I wll say something about the swap suggestion that inspired this question at the end, because I have my own opinion about it, unsurprisingly, but first, here are some spontanous 18th Century ideas from yours truly. I tried to pick contemporaries of the same generation:


( Kingdom Swap 1: Friedrich Wilhelm I. (Prussia) swaps with his first cousin George II (Britain and Hannover) )

( Kingdom Swap 2: Stanislas I. Poniatowski (Poland) swaps with Joseph II (HRE) )

( Kingdom, err, Realm Swap 3: Peter the Great (Russia) swaps with Gian Gastone de' Medici (Tuscany) )

Now, what thornyrose42 wrote to me was: I was listening to a podcast (You’re Dead to Me) where a comedian quipped that Peter III of Russia and Frederick the Great would have both been quite satisfied with a kingdom swap, since Peter admired Prussia so much and Frederick would not have said no to such a giant hunk of Empire.

Whether or not that is true, what do you think would be some of the best and worst kingdom swaps from your favourite periods? Whose style of governance was much better suited to another kingdom’s problems? Who managed where they were ruling but would have floundered when forced to deal with someone else’s political brew.

( And okay, Peter III and Frederick are contemporaries but of two different generations, but here's my own opinion of how that would go: )

The other days