The article examines and compares the formation of the Breton and Croat gentile kingdoms in the 9th century in the context of the interaction between local elites and political structures of the Carolingian Empire. In doing so, the article focuses on strategies of Breton and Croat leaders, who, while remaining within the framework of the Frankish world (pax Francica) and demonstrating their loyalty to the Carolingians, nevertheless actually created their own polities (regna) in the process of their interaction with the Franks. While emphasizing the importance of regional alliances between indigenous rulers and Frankish counts for the processes of local politogenesis, the author shows that it was precisely the equal-level interaction of elites that came in the conditions of the weakening of the Frankish control over the periphery in the 830s to replace previous “colonial” practices of governing, created conditions for the formation of gentile kingdoms both in Brittonic Armorica and in Slavic Dalmatia. The emergence of both the Breton and Croat kingdoms (regna) was primarily the result of political compromises, which in both cases meant a conscious refusal of the Frankish authorities from direct control over local societies. Under such conditions, the demonstrative loyalty of local leaders to a ruler from the Carolingian dynasty not only did not significantly limit the space of political action for them, but, on the contrary, provided a necessary impetus and resources for their political creativity, that is, in fact, acted as a factor of politogenesis.