No Henry VI of England

A variation on the above is, what if there were no or a different Henry VI because Henry V was unavailable to wed Catherine of Valois, being married already? Thirty-three was after all rather late to get round to it. There was apparently at one time a proposal that his youngest sister Philippa's marriage to Erik of Pomerania, King of Denmark, Sweden and Norway, should be a double wedding, the then Prince of Wales marrying Erik's sister Katharine. Philippa wed in 1406, when Henry would have been 19 and Katharine 16, so had the plan come off they were both old enough for the marriage to be consummated, and Henry could by the time he died have had a fourteen- or fifteen-year old son to succeed after a brief regency, if any regency was felt necessary.

The marriage of Henry and Katherine, was not, as pointed out above, absolutely necessary to seal Troyes. She was Charles VI's youngest daughter and would have been six or seven years older than Henry V's hypothetical son by Katharine of Pomerania, making her marrying him instead unlikely (though far from impossible). One alternative plan would be for the young Prince to marry Isabella of Brittany, Charles VI's granddaughter by his oldest daughter Joan, born in 1411 so of a suitable relative age for the match.

Many consequences ensue. The briefer regency would have moderated the damaging meddling of the Duke of Gloucester, leaving his much abler brother Bedford to get on with things. Not only would Henry V's successor not have been an infant, he was likely to be mentally sound also, assuming that the real-life Henry VI's insanity was inherited from his maternal grandfather. England could well have turned out victors in the Hundred Years War instead, and it seems reasonable as outlined above to believe that at the time the union with France had a chance of enduring, given only the good start it did not get.

No Tudors, but with no Wars of the Roses they would have no opportunity for the throne in any case. And I do believe that the manifold failings of Henry VI were the ultimate cause of the wars, and that until his incapacity became manifest loyalty to the Lancastrian dynasty was firm. A complication would be the powerful claim to the various Scandinavian successions that would follow Erik's childless death, but that could be wriggled out of somehow. Or exploited, depending on the wishes of whoever was writing the ATL.
 
The marriage of Henry and Katherine, was not, as pointed out above, absolutely necessary to seal Troyes.

Maybe not. Henry V and Catherine's son (or in my TL John II and Catherine's son) would not be King of France because he was the grandson of Charles VI. But his being Charles VI's grandson would reinforce his claim to the throne.

Besides, I am quite fond of Catherine. In OTL, she was the mother of Henry VI and through her second marriage the grandmother of Henry VII, first of the Tudor dynasty. So in my timeline, she gets to be the ancestor of all the Plantagenêts who would rule over France and England.
 
God's Will, don't you know...

England could well have turned out victors in the Hundred Years War instead, and it seems reasonable as outlined above to believe that at the time the union with France had a chance of enduring, given only the good start it did not get.

No Tudors, but with no Wars of the Roses they would have no opportunity for the throne in any case. And I do believe that the manifold failings of Henry VI were the ultimate cause of the wars, and that until his incapacity became manifest loyalty to the Lancastrian dynasty was firm.

And in the long run, England (and perhaps Scotland:eek:) left as a series of provinces of France, fighting for their independence. Resulting in the appearance of Saint Jane*, Maid of Nottingham, driving the godon French into the English Channel!:p
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*-ITTL, the Patroness of Great Britain:cool:
 
Perhaps. And perhaps not. I have no particular wish that England won the Hundred Years War, it's just that that is one of the premises of the thread. I want to pick up on an earlier remark on royal inbreeding, if I may. It seems to often be assumed that 1) royals are always inbred and 2) the consequences are always harmful. Neither is true.

For the second, the most extreme counter-example is Cleopatra VII, the famous one who successively captivated the two most powerful men of the day, yet was the product of near three centuries of brother-sister incest. Clearly, she was far from a drooling, deformed dwarf. A modern example is the present King of Norway, Harald V. He is pretty inbred by most standards; his parents were first cousins, both being grandchildren of Frederik VIII of Denmark. His paternal grandparents were also first cousins, both grandchildren of Christian IX of Denmark. His maternal grandparents were first cousins once removed, with his maternal grandmother being a first cousin of his paternal grandmother as well as a sister of his paternal grandfather.

That is quite a serious loss of ancestry, but he seems a perfectly normal and functional individual. The same perhaps cannot be said of his daughter, whose parents are entirely unrelated. Turning to Plantagenet inbreeding as regards the sons of Henry IV, their sixteen great-great-grandparents show the following near relationships: Henry, 3rd Earl of Lancaster and his wife Maud Chaworth, 20 & 21, come up twice, so there are actually only fourteen. Edward II and Elizabeth of Rhuddlan, 1 and 25, were full siblings. Edward and Henry were first cousins, as were Isabella of France and Joan of Valois, 17 and 19. And that's it for first cousin or nearer. Out of sixteen it's not much, one duplicated pair, one pair of siblings, two pairs of first cousins.

As for firing blanks, Bedford was fertile. His first wife died in childbed, and he had a natural daughter. Gloucester's two marriages were childless but he had a natural daughter Antigone, from whom ample descent survives today (which includes the present Queen, through her mother); as far as I know, the only traceable descent from Henry IV despite his seven children born in marriage. Still, only one of his four sons that lived to adulthood failed to sire any children of his own, rather disproving the shooting blanks idea.
 
All right, so I looked at Johnjackos' family tree.

KINGS OF ENGLAND AND FRANCE

John II & III (1422-1442)
Charles I & VII (1442-1489)
Philip I & VII (1489-1508)
Philip II & VIII (1508-1547) [1]
John III & IV (1547-1591) [2]
Richard III & I (1591-1617) [3]
Richard IV & II (1617-1692) [4]

[1] Duke of Burgundy (as Philip IV) in 1527.
[2] Also Duke of Britanny since 1515.
[3] Becomes King-consort of Scotland in 1561.
[4] Grandson of Richard III & I. Son of King Philip of Scotland (ruled 1603-1610), who was also Prince of Wales, and brother of John II of Scotland (ruled 1610-1616) whom he succeeded after the latter's death. Crowned Emperor in 1643.

Though I'm a little sad I didn't get to see the part from 1692 to 2000 (Sorry, genealogist nitpick :D), I found this very interesting. The only thing that would bother me are the choices of Charles and Philip as names in this scenario : even with a Valois Queen Mother (Catherine), that doesn't really seems plausible to me : I was expecting some Henry or Edward.

Domenic said:
Perhaps. And perhaps not. I have no particular wish that England won the Hundred Years War, it's just that that is one of the premises of the thread. I want to pick up on an earlier remark on royal inbreeding, if I may. It seems to often be assumed that 1) royals are always inbred and 2) the consequences are always harmful. Neither is true.

That royals do not always inbred is true : that's the first reason we had marriage between foreign prince and princes. You have plenty of examples : Henri I of France married Anne of Kiev, whom he had absolutely no family connection known for example.
There is also comes one fact into play at least in Christian Europe : Church Laws. They can be pretty strict on marriage : you can't marry someone if you are less than 4th Cousins (which means at least one great great great grandfather in common) for example. There also cases linked to godparents' families, spouse's families and (not sure of this one) adopted families. If you wished a marriage despite those conditions, you needed a Papal bull so that the marriage could happen and it wasn't simple to do.

As for the fact that consequences are always harmful, I would tend to say that they are generally harmful. Consanguinity is generally bad for health. Of course, you had pretty good examples of great inbred monarchs (you mentionned Cleopatra VII) but the most known cases of Consanguinity are generally bad if not horrible.
Take Charles II of Spain (last Habsburg King of Spain, nicknamed "the Bewitched") for example : he was the result of Hapsburg serious inbreeding. Just take a look at his genealogical tree :

Charles II
Parents : Philip IV of Spain, Marianna of Austria.
Grandparents : Philip III of Spain, Margaret of Austria, Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III, Maria Anna of Spain
Great Grandparents : Philip II of Spain, Anna of Austria, Charles II of Austria, Maria Anna of Bavaria [1], Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II, Maria Anna of Bavaria [2], Philip III of Spain, Margaret of Austria
Great Grandparents : Charles V, Isabella of Portugal, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II, Maria of Spain, Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I, Anna of Bohemia and Hungary, Albert V of Bavaria, Anna of Habsburg, Charles II of Austria (twice), Maria Anna of Bavaria [1] (twice), William V of Bavaria, Renata of Lorraine, Philip II of Spain, Anna of Austria

In Bold are people who appear twice in the genealogy but at different levels. The people with the same color are brother and sisters.
[1] and [2] are, despite similar names, are not the same person : the first one is daughter of Albert V of Bavaria while the second is the daughter of William V of Bavaria (who is Albert V's son!)

If I were to continue up to one more generation, you would find out that Philip the Handsome and Joanna I of Spain are twice the great great grandparents of Charles II of Spain. Charles V, Isabella of Portugal, Ferdinand I and Anna of Bohemia-Hungary would make another appeareance in the tree, as would Albert V of Bavaria and Anna of Habsburg.

Saying that Charles II of Spain's tree is worse than that of Cleopatra VII might be a mistake (Having a brother/sister as spouse is probably worse than having a grandfather that is also your greatgrandfather) but I think it's the other extremity of what you can have with consanguinity.
Alas (or Fortunately, depends on how you look at the matter), cases like that of Charles II are most known (and maybe more frequent) than that of Cleopatra VII.
 
I don't want to derail the thread, so I'll be brief. My point was that harm doesn't always result, in fact it mostly doesn't, but yes it can. Carlos II is a well-known example of that, and Philip II's son Don Carlos is another. I can't however see that the Church's laws operated to stop this at all. It didn't require a Papal Bull to marry within forbidden degrees, just a dispensation, and there was normally no difficulty about this at all, only when the Church for political reasons wanted to make some. Otherwise, how could these repeated cousin and uncle/niece marriages have happened? Don Carlos's parents were double first cousins. That means he only had four different great-grandparents, and as it happens two of the four were siblings! Goes a bit beyond fourth cousins, and all of those marriages were allowed.

My original point was that while it is surprising that Henry IV had so few grandchildren considering the number of his children, inbreeding was not the cause, since they weren't especially inbred. And he did in fact have some grandchildren, so the scenario was not questionable due to his sons' lack of fertility.
 
I'd go out on a limb and say that medieval royal marriages were actually more genetically diverse than early modern royal marriages, since the increasing centralization of states meant fewer polities on the same social level.

And I'd think Henry IV's children weren't just trying hard enough. ;)
 
Though I'm a little sad I didn't get to see the part from 1692 to 2000 (Sorry, genealogist nitpick :D), I found this very interesting. The only thing that would bother me are the choices of Charles and Philip as names in this scenario : even with a Valois Queen Mother (Catherine), that doesn't really seems plausible to me : I was expecting some Henry or Edward.

Yorel, thanks for your comments. And be reassured, I have more trees coming! This being said, rather than continuing "vertically", with the elder branch, I thought I would show how it develops horizontally. My next instalment will show the unification of Spain under the Plantagenêts, through the descendants of the second son of Charles I/VII.

I chose "Charles" as a name for John II/III and Catherine's son as an obvious tip of the hat to the French dynasty - let's not forget that Charles was known from his birth to be destined to be King of England and France; he had to have a name familiar to the French. Same thing with the 2 Philips that would follow him, "Charles" and "Philip" being at the time among the most commonly used names of the Capetians kings. Please note that they do not use "Louis", probably because they feel it is too specifically French.

When the dynasty is firmly established, you will see more Henrys - and you've already seen 2 Richards.

I found the discussion about inbreeding very interesting, but I have to say I only copied what happened in OTL with the principal Europeans families. I will be careful however to spare the Plantagenets the endogamy habits of OTL's Habsburgs.

A technical question: any tip on how to avoid my trees to be wider than the forum page?
 
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I've always thought that accusations of gross in-breeding of monarchs were frankly misinformed and wrong. Yes, there was some in-breeding among the ranks, but the Hapsburgs are probably the stand-out example of it, and even then it only really bothered them in the form of a couple of characters from a specific century. There was also Catherine of Valois but you look at her ancestors and you know what? there wasn't really any in-breeding there. She has no repetition amongst her nearest three generations of ancestors, for a start, and while marrying your cousin is illegal, marrying someone who shares an ancestor of the fourth or fifth degree is not (and there's not really even any proof that she had that). Something else to think about for those who like to tell stories of rife inbreeding amongst the royal family: in this era, most peasants had been contractually tied to their village for many generations and weren't even allowed to leave temporarily except under certain conditions. Most farming villages and towns would have a population of not more than a hundred. Down the centuries, how many different ancestors do you think those peasants had? They were probably a lot closer in blood to those in the huts near to them than the monarchs of the day were to each other. And that's not to mention that mental illness can be caused by other things than inbreeding, so Catherine of Valois' condition quite possibly is a total false lead, just as George III's madness was in fact nothing to do with madness or inbreeding but was a bad case of the disease porphyria.

A technical question: any tip on how to avoid my trees to be wider than the forum page?

I'm assuming you made it in MSPaint? You have two main options. One is to simply ensure that your image is no wider than 1200 pixel across (going off the general assumption of a 1280px monitor being standard, subtracting off a few pixels for the margins along the side of the game). The other alternative if that is too fiddly is to upload to imageshack, where you should be able to specify a thumbnail size to display: just choose one that is quite big but not wider than the screen. If anyone wants to view the full picture in its proper size, imageshack's thumbnails are themselves direct links to the original image.

Oh, and as for your comment about names: that's all good and cool. Remember though that the name "Richard" was associated with the Yorkists and was therefore unpopular for the Lancastrians though ;)
 
As promised, please find below a tree showing the establishment of the Plantagenêts in Spain and the unification of the country - a bit later than in OTL.

PLANTAGENÊT FAMILY TREE (SPANISH BRANCH) - 1479-1648

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Falastur, thanks for your help

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KINGS OF CASTILLE & LEON

John I (1379-1390)
Henry III the Sufferer (1390-1406) - son of John I
John II (1406-1454) - son of Henry III
Henry IV the Impotent (1454-1474) - son of John II
Isabella I (1474-1501) - sister of Henry IV. Wife of John III of Navarra.
Charles I (1501-1537) - son of Isabella I. Also King of Navarra.
Henry V (1537-1568) - son of Charles I. Also King of Navarra.
Isabella II (1568-1581) - daughter of Henry V. Also Queen of Navarra. Wife of Ferdinand IV of Aragon and Sicily.
Isabella III (1581-1592) - daughter of Isabella II. Also Queen of Aragon, Sicily and Navarra. Takes the title of Queen of Spain in 1590.
Charles II (1592-1648) - son of Isabella III. Also King of Aragon, Sicily and Navrra. King of Spain.

KINGS OF ARAGON & SICILY

Ferdinand I the Just (1412-1416)
John II (1416-1479) - son of Ferdinand I. Also King of Navarre in 1425.
Ferdinand II (1479-1516) - son of John II.
Ferdinand III (1516-1558) - son of Ferdinand II.
Ferdinand IV (1558-1572) - son of Ferdinand III. Husband of Isabella II of Castille and Leon.
Isabella I (1572-1592) - daughter of Ferdinand IV. Also Queen of Castille, Leon and Navarra in 1581. Takes the title of Queen of Spain in 1590.
Charles I (1592-1648) - son of Isabella I. Also King of Castille, Leon and Navarra. King of Spain.

KINGS OF NAVARRA

Charles III (1387-1425)
Blanche I (1425-1441) - daughter of Charles III. Wife of John II of Aragon.
John II (1425-1479) - husband of Blanche I. Also King of Aragon and Sicily.
Eleanor I (1479-1484) - daughter of John II and Blanche I. Wife of Charles I & VII of England and France.
John III (1479-1489) - son of Eleanor I. King jure matris until the death of his mother in 1484. Husband of Isabella I of Castille and Leon.
Charles IV (1489-1537) - son of John III. Also King of Castille and Leon in 1501.
Henry V (1537-1568) - son of Charles IV. Also King of Castille and Leon.
Isabella I (1568-1581) - daughter of Henry V. Also Queen of Castille and Leon. Wife of Ferdinand IV of Aragon.
Isabella II (1581-1592) - daughter of Isabella I. Also Queen of Castille, Leon, Aragon and Sicily. Takes the title Queen of Spain in 1590.
Charles V (1592-1648) - son of Isabella II. Also King of Castille, Leon, Aragon and Sicily. King of Spain.

Here is what I understood from the tree. I didn't went for the numerotation of the Kings of Spain after the reign of Isabella III & II & I of Castille-Leon, Navarra and Aragon-Sicily because I don't know if this is a new numerotation (making her Isabella I of Spain) or if it shall follow the numerotation of the Castillan monarchs, like it did OTL.

On a side note, I'm not sure how the Navarese crown works, but it seems to me that the Husband is always included in the numerotation of Kings : Charles I & VII of England-France should thus be Charles IV of Navarra technically. I'm also not sure the crown shouldn't have stayed in personnal union with England-France after the death of Eleanor I since her eldest son is Philip I & VII of England-France.
Yet again, I'm not an expert on Navarra. Maybe it was possible to give Navarra to John III in this scenario.
 
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On a side note, I'm not sure how the Navarese crown works, but it seems to me that the Husband is always included in the numerotation of Kings : Charles I & VII of England-France should thus be Charles IV of Navarra technically. I'm also not sure the crown shouldn't have stayed in personnal union with England-France after the death of Eleanor I since her eldest son is Philip I & VII of England-France.
Yet again, I'm not an expert on Navarra. Maybe it was possible to give Navarra to John III in this scenario.

Good point, Yorel. I'm not an expert on Navarre either, but I have seen nothing yet that would prevent Queen Eleanor to abdicate the crown in favour of her cadet son in 1479.

Thanks for taking the time of summing up the list of kings and queens.

Next post will show the descendants of Charles I of Spain and the union with Portugal.
 
Here is what I understood from the tree. I didn't went for the numerotation of the Kings of Spain after the reign of Isabella III & II & I of Castille-Leon, Navarra and Aragon-Sicily because I don't know if this is a new numerotation (making her Isabella I of Spain) or if it shall follow the numerotation of the Castillan monarchs, like it did OTL.

Good remark. I think we should follow on what happened in OTL and carry on from the separate kingdoms' numerotation, so Isabella I of Spain should be known as Isabella III and Charles I as Charles V. I will amend the coming trees accordingly.
 
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As promised, please find below a new tree showing the Plantagenêt kings of Spain until the union with Portugal

PLANTAGENÊT FAMILY TREE (SPANISH BRANCH) - 1489-1812

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Can I just ask where these Dukes of Normandy in the family tree are coming from? I mean, if the main premise is a united England and France, shouldn't the Duchy of Normandy be in the royal demesne, just like every King of England is Duke of Lancaster by default?
 
Can I just ask where these Dukes of Normandy in the family tree are coming from? I mean, if the main premise is a united England and France, shouldn't the Duchy of Normandy be in the royal demesne, just like every King of England is Duke of Lancaster by default?

I'll post the line of the Plantagenêts dukes of Normandy later, but suffice it to say that from the mid-16th century, it's only a courtesy title; they don't rule over the territory, or only as a representative of the King-Emperor. The same apply to the dukes of Burgondy and Aquitaine.
 
Kings of Spain (following the Castillan numerotation)

Isabella III (1590-1592) - Queen of Castille, Léon, Navarra, Aragon and Sicily. Took the title "Queen of Spain" in 1590.
Charles II (1592-1648) - son of Isabella III.
Charles III (1648-1651) - son of Charles II.
Alphonso XII (1651-1709) - grandson of Charles II. Son of Henry, Prince of the Asturias.
John III (1709-1741) - son of Alphonso XII.
Alphonso XIII (1741-1759) - son of John III.
Charles IV (1759-1779) - son of Alphonso XIII. Husband of Maria I, Queen of Portugal.
John IV (1779-1812) - son of Charles IV. Also King of Portugal in 1785.

Kings of Portugal

Peter III (?-1743)
Alfonso VIII (1743-1748) - son of Peter III.
Maria I (1748-1785) - daughter of Alfonso VIII. Wife of Charles IV, King of Spain.
John VI (1785-1812) - son of Maria I. Also King of Spain.

I believe you made a mistake when you did that tree... You said you would base the numerotation of the Spanish Kings on the Castillan numerotation, like it was done OTL. On your tree, the numerotation seems based on that of Navarra...

Here is what the numerotation of the Kings of Spain would be for each Kingdoms... On a side note, I'll probably should add a King in the Aragonese monarchs list... I forgot Alphonso V the Magnanimous, who ruled from 1416 to 1458 (between Ferdinand I and John II of Aragon).

Kings of Spain (Numerotation working this way Castille-Leon & Navarra & Aragon-Sicily)

Isabella III & II & I (1590-1592) - Queen of Aragon and Sicily in 1572. Queen of Castille,Leon and Navarra in 1581. Took the title "Queen of Spain" in 1590.
Charles II & V & I (1592-1648) - son of the previous.
Charles III & VI & II (1648-1651) - son of the previous.
Alphonso XII & II & VI (1651-1709) - grandson of the previous.
John III & IV & III (1709-1741) - son of the previous.
Alphonso XIII & III & VII (1741-1759) - son of the previous.
Charles IV & VII & III (1759-1779) - son of the previous. Husband of Maria I, Queen of Portugal.
John IV & V & IV (1779-1812) - son of the previous. Also King of Portugal in 1785.
 
I believe you made a mistake when you did that tree... You said you would base the numerotation of the Spanish Kings on the Castillan numerotation, like it was done OTL. On your tree, the numerotation seems based on that of Navarra...

What I did is simple: whenever there is a discrepancy between numbers, I took the highest number as the official one.

As usual, thanks for taking the time of going through the data.

Not sure I will continue - there doesn't seem to be much interest for "alternate genealogy"...
 
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