AFAIK, only Celtic regions have such names. For many others High King would look weirder than Emperor.
Not necessarily. 'High base_title' is historical jargon used by English-speaking historians regardless of the basis in actual titles. For example, there was never a 'high duke' in Poland and, in fact, his title didn't include the word 'duke'. As in sure, the guy was the duke of a couple of things but the actual title was 'Prince of the Kingdom of Poland' (basically an uncrowned, ersatz king), in the game, he's a king. English historians would call him the high duke. Just like those high kings in Ireland didn't necessarily have that precise title (may have been 'supreme king of the n-nians', 'paramount king of n-land' etc.). So IMHO 'high king' is the pretty generic description of a sovereign not of imperial rank per se but of effectively a similar role.
I imagine if the king of France decided to make his son the King of Aquitaine, he'd then retain some kind of 'supreme kingship of all Franks', basically making himself a warlord above his son, capable of commanding the troops. Which is most of what this is about. To pull off something like this, you'd basically need to find kings ready to be your vassals. Then you'd get a nice designation that denoted you as the boss (possibly without calling them 'underkings' or otherwise harming their prestige).
But nobody in that time accomplished the prerequisites here AFAIK. Some might have made a proclamation and even if the title itself was not accepted internationally, the ruler's authority would be accepted by many. Later historians might end up using word Empire for that monarchy as well so we would have the same reason for name like Byzantine Empire (which also didn't call itself that at the time).
Yeah and well, since nobody had accomplished those prerequisites before the player, then one just can't say that those empires exist de iure. Even though it does make sense to make them formable for those players (whether human or AI) who do meet the prerequisites. After that point, i.e. after someone actually achieves that for the first time, it may well stay de iure for ever, as far as I go. And if you actually hold several kingdoms as their de iure liege and decide to put up an empire there, it might as well start as a faully integrated de iure from that point. Just no pre-existing ahistorical de iure empires is all I'm asking for.
In the end, it is just a word that can be considered a literal proclamation, later historian proclamation, unofficial proclamation, etc... whatever the player in question decides to do. Empire is word WE TODAY would use so the situation is similar to why we call Roman Empire the Byzantine Empire.
The problem is that mediaeval mentality didn't admit of anybody being equal to the Augustus. Be it the Basileus ('Greek Emperor') or the Kaiser (basically '
the Emperor'), the guy was imagined to be on top of the secular Christian hierarchy, regardless if you were subject to his orders or immune from them. Had the HRE emperors had more power, they would have asserted their position throughout the entire Christendom and it's not like they didn't try or actually succeed from time to time (handing out royal titles, legislating etc. for areas where they couldn't demand tax and levies). The HRE emperor wasn't just a King of Germany with a higher title (like from late 16th century onward). He was more like the honorary (eventually, and largely due to lack of enforcement power) superior of all Christian kings, somebody up the feudal ladder and unique, whether you actually took orders from him or not. And if you were on the same battlefield and on the same side, you'd generally take orders from him. And if he chose to ennoble your commoner soldier for bravery, you couldn't do a thing about it. (Things were also drastically different in the emperor's actual presence, you know...) The idea of European kings being at least de iure vassals of the HRE emperor was strong even in the late 12th century. Remember Richard the Lionheart's delay on his way back home? He was forced to do homage to the Kaiser while taken prisoner. Not on account of specific claims but on account of the Emperor being the Emperor. (And it wasn't just a neighbouring emperor being bossy, like let's say, a Chinese Emperor taking it out on neighbouring kingdoms he hadn't held power over before.)
Realistically, you could have called yourself an emperor and got away with it, I guess, since it's not like the entire Europe would necessarily have united against you and went on a crusade to your lands just because you took the imperial title with a limited territorial designation and minded your own business otherwise. On the other hand, it's not like the Basileus and even the Kaiser wouldn't laugh at your envoys reciting your titles, let alone consider you marriageable on an equal principle. Just like the Byzantines did to the HRE for the first 200 years or so (although they recognised the Bulgarian and later Serbian imperial title).
...But at the end of the day there weren't de iure empires other than the Roman Empire, the geographical extent of which was not coterminous with the territorial extent of the HRE emperor's feudal vassals. There would have been sufficient basis to put even France and Britain in de iure HRE in the 1066 start, or even the 1187 one (or at least to justify such a move as one's interpretation of history with solid arguments). It was only really 14th century and later that French and Polish lawyers and maybe English ones finally delivered a beating to the Kaiser's mouthpieces (e.g. the Council of Constance, 1414-1418), when the Kaiser was asking for it, trying to erect Polish vassals as independent Reichsfürsten (princes of the Reich) and the like, and everybody finally lost patience.
For similar reasons, nobody would be retroactively referred to as an 'emperor' by historians in Europe who didn't claim the title. This was done to the Padishah (Ottoman 'Emperor'), makes sense with regard to the Khagans, maybe a more secular Caliph. 'Emperor' is a feature from our languages and cultures, and in the case of German or French or Spanish or Polish or whatever rulers in the middle ages, we just don't really translate. The languages and the laws and customs about titles were already pretty defined. Yes, there can be some controversy about Slavic or Lithuanian rulers or Pagan rulers but that's mostly it as far as past 1066 is concerned, I think.
Also, if you called yourself 'imperator totius Hispaniae' or some such, that wouldn't necessarily exempt you from some kind of primacy of the HRE emperor (
the emperor) or the Basileus.
They make even less sense for most nations and for today's naming conventions.
High Kingdom is used by some nations, but others would consider the name ridiculous.
As I said, 'High King' is basically a feature of historical jargon more than the reconstruction of an actual title (basically if you have a bunch of kings and one of them is the most important and can command the others to some extent, 'high king' is the generic denominator for that kind of thing, as an actual title it's basically limited to the Celts but anyway). Similar reconstruction can't really be made to call somebody an 'emperor' in mature European middle ages.
Also, you wouldn't normally have a nation called 'high kingdom of this or that'. There would be the 'high kingship' in a kingdom where regional kings had appeared. Or 'high kingship' of a confederation of previously separate kings.
Grand Duchy and Archduchy are supposed to be a bit below Kingdom so I don't see why it should be a name for a title above King.
Those are still superdukes that are not quite kings. In fact, their existence is another testimony to the unique character of a king (and even if you elevate a duke a lot above other dukes, he still doesn't get there). The same would be true about those kings who did in fact have other kings as vassals. Or the mythical version of King Arthur.
For today's wording conventions, Empire is used on many occasions.
Yes, Empire. But not Emperor. For example, the
Angevin Empire. Of which there never was an emperor (let alone a single ruler), let alone could it be called a de iure empire. It's just a historical figure to describe a certain de facto state of things.
However, it does not mean that people inside that game call it that so, if you really want flavour, you can say later historians in that alternative universe will it Empire while you yourself can call it whatever you think is fitting.
For gameplay reasons game will simply call it Empire.
Again, no problem creating new empires from scratch, whether as HRE extension (it's very plausible, actually, to imagine the HRE emperor raising a king to the imperial dignity with enough opinion and other ties, it's just that it never happened in practice, only the Basileus actually did that and very rarely) or as a Roman Empire usurpation/splinter or as a national empire ('of all the Norse' etc.). But 'de iure' means pre-existence 'by law' of such an empire. Which is a huge problem.
Roman Empire is called Byzantine Empire by historians.
What alternative historians would call "Empire of Britannia" could have at time have called itself "Roman Empire" or something.
A formable empire in Britannia is cool. A 'de iure Empire of Britannia' in 1066 is, well, if I may be frank, very, very disappointing. This is not meant to be an attack on the devs but an expression of opinion, which I, however, won't be holding back. If we have a 'de iure Empire of Britannia' in 1066, we're in alternative history already before the game starts. An alternative history in which such an empire was created by someone at some point before the game started.
Not everything in game is to be taken literal... no, most things in the game are not supposed to be taken literal. I can make you an essay of "wrong representation of Kingdom of Croatia and Dalmatia" but I won't because there is no point: even if terms are wrong, playing it works as it should (optimally). My knowledge if history is good enough to know how it should actually be called.
The examples you mention are details that can be ignored for the sake of simplicity or fun, unless you actually happen to be Croatian, in which case it's no longer so marginal to you (e.g. I'm Polish and if the de iure Russian Empire included the Kingdom of Poland, I'd uninstall the game and never look back, I guess, while nobody else would care much) but even then you probably wouldn't care so much about mere naming.
Word de-jure is used by game to easily explain a mechanic. The de-jure map itself is far from being correct (especially since it should change with time) but it does its job: it makes game mechanics work. Here, it it is a mechanic that makes the Empires formable without wasting time on unimportant bits.
Yes but there's a limit to rock, paper and scissors simplifications. It's one thing if you have a Kingdom of Jerusalem being de iure in 1066 (which it shouldn't be) or Poland's paramount prince or Lithuania's paramount duke as King or plenty of small dukes reduced to counts, plenty of real-life claims not represented on characters, wars not actually represented in historical starting dates etc. But a whole big Empire of Francia would be an entirely different matter. We can gloss over duchies or even some kingdoms. We can't really gloss over entire empires that never existed but are in for the sake of a vision of gameplay (e.g. multiplayer balance). Please also note that the word 'de iure' has a fixed, standard meaning in law, diplomacy and history.
In other words, you are looking at terms from the Historian perspective, not Developer perspective. However, Developer Perspective is correct here while Historian Perspective is used when you write AAR's (like when in EU3 you call Austria Arch-Duchy instead of game's Kingdom of Austria) or talk about your achievements to someone else.
There we disagree. The core idea of CK1 and then CK2, as well as EU, Victoria, HoI etc., was that you had a historical start, meticulously represented (as far as a computer game scenario is capable of it), only from which you had the sandbox ability to do whatever you wanted and the game mechanics let you (sometimes guided by missions), with some things indeed trimmed down to size or standardised or whatever (in mostly minor aspects). Adding a de iure Empire of Francia or Empire of Scandinavia puts CK2, which started as a sandbox historical game (historical start) in alternative history or even in fantasy already from start. This is a radical change to the very definition of this game, from my perspective. In many ways, this is like having a chair pulled out from under you. That's just too much fiction (and yes, it's fiction, maybe not fantasy but certainly fiction) to accept in this type of game at a historical starting point. In a game that pays attention to represent the ephemeric Kingdom of Cyprus or the fragile exotic Christian Nubia, along with a list of all the rulers of every shabby county in the game back to 9th century, it really makes no sense to add a 'de iure' Empire of Scandinavia or Francia that never existed by any law or right. From my perspective, including a de iure Scandinavian Empire, or Francia, defeats the purpose of all this meticulous historical reconstruction present in the game. Also, I think such radical changes to the character of a game, the sequel to a previous such game.
And if you do so then at least change the in-game definition of de iure, explain that it just means the extent of things that will be considered 'legal' if you do them. Not 'de iure' existing states (but de facto currently dormant) which they were supposed to be. Or heck, explain that you've departed a significant notch from the historical reconstruction idea of the game. Because this
is a radical change in approach.
I supposed it was the empire of the frank, therefore France + west germany.
The Franks were a kingdom but a tribal one, with huge prominence of the ruling family rather than the ruling person. And blood was everything. You could have minor kings under major kings, I guess. There's a recorded instance of a king of Franks actually raising a subject's seigneury (lordship, barony) to a petty kingdom. But the Frankish king was still not an emperor.
Great Horny Toads - what a long and tedious exchange on the inclusion of de jure "Empires"!
I have to say that I agree with keeping medieval sensitivities alive in the game. There are some things that were just part of the "medieval mindset"; examples would be that any "Empire" had to be a recognised successor to Rome (since that was the "Empire") and that there could only ever be one Pope, since he was the head of the worldwide (i.e. "Catholic") Christian church.
Oh, hang on a minute...
More seriously, though, "variant titles" of "High King" or "Pendragon" (or "King of Kings" or "Shah-an-Shah" or whatever) would be very nice.
IMHO Pendragon for someone of the Welsh culture would be lovely (a bit in the Arthurian fantasy direction but not really, since the title actually is real) and especially Shahanshah for a Persian-culture emperor (okay, maybe not a Kaiser who had a Persian guardian
). And at any rate I think Persia should be an empire. This would, however, make it problematic to reflect the Caliph's secular overlordship. Perhaps a mediaeval Persia (I'm talking about 1066 mediaeval, not 7th century Emperor Heraclius mediaeval) should be a regular kingdom after all. That's a hard nut to crack.
United Kingdom of Britannia/Britain
Too much association with the Acts of Union (18th and 19th century). 'High Kingdom' would be default for any Celts. Or 'Kingdom of All Britain' (Regnum omnis Brittanniae). Would be fine for the Saxons. Hard to say for the Normans but they wouldn't be above drawing on Celtic concepts for legitimacy. Still hard to see that kingdom as an actual empire (including due to size).
Grand Duchy/Princedom of Russia
IMHO the Kingdom is fine. There was once a king,
Daniel. This is enough excuse. No Grand Prince/Duke would be considered equal to an emperor, let alone above a western king. Considering them equal to western kings would've been a matter of practicality but enabling someone with that title to vassalise, let's say, a neighbouring king, would be too off.
Would be fine as a Roman splinter (though then maybe Gaul rather than France), with or without contesting the German Kaiser's claims. That'd be in virtue of the Charlemagne legacy as the Roman Emperor, though, not as King of France, which was still a (solid) kingship.
There were attempts by Spanish kings that happened to rule over other kings or have claims on them. But a de iure Empire of Hispania (Spain just sounds bad before 15th century and especially if France is Francia and not France) would be a far stretch. For the record, Spanish Empire was an empire because of the colonial holdings (over which the sun would not set etc.), not the Iberian base.
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Er, no. That doesnt cut it. Personally I'm OK with loosening the definition of Empires for gameplay purposes, but your solution wouldnt have flied IRL; you needed legalistic grounds of succession, simply having alot of formerly-Roman land didn't count for squat in that sense. The Emperor was also meant to have universal jurisdiction and therefore the title couldn't be 'split off' regionally all that easily, the Imperial split between East and West was a very big deal around which European politics revolved to the extent of being a major cause of the Schism.
Personally I think the best compromise would be to call the fictional Empires High-Kingdoms rather than Empires (though make them mechanically-similar Tier 4 titles). I'd also prefer them to start as purely titular, but a dev gave a pretty good explanation of why it wasn't so in this thread (user friendlyness / UI issues).
&& this reply by The Phoenix:
A requisite for creating an imperial title could be that you have a claim on another imperial title, at least for catholics.
For catholics, an alternative requisite could also be that you are best buddies with a pope and either share the same heresy, are plain catholics while there is no plain catholic emperor, have an imperial crusade target (Latin Empire) or there is no other catholic empire.
"High Kingdoms" is ugly. Better to just call them kingdoms - and possibly, but not necessarily, make kings who are vassals of 4th-tier kingdoms get a different title than "king".
What do you guys think about titular empires or even creatable de iures but simply not pre-existing de iures? I'd be okay with that because the game is basically rock-paper-scissors, i.e. simplified, not extremely verbose about the details. Details are still left to imagination and we're still creating alternative history anyway. I could live with creatable empires in Europe so long as the conditions were hard enough/plausible enough, but basically hard (hard to form or hard to hold, or both). But the absence of fictional de iure empires on the map would avoid the most painful wound to historical sensibilities. It saddens me that Paradox isn't willing to go this route. I wonder how many recorded downloads would there be on a mod reversing this addition.
But in the game you regularly forge claims for different titles, why should it be impossible to forge the claim for empire titles? Just make it implied that when you create a Scandinavian Empire you forge a lot of documents, threatening and cajoling your way through western europe, proving that you in fact are the legit successor to the roman emperor.
Fine as well, and also fine if the HRE emperor is your uncle and needs your help with his dukes, and is willing to show you his love. Just no de iure Scandinavian Empire. I can gloss over a lot of things but I can't really pretend that a Scandinavian Empire was a de iure empire in 1066. IMHO the HRE and ERE should be able to raise kings to the imperial dignity (with harsh conditions and large base reluctance, mitigated by being family members or allies) and in certain conditions the Pope should be able to do so (this is already somewhat present in the form of Invasion where you select the HRE as your target). Or the player on his own authority if he had a claim on one of the imperial titles. Or heck, the King of France should always be able to do it as long as he can get away with it because he rules
the kingdom of Franks, the junior German offshot of which claimed the imperial legacy. For France, it would be a matter of saying, 'hey, we are the true heirs of Charlemagne!'. Also, as I said, some Welsh dynasties believed themselves to be male line descendants of Constantine. It would be hard to stop someone like that from using the imperial title at least in his own lands.
But if you forge a lot of stuff to put yourself forth as a legit emperor, this is really far from an empire existing in your
lands (de iure) rather than in your
person. One just can't speak of an Empire of Francia or Spain (etc.) existing de iure as of 1066.
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Another solution to practical problems I could see would be to allow a king to be the overlord of another king if he actually conferred that other king title without a war. So if you're the King of Norway and Denmark, you could give Denmark to your son and be his overlord. Same for multidukes and their kids. Possibly also the same for claimants whom you install in other kingdoms. Or when you have a claim on the other kingdom but allow the current king to rule after defeating him and forcing him to acknowledge your rights. This might or might not make you a king+. Perhaps this type of vassalage would disappear over time (especially with claimants installed in neighbouring kingdoms) or limited to a small number of cadets.
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