Sources and methodology

Archives and institutions

Main reference works

Cultural and political history

Cartography

Working criteria

The general bibliography brings together the works, databases and institutions consulted. References to individual articles and biographies appear in the corresponding profiles.

This database is a developing synthesis: a contextual reference does not by itself verify every detail in a profile.

Dates are usually expressed by year; “c.” marks dates recorded as approximate.

Where a date is known only as a range or bound, the profile displays it as such and adds a documentary explanation. The year filter includes years compatible with those bounds. Approximate dates retain their conventional year without inventing a margin of error.

Dynasty profiles distinguish cadet branches from transfers by marriage or inheritance. A shared family name does not by itself establish a line of descent among all its bearers.

Wikipedia is used as an auxiliary bibliographic guide. Disputed family relationships and chronologies require corroboration with specialist references.

Government records distinguish territory, title, class and condition. A claim or nominal title is not equivalent to effective rule.

Explained successions are an editorial selection: a later entry does not by itself prove direct succession. Crises show historical claims; kinship is limited to recorded parentage. Accession to a title, coronation and effective rule are distinguished when specific information exists.

Title stages group offices by year and distinguish effective rule, regency and nominal titles. Overlap within one year does not prove that two rulers held power on the same day. Unions may include breaks and do not imply uniform institutions. Europe in this year summarises only loaded data compatible with the selection; it does not extend lives beyond sufficiently documented bounds.

The map is a simplified historical representation. An absent relationship means that it is not recorded in this database.