So this game I noticed I could purchase a commander from my vassal for 200 influence. I did so, he showed up, I moved to a city. So far, so good! But then when I built up influence again, I saw a commander was again available - only this time when I confirmed the levy, my influence did not drop, and I did not appear to get a commander, so I tried multiple times thinking it was glitching or frequency limiteed. Several turns later, my 'dead' commanders spawned! So I ended up with enough commanders for all my settlements, and as best as I can tell it did not cost me any influence past the first one. this was antiquity - in exploration I confirmed the same for naval commanders.