How to Become the British Monarch

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How to become the British Monarch: Historically, the crown sat upon your head mostly because you had the biggest army. When you died usually your eldest son kept control over that army and so the crown relocated to his head, though, of course, someone with a bigger army could change the political landscape quite abruptly. As time marched on and the world grew less violent eventually in 1701 Parliament established a set of rules to transfer the crown from one head to another -- hopefully with less turmoil than before. So here's how the 1701 rules work: Frist: don't be Catholic. The British Monarch is also the head of the Church of England to which the monarch much convert if not already a member. Except that if you're Catholic, no crown for you. The history of the royal family and how this rule came to be is a story for another time, but suffice it to say that bigger-army diplomacy was involved. And, BTW, no you can't cleverly get around this rule by converting from Catholicism to something else then to Church of England. In the eyes of the crown, Catholicism is transitive. Second: don't be a bastard. Sometimes it's good to be the king, but it's never good to be the illegitimate children of the king -- who are out of line for the crown literally from the moment of their conception. If you're related to the monarch but are either a Catholic or a bastard or both, the crown has the delightful term 'Naturally Dead' to refer to you and your lack of right to succession. Third spouses don't count. While people often think of kings and queens as a pair: that's not the way it works here. Spouses of Monarchs are known as Royal Consorts. They may be called 'prince' or 'queen' but as far as the crown is concerned, they're not in line for the throne, they're just the matching 23 Chromosomes needed for the creation of the real heir. Fourth and Finally: Male Primogeniture (whatever). This is the algorithm of inheritance. When the Monarch dies -- or abdicates -- but usually dies -- the crown goes to the eldest son who isn't 'naturally dead'. If there happens to be an elder daughter tough luck to her: baby brother gets the crown. It's Simple enough, but there are non-obvious cases: take a king with two sons: if the eldest dies before the king does, obviously the crown goes to the youngest (now oldest) brother. But what if the eldest son gave the king a grandson before death? Where does the crown go then? Well, the crown basically pretends that everyone -- except the naturally dead -- is alive: so upon the death of the king the crown goes to his eldest son -- who is now sort of the king who just really happens to be dead -- so the rule kicks in again, and the crown goes to *his* son, not as seems obvious now, his brother. But if this 1701 rule means that eldest sons get the crown, how did queens ever come to be? Basically, daughters were the last choice of the crown, which is why there have been so few. To get the crown, a daughter had to be either the only child of the monarch or the eldest child without competing brothers. So pregnant mothers must have made any daughters with queenly aspirations quite nervous. Now sometimes the branch of a family tree die out: be it from war or plague or whatever so the crown's contingency plan if it's at a dead end is to back up one level, and then apply the rules forward again looking for a living head to sit upon. If no luck, back up again, and repeat and repeat until a living heir is found. And there will always be an heir. The first king of England was over a thousand years ago and the mathematics of human reproduction backed up by DNA evidence reveals that just about every European alive is distantly related to him. So the crown will eventually find a way. So from the first king through the new millennium, the various rules when along, making monarchs, though with a gender biased result, that no one seemed too bothered about until suddenly, in 2013 for no particular reason at all, everyone decided that the rules needed to be updated *right now*. So, Parliament and the Monarchy got together and made some changes: most notably striking the male part of rule #4. From 2013 on the crown views all royal sons and daughters with equal favor. The only thing that matters is the order of their birth. So prior to 2013 the boy in a set of fraternal twins in development could sit back and relax -- secure that the crown would be his no matter what happened on delivery day, but in the post 2013 gender-equal world it's now a race for the door to win the crown.
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Channel: CGP Grey
Views: 5,710,820
Rating: 4.9408183 out of 5
Keywords: cgpgrey, education, Monarchy Of The United Kingdom (System Of Nobility), Royalties, King, Queen, Princess Kate, Elizabeth II (Monarch), Queen Victoria, History, Monarch (Ontology Class), United Kingdom, England, London, Baby, Royal Baby, Prince William, Prince Charles, Duchess of Cambridge, Game Of Thrones (TV Program)
Id: BUY6HGqYweQ
Channel Id: undefined
Length: 4min 12sec (252 seconds)
Published: Tue Jul 16 2013
Reddit Comments

Great video, as always.

Just to clarify, it wasn't just the British Parliament that had to go along with the Monarchy to change the Gender Bias in the line of succession - all members of the commonwealth had to agree. David Cameron lead the charge, but all Commonwealth nations signed on as well, to make it legit.

👍︎︎ 66 👤︎︎ u/theoretical_26 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies

Wikipedia has a list of the heirs to the throne.

The current list is much shorter than it used to be. This old version of the page lists the top 2511 candidates.

👍︎︎ 21 👤︎︎ u/Unlimited_Bacon 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies

For anyone interested, The Seven Kingdoms of Westeros use the same system.

Which is why Stannis Baratheon is the one true King.

👍︎︎ 21 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Jul 17 2013 🗫︎ replies

This video failed to tell me how I would become the british monarch, which was the sole purpose for me to watch it.

👍︎︎ 13 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies

After following on twitter, I did not see a video about conception, chromosones and english knights being about how to become british monarch.

👍︎︎ 10 👤︎︎ u/Cranky-Dutchman 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies

So all I have to do is murder a couple of my fellow Europeans and I become king? Sounds easy enough...

👍︎︎ 6 👤︎︎ u/ROREO93 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies

Yeah, I've seen King Ralph. I fully understand how it works.

👍︎︎ 5 👤︎︎ u/JIGGLY_BALL 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies

Is the new rule about men and women being equal not retroactive? I'm looking at this line of succession and princess Anne is still 10th even though she is the second eldest of the Queen's children.

👍︎︎ 4 👤︎︎ u/WOIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies

according to Johnny English, it's whoever the Archbishop puts the crown on.

👍︎︎ 3 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Jul 16 2013 🗫︎ replies
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