Kings of France and England made Electors in the HRE

France and England were two of mediaeval Europe's premier monarchies. How can you get their monarchs made Electors of the Holy Roman Empire, and what would the effect be? Would adding the strength of England and France mean a more successful Empire, or would they prove over-mighty vassals, tearing the Empire apart and causing its impotence much sooner than IOTL?
 
Giving that it would have meant England and France be part of the HRE, you can bet that their respective kings would never ever agree to, especially for France whom kings assumed a position of equality vis-à-vis from emperors (even if we're talking about a really symbolical equality, it was understood as such and became less so and more formalized with the XIVth).

Remember that electors get only formalized in the mid-XIVth century (Golden Bull of 1356), a time when having HRE imposing its will to the western kingdoms is unthinkable.
 
as indirectly mentioned by Monter, the easiest way would probably be to try and get the them intermarried with an secular elector each, and manage to land them into a Personal union.

only problem through might be that theres only 3 of them, and Bohemia from what I can recall, was pseudo-elective, so they might prefer just leap over the immidiate heir, to get someone else, than ending up in a personal union with a much bigger country.
 
Giving that it would have meant England and France be part of the HRE, you can bet that their respective kings would never ever agree to, especially for France whom kings assumed a position of equality vis-à-vis from emperors (even if we're talking about a really symbolical equality, it was understood as such and became less so and more formalized with the XIVth).

Remember that electors get only formalized in the mid-XIVth century (Golden Bull of 1356), a time when having HRE imposing its will to the western kingdoms is unthinkable.

Maybe if a king of England or France is having difficulty keeping hold of his throne, he might decide to do homage to the Emperor in return for the latter's support. If it's a choice between that and losing the throne altogether, I think a lot of people would take the first option.

as indirectly mentioned by Monter, the easiest way would probably be to try and get the them intermarried with an secular elector each, and manage to land them into a Personal union.

only problem through might be that theres only 3 of them, and Bohemia from what I can recall, was pseudo-elective, so they might prefer just leap over the immidiate heir, to get someone else, than ending up in a personal union with a much bigger country.

So maybe a TL where there are more Electorates, to make it easier to get a personal union with one of them?
 
Maybe if a king of England or France is having difficulty keeping hold of his throne, he might decide to do homage to the Emperor in return for the latter's support.
Especially in France, the whole royal legitimacy depended on being the ultimate suzerain : having a king doing that out of the blue (even in the worse moments, it was never ever considered, should I stress) would lead to either his main vassals deposing him outright and choosing someone less suicidal, or having them directly paying homage to the emperor.

If it's a choice between that and losing the throne altogether, I think a lot of people would take the first option.
Giving that such choice would be ending very quickly as loosing the throne because of what ammounts to a feudal political suicide...
 
The only possible way to have the same person as either the king of France or England would do homage, if they actually also held an Imperial for which they need to do homage. However technically it wouldn't be the king of England or France, still there's a high chance of occasions of similar awkwardness as IOTL existed between the Norman dynasty (after the Norman Conquest of England), later the Plantagenets, and France.

As for the relationship between the Holy Roman Emperor and the king of France, they were the two most prominent Catholic princes; though a crowned Holy Roman Emperor would lead the order of precedence, even after the time, when the actual situation had changed, this (symbolic) courtesy remained.
That's something completely different than having the king of France doing homage to the Emperor; Bohemia was an exception not the rule (only replicateable, if another Imperial Fief was raised to a kingdom, which is unlikely, but not totally impossible). The Empire had various points, when they were strong, requested fealty from the rulers of Denmark, Poland and Hungary; but it rarely occurred and never lasted long enough to structural.

Maybe in a TL where Lothar manages to defeat Charles the Bold and Louis 'the German', there might be a situation, where kings end up doing homage or at least swear fealty to the Emperor. Though there wouldn't be a Holy Roman Empire as we know, and Francia Media probably needs parts of West and East Francia to be able to dominate them, so no France as we know it either.
 
Maybe in a TL where Lothar manages to defeat Charles the Bold and Louis 'the German', there might be a situation, where kings end up doing homage or at least swear fealty to the Emperor. Though there wouldn't be a Holy Roman Empire as we know, and Francia Media probably needs parts of West and East Francia to be able to dominate them, so no France as we know it either.

I think that would devolve into another civil war after some time : vassalic clienteles were still largely made, and without a clear settlement about creating really distinct kingdoms, you'd only have a repetition of what happened in 820's and 830's.

Not that Lothar couldn't have won this round (I'm working on a short TL about it, where Carolingia only slowly declines into a dynastical system, for exemple), but the pre-hommage vassalic features wouldn't really last as they prooved not to before.

And, of course, they wouldn't be considered as Electors, something that only appeared as a formalized entity five centuries after the Carolingian civil wars.
As forging electoral role out of nowhere : Lothar and his successors would have little interest on allowing his brothers and nephew a say onto imperial succession (assuming he muses with the idea at all: it would be quite contradictory with the current imperial takes on power ideology).

Eventually Louis and Lothar's ambitions weren't that sustainable, and even Lothar victory would have lead to a 806-like situation, with three/four distinct kingdoms, mostly because nobility pushed Carolingians to settle their differences clearly.
 
Especially in France, the whole royal legitimacy depended on being the ultimate suzerain : having a king doing that out of the blue (even in the worse moments, it was never ever considered, should I stress) would lead to either his main vassals deposing him outright and choosing someone less suicidal, or having them directly paying homage to the emperor.


Giving that such choice would be ending very quickly as loosing the throne because of what ammounts to a feudal political suicide...

King John of England swore fealty to the Pope at one point, and it didn't result in the consequences you say. Maybe swearing fealty to the Emperor would be different, but I don't see why.
 
There were a couple of times when the king of France was a candidate for being elected emperor, right? What if France is elected emperor, experiences greater hegemony due to this, and then creates an additional Electorate of (name an imperial fief which is held by france), so that when the French kings are no longer emperors, they still have say in who the new emperor will be.
 
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