The Jagiellons Survive in Poland

As of late, I've been reading a great deal about Early Modern Poland. Recently, I posted a question concerning a dynastic union with Hungary which can be found here. This got me thinking about another POD that also has never been (to my knowledge) brought up on this forum...

In 1554, Catherine of Austria, third wife of King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland, suffered a miscarriage. This convinced her husband that the marriage was cursed, as he had previously been wed to her elder sister. He made several attempts to annul the union and essentially separated from his wife. So, my question is this: WI Queen Catherine had not miscarried and instead carried the child to term, giving birth to a healthy son?

We'll call him *Sigismund III, and assume that he's born around 1555 (if only for discussion purposes).

What will the immediate and long term effects of a surviving Jagiellon dynasty in Poland and Lithuania?
 
For starters, King Sigismund will have more leverage in the political future of his country with an heir born in 1555. The catalyst for the elective monarchy was more-or-less his lack of children.

With a healthy successor, the Commonwealth's creation will be sidelined for a bit. When the boy comes to the throne, he may well be able to negotiate a real union that doesn't totally reduce the king's role in Poland and Lithuania.

There will be a good number of effects down the road. If the Jagiellons' survival can stop an elective monarchy from happening, we'll be seeing a stronger country down the line. IOTL, the nobles liked candidates who were the least likely to care about the country; that way, they would hold more political sway. So, for the most part, the elected kings ruled in favor of their homelands, if they ruled at all.
 
For the Jagiellon dynasty to continue, I prefer a scenario where it is the second wife, Barbara Radziwiłł, who bears a heir. I just love the love story between her and King Sigismund.

There would be no reason to introduce the elective monarchy with a heir to the dynasty and the king's power would remain the same as it were in the times of Sigismund I.
 
I imagine that as far as domestic affairs go, *Zygmunt III will spend his reign centralising and strengthening the power of the Polish Crown. However, what I'm curious about is Polish-Lithuanian foreign policy. I can see Sweden and Moscovy being the main rivals for power, and, with a stronger Poland, things can easily play out differently than OTL in Eastern Europe and the Baltic (especially in Russia during the Time of Troubles).

Will *Zygmunt III ally with his Habsburg cousins in the conflicts of the early seventeenth century? Or will he look toward France? It seems that Austria would be a more sound choice, considering their shared opposition to the Ottomans, but I'm not sure when the Thirty Years' War hits (or whatever its equivalent is ITTL). Perhaps the Danes will also be useful allies against Sweden? Or will the Swedes be fair weather friends when it comes to Moscovy?

If I end up writing any sort of TL on this subject, I think that *Zygmunt III will probably marry his cousin, Anna, in the case of a Jagiellon-Habsburg alliance.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Also, will we still see a Union of Lublin (albeit very different)? Or will Zygmunt II August have any interest in this project with a male heir ITTL?
 
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I imagine that as far as domestic affairs go, *Zygmunt III will spend his reign centralising and strengthening the power of the Polish Crown. However, what I'm curious about is Polish-Lithuanian foreign policy. I can see Sweden and Moscovy being the main rivals for power, and, with a stronger Poland, things can easily play out differently than OTL in Eastern Europe and the Baltic (especially in Russia during the Time of Troubles).

Will *Zygmunt III ally with his Habsburg cousins in the conflicts of the early seventeenth century? Or will he look toward France? It seems that Austria would be a more sound choice, considering their shared opposition to the Ottomans, but I'm not sure when the Thirty Years' War hits (or whatever its equivalent is ITTL). Perhaps the Danes will also be useful allies against Sweden? Or will the Swedes be fair weather friends when it comes to Moscovy?

If I end up writing any sort of TL on this subject, I think that *Zygmunt III will probably marry his cousin, Anna, in the case of a Jagiellon-Habsburg alliance.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Also, will we still see a Union of Lublin (albeit very different)? Or will Zygmunt II August have any interest in this project with a male heir ITTL?


The central problem was that the szlachta and the magnates wanted anything but a strong monarchy. If you go back to the beginning of the Jagellonian dynasty in 1370, you will see that the tradition of local lords as the real power in Poland went back a long way back before it manifested itself in the form of oligarch magnates by 1650.

Thus there was no way for even a Jagellonian king to attempt to create a more centralized autocratic state as existed in other parts of Europe.
 
The central problem was that the szlachta and the magnates wanted anything but a strong monarchy. If you go back to the beginning of the Jagellonian dynasty in 1370, you will see that the tradition of local lords as the real power in Poland went back a long way back before it manifested itself in the form of oligarch magnates by 1650.

Thus there was no way for even a Jagellonian king to attempt to create a more centralized autocratic state as existed in other parts of Europe.

I don't know, one or two strong willed kings can do a great deal, given the proper circumstances. Look at how centralisation was imposed in Hungary and Bohemia by the Habsburgs in the seventeenth century--both of which kingdoms had very powerful class of land owning nobility that had managed to gain a great deal of power in the previous centuries through similar past royal concessions. The Vasas were also able to curb the power of the Swedish nobility and introduce absolutism at around the same time. Even the boyars were pretty powerful in Moscovy when Mikhail was first elected tsar.

If *Zygmunt III is indeed his father's son and is clever and forceful enough, what's to stop him and his successors from finding ways to circumvent the szlachta just enough to increase the powers of the Crown at the nobility's expense?
 
I don't know, one or two strong willed kings can do a great deal, given the proper circumstances. Look at how centralisation was imposed in Hungary and Bohemia by the Habsburgs in the seventeenth century--both of which kingdoms had very powerful class of land owning nobility that had managed to gain a great deal of power in the previous centuries through similar past royal concessions. The Vasas were also able to curb the power of the Swedish nobility and introduce absolutism at around the same time. Even the boyars were pretty powerful in Moscovy when Mikhail was first elected tsar.

If *Zygmunt III is indeed his father's son and is clever and forceful enough, what's to stop him and his successors from finding ways to circumvent the szlachta just enough to increase the powers of the Crown at the nobility's expense?
The problem is that the nobles might rebel because the Jagellonians were just elected to the throne by the nobles and they aren't the senior heirs of Casimir III are the Hohenzollerns are who are also the senior claimants to Bohemia.
 
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I don't know, one or two strong willed kings can do a great deal, given the proper circumstances. Look at how centralisation was imposed in Hungary and Bohemia by the Habsburgs in the seventeenth century--both of which kingdoms had very powerful class of land owning nobility that had managed to gain a great deal of power in the previous centuries through similar past royal concessions. The Vasas were also able to curb the power of the Swedish nobility and introduce absolutism at around the same time. Even the boyars were pretty powerful in Moscovy when Mikhail was first elected tsar.

If *Zygmunt III is indeed his father's son and is clever and forceful enough, what's to stop him and his successors from finding ways to circumvent the szlachta just enough to increase the powers of the Crown at the nobility's expense?

What about Batory living 10 or 15 years longer?
 
I don't know, one or two strong willed kings can do a great deal, given the proper circumstances. Look at how centralisation was imposed in Hungary and Bohemia by the Habsburgs in the seventeenth century--both of which kingdoms had very powerful class of land owning nobility that had managed to gain a great deal of power in the previous centuries through similar past royal concessions. The Vasas were also able to curb the power of the Swedish nobility and introduce absolutism at around the same time. Even the boyars were pretty powerful in Moscovy when Mikhail was first elected tsar.

If *Zygmunt III is indeed his father's son and is clever and forceful enough, what's to stop him and his successors from finding ways to circumvent the szlachta just enough to increase the powers of the Crown at the nobility's expense?

I agree, centralization was a process and didn't happen overnight, but could take a few generations of rulers (some helped by conditions).
 
I don't know, one or two strong willed kings can do a great deal, given the proper circumstances. Look at how centralisation was imposed in Hungary and Bohemia by the Habsburgs in the seventeenth century--both of which kingdoms had very powerful class of land owning nobility that had managed to gain a great deal of power in the previous centuries through similar past royal concessions. The Vasas were also able to curb the power of the Swedish nobility and introduce absolutism at around the same time. Even the boyars were pretty powerful in Moscovy when Mikhail was first elected tsar.

If *Zygmunt III is indeed his father's son and is clever and forceful enough, what's to stop him and his successors from finding ways to circumvent the szlachta just enough to increase the powers of the Crown at the nobility's expense?


This is not just a matter of a king having a strong will. It's a matter of other forces. The rise of mercantilism in Europe beginning in 1500 through 1750 fostered the need for centralization after the demise of feudalism. Mercantilism didn't happen in Poland.
 
This is not just a matter of a king having a strong will. It's a matter of other forces. The rise of mercantilism in Europe beginning in 1500 through 1750 fostered the need for centralization after the demise of feudalism. Mercantilism didn't happen in Poland.

This is true. However, a great deal of the reason for that was that the rise of szlachta in Poland at the expense of the towns prevented this; with the Jagiellons not going extinct and butterflying away the Union of Lublin and the Commonwealth, this isn't necessarily a given. Yes, the szlachta had received a great deal of concessions by this POD, but if a clever king is both willing and able, he could ally with the towns against the nobility, and work to further enfranchise them in the Sejm. Further, the magnates and the lesser gentry could easily be played against each other to acheive results—plenty of Polish rulers had done this in the past.

If the Jagiellons were known for anything it was their forethought, patience and openness to new solutions. A king with tight control of his council (i.e. the Senat) could do a great deal before the Union and the Henrician Articles.

And in any case, as a rule, a mercantile society with a strong bourgeoisie isn't always necessary for the development of absolutism—just look at Hungary and Russia in the late seventeenth century.
 
This is true. However, a great deal of the reason for that was that the rise of szlachta in Poland at the expense of the towns prevented this; with the Jagiellons not going extinct and butterflying away the Union of Lublin and the Commonwealth, this isn't necessarily a given. Yes, the szlachta had received a great deal of concessions by this POD, but if a clever king is both willing and able, he could ally with the towns against the nobility, and work to further enfranchise them in the Sejm. Further, the magnates and the lesser gentry could easily be played against each other to acheive results—plenty of Polish rulers had done this in the past.

If the Jagiellons were known for anything it was their forethought, patience and openness to new solutions. A king with tight control of his council (i.e. the Senat) could do a great deal before the Union and the Henrician Articles.

And in any case, as a rule, a mercantile society with a strong bourgeoisie isn't always necessary for the development of absolutism—just look at Hungary and Russia in the late seventeenth century.

Also, the Jageillons were famous for there longevity and an unfortunate habit of breeding a bit late on occasions.

Anyway, there have been instances in history where a king or noble has won by simply outliving their enemies.
 
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