The recent death of Elizabeth II raises questions about the age and health of his successor, Charles, which is already 73 years old.
In inheritance questions (whether it is of estate or right of succession to the throne), is distinguished primogeniture, in which the oldest heir successes, and ultimogeniture, in which the youngest valid heir successes.
Ultimogeniture doesn't pause problems of heirs being too old, and although it generates more cases of regency, allows for monarchs to reign for basically their entire lifetime, therefore making generally stabler leadership.
However, no known monarchy in present day or history is known to have used ultimogeniture as an inheritance rule. Why is that ?
Hey there,
Just to let you know, your question is fine, and we're letting it stand. However, you should be aware that questions framed as 'Why didn't X do Y' relatively often don't get an answer that meets our standards (in our experience as moderators). There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, it often can be difficult to prove the counterfactual: historians know much more about what happened than what might have happened. Secondly, 'why didn't X do Y' questions are sometimes phrased in an ahistorical way. It's worth remembering that people in the past couldn't see into the future, and they generally didn't have all the information we now have about their situations; things that look obvious now didn't necessarily look that way at the time.
If you end up not getting a response after a day or two, consider asking a new question focusing instead on why what happened did happen (rather than why what didn't happen didn't happen) - this kind of question is more likely to get a response in our experience. Hope this helps!
Not to discourage anyone from providing an answer here, but you might also try asking this in r/askanthropology.