List of Emperors of the Levantines

Contents

 * 1 Conine Dynasty
 * 2 Leonine Dynasty
 * 3 Cornellian Dynasty
 * 4 Julio-Yustona Dynasty
 * 5 Luciusian Dynasty
 * 6 XX Dynasty
 * 7 XXX Dynasty
 * 8 Julio-Aleckán Dynasty
 * 9 XXX Dynasty
 * 10 Jazonid Dynasty
 * 11 XXX Dynasty
 * 12 Gram Felix Dynasty
 * 13 de Weluta Dynasty
 * 14 XXX Dynasty
 * 15 XXX Dynasty
 * 16 Jacobi Dynasty
 * 17 de Weluta Dynasty
 * 18 Gracchusian Dynasty
 * 19 de Weluta Dynasty
 * 20 deChantil Dynasty
 * 21 XXX Dynasty
 * 22 XXX Dynasty
 * 23 Marius Dynasty
 * 24 de Weluta Dynasty

Conine Dynasty
The Conine Dynasty forged the Holy Levantine Empire from the Gaelic kingdoms of Gallawa, uniting the latter in the 7th century and conquering enough land in Levantia to reclaim the Imperial legacy of Great Levantia in 761 AD. The Conine Emperors continued the practice common among the kings of Gallawa, dividing ones Kingdom among one's sons. This practice lead to the division of the Empire among Emperor Brian III's three sons in 917, creating the Eastern Kingdom of the Levantines under King Culmann, the Southern Kingdom of the Levantines under King Charles, and the Western Kingdom of the Levantines under King Aemon. The Conine Dynasty was the most predominantly Gaelic Imperial dynasty; their successors would be more Latinic in character.

Leonine Dynasty
In 965, Leo, Eastern King of the Levantines, invaded the Southern Kingdom of the Levantines and was crowned Emperor, beginning the Leonine dynasty. It died out in the 990s, necessitating the establishment of the Collegial Electorate to elect future Emperors.

Cornellian Dynasty
In 997, the Collegial Electorate met for the first time and elected Louis, the Duke of Allaria, who was subsequently crowned by the Pope. He was unable to secure election for his son, Vamniticus.

Julio-Yustona Dynasty
In 1014, Archduke Adrian IV of the Archduchy of Urceopolis was elected Emperor, becoming the first, though by no means the last, relative of St. Julius I to be elected Emperor.

Luciusian Dynasty
Following the reign of Emperor Adrian, the Collegial Electorate selected Leo Galen, Duke of San Gomaina, who established the Luciusian dynasty. The Luciusians managed to become the first family in the electoral era to maintain a father-to-son succession on the Imperial throne, creating an environment of dominance that lasted for 101 years. Their reign was notable for the initiation of the Crusades in Sarpedon, in 1095. One of the first to answer the call to arms was Emperor Carles II, whose recruiting and campaigning efforts resulted in his canonization and veneration as a Catholic saint in 1297. Carles also played a key role in ensuring the Kingdom of Culfra remained within the Empire and granted the Golden Bull of 1098, establishing modern Urcea.

Ju lio-Aleckán Dynasty
The electors next turned to King Niall III of Urcea, in the second year of his reign. Niall was the first Apostolic King of Urcea to sit on the Imperial throne, though his distant cousin, Archduke Adrian, held the Imperial dignity in the 11th century. The Collegial Electorate was prepared to elect Niall's son Donnchad, but he was deposed in the opening stages of the Saint's War.

Jazonid Dynasty
The Jazonid Dynasty, a family of Gassavelian that had acquired the Duchy of Eagaria in the 1200s, took the Imperial Throne in 1387 due to the previous dynastic losses of the Great Plague. By far, it had the longest continuous reign over the Empire and was only surpassed by the House de Weluta in total years on the Imperial throne in the period following the Great War. The dynastic strength of the Jazonids provided a period of stability for the Empire, but the beginning of the Protestant Reformation as well as economic factors lead to The Anarchy, which historians agree began in 1509 with the beginning of the reign of the last Jazonid Emperor, Louis VIII. The Jazonids suddenly died out in 1524 due to a mass assassination, causing the Empire to descend into chaos.

Gram Felix Dynasty
A relatively unlikely choice, Conchobar, head of the House of Gram Felix and Duke of Anivania, managed to win a close election in the Collegial Electorate in 1540 pledging to restore order in the Holy Levantine Empire during The Anarchy. He prosecuted the Nordmontaine War and led the Empire's forces in the Great Confessional War, a war most historians say he was most responsible for starting. He died a few years before the conclusion of that war.

de Weluta Dynasty
During the course of the Great Confessional War, the Collegial Electorate selected King Leo of Urcea as Emperor to continue to prosecute the war against the Protestant Union as a wartime necessity.

de Weluta Dynasty
In 1702, King Riordan VII of Urcea was elected during the long period of peace. Members of the Collegial Electorate sought to continue the period of stability and elected King Riordan to that end.

Gracchusian Dynasty
Following two consecutive Emperors from Urcea, the Collegial Electorate responded to fears by princes of Dericania by electing Louis, the Grand Duke of Verecundia, over Emperor Aedanicus's son and heir, King Leo. This, along with Emperor Louis IX moving to deny the Apostolic King of Urcea succession in the Grand Duchy of Carolina sparked the War of the Caroline Succession.

de Weluta Dynasty
King Leo IV of Urcea annihilated Imperial forces in the War of the Caroline Succession, and the ensuing Treaty of Martinsburg not only guaranteed succession in Grand Duchy of Carolina but also gave the Apostolic King of Urcea the guaranteed right of succession, functionally abolishing the Collegial Electorate. Between 997 and 1935, this was the only period in which the elective monarchy of the Empire was abrogated. Louis IX abdicated in favor of King Leo IV at the end of the war. The naming conventions in this article differs slightly from that in the List of Kings of Urcea, as the name Lucás is also alternatively rendered as "Luciás", meaning that King Lucás III ruled the Holy Levantine Empire as Emperor Lucius III. This convention continues on with emperor Lucius IV in the 20th century as well.

deChantil Dynasty
The Empire had begun to chafe under the domination of Urcea, leading to unrest among the Imperial princes. In the midst of the Second Caroline War, Emperor Lucius III died, and his son, King Brian III, decided not to claim the Imperial dignity until the conclusion of the war. An ad hoc Collegial Electorate met in 1798 to elect Mauricio I, the Duke of Martilles, in an effort to throw off Urcean domination, which was successful, as the Urceans renounced the Treaty of Martinsburg at the conclusion of the war. The Electors made a solemn vow that they nor their successors never again to vote for an Apostolic King of Urcea to assume the Imperial dignity. Emperor Mauricio I failed to secure election for his son following his failure to reignite war with Urcea after the Urceans expelled the Imperial Inquisition from the country in 1815.

Marius Dynasty
After the debacle of the Grand Duchy of Anivania's republican revolution in 1909, the Empire was seeking a steady hand. August I of Burgundie had been an ardent anti-independentist and a loud voice in the Collegial Electorate for reunification measures. Upon the death of Emperor XXX, he made an active bid for the throne as "reunification" candidate. His stated primary agenda was to end the civil war in Anivania and finds ways to mend the confidence of the Kingdom of Dericania's princes in the Imperial Court. He was swiftly elected, but soon showed he had other ambitions.

Following his election as Emperor, August I, immediately declared war on Kiravia, igniting the War of Faskano Strait. August I had assumed the aid of the empire in his bid to expand the Burgundian Empire and crushing of Kiravian interests in Æonara. The remainder of the empire refused as they wanted to focus on the internal issues of rising ethno-nationalism, socialism, and self-determinationism that were plaguing the kingdoms ofDericania, and Culfra. In a bid to win back favor he mediated the end of the Anivanian civil war, but the negotiations soon turned against him and a republican government was secured. He attempted to intervene on the side of Grand Duke but made the situation worse as it was received as the Imperial court not respecting the will of the people. Furthermore, Burgundian military administration of the Legatation of Ankivara was seeming less and less "of the Empire" and more like they were angling to create a fiefdom of their own. The electors were nonplussed by Burgundie's ambitions and the usage of the imperial throne to get them but August balanced these foreign excursions with a wide political birth for the electors which they initially enjoyed. In 1916, with the utter defeat of the Burgundian "match stick" navy in the War of Faskano Strait, confidence in August plummeted. He attempted to redeem himself by focusing on his reunification measures, but his attempts to bring together the empire through imperial subsidies for local improvements was seen as too little too late. It was however during this time that major rail links were made across the empire, that rail gauges were standardized, that telegraph wires were strung between all major cities, and that publicly provided commercial power become available in southern Levantia.

By 1919 it was clear that August no longer had the support of the Empire and pressure was put on him to abdicate. He refused as no other emperor has been asked to suffer the same indignity. He attempted a compromise option to save both the Empire and his role atop it by proposing to divest the Imperial title of the Kingship of Dericania by creating a confederated Kingdom within the Empire. This option was rejected by both the Imperial Diet and lawmakers in Burgundie, further undermining the Emperor's position. Pressure was mounted in early 1920 was the situation in the Kingdom of Dericania continued to unravel. Street riots broke out in a number of cities calling for the dissolution of the Empire and it started to look as though they might gain popular support. August I finally abdicated February 8, 1920, having fanned the flames of division in Levantia and lighting the fuse on the Derian powder keg. He remains the only emperor forced to abdicate and is generally regarded as the father of the fall of the Holy Levantine Empire and the Second Great War. Apologists conversely remember him as a modernizer of Levantia, and the father of public utilities in many southern Levantine nations today.

de Weluta Dynasty
With the Empire's spiraling collapse, the Collegial Electorate took a step that would have been unimaginable a century earlier and elected the Apostolic King of Urcea, James VI, in 1920. By coopting the power and authority of Urcea, the Electors hoped to use its resources to help stabilize the Empire. Urcea fought on the Empire's behalf during the Great War, but in 1935 King Brian IV relinquished authority to rule outside Urcea but did not abdicate the title of Emperor of the Levantines. The Treaty of Corcra acknowledged the right of Brian and any of his successors to continue to use the title Emperor of the Levantines, which they do through the present day. Emperor Brian VIII was the last Emperor elected by the Collegial Electorate.