pontus, she is known for her social works in the help of fire and disfiguration victims, having survived having 65% of her body burned in a hiking trip in 2006 and suffering from a dramatic abuse by the press and “critics” due to her disfiguration (one especially hurtful tabloid went as far as calling her “Queen Jerky”). She is also the first queen consort to have a master’s degree, having firstly completed a Bachelor of Engineering/Science in 2010 and in 2018 completing a Master of Engineering (Mining)

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CARNATIC (கர்நாடக இராச்சியம்/కర్నాటక రాజ్యం)
Officially the Kingdom of the Carnatic
Capital in the Port of Madras (or Chennai), also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 7 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, English and Sanskrit as its official languages, it also recognizes 15 regional languages
The kingdom has a total population of 78 million inhabitants, of whom a majority (at nearly 80%) are ethnic Tamils, with ethnic Telugus being the largest minority (at around 14%), while those of European Ancestry make about 2.5% of the population. The kingdom is majority Hindu in relation to religion, at 77%, while Christians, at 11%, and Muslism, at 7%, are the largest minorities
The Carnatic is a parliamentary monarchy, with the monarch delegating most of their executive powers to their Private Secretary and intervening only when necessary, while the legislative and judiciary are held by the Parliament of the Carnatic and the Royal Court of the Carnatic
The Carnatic was established on September 20th, 1888, as the fifth[1] imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the fourth son of Empress Victoria, was beforehand the Duke of Gwynedd, having been created as such in 1880, and was also the Lord Chamberlain of Coorg, a title still held by his descendants granted by his sister-in-law
The Monarchs’ List​

1888-1914: Leopold (b.1863:d.1914), born Prince Leopold Thomas of the United Kingdom, abdicated
1914-1948: Frederick I (b.1882:d.1948)
1948-1950: Frederick II (b.1898:d.1950)
1950-1987: Mary Jayamma (b.1920), abdicated, currently Queen Emerita Mary, Lady of the Realm
1987-2017: Charlotte (b.1948), abdicated, currently Queen Emerita Charlotte, Deputy Lady of the Realm
2017-: Yukiva (b.1980)
Heir apparent: Laarusha, Crown Princess of the Carnatic and Archduchess of Chennai (b.2011) daughter of Yukiva
2. Princess Keshavi of the Carnatic (b.2014) daughter of Yukiva
3. Princess Annapurna of the Carnatic (b.2015) daughter of Yukiva
4. Princess Dathrija of the Carnatic (b.2016) daughter of Yukiva
5. Prince Sankar of the Carnatic (b.2018) son of Yukiva[2]

[1] As mentioned before, Oregon, which was the fourth imperial kingdom, is not appearing here since it has an update all for itself
[2] His birth was the first male born on the main branch of the Windsors of the Carnatic since Prince Albert Haridwar in 1949

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Yukiva (Victoria Yukiva Vishurutha Indhumathi; born 3 March 1980) is the sixth and current monarch of the Carnatic, as well as its third reigning queen and third queen to reign in a row, ascending to the throne upon her mother’s abdication on August 18th, 2007. She is the daughter of Queen Charlotte of the Carnatic and Prince Raghunatha of Pudukkottai.

Born during the reign of her grandmother, Queen Mary Jayamma, as her parent’s eldest daughter, Yukiva attended Gandhi College at Madras before studying medicine at the University of Oxford, graduating with a specialization in Pediatrics in 2008. An avid fan of figure skating, Yukiva competed at the Winter Imperial Games of 1999 to 2011 before retiring, and remains the largest monetary supporter of ice sports in the Carnatic.

Although she only ascended to the throne of the Carnatic in 2017, the transition of power to Yukiva begun in 2010, with her mother’s functions and powers being gradually phased to her through the following years. Made the queen’s official formal representative to most public events in 2015, Yukiva was made regent in late 2016, reaching the final step before abdication in her induction to the throne.

Officially rising to become Queen of the Carnatic in August 18th, 2017, with the final abdication of her mother, who then proceeded to move to a countryside palace with her Paramour, Yukiva has, like her predecessors, remained out of politics, and has placed a focus on supporting social programs as well as children’s health projects. She is an outspoken fighter against drug-use among teenagers and young adults, establishing various anti-drug and rehabilitation programs even before ascending to the throne.

Mainly through inheritance from her father[1], Yukiva is one of the wealthiest royals in the world, with her personal assets being valued at nearly 1 billion pounds and including a large amount of lands in Southern Bharat and Sri Lanka. As the monarch of the Carnatic, she also owns shares in most of the Casinos in the kingdom, as well as its largest clothing retail chain.

Married in 2009 to her cousin, Prince Bageshri of Maharashtra, after nearly seven years in a relationship, which started while both studied at Oxford, they have seven children together, and were created Raja and Rani of Kolaba by his mother, Queen Tarabai, upon their marriage.

[1] Who passed all his possessions, also mainly inherited, to his children upon becoming a Jain

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BERAR (बेरारचे राज्य)
Officially the Exalted Kingdom of Berar
Capital in the City of Ellichpur (or Achalpur), also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 150 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has thirteen official or recognized languages, with Marathi, Urdu, Lambadi, English and Sanskrit as its main ones
The kingdom has a total population of about 3 million people, a majority (at about 95%) of whom are ethnic Marathas of various groups. The kingdom is majority Hindu (at 76% of the population) while it also has visible Muslim (at 8%), Christian (at 5%), Jewish (at 4%) and Christian Jain[1] (0.9%) minorities
Berar is an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch holding the executive power while the Senate of Berar and the High Court of Ellichpur hold the legislative and judiciary, and is also semi-federative, with most of its settlements working on a semi-autonomous administration. Its monarch is also the direct commander of the kingdom’s military[2]
Berar was established on July 11th, 1891, as the sixth imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the paternal first cousin of Empress Victoria, was beforehand the 2nd Duke of Cambridge, having inherited his title in 1850, as was the only enthroned imperial monarch to not be directly descended from Empress Victoria
Unlike all other imperial kingdoms, Berar is the only one whose Royal Family was not on the Albish Line of Succession from the beginning[3] due to being originated from an marriage without permission[4][5]
The Monarchs’ List​

1891-1904: George V (b.1819:d.1904), born Prince George of Cambridge, Prince of Hanover and Duke of Brunswick and Lüneburg
1904-1912: Adolphus I (b.1846:d.1912), born Adolphus FitzGeorge and “recognized” in 1893[6]
1912-1928: Olga (b.1877:d.1928), born Olga Maria Adelaide Aldridge FitzGeorge, “recognized” in 1893
1928-1955: Adolphus II (b.1900:d.1955), born Prince Adolphus of Berar and Battenberg, son-in-law of the Nizam of Hyderabad[7]
1955-: Mary III (b.1926)
Heir apparent: Henry August, Mirza-Baig of Berar, Duke of Cambridge-in-Berar and Nawab of Amravati (b.1949) son of Mary III
2. Princess Olga of Berar, Duchess of Melghat (b.1981) daughter of Henry August
3. Prince George of Melghat, Marquis of Chikhaldara (b.2002) son of Olga
4. Princess Victoria of Melghat (b.2004) daughter of Olga
5. Prince Vincent of Melghat (b.2009) son of Olga

[1] Said minority is considered “visible” due to the fact that about 95% of their total numbers lives in Berar
[2] In no small part due to Berar’s first monarch having been the Commander-in-Chief of the Forces of the British/Albish Army from 1856 until his enthronement, and as such spending a good part of his time administrating the military of his new kingdom
[3] This comment is technically only a half-truth, as members of the House of Berar are in the line of succession, but none of said members are on it through their direct descent from George V of Berar, being on it due to descending from Empress Victoria
[4] When George V of Berar, at the time still only Prince George of Cambridge, married his wife, the actress Sarah Fairbrother, in 1847, he did so without asking for a royal assent from his cousin, Empress Victoria, which, as a contravention of the Royal Marriages Act 1772, made his children ineligible for any his pre-enthronement rights and titles, which included both his dukedom and right to inheritance to the British/Albish throne. As the Empress was never asked to approve the marriage, it is considered “without permission” instead of “unapproved” or “prohibited”.
[5] Interestingly (and ironically) it is almost an unofficial agreement among the members of the Albish Imperial Family that, had George V of Berar asked for the empress approval for his marriage, she would have actually signed on it, as the empress was known for being rather nonchalant about her cousin-in-laws pre-marital life (Sarah had been her husband’s mistress since at least 1842, was pregnant of their third son at the day of their marriage, and had had two illegitimate children before even meeting George in 1840) and for considering Sarah as her friend, even serving as the godmother of her cousin’s third son, Augustus. It is also agreed that George V couldn’t have known how his cousin would react before his marriage, and that the reason why the Empress never offered to retroactively recognize his marriage was due to believing it would be the height of offensiveness to do so, as it would (in her mind) be her saying she didn’t think her cousin’s marriage or even his children were truly legitimate unless she officially recognized it as being so
[6] Due to his eldest son’s complete lack of interest for inheriting Berar, George V had to find a manner to make him (the eldest son) and his offspring not eligible to the Berari throne (since the idea of abdicating rights wasn’t really considered by anyone of them) but not the other two sons George V had; the solution the king found was making so that, in Berar, only if an illegitimate child was younger than the age of 3 at the time of their parents’ marriage they would be considered legitimate, which meant that only his second son, born in 1846, would be considered legitimate by Berar, and as such was “recognized” as the heir to the throne of Berar in 1893
[7] Although George V was made King in 1891 and Berar had been under British or Albish rule since 1853, the region had been under the de jure sovereignty of the Nizam of Hyderabad since 1724 (which had been recognized by the British in 1804), with his heir being the “Mirza-Baig (“Prince”) of Berar”. Because of that, from 1891 to 1925, there was a slight (mainly based on bickering) dispute between Berar and Hyderabad over whom had the authority over the region (with the original wordings of the kingdom’s establishment being a bit too-vague to be understood) which only ended with the marriage of Adolphus II to the Princess Dilawar of Hyderabad (one of the 21 daughters of Asaf Jah VII), where the Nizam symbolically gave Berar as his daughter’s dowry

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Mary III (Mary Adelaide Georgiana Sylvia; born 29 July 1926) is the fifth and current Monarch of Berar and Commander-in-Chief of the Army of Berar, she is the kingdom’s second queen regnant.

Born into the House of Berar (-FitzGeorge-Battenberg), Mary is the eldest child and daughter of Adolphus II of Berar and Dilawar of Hyderabad. Having only two younger sisters, she became heir presumptive to her father in 1928, when he succeeded his own mother to the throne. Entering the Albish Army at the age of 18 in 1944, feeling that it was needed should she come to inherit the throne, Mary III remained in active service until 1948, and continued on a non-fighting position until 1955.

Serving as her father’s right-hand-woman during the early Second World War, Mary III succeeded him upon his death from a stroke caused by poisoning on January 21st, 1955. On her accession, she became the first woman to command the Army of Berar, since her grandmother left those duties to her son and her husband, and the first monarch of Berar to be descended from the Nizams of Hyderabad.

Like many others of the House of Berar, Mary III is a self-declared “Jewish Christian”, and although in the communion of the Anglican Church she holds to many traditional Jewish customs, beliefs and traditions, once saying that “The only reason I’m not a Jew is because of Jesus”. Religiously speaking she is a rather “eclectic” individual in her relationships and upbringing, with her mother being a Sunni Muslim, her husband being a self-declared Hindu-Muslim and her youngest son being a Christian Jain.

Married in 1948 to Prince Jawan Yasavantrav of Nagpur, whom she first started a relationship as a teenager when they met in Monte Carlo, the couple had three sons together. Widowed less than seven years after marriage, when the recently-made Prince Consort died shielding her from an assassination attempt, Mary III has never officially remarried, and has been since the 1960s in a relationship with Lady Olivia Bhonsle, her late-husband’s second cousin once removed and their children’s governess.

One of the world’s longest-reigning monarchs, commemorating her Diamond Jubilee in 2015, Mary III’s reign, outside of its first years, has been one marked by internal stability and peace in Berar, with the kingdom being considered one of the most overall peaceful regions of Bharat. She has become a bit infamous for her military forces, though, as Berar is the imperial kingdom with the largest number of troops per capita and, due to its stability and general lack of problems, has become known for often “exporting” the bulk of its army to other parts of the Albish Empire, generally for a commission that has become an official revenue source for Berar over the decades.

Surviving a difficult battle against breast cancer in the 1970s, which saw her removing both of her breasts and going through years of precautionary chemotherapy, Mary III, uniquely enough for most monarchs, became in the aftermath of her fight known for her personal interests and personality, as she discovered a passion for cooking and baking that, due to the rather laissez-faire nature of the Berari government, actually came to be channeled into a “career”.

Although still a monarch, Mary III has become a famous baker, cake-decorator and television personality, having dozens of cookbooks, various television shows and a baking and catering company known for its high-quality wedding cakes and foods. Known for her cool and irreverent personality, marked by a “no-shits-to-give” attitude and witty sense of humor, Mary III is considered one of the most well-liked and the most eccentric monarch in Albion.

She announced in early 2020 her plans on abdicating, with it being set to happen in December 20th, 2021

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AOTEAROA/NEW ZEALAND (Kingitanga o Aotearoa)
Officially the United Kingdom of Aotearoa, it is commonly called New Zealand
Capital in the Port of Wellington, which has a population of 462 thousand inhabitants. The kingdom’s largest city is Auckland, with a population of 1.5 million inhabitants
The kingdom has English, Maori, Moriori, New Zealand Irish[1] and the Imperial Sign Language as its official languages
The kingdom has a total population of 5.2 million inhabitants, of whom 70% are of European ancestry (mainly British or Irish) while the native Maori make-up the largest minority at nearly 20% of the population, peoples of Asian or Pacific Islander ancestry comprise 8% of the population. A majority of the population is Christian, at about 80%, while Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims and Non-Religious make most of the remaining percentage
Aotearoa is a parliamentary monarchy in the Westminster System, with its First Minister holding most of the executive power while the monarch serves as a neutral overarching figure for it, the legislative and the judiciary
Aotearoa was established on May 26th, 1894, as the seventh imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the third son of Emperor Arthur (at the time still the Prince of Wales), never held a royal dukedom before his enthronement, and married some weeks after his enthronement
Unlike most other imperial kingdoms, Aotearoa also counts the High Kings of Ireland when counting its monarchs, and in specific uses their anglicized names
Aotearoa is one of the few imperial kingdoms to have princely states within its territory, with its government recognizing the autonomous authority of the Tanui Confederacy[1], the Tūwharetoa Kingdom[2] and the Kingdom of Rēkohu[3]
The Monarchs’ List​

1894-1901: George V (b.1868:d.1901), born Prince George Henry Victor of Wales
1901-1920: Roderick II (b.1895:d.1920)
1920-1981: Meredith (b.1913:d.1981), by marriage Duchess of St. Albans
1981-1993: Roderick III (b.1935:d.1993)
1993-1996: Donald VI (b.1964:d.1996)
1996-2000: Hector III (b.1979:d.2000)
2000-: Roderick IV (b.1993)
Heir apparent: Princess Victoria, Princess of Greystone, Archduchess of Southland (b.2018) daughter of Roderick IV
2. Prince Arthur of Aotearoa (b.2020) son of Roderick IV
3. Prince Archibald of Aotearoa (b.2020) son of Roderick IV
4. Princess Meredith of Aotearoa, Duchess of Auckland (b.1995) daughter of Hector III
5. Prince Charles of Aotearoa, Earl of Eden (b.2018) son of Meredith

[1] Born from the Irish immigrants to Aotearoa, who mainly came from Connacht and Donegal, New Zealand Irish is considered the most unique of dialects of Irish that exists, as it has a considerable influence of Maori on its pronunciation and in loanwords, as well as having a generally large deviation from other kinds of Irish due to a century and a half of local developments
[2] The largest recognized Maori state, comprising a considerable part of the North Island and made by several tribes, it is ruled by a de jure elective king that serves as a “high king” over the entire state, and has some power over all the confederacy’s members as well as over some other Maori tribes across Aotearoa
[3] The other recognized Maori state, it covers much of the center of the North Island
[4] Something of a unique state, the kingdom, whose territory comprises the entirety of the Chatham Islands, is in fact closer in structure to a communal society, with its status as a monarchy only being established by the Albish when they made the first leader to come to them for help during the Moriori Genocide the nominal king of the entire people after they established a pseudo-protectorate over the islands in the 1850s[a]

[a] A minor POD caused in part by the butterfly effect, ITTL the Ngāti Tama and Ngāti Mutunga tribes landed on the Chatham Islands later than OTL, and at the time the Moriori had a somehow closer relation with the Albish to the point of managing to successfully ask for aid from them

Spoiler: A small tangent

In a small tangent on relation to Aotearoa, here is the streamlined line of descent from Queen Meredith’s second son, Prince Anthony, as upon her marriage to Lord Charles Beauclerk, 15th Duke of St. Albans (b.1915:d.1968), it was agreed that his titles would pass down to their second son instead of being absorbed into the Aotearoan crown.

HRH, Prince Anthony of Aotearoa, 16th Duke of St. Albans (b.1936:d.1976)
married The Most Hon. Lady Edith Abney-Hastings, 7th Marchioness of Hastings (b.1934)

Prince Albert Frederick of Aotearoa, 17th Duke of St. Albans (b.1954:d.2019) married Empress Charlotte​

Cedric, Prince of Wales (b.1982), also the 18th Duke of St. Albans and the 15th Earl of Loudon​

Prince Thomas of Wales, Duke of Cambridge (b.2001), also Earl of Burford and Baron of Botreaux​

As has been said on the article about Empress Charlotte of Albion, agnatically the Prince of Wales and his children are the direct agnatic descendants of King Charles II of England, Scotland and Ireland, through his illegitimate line of descendants of the Dukes of St. Albans. Interestingly, through the female line, the Prince of Wales is also the heir to another alternate line of succession to the (in specific) English throne, as his paternal grandmother, the 7th Marchioness of Hastings (in OTL only the 12th Countess of Loudon), is also the seniormost legitimate descendant of George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence, through his daughter, the Countess of Salisbury, and so, for those who believe that the line descending from Edward IV are not legitimate, he technically will be the first “legitimate” successor of Richard III.

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Roderick IV (Roderick Marcus Murtagh George Archibald Anthony; born in 19 November 1993) is the seventh and current monarch of Aotearoa. Ascending to the throne at the age of 6, he is, among current monarchs of imperial kingdoms, the one to most recently be under a regency due to being underage.

Born during the reign of his great-grandfather and eponym, as the only son and eldest child of Hector III and Victoria of Teck, Roderick IV was nearly born out of wedlock, as his parents, childhood sweethearts and merely teenagers at the time, married only hours before his birth, which came extremely prematurely. Kept on a neonatal ICU for nearly 6 months due to being born at only 28 weeks, his premature birth resulted on the king having a highly underdeveloped lung and only one functional kidney.

Prince of Greystone at the age of 2, when his grandfather died in 1996, Roderick IV ascended to the Aotearoan throne when his father died from a sudden respiratory failure in August 2nd, 2000, being only 6 at the time. Due to being still a child, the new king became the fourth monarch of Aotearoa to start their reign under a regency.

Assuming full royal powers in 2011, when he reached majority at the age of 18, Roderick’s direct reign has seen a rise in immigration to Aotearoa, mainly from other corners of Albion, and a small but perceptible rise in political fraction, with the monarch being forced, for the first time in over 50 years, to temporarily take full control of the governmental administration for nearly the entirety of 2016 and much of 2017 due to the state of Parliament and political unity. Roderick IV has openly expressed his fondness and enjoyment of his current First Minister, the Baroness Morrinsville, whom he has called “the most capable I’ve ever seen”

A Bachelor of Letters, Roderick IV is the first monarch of Aotearoa to have published books, having, as of 2020, published a total of five books under pseudonyms, including two translations of historical works or compilations of tales. Fluent in Maori, Moriori and Irish-Gaelic[1], being the first monarch of Aotearoa to be both[2], Roderick IV is known for his tendency to mix languages when speaking, sometimes doing so even during speeches.

Married to Princess Tomairangi Te Wherowhero of Waikato in 2016, after being engaged since the age of 9, they are the first biracial royal couple of Aotearoa, as well as the first time a Aotearoan monarch married one of the native royal families. They have three children together, their eldest, a daughter, being the first heir apparent to follow absolute primogeniture

[1] He was taught New Zealand Irish, and is quite talented at it and Standard Irish, but colloquially speaks mainly on the (endangered) Roscommon Dialect, in itself a dialect of Connacht Irish, which is the “family language” of his mother, the Connacht Branch of the House of Teck
[2] Although all Aotearoan monarchs have been at least passable at Maori, and Meredith was the first to be fluent in speaking Irish, Roderick IV is the first to be a fluent speaker of both, and lacking any “unplanned” accent, and the first to speak above the “passable” level on Moriori

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THE BAHAMAS (Königreich und Gemeinwesen der Bahamas)
Officially the Kingdom and Commonwealth of the Bahamas
Capital in the City of Nassau, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 290 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has Imperial English[1] as its official language, and recognizes Bahamian English[2], German[3], Chinese[4] and Greek[5] as national languages[6]
The kingdom has a total population of 485 thousand inhabitants, made up by 50% of Afro-Bahamians, 30% of Mixed-Bahamians (mainly the result of 20th and 21st century miscegenation by English Euromericans and Afro-Bahamians), 15% of White Bahamians (mainly descended from 19th and 20th century German and Greek immigrants) and 2% Sino-Bahamians (mainly descended from 20th century immigrants) with the remaining 3% of the population being of various other ethnic groups. The kingdom is overwhelmingly Christian, with Protestant denominations in specific making about 85% of the population
The Bahamas are an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch holding the executive power as well as some overarching authority over the legislative and judiciary, who otherwise are held by the Parliament of the Bahamas and the High Court of Nassau.
The Bahamas were established on August 10th, 1895, as the eight imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, a son of German Empress Victoria, was the second and last non-Albish royal to receive an imperial kingdom, and was enthroned on the day of his marriage.
The Bahamas are one of the two current imperial kingdoms[7] to be territorially expanded after its establishment, annexing the Florida Keys archipelago during the Second American Civil War. It is also the only imperial kingdom to include the Electress Sophia of Hanover when counting its monarchs[8]
Interestingly the Bahamian Royal Family, the House of Hohenzollern-Nassau-Zuylestein, is agnatically descended from the House of Nassau[9], but is not considered a part of the actual dynasty due to the branch it descends from, Nassau de Zuylestein[10], being an illegitimate one, which some consider a funny bit of irony since not a single one of the official branches of the Nassau Dynasty are through agnatic lines[11]
The Monarch’s List​

1895-1952: Sigismund I (b.1866:d.1952), born Prince Sigismund of Prussia, also Commander-in-Chief of the Caribbean Fleet
1952-1959: Sigismund II (b.1900:d.1959)
1959-1995: Mary IV (b.1935:d.2014), abdicated, Retired Queen Mary from 1995 to 2014
1995-2016: Sophia II (b.1960), abdicated, currently Retired Queen Sophia, Princess of Zuylestein-in-Andros
2016-: Sophia III (b.1984), also Princess of the Keys and Grand Duchess of Inagua
Heir apparent: Sigismund, Prince Royal of the Bahamas and Grand Duke of Andros (b.2011) son of Sophia III
2. Princess Charlotte of the Bahamas (b.2011) daughter of Sophia III
3. Princess Caroline of the Bahamas (b.2011) daughter of Sophia III
4. Princess Margaret of the Bahamas, 2nd Duchess of Eleuthera (b.1985) niece of Sophia II
5. Princess Annelise of Eleuthera, Princess of Windermere (b.2007) daughter of Margaret

[1] Colloquially called “Posh” in the Bahamas, other names for it are “Madam’s English” and “The Empress’ English”
[2] An English Creole language, it is de facto the vernacular language of the Bahamas, but most Bahamians consider it to actually be simply their local dialect of Imperial English and not a separate language (which has caused it to be relatively understudied)
[3] An German Creole language, spoken by parts of the German-Bahamian population, it is in specific derived from the Lower Saxon and Eastern Lower German dialects of German, as most of immigrants from Germany came of the region of Lower Saxony and Pomerania
[4] A Greek Outlying dialect, spoken by much of the Greco-Bahamian population, it is actually divided into two dialects, one descended from the Greek of the late 19th-century Aegean immigrants and the other from the turn-of-the-century Cappadocian and Pontic immigrants
[5] Spoken by parts of the Sino-Bahamian population, it is a dialect similar to the Suzhou dialect of the Wu Languages, as much of the Chinese immigration to the Bahamas came from the Wu region of China along Shanghai and the mouth of the Yangtze
[6] Which means that although not official languages of the kingdom, said languages can be taught in school and are protected by law as a precaution in case their numbers dwindle to the point of becoming extinct
[7] If Oregon was still considered an imperial kingdom, it would be a third
[8] Mary IV, upon becoming Queen, actually decided to take the time to preemptively make a set of rules and a list of whom should be included when counting regnal numbers, establishing a system considered one of (and probably the most) complicated regnal counting systems among the imperial kingdoms. Although her wording was at times complicated, the main point Mary IV establish was that names used before 1707 (with the first Acts of Union) but not after should have their numbers calculated by doing a sum of all eponymous monarchs before the counting of a newcomer (reason why Mary IV herself wasn’t “Mary III”); another major precedent she created was of who should be included when doing said counting, establishing the counting of English Monarchs as beginning with Alfred the Great in 886 and doing a list of which non-reigning ancestors should be included in calculations (and by doing so posthumously renumbering various monarchs). The individuals of said list are:

Spoiler: From the Most Recent to the Most Ancient

In relation to the thrones after the Union of Crowns in 1603
- The German Empress Victoria (1840-1905), the mother of Sigismund I of the Bahamas – as Victoria II
- Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn (1767-1820), the father of Empress Victoria – as Edward XI
- Frederick, Prince of Wales (1707-1751), the father of George III of the United Kingdom – as Frederick
- Electress Sophia of Hanover (1630-1714), the mother of George I of Great Britain – as Sophia I
- Electress Palatine Elizabeth (1596-1662), the mother of the above, daughter of James VI & I – as Elizabeth III
In relation to the Kingdom of Scotland before the Union of Crowns
- Princess Marjorie de Brus/Bruce (1296-1316), the mother of Robert II Stewart, daughter of Robert I the Bruce – as Margaret I
- Robert VI de Brus, Lord of Annandale (1243-1304), the father of Robert I the Bruce – as Robert II
- Robert V de Brus, Lord of Annandale (c.1210-1295), the father of the above – as Robert I
- Isobel of Huntington (1199-1251), the mother of the above – as Isobel
- Prince David of Scotland, 8th Earl of Huntingdon (1152-1219), the father of the above – as David II
- Prince Henry of Scotland, 3rd Earl of Huntingdon (1114-1152), the father of the above, son of David I Dunkeld – as Henry
- Princess Bethóc of Scotland, the mother of Duncan I Dunkeld, daughter of Malcolm II MacAlpin – as Beatrice
In relation to the Kingdom of England before the Union of Crowns, of the times of the Wars of the Roses
- Princess Margaret Tudor (1489-1541), the mother of James V of Scotland and great-grandmother of James VI – as Margaret III
- Elizabeth of York (1466-1503), the mother of Henry VIII, wife of Henry VII and daughter of Edward IV – as Elizabeth I
---Following the Ancestry of Henry VII---
- Margaret Beaufort (1441/43-1509), the mother of Henry VII – as Margaret II
- John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset (1403-1444), the father of the above – as John IV
- John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset (c.1371-1401), the father of the above – as John III
- John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster (1340-1399), the father of the above and of Henry IV, son of Edward III – as John II
---Following the Ancestry of Elizabeth of York---
- Anne Mortimer (1390-1411), the paternal grandmother of Edward IV and Richard III – as Anne I
- Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March (1374-1398), the father of the above – as Roger
- Philippa of Clarence, 5th Countess of Ulster (1355-1382), the mother of the above – as Philippa
- Lionel of Antwerp, Duke of Clarence (1338-1368), the father of the above, son of Edward III – as Lionel
In relation to the Kingdom of England before the Union of Crowns, of the times before the 100 Years War
- Empress Matilda, Lady of the English (c.1102-1167), the mother of Henry II, daughter of Henry I – as Matilda II
- Princess Matilda of Scotland (c.1080-1118), the mother of the above – as Matilda I
- Saint Margaret of Scotland (c.1045-1093), the mother of the above – as Margaret I
- Edward the Exile (1016-1057), the father of the above and of Edgar II, son of Edmund II Ironside – as Edward IV

[9] Although originally the Royal House of the Bahamas was an offshoot of the Prussia-Brandenburg” (AKA “Main Imperial”) branch of the Hohenzollern Dynasty, that ended with Mary IV, who married The Hon. William Philip Nassau de Zuylestein and made the House of Hohenzollern-Nassau, which continued due to her daughters and granddaughters mainly marrying one or other Nassau (mainly “de Zuylestein”) cousins
[10] Originated in the early 17th century with Frederick of Nassau, Lord of Zuylestein (illegitimate son of Frederick Henry, 19th Prince of Orange, the third Stadtholder of the Dutch Republic and the youngest son and child of William the Silent), the family entered the Peerage of England with his son, William van Nassau de Zuylestein, who was made Earl of Rochford by William III, his first cousin (as he was an important player in preparing the Glorious Revolution). All of that is following OTL, with things changing in a minor pre-Victoria POD as the family, instead of dying out in the legitimate male line in the early 19th century, flourished during the 1780s and the 1800s, starting with the 4th earl marrying his mistress and being followed by his ITTL legitimate son (whose OTL agnatic descent lasted up to the 1990s) while his brother’s children produced two new branches of the family

Spoiler: 11, a Tangent on the House of Nassau

The only non-illegitimate and non-morganatic branches of the Nassau Dynasty are the houses of Orange-Nassau (who originated the Nassau de Zuylestein branch, and died on the male line with Wilhelmina of the Netherlands in 1969) and of Nassau-Weilburg and Nassau-Weilburg-Usingen (who separated with the daughters of William IV, Grand Duke of Luxembourg and Elector of Nassau, who was the last male agnate of the House of Nassau). The Nassau-Weilburg-Usingen, who are the Electors of Nassau (and went through a bit of religious flip-flopping), are the only of the three with any claim to still being agnates of the dynasty, as they descend on the male line from Karl Philipp of Nassau-Usingen, Count of Weilnau (1746-1789), who was the morganatic son of the penultimate Sovereign Prince of Nassau-Usingen and whose descendants were granted the title of “Princes of Nassau-Usingen” by the Electors of Nassau
On the morganatic side of things there are, excluding the Nassau-Usingen, two other male-line branches of the dynasty, the Princes of Nassau-Saarbrucken (or Dukes of Nassau-Dillingen), descended from the last sovereign Prince of Nassau-Saarbrucken and his morganatic second wife (who was born middle-class and even worked as the handmaid of one of his previous mistresses, before taking the position of mistress herself, which she held for over a decade before their marriage); and the Princes of Nassau-Merenberg (or Counts of Merenberg), descended from Prince Nikolaus Wilhelm of Nassau by his wife, Natalia Pushkina, daughter of the famous writer Alexander Pushkin.
Interestingly, the House of Orange-Nassau of the Netherlands (and its branches on post-colonial kingdoms) does descend on the female line from another illegitimate branch of the Orange-Nassau Dynasty, as Queen Juliana of the Netherlands’ husband was Lord George Crawley (-Nassau d’Auverquerque), 9th Earl of Grantham, whose ancestor, the first Earl of Grantham of the Peerage of Great Britain, was the grandson of Henry de Nassau d’Auverquerque (the sole Earl of Grantham in the Peerage of England, a second cousin once removed of King William III, and a great-grandson of Maurice, Prince of Orange) through his mother, Lady Frances, who died only days after her son was made an earl (he had been Viscount Boston since 1755)​

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Sophia III (Sofia Evangeline Wilhelmina Marion; born in 27 January 1984) is the fifth and current monarch of the Bahamas, as well as their third reigning queen both overall and in a row, ascending to the throne upon her mother’s abdication.

Born into the House of Hohenzollern-Nassau during the reign of her grandmother, Mary IV, Sophia is the only child of Queen Sophia II, at the time still Princess Royal, and Bertrand, Prince of Zuylestein-in-Andros. She went through most of her primary and secondary education at the Queen Mary’s Academy, Nassau, an all-girls school affiliated with the Royal Navy where she developed an interest for entering the armed forces.

Enrolling in the Royal Navy upon completing her schooling in 2001, Sophia III remained on active service until 2015, taking leave to attend the Naval College of Engineers of Nassau, from where she left with a Bachelor of Engineering, and for the birth of her children. For most of her service Sophia III was a Captain, becoming a Commodore in 2012, and served mainly on the Caribbean Fleet, working in the late 2000s on the fight against drug-trafficking and pirating along the Caribbean Sea. Upon her retirement from active service in 2015, the then Princess Royal was made a Rear-Admiral, which is her current rank.

Openly lesbian, Sophia III has been in a relationship since her teens with Lady Cornelia Ellice[1], made Countess of Nassau in 2016, which started when both were studying at Queen Mary’s, and is quite frank over her lack of sexual interest for men. Nonetheless, Sophia caused a bit of a tizzy in 2006 when she married her childhood friend and distant cousin, Michael Savage Nassau de Zuylestein, who, much like her, is extremely open about his own sexuality.

Due to the couple’s lack of sexual attraction, they only had children in 2011, when they had triplets through Sophia III’s paramour, who served as their surrogate. The queen is also the carrier of a mitochondrial mutation that causes LHON, which resulted on their children being the first royalty known to have underwent mitochondrial replacement, their “donor” being the Countess of Nassau herself.

Sophia III officially became Queen of the Bahamas on June 22nd, 2016, with her mother’s abdication, but, unlike with the transition from Mary IV to Sophia II, the process took over a year as the then monarch followed the example set by other imperial kingdoms and phased the royal powers to her daughter. Her reign has been mainly marked by the post-2018 economic downturn on the Bahamas, caused mainly by the collapse of the Angelique Conglomerate, the kingdom’s largest private employer, after a corruption and plotted treason scandal. Although things seem to be in the upswing, in special after the government took control of most of the conglomerate’s splinters, analysts say it may take years for a full recovery.

In popular culture, Sophia III of the Bahamas is known for her dry and cold-seeming personality, which often makes people do double takes in her more irreverent and eccentric moments. She is also known for her stormy relationship with the Duchess of Eleuthera, with some believing that Sophia’s reason for marrying and having children was barring her from inheriting the throne of the Bahamas. The two are seen to have been getting better in their relation in more recent years, in special after the duchess’ show of loyalty during the Angelique Crisis[2]

[1] Interestingly, a descendant of Elizabeth Courtney, the illegitimate daughter of Lady Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire, and the 2nd Earl Grey, British Prime Minister from 1830 to 1834
[2] Although the failed treason plot was to place the Duchess of Eleuthera on the throne of the Bahamas by assassinating Sophia III and her children, the duchess, upon being invited to the plot, chose to retain her loyalty to the kingdom and her family instead of following her ambitions or desires, working with the plotters just long enough to gain hard proof of their treason before denouncing them in international television

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ADEN (المملكة المتحدة للأراضي وخليج عدن وحضرموت وصوماليلاند)
Officially the United Kingdom of the Lands and the Gulf of Aden, the Hadhramaut and Somaliland
Capital in the Port of Aden, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 738 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has Arabic[1], Somali and Imperial English as its official languages, and also recognizes Soqotri, Mehri, Hobyot. Jibbali and Shehri as regional languages
The kingdom has a total population of nearly 10 million inhabitants, of whom an overwhelming majority are Sunni Muslims (with only about 5% being of some other religion or denomination), while ethnically it is almost equally divided (about 45% to 48%) between Somalis (mainly of the Ishaak and Dir clans) and Arabs (mainly of Yemeni and Hadhramauti identity), while about 7% of the population is made of other Semitic peoples, Afaris and of people of European or South Asian ancestry
Aden is a semi-absolute monarchy, with its monarch (who is officially an executive monarch of the Westminster Style) holding strong and overarching powers over all branches of government, with both the Parliament and the High Court of Aden being subservient to his authority. Aden is also considered semi-federative due to the high number of princely states and the various levels of autonomy within them
Aden was established on September 5th, 1896, as the ninth imperial kingdom. Its first king, the third son of George V of Bengal, was already married to the two daughters of Sultan Turki bin Said of Oman beforehand, having married them shortly after converting to Islam in 1895
Unlike all other imperial kingdoms, Aden not only possesses princely states within its territory but most of its area is actually made by them, with the Adenese government recognizing a total of 54 princely states, of whom only 2 (the Sultanate of Habr Yunis and the Isaaq Sultanate) are located on Somaliland and only 1 (the Al-Mahri Sultanate of Socotra) is entirely insular, and include some states, of whom the most prominent is the Abdali Sultanate[2], which are actually comprised of various smaller princely states. The direct territories under the rule of the Adenese government are the area of the Port of Aden and the western half of Somaliland
The Monarchs’ List​

1896-1903: Benedict Mubarak Ismail bin George (b.1872:d.1903), born Prince Alfred Benedict of York (and later Bengal)
1903-1957: Muhammad bin Ismail (b.1896:d.1957)
1957-1960: Hakim bin Muhammad (b.1920:d.1960)
1960-2015: Abdul bin Muhammad (b.1927) son of Muhammad of Aden, abdicated, currently Retired King Abdul
2016-: Amir bin Said (b.1979) born Prince Amir of Aden, son of Prince Said of Aden, grandson of Muhammad of Aden
Heir apparent: Ismail, Crown Prince of Aden, Emir of Hargeisa and Prince of Seera (b.2001) son of Queen Hagarla
2. Prince Moulay of Aden (b.2002) son of Queen Amatalrauf
3. Prince Qasim of Aden (b.2002) son of Queen Hagarla
4. Prince Ali of Aden (b.2005) son of Queen Ramziya
5. Prince Ahmad of Aden (b.2006) son of Queen Ramziya

[1] The kingdom has a standardized version of Arabic (called Adenese Arabic) as the official one, but does still recognize the Ta’izzi-Adeni, Hadhrami and Dhofari dialects of Arabic, even if only in a regional level
[2] Also known as the Sultanate of Lahej, it was the first state of the Aden Protectorate that preceded the imperial kingdom (being the original state to hold the port before the coming of the British in the late 1830s) and officially has a territory made of most of the lands west of the Aden Province, but fragmentation among its tribes, sheikdoms and settlements over the 19th and 20th centuries resulted on it de facto being fragmented into a group of states, the largest of whom isn’t even the one held by the Abdali Sultan around Lahej

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Amir bin Said al Mubarak (Amir Muhammad Ismail Benedict Victor; born in 30 March 1979) is the fifth and current King of Aden. A great-grandson of Mubarak Ismail[1] of Aden, he was chosen by Abdul of Aden as his successor upon the former king’s abdication, and was proclaimed king on September 4th, 2016, being the most recently ascended monarch in the Arabic Peninsula.

The only son of Prince Said Tariq of Aden and Princess Zainab of Egypt, Amir lost his parents to a plane crash when he was only 5, and was rotated among the expansive Royal House of Aden until he was 9, when his uncle, then King Abdul, adopted him. Amir became the heir presumptive of Aden upon his adoption, his being the first and (as of 2020) only time an imperial monarch adopted a close relative and made them their heir.

Raised in Aden, Amir had his secondary education at Eton, Berkshire, and his higher education at Oxford University, graduating with a Bachelor of Economics degree. Entering the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in 2000, he served for four years in the Albish Army after graduating there, being deployed mainly to Aden itself during his active service.

Leaving the army in 2006, Amir entered the Ministry of the Economy of Aden that year, being made its head in 2010 when he was made a Minister in his adoptive father’s cabinet. Amir held the position until 2013, when he was made Deputy First Minister.

Deputy First Minister from 2013 to early 2016, Amir became regent to his adoptive father in January 26th of that year, when Abdul of Aden fell into a month-long coma after breaking his hip while on a flight of stairs. Amir remained on that position until September 3rd, 2016, when the still bedridden king abdicated, and was officially declared as his successor a few hours later, on the 4th. Amir’s coronation occurred on September 5th, being one of the fastest times between the ascension and coronation of a monarch, being a televised ceremony marked by the individual swearing of oaths of fealty by the rulers of all princely states of Aden.

A still relatively recent one, Amir’s reign has been an overall stable one, with the most remarkable events of it being the finishing of the building of Aden’s “Stilted City” and the failed terrorist attack on the Adenese Royal Family while they were staying on vacation, which saw the first time on his reign that the king and his wives’ military background came to the forefront of the popular mind[2].

A Sunni Muslim (of the Mubaraki Sect), Amir is currently the only monarch of an Imperial Kingdom to be officially polygamous, marrying firstly to Princess Hagaria of Habr Yunis, a decorated member of the Imperial Special Forces, in 1998; and second to his cousin, also a commodore of the Royal Navy, Princess Amatalrauf of Dahla, in 1999. Finally, in 2002, he married his third and fourth wives, the twin princesses Rawda and Ramziya of Lahej, whom he met on the ceremony awarding them the Victoria Cross. Together the five have fourteen children

[1] Although “Benedict Ismail” is the most commonly used version of the first king of Aden’s name, the name’s Arabic equivalent is also often used, in special in Aden itself
[2] Queen Hagaria ended with the highest kill count, the king with the lowest

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PUNJAB (ਪੰਜਾਬ ਦਾ ਰਾਜ)
Officially the State of Punjab
Capital in the City of Lahore, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 14 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Punjabi[1], Persian[2], Hindi, English and Sanskrit as its official languages, but also recognizes on a regional level the Haryanvi, Saraiki, Dogri, Gojri, Hindko, Pahari, Pashto, Urdu, Bagri, Balochi and Sindhi languages
The kingdom has a total population of 98 million inhabitants. Of them, a majority (of around 80%) are ethnic Punjabis, while various other ethnic groups make the remaining of the population, including Dogras, Pashtuns, Haryanvis, Saraikis and Muhajirs. The region is mostly divided between Sikhs, Muslims and Hindus, who respectively make around 31%, 35% and 27% of the population, while the remaining 7% are made mainly of Christians, Jains, Zoroastrians, Buddhists and Ravidassias
The Punjab is a semi-executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with the monarch holding much of the executive power but also sharing it with his First Ministers, while the Punjabi Parliament and Paramount Court hold the legislative and judiciary
The Punjab was established on September 20th, 1896, as the tenth imperial kingdom. It is the only imperial kingdom to have enthroned co-monarchs upon its creation, with them being the second son of George V of Bengal and a daughter of Maharaja Duleep Singh[3], who were beforehand the Duke and Duchess of Lahore since their marriage in 1892
Similarly to Cyprus, the Punjab recognizes the monarchs of the Sikh Empire as being predecessors of its own monarchy, but as of 2020 only one of its monarchs, Victor Sher II[4], has actually used them when counting their regnal name
The Monarch’s List​

1896-1960: Victor I (b.1871:d.1960), born Prince Victor Augustus of York (and later Bengal)
1896-1945: Catherine (b.1871:d.1945), born Princess Catherine Hilda Duleep Singh of Punjab
1960-1978: Victor Sher II (b.1935:d.1978), born Prince Victor Duleep Singh of Punjab, grandson of Victor I and Catherine[5]
1978-: Victor III Ranjit (b.1960)
Heir apparent: Crown Prince Victor Satparvan, Sher-e-Punjab and Maharaja of Lahore (b.1985) son of Victor III Ranjit
2. Prince Albert Dharamjyot of Punjab, Raja of Shahpur (b.1987) son of Victor III Ranjit
3. Prince Nicholas Satsarang of Shahpur (b.2010) son of the Raja of Shahpur
4. Princess Violet Saroor of Shahpur (b.2012) daughter of the Raja of Shahpur
5. Princess Hilda Premsukh of Punjab (b.1982) daughter of Victor III Ranjit

[1] On both the Gurmukhi and Shahmukhi scripts of the language
[2] The language of court and literature of Punjab for centuries, and the language of court during the late Sikh Empire, it was actually in decline when it was made official in the state mainly as a reckoning to the old empire, but said official status caused a revival of the language on Punjab, with it serving as a species of lingua franca among non-Punjabi ethnic groups
[3] Victor Sher II included both Victor I and Sher Singh, the 4th Sikh Emperor, when counting his regnal numerals
[4] The 5th and last Maharaja of the Sikh Empire, Catherine was his second daughter by his first wife, Bamba Müller[5] His mother, Victoria, was the eldest of the daughters of Victor I and Catherine of Punjab, while his father was the only son and child of Prince Frederick Duleep Singh, second son of Maharaja Duleep Singh and Head of the Sikh Imperial Family

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Victor III Ranjit (Victor Ranjit Adalbert Nirmal Lahna; born in 4 July 1960) is the third(fourth)[1] and current monarch of the Punjab, being also the second-oldest male (and oldest to have inherited his throne) among the current rulers of the imperial kingdoms.

Born into the House of Punjab as the second son and child of Victor, Sher-e-Punjab, and Bakhtawar of Patiala, Victor III Ranjit was only three-months-old when his father became King of Punjab, and for most of his first years he lived at the Jamnikachukuma Palace, his parents fortified retreat residence in Shahura, while Victor Sher II was involved in the administration of post-war Punjab. A second son, Victor III was never expected to inherit his father’s position, instead developing an interest for dancing and acting that resulted in him entering the Imperial Ballet School in 1972, being set to become a member of The Imperial Ballet upon graduation.

Said ambitions were ended when, in an unexpected turn of events, both Victor III’s older brother and father died in the span of a single week, the former to a motorcycle accident and the latter from a heart attack. Suddenly entrusted with the position of monarch at the age of 18 in December 22nd, 1978, Victor III’s early reign was marked by instability and uncertainty as he settled into his new role and got accustomed back with Punjab, with Queen Mother Bakhtawar becoming the greatest support to his reign as the éminence grise of Punjab, maintaining at bay most discontent and/or dissident forces.

Married in 1980 to Princess Karanjit of Kapurthala, his late brother’s fiancée, in what is admitted to have been a move by the queen mother to gather popular support to his side, as Karanjit remained a beloved figure as the dowager crown princess, they have five children together, and for all that their marriage did not start smoothly or peacefully the two are known for having come to love eachother over the years.

Although he has been the monarch of Punjab for over 40 years, Victor III Ranjit’s reign has been a surprisingly uneventful one, with the king being known for his overall neutral stance on most political matters and for the fact that his wife and eldest son are as much of the rulers of Punjab as him. The king’s most known direct actions are his social projects, which have done many great things for the life of the poor and in special for poor and homeless youths, and his avid support of the arts and education.

Although Punjab is considered one of the more conservative parts of the Albish Empire, Victor III Ranjit is known for his open support for people who aren’t straight or aren’t cisgender, causing a bit of a scandal when he socked a politician for said politician’s speech condemning the Marriage Act of 1995

[1] There has always been some confusion on the matter, due to the fact that Punjab had a pair of co-monarchs where neither was officially considered as being deserving of the title due to being the consort of the other, so to this day people aren’t sure if they should count Victor I and Catherine separately or as a “single” monarch

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ASSAM (असम की घाटियों और पहाड़ियों का क्षेत्र)
Officially the Realm of the Valleys and Hills of Assam
Capital in City and County of Shillong, which has a population of nearly 150 thousand inhabitants. The kingdom’s largest city is Dispur, with a population of 1.8 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Assamese[1], Nepali, Hindi, Gaelic, English and Sanskrit as its official languages, but also recognizes over 20 minority or regional languages, including Khasi, Garo, Bengali, Apatani, Moinba, Adi-mishmi and Kachari
The kingdom has a total population about 36.6 million inhabitants, who are made of about 70% of ethnic Assamese, while the remaining 30% are divided among dozens of smaller ethnic groups, including the Khasi, Nyishi and Bohtiya peoples, as well as one of the largest European-descended groups in Bharat by percentage of the population[2]. The kingdom is majority Christian, with over 80% of the population identifying as such, the largest denomination being the branches of Hindu-Anglicanism
Assam is a strong executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch holding the executive power but also having an amount of legislative and judiciary powers, which are mainly held by the Parliament of Shillong and the High Court of Assam
Assam was established on September 1st, 1906, as the eleventh imperial kingdom, being also the first to be made during the 20th century and the last created by Empress Victoria. Its first monarch, the third son of Leopold of the Carnatic, was beforehand the Raja of Darwha, having been created as such in 1901
Unlike all other Bharati imperial kingdoms, Assam officially has a princely state within its territory, the Jaintia Kingdom, which is made by the twenty Khasi Hills Chieftainships, de facto petty princely states that are an integrated part of the kingdom’s territory, in part due to the future personal union of Jaintia with Assam and in other due to the location of Assam’s capital as a species of enclave within the Khasi and Jaintia Hills[3]
Unlike most other imperial kingdoms, Assam also includes the High Kings of Ireland (in specific those considered historical) when counting its monarchs, and does not differentiate between anglicized or non-anglicized variations
The Monarchs’ List​

1906-1946: Leopold (b.1885:d.1946), born Prince Leopold Maurice Charles of Gwynedd (and later the Carnatic)
1946-1952: Percival I (b.1906:d:1952), born Prince Percival Edmund of Darwha
1952-1960: Brian III (b.1931), abdicated[4], currently the Archduke of Dispur
(Disputed during 1955-1957 by Aurelius (b.1941:d,1957?), son of Percival I, allied puppet[5])
1960: Percival II (b.1933), son of Percival I, abdicated[6], currently the Archduke of Gohpur
1960-: Ariana (b.1937), daughter of Percival I, First Minister of Assam from 1955 to 1960, Rani of Jaintia from 1959 to 2003
Heir apparent: Mael Jasamanta, Maharaja of Balpara, Raja of Jaintia and Lord of Shillong (b.1956) son of Ariana
2. Prince Adrian of Assam and Jaintia, Crown Prince of Jaintia and Archduke of Kamrup (b.1983)
3. Prince Francis of Assam and Jaintia, Prince of Magaldai (b.2005) son of Adrian
4. Prince Octavius of Assam and Jaintia (b.2010) son of Adrian
5. Princess Adelaide of Assam and Jaintia (b.2006) daughter of Adrian
[1] The easternmost Indo-Aryan language in the world by land of origin
[2] Assam has one of the largest European-descended or European populations in Bharat, with about a third of the population identifying as having some European ancestry (although only about 10% of the population identify as being “European”), most of that population is of Irish or Scottish ancestry, resulting on a creole mix of Irish and Scottish Gaelic being an official language in Assam
[3] Originally established due to its location on the crossing of the Khasi Hills and serving as their headquarters until the establishment of the Assam Colony, the city and county is marked for its nicknamed of “Scotland of the East” due to its cooler climate and hilly landscape reminding the British of the Scottish Highlands
[4] Traumatized by the events of the Second World War, Brian III abdicated as soon as he could after the war’s end and moved to the Home Islands where he worked as a chemistry professor and later became Headmaster of Eton, currently finishing his second decade on the office
[5] The youngest son of Percival I, being his only child by his second wife, Aurelius became the allied puppet of Assam during the Second World War and is believed to have been executed on orders of either Brian III or then First Minister Ariana after his capture in 1957, with his body being left on a ditch somewhere in Northeastern Assam
[6] The second son of Percival I and just as disinterested on the Assamese throne as Brian III, his reign lasted the time it took for him to do the procedures to abdicate from it, and after his abdication Percival II (mainly known by his third middle name, Aberforth) moved to the Home Islands and opened a pub in Berkshire

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Ariana (Ariana Walburga Adelaide Margaret; born in 1 May 1937) is the fifth and current monarch of Assam, as well as the kingdom’s sole reigning queen and longest-reigning monarch, commemorating her 60th year on the throne with a Diamond Jubilee in 2020.

The third child and only daughter of Percival I of Assam, with his first wife, Kendra of Aotearoa[1], born during the reign of her grandfather, Leopold, Ariana, at the time of her birth, was never expected to become a monarch, being not only a daughter but having two older brothers, but nonetheless received the same education as her older siblings, being considered early on the most talented and driven of the three in relation to learning.

Only two when her mother died, Ariana grew up by the side of her stepmother, Diana Barebone, whom she called “her dearly beloved”, and was known for often coddling and spoiling her youngest brother, Aurelius, who Ariana called her “favorite sibling”. When she was 9 Ariana’s father became king, and she was given the title “Lady of Assam” by him, the following year, in 1947, Ariana was betrothed to Crown Prince Lakshmi of Jaintia, with whom she had been friends since toddlerhood.

Only 15 when Percival I died from an untimely stroke in 1952, Ariana spent the early years of the Second World War in a mix of worry and overwork, supporting Brian III while Kuomintang China loomed over Assam. She finally married in 1954, only two months before the death of Emperor Leonard at the Blitz and the Allied invasion of Bharat.

Made her brother’s First Minister in 1955, when Assam was invaded and the kingdom became a thorn warzone, Ariana’s time on the position, which would last until her ascension to the throne, was marked by difficulty and the need for harsh decisions, with her and her husband de facto taking control over Assam while her oldest brother served as their figurehead and her youngest brother was a puppet of the Allies. On 1957 the loyalist forces captured Aurelius, and until recently Ariana was believed to have ordered the boy’s execution. During the war itself Ariana had her first and only child, Jasamanta II, who was born prematurely when she survived a car explosion and was made sterile by the shrapnel.

After the war ended in 1958, Ariana continued holding the position, while her husband ascended to the position of Raja of Jaintia in 1959. In 1960 she oversaw her brother Brian III’s abdication, and the entire short reign and following abdication of her other brother, Percival II, officially becoming the monarch of Assam in May 17th, 1960, at the age of 23.

An extremely competent monarch and administrator under any kind of pressure, with her early reign in special being a show of it, marked by the rebuilding of Assam nearly from the ground-up and the greater integration of the Khasi and Jaintia Hills into the kingdom, Ariana is known much for her personality, being often curt and harsh and with an imposing presence, which is only helped by her remarkably booming voice.

Nicknamed “The Witch Queen of Assam” by her critics due to her appearance[2] in her early years, Ariana (accidentally or not) rebranded that name with her reign, which was marked in the 1960s and 70s for the almost magical recovery and growth of Assam’s economy and infrastructure in the post-war years, and then as she aged the nickname developed yet another new meaning as the queen became famous for seemingly always being one step ahead of anyone against or supporting her. Ariana sometimes has also shown a sense of humor on the matter, and, for example, has made a tradition of wearing some variation of a witch costume at her All Hallows’ Eve Speech.

Widowed in 2003, when Lakshmi III of Jaintia died the year before their 50th anniversary, Ariana has expressed her desire to be buried with him upon death, and in Mary 2nd, 2020, announced she was beginning the process of abdicating to her son, having been diagnosed with the earliest stages of Alzheimer in March of the same year

[1] Illegitimate granddaughter of George V of Aotearoa, she and her father were recognized by Queen Meredith as being akin to the legitimized descendant of Louis XIV, not having right to inherit the throne but being recognized as a part of the Royal House of Aotearoa
[2] Ariana always had a striking appearance, but the war aged her dramatically to the point that some of those features could be considered similar to those of a stereotypical witch

 

[Peppe]

So, here's part two of the imperial kingdoms, sorry for it being the shortest of the three (and for, at least to me, not being my best work in the writting department)

The Imperial Kingdoms, of the Creations of Emperors Henry and Leonard

Between the creation of the 11th and the 12th imperial kingdoms, there was a hiatus of 30 years, 3 months, and 10 days, during which the entirety of the reign of Emperor Arthur, and the majority of the reign of Emperor Henry, occured.
Due to a variety of reasons, of whom the chief ones were bad timing, lack of interest and general circumstances, the reigns of Emperors Henry and Leonard of Albion saw the creation of only three imperial kingdoms, with there being also a span of 15 years between the creations of Emperor Henry and the creation of Emperor Leonard.
Unlike most of the imperial kingdoms that preceeded them, the 12th, 13th and 14th kingdoms saw a certain amount of effort being placed on acclimating the first monarchs to their new kingdoms before enthronement, with said first monarchs being appointed to the rulership of their kingdom's territorial predecessors at least a year beforehand.
It is also here that the oldest imperial kingdom to still be ruled by its first monarch (as of 2020) appears

LOWER BURMA (မြင့်မြတ်ညီညွတ်သောနိုင်ငံတော်အောက်မြန်မာပြည်၊ ရခိုင်နှင့်တနင်္သာရီ)
Officially the Sublime Unified Kingdom of Lower Burma, Arakan and Tenasserim
Capital in the City of Rangoon, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 5.3 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Lower Burmish[1], English and Sanskrit as its official languages, and also recognizes a set of Karenic, Arakanese, Kuki-Chin and Mon dialects and languages on a regional level
The kingdom has a total population of nearly 19 million inhabitants, a majority of whom are ethnic Burmese, while the Karen, Rakhine, Chin, Rohingya and Mon peoples make the largest ethnic minorities, with peoples of European and Chinese descent being a prominent minority specifically on urban areas. The kingdom is majority Christian, with 63% of the population being a part of the Protestant Church of Burma[2] while another 5% profess to some other Christian church or denomination, the largest minorities are Buddhists, who officially make 25% of the population[3], and Muslims, who make about 6% of the population (and live mainly on the region of Arakan)
Lower Burma is a semi-executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, having developed from a constitutional absolute monarchy, with its monarch holding most of the executive power but delegating a relatively large percentage of it to his First Minister, with the Lower Burmese Parliament and Primal Court holding the legislative and judiciary powers. Some like to joke that Lower Burma is also partially a theocracy due to the power of the kingdom’s national church, the Protestant Church of Burma, and the religious-based powers of its monarch[4]
Lower Burma was established on December 11th, 1936, as the twelfth imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the second son of Emperor Henry, was beforehand the Duke of York, having been created as such in 1924, and a vicar in the Church of England since 1935[5], he was also the Viceroy of Lower Burma, having been appointed as such in 1933
The Monarchs’ List​

1937-1972: Edward X (b.1895:d.1972), born Prince Edward David of Cambridge
1972-1977: Edward XI Thuraphaya (b.1939:d.1977)
1977-2009: William V Kaunghayma (b.1955) abdicated[6], currently the King Father/Hkamedaw
2009-: Edward XII Sittwe (b.1980)
Heir apparent: Crown Prince Einshay Mintha Edward, Deputy King of the Realm, Uparaja of Arakan (b.2016) son of Edward XII
2. Prince Stephen Mintha of Lower Burma (b.2020) son of Edward XII
3. Princess Minthami Wallis of Lower Burma, Lady of Hmway Saung, Lady of the Scarlet Pavilion (b.1982) daughter of William V
4. Prince Mintha Charles of Lower Burma (b.2018) son of the Lady of Hmway Saung
5. Princess Minthami Lavinia of Lower Burma (b.2018) daughter of the Lady of Hmway Saung

[1] A branch of the Burmese language (also called “Yangon Burmese”), it’s difference to “Upper Burmish” (or “Mandalay Burmese”) is akin to the difference between European and North American English
[2] Officially the “Most Illustrious and Serene National Protestant Church of Lower Burma” (colloquially known as “Protestant Church of Burma” or “PCB”), which has been the national church of the kingdom since 1945, for more info into it look-up the threadmark into “Hindu-Anglicanism”
[3] As the Protestant Church of Burma is a highly syncretized religion with Buddhism, some consider it to be a part of the Buddhist percentage and as such consider Buddhism to be the unofficial religious majority of Lower Burma, at 88%
[4] The power of the Lower Burmese monarch within the PCB, which they are the head of, is considerably greater than the Albish Monarch within the British churches they head, in part due to the fact that all Lower Burmese kings have been much more involved in their national church, and have all been ordained priests within it
[5] An ordained priest since the age of 25, and a vicar since the year before his enthronement, Edward X of Lower Burma actually remained a member of the Church of England until 1938, when he married a thrice-divorced Burmese-Canadian socialite and was converted to the Protestant Church of Burma by her, entering it in 1939 and becoming its head in 1945 when he made it the national church of Lower Burma
[6] The King Father abdicated in a move to end Lower Burma’s de facto absolute monarchy, seeing his continued presence on the throne (due to his personal popularity with the people as an admired and beloved fatherly figure) as a hindrance to any chance of the kingdom moving to a more relaxed monarchy

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Edward XII Sittwe (Edward Suu Aung Wunna; born in 18 August 1980) is the fourth and current monarch of Lower Burma, Arakan and Northern Tenasserim, and Mahasamgharaja of the Protestant Church of Burma. After his father abdicated the throne in his favor, he became monarch on December 7th, 2009, being the first king of Lower Burma to ascend to the throne while his predecessor was still alive and the first to not head a de facto absolute monarchy.

Edward XII was born August 18th, 1980, at the hospital pavilion of the Kandawgyi Palace Complex of Rangoon. He is the eldest son of king William V Kaunghayma, had with his foremost wife, Queen Amay Suu Kyi[1]. He has a younger sister, Princess Mintha Wallis, as well as nine half-sisters and five half-brothers. As the only son of the king by his primary consort, Edward XII was at birth entitled “Prince of Sittwe”[2], and was from birth the Crown Prince of Lower Burma, being recognized as Deputy King (or Uparaja) at the age of 14.

Studying at Magdalen College, University of Oxford, Edward XII graduated from there after completing the Foreign Service Programme, leaving with a degree in Foreign Relations. As like all of his predecessors, he was trained on becoming a member of the PCB, becoming an ordained priest of the church shortly after his graduation.

De facto taking the position of Deputy King at the age of 25, that same year William V announced his intention to abdicate in his son’s favor within the next five years, with Edward XII being, for the next four years, in a gradual acquisition of powers from his father. On December 7th, 2009, the former king issued a Royal Edict officially announcing his abdication and transferred the throne to Edward XII, who was officially crowned on September 23rd, 2012. At the end of his coronation Edward XII also was passed the office of Mahasamgharaja from his father, who has the coronation itself as his last ceremony holding the position.

A liberal much like his parents, and in special influenced by the formidable Queen Mother, Edward XII is known for his widespread reforms of the government, finishing his father’s work on curbing overarching aristocratic power by diminishing his own powers in a constitutional reform, becoming the first monarch of Lower Burma to divide the executive power with his First Ministers and to de facto abdicate from having a direct control over the legislative and judiciary.

Although he has curbed his royal powers (although still holding onto his various royal prerogatives), Edward XII still remains the Mahasamgharaja of the Protestant Church of Burma, and holds de facto absolute power of the kingdom’s state church, but, unlike his predecessors, the king has shied away from using said power to control the government through religious influence, and has instead focused on the spiritual and internal aspects of the office.

Sometimes called a Dharma King, Edward XII has, in general, focused on the social and religious aspects of his position, and is known for his social works based around one or both of said aspects. As of 2020 the king’s most known works are the “Rehabilitation Project”, a land reform and redistribution project that has been in progress since 2014; the complete overhaul and reform of the foster system in Lower Burma; and the establishment of the “Kidu” in Lower Burma[3], creating a direct and effective way through which citizens can appeal to the monarch for help.

A capable diplomat, Edward XII is also known for his work on Lower Burma’s unofficial foreign relations, reestablishing the kingdom’s relationship with neighboring Thailand after decades of estrangement.

Monogamous unlike his father and grandfather, Edward XII has been married since 2003 to Elizabeht Thiri Sanda Williamson[4] (born Elizabeth Sarah), whom he met while both were studying at Oxford, after being in a relationship since 2000. Known for their problems conceiving, which were later revealed to be caused mainly by infertility on the king’s part[5], the couple had their first son in 2016, after a long fertility treatment, and had another in 2020 after a similar process.

[1] Daughter of Bogyoke Aung San, 1st Archduke of Myaungmya, one of Lower Burma’s most talented military leaders before and during the Second World War, being posthumously given the highest peerage ever created in the kingdom
[2] Lower Burma partially follows the Upper Burmese custom of kings having their princely title as their regnal name, with most monarchs adding it as a secondary component
[3] A Bhutanese tradition by origin (the idea being brought to Edward XII by his grandmother, a princess of Bhutan by birth) based on the sacred duty of a Dharma King (a title officially used to refer to the monarchs of Bhutan and Sikkim) being caring for his people
[4] Upon converting to the Protestant Church of Burma, Elizabeth changed her middle name, Sarah, for “Thiri Sanda”, which had been an overblown nickname Edward XII had given to her in their early months of dating, meaning “Splendorous Moon”)
[5] Although the queen has revealed she has an endometrial lining on the thin side (which already makes the implantation of a fertilized egg more difficult), Edward XII (after the news of the queen’s fertility problems were made open and she started suffering from harassment by the press and politicians) revealed that he has Oligoasthenozoospermia, having a low sperm count and producing sperm with reduced motility, which results on him being de facto infertile without medical assistance

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THE STRAITS (Kerajaan Bersatu Selat dan Riau-Lingga)
Officially the United Kingdom of the Straits and Riau-Lingga
Capital in the City and State of Singapore, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 6.1 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Imperial English, Singapore English[1], Malay, Mandarin, Javanese and Tamil as its official languages, and also recognizes various minority languages and dialects on a local level
The kingdom has a total population of 11.4 million inhabitants, of whom the two largest groups are the ethnic Malays, who make 40% of the population, and ethnic Chinese, at 35%, while it also has considerable Javanese, Indian and European minorities, who comprehend, respectively, 7.7%, 4.5%, and 2.3% of the total population, with the remaining 10% being of a variety of other ethnic groups. The kingdom is a majority Muslim, with the followers of Islam making about 52% of the population, while the other half is made mostly by Buddhists, at 24%, Christians, at 13%, Hindus, at 4%, and followers of Chinese religions, at 3%
The Straits are a rather strong executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch not only holding the executive power but having considerable powers over the legislative and judiciary branches of government, who are officially held by the Parliament of the Straits and the National Court
The Straits were established on December 11th, 1936, as the thirteenth imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the third son of Emperor Henry, was beforehand the Duke of Sussex, having been created as such in 1924, and the Governor of the Straits Settlements, having been appointed as such in 1930
Together with the Bahamas the Straits are one of the only two current imperial kingdoms to have been expanded after being established, doing so with the annexation of the Sultanate of Riau-Lingga[2] in 1963, which already had been de facto united with the Straits for a time[3] but became officially so with the death of Sultan Mahmud V, who willed his throne to the Queen of the Straits, who officially united the two states in the mid-to-late 1960s
Similarly to only a few other imperial kingdoms, the Straits also possess an princely state within their territory, the Governorate of the Cocos-Keeling Islands[4], and are marked by their remarkable span of territory, as both the Cocos-Keeling Islands and the “nearby”[5] Christmas Islands are located on the Indian Ocean proper, on the other side of the Malay Archipelago from the Straits
The Monarchs’ List​

1937-1961: Albert (b.1895:d.1981), born Prince Albert of Cambridge, abdicated[6], King Father Albert from 1961 to 1981
1961-: Elizabeth II (b.1926), born Princess Elizabeth of York, Sultana consort of Riau-Lingga from 1947 to 1963
Mahmud V (b.1921:d.1963), Sultan of Riau-Lingga since 1954, ruled as co-monarch from 1961 until his death
Heir apparent: Tengku Besar Albert Sulaiman of the Straits and Riau-Lingga, Yang di-Pertuan Muda (b.1948) son of Elizabeth II
2. Tengku Muda Henry Abdul Rahman of the Straits and Riau-Lingga, Raja Muda (b.1973) son of Albert
3. Tengku Charles Muhammad of the Straits and Riau-Lingga, Raja of Daik (b.1992) son of Henry
4. Tengku Elizabeth Midha of the Straits and Riau-Lingga (b.2014) daughter of Charles
5. Tengku Charlotte Haryati of the Straits and Riau-Lingga (b.2015) daughter of Charles

[1] A variation of Imperial English marked by the adoption of Malay and Mandarin words, terms and some wording structures
[2] Which, unlike OTL, never saw the fall of the Bendahara dynasty and, after some developments in relation to the Dutch, officially became a British (later Albish) protectorate during the 1850s
[3] Ever since the marriage of Mahmud V to the then heiress to the Straits in 1947, the imperial kingdom and the sultanate had been in a slow process of uniting through cooperating administrations and interwoven economies, and in 1961 Elizabeth II, upon her ascension, even made her husband the nominal co-monarch of the Straits. Mahmud V’s will more than anything simply gave the final push on the unification process
[4] Originally an uninhabited archipelago made of two flat, low-lying coral atolls, it was claimed and settled by John Clunies-Ross (Clunies-Ross I) in the 1820s, and only in the 1850s that the then British Empire annexed the islands (by mistake, apparently, as the captain who did the annexation simply though he was on the Cocos Islands of the Andaman), but it remained under the “rule” of its original owners, who were titled “superintendents”. In 1886, during the “reign” of Clunies-Ross III, Empress Victoria officially recognized the Clunies-Ross rule with a perpetual grant, and recognized them as hereditary “Resident Magistrates” of the islands, with the “governorate” being established in 1965 by Elizabeth II of the Straits, who officially recognized the islands as being a uniquely strange princely state
[5] If somewhere 985 kilometers away can be said to be “nearby”
[6] Already tired from ruling before WWII and having suffered as a Chinese war-prisoner through much of it, Albert hadn’t actually ruled the Straits for years beforehand, and his abdication was simply him giving up any pretenses of doing so

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Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Mary Victoria Gilbertine Alexandra; born in 22 April 1926) is the second and current monarch of the Straits, as well as the ninth monarch and first sultana regnant of Riau. As the Queen of the Straits, she is also the nominal Commander-in-Chief of the East Indies Fleet of the Royal Navy and the Admiral Commanding of the Singapore Station. She is also, since 1998, recognized as the honorary “Third Sea Lord”, and holds the position of Chairwoman of the Sovereign Council of Malaysia since 1982.

Born as the first child of the then Duke and Duchess of York, on her maternal grandfather’s house at Mayfair, London, Elizabeth II lived on the Home Islands only until the age of 4, moving with her family to Singapore in 1930 when her father was appointed governor of the Straits Settlements. Originally educated privately at home with her sister, firstly by a governess and then by a series of tutors, Elizabeth II showed from a young age a keen interest for the sea and the navy, something that she passed to her younger sister, Princess Margaret, and after much discussions entered the Royal Naval College, Singapore, at the age of 10.

After nearly 11 years as a Princess of York, Elizabeth II became a “Princess of the Straits” in December 11th, 1936, with the enthronement of Albert of the Straits, and on the following year was a member of the procession during his coronation. Heiress presumptive upon her father’s enthronement, Elizabeth II continued to study at the Royal Naval College, Singapore, until the age of 16, when she progressed to Dartmouth, becoming an ensign at HMS Kinghorne in 1944.

Married on October of 1947 to then Crown Prince Mahmud of Riau-Lingga after years of courtship[2], Elizabeth II did not retired from the Royal Navy upon marriage, although she did take partial leaves during her first and second pregnancies, and spent the late 1940s and early 1950s as a speedy riser on the ranks of the Royal Navy, being a Rear Admiral by 1952.

Stationed on Australia during the early years of the Second World War, Elizabeth II was there when the Straits (and in specific Singapore) fell to the Allies in 1954, hearing of the capture of the city and her parents while at dinner with her family, and served as one of the fiercest and most brutal leaders of the Royal Navy on the Eastern Front of the war, later becoming the de facto ruler of the insular parts of Albish-held Southeast-Asia.

The de facto ruler of the Straits and Riau-Lingga after the end of the Second World War, with her husband being the nominal Sultan of Riau since 1954, Elizabeth II became the official ruler of the Straits on May 17th, 1961, when her father, weakened and traumatized by his time as a prisoner of war, abdicated on his daughter’s name and dropped any pretenses of being the actual ruler of their kingdom.

Co-monarch with her husband for two years, Elizabeth II became a widow in 1963 when Mahmud V died from lung cancer on June 29th, and at the same time inherited his throne. Because of that, Elizabeth II’s early reign was marked not only by the rebuilding of the Straits, which were decimated by the Second World War, but also by the finalization of integrating the Straits with the also rebuilding Riau-Lingga Sultanate, a process that symbolically was completed on August 26th, 1967, when Elizabeth II was crowned simultaneously as Queen of the Straits and Sultana of Riau-Lingga.

Currently the longest-serving ruler of Southeast Asia and the Malay World (and one of the region’s longest-reigning monarchs in history), with over 6 decades of experience as a ruler, Elizabeth II is considered by many the primus inter pares among the rulers of the region, often being seen as a source of guidance and counsel for her youngest peers. On the Straits themselves, the queen is colloquially known as “Queen Nenek” by her subjects, and has her long reign marked, above all else, by the growth and development of the kingdom over the decades, going from a land ravaged by war sustained by being a bastion of Albish military power to an economic powerhouse, serving as a financial, services and shipping hub and having one of the highest qualities of living across the Albish Empire.

Identifying as a deeply religious woman, Elizabeth II is also a self-declared “incomplete convert”, admitting to the fact that, although converting to Islam in 1947 in preparation to her marriage, she never abandoned much of the beliefs she was raised with as an Anglican, calling her beliefs as being “a mixing of both what I was raised with, what I married into[3], and some things I accepted with the years”[4]. In relation to her personal life and interests, Elizabeth II is known for her interest in marine biology and ecology, often visiting research centers and aquariums on her free time, and is known for her lifelong friendship with the late Julia McWilliams, the decorated Royal Navy Commodore, marine biologist and military researcher.

[1] 17 Bruton Street, nowadays the official residence of the monarch of the Straits in London, was at the time of Elizabeth II's birth the London home of her maternal grandfather, the Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne
[2] The two had actually met as children, and were even casual friends, but only started developing a closer and later romantic relationship after meeting as students at Dartmouth (Mahmud became an officer of the Engineer Corps of the Royal Navy), spending much of the years between 1942 and 1947 in a long courtship done through letters and chance encounters, with Elizabeth II revealing much later on they actually had their first night together in 1945, while stationed at Malacca
[3] Doing the Hajj in 1948, and committing to Islamic dietary laws (the queen has at times even joked about her sorrow at not being capable of drinking wine or whisky anymore), Elizabeth II has as the main points of her mixing the manner through which she does her daily prayers (the queen has admitted to mostly doing it on the same manner as she prayed when she was officially Christian) and the fact that she fasts during both Lent and the Ramadan
[4] The last part referring most probably to Elizabeth II’s admittance to having adopted some beliefs from Hinduism, in special the idea of reincarnation

[a] Although Elizabeth II had been the monarch of the Straits for the good part of a decade and Mahmud V had been Sultan since 1954, war, rebuilding and integrating caused both of them to delay their coronations, with Elizabeth ending-up being crowned in 1967 while Mahmud V had a hastily-prepared coronation a few weeks before his death

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SIERRA LEONE (Kiŋdɔm de Salone)
Officially the Kingdom of Sierra Leone
Capital in the Port of Freetown, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 1.2 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Imperial English and Krio[1] as its official languages, it also has over 30 native languages within its territory, many of whom are official on the local or regional level
The kingdom has a total population of nearly 12 million inhabitants, and is an extremely multiethnic country having at least as many native ethnic groups as it does languages, outside of them, there are also those of Afro-American descent[2], who make about 8% of the population, and those of Euro-American descent[3], who make another 3% of the population. Religiously the country is mostly divided among Muslims (mainly Sunni of the Maliki school of jurisprudence[4]), who make about 26% of the population, Christians (mainly Protestants), who make about 18% of the population, and Krio[5], the largest Christo-Islamic Religion[6], whose believers make 51% of the population; another 3% are followers of African folk religions[7]
Sierra Leone is a nominal executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch holding the executive power but rarely using it (delegating the office of chief of government to her Foremost Ministers when she isn’t needed) while the Parliament of Sierra Leone and the High Court of Freetown hold the legislative and judiciary powers
Sierra Leone was established on June 2nd, 1952, as the fourteenth imperial kingdom. Its first (and current) monarch, the third daughter of Emperor Leonard (being the only monarch enthroned by him), never held a royal dukedom before her enthronement, but had been married to Prince Theodore of Gondar, an Ethiopian Prince[8] since 1950, she was beforehand the Governor-General of Sierra Leone since 1950
The first imperial kingdom to be established specifically from Albion’s direct territories in Africa, Sierra Leone is marked by being semi-feudal in a similar sense to some of the other territories of the empire in the continent, with its smaller administrative divisions (shires and domains[9]) being mainly ruled in a level or other by the hereditary native nobility recognized by the Albish in the 19th century, in special on the domain level, where the position of hereditary administrator is entirely official, with their level of authority depending on the place
The Monarch and her Family​

Since 1952: Victoria II (b.1931), born Princess Victoria Mary of Wales, the first and currently only monarch of the country
Her late husband, Prince George of Gondar, Grand Duke of Rokel (b.1930:d.2017)
1) Crown Princess Leona of Sierra Leone, Grand Duchess of Rokel, Princess of Kenema, Duchess of Pepel (b.1953)
m. Prince Marcel Etienne of Wahran, Duke of Lungi (b.1952)

1) Prince Henry Victor of Sierra Leone, Duke of Sherbro (b.1980) m. Lady Harriet Lipton-Paget of Maforki (b.1980)​

1) Princess Georgiana of Sherbro (b.2007)​

2) Princess Adelaide of Sherbro (b.2009)​

3) Princess Magdalene of Sherbro (b.2013)​

2) Princess Marcella of Sierra Leone (b.1983) m. Diedrich II, Grand Duke of Reisküste and Prince of Prussia (b.1979)​

1) Prince Diethard of Reisküste and Prussia, Hereditary Grand Duke (b.2009)​

2) Prince Wulfric of Reisküste and Prussia (b.2010)​

2) Princess Millicent of Sierra Leone, First Royal Lady (b.1955)
3) Princess Oriana of Sierra Leone (b.1957:d.2012) m. Leul Ras Mengesha III, King of Tigray (b.1953)

1) Makeda, Empress consort of Ethiopia (b.1975) m. Salomon V, Emperor of Ethiopia (b.1974:d.2009)​

1) see Meklit, Crown Princess of Tigray​

2) Menelik III, Emperor of Ethiopia (b.1995) m. Woyzero Alitash of Gondar (b.1994)​

1) Leult-hoy Judith, Queen of Shewa (b.2011) m. Leul Ras Sahle Melekot, King of Shewa (b.2011)​

2) Abeto Kidane, Crown Prince of Tigray (b.1977) m. Princess Meklit of Ethiopia, Crown Princess of Tigray (b.1993)​

1) Leul Lij Tesfaye of Tigray (b.2011)​

2) Leult Oriana of Tigray (b.2013)​

3) Leult Desta of Tigray (b.2014)​

4) Leul Lij Dawit Yakob of Tigray (b.2016)​

5) Leult Seble of Tigray (b.2017)​

3) Abeto Yohannes of Tigray (b.1979)​

4) Zewditu of Tigray (b.1980) m. Leul Ras Woldemichael Solomon IV, Bahri Negus (b.1975)​

1) Emebet Etenesh, Crown Princess of Medri Bahri (b.2002)​

2) Emebet Yewubdar of Medri Bahri (b.2003)​

3) Emebet Mariam of Medri Bahri (b.2005)​

4) Princess Cersei of Sierra Leone, 1st Duchess of Waterloo in Sierra (b.1969)
m. Robert Peters, 7th Duke of Freetown, 3rd Prince of Kabala and Deputy Minister of Mining (b.1967)(a)
m. James Sackville, Duke of Waterloo in Sierra (b.1982)(b)

1a) Prince John of Freetown (b.1995)​

2a) Princess Meryl of Freetown (b.1997)​

3a) Prince Thomas of Sierra Leone, 1st Duke of York in Sierra (b.2000) m. Princess Louisa of the Bullom (b.1999)​

1) Princess Adele of York (b.2019)​

4b) Princess Anna of Waterloo (b.2006)​

5b) Prince George of Waterloo (b.2009)​

[1] Also called Sierra Leonean Creole, it is an offshoot of the various variations and dialects of English brought during the settlement of the Sierra Leone Colony, and due to its non-native origins is considered by the kingdom’s government as another national lingua franca together with Imperial English
[2] Mainly the descendants of the Nova Scotian Settlers, Jamaican Maroons and various liberated slaves who settled Sierra Leone from its inception and throughout the 19th century (during which a majority came from the United States, or escaped from there to Canada and then to Sierra Leone)
[3] Ergo, the mostly biracial descendants of the Albish settlers who came over the course of the 19th century
[4] The main school of Sunni Islamic jurisprudence in Africa, influenced by Sufism, it is marked by considering popular consensus
[5] A result of both exceedingly convincing missionaries coming to entrenched Muslim communities and the Islamic Reformation, Krio, sometimes called Faith of Sierra Leone, is a religion that mixes both local Islamic Faith with Protestant (mainly Anglican and Presbyterian) Christianity, as well as a good serving of folk beliefs. Some have called it “Islamic Christianity”, and it often gets exceedingly confusing when the matter of jurisprudence comes (as it uses both the Quran, the protestant Bible, the hadiths, and popular consensus as its sources)
[6] A bit of a strange appearance from the 19th century onward, they aren’t that numerous or widespread, and only really came into being with the Islamic Reformation, but are marked by generally seeing the mixing of both Christianity and Islam into a single set of beliefs and rituals, often possessing both the jurisprudence of the latter and the mysticism of the former
[7] Although some consider those numbers to be much higher, as often practitioners of other faiths also hold many folk beliefs or have their own faiths highly syncretized with said beliefs
[8] A direct descendant of Emperor Tewodros II of Ethiopia, whose only son, Prince Alemayehu, did not die at age 18 like OTL and had descendants, his son being later recognized as the nominal King of Gondar by Emperor Salomon IV of Ethiopia (in part due to his marriage to one of Alemayehu’s daughters, and in part due to his mother’s own prodding due to her sibling-like relationship with the Ethiopian prince). Theodore was actually born in Wiltshire, and set foot in Ethiopia for the first time when he went there for his daughter’s marriage in 1972
[9] That being the most commonly used name, others include fiefdoms, chiefdoms, states, native kingdoms and princely states

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Victoria II (Victoria Mary Albert Laetitia; born in 29 July 1931) is the Queen of Sierra Leone. The first monarch of Sierra Leone as an imperial kingdom of Albion, she ascended to the position on June 2nd, 1952, upon being enthroned by her father, Emperor Leonard of Albion. She is the first woman to be enthroned as the sole ruler of an imperial kingdom, and currently the oldest living enthroned monarch among the Albish imperial kingdoms.

Born on July 29th, 1931, in Windlesham Moor, as the sixth child and third daughter of the Prince and Princess of Wales (later Emperor Leonard and Empress Olivia), Victoria II was at birth the seventh in the line of succession to the Albish throne, a number that later rose to sixth upon the death of her grandfather in 1943.

Known for her liking of acting, singing and dancing since an early age, Victoria II was as a child and then a teenager known for her bright, humorous and high-spirited personality, something she has retained to this day. She met her future husband, Prince Theodore of Gondar, when both were 14 and on holiday in Bath, and commented over the years on the fact that it took them months to become comfortable around eachother, with the couple only officially entering a romantic relationship in 1949.

Married in 1950, when she was 19 and him 20, Victoria II was shortly thereafter made the Governor-General of Sierra Leone, becoming one of the youngest individuals ever appointed to rule over an albish territory. It is agreed that the appointing was in preparation to making her a monarch, which is most greatly shown by the fact that, upon her enthronement, which occurred less than a year into the Second World War, Victoria II only had to wait a week before her coronation, whose preparations had been completed months beforehand.

In Sierra Leone for nearly the entirety of the war, forcing her way in to attend Emperor Leonard’s funeral, Victoria II, during that time, mostly served as the sustainer of high spirits in Sierra Leone, which became one of the parts of the Albish Empire least affected by the war and served as a central point for the Axis’ military efforts and strategy. It was also during the war that Victoria II had her three eldest daughters, all born on a bunker beneath the Royal Palace of Freetown[1].

Possessing one of the longest reigns in history, Victoria II’s nearly seven decades as the ruler of Sierra Leone have been (as of 2020) marked by her serving as the neutral but friendly and caring head of the kingdom’s government, serving, in the simplest of terms, as the individual responsible for dealing with the complicated internal diplomacy of Sierra Leone. Although officially the sole holder of the executive power on the kingdom, Victoria II nonetheless has historically preferred to delegate the work as chief of the executive to her Foremost Ministers, more than once explaining how the needs of Sierra Leone’s governance are simply too great for a single individual, but has also not shied away from actively taking the reins of power, doing so in special during the political turmoil and instability of the late 20th century. Currently (as of 2020), Victoria II’s main FM is her daughter and heir, Leona, who was appointed to the position in 2012 and divides the power with four other ministers.

During her reign Victoria II has also seen a great development of Sierra Leone in its economy, infrastructure and life quality, with the kingdom having one of the lowest rates of poverty, illiteracy and child mortality in West Africa, and being marked for the fact that there is barely any difference in life quality between urban and rural environments. Although always complimentary of the large mining and agricultural sectors of Sierra Leone (which provide most of the kingdom’s exports), Victoria II is known for her spearheading the development of the kingdom’s services sectors, which provides work for over a third of the population and, interestingly, is mainly based around “exporting” work, as Sierra Leone is the main destination for outsourcing customer interaction services[2].

Known for having a kind and charming public persona, Victoria II is also known for her abhorrence of corruption, child labor and forced labor, the latter two of which caused her to nationalize large chunks of both the mining and cocoa farming industries of Sierra Leone while the former is considered the greatest factor behind the political unrest of the late 20th century, and whose response to is the reason why Victoria II will probably always be remembered for the “Nine Purges”.

By marriage an Ethiopian princess, although she and her husband visited Ethiopia for the first time in the 70s, Victoria II is the maternal great-grandmother of Emperor Menelik III of Ethiopia, through her third daughter, Princess Oriana, who died in 2012. With her husband Victoria II is the mother of four daughters, of whom three are married. Although originally believing to have become sterile after the complicated pregnancy of Princess Oriana, the queen gave birth to last child in 1969, 12 years after her beforehand-youngest daughter. Princess Cersei is most often known for her relationship with her parents and personal life, becoming infamous as a young woman for being a tabloid fodder, marrying her gay friend in 1995, divorcing from said gay friend in the year 2000, and marrying her mother’s 20-year-old then junior undersecretary.

[1] “Better be safe than sorry when air-raids are a thing”
[2] Some like to joke that Sierra Leone is one of the only places in the world where a subsistent farmer is also a call center worker, with most of them actually doing said job from home

 

[Peppe]

Hi. So, after a few days of thinking (and a draft I lost because I was down with the side effects of both my third COVID shot and a Flu shot for a time long enough for the draft to seemingly auto-delete), I decided to go with what I was thinking about for a while now and post the final installment in the Imperial Kingdoms trilogy without the infoboxes and pages on all monarchs directly descended from Empress Jessamine, so I can finally see myself move forward in my writings on this TL.
I'm gonna try and add them when I do an update on the "heirs" of the Albish Empire (meaning the children and descendants of Empress Charlotte), but, until then, they're not gonna be on this update (although since I'm keeping their family trees in the update there will be some information about them, and, to anyone interested, you all are completely free to ask questions about anything in relation to the trees and the monarchs, just because I can't at the moment put together a "wikipedia page" for them, I'm completely open to answering any questions about them)
Finally, I'd just like to say, Rest in Peace Betty White, you were amazing.
Victoria II of Sierra Leone, although having her appearance based on Betty, isn't dead ITTL even as of the TL's 2022. Also, I'm going to add that although Victoria is her visual clone, BW does have a personal equivalent ITTL (which I'm going to consider different from a "look-alike" like Victoria II), that equivalent is:
Marion Horatia White (1922-2015), a Californian general and war hero during WWII, she later became the 55th United States President (as California considers itself the US' direct continuation), although de facto she was California's 23rd President.

The Imperial Kingdoms, of the Creation of Empress Jessamine
Although by no means the longest in Albish history, between the creation of the 14th and 15th imperial kingdoms, there was a hiatus of 8 years, 11 months, and 11 days, during which the majority of the Second World War, as well as the death of Emperor Leonard and ascension of Empress Jessamine to the throne, occurred.
Due to possessing the second-longest reign in Albish history, Empress Jessamine is the Albish monarch with the highest number of enthronements under her name after Empress Victoria, with a total of eight imperial kingdoms being created during her decades on the throne. Uniquely to her, the enthronements during the empress reign saw a certain generational nature to them, with most of the imperial kingdoms created during Empress Jessamine's reign being done so either rather close to eachother or with decades between them, with the 16th and 17th kingdoms being created both on 1962 (and the 15th in 1961) while there was a gap of nearly 17 years between the 17th and 18th (with another of 22 years between the 20th and 21st).
Due in great part to the untimely death of Emperor Leonard, as well as some personal actions during the Second World War, Empress Jessamine's reign saw the first, second and, as of 2020, last, time an Albish monarch enthroned their siblings as monarchs of an imperial kingdom, with them all being in the span of the years of 1961 and 1962.
Empress Jessamine also was the only Albish monarch to posthumously enthrone someone, as, although she made all preparations beforehand, the empress died before the enthronement of Queen Agnes of Belize was made official, with the fact that it was the empress untimely death that stopped her from doing it being the reason why, although it was during the short reign of Empress Eleanor, the creation of Belize as an imperial kingdom is considered as being by Empress Jessamine.
Although not about the creation of imperial kingdoms, but directly in connection, it was also during the reign of Empress Jessamine that Oregon stopped being considered one and became a member-state of The Commonwealth. It was also during her reign, in its early years, that the Cockatrice Throne of New Dheli separated itself from the Imperial Throne in London, when her eldest younger sister, Euphemia, in following with decisions made in the aftermath of the Second Mutiny, was given the direct rule over the colonial territories in Bharat, in what was de facto a new and eccentric type of imperial kingdom.
And while not imperial kingdoms, it was also during the reign of Empress Jessamine that two other types of autonomous (or semi-autonomous) parts of Albion came into being, with the establishment of the few princely states directly under London and the creation of four of the five "imperial pseudo-kingdoms", territories directly under London that, while not de jure so, are de facto their own petty kingdoms of branches of the Imperial Family.

THE MARIANAS (Reino Unido de las Islas Marianas)
Officially the United Kingdom of the Mariana Islands
Capital in the Royal Town of Agaña, which has a population of 5.6 thousand inhabitants. The kingdom’s largest city is Saipán, with a population of 47 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has English, Spanish and Chamorro as its official languages, it also recognizes Tanapag[1], Carolinian, Palauan, Japanese, Cantonese, Korean, Malay, French and Tagalog as national minority languages
The kingdom has a total population of 225 thousand inhabitants, which are divided among a great variety of ethnic groups due in great part to immigration during the 19th and 20th centuries. The largest groups of the kingdom, who together make about 50% of the total population, are the Chamorro[2], the Marianans[3] and the Whites[4], while the remaining half are made of a wide mix of other Oceanian peoples (like Palauans and Carolinians) and people descended from non-European immigrants, mainly Japanese[5], Cantonese and Korean. The kingdom is a majority Christian state, with Roman Catholics making around 70% of the population, while Protestants and Buddhists make the largest religious minorities (at 15% and 6%), with the remaining percentage being made by believers of Native Religions, other Christian sects, Islam, Shintoism and Daoism
The Marianas are a constitutional absolute monarchy in the most traditional sense of the word, with the monarch holding power over the entirety of the kingdom’s government and having the Parliament of the Islands and the High Court of Agaña as subservient and often only-advisory organs in their administration
The Marianas were established on May 13th, 1961, as the fifteenth imperial kingdom, being the first to be created by Empress Jessamine. Its first monarch, the fourth son of Emperor Leonard, was beforehand the Duke of Sussex, having been created as such in 1955, and the Governor of the Marianas, having been appointed in 1958
The Marianas are marked for being the imperial kingdom with the shortest span of time between its territorial acquisition by Albion and its establishment, as the Mariana Islands were only officially taken from Spain in 1958
The Monarchs’ List​

1961-2013: Vincent (b.1931:d.2013), born Prince George Vincent of Wales
2013-2015: Henry IX (b.1956:d.2015), assassinated[6]
2015: Elizabeth II (b.1974:d.2015), ruled from January to June
2015: Mary III (b.1974:d.2015), daughter of Henry IX, ruled from June to September, deposed[7]
2015-2018: Richard IV (b.1975:d.2018), son of Henry IX, assassinated[8]
2018-2019: Henry X (b.1977), son of Henry IX, abdicated, currently The Prince-Abbot of Zarpana[9]
2019-: Anne II (b.1979), daughter of Henry IX
Heir apparent: Vincent, Crown Prince of the Marianas, Grand Duke of Saipán (b.2013) son of Anne II
2. Princess Maud of the Marianas, Duchess of Rota (b.2015) daughter of Anne II
3. Prince Victor of the Marianas, Duke of Tinian (b.2016) son of Anne II
4. Princess Evangeline of the Marianas, Countess of Tanapag (b.2001) legitimized daughter of Anne II
5. Prince Michael of the Marianas, Duke of Farallon (b.2001) son of Vincent[10]

[1] A Micronesian language descended from Chuukic, spoken in a single settlement in the island of Saipan, it is the only “protected language” of the Marianas, as it was almost always under the danger of getting extinct over the 20th century
[2] The indigenous people of the Mariana Islands
[3] The multiracial parts of the population descended from the Spanish, mainly with Chamorro or Philippine ancestry
[4] Mainly the descendants of the Albish, French and American immigrants from the 19th and 20th centuries
[5] Coming mostly from the western islands of Japan
[6] Poisoned at breakfast (possibly) by his own daughter and heir
[7] And later assassinated in her sleep
[8] Probably on the orders of his younger brother and successor (who has shown himself to be quite ruthless for a monk)
[9] Henry X only ruled long enough to be certain that his sister’s succession would be a smooth one, and then proceeded to abdicate and return to his previous position as the Prince-Abbot, which he has held since his early 30s (after becoming a monk when he was 27)
[10] Vincent of the Marianas loses to few other rulers of imperial kingdoms in relation to his marriages and offspring, marrying five times (and doing so in special in his later years) and having in total 17 legitimate children (and many more illegitimate ones)

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Anne II (Anne Caroline Girmhilde Sophia) is the seventh and current monarch of the Marianas, being their third reigning queen and the one among the current monarchs of imperial kingdoms to have most recently ascended to their throne (as of 2020).

Born to the Marianas Branch of the Windsor Dynasty, as the third daughter and youngest child of the Grand Duke of Saipán, the future Henry IX of the Marianas, and Marion FitzArthur-Windsor (of the Earls of Chesterfield), Anne II was, at birth, the eight in line to the thrones of the Marianas, coming after her father and siblings, and remainder on said position until King Vincent of the Marianas’ death in 2013. In 1997, at the age of 18, she was made “Countess of Tanapag” by her grandfather.

The youngest of her parents’ seven surviving children, Anne II was in no way expected to inherit the throne of the Marianas for much of her life, and during her youth became known for her involvement with motorcycle racing, although an unfortunate accident caused her retirement in 2001, as well as for entering the world of writing, becoming a novelist of reasonable renown during her 20s.

After five years together, Anne II had the plans for marrying her then boyfriend, the late James Santana-Ross, in 2002, and was pregnant when he died in a crash while racing, giving birth a few months later to the current Countess of Tanapag. Not in a scandal but grief-stricken, Anne II was convinced by her parents to leave the Marianas for a few years in the hopes of letting her go through mourning more easily, and moved to Colombia in 2003. Living on the country until 2009, during that time Anne entered a relationship with Sebastian Aquillar Escobar (the younger son of Chancellor Emilia Escobar), whom she met at a bar in Cali in 2005, and came back with him upon returning to the Marianas. In 2010 the two married, and have three children together.

Still a relatively minor royal upon her return, Anne became something of an underrated social darling in the Marianas during the early 2010s, in great part due to being the only one of her siblings to have a happy relationship and being the first among them to have children. Nonetheless, Anne II chose to remain uninvolved in the growing intrigues and tensions of the kingdom’s court, turning a blind eye while her siblings went for the other’s throats. In 2015 the then countess was in Hong Kong during most of the year’s chaos, returning in December of that year when her eldest brother had already begun his reign.

Not targeted by her brother during his time on the throne, Anne II remained on the sidelines publicly during that time, although, as Richard IV became increasingly paranoid and his mental faculties deteriorated, she was behind the scenes one of the main plotters behind the 2018 coup. Upon Henry X’s ascension, as a self-called “transitional king”, and her own rising to heir presumptive, Anne II became First Minister of the Marianas, a position she held until her ascension upon his abdication, in August 22nd, 2019.

Crowned three days later, Anne II hasn’t had (as of 2020) much time to show her “personality” as a ruler, and has mainly shown herself to be focused on bringing back stability in the kingdom, as well as investing in its dwindling tourism sector

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KIRIBATI
Officially the Kingdom of Kiribati of the Gilbert and Phoenix Islands
Capital in the City of Tarawa, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 65 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has English and Gilbertese (or Kiribati) as its official languages
The kingdom has a population of 112 thousand inhabitants. Of them a majority, at 96% of the population, are native Gilbertese (or I-Kiribati), with the other 4% being mostly Whites and Mixed-Race individuals descended from Albish immigrants; the population is overwhelmingly Christian, with 57% being Catholic and 40% Protestant[2], while the largest religious minority is the Baha’i Faith, whose followers make nearly 2% of the population
Kiribati is a semi-federative and constitutional absolute monarchy, with its monarch holding an overwhelming majority of control over all branches of government while, due to the spread-out nature of its territory, the kingdom’s local administrations are semi-autonomous from the central one
Kiribati was established on June 3rd, 1962, as the sixteenth imperial kingdom. Its first monarch, the sixth and youngest son of Emperor Leonard, never held a royal dukedom before his enthronement, and had been in a common law marriage since 1954
Kiribati possesses a single princely state within its territory, the High Chiefdom of Abemama, Aranuka and Kuria, who became an Albish protectorate during the 1890s and was later entered colonial Kiribati as a princely state
Kiribati is the most recently established imperial kingdom to not be under its first monarch
The Monarch, her Father and Her Offspring​

1962-1965: James VIII (b.1937:d.1965) born Prince James Godfrey of Wales
1965-: Hermione (b.1957) born Lady Hermione Elizabeth Marion FitzJames, “legitimized" in 1962[2]
Her husband, Prince Daniel of Orkney and of Hesse and by Rhine (b.1949)
1) Crown Princess Winifred Charlotte of Kiribati, Princess of Rawaki (b.1982) m. Prince Sakuhito Katsura of Japan (b.1982)

1) Prince Adele of Rawaki, Duke of Kanton (b.2002) m. Princess Magdalene of Abemama (b.1997)​

2) Prince John of Rawaki, Duke of Nikumaroro (b.2005)​

3) Princess Georgiana of Rawaki, Duchess of Orona (b.2007)​

2) Princess Theodora of Kiribati, Princess of Butaritari (b.1982) m. Prince Sebastian of Abemama (b.1979)

1) Princess Yolanda of Butaritari, Countess of Tikurere (b.2003)​

[1] Mostly Anglicans, with the remainder being mainly Seventh-day Adventists and Kiribati’s own branch of the Mormons
[2] Hermione’s parents were on a common-law marriage since 1954, but hadn’t ever actually gotten officially married by the time of his enthronement, with her being “legitimized” when they officially tied the knot shortly after James VIII’s enthronement

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Hermione (Hermione Elizabeth Marion; born in 5 May 1957) is the second and current monarch of Kiribati, being the kingdom’s only reigning queen and by far its longest-reigning monarch.

Born Hermione FitzJames, the daughter of the then Prince James of Albion and his common-law wife, Margaret Henfield, Hermione of Kiribati was, until the age of 5, officially illegitimate. Growing-up at Frogmore Cottage, Windsor, Hermione lived in the Home Islands until 1962, when James VIII was enthroned the monarch of Kiribati and her family moved there. A “royal bastard” for a few months until her parents’ marriage and her immediate legitimization, Hermione became heiress apparent at the age of 6.

Heiress apparent for only two years, Hermione became queen at the age of 8, when her father died from consumption. A child upon her ascension, the queen was under the regency of her uncle, and unofficial second parent[1], Reginald Henfield, First Minister since 1962 and Governor of the Gilbert Islands from 1960 to 1962.

Reaching majority in 1975, Hermione chose to extend her uncle’s regency for another seven years instead of immediately assuming the reins of government, going to the Home Islands to study at St. Andrews, leaving with a Master of Arts in Economics, and then entering Columbia University, where she left with a Bachelor of Science in Geography and Geology. During her time in Long Island, Hermione became known as a gregarious but study-focused person, who appeared only in main social events and some minor other occurrences[2].

It was during her years in university that Hermione of Kiribati met and married her consort, at the time of their first encounter a distant cousin eight years her senior, in leave from the Royal Navy to gain a degree in applied sciences. Meeting in 1980, the royal couple entered a relationship at the end of that year, and, after accidentally getting pregnant, the year after, having their twin daughters, princesses Winifred and Theodora, in early 1982.

Finishing her studies in 1982 itself, Hermione of Kiribati finally assumed full royal authority a year later, finishing her 18-years-long regency, although First Minister Henfield remained on that office until 1985, when he retired after over two decades as the partial or sole ruler of the kingdom.

Assuming power in 1975, as previously mentioned, Hermione reign began with the creation of the “Insular Maintenance Bureau” due to her education in geology, with the government division being responsible for safeguarding the stability and existence of the islands of Kiribati from erosion, soil liquefaction and sea-level rises above all else, a mission that expanded to the ecology of the islands in the 1990s after the Banaba Disaster. One of the queen’s most famous projects connected to the bureau is the Tarawa Seawall, considered one of the “Nine Wonders of Engineering”, whose building was finished on her Coral Jubilee.

Outside of nature-caused infrastructure projects, the queen also enacted a variety of social-based projects over the years, her most famous ones being the building of desalination plants on all inhabited islands, as Kiribati has a major lack of access to natural drinking water[3]; the introduction of government-backed sea farming, to diminish the need for imported foodstuffs; and the more recent investments in the building of artificial “islands” due to population growth.

Called “a considerate and agreeable woman” by a newsletter in her youth, the queen is known for being charming and easygoing, and outside of her projects she has mainly focused her reign on the matters of Kiribati’s economy and prosperity, being sometimes called the “backbone of tourism” on the kingdom due to her endeavors not only to establish it but also as the de facto poster-woman for the industry, which stands with fishing and fish-farming as the major sources of Kiribati’s economy.

A self-proclaimed “passable politician”, the queen has often delegated that side of ruling to either her husband or her children, with Crown Princess Winifred in particular being often called the “eminence in shadow” of Kiribati. In relation to her family, Hermione is known for seemingly being “always on the honeymoon phase” in her marriage but having a relatively more strained relationship with her daughters, in that case due to having, in special in their youth, a rather strong “mother-hen syndrome”[4]

[1] James VIII made a rather poor effort while he was alive of hiding the fact that he was in a relationship with both Henfield siblings, actually beginning said relationship with Reginald before being acquainted with Margaret through her brother
[2] Hermione of Kiribati did cause a bit of a fuss when she entered and won an eating competition, and following that became a semi-recurrent appearance in the “circuits” of the sport in Long Island (when asked how she never gained weight in that process, the queen admitted to having an “unnaturally fast” metabolism)
[3] With Kiribati making a small amount of money from the selling of the brine produced by desalination projects, as it is considerably less contaminated than most wastewater brine
[4] Used in Albion mainly to refer to nigh-suffocating overprotective parents

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SEYCHELLES (Royaume des Îles des Seychelles)
Officially the Kingdom of the Islands of Seychelles
Capital in the Port of Victoria, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 35 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has English, French and Kreol[1] as its official languages
The kingdom has a population of 135 thousand inhabitants. Of them, the majority (at around 88%) are Seychellois Creoles[2], while the remaining population is mainly divided among those of British[3], French[4], Chinese[5] and Bharati[6] ancestry. The kingdom is majority Christian (at around 89%) with about 76% of the population identifying as Catholic, the largest religious minority is Anglicanism, at just over 8%, while 5% of the population follow other denominations; the remaining 11% are made mainly of Hindus, Muslism and Buddhists
The Seychelles are an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style under a military authority, with its monarch holding the executive power and direct control of the local military, which, in special the fleet of the Imperial Navy, holds control over part of the legislative and judiciary powers together with the Parliament of the Seychelles and the High Court of Victoria
The Seychelles were established on October 21st, 1962, as the seventeenth imperial kingdom. Its first (and current) monarch, the fourth daughter and tenth child of Emperor Leonard, never held a dukedom before her enthronement, but was beforehand the acting (later official) Governor of the Seychelles since 1956 and Rear-Admiral of the Indian Ocean Fleet since 1960, and had been married since 1960 to the 3rd Duke of Bolton[7]
The Monarch and her Family​

Since 1962: Mary III (b.1938), born Princess Mary Adelaide of Wales, the first and currently only monarch of the country
Her late husband, Lord Arminston Edward Algar Orde-Powlett, 3rd Duke of Bolton and 8th Baron Bolton (b.1940:d.2015)
1) John Victor of the Seychelles, 4th Duke of Bolton, Duke of Mamelles and Prince of Mahé (b.1962)
m. Lay Madison Abigail Wyczenski Clunies-Ross (b.1962)

1) Prince Charles of Mahé, Duke of Farquhar and Marquess of Basingstoke (b.1990) m. Lady Lorette Citoyen (b.1990)​

1) Princess Arabella of Mamelles, Countess of Bancs de Sable (b.2017)​

2) Princess Margot of Mamelles (b.2018)​

3) Princess Lucille of Mamelles (b.2019)​

4) Princess Olympe of Mamelles (b.2020)​

2) Prince Winston of Mahé, Duke of La Digue (b.1991) m. Lady Philippa de Laborde Goldsmith de Monpezat (b.1990)​

3) Princess Marion of Mahé (b.1999)​

2) Princess Clementine of the Seychelles (b.1963)
m. Crown Prince Mael Jasamanta of Assam, Maharaja of Balpara, Raja of Jaintia and Lord of Shillong (b.1956)

1) Adrian of Assam, Crown Prince of Jaintia and Archduke of Kamrup (b.1983) m. Princess Kishori of Manipur (b.1983)​

1) Prince Francis of Assam, Prince of Magaldai (b.2005)​

2) Princess Adelaide of Assam (b.2006)​

3) Prince Octavius of Assam (b.2010)​

2) Prince Nathaniel of Assam (b.1985) m. Princess Maria Priyanka de Bourbon, of Bhopal (b.1985)​

1) Princess Thomasin of Assam (b.2008)​

2) Princess Diana of Assam (b.2012)​

3) Prince Charles of Assam (b.2015)​

[1] Also known as Seychellois Creole, it is a French creole language marked by often having words be abbreviated, as well as possessing some adopted words and terms from Albish English. It is known for being the language in which the Anthem of the Seychelles, Koste Seselwa, is written
[2] Descended from the slave transported from Mauritius when the Seychelles were colonized, being the last slaves to be introduced to the Indian Ocean, they are mainly of East African and Malagasy origins, although a considerable minority also possess Albish, Bharati, French or even Chinese ancestry as well
[3] Descended almost entirely from post-Napoleonic settlers, which came mainly from Northwestern England, the Scottish Highlands and Wales; they are the majority ethnic group of the Farquhar and Cosmoledo atolls
[4] Descended almost entirely from the pre-Napoleonic French colonists, most descend from the initial 15 white settlers from Mauritius that first came in 1770
[5] Originated from Chinese immigrants who arrived from Mauritius in 1886, being originally mostly vanilla farmers, the population is descended from them and from relatives brought over from China over the following decades (being mostly of Cantonese and Hakka origins)
[6] Originally descended from South-Bharati/Dravidian slaves and coolies brought during the time of the Seychelles as a colony of France, the majority are of a more recent Bharati origins, mainly coming as workers during the late 19th and early 20th centuries
[7] The Dukes of Bolton of the second creation (1935), they are the female-line descendants of the dukes of the first creation (through the natural daughter of the 5th duke), having been before the dukedom already on the peerage as Barons Bolton – created in 1797 for Thomas Orde-Powlett, the 5th duke’s natural-son-in-law –, with the future 6th Baron Bolton, Nigel Amyas Orde-Powlett, being created duke in 1935 after his father, the 5th baron, declined the peerage (the 5th baron had been, before inheriting his peerage, a respected MP during the early 20th century, and had been made Lord Lieutenant of the North Riding of Yorkshire shortly before the offer of a dukedom)

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Mary III (Mary Adelaide Margaret Jane, born in 7 September 1938) is the Queen of the Seychelles. The first monarch of the islands as an imperial kingdom of Albion, she ascended to the position on October 21st, 1962, upon being enthroned by her sister, Empress Jessamine of Albion. She is one of the three rulers of an imperial kingdom to be enthroned by their sibling, being currently the last one living among Empress Jessamine’s siblings enthroned by her.

Born on September 7th, 1931, in Gosford Park, as the tenth child and fourth daughter of the Prince and Princess of Wales (later Emperor Leonard and Empress Olivia), Mary III was at birth the eleventh in the line of succession to the Albish throne. Like only a few other imperial princes and princesses, her birth was a complete surprise, occurring when the future emperor and empress were attending a shooting party at a country estate, and was doubly surprising due to occurring only a few hours after the murder of the party’s host, Sir William McCordle, 1st Baronet[1].

Known for being energetic and quick-witted since childhood, as well as for having a love for the sea, sailing, and sport fishing, Mary III first expressed her desire to become a sailor as a child, being recorded loudly declaring her ambitious at her 7th birthday party. Entering the Royal Naval College, Osborne, as a 12-year-old in 1950, Mary III remained there even after the beginning of the Second World War, holding her ground in her decision to enter the Royal Navy, which she officially did at the age of 16 upon graduation. During her time at Osborne, Mary III also showed a great interest and liking for acting, being a part of the college’s “theatre association”.

Serving on WWII from 1954 onwards, being deployed to the Indian Ocean and seeing direct action in the Maldives, Seychelles, and the Malay Arch[2], Mary III ended-up becoming the acting governor of the Seychelles in 1956, taking command out of necessity during the Second Chinese Offensive and ending up remaining on the position afterwards. De facto forced out of frontline duty by her new charge, Mary III remained as acting governor until 1958, when she was officially appointed to the position, and remained as such until her enthronement.

Never officially retiring from active service, Mary III spent the remainder of the war as the de facto administrator of basically the center point of the Axis’ supply lines in the Indian Ocean, as well as their main retreat, rest and triage point. Although never elevated in rank through the war (mainly due to having more pressing matters), Mary III was retroactively done so in 1960, when she was elevated to the rank of Rear-Admiral in the Indian Ocean Fleet for her service; in 1965 the queen was made a Vice-Admiral, and finally became a semi-honorary Admiral in 1978.

Meeting while at Osborne, but only beginning a relationship in the final years of the Second World War after he became her personal secretary, Mary III finally married in 1960 to Arminston Edward Orde-Powlett, who that same year had become the 3rd Duke and 8th Baron of Bolton. The two remained married for nearly 55 years until the Duke Consort’s death in 2015, having two children together.

Enthroned in October 21st, 1962, the queen was originally planned to be enthrone in 1958, only a few months after the end of WWII, but her own wishes to wait until the rebuilding efforts in the war’s aftermath were completed, and later her continuous attempts to convince the Duke Consort of accepting to become her co-monarch, caused Mary III’s enthronement to be delayed for four years. Due to the time of waiting, plans for her acclamation[3] were already completed by the time of the enthronement, with the ceremony occurring less than a week later in November 1st.

Completing 58 years on the throne in 2020, Mary III’s reign has been a relatively stable one, being marked by the strange contrast between the kingdom’s status as a “glorified naval station”, serving as both the core of the Royal Navy’s control on the Indian Ocean and the headquarters of the fight against piracy in its waters, and its fame as center for tourism on East Africa as much as for being one of the most developed countries in the continent.

Often characterized as a “benevolent dictator”, Mary III has seen her fair share of discontent and dissention during her reign, commanding Seychelles through five failed coup attempts over the decades, the first one, occurring in 1977, being famous for the fact that its leader, the socialist France-Albert René, ended up being later pardoned and made her First Minister, serving on the position for nearly two decades and becoming a personal friend of the queen. Often commented on the strange contrast between her semi-military rule and her kind and motherly image, Mary III is known for having only gone “out of character” a few times during her reign, the most infamous being in 1981 during the “Angela Crisis”, a failed white supremacist coup and insurrection that saw her go all-out with the trappings of a dictator. Ever since the queen is known for her no-quarter policy in relation to white supremacism, most recently shown during the aftermath of Empress Eleanor’s assassination.

Known for often trying to foster good relations between Seychelles and the imperial kingdoms on Bharat, Mary III is currently (as of 2021) one of the monarchs of an imperial kingdom of Albion with the closest connection to the line of succession of another one, her daughter and younger child, Princess Clementine, being set to become Queen consort of Assam in the near future

[1] A interesting tale, often compared to one of Baroness Christie’s novels, the man, a first-generation baronet, was both poisoned and stabbed and almost all of his guests and relatives had some reason to murder him (the man was of quite an unagreeable disposition and most people at Gosford Park at the time either loathed or deeply disliked him).
The culprit of the murder was Sir William’s housekeeper, Helena Wilson, who was later revealed to have done so by poisoning the baronet so as to make sure her son’s only crime was to have stabbed a corpse. For, you see, one of the guest’s (Sir William’s brother-in-law) valet, Robert Parks, was actually the baronet’s illegitimate son, forced to an orphanage by him after Mrs. Wilson, who had been a worker on the baronet’s factory and basically been coerced to have relations with him, gave birth.
Although Mrs. Wilson was initially arrested for the crime, her trial, which saw the revelation of the convoluted tale of the baronet’s murder mainly by the shocking testimony of Gosford Park’s cook (Mrs. Laura Croft nee Wilson, whom was actually Mrs. Wilson for-long-estranged sister (their relationship having rekindled after the murder), and who also had a child by the baronet, and had been forced out of work at his factory after she refused to give them up to adoption), ended with the woman being given an imperial pardon, as although she was judged guilty (as it was a trial more for the decision of her sentence, as Mrs. Wilson had been arrested after confessing to the murder), the circumstances of the murder resulted on the jury actually declaring that “a pardon would be considered acceptable” on their judgement, which was passed by the Crown after a intervention by the then Prince of Wales in her favor.
Although forever estranged from her son (they met periodically, and she did have a closer relationship with his children), Mrs. Wilson lived a relatively well-off life in the years following her trial, being offered the position of housekeeper at Windlesham Moor shortly after her pardon and receiving a grace-and-favour apartment in St James’s Palace after her retirement.
[2] Albish nickname for the outer shores of the Malay Archipelago, also including the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, it has come to signify the northeastern parts of the Indian Ocean to the Albish
[3] Mary III declined having a coronation, and instead had a ceremony that was a mix between a Royal Navy award and the acclamation of the Portuguese monarch

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NATAL (Umbuso WaseNatali | Koninkryk van Natal)
Officially the Kingdom of Natal
Capital in the Royal City of Pietermaritzburg, also the kingdom’s second-largest city, with a population of 1.7 million inhabitants. The kingdom’s largest city is Port Natal (or Durban), with a population of 4.2 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Imperial English, Natalia English[1], Zulu and Afrikaans as its official languages
The kingdom has a total population of around 10.5 million inhabitants, marked by migration and colonization through the 19th and early 20th centuries. The majority of the population, at 51%, are Coloured (or Biracial)[2], with the second and third largest groups being Black Africans[3] at 28% and Whites (divided between Boer[4] and Britannic[5]) at 11%, while peoples of South (mainly Bharati[6]) and East Asian (mainly Vietnamese[7]) descent make most of the remaining 10%. The kingdom is majority Christian, with 82% of the population identifying as Protestant[8] and 5% as Catholic, while the largest minorities are Folk Religions, at 8%, and Hinduism, at 3%
Natal is an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, but nearly veers into being a constitutional absolute monarchy, with its monarch holding the executive power as well as having a wide range of control over the legislative and judiciary, who nominally are under the prerogative of the Natalian Parliament and the High Court of Pietermaritzburg
Natal was established on July 5th, 1979, as the eighteenth imperial kingdom. Its first (and current) monarch, the second son and fourth child of Empress Jessamine, never held a royal dukedom and was unmarried before his enthronement, marrying on June 25th in a ceremony that doubled as his coronation​

[1] A dialect of English marked by having the influence form both Afrikaans, Xhosa and Zulu
[2] This is a classification made by various groups, including pre-colonial mixed-race Trekboers, mixed-race descendants of post-1850s white settlers and natives (the largest), and mixed-race descendants of post-1850s white settlers and Bharati laborers
[3] Mainly ethnic Zulus, but with small Sotho and Xhosa minorities as well
[4] The smaller of the two groups (although not by a wide margin), they migrated to the region during the early 19th century and established the Natalia Republic, an almost anarchically disunited Boer State that lasted from 1839 to 1852, when it was annexed by the then British Empire and turned into the Colony of Natal
[5] Mainly English and Welsh in origins, interestingly, this classification also includes those of mixed white and East Asian descent
[6] Descended mainly from Tamil indentured laborers who settled after the expiration of their contracts, brought to Natal by the boom of its sugar, coffee, tea, arrowroot and cotton industries during the mid-19th century, interestingly, this classification often also includes those of mixed Bharati and African ancestry
[7] Descended mainly from farmer immigrants from Cochinchina who came during the late 19th centuries
[8] It has some level of ethnic division, with those more of Boer or Dutch ancestry being mainly Calvinist or Lutheran while those more connected to Albion are mainly Presbyterian and Anglican

The Monarch and His Family
Including: Him, his Consorts, his Lovers, Mistresses, and Paramours, and their offspring, Legitimate or Legitimized​

Since 1979: Charles III (b.1958) born Prince Charles Francis of Albion, the first and currently only monarch of the country
His first consort, married from 1979 to 1985, Princess Anticlea Venakatha of Kandy (b.1958: d.1985) (a)

1) Duncan, Crown Prince of Natal, Grand Prince of Alasia, Archduke of Laverton and Menzies, etc. (b.1980)​

His wife, married in 1999, Princess Marianne of Namibia, Air Marshal (b.1980)​

His mistress, from 1995 to 1999, Dame Georgiana Strummond (b.1997) (a)​

His mistress, from 2005 to 2011, Lady Sophia Spencer, Sergeant (b.1975: d.2011) (b)​

1a) Maximillian, Duke of Buffelskloof (b.1997)​

2a) Maribelle, Lieutenant-Colonel (b.1999) m. The Hon. Olenna Stanhope-Windsor (b.1999)​

3) Lulach, Hereditary First Prince, Prince-Duke of Tugela and Kranskop (b.1999)​

m. Princess Catherine of the Transvaal (b.1985) m. Suzaku Takatsukasa, 5th Prince Kururugi (b.2000)​

1) Princess Ophelia of Tugela and Kranskop (b.2019)​

2) Prince Stephen of Tugela and Kranskop (b.2020)​

3) Prince Ciel of Tugela and Kranskop (b.2020)​

4) Louis, Prince-Duke of Laingsburg (b.1999) m. Countess Ingrid von und zu Pappenheim (b.1996)​

5) Euphemia, Duchess of Verhardingveld (b.2000)​

6) Carine, Duchess of Kleinsee (b.2002)​

7) Natalia, Duchess of Kenhardt (b.2003)​

8) Roland, Duke of Creighton (b.2003)​

9b) Faramond, Marquess of Ooshof (b.2008)​

2) Guinevere, First Princess of the Realm of Natal (b.1983) m. Julius Kingsley, the Duke of Nymans (b.1999)​

1) Lady Alice Kingsley-Windsor-vanNatal, Countess of Gormfield (b.2020)​

His second consort, married from 1987 to 2004, Lady Diana Spencer, 2nd Baroness Spencer of Port Natal (b.1964) (b)

1) Andrew, Prince Consort of Halifax (b.1988) m. Princess Johanna Mountbatten, 5th Duchess of Halifax (b.1988)​

1) Prince George of Halifax and Natal (b.2018)​

2) Princess Matilda of Halifax and Natal (b.2018)​

2) Alfred, Third Prince of the Realm of Natal (b.1989)​

3) Schneizel of Natal, First Minister of the Realm, Duke of Iddlingshire (b.1993)​

1) Legitimized Prince Louis of Iddlingshire (b.2015)​

2) Legitimized Princess Cora of Iddlingshire (b.2018)​

4) Diana of Natal, Second Princess of the Realm (b.1994: d.2016)​

5) Clovis I, King jure uxoris of Bourbon (b.1996) m. Marie II Randrianarisoa, Queen of Bourbon (b.1996)​

1) Prince Philippe Razafindramary, Dauphin of Bourbon (b.2020)​

2) Prince Alexandre Randriamahazomana, Duke of Saint Gilles (b.2020)​

3) Prince Chlothar Randriamihaja, Duke of Bras-Panon (b.2020)​

His third consort, married from 2005 to 2007, Princess Carine Windsor-FitzLouise-Gore of Arran (b.1975: d.2007) (c)

1) Castor, (b.2005)​

2) Pollux, Duke of Dundashire/Dundas (b.2005) m. Annabeth Franklyn (b.2004)​

1) Prince Arcadius of Dundas (b.2020)​

3) Eurydice, (b.2007)​

His fourth consort, married from 2010 to 2018, Lady Martha Frances McMahon (b.1982) (d)

1) Mathilda, (b.2011)​

2) Violet, (b.2013)​

3) Sybil, (b.2014)​

4) Evelyn, (b.2016)​

5) Jocelyn, (b.2016)​

His fifth and current consort, lover since 2015, married since 2018, Prince Frederick of Albany and Battenberg (b.1997) (e)

1) Elizabeth, (b.2020)​

2) Kathryn, (b.2020)​

3) Marion, (b.2020)​

4) Henry, (b.2020)​

His lover, from 1973 to ≈1978, Samuel Evelyn McPherson-Browne-Ashford, Consort of Appomattox (b.1958: d.2020) (*)
His lover, from 1973 to ≈1978, Regina Marion Browne-Ashford, 1st Duchess of Appomattox (b.1958: d.2013) (*)

1) Georgiana, Most Lovingly Remembered (b.1975: d.1978)​

2) Theodore, (b.1976) m. Dona Josefina de Oliveira e Daun de Lencastre, 11th/3rd Duchess of Aveiro (b.1971)​

1) Dom Sebastião Augusto de Natal e Lencastre (b.2001)​

2) Dom José Jorge de Natal e Lencastre (b.2002)​

His lover and later mistress, from 1975 to 1979 and 1985 to 1993, Dame Theresa Jung-ok Kim, 1st Baronetess (b.1952) (*)

1) Vincent, 1st Duke of New Hereford (b.1988: d.2019) m. Princess Jane Yasmin of Kiloa (b.1989)​

1) Victoria, 2nd Duchess of New Hereford (b.2011)​

2) Princess Fatima of New Hereford and Kiloa (b.2013)​

3) Princess Leonie of New Hereford and Kiloa (b.2014)​

His lover and later mistress, from 1976 to 1990, Princess Alexandra Marinovna Yusupova (b.1955) (*)

1) Tatiana, Countess of Canemard (b.1979)​

Her first consort, from 2002 to 2009, Prince Heinrich XLIV. Reuss zu Köstritz (b.1978) (a)​

Her second consort, since 2013, Buhle Baone (b.1979) (b)​

1a) Prince Heinrich V. Reuss zu Köstritz of Canemard, Viscount Cadbury (b.2005)​

2a) Prince Heinrich VI. Reuss zu Köstritz of Canemard (b.2005)​

3b) Princess Alexandra of Canemard (b.2016)​

2) Konstantin, Prince Yusupov of Natal (b.1983) m. Count Raphaël Etienne de Polignac (b.1987)​

1) Princess Xenia Konstantinovna Yusupov (b.2017)​

2) Princess Olga Konstantinovna Yusupov (b.2019)​

3) Vasily, Most Lovingly Remembered (1984)​

4) Ekaterina, Lady of Kériolet (b.1987) m. Bernard Clavering-Cowper, Duke of Fordwich-Nassau (b.1987)​

1) Lord Charles Arthur de Grey Nassau Clavering-Cowper, Earl Cowper (b.2012)​

2) Lady Elizabeth Madeleine de Grey Nassau Clavering-Cowper (b.2014)​

3) Lady Brigitte Jane de Grey Nassau Clavering-Cowper (b.2015)​

4) Lord Max Frederick de Grey Nassau Clavering-Cowper (b.2017)​

5) Lady Henrietta Nathalia de Grey Nassau Clavering-Cowper (b.2018)​

6) Lady Louisa May de Grey Nassau Clavering-Cowper (b.2019)​

His lover, from 1978 to 1980, Elizabeth Porter Clayton, by marriage Baroness of Cardinham (b.1957) (*)

1) Regina, Duchess of Emnambithi (b.1980) m. Princess Sonia Gugulethu of Zulu (b.1981)​

1) Prince George of Emnambithi (b.2018)​

His lover, from 1985 to 1987, The Hon. Sir Francis Emmanuelle Barker (b.1954: d.2016) (*)

1) Theobald, Duke of Edinburgh of the Seven Seas, Lord Administrator of Tristan da Cunha (b.1986)​

His first consort, from 2009 to 2010, The Hon. Sophia Bonham Carter, Commodore (b.1985) (a)​

His second consort, from 2012 to 2014, from Madame Marie Anaïs Grimaldi, of Toudon (b.1986) (b)​

His third consort, since 2016, Sir Jonas Hengji Xiang, KCVO (b.1986) (c)​

1b) Lucas Melchior, Earl of Pormfrost (b.2014)​

His paramour, from 1988 to 2007, Henry Pieter van Schoor, Admiral, Duke of Nyberg (b.1964) (*)

1) Richard, Duke of Grootvloer (b.1991) m. Princess Nguyễn Phương Liên of Vietnam (b.1989)​

2) Friedrich, Duke of Lidgetton (b.1992) m. Anders Stromm du Bloch-Carcenac (b.1989)​

3) Isobel, Countess of Houtleih (b.2002) m. Sir Raphael Boyce-Mthembu (b.2002)​

His mistress, from 1989 to 1992, Victoria Gutiérrez de la Concha y Carvadales, 7th Marchioness of Havana, Grandee (b.1965) (*)

1) Cornelia, Major-General, Baroness of Guadalest (b.1993)​

His mistress, from 1989 to 1995, Carole Ntombizanele Stairs-Jones, 3rd Countess Jones-Baskin (b.1961) (*)

1) Claire, Princess Takamado (b.1992) m. Renya, Prince Takamado of Japan (b.1992)​

1) Princess Sayako of Takamado (b.2017)​

2) Prince Kuniie of Takamado (b.2018)​

3) Prince Shigejiro of Takamado (b.2019)​

2) Sebastian, Prince of Valguarnera (b.1995) m. Vittoria Alliata, 15th Princess of Villafranca, etc. (b.1950)​

1) Princess Teresa van Natal Alliata di Villafranca (b.2018)​

2) Princess Giovanna van Natal Alliata di Villafranca (b.2018)​

3) Princess Raphaela van Natal Alliata di Villafranca (b.2018)​

4) Prince Antonio Francesco van Natal Alliata di Villafranca, Duke of Salaparuta (b.2018)​

5) Princess Maria Immacolata van Natal Alliata di Villafranca (b.2020)​

6) Prince Giuseppe Antonio van Natal Alliata di Villafranca (b.2020)​

His lover, from 1991 to 1996, The Hon. Feodora Marbury (b.1966: d.2011) (*)

1) Nathaniel, Duke of Nuweburg (b.1994)​

His first consort, from 2014 to 2016, Lady Joanna Boipelo Mosetsanagape (b.1991: d.2016) (a)​

His second consort, since 2019, Lady Suzanna Masego Mosetsanagape (b.1993) (b)​

1a) Princess Catrina Sethunya of Nuweburg (b.2016)​

2a) Prince Moritz Tshepo of Nuweburg (b.2016)​

3a) Prince Andreas Thabang of Nuweburg (b.2016)​

His lover, from 1992 to 1995, HIH Humphrey Maynwaring Frowseloure, Earl of Edgerley (b.1963) (*)

1) Elsa, Grand Duchess of Tilea (b.1993) m. Prince Alexander of Tilea (b.1991) (a) m. Gerhard Fernandes (b.1993) (b)​

1a) Princess Mabel of Tilea, Lady of Miragliano (b.2012)​

2a) Prince Mason of Tilea, Hereditary Grand Duke (b.2012)​

3b) Princess Simone of Tilea, Lady of Pavonia (b.2020)​

2) Lucille, Hereditary Countess of Edgerley (b.1994) m. Prince Natsuhiko Tokugawa of Mildian (b.1994)​

3) Julia, Duchess of Shemya (b.1994) m. HS Grayson Silvestrov Milkovich (b.1993)​

His lover and later mistress, from 1993 to 1998, The Hon. Charlotte Baskerville-Canty (b.1979) (*)

1) Addam, Most Lovingly Remembered (b.1995: d.2016)​

2) Magnus, Count of Andrade (b.1998) m. Enriqueta Martinez de Irujo y Fitz-James, 13th Duchess of Montoro (b.1999)​

1) Doña Maria Adriana FitzRoy-Windsor y Martinez de Irujo, 20th Marchioness of the Carpio, Grandee (b.2018)​

2) Doña Cayetana FitzRoy-Windsor y Martinez de Irujo, 25th Countess of Lemos (b.2019)​

3) Doña Brianda Helena FitzRoy-Windsor y Martinez de Irujo, 23rd Countess of Villalba (b.2020)​

His mistress, from 1994 to 1997, Lady Florence Spencer-Churchill (b.1967: d.2014) (*)

1) Felix Winston, Prince of Mindelheim (b.1997) m. Maria Franziska von Osten-Sacken-Bogdanov (b.1995)​

His lover, from 1994 to 2001, Bernard Raubenheimer Pretorius, 1st Earl of Veermark (b.1971: d.2001) (*)
His lover, from 1994 to 2001, Ottoline Raubenheimer Pretorius, 1st Baroness Everyngstal (b.1971: d.2001) (*)

1) Saartje, (b.1997) m. Piers Butler, 1st Duke, 9th Marquess and 27th Earl of Ormonde (b.1993)​

1) Lord Oliver Tyler Butler, 8th Earl of Ossory and Viscount Mountgarret (b.2016)​

2) Lady Siobhan Julia Butler (b.2019)​

2) Lavinia, Baroness Fitzroy of Estone, Most Lovingly Remembered (b.1999: d.2018)​

3) Bertrand, Duke of Nekveldring and 2nd Earl of Veermark (b.1999) m. Margaret Ntobeko Ndobe-Lawne (b.1998)​

4) Jacob, Earl of Geselskap (b.2000)​

5) Adele, Countess of Estone (b.2001) m. Clara Madstone (b.2000) (a)​

1) Lady Jane of Estone (b.2015)​

2) Lord James of Estone (b.2019)​

His mistress, from 1996 to 2001, Madam Margaret Evangeline Leask, Maid of Leask (b.1974: d.2007) (*)

1) Kenneth, (b.1998)​

His lover, from 1997 to 2000, The Hon. Dame Kholiwe Victoria Nqakula, 1st Baronetess (b.1973) (*)

1) Nathalie, (b.1999)​

His lover, from 1998 to 2002, Dame Ariana Bhekifa Dlamlenze Mulder, 1st Baronetess (b.1970: d.2012) (*)

1) Walburga, (b.2001)​

2) Antonia, (b.2002)​

His lover, from 1998 to 2003, Grossbürgerin Anna von Gravenreuth-Jauch of Hamburg (b.1974: d.2003) *)

1) Wulfric, Lord of Wellingsbüttel (b.1999) m. Balthasar Friedrich von Campenhausen (b.1997)​

2) Wolfgang, Lord of Schönhagen (b.2001) m. Madison Staples Lewis (b.2001)​

1) Annelise, (b.2019)​

3) Wilhelmina, Lady of Krummbek (b.2002)​

His lover, from 2001 to 2009, Marieke van den Heever, 1st Baroness of Slymaford (b.1969: d.2013) (*)

1) Johannes, 2nd Baron of Slymaford (b.2003)​

2) Samantha, (b.2004)​

3) Ottoline, (b.2007)​

4) Lionel, (b.2009)​

His paramour, from 2002 to 2015, Sir Charles Ambrose Fitzwilliam O’Brien, 1st Earl of Phumulplek (b.1955: d.2015) (*)

1) Marcus, 2nd Earl of Phumulplek (b.2002) m. Theresa Abusiswe McMahon (b.2000)​

1) Lord Neil vanNatal-McMahon-Windsor, Viscount Murgaut (b.2020)​

His paramour, from 2003 to 2014, Hochwohlgeboren Pascal Rudolph von Gravenreuth, Freiherr (b.1988) (*)

1) Reinrich, (b.2007)​

2) Ludwig, (b.2007)​

His lover, from 2005 to 2011, Adelaide Scawen Wyndham, by courtesy Baroness Leconfield (b.1972) (*)

1) Philippa, (b.2008)​

2) Peter, (b.2010)​

3) Margaret, (b.2012)​

His mistress, from 2007 to 2015, Dame Mary Bhekithemba Tyali van Der Knaap (b.1980) (*)

1) Prudence (b.2008)​

2) Theophania, (b.2011)​

3) Augusta, (b.2013)​

4) Henrietta, (b.2015)​

5) Credence, (b.2015)​

His lover, from 2010 to 2015, The Rt. Hon. Justice Violet Thu Nguyen, Baroness Nguyen of Walden (b.1966) (*)

1) Benjamin, (b.2011)​

2) Cyrus, (b.2011)​

His lover, from 2011 to 2018, The Hon. Dame Isobel Dorothea O’Brien, 1st Baronetess (b.1991) (*)

1) Alexander, (b.2013)​

2) Flora, (b.2014)​

3) Saoirse, (b.2015)​

His mistress, from 2012 to 2015, Dame Ntsoaki Hoyle Battersby, 1st Baronetess (b.1980) (*)

1) Alec, (b.2012)​

2) Samuel, (b.2013)​

His lover, from 2013 to 2019, Sir Michael Thandisizwe Matshoba, 1st Baronet (b.1994) (*)

1) James, (b.2016)​

His lover, from 2015 to 2017, Dame Agetha Caaren Opperman, 1st Baronetess (b.1994) (*)

1) Thomasin, (b.2017)​

His mistress, since 2014, Sabelo Nonkosi Cohen, Countess of Vunksdorf (b.1992) (*)

1) Guilford, (b.2014)​

2) Sophia, (b.2016)​

3) Paul, (b.2019)​

His mistress, since 2016, Maline Lindelani Waterboer, Countess of Swanton (b.1995) (*)

1) Nicholas, (b.2018)​

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QUEBEC (Royaume du Québec)
Officially the Kingdom of Quebec
Capital in the City of Quebec, also the kingdom’s second-largest city, with a population of 550 thousand inhabitants. The kingdom’s largest city is Montreal, with a population of 1.7 million inhabitants
The kingdom has English[1] and Québécois French[2] as its official languages
The kingdom has a total population of 8.5 million inhabitants, a majority of ~87% of whom self-identify as Québécois[3], while the remaining 13% are divided mostly among Other Europeans[4], First Nations[5], and Francophone Immigrants[6]. It is a majority Roman Catholic population, at around 87%, with only 5% identifying as being of other Christian denominations, while there are also visible Jewish[7] (3.6%) and Muslim (1.5%) minorities
Quebec is nominally an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with the monarch delegating most of her executive powers to her Private Secretary and intervening only when necessary, while the legislative and judiciary powers are held by the Parliament of Quebec and the Quebecois High Court
Quebec was established on May 6th, 1982, as the nineteenth imperial kingdom. Its first (and current) monarch, the third daughter and fifth child of Empress Jessamine, never held a royal dukedom before her enthronement, which occurred only days after her marriage
Unlike all other imperial kingdoms, Quebec was established as an imperial kingdom in the process of being separate from a larger contiguous territory of the Albish Empire, being until 1982 a Province of Canada and even after its establishment Quebec is highly interconnected with its previous state
The Monarch and her Family​

Since 1982: Anne II (b.1959) born Princess Anne Catherine of Albion, the first and currently only monarch of the country
Her late first husband, married in 1982, Sir Carlisle Wyndham-Burns (b.1958:d.1997)(a)
Her second husband, married in 2001, Nathan Colling-Kaplam, 5th Baronet (b.1976)(b)

1a) Princess Victoria of Quebec, Dauphine of Quebec and Duchess of Montréal (b.1988)​

m. Prince Louis Alois of Provence (b.1987)​

1) Princess Anne Elizabeth of Quebec (b.2015)​

2) Princess Charlotte of Quebec (b.2016)​

2a) Princess Raquel of Quebec, Duchess of Léry (b.1995) m. David Alexander Grant, 13th Baron de Longueil (b.1994)​

1) Prince Michael Alexander Grant of Léry, Earl of Lachute (b.2018)​

3b) Prince George Louis of Quebec, Duke of Estrie (b.2003)​

[1] A variation of Canadian English with some Quebecois loanwords and pronounce
[2] The dominant language of Quebec and the predominant variant of French in Canada (West of the Bay of St. Lawrence), it is marked for being remarkably distinguishable from Standard French in its accent and phonetic differences (although the latter does decrease the more formal manner the Quebecois French is spoken) and for being closer to 17th century Parisian French than to modern Standardized French
[3] Also called French-Canadians
[4] A large percentage of them are those who self-identify as Romani or as of Romani descent (who also extend to those self-identified as “Quebecois”, who mainly came from Western Europe (majorly France) during the early and middle 20th century to flee the persecution against them that had been in the rise in the region since the times before the First World War
[5] The largest First Nations in Quebec being the Cree, Innu and Mohawks
[6] Mainly black immigrants from Haiti, Louisiana and French West Africa
[7] Which came mainly from France during the mid-20th century due to the Second World War

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PAPUA AND THE SOLOMONS
Officially the United Kingdom of Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands
Capital in Port Moresby, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 2.2 million inhabitants
The kingdom has English, Papomon[1], Hiri Motu[2] and Sign Language[3] as its official languages, it also recognizes over 600 “living languages” within its territory, which are considered official mainly on the local level
The kingdom has a total population of 4.8 million inhabitants, about three-quarters of which line in the New-Guinean half
An extremely multiethnic state, most of the kingdom’s population are Melanesians (comprising nearly 80% of the population), which is on itself an amalgam of the hundreds of native ethnic groups spread across its territory, while the remaining percentage of the population is a mix of peoples of (sometimes mixed) Polynesian, Micronesian, Japanese and European ancestry.
Religiously the kingdom is majority Christian, with 63.7% of the population identifying as some denomination of it (the largest denominations being Anglicans, Papuan Protestants[4] and Roman Catholics[5]), while its largest religious minority is Judaism[6], at 31.5%[7], while the remainder of the population is mostly a mix of followers strictly of Folk Religions, Baha’is[8], Buddhists and Muslims
Papua and the Solomons are an executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with their monarch holding control over the executive power while the legislative and judiciary are held by the Parliament and High Court of Port Moresby
Papua and the Solomons were established on August 25th, 1989, as the twentieth imperial kingdom. Its first (and current) monarch, the youngest daughter and child of Empress Jessamine, never held a royal dukedom before her enthronement, but had been married since late 1988, with most people believing delays in planning caused her not to be enthroned shortly after marriage
Unlike only one other imperial kingdom, Papua and the Solomons was established out of two Crown Colonies, being the first of them to ever be so. Its Royal Family is also one of the few among the imperial kingdoms who are barred from the line of succession, due to matters of religion[9]
The Monarch and her Family​

Since 1989: Augusta (b.1963) born Princess Augusta of Albion, the first and currently only monarch of the country
Her husband, Prince Alec Julian Ben-Zephaniah Windsor-FitzLouise-Gore of Arran, Vice-Admiral of the Pacific Fleet (b.1963)
1) James of Papua and the Solomons, Grand Prince of D’Entrecasteaux (b.1992) m. Princess Emma of Samoa and Prussia (b.1992)

1) Prince Julian of Papua and the Solomons (b.2017)​

2) Princess Margaret of Papua and the Solomons (b.2019)​

3) Princess Luiza of Papua and the Solomons (b.2019)​

[1] Which as semi-constructed language created from the two main English Creole Languages in the kingdom, Pijin and Tok Pisin, the respective creole lingua franca of the Solomon Islands and Papua
[2] A simplified variant of the Motu Language, an Austronesian language from the area around Port Moresby, it is a mix of both a creole and a simplified (or pidgin) language, and served as the original lingua franca in Papua New Guinea during colonial times
[3] In specific the local standardized sign language (and not the imperial)
[4] Although almost all non-native religions in the kingdom see a high level of syncretism among its followers, Papuan Protestants, like the various Hindu-Anglicans in Bharat, officially include traditional beliefs (most often animism and ancestor worship) in with Christian ones. Much like Hindu-Anglicanism, Papuan Protestantism is divided among various, often localized and small, sects.
[5] Which is the largest non-protestant Christian sect in the kingdom, at just under a fifth of the total Christian population, and is mainly present on the Highlands and Northern regions of Papua and on areas connected to Bougainville
[6] It is believed that Judaism came to Papua and the Solomon Islands (the latter first) at some point in the mid-to-late 18th century (some also say it could have been on the earliest 19th), when a Jewish rabbi, Zephaniah ben Michael, and possibly his family, became stranded on one of the various Solomon Islands and not only made friends but became integrated into a local tribe, which converted into a newborn (highly syncretized) branch of Judaism. It is believed that the spread of Judaism from there, which occurred surprisingly fast for something that doesn’t seem to have included outright missionary work, was then caused by the original tribe being either well-connected with the rest of the Solomon Islands or have been forced to enter a diaspora period, which through luck spread the new religion through firstly the islands and then to New Guinea (with Judaism being also a relatively-large religion on the other quarters of the island), with both having considerable Jewish populations by the time the Albish came
[7] Technically the largest single religious sect in the kingdom (as “Solomonian Judaism”, also known as “Zephanite Judaism” seems to have a relatively large amount of willingness for internal variety in syncretized beliefs while remaining de jure or de facto united), it is the absolute majority in the Solomon Islands and mainly present on Peninsular/Eastern Papua
[8] The religion is probably the most recent among visible minorities in the kingdom, coming to it during the early-to-mid 20th century and having as followers about 1% of the kingdom’s total population
[9] Although Queen Augusta was born in the protestant Anglican Church, she chose to convert to Judaism as a part of her marriage, differentiating her and her family from the Royal House of Berar who hold to various Jewish beliefs but remain officially Christians

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SOUTHERN ANTILLES
Officially the United Kingdom of the Islands of the Southern Antilles
Capital in Port of Spain, also the kingdom’s second largest city, with a population of 45 thousand inhabitants. The kingdom’s largest city is San Fernando, with a population of 72 thousand inhabitants
The kingdom has Imperial English as its official language, it also recognizes a total of twelve other languages, including 6 English-based Creoles[1], 3 French-based Creoles[2], 2 “Indian” Creoles[3], Spanish[4] and Karif[5]
The kingdom has a total population of about 2.2 million inhabitants, of whom about 65% are Black (with local percentages varying wildly depending on the region), while the remaining 35% are made mainly of Mixed-Race, European White and Bharati origins, there are also small Carib[6] and Arawak[7] populations. The kingdom is majority Christian, with around 78% of the population identifying as such (with neither Catholics or Protestants being an overwhelming majority), while the largest religious minorities are Hindus, at 8%, and Yahas[8], at 5%
The Southern Antilles are a semi-executive federative monarchy partially in the Westminster Style, with their monarch nominally holding the executive power over the state but rarely actually getting involved in the day-to-day administration of the kingdom, leaving most of it to his Private Secretary, while each of the kingdom’s components are mostly self-governing
The Southern Antilles were established on March 25th, 2012, as the twentieth-first imperial kingdom. Their first (and current) monarch, the second son and fourth child of Empress Charlotte, never held a royal dukedom before his enthronement, which occurred the day before his wedding
Like only Papua and the Solomons, the Southern Antilles were established from a group of territories of the Albish Empire, and is unique in that its many components were initially made into separate imperial kingdoms in personal union, being officially united into a single entity in 2014
The Monarch and his Family​

Since 2012: Alexander IV (b.1985) born Prince Alexander Michael of Norwich, the first and currently only monarch of the country
His wife, Alba Muñoz Tamayo (b.1984)

1) Prince Louis of the Antilles (b.2014)​

2) Prince Henry of the Antilles (b.2015)​

3) Princess Maria of the Antilles (b.2016)​

4) Princess Lourdes of the Antilles (b.2018)​

5) Prince Mariano of the Antilles (b.2020)​

[1] In specific the creoles local to Tobago, Trinidad, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (which is often called “Vincentian Creole”), Grenada (whose local creole is especially influenced by French), Barbados (which is often called “Bajan Creole”) and Saint-Lucia (which is even more influenced by French than that of Grenada). Many of these creoles are often confounded with the non-standard variations of imperial English spoken by most of the kingdom
[2] In specific the creoles local to Saint-Lucia, Grenada and Trinidad (the former two being sometimes considered dialects of the larger Antillean French Creole)
[3] In specific “Caribbean Hindustani” and “Caribbean Tamil”, both the result of 19th and 20th century Bharati immigration
[4] Which, ITTL, has a relatively large population of native speakers in Trinidad, mainly moved from Venezuela during the late 19th and early 20th centuries or descended from Spanish (mainly Andalusian) immigrants from the same era
[5] Which is considered an endangered language due to its small population of native speakers, who live solely in Barbados
[6] Which, ITTL, have a relatively large population on Grenada, Saint Vincent and Tobago, including both the Kalinago/traditional Island Carib and the Garifuna (or “Black Caribs”)
[7] All of which descend from a small group of early-20th century Lokono immigrants from Guyana, led by Princess Marian of the Toh Isauka Chiefdom (one of the many native semi-princely states of Albish Guyana, and the last to come under Albish rule), to Barbados, most of them also descend from the princess herself, and her Danish-Dutch-Canadian husband
[8] “Yaha” is the ITTL name for Rastafarianism, which has a slightly different history, beliefs and development compared to OTL

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BELIZE
Officially the Kingdom of Grand Belize[1] and the Bay
Capital in the City of Belize, also the kingdom’s largest city, with a population of 2.7 million inhabitants
The kingdom has Imperial English as its standard official language[2], with Kriol[3] and Belizean Spanish[4] being main spoken languages, it also recognizes as official thirteen other languages, including 7 Mayan languages[5], 3 German Dialects[6], Hindi[7], Garifuna[8], Bay Spanish[9], Japanese[10], and Corozali[11]
The kingdom has a total population of 5 million inhabitants, heavily affected by centuries of colonization and immigration[12] and comprised by an incredibly variety of ethnic groups and ethnicities[13], and is a majority Christian state, with about 54% of the population identifying as being Roman Catholic and another 38% identifying as being of some Protestant denomination (while 3% identify as Eastern Orthodox)
Belize is a semi-executive monarchy in the Westminster Style, with its monarch having control over the executive power but sharing it with her First Minister, often delegating much of it and serving as a mediator, tie-breaker and proof-reader to both the Ministers, Parliament and High Court of Belize
Belize was established on September 3rd, 2015, as the twentieth-second imperial kingdom. Its first (and current) monarch, the youngest daughter and child of Empress Charlotte, never held a royal dukedom before her enthronement, which was planned to occur a month after her marriage
The most recent imperial kingdom to be created, and the last to be created by Empress Jessamine (who died before officially issuing Queen Agnes' enthronement, done posthumously under Empress Eleanor)

, some claim that it might justifiably be the last imperial kingdom to ever be created within at least the confines of Earth​

Uniquely, Belize is the sole imperial kingdom in the Americas to possess a princely state, the Realm of Petén, which holds the distinction of being the only pre-Columbian Mesoamerican state to survive the Spanish Colonial Period[14]
The Monarch and her Family​

Since 2015: Agnes (b.1989) born Princess Agnes May of Norwich, the first and currently only monarch of the country
Her husband, Alfred Fredleifson Mackenzie, 2nd Viscount of Dagringa (b.1986)

1) Princess Isla of Belize, Grand Duchess of the Bay Islands (b.2016)​

2) Princess Suellen of Belize (b.2017)​

[1] When Albish Honduras was renamed in the 1970s, the agreed name was simply “Belize”, which had colloquially become the name of the colony, when Belize and the Bay Islands were turned into a kingdom, it was decided that an added flare should be made due to “Belize” being more connected to the kingdom’s eastern continental half and disregarding the Western half of Petén. And so, the name “Grand Belize” (another name proposed was “Belize and Petén”, which was decided would confuse things with the Mayan Kingdom of Petén, which was also a part of the imperial kingdom) was agreed upon in early 2015, although the kingdom is still often called simply “Belize”
[2] Serving as both the language of law and the basis for the English education and a lingua franca for parts of the country
[3] The colloquial name for the Belizean Creole, after English it is the most common second language
[4] Which is relatively close to Mexican Spanish
[5] In specific the Q’eqchi’, Mopan, Yucatec, Itza, Kowo, Yalain and Lacandon languages
[6] In specific the Pennsylvania Dutch, Plautdietsch (or Mennonite Low German) and Belizean German (influenced by Spanish, Q’eqchi’ and Kriol and spoken mainly by the urban and the more mixed-race Mennonite communities)
[7] Which is the name used in Belize to identify a set of dialects of Hindi-Urdu (or Hindustani)
[8] Called “Karif” in the South Antilles, it is the language of the Garifuna people
[9] Which is influenced heavily by English in general and by Jamaican Patois
[10] A localized dialect derived from the more western dialects of Japanese, and influenced by the Ryukyuan languages
[11] A creole language established on the Corozal County on the north of the kingdom, from the mix of Tamil, Spanish, Yucatec Maya, English and a bit of Hindustani
[12] The lands of Belize (in special the coastal region) were a part of Central America that remained elusive to Spanish control for much of their colonial empire, with the English being the first Europeans to successfully settle on the coastlands of Belize during the early 18th century and the inlands of the Petén Basin only being conquered by the Spanish at the end of the 17th century, and much of their settlement was actually one that occurred through the 19th and 20th centuries as the kingdom was developed
[13] A list of them includes:
- Mestizos (also known as Hispanic Belizeans), the largest ethnic group, they are people of mixed Spanish and Maya descent, who actually mainly came to Belize during the mid-19th century to escape the early years of the Caste War of Yucatan and settled mainly along the north and the coasts of the kingdom
- Ladinos (also known as Hispanic Belizeans), the largest ethnic group of the western half of Belize, they are people of mixed Spanish and Maya descent much like the Mestizos above, but unlike them are the result of miscegenation locally instead of having migrated into Belize
- Creoles (also known as Kriol), the second-largest ethnic group of the kingdom, they originated from the many Black Africans brought by English and Scottish log-cutters at the inception of Belize, and have developed with the miscegenation with both said log-cutters and other later white settlers, the native Mayan peoples, and the various immigrant groups of the recent centuries
- Mayas (also known as First Nations or First Peoples), actually a group of various tribes and peoples, like the Yucatec, Itza, Kowoj, Mopan and Q’eqchi’, some of them are native to Belize (even if some, like the Mopan, were forced to flee and then returned later on) while others migrated to it during the 19th century, often fleeing enslavement in Guatemala
- Gariganu (often called Garifuna, even if that is actually the singular for their name), a people mainly of the coastal regions of Belize, they are a people of a mixed African, Arawak and Island Carib ancestry, being originated from the Black Caribs that were forced out of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines during the 18th century and settled along the coastlands of the Bay of Honduras
- Baymen, chiefly the descendants of the earlier white settlers of Belize
- Islanders (also known as Hispanic Baymen), the main inhabitants of the Bay Islands, being of Hispanic ancestry and mainly whites or white-passing generally speaking
- Mennonites (also known as Germans and Prussians), they are actually three separate groups of Mennonites who migrated to Belize over the 19th and 20th centuries, coming from the United States, Russia and Mexico (in order of earlier to later coming)
- Hindi (also known as Corozali and Bharati), the descendants of the Bharati immigrants who came mainly as indentured workers to Belize during the 19th century, being actually made of a mix of ethnic groups including the Tamil and Punjabi
- and East Asians, the descendants of the mainly Japanese and Ryukyuan immigrants who came to Central America during the course of the late 19th and early 20th centuries
[14] A minor Pre-Victorian POD. Although in OTL the end of the last independent native peoples in Mesoamerica was a brutal one of conquest in 1697, ITTL the Kingdom of Petén Itza not only managed to establish a pseudo-coalition with the neighboring Kowoj and Yalain Mayas but, after a “minor” conflict and negotiating, became a vassal state of the Spanish Empire, made of the kingdoms of the Itza, Kowoj and Yalain peoples, which survived relatively unscathed through the 18th and 19th centuries, although attracting immigration from other Mayan peoples. The kingdom officially became a princely state of Albish Honduras/Belize in the 19th century, when its rulers saw Albion as the lesser of two evils compared to Guatemala, and ended-up serving as the axis for the establishment of Albish rule over the OTL Petén Department

 

[Peppe]

So, Hi! After quite a while where my only additions to this TL were answering @TheBeanieBaron's questions or being on radio-silence, here's an update! Sorry for the lower quality (in my opinion) and out-of-the-blue subject, this is an idea that has been floating around in my head for a while and is also an attempt of mine at doing "lower-effort" or "smaller" updates to see if I can manage to post them more frequently.
(also, sorry for the less scientifically-sound instances, much of this was written or the ideas created in a fugue state after watching videos about rapid evolutionary changes)
Animals of North America
Although the introduction of animals from the Old World and the extinction of animals indigenous to the New has been a tale as old as humanity's entrance into the continent, during the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries of the Common Era ITTL, those factors have been both extremely present and surprisingly absent, and while many species still have come to extinction like OTL, many others have survived against the odds, and many species which became invasive behemoths were never done so, while at the same time many others were introduced and did not.
On the matter of foreign species introduced to North America during the last few centuries, a difference needs to often be made between "invasive" and "naturalized", as although many of them, in special among animals, have the potential to be destructive invaders, luck of the draw, different relationships with humans, different lucks by indigenous animals, and the many introductions and survivals ITTL have resulted on many of them becoming new components of a "stable" ecosystem, and sometimes even adding stability to animals that beforehand were a danger of becoming invasive or problematic, being "naturalized" (or "rewilded") in the North American biosphere
Most of this isn't meant as a comprehensive or semi-full list, and is more of a "compilation of most memorable"
SPECIES AND SUBSPECIES NATIVE TO NORTH AMERICA, WHICH PERSEVERE FROM OTL

The Tecopa Pupfish (Cyprinodon nevadensis calidae) is a quite unique subspecies of the Amargosa Pupfish (Cyprinodon nevadensis) original to the Mojave Desert of California, being native to the outflows of a pair of hot springs within it, most famously known for its unique resistance to heat, being fish only 2.5 to 4 centimeters in length but capable of living in temperatures above those of a hot tub (surviving in waters above of and above 43 °C).
Although originally an isolated endemic species only discovered in the 1920s, the Tecopa Pupfish came to be more well-known in 1936, Ieyasu, Prince Consort of Oregon, gained one of them while visiting California, giving it to his grandson, Michael, who, in 1947, now as Prince of Vancouver, acquired for himself an entire school of them. The fish, who were officially recognized as distinct subspecies after the prince assigned and entire squadron of scientists and caregivers to them due to their “finicky” needs, became over the course of the Second World War both adored pets of the Oregonian Royal Family and “comedic sources of inspiration” for Oregon, exemplified by the “Boiling Won’t Kill Them, and it Won’t Kill Us” slogan of 1955.
With the death of the pupfish on their natural waters in 1977, only weeks before the Prince of Vancouver’s own unexpected death, the "Royal Pupfish of Oregon" became the subspecies only population, and although now reintroduced to their Hot Springs (with the Tecopa Onsen’s acquisition by Oregon in 2003) most of their numbers, no matter how large, still reside on the Vancouver Aquarium and on other royal properties in Oregon (with there being only 5 populations outside of the country, 1 on London, 1 in Tecopa, 1 in Antarctica and 2 in Tokyo)

[1] although officially set as “Domesticated”, the conservation status of the Tecopa Pupfish is seen as something of a conundrum and a source of discussion, as the subspecies was only categorized as “domesticated” due to no-one agreeing on the other options (as while extinct on the wild for decades, it was reintroduced in 2003, and while mostly living in aquariums, its numbers are anything but small, and include populations in self-sustaining habitats)​

The Dryland Elk (Cervus canadensis merriami) known in OTL as Merriam’s elk, the Dryland Elk is one of the many subspecies of the elk found in North America, being native to the arid regions on the subcontinent’s Southwest. Known for having a considerably stormy history with humans, having nearly become extinct due to uncontrolled hunting and cattle grazing, the subspecies nearly became extinct during the early 20th century, reaching a low of only a few hundred individuals in 1906, but managed to regain numbers over the following decades, being considered “Vulnerable” due to the persistent danger of habitat destruction and human overhunting and poaching

The Eastern Elk (Cervus canadensis canadensis) sometimes also known as the Laurentian elk, the Eastern Elk is another one of the various subspecies of the elk found in North America, originally inhabiting Southern Canada and the North-Eastern USSA, and, much like it’s above relative, nearly became extinct during the 19th and early 20th century. Although surviving, the Eastern Elk in modern times has most of its population living in wildlife parks, animal parks and zoos, with its largest herd in the wild being actually located in Aotearoa and descending from much crossbreeding with other elk and deer species, while in North America wild herds can only be found in the northern Appalachian Mountains and scattered around the Great Lakes

The Eastern Cougar (Puma concolor couguar) a subspecies of the North American Cougar, the Eastern cougar is seen as being a small dying remnant of the cougars native to the American Northwest, having dwindled in numbers by centuries of human encroachment and by being dissolved into cougar populations originated from the west. Surviving longer than most expected, as of 2020 the species is considered “Critically Endangered”, having de facto lost its range to “colonization” by cougars from the West and with only 15 “pure” mostly elderly specimens living on the wild, and most expect it to soon become extinct on it, surviving only by its captive, albeit larger, population

The Florida Wolf (Canis floridanus) a species[2] of wolf endemic to Florida, first officially named in 1912, the Florida Wolf is mostly known for being the only wolf species to mainly inhabit the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, extending across Florida to Louisiana (where it mixed with the Mississippi Valley wolf before that subspecies’ extinction), and for its coloring, as the species has two subspecies, Black and Red, which are famous for their respective coats nearly uniformly-covered by jet-black and deep-red fur respectively (while their builds are a variety depending on the location, going from extremely similar to those of red wolves on the East to even more small and slender on the West)

[1] Surprisingly resilient, the Florida Wolf, although nearly becoming extinct due to human encroaching, managed to make a revival during the early 20th century, becoming the only wolf subspecies in Southern North America to have a large range​

[2] genetically, the Florida Wolf is a subspecies of Canis lupus​

The Sea Mink (Neogale madidus) the largest of the minks, being favored by fur traders due to that, the Sea Mink was nearly made extinct during the 19th century due to the unregulated fur trade in North America, becoming as such in the wild between 1890 and 1920, and only survived due to an effort to capture them instead of killing made by a fur farm in New Brunswick during the 1850s, which resulted on the species surviving in captivity. Unlike many species which survived in captivity, the Sea Mink wasn’t simply later reintroduced to the wild, as the farm which almost-accidentally saved the species also made efforts to domesticate them, resulting on modern Sea Minks being pets (as due to their small gene pool the species is considered as too-fragile to be used on fur farming by the Canadian government, and is even protected from neutering) with attempts to “rewild” them being still ongoing

The Carolina Parakeet (Conuropsis carolinensis) a small species of neotropical parrots (in looks marked by possessing a green body, bright-yellow head, reddish-orange face and a pale beak, and for being one of the few parrot species native to North America), the Carolina Parakeet is most well-known for its status as one among the very few species of birds to be poisonous, being as such due to their diet, with the species being known for its animals considering cockleburs (a toxic plant) a favorite food. Nearly made extinct by human action during the 19th century, with its population rapidly declining with the settlement and clearing of deciduous forests, in modern times the Carolina Parakeet can only be found in the wild in Florida, although the species possesses a considerable population in captivity, being considered surprisingly good pets due to their long lifespan (living to upwards of 35 years), although their gregarious nature makes the species preferable to have in pairs or groups, or with highly-involved owners (in the wild the parakeet is often seen in flocks with as many as 300 birds)

The Dusky Seaside Sparrow (Ammospiza maritima nigrescens) a subspecies of the seaside sparrow endemic to a single group of salt marshes in a peninsula in Florida, the Dusky Seaside Sparrow is mainly known for that single reason, as the animal has had a decades-long history of having its existence threatened by human action in and around it’s isolated habitat, which finally resulted on the habitat’s surrounding area being turned into a restricted Wildlife Refuge in 1985 by the US’ (after what the USSA government called “one too many annoyances”). As of 2020 the subspecies is considered “Vulnerable”, as although protected its small habitat still makes it vulnerable to things like natural disasters or malicious actions

The Heath Hen (Tympanuchus cupido cupido) a subspecies of the greater prairie chicken, being historically native to the coastal areas of the Eastern Seashell from New Hampshire to Virginia, the Heath Hen in modern times is an animal known as being “cozily threatened”, as although intense hunting by humans during the 19th century resulted on the subspecies being restricted solely to the island of Martha’s Vineyard since 1870, human attempts to preserve the subspecies have resulted on it being a common sight on the island, with the subspecies being considered “Critically Endangered” more due to the smallness of its range and high levels of inbreeding (as its population reached a low of 70 individuals in 1908)[1] than active threats against its existence, with bird watching of the Heath Hen’s traditional lekking grounds being a tourist attraction in the island while many people keep them as pets

[1] Due to the matter of inbreeding, the Massachusetts’s government does periodical checkups of the Head Hen’s genetic variety due to fears of inbreeding causing the animals to go extinct, with Martha’s Vineyard keeping both stud books and breeding locations for the birds and having an entire association whose job is to analyze individuals kept as pets and decide whether or not they can breed​

The Ivory-Billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) a species of woodpecker originally native to Southeastern North America and Cuba, and being of particular focus among birdwatchers, the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker is, in modern times, a species whose existence is restrict to captivity, as although some claim the species to still exist in the wild, hunting and logging by humans resulted on the specie’s only known populations to be on aviaries and zoos since the 1940s, with attempts to reintroduce them to the wild failing time and time again due to a variety of factors.

The Passenger Pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius) in the past the most abundant bird in North America, but driven to near extinction by humans through massive overhunting and widespread deforestation, the species only survived by luck, as by 1901 only a single, if large, flock survived, having been captured in 1897 by a stroke of luck by a Bahamian naturalist. Although managed to be kept alive through almost any means necessary over the decades, becoming one of the first animal species to undergo artificial insemination, and in modern times numbering on the millions, the Passenger Pigeon remains an animal species whose existence is always feared for, with even its conservation status being disagreed upon, as although seen once more in the wilds of North America, the bird’s unique needs for reproduction in the wild (needing large breeding populations to have sustainable levels) have meant that for over a century the species has been raised by and around humans, a situation which has permanently changed in certain ways the birds’ behaviors, and even now, with populations finally at “passable” levels, most of the species’ reproduction occurs in “captivity”

SUBSPECIES "NATIVE" TO NORTH AMERICA BUT ORIGINATED FROM ANIMALS INTRODUCED BY HUMANS

The American Lake Cow (Hippopotamus amphibius taurinus), also called Waco. Considered one of the poster children of human-introduced animals, the American Lake Cow is a subspecies of the African Common Hippopotamus, whose origins date to 1889 with the “American Hippo Bill”, a piece of legislature that saw the government of the United States of America sponsor the importation of dozens of hippopotamuses from Africa to the bayous of Louisiana, to both eat the invasive water hyacinth and to be farmed for their meat.
A ambitious project, the Hippo Bill soon saw incredible disasters, as many of the animals brought to Louisiana, remarkable in their lack of docility, soon escaped their enclosures and went into the wilderness, beginning the colonization of Louisiana’s wilderness by the hippopotamus as well as the infamous Hippo Wars, which would mar the decades to follow[1]. An animal often prone to anger, the Lake Cow was also a source of chaos during the wars of the 20th century, with violence by individuals or even herds being a, while not common, frequent occurrence through the years.
Spreading across the Mississippi’s reach and the South the Lake Cow is in modern times another staple figure of the North American fauna, marked for having a worse relationship with humans than with the environment it has “invaded” upon, being the source of death and destruction every year… as well as the source of game meat, for ironically more of the animal’s meat is acquired through hunting than through them being kept as livestock

[1] the Hippo Wars of the 1890s and 1900s would see the death of thousands and widespread low-level destruction across the US South, and is to this day remembered for the fact that although the American military was an active participant of it, the hippos still won​

The Domesticated Hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius amicus) a unique subspecies of the Common Hippopotamus, descended from the American Lake Cow, the Domesticated Hippo has its origins rather recently when compared to many, being born with a single male hippopotamus named Frederick, who was rescued as a calf in 1946 by a traveler and brought with them to California. Unlike most cases of such situation, “Fred” was born with an uncommon level of docility when compared to others of its species (which some theorize might mean he was the unknowingly-successful result of an attempted artificial breeding of docile Lake Cows) even as an adult, a trait which he passed to its offspring, resulting on a subspecies of hippopotamus about as friendly as cows.
Although compared to cows and descended from “Lake Cows”, the subspecies has never been actually used as livestock, with Old Man Fred (he died at the age of 59)’s descendants instead existing in zoos, parks and on the residences of individuals capable of keeping them as pets (most live on the San Francisco Zoo, where Fred lived almost his entire life)

The Woolly Hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius americanus) another subspecies of the American Lake Cow, and a unique and astonishing case of “rapid evolution”, the Woolly Hippopotamus is an animal native to the northern reaches of the Mississippi and its watershed, being mostly seen on colder and mountainous areas.
As a case of rapid evolution, having developed a fur coating over the course of a few decades at most, the Woolly Hippo is believed to descend from a group of the early populations of Lake Cows who, somehow, managed to migrate northwards and, over the course of a few generations (most probably) heavy with inbreeding, developed a full fur covering across its body instead of dying-out due to being unprepared to the cold environment, living unknown to humans until a specimen was first seen in 1965 in Canada.

[1] Due to its harsher environment, rather small numbers, and small gene pool, the Woolly Hippopotamus is only not considered Threatened due to a lack of real predators and human intervention, as all known members of the subspecies live on a government-run wildlife park in Canada and are monitored 24/7 by a staff (including park rangers and veterinarians)​

The American Woolly Ass (Equus africanus asinus) less of a subspecies and more of a feral donkey from a specific breed, the American Woolly Ass descends from a herd of Poitou Donkeys in Ohio during the early 20th century, whose farm was abandoned during the Second Civil War with its livestock being set free by the fleeing inhabitants, with the local herd managed to prosper on the region even with the presence of humans and predators.
Much like their non-feral relatives, which now exist mainly as “show donkeys” after falling out of use for machines or other breeds (in special as the breed was developed for the sole purpose of being mated to produce mules), the Woolly Ass is marked by its distinctive coat, a long and shaggy one that hangs in long and thick locks from the ass’ back, which at times can reach down to the ground, resulting on the animal’s now distinct “jumping run” made so as to not trip over itself; the Woolly Ass is also known much for its size, with members of the subspecies often reaching 1.5 meters in height, and having ears heavy enough for them to not hold them upright.
Although commonly known as “feral donkeys”, and seen as especially vicious in nature, the Woolly Ass is in actuality extremely easy to tame, having retained many of its behavioral traits from when the subspecies was still a domesticated one, and captured and “re-domesticated” specimens are often seen in farms and ranches in North America as pets and guards.

The American Ostrich (Struthio molybdophanes americanus) a subspecies of the Somali (or Blue-Necked) Ostrich, first brought to North America in 1905 to establish a “hunting ranch” in Texas, the business’ failure only a few years later resulted on the leaving of the animals to deal with themselves on the wild, which in turn resulted on, due to the large-scale depopulation of the Great Plains of most native megafauna, their spread across the emptier expanses of North America over the course of the 20th century.
Considered in modern times a relatively-common sight in the North American plains, in special on their south, and sometimes hunted by humans for their meat and feathers, the American Ostrich is also known for its “rivalry” with wild horses, both using the other as occasional sources of meat

The American Lion (Panthera leo peregrinator) a subspecies of the African Lion, brought to North America in 1909 in an attempt to use them as living weapons against the Lake Cow during the Hippo Wars, which both did and didn’t work, in modern times the American Lion is one of the largest predators of the North American continent, being basically the only thing keeping the populations of grazing animals in check within the Great Plains (in special wild hogs, ostriches, sometimes hippos, and wild horses)

The American Peafowl (Pavo cristatus americanus) and the Prairie Peafowl (Pavo cristatus fuscus) both subspecies of the Indian Peafowl of Southeast Asia descended from peafowl kept in captivity at “feather farms” during the late 19th and early 20th century. Uniquely different from one-another, the two peafowl subspecies are known mostly for their coloring, with the American Peafowl (also known as the Arizona, Desert or Blood Peafowl) being, through a unique set of circumstances, bred to possess red feathers before returning to the wild during the conflicts of the 1920s and ‘30s, managing to survive against all circumstances (mainly through developing personalities similar to those of badgers); while the Prairie Peafowl came to be through normally-colored peafowls which escaped into the wild, with the pressures of its environment causing the species to lose much of its distinctive colors by forcing its females to continuously choose dimmer-colored males which were more capable of hiding, resulting on a subspecies whose main colors are brown, beige and yellow

The Northern Peafowl (Pavo cristatus nivalis) a subspecies of the Green Peafowl, whose origins date to a “feather farm” in Minnesota during the 1890s, when a leucistic peacock was born and bred by said farm due to its “snowy-white feathers"; nearly two decades later, with the First World War, said farm was abandoned and much of its animals, after escaping, died, including most of the peafowl incapable of hiding in the snow, by sheer random luck, and a bit of intelligence, the leucistic population managed to survive, using their white coloring to camouflage in snowy landscapes and hiding away during warmer months.
Also known as the “Winter Peacock”, and in modern times protected by the Canadian government, the Northern Peafowl has a much different preference on its females in relation to their mate’s appearance, having a keen eyesight and considering cocks with fuller feathers as being more attractive than those without (in part due to seeing it as better capable of hiding away chicks underneath, as males are often responsible for incubating and watching over the chicks while the females forage)

SPECIES WHICH EXIST IN NORTH AMERICA IOTL, BUT WHICH ARE *CHANGED* IN RELATION TO IT ITTL

The Devils Hole Pupfish (Cyprinodon diabolis) is probably the most unique species known to be a relatively-common pet, being a species of fish whose native range equates to a single rock shelf about 18m2 in area located within a water-filled cavern in the middle of the Amargosa Desert of California, which makes it be seen as the most isolated species of vertebrates known in nature (when not counting those kept by humans outside their native habitat).
An animal whose origins are a mystery (with time ranges going from a thousand to sixty thousand years into the past), the Devil’s Hole pupfish is a species marked by its fragility (as well as by its baffling strengths), made of individuals of maximum lengths of half a centimeter whose features make them resemble infants from other species, possess an incredible lack of defenses or even resistance to outside threats, and although capable of breeding with neighboring species of pupfish are so isolated in origins that their genes are too recessive to “survive” said breeding most times; said fragility extends even to their habitat, with the pet industry needing to make versions of almost all fish-related parts of itself specifically for the pupfish.
Believed to have been unknown for millennia, the first sight of a Devils Hole pupfish was recorded only in 1930, but it was only a few decades later, in 1953, that the first (at least known) attempt to keep them outside of the Hole occurred, when a group of Mexican scientists captured a few of them. That attempt, however unlikely and untimely, was successful after much trial and error, being inherited by the restored Californian government who continued it, resulting in the expansion of the specie’s artificial habitats over the following decades (in great part due to their looks’ and the “free advertising” of the legal battles over Devils Hole during the 1960s and ‘70s), with the first instance of them being kept as “high maintenance pets” occurring in 1982. Their popularity as pets skyrocketed as the cost lowered over the 1990s and 2000s, resulting on the pupfish’s modern status as “bit costly, but not that much” exotic fish pets.
Ironically, although on the wild they have remained a single and isolated population (although sightings of possible deeper populations in the Devils Hole exist, they are as of 2020 considered only theories and speculation), the pupfish has developed a number of subspecies from its captive population, often times caused by human attempts at either creating colonies of them on other bodies of water or artificially “buffing” the fish through selective breeding and genetic editing, with them being:

- Cyprinodon diabolis amargosae, the Amargosa Devil, is a subspecies born of the semi-successful breeding in captivity of the original pupfish with the “nearby” Amargosa River pupfish (Cyprinodon nevadensis amargosae)[2], as a mix of the two, it possesses the general shape and features of the latter with the colors of the former, while having a wide range of sizes, with males being closer to the former while females are closer to the latter​

- Cyprinodon diabolis sapphiricus, the Sapphire Pupfish, is a subspecies born of the selective breeding of pupfishes[3], being marked by both sexes possessing a “metallic blue” color which resembles that of Sapphires (in special in juveniles) and by being “bulkier” than the “baseline” Devils Hole pupfish, having shapes varying from oval to teardrop​

- Cyprinodon diabolis desmonianus, the Desmond or the Banshee Pupfish, is a subspecies born of the selective breeding of pupfishes by the Princes of Desmond in Oregon, being marked by its females’ being greyish in color and having red-tinted eyes and fins, and also being capable of emitting squeal-like sounds (while making faces that “resemble someone screaming”)​

- Cyprinodon diabolis lupus, the Grey Pupfish, is a subspecies born of the selective breeding of pupfishes, resulting on a group marked by being grey-tinged in color and slightly-more proactive than others of the species, forming close family groups during mating season and possessing longer lifespans compared to the “baseline”​

- Cyprinodon diabolis salinus, the Devils Child Pupfish, is a subspecies born of the selective breeding in captivity of the original pupfish with the Death Valley Pupfish (Cyprinodon salinus), being marked by its “high success” on that, surprisingly retaining much of the former’s appearance while also inheriting much of the latter’s hardiness, being capable of surviving in waters four times saltier than the sea and in temperatures between 0 and 46 °C​

- Cyprinodon diabolis amorlaboris, nicknamed Lovecraft’s Pupfish, is a subspecies born from the selective breeding of pupfishes both among themselves and with other close species, marked by originally being described as “misshapen” but since then becoming one of the closest living things known to man to resemble H.P. Lovecraft’s Deep Ones, possessing permanently-existing pelvic fins[4] as well as stronger and larger pectoral ones, thorny growths on their sides (in females), occasional greenish colorings, and “teethed” down-turned mouths​

- Cyprinodon diabolis asmodei, nicknamed Hells Hole Pupfish, is a subspecies born through, as of 2020, unknown measures, first revealed at the 2009 World’s Fair, being marked by having scales with deep-red to purple colors with a white tail fin, as well as similarly colored eyes and “horn-like” structures on their gills. The subspecies, only proved as such after lab tests, is the source of many conspiracy theories​

[1] while incredibly large in numbers, being seen by many as a famous pet species and with various subspecies of its own, the Devil’s Hole Pupfish is a species which is best-described as “exigent”, with their variety of unique needs and threats making their existence one that depends heavily on direct and diligent human work; for that reason, the species is overall seen as “Vulnerable” (with its endemic population being seen as “Somehow Not Extinct”), a result of their high numbers counterbalancing their environmental weaknesses just enough to place them outside of the “Endangered” or “Critically Endangered” categories​

[2] strangely, when attempts at crossbreeding were made in the wild, by placing a small number of Devils Hole pupfishes on the Amargosa’s habitat, it simply resulted on the offspring of the two being Amargosa River pupfishes in one or two generations​

[3] the selective breeding the Devils Hole pupfish is something rather complicated overall, as not only it involves having to catch and isolate from the original population the individuals selected for breeding but those not selected aren’t simply discarded, but instead are bred either amongst themselves or returned to the original population​

[4] although the normal Devils Hole pupfish lacks pelvic fins, they are still capable of growing them, doing so when raised in lower temperatures than those of the Devils Hole itself​

The Floridian Monkey (Macaca mulatta florisiensis), one of the many Old World Species introduced to North America by humans, it is a subspecies of a species native to South Asia. The history of the Floridian Monkey begins in 1898, when a colony of Rhesus monkeys was brought to a private zoo in Florida. Said colony only existed in captivity for a few years, being so only until 1907, when it was released into the wild by the zoo’s end during the events of the Tooey Massacre, following which the monkey’s population grew in the zoo’s ruins.
Over the following decades, the Floridian Monkey’s population only grew, bolstered by individuals from zoos, parks and a farm[2] (which either escaped, were released by humans or were accidentally released during the wars), reaching numbers estimated to be on the mid-thousands by 1996, when they were first catalogued as a subspecies.
As of 2020, the Floridian Monkey is seen as both a “naturalized species” of North America and a public nuisance, in special on the countryside (although the animal has also been seen in abandoned urban environments), and its population, which is estimated to number on the tens of thousands, is believed to now spread across a range going from Tampa to Charleston from North to South mainly across the northern Floridian Peninsula and along the shore (having a particularly large population on Morgan Island)

[1] although often times involved in conflict with humans, being even hunted for meat in certain places, the Floridian Monkey is considered to be of Least Concern due to both its wide habitat range, its large numbers, and Morgan Island’s status as a reservation specifically focused on the animals (with the island being nearly uninhabited by humans while having over 4000 monkeys living on it)​

[2] Elbowgrease Furry Ranch, an unfortunately named fur farm, and, as their brochure stated "the only in North America to officially have primates!"​

The Mississippian Swamp Rat (Myocastor coypus hyperboris) also known as Nutria, it is another species introduced by humans, being native to South America and first appearing on North America in fur farms in California in the 1890s, being soon brought to Louisiana for the fur industry. Rapidly spreading across the Mississippi River Delta and mostly the western coasts of the Gulf of Mexico during the 1920s and 1930s, being freed mainly by the destruction of enclosures by natural disasters (such as hurricanes) and then permitted to expand by the open warfare of the First World War and the Second Civil War, which disrupted trapping by fur traders (which would manage to lower the animal’s population), the Swamp Rat soon became an entrenched species on those regions, and by the 1960s was considered just another animal of the USSA’s south.
Although large in numbers and considered a possible threat to wetland environments, being only declared an official subspecies and not an invasive species only in 2014, the Mississippian Swamp Rat has its population and reproduction kept in check by a variety of factors and individuals, as although of acceptable temperatures and environment, the subspecies’ habitat is home to both natural predators large enough to take them on and humans, who see them as sources of fur and food, which together keep the animal’s population below unmanageable levels

The Parrot Seal (Phoca vitulina psittacusimilis) a unique among this list, it isn’t a separate species or even a genetically-unique subspecies of the Harbor Seal, but instead a literal “clan” of seals descended from a single seal named Hoover adopted by a pair of New England fishermen in the 1940s, who learned to make human words and sounds to an extreme level and passed that, together with an extremely high level of intelligence (even above that of the already-elevated one possessed by normal seals), to his offspring

The Axolotl (Ambystoma mexicanum) considered by many the “national animal” of Mexico, being indigenous to the Anahuac[1] and being the animal most often connected with the country’s capital (and historically tied with its local cuisine), the Axolotl is an amphibian, being closely related to the tiger salamanders of North America, and is considered unique amongst them, as its members don’t undergo metamorphosis when maturing into adults, instead remaining aquatic and gilled. The species, even more than that, is also known as an exotic pet, and even more for the incredible regenerative abilities it presents, being capable of growing back limbs, gills, and parts of their eyes and brains.
Considered Near Threatened mainly due to its native habitat, as although heavily protected the Anahuac is still a single endorheic lake with a metropolis of millions within and around it, the Axolotl’s native population also possesses a few noticeable subspecies within it (which although often considered just different-colored members of the main species are scientifically seen as separate subspecies due to their colors being caused by unique genes found solely in them), which are:

- Ambystoma mexicanum xiuhnacochtli, the Blue Axolotl, which appear in a variety of blues (darker ones being most common in the wild)​

- Ambystoma mexicanum mayananachtli, the Green Axolotl, which appear in a variety of greens (but mainly lime-esque color)​

[1] The endorheic lake at the bottom of the Valley of Mexico basin, which although colloquially divided between five smaller lakes (the brackish Zumpango and Xaltocan, the greatest Texcoco, divided between Salty and Fresh, and the fresh Xochimilco and Chalco) is at the end of the day a single body of water with only dikes separating it’s brackish and sweet parts, the Anahuac was nearly destroyed due to actions made during the Spanish Conquest of the Aztecs, with only luck managing to save the flood protections systems built by the latter and even larger luck over the following centuries preventing the lakes from being simply drained for use to expand Mexico City​

The Nanulak Bear (Ursus ombratan) a species born from the surprisingly successful hybridization between Polar and Grizzly Bears in the wild itself, resulting on an offspring which was capable of reproducing even if only among its own kind[1], the Nanulak Bear is a relatively young species, being only officially considered as such and not simply cases of hybrids in 1977, but is a memorable one, having looks and behaviors that are the mixing between its forefathers (being sometimes compared to pandas due to their coats being often brown on the hindquarters and lower sides and white on their front and back) and being considered one of Alyaska’s National Animals[2]

[1] while born from the crossing between two bear species, a Nanulak can only breed successfully (producing fertile offspring) with another Nanulak and not with either of its “parent species”, which has meant that the species possesses a rather high level of inbreeding amongst its members, only offset by the fact that “first generation” bears” are capable of mating amongst eachother without them needing to be from the same Polar/Grizzly coupling​

[2] a title shared with the Alaskan Moose and King Salmon (as living symbols) and the Three-Headed Crow (as a heraldic symbol)​

 

[Peppe]

Hi! Sorry for the wait, much like why I haven't posted anything this past month after finally making progress to do so, I started college in August, and that has been a certifiable shredder into my free time (literally one of the few reasons I managed to find time to post this right now it's because its Independence Day and as such I had my day free)

Have any Olympics been opened by the consort of an reigning monarch?

Much like OTL*, yes.
- Both the 1996, 2006 and 2012 Olympics were partly opened by George, the King Consort, as part of the opening ceremonies was Empress Jessamine coming in during the middle of the ceremony for them to finish it together (the 1996 was opened almost entirely by him, and the only part where Jessamine was involved was when an attempted assassination resulted on her impromptu jumping-in just as the ceremony was to close)
- The 1924 Olympics were opened by the Prince Consort of the Netherlands
- the 1942 Olympics were opened by the Prince Consort of Denmark (well...)
- and the 2008 Olympics were opened by the Empress Consort of Korea

*I'll admit I didn't know it until researching for this question, but the OTL 9th Summer Olympics in 1928 were opened by the Prince Consort of the Netherlands

Are any of the German Member-States in personal union with a foreign country?

No

Which monarchs lived the longest after abdicating?

The five monarchs with the longest lives post-abdication ITTL (as of December 31st, 2020), as far as I remember/know, are:

- Manuel III of Kongo, who lived for some 71 years, 1 month, and 6 days following his abdication in 1931
- surprisingly enough, Emperor Yōzei of Japan, who while existing in the first millennium CE and being an OTL figure managed to live for a total of 65 years, 7 months and 19 days after being forced to abdicate at the age of 15
- Carlos V of Spain, who has lived for some 62 years since his abdication/deposition in the 21st of September of 1958
- and the brothers Brian III and Percival II of Assam, who have lived for nearly 61 years since abdicating in the 6th and 17th of May of 1960 respectively

When did the Imperial Monarchs of Bharat started to give their children Indian names?

Well, that's a question without a correct answer really? native middle names appear as early as the children of the first generation of monarchs of Imperial Kingdoms of Bharat (Leopold of the Carnatic being a prime example) and first names don't really have a chronology.
Sorry?

Who's the oldest male member of the Albish imperial family?

Well, this answer I have actually already given, it's Prince Reginald of the Carnatic (one of Frederick I's many sons), who is still alive kicking and screaming at the age of 101.

But, just for fun, if you meant the "main" branch of the family in specific, then the eldest is George the King Father, who is 96

What was the first non-Albish royal funeral to be filmed/televised?

The first non-Albish royal funeral to be filmed was, surprisingly enough, that of Prince Yukihito of Japan (one of Emperor Meiji's younger sons) in 5th July 1908, as Empress Shōken, a master of PR and a genial modernizer, decided to use his funeral to make a concerted show of strength and unity to Japan in light of the pneumonic plague ravaging the country (which had been what killed the prince). She kept with that when doing the funeral of Emperor Meiji the following year, which was also the first funeral of a reigning monarch unconnected to the Albish*.

The first funeral of a non-Albish reigning monarch (but connected to the Albish Imperial Family) was actually of Carlota I of Portugal (and her posthumously recognized son, Luis I), in the 21st of February of 1909.

*I wish to note that this is an ITTL extrapolation of what I feel like she was OTL from looking at wikipedia, and that ITTL Empress Shōken also deserves mad props for the fact that she planned her sort-of-step-son's funeral mere weeks after nearly dying herself from the pneumonic plague, with much of the funeral being the repurposed plans for her own funeral

Does Galicia (the one on the Iberian peninsula to be exact) have a subnational monarchy?

Sorta? Morrazo isn't an official subnational monarchy or autonomous, but due to some shenanigans during the chaos that was 19th century Spain, Antônio de Asis, 3rd Duke of Cádiz (ITTL son of Infanta Paula of Brazil (third daughter of Pedro I/IV, who IOTL died at 9 probably from meningitis) and supposedly Francis, Duke of Cádiz) became the *sort-of* ruler of the Comarca of Morrazo (comprised of the Morrazo peninsula basically) and that "sort-of-office" passed down his family (it could be best described as a "sort-of-mayor, sort-of-judge, general dispute-solver?")

When Spain fell under the Regency, they cracked down hard on any sort of shenanigans of that kind, and when WWII came around the supposed incumbent was a decorated army official turned resistance fighter. Following the war, Galicia ended-up deciding to recognize/revive the "sort-of-office" again, but again it is more of a "local eccentricity" than a subnational monarchy I think? (while the office's holder is influential, being a part of the Galician peerage and extended Royal Family, it isn't through that office)

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Disconnected from the answers above, here are a few snippets about in-universe pop-culture to add a sort-of update to the TL
(Some quite heavily inspired by/based on posts by @PatricianLipwig and @ThatAutisticGuy on the Sixth Alternate Wikipedia Infoboxes thread from July)​

Les Misérables (opera)

Les Misérables, colloquially known as Les Mis or Les Miz is an opera in three (or four) acts by the composers Arthur Sullivan and César Bizet. The libretto was written by Jean-Marc d'Chanson and Henri Boublil in French and by William Schwenck Gilbert and Julian Sturgis in English, based on Victor Hugo's eponymous novel. The opera was first performed at the Palace Theatre of London in 24 September 1889, where it has kept nearly continuously running ever since, making it one of the longest-running productions in the world. A wild success at its launch, and remaining so to this day, the opera is, outside its tale, often remembered for the sheer insanity that went behind the scenes during its development and early years, with the fact it even came to be being just another part of that.

The source of a great deal of studies, journalistic papers, documentaries, biographies, novels, movies and even a musical, the production of Les Misérables already started as a diplomatic middle finger to the French in the part of Albion (being based on an work that was infamous for having its adaptations prohibited from performing in Paris and having among its cast and production team a battalion of French political exiles, besides premiering in French in a theatre built in a French style specifically for the occasion) and was marked by things like financial problems, butting heads and clashing personalities, sabotage, and physical altercations (most often between Gilbert and Sturgis), all things that were paved over through the Albish government’s sheer and unrelenting drive to see it made.
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The War In Heaven (epic)

The Wars in Heaven, JCR 26, is a cycle of eight English-language* epic music dramas composed by Johnathan Starford. The works are based loosely on characters from Arthurian Legend, as well as figures from the Late Roman Republic and Greco-Roman and Egyptian Mythology. The composer termed the cycled a “Engaged Play”, structured in two sets of four days separated by a “Reflection” of five days. It is often referred to as the Wars in Heaven Saga or Star’s Wars.

Starford wrote the libretto and music over the course of about twenty-two years, from 1838 to 1858. The eight parts that constitute the Wars cycle are, in sequence:

- The Perilous Phantom​

- Anakin​

- Among the Stars​

- Twilight of the Jedi​

- Anew Hope​

- The Strike Back​

- Vader​

- Requiem of the Sith​

Individual works of the sequence are often performed separately, and indeed the operas are written in a manner so that a viewer could watch any of them without having watched the previous parts and still understand the plot. However, Starford intended them to be performed in series.

Originally the first four were seen as the finished cycle, called the “War in Heaven”, and their first performance as such opened the first London Festival in 1844, beginning with The Perilous Phantom in 13 August and ending with Twilight of the Jedi on 17 August; it was only in 1854 that Anew Hope was premiered, beginning the so-called “Second Cycle”. The complete cycle first premiered closing the International Exhibition in 1862, beginning with The Perilous Phantom in 3 November and ending with Requiem of the Sith on 15 November.

Following Starford’s death in 1870, it would be discovered that the Wars in Heavens had changed greatly over time from his original plans, as he had intended for them to be what we would now call a “Space Opera” drawing inspiration from Lucian of Samosata’s Vera Historiae but had decided to change it due to fearing it would be even more difficult for the viewer to understand his story in that setting.

This discovery came due to the continuous publication of Starford’s posthumous works, as the man, somewhat bitter over being incapable of portraying his work as he originally planned, instead had spent his later years translating his cycle into novel form using his original setting, producing both literary equivalents to his operas as well as additional novels and novellas that would also be published by his children.

Due to the large number of works added by Starford posthumously, and the both small and great difference between the literally and dramatic Wars in Heaven, people have colloquially given additional titles to them, with some calling the operas the “Legends”, for example, due to their use of a setting akin to that of mythology.
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The Mysterious Thing (play)

The Mysterious Thing, sometimes referred to as just The Thing, is an 1877 American play by Donald Hanrahan Stuart, based on his 1861 novella “Who Goes There?” (Published under the pen name “Don A. Stuart”); its story follows a group of people trapped in an Arctic expedition with shapeshifting monsters able to absorb and imitate any living being. Considered one of the world’s first modern science fiction horrors together with the likes of Frankenstein, The Thing is often remembered for the at-the-time groundbreaking practical effects used in its first run, which were said to be “so realistic as to make watchers believe The Thing really was there”.

A nonprofessional actor, Hanrahan actually was a member of the cast during the play’s first run due to an actor falling down with cholera the eve of the premier, and during the Thing’s first 15 shows he played Mr. Blair
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Home Alone (novel)

Home Alone is an 1890 novella by Benjamin D. Mayweather, first published in Chicago by Laird & Lee and illustrated by Joanna C. O’Hara. Home Alone recounts the story of Kevin McCallister, the rambunctious 8-year-old son of a well-to-do Chicago family who, due to unfortunate coincidences, misadventures and familial incompetence is left behind at his family’s house when they go on a trip to Paris during Christmastide, during his time home alone, he has to deal with a variety of occurences, and defend his house from a pair of unrelenting but highly incompetent thieves. Published on November 16th, the novella was a massive sensation at the time, with the first edition selling out by the start of December; by the end of 1891 15 editions had been released.
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Django the Freeman (novel)

Django the Freeman is an 1858 part-poetic epic novel by Benjamin D. Mayweather, first published by A. S. Barnes & Co. and illustrated Dangerfield F. Newby and Mayweather himself. Freeman recounts the story of a slave, Django, in a journey to be reunited with his wife Brunhilda with the aid of a German bounty-hunter named King. Highly successful in the US North and in Canada, as well as Europe, the novel’s themes, as well as its brutal fate for most slave-owners, resulted on it being banned and decried as “abolitionist propaganda”, with some going as far as calling for Mayweather’s arrest for his “open support and instigation of slave insurrection”.

Receiving death threats and three revoked arrest warrants in the months following the book’s publication, Mayweather was remarkably joyous over the reactions he received from pro-slavery groups about his novel, even after the 1859 attempt against his life, and would later in 1866 publish a short story about Django and Brunhilda solely about how well they were doing living in Canada.
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Sojourn to the Past (novel)

Sojourn to the Past is an 1822 romance novel by Oliver Corbray and Johnathan Starford, first published by Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor & Jones in Edinburgh, and illustrated by Corbray. Set in 18th century Scotland, the novel details the adventure of young Martin McFly, who finds himself transported back into the past by the machinations of the benevolent but clumsy Doctor Brown, and must then rekindle his parents love. Mostly ignored critically at the time of its publication, but a success among the public, the novel is considered a pioneer of the science fiction genre as much as it is remembered for its maintain in the ranks of classical romantic literature.

An interesting anecdote about the novel’s original publication is that, although set in the late and mid-18th century, its illustrations depicted a setting resembling that of the 16th century, which, although main an internal joke to them, resulted on Corbray and Starford deciding to later write and publish in 1835 Sojourn Back to the Past, where Martin and Jennifer are sent to the 1580s.
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Mr. Lorax, Speaker of the Trees (novel)

Mr. Lorax, Speaker of the Trees, sometimes called simply Mr. Lorax or Lorax, is an 1870 poetic novella and modern fable by Benjamin D. Mayweather (under his pen name of “Dr. Maynard”), chronicling the plight of the environment and the Mr. Lorax, the titular character, who “speaks for the trees” and confronts the Once-ler, who causes environmental destruction. Made by Mayweather over his concerns over the environment, the story uses the literary element of personification to create relatable characters for industry (as the Once-ler), the environment (being the Truffula trees) and activism (as the Lorax), and encouraging personal care and involvement in making the situation better: "Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not."

Both a sensation and great strike on the people of the time when it came out, the was greatly influential even shortly after its publication, which is seen as having come at just the right moment, being directly referenced in the passing of the Act of Dedication by the US Congress the following year, and to this day being often used and quoted by activists and politicians; for that reason, Mayweather is often remembered as one of the “Father of Environmentalism”.

 

[Peppe]

So.
Hi.
I apologize for the lack of anything in the TL the last month.
I had been planning some things (and now have returned to them), but the Queen’s death hit me harder than I could even imagine.
She was always a sort of vague inspiration for this entire thing, in many ways, and when she died, I didn’t even know how to react properly.
For a while on the day the news hit I thought about making a post commenting on it, and what it would mean for her ITTL counterpart, but that felt too small, and too shallow.
I then though about making an entire update depicting Empress Jessamine’s royal funeral, as in spirit she is the Queen’s ITTL mirror, but I didn’t feel like I could make justice to it, to Jessamine and the Queen even, even to the TL in of itself. I was still a bit in shock then I think, and it didn’t feel right to try and show the image I had without being capable of actually portraying it correctly and soundly.
And then I just fell a bit…
I don’t know how I felt, really.

I said “sort-of” above, but that’s a big understatement, she was one of the inspirations, she was maybe the inspiration, in some strange and unexplainable way to me, for this entire thing. Hell! I had even joked to myself that “when she died” would be when I declared the TL finished for good (bravo, past me).
I’m not even British, or from Europe, but her death hit me as hard as my great-grandmother’s early this year.
And so I spent the rest of September in a bit of a lull, a think a part of me trying to disconnect from this work. Not really doing any writing or mapmaking or things similar.
Had my first exams as a college student.
Had my first practical classes in culinary school.
Had my 20th birthday
-
And then I had a pretty large number of questions asked to me on my other active project.
Them coming already had been a bit of a surprise, and they were so many all at once!
It sort of jolted me back into creating things.
And made me return to working on this TL, which I have been doing for much of October.

Having written all of that, It still feels wrong to making this return with only the answer to the most recent questions, and also feels wrong to leave the Queen without something in her honor, in her remembrance.
As such, while it isn’t enough – or to me doesn’t feel enough –, here is her ITTL counterpart, now appearing on a post solely for herself instead of as one of the many monarchs of the Imperial Kingdoms of Albion

(sorry for the wordy-ness, I don’t really know what got over me)

---------------------------------​

Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Mary Victoria Gilbertine Alexandra; born in 22 April 1926) is the Yang di-Pertuan Arif Tua[3] of Malaysia and Elder Queen of the Straits[4] since October 2021. She was declared the Elder Queen of the Straits on 15 October 2021, as part of pseudo-abdicating the throne to her eldest son, Sulaiman, after serving as sole Monarch of the Straits[5] since 1961 and as Sultana of Riau-Lingga[6] since 1963. On 8 December 2021, days after her partial abdication, she was proclaimed as Yang di-Pertuan Arif Tua of Malaysia by the Council of Rulers of Malaysia, which she had served as Chair since 22 January 1982. Since 18 May 1998, she is also the ceremonial Third Sea Lord of the Royal Navy.
Born as the first child of the then Duke and Duchess of York, on her maternal grandfather’s house[7] at Mayfair, London, Elizabeth II lived on the Home Islands only until the age of 4, moving with her family to Singapore in 1930 when her father was appointed governor of the Straits Settlements. Originally educated privately at home with her sister, firstly by a governess and then by a series of tutors, Elizabeth II showed from a young age a keen interest for the sea and the navy, something that she passed to her younger sister, Princess Margaret, and after much discussions entered the Royal Naval College, Singapore, at the age of 10.
After nearly 11 years as a Princess of York, Elizabeth II became a “Princess of the Straits” in December 11th, 1936, with the enthronement of Albert of the Straits, and on the following year was a member of the procession during his coronation. Heiress presumptive upon her father’s enthronement, Elizabeth II continued to study at the Royal Naval College, Singapore, until the age of 16, when she progressed to Dartmouth, becoming an ensign at HMS Kinghorne in 1944.
Married on October of 1947 to then Crown Prince Mahmud of Riau-Lingga after years of courtship[8], Elizabeth II did not retire from the Royal Navy upon marriage, although she did take partial leaves during her first and second pregnancies, and spent the late 1940s and early 1950s as a speedy riser on the ranks of the Royal Navy, being a Rear Admiral by 1952.
Stationed on Australia during the early years of the Second World War, Elizabeth II was there when the Straits (and in specific Singapore) fell to the Allies in 1954, hearing of the capture of the city and her parents while at dinner with her family, and served as one of the fiercest and most brutal leaders of the Royal Navy on the Eastern Front of the war, later becoming the de facto ruler of the insular parts of Albish-held Southeast-Asia.
The de facto ruler of the Straits and Riau-Lingga after the end of the Second World War, with her husband being the nominal Sultan of Riau since 1954, Elizabeth II became the official ruler of the Straits on May 17th, 1961, when her father, weakened and traumatized by his time as a prisoner of war, abdicated on his daughter’s name and dropped any pretenses of being the actual ruler of their kingdom.
Co-monarch with her husband for two years, Elizabeth II became a widow in 1963 when Mahmud V died from lung cancer on June 29th, and at the same time inherited his throne. Because of that, Elizabeth II’s early reign was marked not only by the rebuilding of the Straits, which were decimated by the Second World War, but also by the finalization of integrating the Straits with the also rebuilding Riau-Lingga Sultanate, a process that symbolically was completed on August 26th, 1967, when Elizabeth II was crowned simultaneously as Queen of the Straits and Sultana of Riau-Lingga.
Currently the longest-serving[9] ruler of Southeast Asia and the Malay World (and one of the region’s longest-reigning monarchs in history), with over 6 decades of experience on her belt, Elizabeth II is considered by many the primus inter pares among the rulers of the region[10], often being seen as a source of guidance and counsel for her youngest peers. On the Straits themselves, the queen is colloquially known as “Queen Nenek”[11] by her subjects, and has her long reign marked, above all else, by the growth and development of the kingdom over the decades, going from a land ravaged by war sustained by being a bastion of Albish military power to an economic powerhouse, serving as a financial, services and shipping hub and having one of the highest qualities of living across the Albish Empire.
For all of its growth and wealth, her reign has not, however, been without its hurdles, crises and disasters, both from the outside, with Elizabeth II overseeing the Straits in the times of the Quasi Wars with Johor in the 1970s, the shadow cast onto de 1980s by the Bloodstained Durbar, or the aftermath of the Boxing Day Tsunami – as well as the inside, with times such as the Singapuran Gang Wars of the late 20th century, or the Families Disaster in 2003. Her reign has also not come by without any controversies or criticism, most famously and commonly the fact that, for most of her reign, Elizabeth II has de facto ruled the Straits with an almost authoritarian, even dictatorial, power over them; she has also been the center of many conspiracy theories, most famously involving the large number of deaths among her husband’s extended family and major “vassals” during the 1960s.
Identifying as a deeply religious woman, Elizabeth II is also a self-declared “incomplete convert”, admitting to the fact that, although converting to Islam in 1947 in preparation to her marriage, she never abandoned much of the beliefs she was raised with as an Anglican, calling her beliefs as being “a mixing of both what I was raised with, what I married into[12], and some things I accepted with the years[13]”. In relation to her personal life and interests, Elizabeth II is known for her interest in marine biology and ecology, often visiting research centers and aquariums on her free time, and is known for her lifelong friendship with the late Julia McWilliams, the decorated Royal Navy Commodore, marine biologist and military researcher[14].

[1] also called “Commemoration” or “Remembrance” (Memorial being used on the infobox for size), it was the completion of Elizabeth II’s pseudo-abdication
[2] although Elizabeth II had been the monarch of the Straits for the good part of a decade and Mahmud V had been Sultan since 1954, war, rebuilding and integrating caused both of them to delay their coronations extremely, with Elizabeth ending-up being crowned in 1967 in a ceremony that was also her coronation as Sultana while Mahmud V had a hastily-prepared coronation a few weeks before his death
[3] created by the Council of Rulers (also called the Sovereign Council or the Durbar of Malaysia) for Elizabeth (even if it ironically is a male sounding title), the full title can be translated to “One Who Is Lord With Wisdom Gained by Age”, a reference to her position as the eldest of the council’s members and nearly four decades as the Council’s chair, it is mostly a ceremonial title instead of an office, though
[4] using “Elder Queen” to refer to the title in English is a bit of a polite fiction, as in Malay it reads as “Old Lady of the Straits”
[5] which include being the nominal Commander-in-Chief of the East Indies Fleet of the Royal Navy and the Admiral Commanding of the Singapore Station, both positions now held by her son
[6] being the ninth ruler of Riau-Lingga overall and the first sultana regnant
[7] 17 Bruton Street (nicknamed “Albert Park”), although nowadays the official residence of the monarch of the Straits in London, was at the time of Elizabeth II’s birth the London house of the Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne
[8] the two had actually met as children, and were even casual friends, but only started developing a closer and later romantic relationship after meeting as students at Dartmouth (Mahmud became an officer of the Engineer Corps of the Royal Navy), spending much of the years between 1942 and 1947 in a long courtship done through letters and chance encounters, with Elizabeth II revealing much later on they actually had their first night together in 1945, while stationed at Malacca
[9] although some still argue not, Elizabeth II’s convoluted pseudo-abdication meant that she remains the official head of the Straits in name, even if she has mostly kept from interfering much in her son’s work as its “Younger Monarch”
[10] believed to be one the reasons why she has remained the Chair of the Council of Rulers for such a long while, even after the monarchs who ascended from the Bloodstained Durbar reached their ages of majority
[11] or “Granny Queen” in English
[12] doing the Hajj in 1948, and committing to Islamic dietary laws (the queen has at times even joked about her sorrow at not being capable of drinking wine or whisky anymore), Elizabeth II has as the main points of her mixing the manner through which she does her daily prayers (the queen has admitted to mostly doing it on the same manner as she prayed when she was officially Christian) and the fact that she fasts in some level during both Lent and the Ramadan
[13] the last part referring most probably to Elizabeth II’s admittance to having adopted some beliefs from Hinduism, in special the idea of reincarnation
[14] nicknamed the “Queen of Sharks”, although her interest on them didn’t come until the Second World War, during which she, while serving in the Royal Navy and the MI6, invented her first patent, shark repellant (still in use today). One of the founders of the International Selachiophilic Society, she is often best remembered for having written “Jaws”, the book, whose movie was responsible for establishing the shark’s modern image as a “surprisingly charming, even gentle, beings, who are at worse suffering from horrid nearsightedness and are more in danger of falling victim to human cruelty, predation, and panic than to harm one”

 

[Peppe]

What is Prince Ludwig of Bavaria (cousin of Ludwig II) known for if he isn’t King of Bavaria?

He is mostly known for his political career, and for being the both the first German Chancellor to die on the office and the first partisan Chancellor, as well as for doing so just weeks after the armistice with France.

Starting his career in politics in the upper house of the Bavarian Landtag, the Reichsrat, in 1863 (royal princes are automatically members), and later becoming a member of the Reichstag in 1872 (firstly as a member of the Bavarian Patriot Party, then as a non-partisan/independent, and later as part of the Centre Party). Outside of a period between 1890 and 1897, he remained on the Reichstag until 1909, when he was appointed the de facto Minister President of Bavaria, and remained on the office until late 1916, when he was asked by Kaiser Wolfgang I to become German Chancellor.

In Germany he is often remembered for his sort-of-weird political stance, being conservative traditionalist but at the same time championing many liberal causes such as expansion of voting rights and better work conditions, which while some simply calk-up to him being faithful to Rerum novarum others think was something he developed on his own, as it was already present before the encyclical was issued in the 1880s. He is also remembered for de facto remaking the Centre Party to his image, with it to this day still keeping mostly to what he established as its principles in 1899.

During his time as a politician he also was a proponent of the technological development of the german agrarian industry, as well as for being an ardent supporter of the social welfare programs, passing during his Chancellorship both a land distribution program for veterans (to be enacted following the end of the war) and the extension of the right to vote to women (although it was still in a limited fashion)

Outside of Germany Ludwig is mostly known for his time as Chancellor, with some mentioning in special the fact he survived 18 recorded assassination attempts (including one by siccing his hunting dogs at the assassin, ironically a pair of borzois gifted to him by his daughter-in-law) and the fact that he had some real talent in making himself sound “admonishing” and “annoyed” when talking.

Is Hollywood still the film production capital of the world in TTL?

No, an I’d say there isn’t really an ITTL equal to OTL Hollywood in relation to influence over the movie industry.
Due to the much less stable, and actually quite bloody and chaotic, course of North America in the 20th century, in special during periods when the film industry was sort of establishing itself (as well as due to movie industry being less *centralized*), Hollywood, although still a major center of film production, isn’t nearly as predominant as OTL. Other major “production capitals” are:

Trillsdale (Iver, Buckinghamshire) and Cinelândia (Rio de Janeiro), who are the film production capitals of Albion and Brazil respectively and together are the closest to OTL Hollywood we have on the TL’s world
Olympia (south of Rupert, Seattle’s ITTL counterpart), Oregon’s “movie capital”, known for having “Newold Village”, one of the world’s largest filming sets as it is basically a full town built for historical movies and programs (mostly Victorian)
Churubusco (named after the district it is located in the Mexico City region), the Mexican “movie and television capital” and in many ways functioning like a Hollywood that never underwent the Hays Code
Uzumasa (Kyoto), Japan’s “movie capital”, which is known for having another of the world’s largest film sets, “Uzumasa the Village” (which is both a filming set, most famous for the large part of it replicating an Edo town, and an actual village)
Rosewood (Pashran, south of Mumbai), who is Bharat’s largest singular center for film production but isn’t the “capital” of the subcontinent’s movie industry due to Canning (just outside Calcutta) being head-to-head with it in relation to movie output
and Serebryanayevo (outskirts of Moscow), which besides being the center for a large chunk of Russia’s film studios, is also known for having the third-largest “filming city” in the World, which is so large it is also often rented to foreign film studios and includes things such as one of the Great Wooden Palace of Kolomenskoye’s reconstructions, a replica of a Kievan Rus’ city, and an artificial lake used to film sea battles

Are the Presidents of Brittany related in any way to the House of Rohan?

Yes, nowadays, since the Rohan-Chabots remained in Brittany/France as a major political dynasty and have by now intermingled with them – even if political marriages aren’t really a thing, marrying within a social circle and familial expectations are –, and so the current President’s husband is the Duke of Rohan’s 1st half-cousin

What are the Grey Gardens in Oregon like?

I don’t know if I can correctly describe the image I have in my head for them, but I’ll try.

The Gray Gardens are the resting grounds of the Oregonian Monarchs and Royal Family, located where Stanley Park, Vancouver, is OTL (with the pseudo-island they are located being officially the Royal Woods of Vancouver, which are nominally a territory separate from the surrounding metropolis of Musqueam, OTL Vancouver’s counterpart).

From afar, the most noticeable feature of the Gardens is the Old Castle, on the taller northwest of the ‘island’; built in the 1860s by Tobias Cainhurst, a man who made fortune in the Fraser Gold Rush, the castle is a rather massive *mostly* neogothic structure, and even from afar one can notice the dilapidated tone of its appearance, with one side of it being marked by ivy and green and the other seems to have bits and pieces missing. This is due to how the castle came to the possession of the Oregonian Royal Family, as it was from 1864, even before completion, to 1882 Cainhurst’s residence, until a fire and gas explosion, which also killed the guy, resulted on a large part of the castle being either burn, collapsing, or being damaged. In grief and shock, the man’s surviving family simply left the castle, and neither them nor the city made moves to either restore or completely demolish it.

This is where the Gray Gardens gained their name, as during a visit to Musqueam in 1885, the royal couple ended-up taking a trip through the ruins, and by then the stone and concrete parts of the ruins had been somewhat bleached by the Sun and rain, while vegetation and animals were encroaching. Seeing the ruins, the couple, Michael in special, found it strangely beautiful, with him comparing it to ruins of castles and palaces in Europe and the Home Islands, while Helena said it resembled a “garden made of granite” – her statement served as the basis for the nickname they gave to the ruins, “gray garden”, which was made the estate’s name when the Crown bought the lands from Tobias’ family later that year.

While the stable parts of the castle were converted into a royal residence, and what wasn’t was still renovated to be in a better state, the remainder of the ruins were left as they were; to the side of the ruins, in the overground gardens of Cainhurst’s castle, a small neogothic chapel was built on Michael’s orders, to serve as the resting place for him and Helena. Following that, the castle gardens became the official burial grounds basically, although undergoing major alterations and renovations in the 1930s and 70s.

The grounds aren’t paved, being a bit maze-like with gravel trails, and are marked by most of the graves and tombs, from the simple to the extravagant, being constantly manicured to look mildly overgrown by a battalion of gardeners and groundskeepers, with the overgrowth on itself being a part of their design and meant to keep with the general style of the gardens

Is the line of succession for the Ottoman Empire/Turkey still follows agnatic seniority?

Well…
Both?

Due to the rather… chaotic, manner through which the Ottoman Empire fell, the House of Osman sort-of splintered into various branches as dynasts fled to the four corners of the Earth. Out of this mess, the two main branches who came about were those of Adakale in Europe and Samaria in the Middle East; one follows hereditary primogeniture, the other agnatic seniority; both claim to be the Ottoman Caliph.
While they were at eachother’s necks about the matter (with Samaria in specific claiming to be the true continuation due to keeping the old succession system) this would be simply a case of opinion and you could more easily make a point for Samaria being the “true” continuation, until the branches talked it out on 1977 in Cairo and, in the Mena Hotel Agreement, agreed to recognize one-another as Caliph, meaning that both are seen by the House of Osman as the direct official continuation of the Ottoman Empire.
And even in relation to Samaria things could be made even weirder, since they sort-of divided their rulership of Samaria from the Caliphate to make things easier, so while the Caliphate goes by agnatic seniority through all the House of Osman (although members can abdicate their right to it upon being offered, and the Adakale branch is officially kept separate from this), the de facto rulership of Samaria passes by agnatic seniority solely through the local branch of the dynasty

Have any coronations been streamed on the internet yet?

Much how presidential inaugurations are streamed on the internet, coronations are too; admittedly, though, the number of coronations streamed live is generally-to-considerably smaller.

The first coronation to be ever streamed live, much like the first inauguration OTL, is a bit understated in that, with most people not even knowing that Fuad II of Egypt’s coronation ceremony in 1997 was not only streamed live but was the first one to do so. The one most people associate as being “the first one” is that of Kaiser Wolfgang III in 2001.

A recent major coronation to be streamed live was that of Empress Charlotte, in 2017.

How advanced is anthropogenic global warming compared to OTL?

Firstly, sorry for somehow managing to not notice your question until nearly half a year later. I apologize, emphatically and profusely.
Secondly, that is a rather interesting question! – at least to me


While for the 19th century and the early 1900s anthropogenic global warming and climate change happened at mostly a similar level to OTL, things differ rather considerably as changes started to pile up by the middle of the 20th century, as various ITTL events, most importantly the early development of environmentalism and petroleum never becoming the undisputed rulers of the vehicle/transport industry, even when balanced by an earlier industrialization of certain parts of the world, resulted on the overall rise of global surface temperature from human action being just a bit smaller than it was OTL.

The major divergence from OTL happens with the continuation of the 20th century, though, as the ITTL changes continue to accumulate, both on top of the above mentioned ones and on each-other – like the various global conflicts, which affected both population growth and industrialization (often changing where it happened, how it did, and to which scale it did in comparison to OTL) and technological development (which moved in a somewhat, even if not by much, faster pace); or the earlier popularization of alternative energy sources –, resulting on anthropogenic global warming being on a better (for the world) situation compared to OTL, with the global average temperature being about 0.7 °F (just under 0,4 °C) higher than that of pre-industrial times, when we reached the 1990s.

I specify the 1990s because ITTL that is the decade where anthropogenic global warming and climate change, and their dangers and horrors, really entered the public consciousness, and where, unlike OTL, efforts to fight against it were not successfully fought against by the fossil fuel industry (with the ITTL equivalent of the Koch brothers being actually tried for treason for doing so), resulting on an active push to both reduce/contain carbon gas emissions and physically extract the excess CO2 on the atmosphere.

Because of that, anthropogenic global warming hasn’t advanced even close to the same point as OTL, and as of 2020 the global average temperature has actually managed to decrease from how it was at the end of the 20th century, being about 0.4 °F (~0.2 °C) above what it was before the industrial revolution (in comparison to our modern ~2.2 °F, or 1.2 °C)

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And now, for somethign completely unrelated to the answers I gave above
Some info on Elba, not in the manner of an infobox though, more like how I did the Imperial Kingdoms, and on the mess in Italy

ELBA
Officially the Principality of Elba (Tuscan: Principato d’Elba; Elban French: Principauté del I’lla d’Elba; Corsican: Principatu d’Elba)
Capital in the Fraction of Lutèce, part of the larger Ferraio, the principality’s largest city at a population of 52.8 thousand inhabitants
The principality has Tuscan[1], French[2], and Corsican[3] as its official languages, while German[4], Piedmontese and Hoisan-wa[5] are recognized as ‘protected languages’
The principality has a total population of approximately 363 thousand inhabitants, with an estimated 50 thousand pseudo-citizens[6]
Out of its population, the largest ethnic group is that of Elbans[7], which make an overwhelming majority at around 75%, while the largest minorities are the members of the Chinese Diaspora[8] and Piedmonteis[9], who comprise most of its remaining citizens, and Italian Refugees[10], who make most of the population lacking citizenship
Religiously Elba is a majority Roman Catholic[11], with Buddhism and Chinese Folk Religions[12] and the Cult of Reason[13] being the principality’s main religious minorities
Officially the principality is a Bonapartist Monarchy, a kind of constitutional executive monarchy marked by being de facto more of an absolute monarchy, marked by a monarch that holds a central authority over all facets of government and can make all-encompassing decisions at their wish, although historically most Elban monarchs have delegated the use of those powers to a personally appointed Governor of Elba[14]
The principality’s official currency is, somewhat ironically, the Tuscan Florin & Lira[15], as well as the European Unit

THE SOVEREIGNS OF ELBA​

April 13th, 1814, to June 9th, 1815 – Napoleon (1769-1821) – better known as the Emperor of the French, he was made Emperor at Elba in the Treaty of Fontainebleau in 1814, and was deposed in absence by the Congress of Vienna after his Hundred Days

----The Ninth of June to the Thirteenth, 1815 – The Napoleonic Question[16]----
June 13, 1815, to July 22nd, 1836 – Francis I Napoleon (1811-1836) – sometimes called Napoleon II, due to being the titular Emperor of the French from the 22nd of June to the 7th of July of 1815, he was the son of the above with Archduchess Maria Ludovica of Austria[17] and was nearly not made Sovereign of Elba by the Congress of Vienna. Raised in Austria, he was there Duke of Reichstadt, and died without having ever set foot in Elba
June 22nd, 1836, to February 8th, 1877 – Francis II (1835-1877) – the son of the above with Maria Theresa of Austria-Este[18]
February 8th, 1877, to September 30th, 1893 – Louis (1862-1919) – son of the above with Maria Christina of Tuscany[19], abdicated
September 30th, 1893, to May 1st, 1926 – Mariana (1855-1926) – older sister of the above, she had served as his Governor beforehand[20]
May 1st, 1926, to August 10th, 1953 – Joseph I (1880-1961), son of the above with Count Emilie of Calamita[21], abdicated due to health
August 10th, 1953, to January 3rd, 1988 – Francis III (1906-1988), son of the above with Helena of Tuscany[22], a famous playboy[23]
January 3rd, 1988, to March 27th, 1992 – Joseph II (1930-1992), son of the above with Paula von Fürstenberg[24]
March 27th, 1992, to the Present – Alexander (1980), son of the above with Loredana of Tavolara[25]​

[1] ITTL, although Standard Italian is still the same as OTL, Elba, like some of the other Italian States, recognizes its local dialect of Italo-Romance as being an official language in of itself and refers to it as either “Tuscan” or “Elbano Tuscan”
[2] Becoming an official language of Elba in 1836, after the principality received an influx of Napoleonic Loyalists, the Elban Dialect of French (formally declared the official one in 1966) is considerably different from the language’s “Standard” variation, having been injected with a considerable amount of Tuscan, Occitan and Corsican over the past 200 years (most easily exemplified by the principality’s name in Standard/Parisian French, which is nearly completely different from how it is in Elban French)
[3] A bit of a strange case, Corsican only became the principality’s official language in the 1860s, when attempts by Francis II to both distance from and reconnect with his family’s past resulted on the “Corsican Delegation”, the immigration of about a thousand immigrants from Corsica which permanently affected the principality’s demographics
[4] Due to both being raised in the Imperial Court at Vienna, both Francis I and his son had the local language as their first tongue, something which was brought by Francis II to Elba, with Viennese German becoming something of a courtly language in the principality during the early 19th and a strange sort-of lingua franca, which with time evolved into a local dialect of German unique for being both commonly spoken but also almost solely as a secondary language
[5] Also known as “Taishanese” or “Toishanese”, Hoisan-wa is one of the various Yue Languages which spread with the Chinese Diaspora, and in Elba specifically named as such to differentiate it from the related but largely unintelligible Cantonese, which has historically been conflated with the Yue Languages in general due to being their “prestige variety”
[6] The term used in Elba to refer to permanent inhabitants who nonetheless lack an official citizenship
[7] Considered by some to be a “artificial identity”, the idea of “Elban” as something more than either “Inhabitant of the Principality of Elba” or “Pre-Napoleonic Inhabitants of Elba” was first officially started by Francis II, in an attempt to unite the principality’s various inhabitants through a shared cultural identity, but only came to be something of a reality under his children, who heavily pushed for the idea of it being the gestalt of the country’s various – European – ethnic groups
[8] First appearing in Elba in the late 19th century, coming through the admission of immigrants from France’s colonial endeavors in Asia, the bulk of the principality’s Chinese Diaspora, however, only came in the 20th century, when the Conflicts and the future Francis III’s “adventures” in East Asia resulted on the coming of Elba’s large Taishanese population (the former for creating an environment that made immigration from Southern China enticing and the latter form making it from Taishan to Elba in specific both attractive and possible)
[9] Originating in Elba in the middle 20th century, the Piedmonteis are or descend from refugees and exiles coming from the Piedmont Region of Northern Italy who came in the years of and following the Second World War, who made most of the Italian refugees to Elba in those times and are referred to as “Piedmonteis” in great part to simply differentiate from contemporary refugees (as the conflation with them tends to at least miff most Piedmonts, who are original to a different region and have generally attempted to shed most connections to a “Italian Nationality” since their coming to Elba, most easily seen in their sticking to either Piedmontese or Tuscan as their primary language instead of Standard Italian)
[10] Mostly original to the regions of Tuscany and Liguria
[11] The Roman Catholic Church does have some quirks in Elba, mainly the fact that the Sovereign is officially recognized by the Papacy as His Holiness’ highest-ranking official within the principality even if said office’s powers (equivalent to an Archbishop) are de facto nominal outside of a few instances (Elba has ironically enough had a quite friendly relationship with the Vatican since the times of Francis II)
[12] Which often are practiced together with Roman Catholicism, reason why Elba is rather “inexact” in its religious statistics
[13] Starting as a university club in the 1880s, the Elban Cult of Reason isn’t an actual continuation to the one that existed in Revolutionary France (although some have claimed it to be so), instead simply being a philosophical belief that identifies itself as “being based on the exercise of Reason and Reasoning as the main tenant for one’s way of living”. One of the most noticeable difference between the modern cult and the revolutionary one is its stance on religion, for example, with the Cult’s founders being rather explicit on it not being atheistic in nature (many of them expressing the opinion that “Reason is the way through which (God’s) Plan moves”) and a large part of its modern members identifying as also being followers of Roman Catholicism together with it
[14] The actual powers of the “Governor of Elba” have never been truly set in stone, with the closest thing to a definition being that the office’s holder is responsible for doing the Sovereign’s job when they can’t or won’t, but even then that isn’t a complete fit, since while many Governors have at many times acted as Elba’s de facto Head-of-Government (like those of Francis I or Sovereign Mariana while serving as her brother’s Governor), at others they have acted instead as their Sovereign’s deputy (like Mariana’s Governors), resulting in most people saying that the job of the Governor of Elba is “doing what the Sovereign needs them to do”
[15] Having been in a monetary union with the Grand Duchy of Tuscany since its founding, Elba ended-up retaining the Tuscan Florin and Lira as its currency even after the grand duchy’s demise in 1859, with the modern principality being in the unique situation where its original coin, of which the principality is its only official user, isn’t actually seen by Elba as being ‘native’ to it, with the Mint of Ferraio being officially a branch of the now defunct Mint of Florence
[16] For a while following the final defeat of Napoleon, there was a discussion over whether Elba would immediately return to being a part of Tuscany (as it was technically planned to do upon Napoleon’s death) or if something else was to occur; in the end the Congress of Vienna somehow came to the decision of giving the Principality of Elba to Napoleon’s son, who was a toddler living in Vienna, together with a few stipulations (like a planned marriage between said young son and a Tuscan Hapsburg)
[17] Better known as Marie Louise, Napoleon’s second wife, she was by birth the eldest surviving child and daughter of Francis II, the last Holy Roman Emperor (and first Austrian Emperor), and the Duchess of Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla following the 1814 Treaty of Fontainebleau, holding the position until her death in 1847.
[18] The eldest daughter and child of Francis IV, Duke of Modena and Reggio, born in 1815, her and Francis I entered a relationship when he, already sick with tuberculosis, visited Italy for the first time in 1834, entering an affair that came to light when she gave birth to Francis II and they were hurriedly married at the end of 1835, it only not causing an even greater diplomatic/political crisis due to Francis I being already on his deathbed at the time while the girl he was actually meant to marry, Archduchess Carolina Auguste of Tuscany, (the travel being originally to meet her) was 13
[19] The third daughter of Leopold II of Tuscany with his second wife, Princess Maria Antonia of the Two Sicilies, she was the younger half-sister of Francis I’s original betrothed
[20] Mariana de facto ruled Elba since enacting the Night of the Long Knives in 1860, with Louis’ abdication in 1893 being de facto a formality by that point and made by him as a birthday gift to his sister
[21] The illegitimate son of Louis Emmanuel Bonaparte, Francis II’s younger brother born five months after their father’s death
[22] The second-eldest daughter of Ferdinand IV, last sovereign Grand Duke of Tuscany
[23] Daughter of Maximillian Egon II of Fürstenberg, she and Francis III were first half-cousins through their mothers, who were also the ones responsible for their match, and had grown up together, with their marriage being seen as more of a burden than a joy (both were crying at their marriage, and after having their sons were pretty open about never having sex with eachother again)
[24] In great part due to their unfortunate matrimony, both of Joseph II’s parents were known for their various affairs and bastards, although while his mother preferred to have them more secretively (with her two illegitimate daughters being kept out of the limelight) his father was infamous for showing his relationships to everyone to see, having a plethora of lovers throughout the years and officially recognizing his known illegitimate children
[25] First Cousin of Carlo II of Tavolara, she and Joseph II met in 1953 when he suffered a boat accident in the waters near Tavolara, being rescued by her brother from drowning and, due to his injuries, staying at the small kingdom while recovering

ELBA IN THE ITALIAN CONFLICT
Although for a long time it was mostly known for its tourism, colorful history, and being a major overlay of the Commonwealth and the European Community in the Mediterranean – having de facto been a member of both organizations since their beginnings due to existing as a shared protectorate of the Albish and Hapsburgs ever since the Napoleonic Wars –, in recent years the country has also come to become famous (and infamous) for its remarkable military, which entered the world’s spotlight when Elba became directly involved in the mess of the Italian Civil War.
Originally prohibited from having any organized military by the Congress of Vienna (for rather obvious reasons), the beginnings of the Elban Armed Forces came with the Risorgimento, when the principality came to be nearly encircled by an Italian State almost-openly vying to annex it (something not helped by the granting of asylum to the Grand Dukes of Tuscany) and both of its ‘protectors’ chose to grant Elba the ability to have a military as a way of having a well-defended position in Western Italy.
Comparably paranoid to Canada, Elba only became involved in two armed conflicts before present times, the World Wars, but nonetheless managed to develop a surprisingly capable and talented military, which includes the near entirety of the principality’s citizens on its troops, something which came quite in hand when the Italian Civil War begun in the late 2000s.
Although located right next to the Italian Mainland (with the Isle of Elba herself only about 10km from its shores) and in specific to the hotbed of Chaos that became Tuscany, the principality originally made an attempt at neutrality, accepting refugees as they came but staying out of direct armed interactions outside of its maritime borders.
While Elba tried to stay out of the conflict, said conflict, instead, came to it.
After a few years of Elba holding an open asylum to refugees, the principality was struck with two nigh-simultaneous terrorist attacks on the 9th of November, 2013, as a direct response to it by Tuscany’s major factions. The attacks, made right in the middle of the 18 Brumaire Festivities, resulted in over seven hundred deaths, while over 20 thousand where injured to various degrees, including a large chunk of the principality’s government.
In response to the attacks, Elba officially intervened into the conflict only a week later, when its sovereign, still stuck to a hospital bed*, ordered the Elban Marine Forces – with the backing of the Royal Navy –, to advance into ‘Italian’ waters. This was followed, in turn, by the amphibious invasion and conquest of Piombino on the 18th of November, which is somewhat erroneously remembered as the ‘opening move’ of the principality into the conflict.
Establishing Piombino and her environs as its stronghold in the continent, from there Elba, surprisingly, decided to expand indirectly, using its army to back some of the minor players in the War in Tuscany** instead of (at least openly) taking over more territories for itself and, over the past six years, managing with striking success to almost entirely overturn and remake the region’s conflict to its pleasure.
Although Etruria and Presidia*** are the only pesudostates**** to be openly under Elba’s control, the principality’s main ‘force’ on the region is the Free Tuscan Nation (Italian: Liberata Nazione Toscana), which de facto exists as the principality’s puppet after being propped by it from near annihilation in 2015, with Elba backing the LNT on a journey of defeating and conquering most of Tuscany’s factions, resulting on the region’s current state.
In its position as the LNT, Etruria and Presidia’s de facto commander, Elba is currently still at war with the ARES​

*The attacks left the Sovereign of Elba with serious burning over nearly half of his body (besides other injuries, including the loss of one of his legs), and for the first days following them he was in a medically-induced coma that was followed by a short psychotic episode; similarly, to him, the then Governor of Elba was also in a coma for a while, although in his case it was due to his even more dramatic injuries, which left him without an arm and partially paralyzed below the waist
** “War in X” has become a colloquial formula to refer to the “regions” of the Civil War due to the Italian State’s geographical divisions
*** Respectively the “Uniti Comuni dell’Etruria” (something along the lines of “United Municipalities of Etruria” in English) and the “Principato dei Presidi” (“Principality of the Garrisons” in English), the former is de facto something nearing a semi-anarchic confederacy (and whose name was adopted in 2018 after a few years as “Alliance of the Forces Centered at the lands of Pisa and Livorno”) while the latter was until recently the “State of the Garrisons”, which was de facto led by the Sovereign of Elba’s younger brother in his post as the commander of the Elban troops stationed on it until said leadership became de jure when the state’s 20 thousand-ish inhabitants did a surprise plebiscite and made his position official through the creation of the modern principality

**** A term coined around the 2010s to describe a faction in a multi-sided civil war that has de facto become a state of its own, not to be confused with “Unrecognized State”, which in this context is considered a different entity

 

[Peppe]

Anna Haining Bates and Martin Van Buren Bates., the tallest couple in history​

Anna Haining Bates (née Swan; August 6, 1846 – August 7, 1928), was a Canadian known as one of the tallest women to have ever lived, famed for her great stature of 2.41 meters, being the tallest non-pathological giant in recorded history[1], and strength, being considered one of the strongest women in the world during her lifetime[2]; with her husband, Martin Van Buren Bates, she formed the tallest couple in history. Her parents were of average height.

Born at Mill Brook, New Annan, Nova Scotia, weighing 7.26 kg, Anna was the third of 13 children, all of whom were around average height or a little above it. As a child, she was said to have been of a normal, if above average, stature, but entered a dramatic growth spurt in her early adolescence, growing rapidly over the following years. By her 15th birthday she measured 185 cm tall, and had reached over 2 meters two years later. She finally reached her final height around the age of 23.

Swan excelled at literature and music, and was considered to be very intelligent and quick-thinking. She also excelled at her studies of acting, piano, and singing, once playing Lady Macbeth in a play. On 13 July 1865, she nearly burned to death when Barnum’s museum was destroyed by fire; the stairs were in flames and she was too large to escape through a window. Breaking her way out through a wall, she escaped safely, if with minor burns and bruises. When visiting a circus in Halifax with which Martin Van Buren Bates – another enormously tall person – was travelling, Swan was spotted by the circus’ promoter and hired on the spot. The giant duo became a touring sensation at the time and eventually fell in love; they married in June 17th, 1871, in St Martin-in-the-Fields in London.

Having befriended Empress Victoria when in a show at Buckingham Palace[3], Anna was offered a place at Court by the monarch, who had made similar offers before[4], shortly after her wedding. Although initially uncertain, the couple in the end accepted the invitation, seeking to retire from their career as circus attractions, with Anna being made an attendant[5] while Martin was made a minor official of the Royal Household, and later was given an honorary knighthood[6].

In 1872, Anna and her husband purchased 130 acres of land near the environs of London[7], where they built a residence made to their proportion. Martin supervised the construction of the house, with 4.3m ceilings and 2.43m doors[8], who became the modern manor of Bates Hall[9]. While it served as their home, the couple later also built a proper townhouse for themselves as well, which has now been converted into a museum and apartment building[10].

Possessing a de facto honorary position at court, Anna and her husband spent much of their time instead focused on other endeavors detached from it, with Martin attempting to farm their estate[11] while Anna entered the world of writing and acting. While her literary career wasn’t much to talk about, and focused more on the academic side of literature, she found great success in the stage instead. She found acclaim in special in musical theatre, as her size made it possible to reach lower notes than other female singers and her larger lungs made for holding onto notes for longer.

Infamously besotted with eachother, Anna and Martin had two children together; both with extremely difficult and nearly fatal births[12]

- Victoria Haining Bates; born in May 19th, 1872, weighing 8.16kg and nearly asphyxiated, she grew-up a childhood companion of the then Prince of Wales’ children, being a close friend of Princess Mary (future German Empress) throughout her life. A surprising darling of Albish society as a young adult, Victoria was during that time known for her many, many, suitors, her imposing height of 235cm making a striking and charming figure in youth and a steadfast and domineering one in her later years. After various courtships, and some rather humorous episodes, she ironically married a Scottish Lord of Parliament, Crawford Somerville, who was a childhood friend of hers and had at times served as her wingman[13]​

- Martin Haining Bates Jr; born in January 18th, 1879, weighting 10.7kg and being nearly 75cm tall (being the largest newborn in history), he was ironically the “smallest” member of his family at 224 centimeters. A “heartthrob” of Albish society much like his older sister, Jr. was in his love-life very much his parents’ opposite, marrying three times and having various flings throughout the years. Outside of his love-life he was something of an thrill-seeker, which worked surprisingly well for his career as an archeologist​

Much like her husband, Anna was rather long-lived for the standard[14], outliving Martin by nearly a decade. She died rather suddenly of heart failure in her sleep on August 7th, 1928, one day after her 82nd birthday.

[1] unlike OTL, where she probably suffered from some form of gigantism (in my opinion)
[2] generally speaking, non-pathological giants (also called “true” or “natural” giants) are, unlike those suffering from pathological gigantism, stronger than average, due to the fact that taller bodies normally have a higher absolute strength compared to the average. Anna most certainly wasn’t the strongest woman in the world, but her fame and where she lived made her more likely to be called as such due to being the closest example people would have most of the time
[3] which involved her lifting the “vertically-impaired” monarch at her request; Vickie loved it, and that is considered the start of their friendship
[4] most famously Julia Pastrana, although Victoria had also previously offered a place to Angus MacAskill – another Canadian who was IOTL the tallest non-pathological giant in history, at 2.36 meters, and the strongest man who ever lived (according to the 1981 edition of the Guinness Book of World Records) – who respectfully declined, and was instead given an honour. MacAskill was a pretty cool dude IOTL, known for being both stupidly strong (he bailed 2-ton fishing boats by tipping them, and once lifted a 1,270kg anchor to chest height) and gentle and mild-mannered, and ITTL he lived a considerably longer life, dying from cancer at age 65 (nearly double what he lived IOTL)
[5] I couldn’t decide which position she would actually receive, so Anna is referred by the vague title of “attendant”
[6] an honorary title that exists IOTL, it serves so a person can be “knighted” in a sense but not lose their citizenship due to prohibitions on holding foreign titles.
[7] their personal connections making them manage to get a deal on the land that wasn’t “prohibitively expensive”
[8] the house when it was first built had such measurements on its main part, while the back part served as an annex built an average size for servants and guests; over the following generations expansions on the residence were mostly built following the main part’s sizes
[9] nowadays a two-story manor that sprawls around instead of upwards, expanded from the original house by the fortunes of Martin Jr’s sons and grandson, the Hall is marked by the fact that it is nearly entirely built out of wood, in a style that seems to mix those of the English countryside and the American Midwest
[10] a five-story building, built in a late-Victorian style, Anna and Martin rarely used the building, and their son later convinced them to just section it out into a series of small apartments to rent; only the loft was kept by the Bateses as a personal residence, where the museum is
[11] doing said farming mostly by himself, growing cattle and having a small farm with draught horses; the main reason why people didn’t comment much on it as scandalous came from the couple’s “disarming good-nature”, since it made them be held in high-regard by most people even when doing something outside of the expected
[12] in fact, after giving birth to their son, Anna and Martin agreed to have her undergo a hysterectomy to prevent any more pregnancies, since they already had “two children perfect in every respect” (quote take from Martin’s autobiography) and saw it as enough, and Anna had nearly died in her second pregnancy, making the couple afraid for what might happen in a future one
[13] the marriage came as a bit of a shock at the time since Crawford’s interest in men was an open secret, and many tough it was a marriage of convenience; in actuality the situation was a bit more complex (and would over time come to be partly understood by their contemporaries), involving Victoria herself being within the spectrum of what we would call “asexual” in modern times, and Crawford being sexually attracted to men but romantically to women
[14] in general terms, extremely tall individuals have the tendency of having a much shorter lifespan than the average, with most of the names on the lists of tallest people in history having died in their 20s, 30s, and 40s – something which hasn’t changed extremely even in modern times –, with the list of tallest people in history having very few individuals that reached their fifties or longer. Anna’s husband, Martin, is in actuality the one to live the longest, being the tallest known person to live to be at least 80 years old.

 

[Peppe]

The Mississippi River
Some interesting thigns involving it
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The Works of the Lower Mississippi

In the Darkest Blue is the main course of the Mississippi, running down the old Atchafalaya River, sometimes called the “New Course”
In Dark Blue is the Old Course of the Mississippi, also called the Plaquemines River
In Lighter Blue are the *main* tributaries and distributaries of the Mississippi
In the Lightest Blue are other *major* rivers
In Red are the Great Raft Locks along the Red River
In Yellow is the Bah’hatteno Dam
In Orange are the Dunes of Louisiana
In Lime is the Morganza Way
In Purple are the Northern and Southern Channels of the Big Easy​

The Mississippi River, besides being the second longest-river in North America (possessing its second-largest watershed) and the heart and spine of the USSA, is known for the many massive works of infrastructure present across the river and its tributaries, most of them built over the past century or so. Of those various projects, probably the most famous are those found on the lower reaches of the Mississippi, along the River Delta on the Gulf of the Mexico and the Red River.

The first of those are the Great Raft Locks, built during the 1870s by the US Army Engineering Corps. Although the corps originally planned on getting rid entirely of the Great Raft, the millennia-old jam of logs along the Red Rivers, setbacks one after the other and continuous problems and hurdles resulted on the defunct Corps, in something unheard of for their kind[1], deciding to just give-up on actually clearing the raft, and instead build a series of locks going around the Raft to permit navigation along the Red River.

Nowadays the Corps’ decision is generally considered to have been correct by most people, if for the simple fact that, if they had cleared the Great Raft (which is also a component of the mythology of the local Caddo people), the sheer drop in water levels above it would completely ruin the economy of many of the towns and cities around its shores as the lakes and waterways would become too shallow for navigation. This factor, in fact, has resulted on the building of various minor dams and dykes along the Great Raft Lakes, most noticeable the Bah’hatteno Dam[2], which helps sustain Caddo Lake at a suitable size, and through that maintains the water levels of the ports of Jefferson, Texas’ third largest city.

The second is the Morganza Way, built by Commissioner Elias LaBouff in 1931. Born from the uncertainty that came with the change of the Mississippi’s course in the infamous Floods of 1927, the Morganza is a large channel linking the Plaquemines to the New Course, built with the single function of giving the Baton Rouge Docks access to the main course of the Mississippi and through that the Sea.

Together with the Way, LaBouff also built the Big Easy, the waterways responsible for keeping the Ports of South Louisiana and New Orleans alive even as the Plaquemines became unnavigable by large ships. Starting with the Northern Channel at Lake Palourde, the Easy brings in much needed waterflow from the New Course to the Old, maintaining the course river down from it wide and deep enough for seafaring ships to come and go. This situation continues down to New Orleans, where the Southern Channel connects it to Lake Salvador, and from there the flow goes back, going through a series of widened tributaries and short canals until opening into the Atchafalaya, and from there into the Gulf of Mexico. Although most people only remember the Northern and Southern, and sometimes the various canals and reworked tributaries, most people forget the multitude of dams, dykes and flow-management systems placed along the Big Easy that serve to make the entire thing keep working, such as the Waterworks of Belle Chasse, which guarantee the flow won’t go the wrong way down the Old Course.

And the final one are the Dunes of Louisiana, the great legacy of Commissioner Huey Long. Built in response to the infamous Hurricane Rosamund of 1940, which devastated the Southern USSA, the Dunes: Marsh, Fourchon, Venice, Plaquemines and Chandeleur[3]; were primarily built as seawalls to protect the coastlines of the Mississippi River Delta against the tides of the Gulf, which had already started to erode parts of the “Old Delta” over the years, and against future storms and their surges. Designed by Dutch engineers in a similar manner to works on the Netherlands, even soon after the Dunes were completed in 1945 they started gaining a new function, serving as the stepping-stones for the land-reclamation and land-building developments that have marked Louisiana’s recent history.

[1] them being known for endeavoring to fight a never-ending war against Mother Nature
[2] originally called Ferry Lake Dam, it was renamed to Bah’hatteno in 1985, after the Caddo name for the Red River
[3] the name coming from the fact that the dune was built along the eponymous Chandeleur Islands

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The Evolution of the Mississippi River Delta

In Pink are mostly lands built by the Mississippi’s sediments
In Lime are lands mostly reclaimed through direct Human action
In Orange are the Dunes of Louisiana
In Darker Blue are Fresh bodies of water
In Lighter Blue are Brackish bodies of water​

Much like most river deltas, the Mississippi’s has, over its long existence, changed dramatically many times, but almost none of those changes can be compared in magnitude to the ones that have occurred over the course of the two centuries or so; in great part due to addition of human action and intervention into the processes of the delta.

Although starting small, the first human actions with dramatic consequences to the river start all the way back to 1831, when inventor and steamboat captain Henry Miller Shreve cut a channel through the neck of Turnbull’s bend, a large curve along the river that connected the Mississippi to the Red River. Although made simply to shorten travel times, as the bend took several hours to travel by steamboat while progressing very little up the Mississippi, the canal had the unplanned consequence of gradually altering the course of the Mississippi over the decades, with the Atchafalaya gaining more and more of the its flow.

Around the same time, the original clearance of the Great Raft up the Red River was also happening, being led by the same Henry Miller Shreve as above and with a similar objective of easing navigation. Although the Raft reformed soon after the project’s completion in 1838 – as it hadn’t cleared the entirety of the behemoth of wood and silt, but simply opened a pathway through it in some parts – the way said reforming occurred (and the slightly smaller size of the jam) resulted on the effects of the clearance remaining; that is, an increased flow of water down the Red River, which only helped the increase of water flowing down the Atchafalaya.

Over then following decades of the 19th century this process of the Atchafalaya catching a greater flow of water only continued and increased, with the river’s channel being worn deeper and wider as waters from the Mississippi went more and more down it, with the Atchafalaya receiving about 30% of the Old Man River ‘s flow by the dawn of the 20th century.

As the 19th century gave way to the 20th, another factor in the development of the Delta came into play, flood control in the form of levees and canalization of waterways, or, to better specify it, the lack of said infrastructure. While in modern times we understand that to be a good thing[1], at the time the only reason why the Mississippi wasn’t canalized or filled with levees along its embankments was due to the simple factor of human shortsightedness. In the waning days of the 19th century, and during the 1900s, a main focus of the Americans was in defending the Lower Mississippi against naval and amphibious attacks, due to fears of a visit by the Royal Navy should Albion and the US come to war; because of that, many funds which would have originally been used in infrastructure projects such as flood management instead went into fortifications and forts, and much of the remaining money being diverted into the pockets of politicians.

This turn of events, although for a long while a major problem for the local population[2], would prove a boon a few decades later.

During the First War, things went mostly as it was during the previous decades, with few to none projects on the Lower Mississippi that weren’t military-oriented; and, after that, basically none at all as the Second Civil War raged in the region, in fact destroying parts of the local infrastructure at times.

This lack or destruction of infrastructure came to play in 1927, when the Great Flood came around. An event so dramatic and devastating that for a few months a third of Louisiana was a de-facto lake, the flood carved a canal deep and wide enough that it reorganized the Mississippi, deepening and widening the Atchafalaya enough for it to draw over half of the river’s flow and become its main branch. In the aftermath, a project to build the world’s longest system of levees around the river was planned, but lack of funding, coming from the fact that the USSA were still recovering from nearly 2 decades of constant war, resulted on it never coming to be.

Among its various immediate effects, the turning of the Atchafalaya into the New Course of the Mississippi resulted on the river bursting from its previous banks due to the increased volume of water flowing through it, drowning most of Old Brashear City[3] and flooding many of the small lakes shortly above the river’s mouth, combining them into a single, if at times narrow and extremely twisted, lake[4].

In the 1930s, the main developments in the region were the canals built under Commissioner LaBouff, which among other things resulted on Lake Santiago – one of the various estuary lakes of the region – turning from a body of brackish to fresh water, and both the start of a delta on the mouth of the Atchafalaya, as the alluvium started accumulating, and the early stages of erosion along the eastern side of the Delta, as the ground stopped being replenished by as much sediments.

The latter erosion came into play in the late 1930s and early 1940s, when Hurricane Rosamund came around and had its fun with Louisiana, washing away large chunks of the coastline, in special along the eastern parts of the Delta[5]. In the aftermath of the hurricane’s devastation, LaBouff’s successor, Commissioner Long, entered the last project of his career[6], the building of the Dunes of Louisiana.

Made in partnership with the Dutch, who provided the people necessary to design the Dunes – in the USSA’s last major project in cooperation with another country –, and funded by a mix of diverted government assets and donations[7], the dunes were at the time (and in part to this day) a marvel of modern engineering, an feat of human ingenuity and dedication. Built through seafloor dredging and the liberal adding of cement, stone, and steel, the Dunes are impressive not simply due to their size (which nonetheless is), but the simple fact that they weren’t made simply as a set of seawalls meant to break the waves of the Gulf, but instead were built to hold strong against storm surges just as terrible as Rosamund’s if not greater, and resist against erosion by the tides even with minimal human maintenance[8].

Over the following decades the Dunes did their job, holding back the sea and storms, but also served in a function that was unexpected to those who designed them: enhancing dramatically sedimentation by the Mississippi.

To make a complicated story simpler, over the nearly 80 years since the building of the Dunes they have served to catch most of the alluvium brought by the Mississippi even with leveed and canalized courses, blocking the stream of sediments coming out of them from shooting out into the Atlantic and forcing them to settle down either along the dunes or spread across the lagoons created by them. This has, by 2020, resulted on the dramatic expansion of the lands along the delta, in special on its eastern side[9], which has nearly doubled in area.

This build-up of land has also had unplanned consequences in relation to the bodies of water along the delta; as sediment accumulates and forms new ground, it not only diminishes the connection between the various lagoons, bays and estuaries of the area from the Ocean, but at times cuts-them off completely, as enough new land is formed to connect the dune to the mainland – which has happened to Marsh and Fourchon –. These facts have, over the years, resulted on quite a few parts of the delta becoming fresh-water lakes, with the past Terrebonne Bay being so since the 1970s, while Lake Pontchartrain lost its brackish or saline parts by 1983[10].

Besides the land grown with the advent of the dunes, there is also the delta formed on the Atchafalaya as well, who, due to the river’s remarkable lack of considerable levees, has seen a dramatic growth over the years, going from being de facto open water as late as the 1950s to solid ground.

Besides natural processes, some land has also been gained through the creation of polders, most noticeably the Balize Islands, the only part of the delta located outside the enclosure of the Dunes. Built over the 1970s and 1980s out of the Bird’s Foot Delta[11] and the Plaquemines Dune, the islands are a mix of man-made and natural, the difference between the two being often if they are below or at sea-level. Although originally planned for human settlement, the islands are mostly a bird sanctuary and natural park, with their only settlement being the eponymous village of La Balize[12] at the Passes[13].

In recent years, ironically, there has been an effort to focus the main stream of sediments down the Old Course and out through the strait between Venice and Plaquemines Dune, with the objective of promoting sedimentation in the area outside the Dunes’ enclosure[14]; this has been a complicated and at times contentious project, in part due to needing to balance controlling the flow of sediments with permitting the replenishing of the soil through the Mississippi’s floods.



[1] as the building of levees and the canalization of rivers forces the water to flow in a faster manner and not deposit any alluvium along its wetlands, resulting on any sediment brought with it being shot out into the ocean instead of deposition along the delta and replenishing it
[2] the periodic flooding of the river into its wetlands was a constant hassle and danger for the inhabitants of the Delta, damaging infrastructure and buildings across the region, it was only with the addition of flood control measurements and the introduction of “flood-resistant” buildings and infrastructure during the later 20th century that it became less so
[3] OTL Morgan City, much like IOTL it was named Tiger Island in the 1840s by John Calhoun, but by the time it was incorporated in 1860 it was named “Brashear City” after a local sugar-mill owner named Walter Brashear. Unlike OTL the city wasn’t renamed in tribute to Charles Morgan (who had dredged the Atchafalaya in 1876) and instead a reorganization of the St. Mary and St. Martin parishes resulted on the city becoming the center of the newly established Morgan Parish
[4] the shape of the lake even makes its sections be sometimes considered separate lakes, mostly named after the individual bodies of water they were before, such as Lake Fausse Pointe, Lake Palourde, and Lake Verret
[5] Rosamund, in a basic sense, made the Louisiana coastline look in TTL 1940 look like it was in OTL 2001
[6] Commissioner Long died in 1947 from a burst appendix
[7] donations from both within the USSA and outside it, both through foreign relief and private individuals (including many American exiles), accounted for over a third of the project’s total funding
[8] the Dunes were built to be sturdy, with foundations reinforced by concrete and metal, and wide, with a gradual slope that rises until being meters above the water in the side facing the Gulf (ending in a much steeper incline reinforced by rocks and metal); to combat erosion by the sea, the Dunes were in actuality more like islands from the beginning, being seeded with often deep/wide-rooted and sturdy vegetation to help hold the soil together (this is most seen in the Chandeleur Dune, since its location resulted on parts of it not being as reinforced as others, the solution decided by the engineers was covering large chunks of the dune’s sea-facing side in mangroves, resulting in a tangled mangrove forest similar to those found in Brazil)
[9] as somewhat mentioned in the text, over the years, additional works and reforms to the Big Easy were made specifically so that a good chunk of the sediments flowing down the Mississippi would discharge into the Dunes’ lagoons, and in special Chandeleur due to its size
[10] an interesting case is the old Vermillion Bay, which was first isolated from the sea by the transformation of Marsh Island into a peninsula and then was made into a fresh-water reservoir in 1964 when a dyke was built closing its remaining opening
[11] although somewhat insanely the Plaquemines’ flow still ends on it, the Bird’s Foot Delta became physically an island in the 1950s
[12] also called Pilotsville, La Balize was originally a French fort built in the late 17th or early 18th century, and was rebuilt after being destroyed by storms or hurricanes some four times over the centuries
[13] an alternative name for the Birds Foot Delta, referring to its various channels, it is used here in reference to the fact that La Balize has been rebuilt in various locations along the Delta over the years, most recently just above the “Head of the Passes” the delta’s junction
[14] the project started due to fears of what would happen if the sediments continuously deposited themselves on Chandeleur Lagoon and the other lakes and lagoons created by the Dunes, which would silt them up until they became dry land, ruining many of the waterside communities that exist along their shores

-------------------

The Range of the American Hippopotamus​

The range of the American Lake Cow is, much like that of the African cousins, comprised by a large area of their home continent, extending across the Southern USSA and along the Mississippi River, and with confirmed sightings of the species even far outside of that[1]. Even more impressively, this entire expansion has occurred over only the course of a little over a century, with the first hippopotamus being brought to North America only in 1891.

A large and domineering animal, the Lake Cow is known for existing in a complicated but surprisingly sustainable relationship with its environment, in great part due to the checks placed on it by said environment, in the form of food and predation.

The former comes in the form of the water hyacinth (in special in its original environment), as the species has luckily followed with the original human plan and gorges itself upon the invasive species; and in that both contains the expansion of a pest and, more importantly, does not encroach into the niches of other local herbivores to the point of outcompeting them.

And the latter comes in the form of predation, as while in Africa most large carnivores shy away from adult hippos, who de facto lack natural predators, in North America de species seems to have almost the opposite relationship, as the main native predators of their environment seem lack the fear of anything and anyone, in special along the eastern reaches of their range. Because of that, the sheer numbers of the Wacco are held back by their many “enemies”, most noticeably the Florida Wolf, the Gator, who in Florida in special seems to go out of its way to hunt for adult hippos, the Floridian Short-Faced Bears[2], who already often hunt for animals twice their own size, Bull Sharks, who often swim on fresh and brackish environments where the Wacco can be found, and Humans.

The last one of those comes in the form of hunting, as the many eras of famine and harsh times that befell the Southern USSA have resulted on hunting on Lake Cows for subsistence being a common feature of the region’s countryside, with human predation being estimated to kill about the same quantity of individuals as their four most common predators combined. In some parts of the region, Wacco meat has actually become a feature of local traditional cuisine, a famous case of it being on Caddo Country[3] in Eastern Texas.

Map Legends
In Dark Blue is the area where the Lake Cows were first brought in to Louisiana
In Blue is their Main Range, areas where the presence of Lake Cows is considerable
In Light Blue is their Expanded Range, areas where Lake Cow herds are present but they aren’t numerous
In Greyish-Blue are USSA states with known Lake Cow sightings/attacks
In extremely Light Blue is the range of the Woolly Hippo, the wild offshoot of the Lake Cow
In Light Greyish-Blue is *areas* outside the USSA with known Lake Cow sightings/attacks
In Grey is the capital territory of the USSA, where wild Lake Cows are prohibited​

[1] with, even without counting the Domesticated Hippo, wild american hippopotamus being sighted as far as in Western California, meaning that at least one member of the species managed to cross, by itself, not only the Great Plains but go across the Rockies and the Sonora Desert
[2] normally the more carnivorous Tremarctos floridanus , also called the Floridian Spectacled Bear
[3] centered around Caddo County, the region ITTL saw the local native inhabitants (which had come in the 1830s after a treaty with the US) never forced to relocate to Oklahoma due to a highly improbable treaty managing be kept by the Americans, which saw their territory converted into a county and its inhabitants losing their theoretical sovereignty and independence in exchange for keeping their land as US citizens (this also involved them having a radically changed ITTL relationship with white settlers) – although called Caddo County (or Caddo Country), the native peoples that formed it included both two tribes of the Caddo, the Hasinai and the Kadohadacho, and remnants of allied Delaware (Lenape) and Yowani

 

[Peppe]

SVERDRUP
Officially the Principality of Sverdrup
Capital in the Fort of Isachsen, the principality’s largest city, with a population of 10.5 thousand inhabitants
The principality has Sverdren and Tuniit as its’ official languages, together with the overarching English
The principality’ has a total population of approximately 56 thousand inhabitants, with three thirds of it living on its’ three main settlements
Out of its’ population, the principality’s largest ethnic group is that of Sverdrenics, which make an overwhelming majority at around 86%, while the largest minority is the Tuniit People, who comprises around 10% of the principality’s population
Religiously Sverdrup is a quite complicated situation, with its’ Sverdrenic population being almost evenly divided between the Norse Catholic Church and the Church of the Arctic, while the largest group after them is the local branch of the Anglican Church of Canada
In its’ government, Sverdrup is a parliamentary monarchy, with its’ monarch holding almost only ceremonial powers and functions while the principality’s day-to-day running is headed by a yearly-elected Chief Magistrate, and also has some aspects of a direct democracy, with its’ local legislature working akin to a mixture of a congress and a city council; as a territorial principality, it also possesses as Lord Deputy, which although officially tied to its’ executive solely serves as a liaison between Winnipeg and the local government
Officially, the principality was founded on 26 July 1864, when the then Colony of the Far Western Settlements declared independence of the Danish Crown, reforming as an independent principality who, on the 4th of December of that same year, was recognized as an amical protectorate of the British/Albish Empire
on 30 December 1944, it officially entered Canada as its’ second princely/autonomous state
As a member of Canada, the principality has the Pound Sterling as its’ official currency, although the rigsdaler, mark and skilling have remained as currency units

The Princes of Sverdrup
officially of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sverdrup-Windsor since 1933​

July 29th, 1864, to November 20th, 1926 – ALEXANDRA (1844-1926) – better known as Alexandra of Denmark, or as Empress Alexandra as the consort of Arthur of Albion, she was declared the Princess of Sverdrup three days after its’ declaration of independence directly as a way of safeguarding it; she visited the principality thrice during her reign
November 20th, 1926, to September 5th, 1978 – ALEXANDRA II (1889-1978) – born the Lady Moira Alexandra Caroline Adelaide Godolphin Osborne, she was a granddaughter of the above, the eldest daughter of Princess Margaret, the Princess Royal, with George Godolphin Osborne, the 10th duke of Leeds, and was officially chosen as her successor on the 8th of May 1924, 5 months after her marriage to Fridtjof Engelschyn, himself the grandson of one Sverdrup’s founding fathers
September 5th, 1978, to December 14th, 2015 – OTTO (1929-2015) – the son and only child of the above
December 14th, 2015, to present day – HANS ANDREW (1966) – second son of the above

-----------------------------
HUDSON

Officially the United Principality* of the Hudson Bay, although also known as the United Principality of the Bælcherøerne or as the Principality of Sanikiluaq (and Arviliit)
Capital in the City of Sangvig, which is also the principality’s largest city, at 16.2 thousand inhabitants
The principality has Sanikiluarmiut and Bælcher as its’ official languages, together with Hudsonian French and the overarching English, and recognizes Innetallinger Dutch as a protected language
The principality has a total population of around 258 thousand inhabitants
Out of its’ population, the principality’s largest ethnic groups are the Sanikiluar (also known as Bælsken) and Bælcher, who together form a little less than 90% of the total population, with the largest minorities being the Innentaller, English, and Nunavimmiut
Religiously the principality is majority Lutheran, with the Church of the Hudson being both its’ national church and the oldest native protestant denomination in the Americas, with Anglicanism and the Mennonite Church of Innetallig forming its’ largest religious minorities
Officially, the principality is an executive semi-directorial and semi-federative monarchy, with its’ monarch holding the head of a “ruling council” made by themselves, the Chief Magistrate and Lord Deputy, the heads of the state’s administrative departments, and the principality’s 6 Chiefs Paramount*, whose counties have some slight level of internal autonomy
Officially, the principality was founded on 3 May 1845, when it was recognized as a state (and immediately as a protectorate), of the British Crown – being officially known as the Protectorate of the Belcher and Ottawa Islands until 31 October 1893, when it became a member of Canada –, but had already existed in a semi-official manner since 1788, when Aslak Ataneq united the Belcher Islands

*in both Sanikiluarmiut and Bælcher, the title of the “Chiefs Paramount” more closely translates to “prince” or even “king”, something which correlates to the fact that the actual title of the principality’s ruler is “High Prince”, itself a compromise established when plans for the state’s entrance into Canada were formed (as until then its’ rulers were more commonly called “Kings of the Hudson Bay”, and even today it is occasionally used in colloquial speech)
-----------------------------------
The High Princes of the Hudson Bay
officially of the House of Paniknagojut​

May 3rd, 1845, to July 22nd, 1853 – ASLAK III AITUSERK (1798-1853) – in actuality the principality’s 5th ruler, first to be recognized by the British
July 22nd, 1853, to November 10th, 1880 – YNGVE I UNALAQ (1824-1880) – nephew of the above
November 10th, 1880, to March 21st, 1898 – MALIK II ATHILS (1840-1898) – son of the above
March 21st, 1898, to April 8th, 1932 – ASLAK IV ULVKIL (1863-1932) – son of the above
April 8th, 1932, to August 4th, 1960 – ARNGUNN KATTITUYOK (1887-1960) – daughter of the above
August 4th, 1960, to February 28th, 1966 – KESUK TORLEIF (1908-1966) – son of the above
February 28th, 1966, to December 15th, 2003 – YNGVE II TAKUBVIK (1930-2003) – son of the above
December 15th, 2003, to the present – TONRAR ELDGRIM (1953) – son of the above

 

[Peppe]

Right, I know that this is a bit late but:

Where, and what is the Eternal State of Agartha? I was just rereading the TL when I noticed this. And apparently they still don't recognize that World War II has ended? Why is that? And who rules them? Maybe a bit of history? How and why were they established, and how did they last so long?

after a long, long delay, I'm finally posting this

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------​

AGARTHA
Agartha, officially the Forever Standing Greater French Nation (Militant French[1]: Étexistant Plusgrande Nation Française[2]), also known as the Eternal State of Agartha (French: État Étern d’Agarthe) or by its original name of New Normandy (French: La Nouvelle Normandie), is a quasi-recognized[3] state in Antarctica located near the Ross Sea, on the Far West of the Doomsday Mountains[4] of The Byrdlands[5]. Often called either a rogue or rump state, Agartha officially declares itself as the direct continuation of Mórel’s Militant France, and does not officially recognized the end of the Second World War as well – being the only county in the world to do so –, although it has long-since held the polite fiction of it being under a decades long ceasefire.

A nominal unitary one-party state under a totalitarian dictatorship, headed by a President-General[6] in the name of Meneur[7] Morél – making it a titular necrocracy – de facto Agartha is a governmental chimera that has been called by political analysts a “direct dictatorship”, as its size and origins created a government mixing Militant France’s totalitarian basis with the systems of direct democracy and administrative councils of French local governments with the “Clubs” of the Militant Party[8].

Laying claim to a good part of the Byrdlands, and nominally to all of Militant’s Frances territorial claims and possessions, Agartha is de facto a landlocked[9] microstate with a total area of a few dozen square kilometers[10]. Although not directly connected to any other polity, the country is jokingly described as being the world’s only “borderless enclave”. Agartha has a small population, counting 2,385 inhabitants in 2017, who mostly live on the core made by the original “New Normandy Colonial Station”, now Moréllie, which is the largest settlement at over 800 people. Internally the country is divided into five sectors, called Departments, which correspond to the “settlements” existent within it.

Economically speaking, Agartha is not much different from an isolated small town or village, and in many aspects lacks a trade-based economy entirely. Within itself, the state provides many of the basics for survival, in a sense similarly to a military base or research station, and most inhabitants could be technically categorized as being government workers or contractors[11], there is also a level of barter trading amongst its inhabitants, often in the basis of exchanging services or manufactured products[12]. Foreign interactions are also complicated, as they either come from foreign relief[13] or in the form of tourism and research[14], the latter two are the only source of any form of foreign trade for Agartha, as the money they theoretically spend[15] is siphoned and saved by the Agarthan government, which uses it to fund a yearly “trading expedition” into the outside world[16]. The unique nature of the country’s economy has made some, ironically, identify it as being a kind of socialist state[17].

Tracing its’ origins to Militant France’s attempt to lay claim and colonize Antarctica in the mid-1940s, when it established the New Normandy Colonial Station in 1945 (after having laid claim to the Byrdlands in 1940) the state was de facto founded only a decade later, when its’ contact with the French Mainland was lost as the tides of the Second World War turned. Unlike what would probably be the norm for an Antarctic Station, however, it was since the begging meant to be a self-sufficient entity[18], and so its population, which at the time amounted to only a bit more than a hundred people, managed to survive more-or-less without problems, even if a period of so-called “Lean Times” did follow the disconnect.

At the time a quite secret project of the Militants, its’ existence was only known to the Axis after the end of the War, when it was found on a number of documents, but records of the colony’s self-sufficiency were somehow lost in the final weeks of Morél’s reign; because of this, it was believed by them that the attempted colony had almost certainly long-since died, and, in the eyes of the tired and recovering powers, trying to find its’ ruins[19] was a moot objective and left for later – which then became “when we remember to do so”.

It was then that the “Unknown Years” followed, the period between 1958 and 1999 when Agartha existed as an entirely isolated entity from the rest of the world, entirely unknown to most and believed dead to the few aware of its’ existence. During that time the state underwent many transformations, the many consequences of living so near the Poles becoming known[20] while a number of disasters nearly spelled its’ doom[21], while its’ population and size expanded, and while its’ leadership attempted to keep the “Militant Spirit” and its’ practices alive[22] and, at the same time, causing it to change and wear on people.

While necessity had already started to change things during the Unknown Years[23], it was only with the “Discovery of Agartha” in 1999 that the modern state came to be.

As the state expanded over time, and as more stations and bases were built by the rest of the world in Antarctica, accidental sightings of it and its’ inhabitants[24] started to trickle into the outside world, although for many years these were believed to simply be mirages, tall-tales, or superstitions; it was only in 1999 that these sightings were finally considered by the powers-that-be, resulting on the establishment a small, but well-funded, multinational expedition to look into them.

The Carpenter Expedition was officially launched in October of 1998, and, after months of transversing the Byrdlands, they ended-up coming into contact with a patrolling Agarthan, meeting in the 23rd of March, 1999; this first meeting wasn’t the best by any means, with the Agarthan, considerably frightened, attempting to shoot at them with an veritably ancient shotgun[25] but, luckily, missing, and ending-up being captured by the expedition and, quite swiftly, brough back to their base of operations.

The news of this event were astonishing to many, and caused worldwide reactions and, as many might expect, panic, as it seemed to be as if real-life was enacting a trashy horror movie of some kind, with people around the globe fearing what sorts of terrors or super-weapons this “Secret Militant Remnant” could unleash.

These fears lasted for only a few weeks, as that was about how long it took for the captured Agarthan, one Etienne Marcoux, to have his own fright lessen to the point where he was actually capable of being interviewed[26], revealing to the world the reality of Agartha. Some might (and did) call it “underwhelming”, but at the end of the day his interview did ease the minds of the world at large and revealed that Agartha was quite similar to an incredibly large-scale Antarctic Base.

It was shortly after the end of the Antarctic Night of 1999 that an actual contact with Agartha proper was made, which was probably the single-most dramatic event in the state’s history.

The reason behinds this comes from the aforementioned changes that had come upon Agartha and its’ inhabitants over time, as during the course of the Unknown Years a certain divide started to appear between its’ generations, with the younger inhabitants growing discontent and weary of the Militant “ideals” and “spirit” while the older inhabitants were much less so.

This proper contact, as such, basically came at almost the exact time needed, as over the Night of 1999[27] Agartha had de facto become divided between two factions, the “die-hards” of the original leadership, and the “reformists” who wanted to lessen the many restrictions and controls that absolutely ruled the state.

And so it was that the “threat” of the “Axis Returned” basically caused their power-struggle to reach its’ climax, as it motivated the “reformists” to basically go through with a coup d’etat against the old leaders, taking over Agartha just in time for the ships to reach it and, as such, being quite more palatable to interact in the outside world’s opinion. Although the fact that this was mostly a generational divide, and that it was in general quite bloodless, resulted on the various in-name-only rules and traits that Agartha still possesses, having been kept as basically a bundle of olive-branches to the non-reformists

[1] nowadays called “Agarthan” more, Militant French started as Morél’s own eccentric way of speaking (the man rather enjoyed creating, compounding, and contracting words), which gained traction as a show of party loyalty among the Militants and was later unsuccessfully promoted by the Militants as a replacement to Standard French; most of Agartha’s “original settlers” were party members themselves, and their complete isolation from the outside world served to promote it to evolve, with “modern” Militant French being at times rather separated (sometimes purposefully) from Morél’s own
[2] in Standard French “Grande Éternelle Nation Française”
[3] due to its almost theatrically-kept claim to being Militant France, Agartha is officially not recognized by any nation on Earth and probably won’t be unless that changes, but many countries de facto do so through trade and relief (there have been proposals to recognize Agartha as a separate entity from Militant France and keep some sort of polite fiction on the matter, but none has come to fruition as of 2020)
[4] counterpart to the Executive Committee Range of OTL but considered as extending farther west, ending in what IOTL are the Alexandra Mountains
[5] slightly larger counterpart of OTL’s Marie Byrd Land
[6] a gubernatorial title used in Militant France to refer to government-appointed administrators
[7] “Leader” in French
[8] basically local divisions of the Militant Party, served as centers for political discussion and decision-making
[9] technically, Agartha does have access to the sea, but the state’s lack of any naval capacities, and the fact that most of the year said access is frozen in ice and only accessible by submarine or ice-breaker, results on it being de facto so, and at times being even shown as landlocked on maps (depending on how they represent nigh permanent sea ice)
[10] the underground and often vertical manner through which Agartha expanded over the years resulted on the exact measurements being kind of iffy to calculate, but its above-ground surface area is of 29,5 square kilometers
[11] not surprisingly, basically all jobs within Agartha in some way or another trace back to its’ government, and were actively controlled by it for much of the state’s history (and technically still are, with even the few “family businesses” in the state being de facto owned by it); because of this, the only people who aren’t technically government workers are children and stay-at-home-parents
[12] also not surprisingly, money is pretty-much nonexistent within Agartha
[13] as the state’s small size, small population, and isolated location mean it lacks in many resources, even if food has historically not been one of them, as, for example, it de facto doesn’t produce any medication locally
[14] Agartha has proven to be a treasure-trove for researchers of many kinds
[15] “theoretically” in this case being used due to the fact that in most cases of research (and even some of tourism) they are being bankrolled by their governments or some form of institution, and basically have a tab on Agartha’s establishments and facilities
[16] it has also historically been an Agarthan sort-of-equivalent to the Amish Rumspringa
[17] something which shouldn’t be said to an Agarthan, they most likely are aware of it, but much like in regard to the Second World War being over, they still keep the polite fiction that they are fascists*
[18] it is uncertain why (although hypotheses abound), but from the very-beginning Morél was adamant that the colony was to be capable of growing and producing its’ own food, and even to find its’ own fuel, with the colony, by the time its was disconnected from the rest of the world, having more of its’ area made by greenhouses and fish farms/livestock pens than by inhabited areas
[19] similarly to the records mentioning the station’s self-sufficiency, the ones actually giving away its location were also lost during Morél’s last weeks
[20] although, admittedly, they were already becoming known even before Agartha’s disconnect to the outside world, with the effects of Winter-Over Syndrome being directly connected to why the stances of the state’s older and younger generations differed so greatly (notably, newer generations of Agarthans have shown to have a natural disposition to not suffer, or have less effects, from it)
[21] including an epidemic in 1964, which killed a quarter of Agartha’s population (beforehand of some 350 people) and an alarmingly-large number of times when Agartha or parts of it were nearly destroyed by people in the throes of Polar Madness
[22] most infamously the killing of “undesirable” children and individuals, which died with the changes of 1999
[23] primarily in the fact that the Militant championing of women’s functions being as mothers and housemakers was abandoned by the Agarthans as early as the 1960s, due to the death of a considerable part of their male population, which is also tied to the shift in the opinions and philosophies of its’ generations
[24] even before Agartha expanded outside of its’ original station, its’ leadership had already been sending periodic patrols through the ice and snow of the Byrdlands, primarily as scouts and lookouts as to any “incoming Axis attack”
[25] following their loss of contact with the outside world, one of the things Agartha lost access to was the manufacture of weapons of basically any kind, in part due to possessing a small to almost non-existent access to metal (with mining for it being difficult due to the environment) but also due to lacking the capacity to reach or even build the infrastructure needed for it, with the weapons present on the state in the ‘90s being either bladed/blunt weapons (and often times made of wood)
[26] for complicated reasons, over time the Axis had actively become something akin to horror monsters to many Agarthans, with Marcoux admitting that, at first, he had though that he was a prisoner of war and that they were going to torture him to death to reveal his secrets or something similar
[27] the Agarthan year is colloquially divided into 1 Night (lasting from 7 to 8 months in the middle of the year) and 2 Days (1 at the beginning and the other at the end of the year, continuing from or ending with the days of the previous or following year)

*this note and the sentence it connects to are absent from *Wikipedia* within Agartha no matter the language