Kings
A king is a supreme ruler, sovereign over a nation or a territory, of higher rank than any other secular ruler except an emperor, to whom a king may be subject.
Kings Encyclopedia Articles
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Henry VIII
Henry VIII was the king of England (1509–47) who presided over the beginnings of the English Renaissance and the English Reformation. His six wives were, successively, Catherine of Aragon (the mother of...
Charlemagne
Charlemagne king of the Franks (768–814), king of the Lombards (774–814), and first emperor (800–814) of the Romans and of what was later called the Holy Roman Empire. Around the time of the birth of Charlemagne—conventionally...
Henry IV
Henry IV was the king of Navarre (as Henry III, 1572–89) and the first Bourbon king of France (1589–1610), who, at the end of the Wars of Religion, abjured Protestantism and converted to Roman Catholicism...
Gustavus Adolphus
Gustavus Adolphus was the king of Sweden (1611–32) who laid the foundations of the modern Swedish state and made it a major European power. Gustavus was the eldest son of Charles IX and his second wife,...
Frederick II
Frederick II king of Prussia (1740–86), a brilliant military campaigner who, in a series of diplomatic stratagems and wars against Austria and other powers, greatly enlarged Prussia’s territories and made...
Henry IV
Henry IV was the duke of Bavaria (as Henry VIII; 1055–61), German king (from 1054), and Holy Roman emperor (1084–1105/06), who engaged in a long struggle with Hildebrand (Pope Gregory VII) on the question...
Charles V
Charles V was the Holy Roman emperor (1519–56), king of Spain (as Charles I; 1516–56), and archduke of Austria (as Charles I; 1519–21), who inherited a Spanish and Habsburg empire extending across Europe...
Alexander the Great
Alexander the Great king of Macedonia (336–323 bce), who overthrew the Persian empire, carried Macedonian arms to India, and laid the foundations for the Hellenistic world of territorial kingdoms. Already...
Frederick II
Frederick II was the king of Sicily (1197–1250), duke of Swabia (as Frederick VI, 1228–35), German king (1212–50), and Holy Roman emperor (1220–50). A Hohenstaufen and grandson of Frederick I Barbarossa,...
Frederick I
Frederick I was the duke of Swabia (as Frederick III, 1147–90) and German king and Holy Roman emperor (1152–90), who challenged papal authority and sought to establish German predominance in western Europe....
Philip II
Philip II was the 18th king of Macedonia (359–336 bce), who restored internal peace to his country and by 339 had gained domination over all of Greece by military and diplomatic means, thus laying the...
Philip IV
Philip IV was the king of France from 1285 to 1314 (and of Navarre, as Philip I, from 1284 to 1305, ruling jointly with his wife, Joan I of Navarre). His long struggle with the Roman papacy ended with...
Louis-Philippe
Louis-Philippe was the king of the French from 1830 to 1848; having based his rule on the support of the upper bourgeoisie, he ultimately fell from power because he could not win the allegiance of the...
Louis XIV
Louis XIV was the king of France (1643–1715) who ruled his country, principally from his great palace at Versailles, during one of its most brilliant periods and who remains the symbol of absolute monarchy...
Charles I
Charles I was the king of Great Britain and Ireland (1625–49), whose authoritarian rule and quarrels with Parliament provoked a civil war that led to his execution. Charles was the second surviving son...
George III
George III was the king of Great Britain and Ireland (1760–1820) and elector (1760–1814) and then king (1814–20) of Hanover, during a period when Britain won an empire in the Seven Years’ War but lost...
William I
William I made himself the mightiest noble in France and then changed the course of England’s history through his conquest of that country in 1066. One of the greatest soldiers and rulers of the Middle...
monarchy
Monarchy, political system based upon the undivided sovereignty or rule of a single person. The term applies to states in which supreme authority is vested in the monarch, an individual ruler who functions...
Henry II
Henry II was the duke of Normandy (from 1150), count of Anjou (from 1151), duke of Aquitaine (from 1152), and king of England (from 1154), who greatly expanded his Anglo-French domains and strengthened...
Richard III
Richard III was the last Plantagenet and Yorkist king of England. He usurped the throne of his nephew Edward V in 1483 and perished in defeat to Henry Tudor (thereafter Henry VII) at the Battle of Bosworth...