Challenge: European queen comes out as a lesbian and marries a woman

acgoldis

Your challenge is to take a European queen and have her openly come out as a lesbian (possibly after taking the throne). She then proceeds to force through a marriage to her same-sex partner, arguing that the Old Testament only forbids male homosexuality and not female. She says she is willing to take on the Church if necessary.

As far as her heir is concerned, she either adopts a child (like what Caesar did), announces a successor, or puts her stepchild on throne (her partner's child from a previous marriage).

You may choose the ruler.
 

pjmidd

acgoldis said:
Your challenge is to take a European queen and have her openly come out as a lesbian (possibly after taking the throne). She then proceeds to force through a marriage to her same-sex partner, arguing that the Old Testament only forbids male homosexuality and not female. She says she is willing to take on the Church if necessary.

As far as her heir is concerned, she either adopts a child (like what Caesar did), announces a successor, or puts her stepchild on throne (her partner's child from a previous marriage).

You may choose the ruler.
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Unless she has mind control powers, she gets carted off to an estate in the country to get over her hysteria and the country is run by a regency. Pre 1900 it just cannot happen.
 

Fabius Maximus

acgoldis said:
Your challenge is to take a European queen and have her openly come out as a lesbian (possibly after taking the throne). She then proceeds to force through a marriage to her same-sex partner, arguing that the Old Testament only forbids male homosexuality and not female. She says she is willing to take on the Church if necessary.
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The queen bangs her head and loses all self-preservation instinct and political nous. Oh, and the same accident ends up completely overriding her outlook on life and replacing it with a 21st-century liberal one. "Coming out", "lesbian", and "marriage to her same-sex partner" are not ideas that would make sense in a medieval context, and any queen who tried acting as you describe would be considered insane and deposed in short order.
acgoldis said:
As far as her heir is concerned, she either adopts a child (like what Caesar did), announces a successor, or puts her stepchild on throne (her partner's child from a previous marriage).
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There's no precedent for any of this in medieval Europe. Her actual heir would be her closest living relative, like an uncle or cousin. Said relative probably leads a rebellion to overthrow her when she tries to disinherit him, that is if he hasn't done so already.
 
Mildtryth

Mildtryth

acgoldis said:
Your challenge is to take a European queen and have her openly come out as a lesbian (possibly after taking the throne). She then proceeds to force through a marriage to her same-sex partner, arguing that the Old Testament only forbids male homosexuality and not female. She says she is willing to take on the Church if necessary.
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Jesus (according to Matthew 19) said:
Have you not read that the Creator from the beginning ‘made them male and female’? And said, ‘For this cause a man shall leave father and mother and shall be joined fast to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh’: that they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God joined together let no man separate.
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The Bible might not be too specific on the topic of female homosexuality, but it makes a clear point that marriage is supposed to be between a man and a woman.
 
Chapman

Chapman

Donor
Best case scenario short of ASB intervention is probably a Queen who never marries but manages to retain her throne, and who also has a particular female courtier that she is exceedingly close with. Assuming she kept the throne until her (natural) death she would presumably be powerful enough to have chosen her heir and given them solid footing to begin their reign.
 
Basileus_Komnenos

Basileus_Komnenos

traminer said:
I can think of no one more suitable than Kristina Vasa of Sweden.
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Why? The whole reason she abdicated was her conversion to Catholicism, something which was seen as a pathway one could feasibly take. Converting religious denominations was not anything new as in the case of James II or the House of Wettin.

acgoldis said:
Your challenge is to take a European queen and have her openly come out as a lesbian (possibly after taking the throne). She then proceeds to force through a marriage to her same-sex partner, arguing that the Old Testament only forbids male homosexuality and not female. She says she is willing to take on the Church if necessary.
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This ... this is frankly ASB.

The idea of "gay marriage" as we know of it is only really a modern thing that only started to get off the ground in the 21st century.

If anything like this were to occur the monarch would be seen as insane or bewitched with comparisons to Nero (who allegedly forced a man into being a eunuch and his concubine) and Elegabalus likely being thrown out there. Such a move would face universal opposition from all parties.

The fallout from this would be so bad I wouldn't be surprised it in the highly patriarchal nature of European society at the time, poisons the idea of a Queen regnant coming to power.

Mildtryth said:
but it makes a clear point that marriage is supposed to be between a man and a woman.
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Ngl even in 18th Century France, homosexuality in many circles was seen as a variant of sexual deviancy. And with d'Orleans regency, the Duke being a "libertine" (not like his father but still scandalous), Cardinal Fleurry panicked at the idea of the "debauched" (homosexual) people that surrounded d'Orleans social circles, "corrupting the mind" of a young Louis XV.
 
CountofDooku

CountofDooku

It could work mostly in secrety, rather well even if some male friend cooperates and publicly plays the part of lover/ king (maybe for his own benefit as well) but said man would have to be a saint to not rat her or her secrets out to get rid of her and her very close female courtier. Frankly I belive it is ASB, even up until rather modern times, especialy if the Christian Church/ Islam or another similar Monotheistic Religion has any power in the country (things might be a bit easier in Asianpr Ancient Polytheist religions, were some gods could be seen as examples of such relationships).

Even without the churhc, if the public is not to keen on any such things you have a problem, which then would be a reason the royal family is not very supportive either (to keep throne, power and prestig, no matter what they might thing privately, or if they othewise would even support their relative under different circumstances as long as thinks can be kept a secret). But out in the open, back in those times, when any even small weakness was exploited by royal and family rivals that is sadly a short way to the stake, some other execution, prison for life, or a mental asylum, thanks to the "charming" intolerant people of the time, so clearly ASB.
 
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BoleynBuff

Analytical Engine said:
Does that verse actually forbid female homosexuality? Or is it just a tirade against the wickedness and ungodliness of the world?
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It literally says it’s unnatural for women to have sex with each other. Plus, female homosexuality being included in list of examples of wickedness means it’s also supposed to be seen as wicked.
 
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BoleynBuff

Analytical Engine said:
And the concept of homosexuality dates from the 19th century. What's your point?

The bible doesn't condemn homosexuality at all. It condemns certain sexual practices
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Those sexual practices that the Bible condemns include people of the same sex having sex with each other. I fail to understand your point.
 

traminer

Basileus_Komnenos said:
Why? The whole reason she abdicated was her conversion to Catholicism, something which was seen as a pathway one could feasibly take. Converting religious denominations was not anything new as in the case of James II or the House of Wettin.
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I’m thinking more of what preceded that. The rumours surrounding her (possibly cultivated by her) and the young men and women of her court, the sense of experimentations with her identity (let’s play up the virginal angle! Let’s play up the cultured bon vivant!).
The suggestion that she was initially mistaken for a boy at birth (surely an exaggerated story, but exaggerated why and when?).

Her zeal for running counter to others’ expectations of her and her indifference or manipulation of others’ perception of her.

Would she actually be a lesbian? Meh. It almost doesn’t matter. She seems to me like someone who would try to push people’s buttons to extremes. She could always come out while remaining virginal and pure and lying about it.

And she would completely rock the adoption of a completely inappropriate child as her ward.

(Also, there is no single character I’ve heard of in history who strikes me as such a glorious candidate for a hyperbolically irreverent alternate history as her. What if every whim of Kristina’s turned out in her favour? You’d have a wrecked Catholic Church, she’d be Queen of Naples, and she’d probably be revered as a 1600s successor to the Virgin Mary, all while patronizing the arts in ever grander ways and bankrupting all her friends. What fun!)
 
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TheKutKu

TheKutKu

I mean, it’s not ASB If this is a deliberate maneuver to destroy any legitimacy of this ruler - and her wife.

A political suicidal action that brings another person down with you is heterodox but not inconceivable.
 

Polish Eagle

traminer said:
(Also, there is no single character I’ve heard of in history who strikes me as such a glorious candidate for a hyperbolically irreverent alternate history as her. What if every whim of Kristina’s turned out in her favour? You’d have a wrecked Catholic Church, she’d be Queen of Naples, and she’d probably be revered as a 1600s successor to the Virgin Mary, all while patronizing the arts in ever grander ways and bankrupting all her friends. What fun!)
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Kristina also presented herself as a candidate for the Polish throne, so, per local custom, she'd reign there as Rex in such a timeline. Oddly enough, there's not necessarily a conflict with your Naples idea--Louis the Great was King of Poland and also ruled over Naples, so she could invoke that memory.

But as to the thread scenario, it's basically ASB. There is no European queen who had the personal legitimacy to, essentially:

1) live in sin as far as all her subjects are concerned, quite openly

2) pull a Henry VIII and create her own religion with changed rules about marriage

3) announce that she's unilaterally ending the dynasty and handing power over to a non-relative

A queen having a favorite is one thing. Same-sex marriage is another.
 

desmirelle

@acgoldis, Counter Challenge: make this challenge not ASB!

Seriously, if you are going to be writing in a particular era, you have to do the research so you know what sorts of moral/societal class structures/religious values, etc are appropriate.

But you have been given one solution and I'll use a known example of a consortless Queen:
Elizabeth the First could have a female favorite who closeness is the fertile ground for a million rumors. As for an heir, she can write a secret will [by secret I mean the barrister and witnesses mysteriously die or disappear] and the will is placed within a heavily guarded safe [to assuage this queen's given reason for not publicly naming an heir - the older ER gets, the more a secondary court will form about the heir and, being rather narcissistic, Liz can't have that.] This keeps everyone on their toes and allows Liz to keep all eyes on her, because no one but that poor, missing barrister knows what was in the will.
 

desmirelle

Now, having written all that, I regret to inform you there are waaayyyy to many greased palms in her court. It is a title for the having if the secrets are told, and at best, imprisonment for poor, crazy Elizabeth. There are no convents [the rich lady retreat convents that noblewomen used before Edward VI]. Oh, there are some outside England, but she won't be allowed that route. She'll be treated like Katherine of Aragon: shuttled from shabby royal residence to shabby royal residence until she dies - without her partner [who will probably die after being found guilty of bewitching the monarch]. The Protestants will be hyper sensitive and possibly England will go the way of France and Russia: Salic Law; because between Bloody Mary and Loony Liz, obviously women can't rule.
 
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