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Standard Royal Court: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:royalcourt.jpg|frame]]
The
How elaborate the court is will depend on the [[Technology Levels|technology level]], and the wealth of the nation it rules. A barbarian warlord will have the most basic version; one right-hand man, a dozen minor chiefs, and a few hundred warriors. A galactic empire will have a court bigger than most cities, and a population to match - ten million courtiers living in conditions of unparalleled magnificence, their lives all revolving around the centre of power, the emperor at the court's heart. If, that is, the writer wants to keep in touch with reality; [[Gormenghast|total mismatches between the size of the court and the size of the country]] occur.
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Any court beyond the most basic will typically be fractal in structure. Most of the courtiers will themselves be the heads of lesser courts, mirroring the structure of the main court, and many of their courtiers will in turn head minor courts. Thus, the crown prince's best friend and chief advisor might be a duke, ruling over several earldoms, advised by the ducal chancellor. Historically, most courts stopped at four or five tiers, but in fiction there is no limit.
How much of this structure the reader sees depends on the focus of the narrative. If the protagonists are just visiting the court, they'll usually only deal with an handful of people in it, leaving the rest of the
In general, the overall tone of a court is set by its ruler. A good king will have good courtiers; an evil king will have evil courtiers. However, there will usually be one or two courtiers who run counter to the trend, which gives them a greater prominence in the plot, and a new king may inherit a court that runs opposite to his preferences.
Morality is only one dimension along which the
* Sneakiness - some courts are a web of conspiracies; in others, everyone is open about their intentions.
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Positions in a royal court usually start out as purely functional, become either hereditary or reserved for nobles, and end up as purely ceremonial, with the actual work being done by the holder of a more junior post, which may then go through the same cycle. This is how old courts, where this has happened several times, end up with their bewildering array of titles. Young courts, with no long standing traditions, are much simpler, and the nobles in them more likely to do actual work.
Typical plot lines for works set in a
The members of a
The important members of the court, and associated tropes, are:
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* Any number of special favourites, courtiers who are important not because of their inheritance and offices but because the regent has an affection for them. They usually have a certain something about them which can be charm, boldness, honeyed tongue, cleverness, honesty, strength, beauty and other quirks and abilities. The important part is that their influence on the leader is not easily measured. The writers might add as much spicy [[Subtext]] as they like.
** A common ploy is for a patron to introduce suitable candidates to the ruler. If any of them find favour, the patron can then influence the ruler by passing suggestions through the favourite, though ambitious favourites will turn on their patrons the moment they have a better one.
**A more serious kind of courtier is there for serious political reasons. Some are spokespeople for a guild or other special interest. Some are high-class prisoners of war awaiting ransom. Some are hostages from another royal or noble family keeping their daddy in line with their own neck but treated regally until the threat has to be enforced. Some are pretenders to another throne kept in style either to foment civil war in a rival or just as a [[Take That]].
* Any [[The Mistress|mistresses]] the king has. Essentially the same role as favourites, but less respectable. This doesn't stop ambitious courtiers parading their sisters in front of the king.
* If there are enough nobles, they might form a separate body within the court that acts as a kind of legislature for the nation. [[Expy|Expies]] of the [[British Political System|British House of Lords]], the French Estates-General (or just the First and Second Estates), the [[Roman Republic|Roman Senate]], and the [[Holy Roman Empire|Holy Roman]] ''Reichstag'' are common.
* [[Praetorian Guard|The royal bodyguard.]] Expect [[Bling of War|flashy uniforms and weaponry]]. Depending on the story, they can be little more than a showy force with [[Mooks|no substance]] [[Redshirt Army|behind them]] to [[Elite Mooks|unkillable badasses]]. May be a [[Cadre of Foreign Bodyguards]]
Most of these people will have their own circle of courtiers filling the same roles, but their titles will be lesser. Though the stakes are lower, the politics is no less vicious.
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* ''[[A Song of Ice and Fire]]'' shows several courts, ranging from the austere court of the Ironmen, to the [[Deadly Decadent Court|deadly decadence]] of King's Landing, to the unstructured free people of the King Beyond the Wall.
* The ''[[Honor Harrington]]'' novels have the Star Kingdom of Manticore. Which axis of morality and composition you see depends on why you're there in the first place.
**Manticore is a Parliamentary Kingdom and it's workings are obviously English. It's factions are recognizable and most such corruptions it has are either the normal sort you see in a Parliamentary system or fairly simple criminality. Most of it is kept under something resembling Rule of Law.
***Probably the worst thing a Manticoran political faction(as such, though individual members of such have committed treason or blackmail, or on one notorious occasion attempted rape) has done was do a coup by legal hairsplitting(prolonging the signing of terms during a truce in a war so they could enjoy power as they would without calling elections). This was combined with an absurd downsizing of the navy. There is no question it cost lives from a mixture of corruption and stupidity. But if you had proposed to any of them that they kill thousands of their fellow citizens for their own selfishness, they would at least have probably been sincerely horrified at the idea. In any case Manticore has never been a police-state or anything like it unlike some of it's enemies. That is there are villainous Manticorans but Manticore has never been a villainous state.
* [[Gormenghast]] is sneaky, aristocratic, decadent, and ritual-choke. It is so grossly mismatched to the size of the country that to all intents and purposes the court ''is'' the nation-state!
* King Boniface's court in John Barnes's ''[[One for the Morning Glory]]'': a [[Fairy Tale]] court with a liberal admixture of a royal court as needed by the [[Rule Of Whimsy]].
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* ''[[The Tale of Genji]]'' is set at the Imperial Court of Heian Japan which features an Emperor; two or more ex-Emperors, each with his Empress and harem; Princes and princesses galore and rival noble families all jockeying for position and power. However, as a rule the characters are kept so busy managing their complex love lives that one wonders who - if anybody - is actually running the country.
** In real life, that exact question more or less brought on the age of the samurai and the Shogunate.
* A large portion of ''[[The Princess Bride (novel)|The Princess Bride]]'' takes place in the royal court of Florin - more than [[The Film of the Book]] would suggest.
* Vorbarr Sultana in [[Vorkosigan Saga]]. That's where counts and vor hang out. The place is full of [[Dances and Balls]], many a [[Fancy Dinner]], [[Big Fancy House|palaces,]] love affairs, politics, and a weird combination of Russian authoritarianism evolving into an almost British constitutional monarchy.
== [[Live Action TV]] ==
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Royalty and Nobility Tropes]]
[[Category:Settings]]
[[Category:Ensembles]]
[[Category:Standard Royal Court]]
[[Category:This Index Has Standards]]
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