Composite monarchy

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Composite monarchies were common during the early 1400s to mid 1500s in Europe. They were used to strengthen kingdoms or countries. New rulers were expected to adapt to a country’s rules and accept diversity to maintain peace by not changing the status quo of its habitants. It was a brilliant attempt to incorporate each territory’s differences while respecting and preserving cultural differences using local elites as their methods of governing, these monarchies lived by believing those “must be ruled and governed as if the king who holds them all together were king only of each one of them” ^[1]. Its method of rule meant intervention of government or rulers were infrequent allowing the compromise and acceptance between classes, ethnicities and traditions between Christians, Jews and Europeans because people were loyal to the state rather than individuals. Having someone on the local level of governance meant that there would be a “guarantee of preserving peace, order and justice, and to care for the poor. ^[2]”

Contents 1 Definition 2 History 3 References 4 See also 5 Bibliography 6 Additional reading

[edit] Definition

Composite: Made up of separate elements

Monarchy: A state or nation with one supreme power

One autonomous ruler of a unifed nation that allows individual self governance between its states, limiting a monarch's intervention but providing sufficient governance at a local level. This also relieves retaliation against the monarch and benefits by strengthening an entire region. The ruler does not impose any major changes and allows his citizens to move freely within the country. By then people were accustomed to multicultural races and religions and integrated within each others communities, providing interracial families.

[edit] History

European Empires were unified by one ruler Mehmed in 1453, and incorporated multiple kingdoms by allowing local elites to self govern themselves therefore preventing an overthrow of government. Some saw the conquest as punishment for the Byzantine reuniting with the Catholics, but mostly it was a peaceful period of time after the Protestant Rebellion where Catholic Europe learned to cooperate with Protestants and liberated cooperative means between the Venetian and the Ottomans after the Jews escaped into the Ottoman Empire for refuge. The migration between the European nations created a mixed society of cultures including Englishmen, no one tried to control or conquer but integrated by adapting and imitating. Christians, Muslims, Jews, Turks, Greeks, Hungarians, Arabs, Armenians, Kurds, guildsmen, bureaucrats and slaves were free to work and live as they wished, this generous homogenous land free of social and economic restrictions were due to the Ottomans liberal rule to produce a political body that would allow the incorporation of diversity between religions, social groups, races, economics and traditions in which was adapted all over Europe. The polity was distinct in two ways; the ruling class were its subjects (usually they were nobles through heirs), they were people all over the Empire not consistent of race or religion, they only shared mutual political thoughts and high education. The second distinction was that the people were not obliged to share the religion of their monarch.

[edit] References

1. Elliot. J. H. Europe of Composite Monarchies, Past and Present. 1992 The Past and Present Society Published By Oxford University Press. Pg. 48-71

2. Popular Politics in Composite Monarchies: Barcelona Aritsans and the Campaign for a Papal Bull Against Hoarding (1580-5) Luis R. Corteguear, Social History, Volume 26, Issue 1, January 2001, pages 22-39

[edit] See also

• Byzantine

• Mehmed

• Ottoman Empire

• Early Modern Europe

[edit] Bibliography

Goffman, Daniel and Christopher Stroop. 2004. "Empire As Composite: The Ottoman Polity and the Typology of Dominion." In Imperialisms: Historical and Literary Investigations, 1500-1900. Eds. Balachandra Rajan and Elizabeth Sauer. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 129-145.

Elliot. J. H. Europe of Composite Monarchies, Past and Present. 1992 The Past and Present Society Published By Oxford University Press. Pg. 48-71

Popular Politics in Composite Monarchies: Barcelona Aritsans and the Campaign for a Papal Bull Against Hoarding (1580-5) Luis R. Corteguear, Social History, Volume 26, Issue 1, January 2001, pages 22-39

[edit] Additional reading

Cariizares-Esguearra, Jorge. Iberian Colonial Science. Isis. Philadelphia: March 2005, Volume 96, Issue 1: University of Chicago. Pg 64.