Spare to the Throne: Difference between revisions

{{quote|''My parents were rather... traditional. They wanted the heir and the spare, and I was left in the cold.''|'''Sebastian''', ''[[Dragon Age II]]''}}

In history books you will occasionally see references to the term "an heir and a spare" which reflects the desire of [[Royal Blood|kings and queens]] of the time to have at least two male heirs.

* Chagum in ''[[Seirei no Moribito]]'' is the Emperor's second son, and [[Spare to the Throne]]. Unlike most examples he did apparently receive schooling because his older brother suffers from a [[Soap Opera Disease]], and becomes the heir apparent after his brother succumbs to it halfway through the series. In either case, he is remarkably calm (although clearly not-too-pleased) about it.

* Inverted in ''[[The Horse and His Boy]]'' -- it—it turns out Shasta the peasant boy is actually one of two twin princes of Archenland, kidnapped as a babe. And since he's the older of the two twins he's next in line for the throne, which delights his brother no end because he never wanted to be the heir (and is by extension now the spare).

* At the age of eleven, [[Vorkosigan Saga|Aral Vorkosigan]] watched as his mother and older brother were slain by a death squad sent by the mad emperor Yuri. While these events happened before the time of the books, they are of critical importance in the relationship between his father, Count Piotr Vorkosigan, and his son, Miles. His mother, Cordelia, was poisoned while pregnant, and the boy was considered lost by both Count Piotr and their doctors, who called for an abortion, with the intent of trying again for a healthy heir. <br />Years later, while Miles was [[Death Is Not Permanent|briefly dead]], his clone-brother, Mark, who had been created in a plot to replace him and destroy the Imperium, had to face the concept that if Miles was truly lost (dead and ''rotted''), he might have to take up his progenitor's place as heir to the Countship of the Vorkosigan District in the Council of Counts.

* In the [[Prince Roger]] series by [[David Weber]] and [[John Ringo]], Prince Roger is the Heir Tertiary to the throne of the Empire of Man (third in line, after his older brother and sister); nobody, including his own family, can decide whether he's an [[UpperclassUpper Class Twit]] or a potential traitorous usurper, so he is specifically ''not'' given any guidance in how to exercise power. Then he gets marooned on a [[Death World]], and then he finds out he was actually safer on that [[Death World]] than his brother and sister...

* ''[[Dragon Age]] Origins'' has this in Alistair, who reveals early on that he is of royal blood... unfortunately he's a bastard, so he wasn't raised to the task. Needless to say, he's not happy about the idea of becoming king after being trained for something completely different and being quite forcefully assured that his illegitimate status would prevent the question.

* ''[[Suikoden V]]'' has a non-royal example with the House of Barows. After his older brother Hiram was assassinated during the bloody Succession Conflict, Euram was thrust into the role of his father's heir, as well as dealing with his mother's extended [[Despair Event Horizon|BSOD]]. This stress of this helps shape him into the irritating [[Epic Fail|Epic Failing]]ing [[UpperclassUpper Class Twit]] everyone has to deal with during the events of the game, until [[Character Development]] enables him to grow out of it.

** Charles I of England and Scotland (reigned 1625 -1649) was the second son of James VI/I. His older brother Henry Frederick (1594-1612) was trained to become King and was considered robust and athletic. He died suddenly of typhoid fever in 1612, leaving Charles as the heir to the throne at the age of 12. Charles was weak and sickly since birth, and had to overcome physical infirmity (weak ankles) just to walk as a child.

** George V (reigned 1910-1936) was a spare, serving in the Royal Navy for twelve years (1879-1891)--he even got a tattoo of a red and blue dragon on his arm while in Japan. He became the heir when his (somewhat insane, possibly gay) older brother Albert Victor died without issue even before [[Queen VickyVictoria|grandma]] died (giving him on the order of 20 years prepare for the job, but he still would have preferred not to take it at all). It's theorized that the reason these most recent two Georges were such excellent constitutional monarchs is that they hadn't expected the crown and as a result hadn't had the prospect of the crown get to their heads.

** When Edward VIII (reigned 1936) abdicated, his successor, George VI (reigned 1936-1952), was reluctant to take up the post, as he had never expected or wished for the position. He had served in the Royal Navy during [[World War OneI]] (he had to sit out much of it on account of ill-health).

*** For one thing, he had a dreadful stammer and a fear of public speaking. Indeed, it's widely suspected that part of the reason for his death at a relatively young age (56) was due to the stress of being King throughout [[WWWorld 2War II]].

*** It also helped avoid [[Royally Screwed-Up]]: since the two Georges were junior royalty, they were allowed to marry less-royal spouses. George V married Mary of Teck, a fourth cousin and a member of very junior German royalty. George VI married Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, who wasn't even royal but rather the daughter of a Scottish Earl--, in what was essentially a love match, no less (Bertie proposed ''[[Dogged Nice Guy|three times]]'' before she said "yes").

* [[wikipedia:Henry II of France|Henry II]] [[L'État, Etatc'est Cest Moimoi|of France]] seemed relatively fortunate to have ''three'' sons at the time of his 1559 death in a jousting accident. However sickly young [[wikipedia:Francis II of France|Francis II]] died roughly a year and a half later (December 1560) at age 16, his brother [[wikipedia:Charles IX of France|Charles IX]] acended the throne at 10 only to die without issue of tuberculosis in 1574, and [[wikipedia:Henry III of France|Henry III]] (who smuggled himself out of Poland less than a year of gaining ''that'' throne) was assassinated in 1589 leading to [[Succession Crisis|a worsening of the ongoing wars]] that did not really cease even after Henry II's son-in-law [[wikipedia:Henry IV of France|Henry of Navarre]] was crowned in 1594.

[[Category:SpareWill toand theInheritance ThroneTropes]]