Small states in the Middle Ages and beyond that could have replaced OTL great powers

Another country could easily have united Italy. Piemonte essentially just got lucky while having ambitious people in charge.

Pretty much. If I told a European from 1815 that Italy would be unified by a native kingdom and showed him the map, he'd most likely point to the Two Sicilies, but then he'd argue about it especially if he were Austrian.

What if the Genoans or Piedmontes unites Italy instead of Sardinians in OTL?

Er, Piedmont did unite Italy, it's just that the official name of the place was the Kingdom of Sardinia. Even so, Piedmont was the power center of the House of Savoy, especially since France kept on trying to take their ancestral land.
 
Ireland -- brief window of opportunity for expansion in the 5th century.

The Carolingian middle kingdom

Burgundy -- 1st creation (5th-6th century kingdom)
-- 2nd creation (neocarolingian kingdom)
-- 3rd creation (medieval duchy)

The third creation had the best chances of the three.

Strathclyde

Pictland? (Nobody seems quite sure what really happened when Pictland was succeeded by Scotland; they might be the same entity)

Hussite Bohemia

Switzerland. It did OK anyway, but the idea of doing without noble rulers might have had a much broader appeal than it did in OTL.
 
Silesia (could have become very advanced economically)

Moravia (if they defeated the Magyars, kind of before the middle ages)

Kingdom of Galicia-Volhynia (might have formed a greater Empire of the Rus based in Lviv)

Lithuania (If they transitioned from a Duchy to a Kingdom and beat the Poles and Russians)

Transylvania (Perhaps they could have resisted the Austrians and develop an independent dynasty)

Frisians (culturally spread out, if they could have centralized into a state they would be equal to Holland)

Luxembourg (had a very powerful dynasty, if they had a more secure line of succession)
 
Could Savoy, through some Habsburg-style crazily-lucky inheritance and expansion, come to control France? Could France be called Savoy?
 
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Could Savoy, through some Habsburg-style crazily-lucky inheritance and expansion, come to control France? Could France be called Savoy?

Yes and no. Savoy would just be part of the French royal demense, I think.

Though crazily-lucky would have some fascinatingly colorful butterflies.

Not that this is a problem, I'm just saying.
 
Yes and no. Savoy would just be part of the French royal demense, I think.

Though crazily-lucky would have some fascinatingly colorful butterflies.

Not that this is a problem, I'm just saying.

A similar situation happened in OTL - Navarre inherited France, but Henri IV still moved his capital to Paris.
 
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