Can anyone explain to me why the two major power that had monarchies in the Americas after their independence (Mexico and Brazil) were both empires? I know they had some ties to the Austrian empire, (Maximilian I was the brother of Franz Joseph and Maria Leopoldina was their aunt) but I don't see why they couldn't have used the title king? Can anyone help me?
Why american empires?
- Thread starter pandizzy
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I guess part of it was because of Brazil and Mexico's vast territories, which made them much larger than kingdoms like France and Prussia.
I think that it was done as a way to provide continuation to their respective mother/father countries, for example in Mexico's case despite the pro independence faction winning there were a lot of people that were at least sympathetic to the royalist cause, so as a way to give legitimacy Iturbide designed himself as emperor of Mexico and Mexico as an empire.
I think the same can apply to Brazil with the caveat that instead of being done to bring people into the side of the Empire of Brazil most people who were on the side of the Emperor were the ones that wanted to have an empire so it was more of a reassurance than anything.
That's how I have understood it and what my research has taught me but I could be wrong.
I wonder what the linguistic difference would be, if Japan had had a king instead of an emperor.
Anyway, as noted above there was an inflation of emperors in the 1800s, and this feels so debased (to me). I would like an SI-metric system on titles instead, so we could objectively measure whether someone was a grand duke or an archduke, and so on. Napoleon I was clearly an emperor who dominated many kingdoms, but Napoleon III was rather equal to the previous French kings. And a king of Scotland or Bohemia should hold a lesser title than a king of Britain or Germany.
Agamemnon was wanax (over-king) and the others were titled basileus (king), while in a standardised system they might be barons or earls under a duke, or something. (The ravings of a madman, perhaps, but even a sensible source such as Webster's dictionary claimed in 1991 that King Arthur held a court, and he was not a king.)
Anyway, as noted above there was an inflation of emperors in the 1800s, and this feels so debased (to me). I would like an SI-metric system on titles instead, so we could objectively measure whether someone was a grand duke or an archduke, and so on. Napoleon I was clearly an emperor who dominated many kingdoms, but Napoleon III was rather equal to the previous French kings. And a king of Scotland or Bohemia should hold a lesser title than a king of Britain or Germany.
Agamemnon was wanax (over-king) and the others were titled basileus (king), while in a standardised system they might be barons or earls under a duke, or something. (The ravings of a madman, perhaps, but even a sensible source such as Webster's dictionary claimed in 1991 that King Arthur held a court, and he was not a king.)
@nandalf can correct me about Pedro I but ISTR that there was something about a Napoléonic "vogue" for the title "emperor" that lent its attraction to Pedro/Agustin I
There is quiet clear reasons why Austria and Germany became empires not just kingdoms.
Austrian Empire was successor of HRE and Franz I like many of his ancestors were emperors of HRE.
With Germany monarch has usually been German emperor. Furthermore emperor of Germany was too king of Prussia and there was too some other kingdoms inside of Germany so it was necessary show superioriority of head of state compared with kings of Bavaria, Wåurttemberg and Saxony.
With Indian empress/emperor I think that basis is on title of emperor of Mughals.
The Emperors were men who fancied themselves as NapoLeon. It sounded grander han being just a self-promoted dictator.
I dont know about the mexican one, but the brazilian monarchy was constitutional, i think.
The "Empress" of India title was because Victoria did not want to be outranked by her daughter, who would have been the Empress of Germany on her husband's ascension to that throne.
Their constitution was kind of a joke, though, because it put the Emperor above politics and had no checks on him. Pedro got overthrown and exiled for a reason. In any case, it was the biggest portion of the Portuguese Empire, so that explains that.
He was also a admirer of Napoleon and wanted to mimick him by getting a imperial title.
I think that it was for the same reason that so many post 1800 federations became "United States/Provinces" and post-war republics adopted "Democratic Republic" it just is the spirit of the time.
1 - With the end of the HRE, and both Napoleon and Francis declaring themselves emperors the example was given.
2 - Even today Emperor is considered more than King, and at the time it was even more prestigious than it became later.
3 - With more monarchies becoming empires the prestige was debased, but it became like a fashion instead. It went so far that even past monarchies that had no connection with the Roman concept of Imperium are now called as Empires, like Assyria, Japan, the many Persian States, Alexander the Great's Kingdom, the Seleucid Kingdom, and so on.
So I think they became empires because they could, it made their countries more prestigious, and later it became fashion.
1 - With the end of the HRE, and both Napoleon and Francis declaring themselves emperors the example was given.
2 - Even today Emperor is considered more than King, and at the time it was even more prestigious than it became later.
3 - With more monarchies becoming empires the prestige was debased, but it became like a fashion instead. It went so far that even past monarchies that had no connection with the Roman concept of Imperium are now called as Empires, like Assyria, Japan, the many Persian States, Alexander the Great's Kingdom, the Seleucid Kingdom, and so on.
So I think they became empires because they could, it made their countries more prestigious, and later it became fashion.
Which wouldn't have been necessary if George III hadn't declined having the British monarch's title raised to Emperor in a world where title inflation was pretty much the norm in the early 19th century. You had Dukes and Landgraves, whose titles were raised to King.
In Brazil’s case, the imperial monarchy was an idea inherited from prior Portuguese conceptions of Brazil. The Portuguese saw Brazil as a vast, rich and sprawling American empire. In the 18th century there was a high level debate spearheaded by Dom Luis da Cunha as to whether the Portuguese monarch should move to Brazil and adopt the title of Emperor of the West or not. Certainly Dom Pedro I suffered from some Napoleonic influence, but the idea of Brazil as an empire predated Napoleon by at least a century.
Not really. The Moderator Power was just the legal codification of a monarch’s natural reserve powers in any constitutional monarchy. Appointing the government, dismissing parliament and calling elections are all legal prerogatives of the Head of State in parliamentary systems, whether republics or monarchies. The 1824 Constitution did award the Moderator and the Executive powers to the monarch, however, with parliamentarism being introduced in 1847. Nevertheless, the Brazilian imperial Constitution was quite liberal for its time, counting with solid separation of powers and well defined political and civil rights. The monarch exercising the Executive Power wasn’t exactly unusual at the time.
Basically, if you've got enough personal power to just say that you're a monarch now and force people to go along with it, you also have enough personal power to choose which kind of monarch. Y'know, hence "Emperor of Haiti." The post-independance states of the Americas are all colonial regeims, ie their claim to power is not predicated on a succession of previous, similar governments going back for forever, the kind of thing that would obligate a Bourbon and make them want to call themselves King of France. And indeed they were all predicated on fairly explicit repudiations of any organizational structure that could claim anything of the kind.
Mexico or Brazil aren't like that. They are the direct political continuations of the earlier colonial government, the colonial government of the nations they had just asserted their independence from. Similarly-straightforwardly-successionist movements in Europe would be able to generically tie themselves to a previous government of the area, and just say "screw it, this is the Kingdom of Pannonnia now," but as mentioned, the independant colonialist states where not going to tie themselves to anything like that, because it would sort of implicitly obligate them to upgrade the natives from non-citizens to at least third-class-citizens.
So, no historical obligations to one title or another, and if you're making up a new monarchy on the spot anyway might as well go big, y'know?
Mexico or Brazil aren't like that. They are the direct political continuations of the earlier colonial government, the colonial government of the nations they had just asserted their independence from. Similarly-straightforwardly-successionist movements in Europe would be able to generically tie themselves to a previous government of the area, and just say "screw it, this is the Kingdom of Pannonnia now," but as mentioned, the independant colonialist states where not going to tie themselves to anything like that, because it would sort of implicitly obligate them to upgrade the natives from non-citizens to at least third-class-citizens.
So, no historical obligations to one title or another, and if you're making up a new monarchy on the spot anyway might as well go big, y'know?