i have a mind that generates ideas
dont be arrogant sonny boy
punctuation who cares
Well, I for one care a good deal about punctuation...
As for your original post, well, it's an interesting possibility. But then of course it is, because if it wasn't, then you wouldn't have posted it, eh?
Were Charlemagne to decide to go against the established rules of succession, he could well have a rebellion on his hands. After all, if the king was going to do it, then the lesser nobles were also going to do it. And if the lesser nobles were going to start doing it, then hundreds if not thousands of second, third and fourth (and fifth etc., of course...) sons are suddenly going to discover that the land and wealth that they expected to inherit are gone, and that it's the king's fault.
Now, some of them are obviously just going to roll over and die, metaphorically. Others are going to be the sort of guys who love their eldest brothers enough that they'll just grin and bear it, and support their brothers in exchange for which they'll get something - support as a knight, perhaps, or something else on that magnitude if they're lucky. Basically, they'd get what second and later sons would get in the territories that followed primogenitor to start with. But then there's the interesting question of the second sons etc. who don't love their eldest brothers and who have the wherewithal to do something about their expropriation. So, from those fellows, you could have an actual revolt occurring.
Now, Charlemagne would probably smash any such revolt, I mean, this guy knew how to fight, but in so doing he would leave his Kingdom/Empire weakened, something which would be an undesirable result.
But his Kingdom/Empire (we should really figure out which it would be, without the papal crowning and so on) would still be a Medieval super-power, compared to its neighbors. If his successors are at all competent, then the Frankish Kingdom (or the Frankish Empire, or the HRE in spite of things, or whatever it ends up getting called) will do some expanding still - after all, its neighbors will be in no position to resist it.
Charlemagne's innovations militarily were really interesting, after all - he was the first to get really disciplined infantry that could actually do stuff, instead of just moving about as a disorganized mob that was easy prey for mounted knights. If that level of organization can be maintained, the era of the knight would be eliminated - knights might be terrifying one on one or when a group of them are charging, but when faced with spears or pikes and infantry behind them that is disciplined enough to stand in the face of a charging wave of knights, then they're actually not that effective. The real reason they were so effective was not just that they were deadly warriors, which is true - but the main reason was that no one opposing them could muster infantry that would stand with fixed spears in sufficient numbers.
Without the supremacy of the knights, the era as a whole will look entirely different - more centralized authority, the counts yielding power and authority to the king, since he's the one who can afford the upkeep of the largest standing infantry army... and, since he's the one with the troops, he's no longer going to need his nobles for military service, at least not to as great an extent as he would otherwise. They'd still be a great thing to have... just no longer the only thing.
All of this centralization of authority would probably lead to an earlier rise of absolutism - centralized power has that tendency, to make those who hold it want to keep it and expand it - but as to what else it could inspire, that would depend on other factors. Charlemagne was a really great king, unlike many other monarchs, he encouraged commerce and the spread of learning. If his successors keep to that, the Dark Ages could be significantly shortened, with a Renaissance centered on the Frankish holdings, not so much on Italy.
If, however, his successors are not of such high caliber, and play the traditional game of discouraging lower class aspirations in order to keep the nobles happy and their own power secure (both of which would be lesser motivations in this scenario - here their power comes not from noble knights who have to be willing to fight for them, but from common soldiers with spears who fight as part of a disciplined standing army) then the Dark Age could actually be prolonged - look at China, it was centrally controlled, and in spite of what was, compared to Europe, peace and prosperity, it stagnated - because it had one central authority that could, if it so chose, stifle innovation to a terrifying extent. Which, of course, it chose to do. Another good example might be Japan turning away from the gun - because there were no enemies to worry about with the nation unified, the Shoguns chose to eliminate what they saw as a threat to the social order by destroying the guns that they already had and removing the capability to make more.
However, while that dark possibility is a possibility, it wouldn't seem to be the most likely, for a number of reasons. The examples given, of nations that crushed technological innovation did so because the centralized power feared a collapse of its power if the commoners got uppity. Here, the centralized power would draw its military might from the commoners... and would embrace any technological change that weakened the biggest threat to its centralized power - which in this case would be the nobility and their armoured horsemen. So if the musket, crossbow or whatever made the common soldiers that Charlemagne's successors could well be using more deadly against knights, then so much the better - it would further increase the power of the centralized authority, by crushing the opposing decentralized power of the warrior aristocracy.
What could result, actually, might be some sort of "Gunpowder Empire" type scenario - the king has cannons, and so the fortresses of the nobility are useless, while the king also has the huge standing army and the beurocracy that goes with it that means that he is the state, to paraphrase Louis the Somethingth. All of which could result in the rise of a somewhat Enlightened Absolutist Empire that would be more or less a super power compared to its neighbors.
Or at least, that's my interpretation. Thoughts?
