in chronological order (some of
these do not get mentioned in the blog, but I have included them anyway)
And you will notice that there is no King Arthur on this
list, nor Queen Guinièvre, nor any of their royal line or dynasty. And why not?
Because they have never existed, except in the need of European Christianity to
replace the religion of the Celtic world with their own mythologies; achieved, over a period of many centuries, through the writing of both courtly
romances and pseudo-history, and through them the reduction of the Celtic gods and goddesses
to human status.
The dates in brackets are the years of their monarchy, not their lives!
The First Anglo-Saxon (-Jute-and-Fresian)
Epoch (with some occasional Danish inter-regna)
Egbert (Ecgherht) 827
– 839: ruled Wessex, conquered Mercia, controlled all of England south of the
Humber. Added Northumberland and North Cymry. Given the title Bretwalda
(“ruler of the British” in Anglo-Saxon). Buried in Winchester.
Aethelwulf 839 – 858: King of Wessex, son
of Egbert and father of Alfred the Great.
Aethelbald 858 – 860: Second son of Aethelwulf. Crowned
at Kingston-upon-Thames after forcing his father to abdicate on his return from
pilgrimage to Rome. Buried at Sherborne Abbey in Dorset.
Aethelbert 860 – 866: Brother of Æthelbald;
likewise crowned at Kingston-upon-Thames and buried at Sherborne.
Aethelred I 866 – 871: Brother of Aethelbert,
ruled at the time when the Danes were establishing the kingdom of Yorvik
and moving south. With his brother Alfred, he fought them off at Reading,
Ashdown, Basing and Meretun, at the last of which battles Aethelred was killed.
He is buried at Witchampton in Dorset.
Alfred the Great 871 – 899: The
fourth of the brothers to rule from Wessex, he was initially defeated by the
Vikings, retreating to what is now Wedmore near Gleistonbury, where he signed
the Danelaw that divided England into north and south forever afterwards: Saxon
south, Viking north. He also established a permanent army and a very embryonic
Royal Navy, as well as incipiting the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles. He is buried
in Winchester.
Edward (The Elder) 899 – 924: Son of Alfred,
he retook southeast England and the Midlands from the Danes (breaching the
Danelaw in the process!), and then united the kingdoms of Wessex and Mercia. Recognised
as “father and lord” by the Scottish King Constantine II, he
was killed in a battle against the "Welsh" near Chester and buried in Winchester.
Athelstan 924 – 939: Son of Edward the Elder. The
Battle of Brunanburh in 937 made him effectively King of all Britain. He is
buried in Malmesbury in Wiltshire.
Edmund I 939 – 946: Half-bother of Athelastan. King
at 18, stabbed by a robber in his royal hall at Pucklechurch near Bath
when he was only 25. His two sons, Eadwig and Edgar,
were too young to become kings (but see below), so another of his
half-brothers, Eadred, took the throne.
Eadred 946 – 955: The son of Edward the Elder by
his third marriage to Eadgifu. Expelled the last Scandinavian King of
York, Eric Bloodaxe, in 954. He died of a stomach condition in his early 30s,
unmarried and without an heir, at Frome in Somerset. He is buried in
Winchester.
Eadwig 955 – 959: The eldest son of Edmund I, and
still only 16 when he was crowned at Kingston-upon-Thames. Legend has it that
his coronation had to be delayed to allow Bishop Dunstan to prise Eadwig from
his bed, and from between the arms of his “strumpet” and the strumpets’ mother.
Perhaps unimpressed by the interruption, Eadwig had Dunstan exiled to France.
Eadwig died in Gloucester when he was just 20, the circumstances of his death
are not recorded.
Edgar 959 – 975: The youngest son of
Edmund I, and did he arrange his elder brother’s death? He definitely recalled
Dunstan, and installed him as Archbishop of Canterbury and chief
counsellor. Crowned in Bath in 973, he met the other six kings of
Britain in Chester, who rowed him across across the River Dee as a gesture of
homage.
Edgar is present by Shakespearian allusion on March 15, July 16 and
October 22, and a second time under his own name on March 15. The statue of him is in Devonshire Square, by the Bishop's Gate in London
Edward the Martyr 975 – 978: Eldest
son of Edgar, and just 12 when he was crowned. As
Edgar with brother Aedwig, so Edward with his half-brother Aethelred:
Edward was murdered at Corfe Castle
and Aethelred readily took the throne.
Aethelred II (the Unready) 978
– 1013: Less ready to take on the Danes however, whence his nickname. Mind you,
he was only 10, and it was his mum who did the dirty work, or failed to. He fled
to Normandy in 1013 when Sweyn Forkbeard, King of the Danes,
invaded England in an act of revenge for the St Brice’s Day
massacre of England’s Danish inhabitants.
Sweyn Forkbeard 1013: Crowned King of
England on Christmas Day 1013, he made his capital at Gainsborough in
Lincolnshire, but died just 5 weeks later.
Aethelred II (the Unready) (Part
2) 1014 - 1016: Aethelred returned in 1014 after Sweyn’s death, and spent the
next two years trying to push back the tide of weaponed soldiers pouring constantly towards him under the leadership of Sweyn’s son Knut (Canute).
Edmund II ironside 1016: Son of Aethelred II,
and still fighting Knut. He was chosen as king by the good
folk of London, but The Witan (the King’s Council), went for Knut. Picking up
The Danelaw, and after he lost the Battle of Assandun, Edmund made a pact with
Knut to divide the kingdom between them, Edmund keeping Wessex, Knut getting
everything else; and a sub-clause that, if one died, the other would take the
lot. Mysteriously Edmund died only weeks later.
Knut (Canute) the dane
1016 – 1035: King of all England, but he divided it into four earldoms: East
Anglia, Mercia, Northumbria and Wessex. Very successful in almost everything he
did, his only known failure was that pointless attempt to turn back the tide.
Harold I 1035 – 1040: Harold Harefoot, in
recognition of his speed and skill as a hunter. The illegitimate son of Knut;
he stole the throne while half-brother Harthaknut (Harthacanute),
the rightful heir, was in Denmark fighting to protect his Danish kingdom, and
himself officially regenting his absence. He died three just weeks before
Harthacanute came back with his army, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. But
only briefly: Harthacanute had his body dug up, beheaded, and thrown into the
Thames; what was recoverable by his London followers was re-buried at St.
Clement Danes in London.
Harthaknut (Harthacanute) 1040 – 1042: The
son of Knut the Dane and Emma of Normandy,
Harthaknut’s return to England with a fleet of sixty-two warships probably
explains why he was so quickly accepted as king. At his mother’s request he
brought his half-brother Edward, Emma’s son from her first marriage to Aethelred the Unready,
back from exile in Normandy - more on him in the next paragraph. Harthacanute
died, aged just 24, while toasting the health of the bride at a family wedding.
He was the last Danish king to rule England.
Edward Æthelredson of Wessex (St Edward the Confessor) 1042-1066:
The aforementioned son of Emma and Aethelred,
he was king in name but not in practice, leaving the day-to-day to Earl Godwin
and his son Harold while focusing entirely on the rebuilding of Westminster
Abbey. And so pleased was God with his work, he gave him early entry into paradise just eight days after it was completed.
Edward can be found on Oct 13
Harold II (Godwinson) 1066:
Elected king by the Witan, despite having no royal bloodline. Except that he
did have a royal bloodline, the Norman one, through his mother. Who said so?
Why, Duke Guillaume de Normandie, of
course, who claimed that Edward Æthelredson (his second cousin
biologically) had promised the throne to him. Harold defeated an invading
Norwegian army at the Battle of Stamford Bridge in Yorkshire, then marched
south to confront Guillaume in Sussex. The Battle Of Hastings, for which see Oct 14. The end of the epoch of the Anglo-Saxon kings.
*
The Norman-Plantagenet Epoch
Guillaume de Normandie 1066 - 1087; William I, “the
Conqueror”; aka “the Bastard” because
he was the illegitimate son of Robert the Devil, and only got his title by
means irrelevant to this account. Not much liked by his subjects in England
either, he began the “Domesday Survey” in 1085, mostly as a tax ledger to fund
his army back in France. He died at the siege of Nantes and is buried at Caen.
He can not be found on March 15, but can on April 29, Aug 10, Sept 28 and Dec 25, and referenced with reference to Magna Carta on June 15
William Rufus (William II) 1087 - 1100:
Not much more popular than his dad, and even more cruel, he did at least
complete the Domesday Book, for which historians will be eternally grateful,
though no one else. The Rufus Stone in the New Forest marks the spot where a
stray arrow handed the throne to his absolutely innocent brother Henry
(it was Walter Tyrrell what done it, your ‘onner).
He can be found on April 29, and re Magna Carta on June 15
Henry Beauclerc (Henry I) 1100 - 1135: actually
William’s fourth son, he was well educated, established a zoo at Woodstock near
Oxenford to study animals, and was nicknamed “The Lion of Justice”, the second
part because of the quality of the laws that he introduced, the first part because of the
cruelty of the punishments if you broke them. His two sons were drowned in the
White Ship, so his daughter Matilda, married to Geoffrey Plantagenet, was
made his successor; but the Witan wasn’t having a woman on the throne, and gave
the crown on Henry’s death to Stephen, one of William‘s grandsons.
You can find Henry on Dec 1, and re Magna Carta on June 15
Stephen of Blois 1135 - 1154: “His
Weakness” rather more than “His Majesty”. The rise of the barons, though it
would take eighty years before they got to Runnymede; constant raids from Cymry and Strathclyde, pillaging of towns and extortions of money by both. Then what
historians simply call “The Anarchy”, and it lasted a full decade, Matilda
coming in from France à la Cordelia, and not just the equivalents of Cornwall
and Albany to repel her. Sheer bedlam, resolved by the Treaty of Westminster
which assured that Matilda’s son Henry succeeded.
Stephen is on Dec 1, and Magna
Carta on June 15
Mathilda Plantagenet (Empress Maud) 1135 - 1154 though
she was never crowned and is generally left out of the lists of English monarchs. She can be found on Dec 1
Henry Plantagenet, Henry of Anjou, Henry FitzEmpres, Henry Curtmantle (Short Mantle) (Henry II): The
Norman connection key here, through his mother even more than through his
grandfather: by the end of his reign they could have talked about the English
conquest of Normandy rather than t’other way around, and it would stay that way
for the next several centuries, with Franchois the language of the Court and the courts
in England, and its culture among the rulers too, as anyone from the bourgeoisie who has savoir faire and that certain je ne sais quoi can tell you to this day. For the Anglo-Saxon peasants who had none of these, Henry introduced
family names, insisting that each family choose its trade, and stay in it. Also
the jury system, and what was called “scutage”. What gets remembered though is
none of this, but rather Thomas Becket (on Dec 29)
See Dec 1 and Sept 8, Magna Carta on June 15, and also Marie de France on Jan 13
Richard Plantagenet, (Richard 1) 1189 - 1199,
or just ten days, as far as his presence in Aengland goes, and that just for his coronation: Henry’s third son. Less “Coeur de Lion” than
“Esprit de Yuch”! See the GER page
Find him on May 30, July
14, Sept 8, and re Magna Carta on June 15; World Homophobes Day is on Sept 21
John Lackland 1199 - 1216:
Henry’s fourth son, and the adjectives I have found in the history books to
describe him include short, fat, cruel, self-indulgent, selfish, avaricious,
punitive and jealous (of big brother Richard); but not a single compliment has
yet turned up. Excommunicated by Pope Innocent III, compelled by the barons to
sign Magna Carta, the other oft-repeated descriptor is “the worst English
king”.
You can find him on April 24, Oct 19, and re Magna Carta on June 15
Henry Winchester (Henry III) 1216 - 1272:
king at 9, brainwashed by priests, dominated by his French family, taken
prisoner during the Barons’ Rebellion, and forced by Simon de Montfort to
establish a Parliament. But he also rebuilt Westminster Abbey and encouraged
Gothic style architecture across the realm.
He too can be found in connection with Magna Carta on June 15
Edward Longshanks (Edward 1) 1272 - 1307:
formed the Model Parliament in 1295, ensuring that not only the barons got power, but also
the knights, the clergy, others of the nobility (though still not a House of
Commoners). Conquered Cymry and renamed it Wales (from Anglo-Saxon Wal-ès
meaning “foreigner”, “outcast” or “unwelcome”), making it the first home colony
of Greater England; still singular, but after hammering the Scots and bringing
the Coronarion Stone from Scone to Westminster, it wasn’t far away; Eireland
will take rather longer to lose its initial “E”. From this time the heir to the
throne will always be the Prince of Wales first. Many of the Village Crosses of
England owe their history to Edward Longshanks: when his wife Eleanor died he
pilgrimaged her body from Grantham to London, erecting a cross at every
stopping-point.
He too can be found re Magna Carta on June 15
Edward Caernarfon (Edward II) 1307 - 1327:
Gay, which mattered then - Piers Gaveston the most famous of his lovers. Lost
the Battle of Bannockburn, which mattered even more. His theoretical wife, the
Louve de France (that’s she-wolf in Middle Aenglish) went off with her lover
Mortimer, and had her sycophants depose him, then incarcerate him in Berkeley
Castle, where they showed him what they thought of his gayness by shoving a
red-hot poker up his rectum. Worth visiting Gloucester Cathedral to see his
tomb, put up by his successor Edward III.
The official date of his “abdication” can be found on Jan 20. World Homophobes Day is on Sept 21. His wife, Isabella of France, is on the Mediaeval page of “Woman-Blindness”.
Edward Windsor (Edward III) 1327 - 1377:
Like all these kings, all he ever did was fight wars of conquest or defense
against other would-be conquerors. Scotland and France as usual, incipiting the
Hundred Years War, with Crecy and Poitiers the ones that gave his son the
nickname “The Black Prince” and himself a reputation feared around Europe.
Couldn’t do much with swords though when the Black Death struck.
Richard of Bordeaux (Richard II) 1377 - 1399:
The fourth of the seven gay kings (did I fail to mention that William Rufus and
Richard I were both gay? click here
for the other three); but in his case definitely bisexual. Son of the Black
Prince, king at 10, object of the Peasants Revolt (see June 15), devastated by
the death of his beloved wife Anne of Bohemia, he basically went nuts and
deposition was inevitable. Imprisoned in Pontefract Castle, he probably died by
being left to starve.
Henry Bolingbroke (Henry IV) 1399 - 1413:
Henry of Lancaster, exiled by Richard, returned to undertake the deposition.
Himself the son of John of Ghent (mispronounced and mis-spelled in Aenglish as Gaunt), Edward III’s third son, so he had a distant
but valid claim as Richard had no children. Parliament gave him their official
vote, so ancestry became irrelevant. Cymry did not, however, Owain Glyn Dŵr (Owen Glendower in Aenglish) naming himself Prince of Wales and warring to break the English sovereignty.
Then the Percy family joined in, seeing an impending vacuum that they could
easily fill in. And did, when Henry died of leprosy aged 45.
He can be found on Aug 10
Henry Monmouth senior (Henry V) 1413 - 1422:
son of the above. Famed for Agincourt (see Oct 25). Less well-known for Rouen. Made King of France but died
of dysentery on campaign, before his coronation. Same old same old: do kings do
nothing else but fight to get power and wealth and land, and then fight to keep
it? If so, what, can somebody please tell me, is the point of monarchy and why
don’t we get rid of it?
born on Sept 16
Henry Monmouth junior (Henry VI) 1422 - 1461; 1470 - 1471: 6
months old when daddy died. Gradually lost the whole of France - only Calais
stayed English, and that only until Queen Mary's time. Suffered from the same mental illness as several of his
predecessors, and clearly it was in the family gene, probably on the maternal
side. Richard of York was made Protector of the Realm to regent for him, but
all that did was set the roses at war. Battles at St Albans in 1455 gave power
to York, with Edward IV, Richard’s eldest, on the throne
from 1461; but he got his sanity and his throne back briefly in 1470. Didn’t
last. Son Edward was killed at the Battle of Tewkesbury on the day before Henry
was murdered in the Tower of London. And
answering my rant at the end of the previous paragraph, this king did do
something useful, albeit very minorly at the time: he established a proper
school for the first time ever in this country, now known as Eton College, and
also King’s College in Cambridge. Rather less minorly in the centuries that
followed.
His wife was Margaret of Anjou,
who is on the Mediaevals page of Woman-Blindness
Edward Plantagenet senior (Edward IV) 1461
- 1470; 1471 - 1483: another of the not-very-nices, he had his brother George
Duke of Clarence “murdered on a charge of treason” - which way of phrasing it
in the history books does leave me asking some very basic questions. The age of William Caxton and the printing press, right there in Westminster
Edward Plantagenet junior (Edward V)
1483: 13 years old when he took the throne (1483 minus 13 = 1470; you can work
out for yourself why his mum had sought sanctuary in Westminster Abbey and gave
birth to him there), and lasted just two months (recorded in most history books as the shortest ever, but
actually Lady Jane Grey-Dudley beat that, at just 9 days: see below). The
“Princes in the Tower”, he and his brother Richard, locked up and murdered, so
it is said, by uncle Richard, Duke of Gloucester, claiming they were
illegitimate - and given the number of mistresses their dad, EP senior, had, he
may well have been right.
Richard Plantagenet (Richard III):
Richard the non-hunchback, despite what Shakespeare fictionalised and the
nonsense surrounding that body in a Leicester car park. Was it he rather than
brother Edward who got rid of George Clarence? Quite probably. Did he invent
the illegitimacy of the Princes? Quite probably. Did he Erdogan all his other
opponents and rivals? He sure did. His defeat at Bosworth Field brought the
Wars of the Roses to an end.
He can be found on March
15, May 30, June 24 and Oct 2. Bosworth Field is on
Aug 22; Shakespeare’s version is on Nov 5
*
The Tudor-Stuart Epoch
Henry Owen Edmund Tudor of Pembroke (Henry VII) 1485 - 1509; Henry Richmond in some history books, but first it
was Richmount, not Richmond, and second that was his home town, not his family
name. Clever man, though you need to read about his mother if you want to see
where he got it from, and also to understand why her grandson did some of the
things he did:
Margaret
Beaufort her name, founder of both St. John's and Christ's colleges in Grantabridge,
and her name-college, Lady Margaret Hall in Oxenford. Schools for the merchant
class, but first you have to have a merchant-class, and the Catholic church had
rendered that impossible (I have April 29 set up and
waiting for a fuller piece about her on "Woman-Blindness"). By
the end of Henry’s reign, material wealth was already on the increase, but how
do you do that in a world that prohibits money-lending. Aha! Jews! Expelled
from Spain and Portugal and in search of a home. Much more on this in various
parts of the blog, but even more in Prashker’s London. By the way, that’s
Henry’s wife Elizabeth of York, married less for her looks than for wise
politics, who appears as the queen on virtually every pack of playing cards
since they were invented, during Henry’s reign.
Henry senior can be found on May 16
Henry Tudor junior (my sobriquet; Henry VIII really) 1509 -
1547: The only history of him that you
will find, anywhere, sticks to six wives and blames sonlessness on the
Reformation, or vice versa (as opposed to virtue versa). Nothing else, or maybe syphillis and tennis debts. Why? Because
the history curriculum is controlled by the Church of England and its political
representatives the Tory Party, neither of whom wish to acknowledge Henry as
the key changemaker in British economic and political and religious life, the opening of the doors to the non-aristocracy.
Fundamental, radical change, without which... but you can read much more on
this in various parts of the blog, and even more in Prashker’s London.
You can find the most important (though still third-rate) monarch this country has ever had limewashing the church walls on June 24, dramatised by Shakespeare on June 29, ransacking the monasteries on Sept 1, welcoming the Jews back to England on Sept 30, stealing stones from Barking Abbey on Oct 14, and with Catherine of Aragon on May 23 and Dec 16; also mentioned on March 15 and 21, and April 16 and 24
Edward Tudor (Edward VI) 1547 - 1553:
son of Henry junior with Jane Seymour (see April 16). Tuberculoid. Became king aged 9, with the Duke
of Somerset as his Protector. Cranmer’s Book of Common Prayer belongs to this
time (see March 21)
Lady Jane Grey-Dudley (Queen Jane) 10 July - 19 July 1553: Her sad tale is told on July 19 and she gets a mention on April 17
Mary Tudor (“Bloody Mary”) 1553 - 1558: daughter of Henry junior with Catharine of Aragon. Took the throne by coup, and tried by brutal force to
re-impose Catholicism on a now Protestant country. Hugh Latimer ((Bishop of Worcester), Nicholas Ridley (Arhbishop of London) and Thomas Cranmer (Archbishop of Canterbury) were all burnt to a steak (the stake itself was on Broad
Street in Oxenford, marked to this day by a bronze cross; see March 21 and here for that, and her mention among the Supra Idesses on April 17
Elizabeth Tudor (Elizabeth I) 1558 - 1603: Henry junior’s daughter with Anne Boleyn (see June 1), and one of the ghastliest monarchs this country has ever had: two hundred and fifty years of
fresco art whitewashed into oblivion at her instruction; more torture of her
opponents, and not only Catholics, than all the other monarchs of England
combined; and a penchant for going to the theatres for the afternoon
performances rather than the evenings, because that was when the bear-baiting
and the cock-fighting took place. She set up spy and informer netwoks on an
international scale that even the KGB couldn’t match, and made the country rich
by sponsoring pirates who went out and ransacked and then sank Spanish and
Portuguese vessels. Alas, like her father, this is not the way her history gets
told by those who have a vested interest in grandifying her.
She can be found on March 15, April 17, May 16 and 28, Nov 5 and 11, Dec 1, and especially June 24 for the whitewash
James Charles Stuart (James VI of Scotland, James I of
England) 1603 - 1625: the son of Mary Queen of Scots and
the vile, disgusting Lord Darnley. Probably the next on our list of gay
monarchs (cick here), he was fascinated by witchcraft and wrote the book that prompted Shakespeare to re-invent the rather splendid Macbeth as a monster (see Aug 15 and the Scots list). The Authorised
Mis-Translation of the Bible carries his name, and the transformation of Guy
Faux into a Gunpowder Plotter likewise (see Nov 5). The Mayflower Pilgrims, like all these,
can be found on the blog, in their case on Sept 16 and 20
In addition to the above, James can also be found on May 28
Charles Stuart (Charles I) 1625 - 1649: Machomania, as we have seen, was the
predominant madness of most of the early kings. Megalomania in several as well.
Exactly what Charles Stuart’s form of madness was depends on which school of
pseudo-psychology you adhere to, but he is recorded in the annals as “suffering
from a belief that he ruled by Divine Right”. Tried for treason by the House of
Commons in the midst of a pointless civil war, he was beheaded (on Jan 30),
rather like the church gargoyles and grotesques which his equally
machomaniacal, megalomaniacal and divinely-inspired successor would smash in
the years that followed.
The Republican Commonwealth,
1649 - 1653:
For Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of
England, Scotland and Ireland 1653 - 1658, see the GER page
His successor, Richard Cromwell (1658 - 1659, same
title as his dad), was forced to resign after just nine months.
Charles Francis James Douglas Stuart (Charles II, “The Merry
Monarch“) 1660 - 1685: Son of Charles I.
Satyriasis is the official name for his condition. Thirteen mistresses whose
names have been retained by the annals, but that was probably just one weekend
of partying. Lots of sons, but no heir. Had it not been for Pepys coming round
to tell him, he would probably have gone blissfully unaware of either the Great Plague
or the Great Fire, though apparently he did know that Christopher Wren was
rebuilding St Paul’s and several other churches.
James II (of England, James VII of Scotland) 1685 - 1688:
Charles I’s other surviving son, and a convert to Catholicism long before his
coronation, though he did formally agree to keep to grandpa James I’s
coronation commitment, that he would practice his Catholicism in private, but
bring his family, his country, up as Protestant. That lasted about the length
of three Masses and a box of communion wafers, the persecution of Protestant
clergy becoming so vicious, and exacerbated by the “Bloody Assizes” of Judge Jeffreys, and James’ response to the Monmouth Uprising, that Parliament simply told him to give up the crown, and brought William of Orange across the North
Sea to replace him. He died in exile in Saint-Germain-en-Laye in 1701.
*
The Second Anglo-Saxon (-Jute-and-Fresian)
Epoch
William of Orange (William III) and the always-forgotten Mary
II 1689 - 1694: But why him? Because he had a
twofold connection: first, as the son of Princess Mary, the daughter of Charles I;
second, as the husband of his cousin, also a Princess Mary, this one the
daughter of James VII and II by his Protestant first wife Anne Hyde. So
Parliament got rid of the Catholic part of the royal family, but kept the Protestant part: clever
politics!
And for the same reason, what an
interesting date to choose for their arrival. November 5th 1688, in a fleet of
nearly five hundred ships, just in case anyone disagreed with the decision of
Parliament to invite them. James was still on the throne after all, and
expected loyalty; but the Navy took the Oranges’ side, as did most of his army,
and his other daughter, future queen Anne, was at the dockside to welcome her sister home
and lead her triumph to London for what is now called “The Glorious
Revolution”. James, by the way, tried to make a comback-from-exile, via
Ireland, the year after their coronation, but was defeated at the Battle of theBoyne and became thereafter a permanent guest of Roi Louis XIV.
You can find him enstatued on Dec 4
Anne Stuart (“Anna Gloria”) 1702 - 1714:
“Our Lady of the Miscarriages” might be a more apposite sobriquet: seventeen pregnancies but only one child, William, and he died of smallpox before he
reached his teens. Her husband was Prince George of Denmark and Norway, which
re-established the ancient German connection that had ended with the arrival of
the Normans, and which is still in place today despite George V
renaming the Saxe-Coburg-Gotha family as Windsor.
The other key persona in Anne’s life was Sarah Churchill, Duchess of
Marlborough (click here), ancestress of a later Prime Minister. Sarah’s other half led the
army in another of the stupid wars of power, this one of “Spanish Succession”.
The main significant event in Anne’s life was the official formation of the
Disunited Kingdom of Greater England and its Home Colonies, formally known as
“the United Kingdom of Great Britain” after the signing of the official “Union
of England and Scotland” in 1707. Why is it that the kings spend their lives making
pointless wars, while the queens spend their lives making schools (Margaret Beaufort),
hospitals (Bess),
culture (Victoria), and
political harmonies (Anne, Elizabeth II), and
yet we still continue to put kings on the thrones, rather than queens?
Georg Ludwig Hanover (Georg Ludwig in
German, but for some reason the English Frenchified it as George Louis), George I of
Britain and Hanover 1714 - 1727: Still in the family,
though it shouldn’t have been him, but rather Sophia, James I’s only daughter, mothered by
Elizabeth of Bohemia, but now getting old and not remotely interested in giving
up Hanover for London; she died anyway, a few weeks before Anne, and so it was her
son who had the best claim, and was happy to make it, though he was 54 and
spoke scarcely a word of English. Better anyway to have the titles, the money,
and the kudos, spend most of the year in Hanover, just popping over when
ceremony required it, and leave the ruling to those who did speak English; so
he created the position of Prime Minister and First Lord of the Admiralty, and
gave it to Robert
Walpole. He wasn’t even around when James II’s son James Stuart tried and failed to coup himself into power with his Jacobite
supporters. Though he was around to benefit from the scandal of the South SeaBubble.
Georg August Hanover (Georg August in
German, George Augustus in English) George II of Britain and Hanover 1727
- 1760: Like his father he wisely left the running of the country to Robert Walpole. The one exception, and I only mention it because of its date, was the
Battle of Dettingen, which took place on
June 27th 1743, one of many
in the War
of the Austrian Succession; George took an English army to fight there for the
Hanoverian side of his family. Two years later, when the Jacobites made a second attempt to get the throne
back, this time for “Bonnie Prince Charlie”, he stayed home and let the
military do its own leadership at Culloden Moor. For the information, the Bonnie Prince spent the rest of
his life devouring MacDonalds in France, until even that proved too much for
him and he became an alcoholic (click here)
George can be found, establishing Downing Street as the PM's office, on Dec 4
George William Frederick Hanover, George III (“The Mad King
George”) 1760-1811 (officially 1820, but for
the last nine years he was too far gone to even know that he was now completely
blind, and George IV regented for him): Frederick, Prince of Wales and
therefore heir to the throne, died at the age of only forty-four, and so it was his
son who took the throne next, English-speaking, which made a pleasant change
(none of the Normans or Plantagenets did, nor did the earlier Hanoverians). But
he was also yet one more of the throne-lunies, in his case a blood-condition
called porphyria which turns the urine purple and the brain potty. There was
never an era of culture before on the scale of George III’s Britain, though this was
also the epoch of the “Boston Tea Party” and the French Revolution, so as much
war as there was poetry.
George William Frederick Hanover (yes,
the same name as his father) George IV, “The First Gentleman of Europe”, 1811/1820
- 1830: Loved art and architecture, but loved a Catholic woman named Maria Anne
Fitzherbert even more. Tut-tut! They made him marry Caroline of Brunswick, who
he detested, though he managed to father a daughter with her, who sadly died
aged just twenty.
George can be found on Dec 4
William Henry FitzClarence, William IV, “The Sailor King”
1830 - 1837: George IV’s younger brother, he spent his early years between the Navy
and the bed of an Irish actress sometimes named Dorothea Jordan and sometimes
Dorothea Francis and sometimes Dorothea Phillips, with whom he parented ten
children.* Tut-tut again! To be king he had to have a royal wife, and she had
to be German because he would also be king of Hanover, so Adelaide of
Saxe-Coburg was contracted, and they produced two infant mortalities, which was
why Victoria, daughter of the youngest of those four brothers, inherited. The
epoch of Wilberforce and the abolition of slavery in the colonies; also of the
passing of the Reform Act in 1832
* This portrait of her, ”Mrs. Jordan in the Character of Hippolyta, painting by John
Hoppner, 1791” bears a quite remarkable
similarity to a Vigee-Lebrun of the same period - see April 16 for the
latter
Alexandrina Victoria Hanover, Queen Victoria 1837
- 1901: Acclaimed as one of the great monarchs, she actually did remarkably
little her entire life except, first, adore her cousin-husband Albert ofSaxe-Coburg and Gotha while he was alive, and then, second, mourn him without a moment’s
break when he was dead. Albert was the great achiever, of which introducing the
Xmas Tree to England was probably not as significant as the Great Exhibition of1851, whose residue can be found littering the streets of South Kensington to
this day: the V&A, the Science Museum, the Royal Geographic, the Natural
History, Imperial College, the Royal Albert Hall - have I missed several?
The reason for her acclamation is also the reason why I am mulling over
placing her on the GER page: the conquest of India, and the expansion of that
apalling evil the British Empire to almost global scale. Several instances on
the blog, including one particularly ghastly incident in China (see Jan 11). When is the world going to learn that power,
of any kind, in the family, the school, the institution, anywhere, is the
principal failing of the human race and needs to be prevented? The power of
empires far worse than any of the others.
And one more reason for thinking of GERring her. Her parentage, her
marriage, and then those of her nine children, forty grand-children and
thirty-seven great-grandchildren, the need to find royals in order to keep
power within the family. Until eventually the entire monarchalism of Europe was
encousined. Until the banns of World War One were published.
Find her on March 15, April 17 and May 1
Albert Edward Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (Edward VII, “Bertie”). Son
of Queen Victoria. Freud wrote somewhere that men are driven by four
aspirations, to fame, power, wealth and sex, and clearly, as we have seen,
being a member of the aristocracy gives you the means to enjoy all four.
Edward’s horse won the Derby in 1909, his yacht several regattas, and his wife
even allowed one of his mistresses to come to his deathbed to say goodbye. The
rest of his life-story can be found in the Encyclopedia of Oblivion, and is
amongst the top three in the list of arguments in favour of abolishing the
monarchy.
Emilie Charlotte Le Breton (Lillie Langtry) can be found as a latter-day Lucy Lockett on March 15, as
herself on Oct 13
George Frederick Ernest Albert Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (the
family name was changed to Windsor in 1917), George V
1910 - 1936: second son of Edward VII, he was a Navy man who didn’t expect to
become king, but elder brother Albert Victor died of pneumonia in 1892, and the
following year he married the fiancée, Princess Mary of Teck. Probably the
worst twenty years to be king in the entirety of human history, it started with
the First World War, and ended with the rise of Fascism; and along the way he
had the indignity of being forced to give Eireland back to its own people. Oh,
yes, and Wallis Simpson.
Edward Albert
Christian George Andrew Patrick David Windsor (Edward VIII) 1936: Oh, yes, and Wallis Simpson. This particular monarch
can be found in slightly more detail on the GER page; and see Dec 11
Albert Frederick Arthur George Windsor (George
VI) 1936 - 1952):
Yes, I must get around to finding something worth writing about him
Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor (Elizabeth II,
“Lilibet”) 1952 - 2022: I have to
admit my admiration for a queen who didn’t hide from the WW2 bombing in Buck
Pal like her parents, but served in the Auxiliary Territorial Service, the women’s
branch of the Army, and trained like any conscript as a driver and a mechanic. And
then, when war ended, went out anonymously with sister Margaret to celebrate among
the crowds. And for the rest of her life, a simple motto, the one that all
monarchs should follow if there must be monarchs: I am merely a figurehead, the
check and balance that protects the people against corrupt and/or
megalomaniacal politicians; I do not take sides or involve myself on any issue,
and you will never know my opinion about anything (except horses and corgi
dogs, she did make an exception for both of those).
crowned on June 2
Charles Philip Arthur George Windsor (Charles
III) 2022 -
comments pending
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