How Absolute a Monarchy?

I suppose imagine a kingdom that emerged from the post Roman chaos from 400s to the 700s.

Suppose a King has an advisory parliament (I suppose in these days it might just be called a "council of notables" with a dozen people). Sometimes it passes laws, but he always has the final say. No one thinks he's out of line when he strikes one down. And sometimes the king makes new laws and taxes himself.

He can order extrajudicial executions of commoners without reason and nobles with reason (albeit it better be a good one with an excuse why the court can't be used or he's having a revolt on his hands).

In short, legally he can do almost anything and in practice he's only limited by "will the nobles try to overthrow me"

There are a few things he cannot do. One is change parliament (council?) privileges without its approval. Another is changing succession law outright or clauses like "after me this is my heir and then go back to normal succession procedures." Parliament (council?) doesn't appoint the monarch's successor, it's his son if he has one, daughter if not, and a codified procedure for a childless monarch, but the monarch cannot change it at will.

So how absolute is this monarchy?
 
I'm not quite sure what you are asking. If you're asking how "absolute" this monarchy is; absolute in comparison to what? The Frankish Kingdom? The Ottoman Empire? Saudi Arabia?
 
An absolute monarchy is a type of government, not a scale. Something can either be an absolute monarchy or not be and this isn't.
 

PhilippeO

Banned
Not very absolute.

1) The King is probably started mostly a warlord, he accepted as King because he can grant security in post-Empire Chaos, that would means some of his notables is his officers.
2) The army can rebel if he annoy too many officers
3) Defeat would means collapse of Kingdom, of major reform to appease notables
4) Victory would means King MUST grant victorious officers and soldiers who participate with something
5) In pre-modern era, law is very unimportant, most human affairs is done through custom and pre-existing law that he can't break
6) in post-roman era, powerful Bishop is notables and had significant religious, financial and military powers
7) to collect tax, the King had to rely on powerful landowner, many who had their own army.

In short, legally he can do almost anything and in practice he's only limited by "will the nobles try to overthrow me"

This is MOST important limitations of any government.
 
Such a hypothetical kingdom wouldn't be very absolute due to technological limitations. The king may have the final say in the capital, but all the peripheries would need a lot of delegation of power and decentralization to stay in check.

Things like feudalism often arose and were accepted by the monarchs out of necessity - even if that land you officially own is controlled by a vassal, it's a lot better than that land falling into someone else's hands or breaking away while you aren't looking.
 
Doesn't absolute monarchy require centralisation and something resembling a bureaucracy/civil service? Neither is present here, and would've been hard to create with the technological and education levels of the time period in question.

Even if the king in this scenario has absolute power on paper, actually controlling the kingdom likely relies on negotiating/cajoling/bribing/quid pro quo-ing local notables because the king doesn't have the resources or the personnel to directly administer everything.
 
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