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An Alternate History of the Roman Empire: Constantius II - Paranoia in the Palace

Must admit I spent most of this article being confused about the distinction between Magnentius and Magnus Maximus a few decades later.
 
Alex Richards said:
Must admit I spent most of this article being confused about the distinction between Magnentius and Magnus Maximus a few decades later.
Click to expand...

Who has it harder in turns of trying to distinguish between different important figures all of whom have the exact same name, Historians of Prussian Kings or Historians of Roman Emperors?
 
I had to give up trying to use the supposedly helpful indexing aids on my computer when I was doing the index for my (huge) Chronology of Medieval Britain 1066-1307 and 1307-1485 volumes some months ago on account of the overuse of a limited number of names in the medieval period. The same peerages cropped up over the whole period due to the small size of the Anglo-Norman and Plantagenet elites (though often held by different families over the whole period), ditto the same limited number of family names and Christian names. So if you called up , say, 'Surrey' with the indexing tool you would get all the references to all the successive earls of Surrey and all refs to the geographical county of Surrey over 400 years or so lumped in together; the machine couldn't tell them apart. Calling up references to 'Edward' would not distinguish between all the kings, princes and nobles who I referred to by that Christian name in the text; same problem with family names. In the end I had to give up and so it all by hand, page by page , as I was the only one who could tell them all apart.

As for the number of kings and dukes called Richard or Edward in the narratives of the Hundred Years War and Wars of the Roses period, least said the better. In the Anglo-Norman period it was William , Henry and Roger that were the favourite names for boys, and Matilda, Mary and Margaret for girls. At one point in the 1140s English civil war I had one army led by the Empress Matilda and the opposing one led by Queen Matilda (her cousin), and had to be very careful with my script so readers didn't get muddled.

In Roman/ Byzantine history you have 11 Emperor Constantines; in Castile/Spain you have 13 King Alfonsos; and in France you have 18 King Louis, plus the assorted Louis or Lewis names who ruled early Germany and Italy. Not to mention the high numbers of assorted Popes (23 Johns, plus assorted Johns who were later ruled to be illegal 'Antipopes' and were struck off).
 
The index of the superb Europe's Tragedy by Peter H. Wilson (which I have extensively pillaged for my Thirty Years War articles) features such delightful sections as:

Brunswick, Duchy
Brunswick-Lüneburg, Christian
Brunswick-Lüneburg, Christian Ludwig
Brunswick-Lüneburg, Friedrich (I assume as the forename's not actually printed)
Brunswick-Lüneburg, Georg
Brunswick-Lüneburg (Wolfenbüttel), Philipp Sigismund duke of
Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, August II
Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Christian duke von
Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Friedrich Ulrich
Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Heinrich Julius

or my personal favourite:

Sachsen-Altenburg - see Altenburg
Sachsen-Lauenburg - see Lauenburg
Sachsen-Weimar - see Weimar
Sachsen-Weissenfels - see August
 
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