Monarchs of Dundorf

Until well within modern times, the landed gentry and nobility held great power within Dundorf. Their wealth and ownership of vast expanses of good land in tandem with their willingness to adapt to new economic forms gave them a great advantage in maintaining their power compared with the nobility of many other countries.

One unique feature of the nobility of Dundorf is the almost complete absence of women within its ranks. While noble women certainly existed they were traditionally not allowed to directly inherit titles or the lands and privileges the titles held. What historians find as they look through the records of the nobility then is a form of institutional sexism on the part of nobles. This is believed to be the main reason there have been no female monarchs of the nation.

While peerage and the nobility hold little to no power in the modern eras of Dundorf the titles can still be found but are often not flaunted nor greatly respected by common people.

Guide to Noble Titles and Territories of Dundorf
Guide to Nobility titles and territories of Dundorf:

Prince-Electors in the Peerage of Dundorf
Prince-Electors were honorary titles presented to nobles who had distinguished themselves in the name of the King, either through warfare or other service. These titles were given for the duration of the noble's life but were not heritable to their heirs.

A Prince-Elector was given jurisdiction over a geographic area and was inclined to maintain order over the Niederer Adel (lower nobility) of that area; often serving as a judge in various disputes. The Prince-Elector was also tasked with dabbling in politics with the various lower nobility in the region in order to "represent" them in the Imperialer Kurfürsten-Rat alongside the Uradel (Old Nobles) and Hochadel (High Nobles) from across the Dundorfreich. Often, the Prince-Elector cared little for the political wishes of the lower nobility under their jurisdiction and ignored them.

After the gradual colonization of Ichredön by ethnic Dundorfians a Prince-Elector postion was added in 1104 to represent the colonized areas; this position was subsequently eliminated with the loss of Ichredön in 1275.

Archdukes in the Peerage of Dundorf
The position of Archduke was a revolving title given out by the monarch to a selected family. Therefore, there was only one Erzherzog at any given time. Because of this, the Erzherzog position was merely added to the title of a family, as opposed to an area of governance like that of the other peerage titles. However, the position was often deemed hereditary unless the family fell out of favor with a newly elected monarch, such as not supporting them in their bid for monarch. This was why the position often stayed in the same family until an entirely new monarchical dynasty was chosen as the monarch in which case the position was often given to a key supporter causing a name and position change for the Erzherzogtum.

Monarchs
In the beginning of Dundorf the monarchs were selected by the elected assemblies of the nobles. Often, the nobles continued to select Könige and Kaisers from the same family until that line either faced a backlash from its supporting nobles or the assemblies felt that no more acceptable monarchs were available from the family. It is interesting to note the political power and influence wielded by such powerful families lasted for centuries as can be seen by the sheer number of monarchs selected from the family.

First Confederation Era (AD 802 - AD 1278)
The list of the first lines of elected (selected) monarchs of Dundorf can be seen below:

Autocratic Era (1279 - 1720)
During the this era of Dundorfian history, the King was still elected as before but was given much expanded power and influence over the courses taken by the Imperialer Kurfürsten-Rat (Imperial Elector Council) caused by the loss of Ichredön and the subsequent immigration crises that followed. Likewise, the Council no longer functioned as merely an election board for the new King but took on the position of actual governance over a newly centralized land.