Kingmaker

A kingmaker is a grownup or house that has great influence on the royal or political succession, without themselves being a viable candidate. Kingmakers may ownership political, monetary, religious, as well as military means to influence the succession. Originally, the term applied to the activities of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick—"Warwick the Kingmaker"—during the Wars of the Roses 1455–1487 in England.