Sorry but this assumption is just wrong.

Although it was not named Salic Law, in the HRE, and then in the German Confederacy that succeeded it in 1814, all the kingdom and electoral principalities had basically the same succession laws as France. Which is that when a king or prince has no male offspring, then his closest male relative on the older younger branch succeeds him even if he had daughters.

This is why, by exception, emperor Charles VI had to devise the pragmatic sanction for his elder daughter Maria Theresa could retain the Habsburg ancestral kingdom of Bohemia and other principalities.

This is why lateral male branches of the Wittelsbach succeeded to the elder branch in Rhine Palatinate and in Bavaria.

This is why Victoria of Great Britain did not become also queen of Hanover.

You give a nice overview, but this was not so much a rule in all the German lands (and not all the French lands, e.g. Flanders). I think the more reasonable answer, at least before ~1500, is that it was all a mess and the big question was what you could enforce. Younger brothers and cousins tended to be firmly inside the local power structure and thus had a leg up over daughters and sisters who were usually shuffled off to be in the power structure of their husband's court. An underage son would usually short-circuit this issue because it was too traditional not to have him inherit... and obviously many sisters/daughters and their husbands DID press their claims, sometimes succesfully (see e.g. Jacoba von Wittelsbach in Holland-Zeeland-Hainaut).

And in all cases, I think it was firmly established that a lack of any male heir would lead to (through-)female succession.
 
You give a nice overview, but this was not so much a rule in all the German lands (and not all the French lands, e.g. Flanders). I think the more reasonable answer, at least before ~1500, is that it was all a mess and the big question was what you could enforce. Younger brothers and cousins tended to be firmly inside the local power structure and thus had a leg up over daughters and sisters who were usually shuffled off to be in the power structure of their husband's court. An underage son would usually short-circuit this issue because it was too traditional not to have him inherit... and obviously many sisters/daughters and their husbands DID press their claims, sometimes succesfully (see e.g. Jacoba von Wittelsbach in Holland-Zeeland-Hainaut).

And in all cases, I think it was firmly established that a lack of any male heir would lead to (through-)female succession.

I never said it was a rule in all the French fiefs or I all the German principalities.

In France it was the case only for the royal crown and for the appanages, principalities created for the younger royal princes out of the royal domain.

In the HRE, it was the case only for a few principalities, although the most important ones : noticeably those that carried electoral dignity.
 
I never said it was a rule in all the French fiefs or I all the German principalities.

In France it was the case only for the royal crown and for the appanages, principalities created for the younger royal princes out of the royal domain.

In the HRE, it was the case only for a few principalities, although the most important ones : noticeably those that carried electoral dignity.
Except of course Bohemia, which was elective. I think the Wittelsbachs were the only ones who really had their inheritance rules stretched thin, and even then it seems to have taken fighting, not rules, to ensure it all kept passing to the next male-only heir.

Saxony and Brandenburg, the only other 'temporal' electorates, didn't (so far as I can see) have the issue pop up at any time between the accession of the Wettins respectively Hohenzollerns and the dissolution of the HRE. So Bohemia inherited by election (and did pass via the female line through the pragmatic sanction), the Palatine/Bavarian vote went full-agnatic/salic, and the other two didn't need to care.
 
Except of course Bohemia, which was elective. I think the Wittelsbachs were the only ones who really had their inheritance rules stretched thin, and even then it seems to have taken fighting, not rules, to ensure it all kept passing to the next male-only heir.

Saxony and Brandenburg, the only other 'temporal' electorates, didn't (so far as I can see) have the issue pop up at any time between the accession of the Wettins respectively Hohenzollerns and the dissolution of the HRE. So Bohemia inherited by election (and did pass via the female line through the pragmatic sanction), the Palatine/Bavarian vote went full-agnatic/salic, and the other two didn't need to care.

Not only the Wittelsbach. It was the case for Hanover too.
 
It's... not? The name come from the Salian Franks, and Clovis, as it happens, was a Salian Frank.
So it's hard to imagine a France without the Salic law, because it's directly tied to the kingdom's existence. You could have France not founded by Franks and thus no Salian Law, but then would it certainly wouldn't be called France, and it's debatable if it really would be France to begin with.
You could also lose the restriction afterward, I guess, but I'm not really sure what cirmustances could allow that.
possibly a longer period of English rule on the throne of France influenced perhaps by Aquitanian law. Or somehow Bretagne is in a stronger position during the run up to the Act of Union and it is a casualty of the negotiations.
 
If no Salic law, possibly Charles VII replaced on the French throne in 1429 by Joan of Arc?
(even though she didn’t want the job)
 
If no Salic law, possibly Charles VII replaced on the French throne in 1429 by Joan of Arc?
(even though she didn’t want the job)
ASB. Jeanne wasn't a dynast and had no connection to the House of France. She was merely the very pious daughter of an equally pious middling peasant family.
 
If no Salic law, possibly Charles VII replaced on the French throne in 1429 by Joan of Arc?
(even though she didn’t want the job)
Without a legalist interpretation of Salic Law in the XIVth (which got conflated, without real basis, witlh Salic Law), meaning no break of the main Capetian line as IOTL, (either it's maintained, either it breaks earlier) you wouldn't have an historical Charles VII to begin with.
Not that, even tweaking successions customs, and torturing them out of shape, Joan of Arc would ever end up on the throne : this is generally something royal families do.
 
Without a legalist interpretation of Salic Law, (meaning no break of the main Capetian line as IOTL, either it's maintained, either it breaks earlier) you wouldn't have an historical Charles VII to begin with.
Not that, even tweaking successions customs, and torturing them out of shape, Joan of Arc would ever end up on the throne : this is generally something royal families do.
Right, I just don't see how the daughter of a middling-to-wealthy peasant family gets to the throne.
 
Right, I just don't see how the daughter of a middling-to-wealthy peasant family gets to the throne.
When it pops out, it's generally something about "Charles VIII was a weak person that believed he was a bastard", "English claims are of most superior claims anyway", "If she believed she was sent by God, she will pull a theocracy", without forgetting the famous theory according which she was a royal bastard IOTL.
 
Could Charles adopt her and name her as his successor if he didn't have children - like the Roman Emperors?
No. Note that adoptions in imperial dynasties generally included adopting members of your, broad, family. They were still related even if adopted.
As for Middle-Ages, where the dynastic principle is even more pressing than Antiquity, it would simply not be considered for royal titles. On this regard, dynastic adoption is virtually unheard of for most of the era.
 
When it pops out, it's generally something about "Charles VIII was a weak person that believed he was a bastard", "English claims are of most superior claims anyway", "If she believed she was sent by God, she will pull a theocracy", without forgetting the famous theory according which she was a royal bastard IOTL.
WTF with the last one? I mean her parents are attested to, and her mother, Jeanne Who Has Been to Rome, was by all accounts rather pious for her time. For her to engage in some extramarital horizontal activities seems out of character.
 
Without a legalist interpretation of Salic Law, (meaning no break of the main Capetian line as IOTL, either it's maintained, either it breaks earlier) you wouldn't have an historical Charles VII to begin with.
Not that, even tweaking successions customs, and torturing them out of shape, Joan of Arc would ever end up on the throne : this is generally something royal families do.

IOTL, she & her family were ennobled by
Charles VII, so ITTL we’d just do something
similar. (I could see many- even members of the nobility- wanting a Queen Joan because, after all her military successes, they would have thought she really was sent from God & having someone like that on the throne might be a pretty good idea).However, I’m fine with butterflying away Charles VII, one
of my least favorite historical characters.
 
WTF with the last one?
You don't want to know.

IOTL, she & her family were ennobled by Charles VII, so ITTL we’d just do something similar.
Ennoblishment and being considered as petty-nobility, and being considered a candidate for the throne are two vastly, VERY vastly different things. Unless being knighted by the Queen somehow means that you can make a bid for the throne...

(I could see many- even members of the nobility- wanting a Queen Joan because, after all her military successes, they would have thought she really was sent from God & having someone like that on the throne might be a pretty good idea).
However, I’m fine with butterflying away Charles VII, oneof my least favorite historical characters.
@Francisco Cojuanco
Called it both, literally one post before.

Now, more seriously, it won't work. First, french kingship was already seen having a particular relationship with God and the Church since centuries. It's why French thought it plausible she was really sent by God to save the king in first place IOTL.
And nobles that fought for Valois and its line wouldn't just turn away because Joan, who claimed to be there to fight for Valois, would make a better ruler somehow. She was more of a totemic figure for Armagnac army, not really fighting (while leading the banner, a perilous position) and didn't really displayed great leadership skills strictly speaking.
 
You don't want to know.


Ennoblishment and being considered as petty-nobility, and being considered a candidate for the throne are two vastly, VERY vastly different things. Unless being knighted by the Queen somehow means that you can make a bid for the throne...



@Francisco Cojuanco
Called it both, literally one post before.

Now, more seriously, it won't work. First, french kingship was already seen having a particular relationship with God and the Church since centuries. It's why French thought it plausible she was really sent by God to save the king in first place IOTL.
And nobles that fought for Valois and its line wouldn't just turn away because Joan, who claimed to be there to fight for Valois, would make a better ruler somehow. She was more of a totemic figure for Armagnac army, not really fighting (while leading the banner, a perilous position) and didn't really displayed great leadership skills strictly speaking.

It also requires ASBs to infect Joan of Arc's mother and make her, well, not Joan Who Has Been To Rome.
 
You’re right LSC- Salic law or no Salic law,
Joan of Arc as Queen of France is very, very
unlikely, really ASB. Probably the only way it
could have happened is for Joan herself to stage a coup- & being that she was completely loyal to Charles(more’s the
pity)there was just no way she was going to
do it. I just confess I just rather like the thought of a Queen Joan- in fact I admit that
my very first post on “Alter.Hist.” ten months
ago concerned this very senario(its in the
thread “Best Movies Never Made”).
 
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