Stuart Might've-Beens

James VI had three children who survived to adulthood - the famous Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, the Winter Queen, and the beheaded Charles I. But he also had several children who died in infancy:

Margaret (24.12.1598-III.1600)
Robert, Duke of Kintyre (18.1.1602-27.5.1602)
Mary (8.4.1605-16.9.1607)
Sophie (22.6.1606-23.6.1606)

Since their surviving siblings seem to steal all the shine, what if any of these children had survived to marrying age? Most of them (except maybe Sophie) would still be married off in the reign of their father, but after their sister and her husband have been chased off their throne, and after the ideas for a Spanish match have foundered.

So which European princes(s) might James court for them if they were to outlive infancy.
 
So, I've been looking at the Winter Queen's OTL suitors for ideas for her sisters:
Gustav II Adolf of Sweden
Friedrich V, Elector Palatine
Louis XIII, King of France
Also, Wladyslaw IV of Poland and the duke of Savoy expressed passing interest (although in Savoy's case that was when the prince of Piedmont was still the Spanish heir-presumptive; as to Wlad, it seems his suit was couched in the vaguest of hypotheicals (much like his father's earlier suit to marry Arbella Stewart)).

How might a match to one of the daughters of James VI affect things?
 
Here's what I'm thinking in alt-marriages:

Elizabeth to Gustav II
Margaret to Louis XIII/Friedrich V, Elector Palatine
Mary to Louis XIII (if Marge is unavailable) or the duke of Savoy/Wlad.IV
Sophia to Gaston d'Orléans if no match with Louis XIII or whichever of the candidates is still available.

Really wish I wasn't the only one thinking about this
 
Arranging marriages for people who died at the age of 2 IOTL is a bit creepy.

And we know so little about their personalities (obviously) that we literally can't know how their survival would affect history. For instance, Margaret might marry Louis XIII and then a) fall in love with Gaston d'Orleans, causing a massive scandal resulting in her being sent home in disgrace and, eventually, a massive war between England and France; or b) they live happily ever after and have lots of babies and England joins the Thirty Years War on the French side and Oliver Cromwell dies in battle in 1630; or c) she proves to be barren and then there's another civil war over the French succession, ending up with the Courtenays on the French throne, while Margaret herself is shut up in a monastery/builds a breathtakingly beautiful chateau on the Loire/invents the hot air balloon/has a lesbian relationship with Christina of Sweden.

There isn't much that other people can contribute to a thought experiment that's going on inside your head.
 
Arranging marriages for people who died at the age of 2 IOTL is a bit creepy.

<snip>

There isn't much that other people can contribute to a thought experiment that's going on inside your head.

I take your point, although your post is a little mean spirited considering this is an alternate history forum where such thought experiments are essentially the point....

(I also fail to see how arranging these marriages is creepy - most European monarchs had plans for children's marriage prospects from birth so its hardly a weird step in an alternate history to consider what these might have been had the children lived).

JonasResende - much of this, as Uhura points out, is dependent on how you want your timeline to play out. Does Henry PoW survive in this timeline? Because this would affect the marital prospects of the other children.

Henry tried IOTL to take control of young Charles' court, causing a fallout with James, because he was so opposed to the idea of a French/Spanish match.

Plus, James' dynastic policies were based on keeping the peace in Europe, making sure Britain balanced Catholic and Protestant (and Habsburg and anti-Habsburg) forces so as to be able to rise above conflict. But if events in the thirty years war were to change, however, James' policies would have to change as well.
 
I take your point, although your post is a little mean spirited considering this is an alternate history forum where such thought experiments are essentially the point....

Sorry, I was in a bad mood this morning, which is no excuse.

Essentially, my point was that this is an alternate history forum where people go through thought experiments together, based on historical information. In cases like this, where we can't really predict the lives of these people beyond "they have a privileged life as a Princess and then they probably marry one of these half-a-dozen people" then there's no limit to their futures except the imagination of the writer, and that obviously limits the amount of input other people can make before it just seems gratuitous. So to say "Really wish I wasn't the only one thinking about this" kind of misses the point: these historical people are essentially fictional characters in OP's imagination, and asking other people to help you imagine the plot for a novel you might write isn't really what a WI is for.

Sorry, that turned into a bit of a rant, but it wasn't meant to. I'm not actually pissed off with you, Jonas, just a bit tired of all the "WI some dead toddler married a King" threads that crop up five times a page.
 
@ Uhura - apology accepted. And mea culpa, mea maxima culpa

@Reydan: let's assume that the PoW still dies on schedule, after all if we have a younger brother to the duke of York surviving the succession's stable (for a time at least). Which means that those girls - and the reason why I suggested Protestant matches for most of them is due to the fact that the two eldest (at least) will have their marriages somewhat finalized by the PoW's death.

True, Marie de Medici will probably still reverse Henri IV's policy (IDK but I don't really see him living past at least 1615, no matter how healthy he is).

As to the duke of Kintyre's match (IDK what English title he'd get), I was considering a lady mooted for both his elder brothers - a Medici princess (maybe just change which one, since Caterina de Medici (OTL duchess of Mantua) was offered, and she'd be a touch old - or a French princesse du sang/étranger (like someone from the de la Trémoïlle/Rohan/de la Tour d'Auvergne families).
 
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