Best British Monarch?
- Thread starter Mental_Wizard
- Start date
Skallagrim
Banned
Pretty much. A lot depends on how nitpicky you want to be, but the notion of competing Anglo-Saxon kingdoms ended with the fact that Alfred ended up ruling all non-foreign-occupied parts of what we now call England. He was the legitimate claimant, his dynasty drove out the foreigners, and thus England was forged. One can argue that his grandson Æthelstan was the first, because he conquered the Viking Kingdom of York and with that conquest finalised the unification of the Anglo-Saxons... but hardly anyone uses that as the big starting point.
If people really wan to be nitpicky, they can argue that the first "king of England" was actually Henry II, since he was the first to call himself 'Rex Anglie' instead of 'Rex Anglorum'... but that would mean William I, William II Henry I and Stephen of Blois weren't kings of England either (instead being just 'Kings of the English'), and should be discounted. Basically, if you're going to count Kings of the English, you should also count all Anglo-Saxons kings as of Æthelstan-- who first came up with that title. And then the concept itself is clearly more important than the exact title used at the time, which means that besides the Kings of the English, the Kings of the Anglo-Saxons (essentially just Alfred the Great and Edward the Elder) should also be counted.
This is the reasoning most people seem to use, and the one to which I also subscribe. I can understand leaving out Alfred the Great and Edward the Elder, but if one seeks to be consistent, one must then start with either Æthelstan or with Henry II. Since the very idea of considering someone called 'the second' to be the first is patently absurd, Æthelstan would be the sensible choice. (But just starting with Alfred is still better.)
He can totally be blamed for messing up the succession. If he'd engaged in a decent marriage (that is, a diplomatically sensible match with a foreign lady) then he wouldn't have had grasping domestic in-laws that alienated important noblemen and forced Richard to act (IIRC the Woodvilles also acted to disregard Edward's will, which named Richard Lord Protector).
Additionally, he let the fact that he couldn't keep it in his pants affect his regime- this is what lured him into the Woodville marriage, and his famed licentiousness also helped the precontract story seem believable.
Finally, even with all that, things probably would have been fine if Edward hadn't partied himself into an early grave. If he'd lived another decade then Edward V would have come to the throne as an adult and been in a much stronger position, and the Yorkist dynasty could have retained the throne for generations more.
Surely Alfred. W/o him there probably wouldn't be a Britain (or even England) as we know it.
Also, if we're going with best British monarch we need to consider who the first monarch with accepted supremacy/primacy over Britain was. And whether it's just mainland Great Britain or the British Isles themselves.
As a Welshman, I'm not sure this is a point in his favour...
Henry VII gets it for me. He ended the Wars of the Roses, made a peace treaty with France that stopped the French from supporting his enemies and got them to pay him a huge indemnity, through clever diplomatic marriages he made peace with Scotland and an ally out of Spain and persuaded the Pope to excommunicate any rival claimants to his throne. He also decisively reduced the power of the feudal nobility, sorted out the economy (leaving a full treasury to be wasted by HVIII). He also built the first ever dry dock as part of a programme to revive the Royal Navy.
Peace abroad, a strong economy at home and the restoration of law and order. The fact that he is remembered as one of England's more boring monarchs proves the Chinese have a point about interesting times.
As a Man of Kent, I'd vote King Aethelberht of Kent as first Christian bretwalda (High King) of all Britain south of the Humber.
But as he's not on the list, I'm voting Henry VII. He was extremely competent, was a good administrator, and actually recognised that saving money might be a good idea. His foreign policy was also generally successful, except for that issue over the Castilian succession. Which wasn't his fault anyway - how was he to know that Philip of Burgundy would hop the twig as soon as he set foot in Iberia?
But as he's not on the list, I'm voting Henry VII. He was extremely competent, was a good administrator, and actually recognised that saving money might be a good idea. His foreign policy was also generally successful, except for that issue over the Castilian succession. Which wasn't his fault anyway - how was he to know that Philip of Burgundy would hop the twig as soon as he set foot in Iberia?
Tbh these sorts of polls are more about who's popular rather than who's best.
As a guess they'll say something about republics being inherently more democratic even though that's not necessarily the case.
It's quite unbelievable no-one has mentioned William IV yet. He truly moved the British monarchy onto the ceremonial footing that allowed it to survive throughout the revolutionary and liberal age. He worked with his Government to overcome the Lords' resistance to change, cementing the power of the Commons over the Lords. He oversaw the standardisation of welfare provisions for the poor, the banning of child labour abuses, the extension of the suffrage to make Britain a mass democracy and the end of slavery in the British Empire. In foreign policy, he was a major figure in improving relations with the USA, setting the foundation for the Anglo-American alliance that underpinned the Western order for the next century and a half. Oh, and he successfully strived to live long enough to keep Ernst Augustus from the throne.
I had assumed something along those lines. Odd, really, given that ten of the top twenty most democratic countries are constitutional monarchies (Norway, Sweden, New Zealand, Denmark, Canada, Australia, Netherlands, Luxembourg, United Kingdom and Spain), all of which rank higher on the democracy index than the USA (the 'model' democratic republic).
King Arthur, The Once and Future King, King of Knights, By Grace of God King of Britons.
(Secretly a girl called Artoria Pendragon)
(Secretly a girl called Artoria Pendragon)