Most of the texts I've found about monarchies concern almost exclusively the office of the monarch. But, what sort of an organizational structure existed to give the officeholder this power, in 18th century or before in European monarchies? Who was the monarch's second in command, third in command, etc.? If a 17th century monarch would give the command of "bring me a shrubbery, ten miles long", who would do it, and in what order?
Also, how did he motivate his subordinates without a modern nationalist ideology?
In Sweden, dating back to Viking age every year a ting (a meeting between all the estates, peasantry, clergy, burghers and nobility) was held. This was to create new laws, and sort out conflicts regarding disputed lands.
Going forward to the medieval era the king sized more power but the ting was still important because the king at this time was elected, and the tings was in the 14th century the only place in Sweden where more than 10 noble family's was allowed to be under the same 'roof' King Magnus Eriksson made laws that made it illegal to have more than 70 guests at private parties. This was to make plotting easy to discover.
Moving forward again to the 17th century. Sweden was now a large decently rich military powerhouse in Europe. The Viking tings still exists but under the name riksdag. And instead of a gigantic gathering now every estate sent members to represent them in Stockholm. The king couldn't just make up laws and expect them to pass, new laws had to pass through the riksdag.
Sweden at this time had 5 unique power ranks
The most powerful rank in the swedish riksdag was the Drot who's responsibility was to ensure the laws to be followed across the nation. And incase of a regency, (mental problems or a underage king) the drot was king in all but name.
The 2nd and 3rd in rank was the riksmarsk and the riksadmiral (the highest ranked in the military land and navy) they were supposed to give military advice and lead the army e.g Eisenhower and Nimitz in WW2.
The 4th highest rank was rikskansler. Almost identical to the role of a modern prime minister mixed with secretary of state.
The least influential of the 5 most influential people was the riskskattmästare (master of mint)
The ranks was often appointed by the riksdag and the king had the power to make some adjustments if he wanted but mostly agreed to the names present by the riksdag, the king had a veto power, but the riksdag could in some cases overrule the kings veto, until the absolutism of Charles XI and XII. During the time when sweden wasn't an absolute monarchy the riksdag had a lot of power and mostly ran itself in service of the king.