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MadDany94 t1_jdptu6m wrote

Its very stereotypical for medieval themed fiction writers to make duos like this: Royalty (Or at least anyone with a high status) gets saved by a commoner when they were younger, they become best friends, then said commoner because something like their right hand man. Either they become a military officer/guard for them or an advisor.

So that makes me wonder: Has similar stuff like that actually happened in history?

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[deleted] t1_jdre9d8 wrote

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LateInTheAfternoon t1_jdu533t wrote

Many misconceptions here. Plebs =/= Plebeians (in the strict sense for there was of course overlap) and both Augustus (as Octavius, before his adoption by Caesar) and Agrippa were of Plebeian families. Both also belonged to the Roman nobilty, later called Nobiles, which had (starting in the 4th century BC) been opened up for Plebeian families and very soon became flooded with them as the wealth required to move up in society more and more became accessible as the Roman empire^1 expanded. This influx was the more impactful as the number of Patrician families would steadily decline over time. The dichotomy of the early Roman republic of Patricians vs Plebeians was replaced by the dichotomy of Nobiles + Equites vs Plebs; the new order had been firmly solidified by the last quarter of the 4th century BC if not earlier. The Equites and a large part of the Nobiles (within a century the majority) were comprised of wealthy Plebeians. The laws enacted during the course of the 4th century allowed for Plebeians to be eligible for every political office (thus giving them seats in the senate as well, as it was made up of ex-magistrates) and one law even specified that each year at least 1 of the 2 consuls had to be a Plebeian (by the late republic there were streaks of several consecutive years with only Plebeian consuls). To belong to the Nobiles you had to have the wealth required for the top orders of society (as decided by the recurring censuses) and you would have to have distinguished ancestors that had served as magistrates and senators. The only significant distinctions remaining between Patricians and Plebeians were that the former were still ineligible for the office of tribune of the plebs and certain priestly offices were barred for Plebeians.

Note 1: following Finlay I use 'Roman empire' to denote the large territorial extent of the state of Republic Rome and 'Roman Empire' to denote the government which replaced the republic as well as the territorial extent of that government.

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BanjoMothman t1_jdqmaty wrote

Peter the Great has multiple famous examples. Alexander Menshikov was his close advisor and it is suggested by some historians that he was a stable boy as a child. Catherine I, Peter's wife and Empress after his death, was born Marta Helena Skowrońska and lived a life of poverty/peasantry/possibly slavery before becoming mistress to Peter.

Abram Gannibal was originally a slave purchased as a boy from Africa by Peter the Great, who recieved an education and became a military engineer/nobleman into the time of Elizabeth's rule if my memory serves correctly.

Scholars argue whether Daniel from the Book of Daniel in the Hebrew Bible was a real person or not, but his story certainly counts if so.

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jezreelite t1_jdqno3t wrote

While not commoners per se, William Marshal, Otto de Grandson, and William Montagu were all members of minor nobility at best who became friends with kings. William Marshal was a companion of Henry the Young King, Otto of Edward I of England, and William Montagu of Edward III of England.

Another example, though later in history, was Aleksandr Danilovich Menshikov, the favourite and confidant of Peter the Great. Unlike the three I mentioned above, Menshikov was not even of gentry status. Another example was Aleksey Grigoryevich Razumovsky, a Ukrainian Cossack who became the lover and probably morganatic husband of Peter the Great's daughter, Empress Yelisaveta.

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