Worldbuilding & Writing: The Basics of Royal Families & Similar
Okay, one way or another, you've ended up with a form of nobility or some sort of classical hierarchy in your worldbuilding, and now you've realized you're low in ideas or don't know where next to take this. Don't worry, I gotchu. I've made one too many of these.
Monarchies
Most around the world are familiar with monarchies, both as an oppressive force or a family of wealth & power to look up to, whether you feel one type of way or another doesn't really matter when it comes to worldbuilding; as we are creating a story and world here, that could veer any type of way. That doesn't mean it isn't important to understand the political undertones that designing a monarchy comes with.
Monarchies come in many different forms, but for the sake of brevity I'm only going to discuss a few popular ones here
Absolute Monarchies: The sovereign is the sole source of political power, unconstrained by constitutions, legislation, and/or other checks and balances on their authority. (Example: Saudi Arabia)
Constitutional Monarchies: The sovereign's authority is limited through a constitution and/or is not alone in making the decisions, such as working alongside a parliament or religious power. (Example: United Kingdom)
Composite Monarchies: Consists of several countries that are under one rule, often times as a union. (Example: Spanish Empire)
Tetrarchy: A monarchy divided between two emperors, and a group of their designated successors. There's different styles of tetrarchy too. Historically, the tetrarchy originally was lead with two emperors, and their two successor juniors known as caesares. (Example: Roman Empire)
Emirates: Ruled by an Emir, it works similarly to a monarchy, but sometimes has heavy religious ties, of Islamic origin (Example: Afghanistan)
Non-Sovereign Monarchies: A smaller less powerful monarchy that answers to a greater power, such as a union, empire, or colonial power (Example: German Empire's constituent states)
And there's so many others. Now let's talk kings, queens, and royal families. First off, what is the king, queen, or ruler called. Around the world historically and to this present day there are many monarchies, but several are referred to by different names, which are usually gendered.
But gendering even the term king isn't required. Poland itself had a female King known as Jagwida. You could also have to two lead titles that are different due to other factors outside of gender, if you want to get creative.
With various languages and cultures, there's going to be multiple variations of king/queen. I mean just thinking of IRL examples
Kaiser/Kaiserin
Emperor/Empress
Monarch
Sovereign
Archon
Tsar/Tsaritsa
Padishah
Rex/Regina
Koning
Rey/Reina
Sultan/Sultana
Malik/Malikah
Emir/Emira
Archduke/Archduchess
Raja/Rani
Khan/Khanum
Pharaoh
Similar variations can be found for titles for princess and prince, but if I were to list them all, we would be here all day
Finally there's the structure of the family... Depending on how a ruler is given their rule in your monarchy; i.e. god-king, elections, family heirs, could drastically affect the family structure, but more so the people's expectations on those families.
The stereotypical one includes a king, queen, their children usually referred to as princes and princesses, and their queen/king's siblings. But in reality royal families were not only typically quite large, but also often related to other noble families and monarchies (and incest was usually involved).
Also if leadership is passed down through bloodline heirs, there's going to be family members who will backstab and off each other in an attempt to gain that power.
Dynasties vs. Houses vs. Clans
Although the two terms are closely similar, there is major difference between them
A dynasty refers specifically to a sequence/lineage of rulers from the same family. While a house refers to an imperial, noble, or royal family, and can be without ruling. That means the descriptor can of course overlap. Finally there is clans... Now the term clan is much more lenient/ambiguous. A clan be united through kinship or ancestry & descent.
Now there's the complexities of dynast vs. sovereign ruler....
Can a monarchy also be a dynasty? Yes... Can it be a house? Also yes. A clan? Also also yes.
There truly isn't no special distinction aside from their exact specific definitions. Really its all just fancy title stuff that decides whether or not someone holds class value above one another.
Tribal Kingship
But tribes are different....
Tribes are configured similarly to clans, but with higher hierarchal status. They're also typically much large than a clan. Extra factoids about what makes a tribe a tribe is actually fairly disputed, especially among anthropologists; such as how big should a tribe be before its a nation or chiefdom or state, whether or not tribe is even defined by kinship.
Obviously tribes have been put down and oversimplified when it comes to historical and modern examples of tribes due to racism. People still to this day viewing tribal life as primitive, despite tribes being as complex and malleable as monarchies, and examples of civilization.
So what makes a tribe a tribe. Generally speaking, a tribe defined by
A political unit formed from an order of several families
tribal membership can be based off of kinship, ethnicity, dwelling, language, political affiliation, religious belief, traditions, and cultural practices
Now why aren't tribes very common IRL anymore? Mainly due to statedom and federal laws, tribes cannot conduct their own authority and oversee justice within their own community. So if tribes are persisting and very common in your worldbuilding, that means that they have some sort of control over law and other state functions; i.e. taxing, education, military, etc.
This means in most instances the rest of the nation can override whatever dealings are going on inside a tribe.
There are work arounds in the modern day though, whether through giving tribal leaders political power and/or positional seats, or leaving them their own sovereignty and land.
So uhh tribes :D
Aristocracy
Aristocracy is the ruling upper class, such as nobles. They sit right below monarchs and other similar titles on the social ladder. Their power can be political, land-based, found in wealth, or even just social status.
Being a noble doesn't come without responsibility though. The upper class and elite, even of medieval times, had certain expectations, and social taboos only become more and more strict higher up in the class system. This was especially true for women in sexist societies, who were expected to act as a noblewoman would.
Being of aristocrat meant every action, down to your appearance and where you appeared was a social or political statement. That didn't mean that aristocracy didn't use their power to abuse those they viewed below them, which is what they're more infamously known for.
So another thing to think about if you're writing or using any nobles in your worldbuilding is where did their power originate?
Generational wealth, political favor, connections, blood money, it's entirely up to you
Marriage
Everything is political and unfortunately for women, two powerful political families meeting up meant there needed to be some sort of trade/share between the two in order to both lock down and show their loyalty to one another. What greater link than marrying two family members together, so that each could act as leverage in case anyone needed to remind the other the consequences of betrayal.
Dynastic Marriage: Dynastic marriage is when important royal or dynast families marry in an attempt to inherit a throne in the future.
Arranged Marriage: Married where one or more member doesn't get a full say, but instead dictated by their family or some other power.
Dowry: Typically paid by the bride's family to the groom's, a dowry is any form of payment, usually land, property, money, livestock, or commercial for marriage.
Flags, Banners, & Coats
One of my personal favorite parts after designing a royal or noble family is coming up with an insignia to represent them. Whether they are represented by a flag, symbol, banner, or coat of arms, I always enjoy a reason to draw or color something up and call it day.
Flags - The shape of a flag doesn't always have to be the rectangle that most nations IRL use today, and traditionally the colors used are meant to represent something about or important to what is being represented. Taking culture and color theory into consideration, every culture as their connotations tied to the colors of the rainbow.
People in China have somewhat different expectations to the color red compared to people in the United States. The configuration of the flag follows the same rules. Flags also have trends. The reason why most flags came to be tricolor flags was because the Netherlands popularized it with the prince's flag. The simple design made it a popular choice as nations swapped their flags out to be more readable from a distance, especially when accounting for naval travel.
Less complex flags and less expensive colors means easier to reproduce. That doesn't mean there won't be outliers.
Finally there's symbolism on flags; whether an animal, coat of arms, or even carpet pattern, the things represented on flags should stand for something and not just be there to look pretty.
Symbols & Crests - Japan wasn't a big flag country until others countries showed up with their rectangular flags. Instead during the 1800s and before the different regions of japan where represented by their dynasties and a symbol per each known as a crest.
Crests are similar to a coat of arms, but less complicated. There's ton of crests all over the world, many of which you've probably seen without realizing, such as the double-headed black eagle of the Holy Roman Empire. Due to a crests simplicity but iconic appearance it can be placed on flags, shields, armor, coat of arms, banners, and when it comes to knight armor, was adorned on top of the helmet like a plume.
Banners - Banners are like flags, and once were, the common and basic flags of today slowly replacing them. Banners however weren't just to represent royal families or specific estates. They also were used by churches and religious groups alike. At some point they were even used by unions and companies. These banners paved the way for clubs, organizations, and eventual activist groups and minorities to also utilize flags as a form of positive representation.
Banners can be intricate or simple. They can displayed vertically, or on the end of a spear. Their shapes have been historically far more unique than modern flags.
Coats - Finally there's coats. Coats are kinda the opposite of flags in the way, in that people made them ungodly complication just because they could. There's actually a code to making coats IRL. Maybe you want to invent your own code. I could make an entire post about how coats are supposed to work.
Similarly to crests, coats are small and easily displayable. They can be slapped onto anything. Some coats remained simple while became overly complicated.
we don't credit rebecca sugar enough for making the episode with the first gay wedding in a kids show extremely plot relevant so it could not be skipped or cut.
#rebecca sugar has gone on record saying that they knew from the beginning they wanted ruby and sapphire and they put every inch of planning#in to make sure that the studio could not take them out. sugar has said they’d compromised on hundreds of things they’d wanted for steven#so that they had the bargaining power specifically to keep ruby and sapphire’s relationship#and a number of ‘filler’ episodes were created just to establish counter-arguments that might come up when they pitched the wedding episode#the one that comes to mind is the episode about steven and connie getting lost in rose’s room steven’s central conflict about liking their#fave book series’ romantic ending was later weaponised when producer’s were like ‘oh but steven’s a boy he won’t be too interested in them#getting married’ sugar was able to be like ‘no. in this episode it’s established he loves romance and specifically weddings. and in these#episodes it’s shown how much steven cares about ruby and sapphire and their relationship and happiness. you cannot convince me this is not#good and necessary plot development#and they wrapped it up in the season finale and the big climactic point of the diamonds finally coming to attack earth to make the#episode integral to the series no skipping it without confusion. and had ruby wear a wedding dress because international censors took#advantage of her design to give her a masculine va#and sugar made certain that everybody knew This was a queer love story that an entire town supported and admired and that any child watchin#it at home would know they are not alone and that that support is waiting for them out there somewhere#sugar sacrificed the wider story they wanted to tell for that and it was a horrible decision to be given but they made the right choice
Ask yourself, how does this piece make you feel? (No wrong answers)
Look for an artist statement nearby. What does it say about the artist and their relationship to their work? What does the artist say that they are trying to convey with their art? What contextual clues can you pick up from what they say about their background, or what they omit?
Look at the title of the piece. What is the artist saying about their work by naming it that, either explicitly or implicitly?
Look at the medium. Is there anything about the piece that stands out to you, knowing what it's made of?
Look at the year it was made. What cultural events might have been happening around this time? Was this piece part of a particular art movement? What was the purpose of that art movement, and what was it trying to say?
Accept that sometimes, you still might not get it. This is perfectly okay.
“Subverting” Catholic art? Oh, okay. I see, you think this has nothing to do with you. You log onto the internet and you post about how “Wound of Christ” from Psalter and Prayer Book of Bonne de Luxembourg, attributed to Jean le Noir, c.1349, for instance, looks like a vulva because you're trying to tell the world that you enjoy Catholic art and imagery in an alternative, queer, risqué way that challenges Christian beliefs. But what you don't know is that that stigma isn’t just a vulva. It's not just a mandorla. It's not just yonic. It's actually intentionally erotic. And you're also blithely unaware of the fact that around 1297, Saint Angela of Foligno experienced a vision of Christ himself, who called her to put her mouth to the wound in his side and lick the freshly flowing blood. And then I think it was Saint Catherine of Siena who drank blood and a clear liquid from the wound before receiving a ring made from Christ’s foreskin? And then graphically erotic encounters with the side wound of Christ quickly showed up in the writings of eight different mystics. And then the yonic interpretation of the stigmata filtered down through the illuminated manuscripts and then trickled on down into some pseudo-intellectual corner of the internet…where you, no doubt, fished it out of some Pinterest board. However, that interpretation represents hundreds of years and countless visions of religious ecstasy. And it's sort of comical how you think that you've come up with an idea that exempts you from Christian theology when, in fact…you're posting an image that was sexualized for you by the very Medieval saints you think you’re so different than…from “subverted” Catholic art.
functionally suicidal character saying “I would die for you” to their significant other and its like. I get the sentiment, honey, but if a hot dog vendor told me he’d sell hot dogs for me, I wouldn’t feel very moved now would I
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