Or maybe Ferdinand II marries Queen Charlotte of Cyprus. That would make all his children descendants of the Byzantine Emperors.
Actually, I doubt this. I looked at the lineage of the Queen of Cyprus... which leads back to one of the first kings of Jerusalem. Through the paternal line, it looks like they were just nobles in Tripoli c. 1050, meaning it’s unlikely they were closely related to the Byzantine Emperors. Not to mention that there were multiple dynasties that had petered out (Justin’s, for example). The Crusaders didn’t manage to get the Byzantine Empire on board, since it was Orthodox, though that only became relevant after the Great Schism.
What if Castille and Burgundy had been under a personal Union (remembering that Spain inherited Burgundy’s non-French holdings as HRE, anyway)?
On her mother’s side, Queen Charlotte was a great-granddaughter of Manuel II Palaiolagos.
Not bad, but as I suspected, the Palaiolagos dynasty only dates back to 1261. Also, Michael, the original Emperor from that dynasty, was literally excommunicated for blinding the former Emperor, who was a little kid, and then seizing power. Great legacy. Then again, the Romans never had a truly stable rule of succession.
I admit it would have been interesting to have a joining between a Byzantine and Spanish line, only made possible by her parents’ marriage, her father being Catholic. Actually, her mother’s uncles were the last two Byzantine Emperors.
The problem is that she was only Queen for 6 years, before she was overthrown... when Ferdinand was 12. So there wasn’t much reason for Ferdinand to marry her, anyway.
