1.
Queen Victoria
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Victoria was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. From 1 May 1876, she adopted the title of Empress of India. Victoria was the daughter of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn, both the Duke of Kent and King George III died in 1820, and Victoria was raised under close supervision by her German-born mother Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. She inherited the throne aged 18, after her fathers three brothers had all died, leaving no surviving legitimate children. The United Kingdom was already a constitutional monarchy, in which the sovereign held relatively little direct political power. Privately, Victoria attempted to influence government policy and ministerial appointments, publicly, Victoria married her first cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, in 1840. Their nine children married into royal and noble families across the continent, tying them together, after Alberts death in 1861, Victoria plunged into deep mourning and avoided public appearances. As a result of her seclusion, republicanism temporarily gained strength and her Golden and Diamond Jubilees were times of public celebration. Her reign of 63 years and seven months is known as the Victorian era and it was a period of industrial, cultural, political, scientific, and military change within the United Kingdom, and was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire. She was the last British monarch of the House of Hanover and her son and successor, Edward VII, belonged to the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the line of his father. Victorias father was Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn, until 1817, Edwards niece, Princess Charlotte of Wales, was the only legitimate grandchild of George III. Her death in 1817 precipitated a crisis that brought pressure on the Duke of Kent. In 1818 he married Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, a widowed German princess with two children—Carl and Feodora —by her first marriage to the Prince of Leiningen and her brother Leopold was Princess Charlottes widower. The Duke and Duchess of Kents only child, Victoria, was born at 4.15 a. m. on 24 May 1819 at Kensington Palace in London. Victoria was christened privately by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Manners-Sutton, on 24 June 1819 in the Cupola Room at Kensington Palace and she was baptised Alexandrina, after one of her godparents, Emperor Alexander I of Russia, and Victoria, after her mother. Additional names proposed by her parents—Georgina, Charlotte, and Augusta—were dropped on the instructions of the Dukes eldest brother, George, the Duke of Clarence and the Duke of Kent married on the same day in 1818, but both of Clarences daughters died as infants. Victorias father died in January 1820, when Victoria was less than a year old, a week later her grandfather died and was succeeded by his eldest son, George IV. The Duke of York died in 1827, when George IV died in 1830, he was succeeded by his next surviving brother, William IV, and Victoria became heir presumptive
2.
Charles Edward, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
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A male-line grandson of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, he was also until 1919 a Prince of the United Kingdom and held the British title of Duke of Albany. The Duke was a figure in the United Kingdom due to his status as the Sovereign Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. He was deprived of his British peerages, his title of Prince and Royal Highness, in 1918, he was forced to abdicate his ducal throne. He later joined the Nazi Party, and served in a number of positions in Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s and he was the maternal grandfather of King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden and the younger brother of Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone. Prince Charles Edward was born at Claremont House near Esher, Surrey and his father was Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany, the fourth son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. His mother was Princess Helena, Duchess of Albany, the daughter of George Victor of Waldeck and Pyrmont. As his father died before his birth, Prince Charles Edward succeeded to his titles at birth and was styled His Royal Highness The Duke of Albany. After falling ill, the young Duke was baptised privately at Claremont on 4 August 1884, Charles Edward was educated as a Prince of the United Kingdom for his first 15 years. Such was the interest Wilhelm showed in his young cousins upbringing that Charles Edward was dubbed the Emperors seventh son and his mother drummed into him endlessly the importance of becoming a good man, so you bring no shame on Papas name. In 1899 the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, urged by Kaiser Wilhelm II, decided on how to deal with the succession of Duke Alfred and his only son, Prince Alfred, had died in February 1899. The Duke of Connaught, the Queens third son, served in the British military and his son, Prince Arthur of Connaught attended Eton with Charles Edward. Wilhelm II demanded a German education for the boy, but this was unacceptable to the Duke of Connaught, thus young Arthur also renounced his claims to the Duchy. Next in line was sixteen-year-old Charles Edward, who now inherited the throne of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. With his mother and sister Charles Edward moved to Germany, following an education plan by Wilhelm II, he attended the Preußische Hauptkadettenanstalt at Lichterfelde, studied in Bonn and became a member of Corps Borussia Bonn. He also joined the 1st Garderegiment zu Fuß at Potsdam and spent some time at the German court in Berlin and his uncle, Edward VII, made him a Knight of the Garter on 15 July 1902, just prior to his 18th birthday. From 1900 to 1905 Charles Edward reigned through the regency of Ernst, Hereditary Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, the regent acted under the strict guidance of Emperor Wilhelm II. Upon coming of age on 19 July 1905, he assumed full constitutional powers and he proved loyal to the Emperor and was deemed a constitutionally-minded prince. He liberally supported the court theatres in both towns, taking an interest in Zeppelin and airplane technology, Charles Edward supported the newly created aircraft industry at Gotha
3.
Scotland
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Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and covers the northern third of the island of Great Britain. It shares a border with England to the south, and is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, with the North Sea to the east. In addition to the mainland, the country is made up of more than 790 islands, including the Northern Isles, the Kingdom of Scotland emerged as an independent sovereign state in the Early Middle Ages and continued to exist until 1707. By inheritance in 1603, James VI, King of Scots, became King of England and King of Ireland, Scotland subsequently entered into a political union with the Kingdom of England on 1 May 1707 to create the new Kingdom of Great Britain. The union also created a new Parliament of Great Britain, which succeeded both the Parliament of Scotland and the Parliament of England. Within Scotland, the monarchy of the United Kingdom has continued to use a variety of styles, titles, the legal system within Scotland has also remained separate from those of England and Wales and Northern Ireland, Scotland constitutes a distinct jurisdiction in both public and private law. Glasgow, Scotlands largest city, was one of the worlds leading industrial cities. Other major urban areas are Aberdeen and Dundee, Scottish waters consist of a large sector of the North Atlantic and the North Sea, containing the largest oil reserves in the European Union. This has given Aberdeen, the third-largest city in Scotland, the title of Europes oil capital, following a referendum in 1997, a Scottish Parliament was re-established, in the form of a devolved unicameral legislature comprising 129 members, having authority over many areas of domestic policy. Scotland is represented in the UK Parliament by 59 MPs and in the European Parliament by 6 MEPs, Scotland is also a member nation of the British–Irish Council, and the British–Irish Parliamentary Assembly. Scotland comes from Scoti, the Latin name for the Gaels, the Late Latin word Scotia was initially used to refer to Ireland. By the 11th century at the latest, Scotia was being used to refer to Scotland north of the River Forth, alongside Albania or Albany, the use of the words Scots and Scotland to encompass all of what is now Scotland became common in the Late Middle Ages. Repeated glaciations, which covered the land mass of modern Scotland. It is believed the first post-glacial groups of hunter-gatherers arrived in Scotland around 12,800 years ago, the groups of settlers began building the first known permanent houses on Scottish soil around 9,500 years ago, and the first villages around 6,000 years ago. The well-preserved village of Skara Brae on the mainland of Orkney dates from this period and it contains the remains of an early Bronze Age ruler laid out on white quartz pebbles and birch bark. It was also discovered for the first time that early Bronze Age people placed flowers in their graves, in the winter of 1850, a severe storm hit Scotland, causing widespread damage and over 200 deaths. In the Bay of Skaill, the storm stripped the earth from a large irregular knoll, when the storm cleared, local villagers found the outline of a village, consisting of a number of small houses without roofs. William Watt of Skaill, the laird, began an amateur excavation of the site, but after uncovering four houses
4.
House of Stuart
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The House of Stuart, originally Stewart and, in Gaelic, Stiùbhart was a European royal house that originated in Scotland. The dynastys patrilineal Breton ancestors had held the office of High Steward of Scotland since the 12th century, the royal Stewart line was founded by Robert II, and they were Kings and Queens of Scots from the late 14th century until the union with England in 1707. Mary I, Queen of Scots was brought up in France and her son, James VI of Scotland, inherited the thrones of England and Ireland upon the death of Elizabeth I in 1603. Except for the period of the Commonwealth, 1649–1660, the Stuarts were monarchs of England, Scotland and Ireland until 1707, then of Great Britain and Ireland, in total, nine Stewart/Stuart monarchs ruled Scotland alone from 1371 until 1603. James VI of Scotland then inherited the realms of Elizabeth I of England, following the Glorious Revolution in 1688, two Stuart queens ruled the isles, Mary II and Anne. Both were the Protestant daughters of James VII and II by his first wife, during the reign of the Stuarts, Scotland developed from a relatively poor and feudal country into a prosperous, modern and centralised state. They ruled during a time in European history of transition from the Middle Ages, through the Renaissance, monarchs such as James IV were known for sponsoring exponents of the Northern Renaissance such as the poet Robert Henryson, and others. The name Stewart derives from the position of office similar to a governor. It was originally adopted as the surname by Walter Stewart, 3rd High Steward of Scotland. Prior to this, family names were not used, but instead they had patronyms defined through the father, the gallicised spelling was first borne by John Stewart of Darnley after his time in the French wars. During the 16th century, the French spelling Stuart was adopted by Mary, Queen of Scots, the FitzAlan family quickly established themselves as a prominent Anglo-Norman noble house, with some of its members serving as High Sheriff of Shropshire. It was the great-grandson of Alan named Walter FitzAlan who became the first hereditary High Steward of Scotland, another supporter of Matilda was her uncle David I of Scotland from the House of Dunkeld. After Matilda was pushed out of England into the County of Anjou, essentially failing in her legitimist attempt for the throne, many of her supporters in England fled also. It was then that Walter followed David up to the Kingdom of Scotland, where he was granted lands in Renfrewshire, the next monarch of Scotland, Malcolm IV, made the High Steward title a hereditary arrangement. While High Stewards, the family were based at Dundonald, South Ayrshire between the 12th and 13th centuries. The sixth High Steward of Scotland, Walter Stewart, married Marjorie, daughter of Robert the Bruce, in 1503, James IV attempted to secure peace with England by marrying King Henry VIIs daughter, Margaret Tudor. The birth of their son, later James V, brought the House of Stewart into the line of descent of the House of Tudor, and the English throne. Margaret Tudor later married Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus, and their daughter, Margaret Douglas, was the mother of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley
5.
House of Windsor
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The House of Windsor is the royal house of the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms. The houses of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and Windsor have provided five British monarchs to date, including four kings, the name was changed from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the English Windsor in 1917 because of anti-German sentiment in the British Empire during World War I. During the reign of the Windsors, major changes took place in British society, the British Empire participated in the First and Second World Wars, ending up on the winning side both times, but subsequently lost its status as a superpower during decolonisation. Much of Ireland broke with the United Kingdom and the remnants of the Empire became the Commonwealth of Nations, the current head of the house is monarch of sixteen sovereign states. As well as these separate monarchies, there are also three Crown dependencies, fourteen British Overseas Territories and two associated states of New Zealand. Edward VII and, in turn, his son, George V, were members of the German ducal House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha by virtue of their descent from Albert, Prince Consort, husband of Queen Victoria. The King and his family were convinced to abandon all titles held under the German Crown and to change German titles. From 1917 to 1919, George V also stripped 15 of his German relations—most of whom belonged to the House of Hanover—of their British titles and styles of prince, Prince Alastair and Princess Victoria died unmarried and childless. Princess Mary married into the Lascelles family, and Princess Patricia married Alexander Ramsay, neither of the Prince Arthurs had any further children, meaning all subsequent members of the House of Windsor descend from the sons of George V. In 1947, Princess Elizabeth, heir presumptive to King George VI and he was a member of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, a branch of the House of Oldenburg, and had been a prince of Greece and Denmark. It is the translation of the German battenberg, which refers to Battenberg. Philip privately complained, I am nothing but a bloody amoeba, I am the only man in the country not allowed to give his name to his own children. Still, Elizabeth also decreed that her descendants who do not have that style and title would bear the surname Mountbatten-Windsor. This came after months of correspondence between the Prime Minister Harold Macmillan and the constitutional expert Edward Iwi. Iwi had raised the prospect that the Royal child due to be born in February 1960 would bear the Badge of Bastardy if it were given its mothers maiden name rather than its fathers name and she clearly wished to make this change before the birth of her child. The issue did not affect Prince Charles or Princess Anne, as they had been born with the name Mountbatten, Prince Andrew was born 11 days later, on 19 February 1960. Any future monarch can change the name through a similar royal proclamation. At the creation of the House of Windsor, its head reigned over a unitary British Empire, in the chart below, the countries are differentiated between light green, medium green, and dark green
6.
Robert III of Scotland
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Robert III, born John Stewart, was King of Scots from 1390 to his death. He was known primarily as John, Earl of Carrick before ascending the throne at the age of 53 and he was the eldest son of Robert II and Elizabeth Mure and was legitimated with the marriage of his parents in 1347. John joined his father and other magnates in a rebellion against his grand-uncle, David II early in 1363 and he married Anabella Drummond, daughter of Sir John Drummond of Stobhall before 31 May 1367 when the Steward ceded to him the earldom of Atholl. In 1368 David created him Earl of Carrick and his father became king in 1371 after the unexpected death of the childless King David. In the succeeding years Carrick was influential in the government of the kingdom, in 1384 Carrick was appointed the kings lieutenant after having influenced the general council to remove Robert II from direct rule. Carricks administration saw a renewal of the conflict with England, in 1388 the Scots defeated the English at the Battle of Otterburn where the Scots commander, James, Earl of Douglas, was killed. In 1390, Robert II died and Carrick ascended the throne as Robert III, Fife continued as lieutenant until February 1393 when power was returned to the king in conjunction with his son David. After this, Robert III withdrew to his lands in the west and he was powerless to interfere when a dispute between Albany and Rothesay arose in 1401 which led to Rothesays arrest and imprisonment at Albanys Falkland Castle where Rothesay died in March 1402. The general council absolved Albany from blame and reappointed him as lieutenant, the only impediment now remaining to an Albany Stewart monarchy was the kings only surviving son, James, Earl of Carrick. In February 1406 the 11-year-old James and a group of followers clashed with Albanys Douglas allies resulting in the death of the kings counsellor Sir David Fleming of Cumbernauld. James escaped to the Bass Rock in the Firth of Forth accompanied by Henry Sinclair, Earl of Orkney, the vessel was intercepted near Flamborough Head and James became the prisoner of Henry IV of England and would remain captive for the next 18 years. Robert III died in Rothesay Castle on 4 April 1406 shortly after learning of his sons imprisonment and was buried at Paisley Abbey, John Stewart was born c. 1337/40 to Robert, Steward of Scotland and Elizabeth Mure. Following his parents marriage sometime after 22 November 1347 after Pope Clement VIs dispensation, John, styled Lord of Kyle, John is first recorded in the 1350s as the commander of a campaign in the lordship of Annandale to re-establish Scottish control over English occupied territory. In 1363, he joined his father along with the earls of Douglas, the reasons for the rebellion were varied. In 1362, David II supported several of his favourites in their titles to lands in the Stewart earldom of Monteith. These nobles were unhappy at the kings squandering of funds provided to him for his ransom. The dissension between the king and the Stewarts looked to have settled before the end of spring 1367. David II reinforced the position of John and Annabella by providing them with the earldom of Carrick on 22 June 1368 and the tacit approval of John as the kings probable heir
7.
James V of Scotland
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James V was King of Scots from 9 September 1513 until his death, which followed the Scottish defeat at the Battle of Solway Moss. His only surviving child, Mary, succeeded him when she was just six days old. James was son of King James IV of Scotland and his wife Margaret Tudor, a daughter of Henry VII of England, and was the only legitimate child of James IV to survive infancy. He was born on 10 April 1512 at Linlithgow Palace, Linlithgowshire and baptized the day, receiving the titles Duke of Rothesay and Prince. He became king at just seventeen months old when his father was killed at the Battle of Flodden Field on 9 September 1513, James was crowned in the Chapel Royal at Stirling Castle on 21 September 1513. Other regents included Robert Maxwell, 5th Lord Maxwell, a member of the Council of Regency who was bestowed as Regent of Arran. In February 1517 James came from Stirling to Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh, at Stirling, the 10-year-old James had a guard of 20 footmen dressed in his colours, red and yellow. When he went to the park below the Castle, by secret and in fair and soft wedder. Poets wrote their own nursery rhymes for James and advised him on royal behavior, as a youth, his education was in the care of University of St Andrews poets such as Sir David Lyndsay. In the autumn of 1524 James dismissed his Regents and was proclaimed an adult ruler by his mother, several new court servants were appointed including a trumpeter, Henry Rudeman. Thomas Magnus, the English diplomat, gave an impression of the new Scottish court at Holyroodhouse on All Saints Day 1524, trumpets and shamulles did sounde and blewe up mooste pleasauntely. Magnus saw the young king singing, playing with a spear at Leith, and with his horses, and he was given the impression that the king preferred English manners over French fashions. In 1525 Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus, the young kings stepfather, took custody of James, another attempt later that year, on 4 September at the battle of Linlithgow Bridge, failed again to relieve the King from the clutches of Angus. When James and his came to Edinburgh on 20 November 1526, she stayed in the chambers at Holyroodhouse. In February 1527 Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, gave James twenty hunting hounds, Magnus thought the Scottish servant sent to Sheriff Hutton Castle for the dogs was intended to note the form and fashion of the Dukes household, for emulation in Scotland. James finally escaped from Anguss care in 1528 and assumed the reins of government himself, the first action James took as king was to remove Angus from the scene. The Douglas family were forced into exile and James besieged their castle at Tantallon and he then subdued the Border rebels and the chiefs of the Western Isles. Even his pursemaster and yeoman of the wardrobe, John Tennent of Listonschiels, was sent on an errand to England, James increased his income by tightening control over royal estates and from the profits of justice, customs and feudal rights
8.
Mary, Queen of Scots
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Mary, Queen of Scots, also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland, reigned over Scotland from 14 December 1542 to 24 July 1567. Mary, the surviving legitimate child of James V of Scotland, was six days old when her father died. She spent most of her childhood in France while Scotland was ruled by regents and he ascended the French throne as King Francis II in 1559, and Mary briefly became queen consort of France, until his death in December 1560. Widowed, Mary returned to Scotland, arriving in Leith on 19 August 1561, four years later, she married her first cousin, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, but their union was unhappy. In February 1567, his residence was destroyed by an explosion, James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell, was generally believed to have orchestrated Darnleys death, but he was acquitted of the charge in April 1567, and the following month he married Mary. Following an uprising against the couple, Mary was imprisoned in Loch Leven Castle, on 24 July 1567, she was forced to abdicate in favour of James VI, her one-year-old son by Darnley. After an unsuccessful attempt to regain the throne, she fled southwards seeking the protection of her first cousin once removed, perceiving her as a threat, Elizabeth had her confined in various castles and manor houses in the interior of England. After eighteen and a half years in custody, Mary was found guilty of plotting to assassinate Elizabeth in 1586 and was beheaded the following year. Mary was born on 7 or 8 December 1542 at Linlithgow Palace, Scotland, to King James V and his French second wife and she was said to have been born prematurely and was the only legitimate child of James to survive him. She was the great-niece of King Henry VIII of England, as her paternal grandmother, Margaret Tudor, was Henry VIIIs sister. A popular legend, first recorded by John Knox, states that James, hearing on his deathbed that his wife had given birth to a daughter, ruefully exclaimed, It cam wi a lass and it will gang wi a lass. His House of Stewart had gained the throne of Scotland by the marriage of Marjorie Bruce, daughter of Robert the Bruce, to Walter Stewart, the crown had come to his family through a woman, and would be lost from his family through a woman. This legendary statement came true much later—not through Mary, but through her descendant Queen Anne, Mary was baptised at the nearby Church of St Michael shortly after she was born. As Mary was an infant when she inherited the throne, Scotland was ruled by regents until she became an adult. From the outset, there were two claims to the Regency, one from Catholic Cardinal Beaton, and the other from the Protestant Earl of Arran, Beatons claim was based on a version of the late kings will that his opponents dismissed as a forgery. Arran, with the support of his friends and relations, became the regent until 1554 when Marys mother managed to remove and succeed him. King Henry VIII of England took the opportunity of the regency to propose marriage between Mary and his own son, Prince Edward, hoping for a union of Scotland and England. The treaty provided that the two countries would remain separate and that if the couple should fail to have children the temporary union would dissolve
9.
Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley
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Henry Stuart, Duke of Albany, styled Lord Darnley until 1565, was king consort of Scotland from 1565 until his murder at Kirk o Field in 1567. He was the second but eldest surviving son of Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox, Darnleys maternal grandparents were Archibald Douglas, sixth Earl of Angus, and Margaret Tudor, daughter of Henry VII of England, and widow of James IV of Scotland. It is the belief that Darnley was born on 7 December. He was a first cousin and the husband of Mary, Queen of Scots, and was the father of her son James VI of Scotland. Darnley was born in 1545, at Temple Newsam, Leeds, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, through his parents he had claims to both the Scottish and English thrones, as he was descended from both James II of Scotland and Henry VII. Lennox lived in exile in England for 22 years, returning to Scotland in 1564, Darnleys mother, Margaret Douglas had left Scotland in 1528. Lord Darnley was well educated and brought up conscious of his status and he became well-versed in Latin and grew up familiar with Gaelic, English and French. He excelled in singing, lute playing, and dancing, another of his schoolmasters, Arthur Lallart, was interrogated in London after going to Scotland in 1562. Darnley was strong and athletic, a horseman with knowledge of weapons. Darnley wrote a letter to Mary I of England from Temple Newsam in March 1554 mentioning a drama or map he had made and he wished, every haire in my heade for to be a wourthy souldiour. The Lennox family were Roman Catholic and might therefore have represented an alternative succession in England. When Henry II of France died in July 1559, Lennoxs brother, aubigny arranged for Darnley to be dispatched to the French court to congratulate Mary and Francis II of France on their accession and seek restoration for Lennox. Mary did not restore Lennox to his Scottish earldom, but she did give 1,000 crowns to Darnley, Lennoxs plan was to appeal directly to the Queen of Scots via her ambassador, over the heads of Elizabeth and the Guise. Aubigny was also accused of supporting Marys title to the throne of England. Lennox set Nesbit to watch Mary, Darnley and Darnleys tutor, in 1559 Nicholas Throckmorton, the English ambassador in Paris, warned Elizabeth that Elder was as dangerous for the matters of England as any he knew. The historian Sarah Macauley notes, After the Queen of Scots and he was also the natural choice for many of Elizabeths enemies as male, English-born and Catholic. Paget supposed in March 1560 that talk of the Catholics raising Darnley to the throne in the event of the Queens death was well founded, by the summer of that year, Elizabeths position was considerably strengthened. Francis Yaxley was one notable spy, a Catholic, Yaxley had been a clerk of the Signet and had been employed by William Cecil since 1549, travelling in France for him
10.
James VI and I
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James VI and I was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until his death. The kingdoms of Scotland and England were individual sovereign states, with their own parliaments, judiciary, and laws, though both were ruled by James in personal union. James was the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, James succeeded to the Scottish throne at the age of thirteen months, after his mother Mary was compelled to abdicate in his favour. Four different regents governed during his minority, which ended officially in 1578, in 1603, he succeeded the last Tudor monarch of England and Ireland, Elizabeth I, who died without issue. He continued to reign in all three kingdoms for 22 years, a period known after him as the Jacobean era, until his death in 1625 at the age of 58. After the Union of the Crowns, he based himself in England from 1603, only returning to Scotland once in 1617 and he was a major advocate of a single parliament for England and Scotland. In his reign, the Plantation of Ulster and British colonization of the Americas began, at 57 years and 246 days, Jamess reign in Scotland was longer than those of any of his predecessors. He achieved most of his aims in Scotland but faced difficulties in England, including the Gunpowder Plot in 1605. James himself was a scholar, the author of works such as Daemonologie, The True Law of Free Monarchies. He sponsored the translation of the Bible that would later be named after him, Sir Anthony Weldon claimed that James had been termed the wisest fool in Christendom, an epithet associated with his character ever since. Since the latter half of the 20th century, historians have tended to revise Jamess reputation and treat him as a serious, James was the only son of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her second husband, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Both Mary and Darnley were great-grandchildren of Henry VII of England through Margaret Tudor, Marys rule over Scotland was insecure, and she and her husband, being Roman Catholics, faced a rebellion by Protestant noblemen. James was born on 19 June 1566 at Edinburgh Castle, and as the eldest son and heir apparent of the monarch automatically became Duke of Rothesay and Prince and he was baptised Charles James or James Charles on 17 December 1566 in a Catholic ceremony held at Stirling Castle. His godparents were Charles IX of France, Elizabeth I of England, Mary refused to let the Archbishop of St Andrews, whom she referred to as a pocky priest, spit in the childs mouth, as was then the custom. The subsequent entertainment, devised by Frenchman Bastian Pagez, featured men dressed as satyrs and sporting tails, Jamess father, Darnley, was murdered on 10 February 1567 at Kirk o Field, Edinburgh, perhaps in revenge for Rizzios death. James inherited his fathers titles of Duke of Albany and Earl of Ross, Mary was already unpopular, and her marriage on 15 May 1567 to James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell, who was widely suspected of murdering Darnley, heightened widespread bad feeling towards her. In June 1567, Protestant rebels arrested Mary and imprisoned her in Loch Leven Castle and she was forced to abdicate on 24 July 1567 in favour of the infant James and to appoint her illegitimate half-brother, James Stewart, Earl of Moray, as regent. The care of James was entrusted to the Earl and Countess of Mar, to be conserved, nursed, and upbrought in the security of Stirling Castle
11.
Duke of York
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The Duke of York is a title of nobility in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. Since the 15th century, it has, when granted, usually given to the second son of English monarchs. The equivalent title in the Scottish peerage was Duke of Albany, initially granted in the 14th century in the Peerage of England, the title Duke of York has been created eight times. Additionally, the title Duke of York and Albany has been created three times and these occurred during the 18th century, following the 1707 unification of the Kingdom of England and Kingdom of Scotland into a single, united realm. The double naming was done so that a territorial designation from each of the separate realms could be included. The current Duke of York is Prince Andrew, the son of Queen Elizabeth II. Prince Andrew currently has no heirs and has been unmarried since his 1996 divorce. In medieval times, York was the city of the North of England. Yorkshire was Englands largest shire in area, York under its Viking name Jorvik was a petty kingdom in the Early Medieval period. In the interval between the fall of independent Jorvik under Eirik Bloodaxe, last King of Jorvik, and the first creation of the Dukedom of York, there were a few Earls of York. The title Duke of York was first created in the Peerage of England in 1385 for Edmund of Langley, the surviving son of Edward III. His son Edward, who inherited the title, was killed at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the title passed to Edwards nephew Richard, the son of Richard of Conisburgh, 3rd Earl of Cambridge. The younger Richard managed to obtain a restoration of the title, but when his eldest son, who inherited the title, became king in 1461 as Edward IV, the title was next created for Richard of Shrewsbury, second son of King Edward IV. Richard was one of the Princes in the Tower, and, as he died without heirs, the third creation was for Henry Tudor, second son of King Henry VII. When his elder brother Arthur, Prince of Wales, died in 1502, when Henry ultimately became King Henry VIII, his titles merged into the crown. The title was created for the time for Charles Stuart. When his elder brother, Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, died in 1612 and he was created Prince of Wales in 1616 and eventually became Charles I in 1625 when the title again merged into the Crown. The fifth creation was in favour of James Stuart, the son of Charles I
12.
Charles I of England
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Charles I was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles was the son of King James VI of Scotland, but after his father inherited the English throne in 1603, he moved to England. He became heir apparent to the English, Irish, and Scottish thrones on the death of his brother, Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales. Two years later, he married the Bourbon princess Henrietta Maria of France instead, after his succession, Charles quarrelled with the Parliament of England, which sought to curb his royal prerogative. Charles believed in the right of kings and thought he could govern according to his own conscience. Many of his subjects opposed his policies, in particular the levying of taxes without parliamentary consent and he supported high church ecclesiastics, such as Richard Montagu and William Laud, and failed to aid Protestant forces successfully during the Thirty Years War. From 1642, Charles fought the armies of the English and Scottish parliaments in the English Civil War, after his defeat in 1645, he surrendered to a Scottish force that eventually handed him over to the English Parliament. Charles refused to accept his captors demands for a constitutional monarchy, re-imprisoned on the Isle of Wight, Charles forged an alliance with Scotland, but by the end of 1648 Oliver Cromwells New Model Army had consolidated its control over England. Charles was tried, convicted, and executed for treason in January 1649. The monarchy was abolished and a called the Commonwealth of England was declared. The monarchy was restored to Charless son, Charles II, in 1660, the second son of King James VI of Scotland and Anne of Denmark, Charles was born in Dunfermline Palace, Fife, on 19 November 1600. James VI was the first cousin twice removed of Queen Elizabeth I of England, in mid-July 1604, Charles left Dunfermline for England where he was to spend most of the rest of his life. His speech development was slow, and he retained a stammer, or hesitant speech. In January 1605, Charles was created Duke of York, as is customary in the case of the English sovereigns second son, Thomas Murray, a Presbyterian Scot, was appointed as a tutor. Charles learnt the usual subjects of classics, languages, mathematics, in 1611, he was made a Knight of the Garter. Eventually, Charles apparently conquered his physical infirmity, which might have been caused by rickets and he became an adept horseman and marksman, and took up fencing. Even so, his public profile remained low in contrast to that of his stronger and taller elder brother, Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales. However, in early November 1612, Henry died at the age of 18 of what is suspected to have been typhoid, Charles, who turned 12 two weeks later, became heir apparent
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