Arabella is Queen of England, but who gets Scotland?

Griswoldi

Banned
Let's say Elizabeth names Arbella Stuart as her heiress. That butterflies away the Union of Scotland and England for the time being. She marries Edward Seymour like she almost did IOTL and the two have issue.

But then in Scotland, James (son of Mary, Queen of Scots) dies before having issue. Therefore a succession crisis happens.

I know Arbella had a claim, but the goal of this isn't to have a United Kingdom of Great Britain. So instead, is there either someone with a better claim than her (perhaps a Hamilton or de Guise?) or a good enough claim to fight against Arbella in a War of the Scottish Succession?
 
Hamilton would certainly be the rightful heir. I suppose an illegitimate descendant of the Stewarts, such as the Earls of Orkney and Moray, might have a stab at it, but Orkney was an unpopular tyrant and Moray was a child. Otherwise, unless someone found a random descendant of Balliol or the Comyns to put up as a puppet, there isn't much choice.

However, this site details a legalistic quibble which meant that technically James VI shouldn't have been King of Scots at all, and the Earl of Menteith had a good claim to the throne. I suppose it would be interesting to have a coup or rebellion in his favour.
 
It depends when James dies and what happens in the period leading up to it. There are three or four plausible lines of claimants:

  • The Earls of Arran, who were descended in female line from James II of Scotland and were the heirs by legitimate male-preference primogeniture.
  • The Earls (later Dukes) of Lennox, who were descended in male-line from the pre-royal Stuarts/Stewarts.
  • The Earls of Moray. The First Earl (James Stewart) was the most politically prominent of James V's bastards.
  • The Stewarts of Albany, descended from in male line from one of Robert II of Scotland's younger sons. They have a better genealogical claim than the Lennox line under a Salic theory of descent, but were politically insignificant until they married into the Moray line (James Stewart of the Albany line married the daughter-and-heir of the first Earl of Moray, and their son (the 3rd Earl of Moray) inherited both claims).
James Stuart, 1st Earl of Moray, as regent to James VI and the leader of the successful rebellion that chased Mary out of Scotland, probably had the strongest position until his assassination in 1570.

Ludovic Stewart, 1st Duke of Lennox, was a dominant member in James's inner circle from 1581 onwards and would probably have been the heir had James died between then and the OTL conception of his son in 1590 (or if all of James TTL offspring predecease him).

Between 1570 and 1581, I don't have a good feel for who the heir would be. I think I remember seeing a reference to the Scottish Parliament officially confirming the 3rd Earl of Arran as heir at some point during that period, but I can't find a cite, and it seems to contradict the 3rd Earl being confined as a lunatic from 1562 onwards.
 

Griswoldi

Banned
Let's say his death is in 1575, and that James Hamilton is designated his heir and he ascends. With his insanity would it be possible for his brother / heir John Hamilton to become regent and later monarch?

I'm thinking the Auld Alliance will continue with no personal union.
 
Between 1570 and 1581, I don't have a good feel for who the heir would be. I think I remember seeing a reference to the Scottish Parliament officially confirming the 3rd Earl of Arran as heir at some point during that period, but I can't find a cite, and it seems to contradict the 3rd Earl being confined as a lunatic from 1562 onwards.

Upon further research, the reason I couldn't find the cite was because it was the 2nd Earl of Arran (also named James Hamilton) who had been confirmed as heir during the regency for Queen Mary (in exchange for his acquiescence to the regency by Mary of Guise). He died in 1575.
 

Griswoldi

Banned
Would it be better to have James die in infancy, the 2nd Earl of Arran succeed as King and then later on Arbella becomes Queen of England, or to have James live til after Elizabeth dies, his plan backfires after Bessy names Arbella successor, and John Hamilton pressing his claim (based on his father) after James dies?
 
Probably the former. There's probably two windows of opportunity to make it happen:

  1. James dies during Moray's regency, before Arran's return from France in 1569. Moray takes the throne as James VII, but Arran returns from France and successfully presses his claim (as James VIII) against Moray (probably aided by suspicion that Moray had James killed).
  2. James dies between 1573 and 1575 (age 5-8), after Arran has been released from prison. The succession is wide open politically, the regent (the Earl of Morton) had no claim to the throne, and Arran's legal claim is as good as any and better than most.
You could probably make the latter scenario work, but you need to explain why Arabella won out over James for the English succession; why Lennox doesn't get the Scottish throne based on his position in James's government; and how the lords of Scotland were persuaded to swallow the messy situation of either crowning a confined lunatic with the understanding his brother would reign, or crowning a man with a living older full brother.
 
Probably the former. There's probably two windows of opportunity to make it happen:

  1. James dies during Moray's regency, before Arran's return from France in 1569. Moray takes the throne as James VII, but Arran returns from France and successfully presses his claim (as James VIII) against Moray (probably aided by suspicion that Moray had James killed).
  2. James dies between 1573 and 1575 (age 5-8), after Arran has been released from prison. The succession is wide open politically, the regent (the Earl of Morton) had no claim to the throne, and Arran's legal claim is as good as any and better than most.
You could probably make the latter scenario work, but you need to explain why Arabella won out over James for the English succession; why Lennox doesn't get the Scottish throne based on his position in James's government; and how the lords of Scotland were persuaded to swallow the messy situation of either crowning a confined lunatic with the understanding his brother would reign, or crowning a man with a living older full brother.

Would they not just have lunacy declared a bar to the throne? Alternatively there's always the old "accident" standby.
 
Would they not just have lunacy declared a bar to the throne? Alternatively there's always the old "accident" standby.

Both seem plausible to me. Scottish succession law was very fluid, and Scottish politics in this era seem to have been violent and chaotic.
 
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