That makes sense and thanks for clarifying.
A surviving Achaemenid Dynasty still ruling a Persian Empire after over two and a half thousand years would be amazing to see.
Save one extinct Royal House/Imperial Dynasty
- Thread starter GameBawesome
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That makes sense and thanks for clarifying.
A surviving Achaemenid Dynasty still ruling a Persian Empire after over two and a half thousand years would be amazing to see.
Well, the problem here is that most of these Houses didn't actually use the names given to them at the height of their power. Once Henry VII became King of England, no one talked about the Tudors; Henry VII was called a Lancaster on his Papal Dispensation, and his descendants were incredibly loath to remind anyone of their lowly origins. They were the royal house of England, descended from the Houses of York and Lancaster, and little else needed to be said (which is also why if anyone suggests that a hypothetical husband of Elizabeth I would have taken her name and passed it on to their theoretical children, they're probably wrong). The Tudor name only became popular after there were no more Tudors to be afraid of anymore...
I'm pretty sure it's the same with the Valois; at the time they were just the 'royal house of France' to which the other cadet branches also belonged to. The Bourbons did use use their name as something like a surname, but even then, they still liked to think of themselves as the 'royal house of France' when it suited them. Later historians emphasized the cadet branch names to divide the kings up easier.
That doesn't mean that the names are entirely pointless; it depends on the context. In Cyprus, the Lusignan dynasty kept on going even after the male-line died out with King Hugh II. Hugh's cousin and successor, Hugh of Antioch, took his mother's name of Lusignan instead of his father's (which was Poitiers) when he became Hugh III (at any rate, his descendants are usually called 'of Lusignan' and almost never 'of Poitiers'), so the Lusignan name didn't die out until 1474. It really depends on context whether a dynastic name was actually used by said dynasty.
Do we get credit if a few centuries are skipped (i.e. the House of Piast's Silesian cadet branch(es) are a little more fruitful and the Magnates decide to pick a(n ex?) Calvinist as king, then his kid, then his kid's kid, then....)?
Didn't their fall from power have more to do with things outside of Dynastic matters? Either way a surviving Gupta empire would be for sure interesting
The Umayyads. They managed to claw themselves back from the brink of extinction by the Abbasids only to dissolve completely after a single civil war. Plus a world with the Umayyads as surviving Caliphs would be a very interesting/complicated, considering how they were the ones that made the Caliphate a hereditary dynasty on top of their non-Arab discrimination.
I'd also give props to the Hojo clan, both old and new. They played the Game of Thrones exceptionally well throughout their history despite their lowly origins, but it all ended in their disaster for them. A surviving Hojo clan is a sight to behold, but considering what occupations most clan leaders do now OTL, I think a ruthless Hojo CEO or politician would be quite fitting indeed.
I'd also give props to the Hojo clan, both old and new. They played the Game of Thrones exceptionally well throughout their history despite their lowly origins, but it all ended in their disaster for them. A surviving Hojo clan is a sight to behold, but considering what occupations most clan leaders do now OTL, I think a ruthless Hojo CEO or politician would be quite fitting indeed.
Hilariously, the House of Godwin did manage to sort of survive... maybe... in Norway (at least for a little bit):
So, anyone familiar with the Civil War era in Norway ought to know about a guy called Bård Guttormsson, father of King Inge II and his half-brother Duke Skule. According to Heimskringla, Baard's paternal great-grandfather was also named Skuli, and he belonged to a "noble English family." Given the timeline involved, and considering Tostig Godwinson's Norwegian connections, it's not impossible for Tostig to have actually been the elder Skuli's father.
If this identification is correct (and it is a bit shaky), then the House of Godwin didn't go extinct until 1241, when Duke Skule and his illegitimate son Peter were killed. If Duke Skule had prevailed in the civil war against Haakon Haakonsson, then the House of Godwin could conceivably have become a European dynasty like any other.
Nevertheless, this is doubtlessly not what you had in mind, but Hastings is not the last opportunity for the House of Godwin to make a mark!
IIRC during the second Morisco revolt in the 16th century the rebels elected a man who claimed descent from the Umayyads as their leader. Imagine if the revolt had succeeded, and this supposed Umayyad claimant and his descendants still ruled southern Spain.
Surprised nobody has mentioned the Argead dynasty. If they survived i'd imagine the prestige of their house would get them into high places in the Roman and Byzantine empires, who knows there might be a few Argead emperors.
I am a fan of the Kamehameha Dyansty, and their survival, perhaps combined with Native Hawaiians retaining control of plantations, could lead to the Kingdom surviving into the modern day as a somewhat wealthy state.
If I had to pick one not on the list however, I would choose Brunswick-Lüneburg-Romanov, or essentially the branch of the Romanovs descended from Ivan V. Them maintaining the throne rather than Holstein-Gottorp branch retaking power would certainly lead Russia down a different path.
If I had to pick one not on the list however, I would choose Brunswick-Lüneburg-Romanov, or essentially the branch of the Romanovs descended from Ivan V. Them maintaining the throne rather than Holstein-Gottorp branch retaking power would certainly lead Russia down a different path.
Harjawaldaz
Banned
Did anyone mention the Zhou dynasty?
It was technically ruling China from ca 1000 BC to 256 BC If it somehow managed to rebound during the Warring States Period and reunify China, folks may come to the conclusion that it is THE dynasty of China and is divine/untouchable. A system may develop that is similar to Japan - if the dynasty declines, the warlords would be fighting for position of prime minister/chancellor and not the emperor. God knows how long could the dynasty survive then
It was technically ruling China from ca 1000 BC to 256 BC If it somehow managed to rebound during the Warring States Period and reunify China, folks may come to the conclusion that it is THE dynasty of China and is divine/untouchable. A system may develop that is similar to Japan - if the dynasty declines, the warlords would be fighting for position of prime minister/chancellor and not the emperor. God knows how long could the dynasty survive then
I did mention them as one of three possibilities, but since we can only choose one, I went with the Achaemenids.
Perhaps we can have the Argeads as vassals of the Achaemenids as they were during the reign of Amyntas I? That way both dynasties survive. There was already quite a lot of intermarriage between the Achaemenids and Argeads, so maybe we'd eventually get a dynastic union between the two houses.