OTL, male preference was the defacto succession law of England and thus Britain. However, England inherited much of her early legal and political system from its Norman conquerors. What if, among this, was an official practice of sialic/male-only primogeniture? Obviously no Elizabeth I and thus James, but surely some matriarchal claim was important in prior succession disputes? Would Edward III be able to launch the hundred years war or would his lack of a claim in either law cause him issue?
WI: England Practice Sialic Law
- Thread starter AltoRegnant
- Start date
We’d face an interesting new succession question, if Stephen’s two sons died childless as OTL. Would another member of the House of Blois inherit the throne, descended from Stephen’s brothers?
Stephen would not be allowed to claim the crown for the start as his claim was from his mother‘s side
Yeah, that would be quite an interesting succession scenario. Maybe they could try and legitimate one of Henry I’s bastards?
Maybe the POD could be Henry III making an entail or better yet, an act of succession applying Salic Law to England (it was rumoured he made an entail doing so in OTL).
If butterflies are strong enough, would William Clito of Flanders be the only legitimate heir?
If they legitimize a bastard, it would probably be Robert FitzRoy.
NINJA’d!
I doubt anything at all would change. The Normans more or less practiced the Salic Law even if they didn't codify it or call it such. The duchy obviously passed from Robert I to his bastard son, William, instead of either of his legitimately born sisters and their descendants. Would the fact that the tradition is written down on a piece of paper somewhere really matter?
I more or less was focusing on things after the norman period, such as no Elizabeth or sophia of Hannover, and apparently more than a few matriarchal claims were pushed when needed
Except William the Bastard didn't succeed peacefully and his father never married so...
As others said above, it might mean that neither Matilda nor Stephen could legally claim the throne. Meaning Henry I would have to name someone else as his heir or change the law. Of course the Anarchy could still happen but Henry II (if he's born, since Matilda might stay in Germany if she isn't heiress or remarry to someone different) would have to change the law in order to succeed peacefully.
In any case we are forgetting who Salic law in France was a much later invention (female exclusion was just for taking away the crown from little princess Jeanne and exclusion of female lines for blocking Edward III’s claim), so at the time of Anarchy would NOT exist at all.
I guess who an exclusion of females would most likely not involve males descendants from female lines and would go for blood proximity meaning who Henry II would be the direct successor of his grandfather in England
I guess who an exclusion of females would most likely not involve males descendants from female lines and would go for blood proximity meaning who Henry II would be the direct successor of his grandfather in England
Dagoth Ur
Banned
Realpolitik matters more than any kind of supposed succession law. If a maternal grandson of Henry I exists and the barons are all for him, then that maternal grandson will be king. Sure William Clito, if alive here, can strongly contest the succession and get all kinds of support of maybe the Capet king, mercenaries, his alt-wife's family, barons who are out of favor with Henry I, etc. but it won't be easy.
Dagoth Ur
Banned
Considering they both derive their claims from non-Salic descent, that would make no sense for them to come to that agreement.
Your original post asks what if the Salic Law was brought over with the Norman Conquest. I was simply saying that it more or less was already. The law would have failed along with the legitimate male line in 1135.
William's succession was fairly uncontroversial, having the support of both the church and the French crown. The violence that engulfed the duchy was for control of the boy -- and thus control of the duchy during his minority -- not rebellion against his authority generally. William had been duke for nearly a decade before his Burgundian cousin pressed his own claim as son of a legitimately born daughter.
But there is no other option. The legitimate male line fails.
William the Conquerer himself may have been a bastard, but the church reforms of the late-11th century -- reforms that, ironically, William himself supported -- had redefined how society viewed bastards. So it may have been acceptable for a bastard to inherit in the days of William's youth, but it was certainly not so by the time William's son reached old age. There is no known legitimate male-line relative of the Conquerer -- not even some obscure cousin -- after the death of Henry I, and so the only option is to go through the female line. The Salic Law would be null and void. (And, again, this is even assuming anyone cared about what was "suppose" to happen.)
Henry I came under rather intense pressure to recognize William Clito as his heir upon the death of William Atheling, and he refused to do so for the simple fact that recognizing his older brother's son as heir would bring into question his own right to sit the throne -- something he was obviously desperate to avoid. He instead tried to remarry and sire another legitimate son. Recognizing Matilda as heir was the only option he had to keep his own right to the throne unchallenged.
To put it another way, there are only three possible paths for a Salic Law after the death of William Atheling:
- Henry I, for some reason, sees the law as unbreakable and recognizes William Clito as his heir. This is just extremely unlikely considering Henry I's OTL insecurities about his own claim to the throne, but let's just handwave all that way. Clito comes to Normandy or England and lives a different life in ATL, and hopefully produces a son before he dies and a whole new line of kings comes into existence.
- Henry I tries to legitimize one of his bastards -- probably his favorite, Gloucester. (I have to guess he chose not to pursue this option in OTL because of his rocky relationship with the church.)
- No one cares that it's written down anywhere. The Salic Law fails when the male line goes extinct in 1135 and is thus made irrelevant in future generations -- aka nothing really changes.
An alternative would be "free" election without formally binding reference to claims of female line inheritance. As happened in Germany about that time when dynasties died out.