Appanage in the context of "Despotates"

The House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies is a cadet branch of the House of Bourbon that ruled Southern Italy and Sicily for more than a century in the 18th and 19th centuries. It descends from the Capetian dynasty in legitimate male line through Philip, Duke of Anjou (later Philip V of Spain), a younger grandson of Louis XIV of France (1638–1715) who established the Bourbon dynasty in Spain in 1700 as Philip V (1683–1746). In 1759, King Philip's younger grandson was appanaged with the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily, becoming Ferdinand IV and III (1751–1825), respectively, of those realms. His descendants occupied the joint throne, merged as the "Kingdom of the Two Sicilies" in 1816, until 1861, claimed it thereafter from exile, and constitute the extant Bourbon-Two Sicilies family.

The succession of the House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies has, since 1960, been disputed between the senior Calabrian line, which is currently being represented by Prince Pedro, Duke of Calabria (born 1968) and the junior Castro line, which is currently being represented by Prince Carlo, Duke of Castro (born 1963). Efforts of reconciliation were carried out in 2014, but have been followed by continuing arguing in the family as Prince Carlo, Duke of Castro, abolished the law of male primogeniture to absolute primogeniture in 2016, making his eldest daughter heir by going against the tradition of male-line succession within the House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies.

A cadet branch consists of the male-line descendants of a monarch's, ruler's or patriarch's younger sons (cadets). In the ruling dynasties and noble families of much of Europe and Asia, the family's major assets (realm, titles, fiefs, properties, lands and income) have historically been passed from the father to his firstborn son in what is known as primogeniture; younger sons, the cadets, generally inherited less wealth and authority (such as a small appanage) to pass on to future generations of their descendants.

In families and cultures in which that was not the custom or law, such as the feudal Holy Roman Empire, the equal distribution of the family's holdings among male members was eventually apt to so fragment the inheritance as to render it too small to sustain the descendants at the socio-economic level of their forefather—and indeed, too small to efficiently manage or effectively defend. Moreover, brothers and their descendants sometimes quarreled over their allocations, or even became estranged. While agnatic primogeniture became a common way of keeping the family's wealth intact and reducing familial disputes, it did so at the expense of younger sons and their descendants. Both before and after a state legal default of inheritance by primogeniture, younger brothers sometimes vied with older brothers to be chosen as their father's heir or, after the choice was made, sought to usurp the elder's birthright.

Charles I (Italian: Carlo; early 1226/1227 – 7 January 1285), commonly called Charles of Anjou or Charles d'Anjou, was King of Sicily from 1266 to 1285. He was a member of the Capetian dynasty and the founder of the House of Anjou-Sicily. Between 1246 and 1285, he was Count of Provence and Forcalquier in the Holy Roman Empire and Count of Anjou and Maine in France. In 1272 he was proclaimed King of Albania, in 1277 he purchased a claim to the Kingdom of Jerusalem, and in 1278 he became Prince of Achaea after the previous ruler, William of Villehardouin, died without heirs.

The youngest son of Louis VIII of France and Blanche of Castile, Charles was destined for a church career until the early 1240s. He acquired Provence and Forcalquier through his marriage to Beatrice. His attempts to restore central authority brought him into conflict with his mother-in-law, Beatrice of Savoy, and the nobility. He relinquished control of Forcalquier to his mother-in-law in 1248, although she returned it to him in 1256. Charles received Anjou and Maine from his brother, Louis IX of France, in appanage. He accompanied Louis during the Seventh Crusade to Egypt. Shortly after he returned to Provence in 1250, Charles forced three wealthy autonomous cities—Marseille, Arles and Avignon—to acknowledge his suzerainty.

The Grand Principality of Moscow, or Muscovy, known as the Principality of Moscow before 1389, was a late medieval Russian monarchy. Its capital was the city of Moscow. Originally established as an appanage principality in the 13th century, the grand principality was transformed into a centralized Russian state in the late 15th century.

Moscow became a separate principality when Daniel (r. 1263–1303), the youngest son of Alexander Nevsky, received the city and surrounding area as an appanage. By the end of the 13th century, Moscow had become one of the leading principalities within the Vladimir grand principality, alongside Tver. A struggle between the princes of Moscow and Tver began after Mikhail of Tver became grand prince in 1304. Yury (r. 1303–1325) contested the title and was later made grand prince in 1318 by the khan of the Golden Horde, who held suzerainty over the princes. However, Yury would lose the title four years later.

In the Middle Ages, the duke of Normandy was the ruler of the Duchy of Normandy in north-western France. The duchy arose out of a grant of land to the Viking leader Rollo by the French king Charles the Simple in 911. In 924 and again in 933, Normandy was expanded by royal grant. Rollo's male-line descendants continued to rule it until 1135, and cognatic descendants ruled it until 1204. In 1202 the French king Philip II declared Normandy a forfeited fief and by 1204 his army had conquered it. It remained a French royal province thereafter, still called the Duchy of Normandy, but only occasionally granted to a duke of the royal house as an appanage.

Despite both the 13th century loss of mainland Normandy, the renunciation of the title by Henry III of England in the Treaty of Paris (1259), and the extinction of the duchy itself in modern-day France, the monarch of the United Kingdom is regardless still often informally referred to by the title "Duke of Normandy." This is the title used whether the monarch is a king or a queen.

Minsk (Belarusian: Мінск, pronounced [mʲinsk] ; Russian: Минск, pronounced [mʲinsk]) is the capital and largest city of Belarus, located on the Svislach and the now subterranean Nyamiha rivers. As the capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is the administrative centre of Minsk region and Minsk district. As of 2024, it has a population of about two million, making Minsk the 11th-most populous city in Europe. Minsk is one of the administrative capitals of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU).

First mentioned in 1067, Minsk became the capital of the Principality of Minsk, an appanage of the Principality of Polotsk, before being annexed by the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1242. It received town privileges in 1499. From 1569, it was the capital of Minsk Voivodeship, an administrative division of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was part of the territories annexed by the Russian Empire in 1793, as a consequence of the Second Partition of Poland. From 1919 to 1991, after the Russian Revolution, Minsk was the capital of the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic, which became a republic of the Soviet Union in 1922. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Minsk became the capital of the newly independent Republic of Belarus.

The lordship of Piedmont, later the principality of Piedmont (Italian: Piemonte), was originally an appanage of the County of Savoy, and as such its lords were members of the Achaea branch of the House of Savoy. The title was inherited by the elder branch of the dynasty in 1418, at about which time Savoy was elevated to ducal status and Piedmont to princely status. When the House of Savoy was given the Kingdom of Sardinia, the Savoyards used the style of Prince of Piedmont (Italian: Principe di Piemonte) for their heir apparent. This first came into use by Prince Victor Amadeus of Savoy.

The usage was retained when Victor Emmanuel II became King of Italy, "Prince of Piedmont" becoming roughly equivalent to the British "Prince of Wales", the title bestowed to the Crown prince.

Despot or despotes (Ancient Greek: δεσπότης, romanized: despótēs, lit. 'lord, master') was a senior Byzantine court title that was bestowed on the sons or sons-in-law of reigning emperors, and initially denoted the heir-apparent of the Byzantine emperor.

From Byzantium it spread throughout the late medieval Balkans and was also granted in the states under Byzantine cultural influence, such as the Latin Empire, the Second Bulgarian Empire, the Serbian Empire and its successor states (Bulgarian and Serbian: деспот, romanized: despót), and the Empire of Trebizond. With the political fragmentation of the period, the term gave rise to several principalities termed "despotates" which were ruled either as independent states or as appanages by princes bearing the title of despot; most notably the Despotate of Epirus, the Despotate of the Morea, the Despotate of Dobruja and the Serbian Despotate.