The history of Britain is that of a small island that began as a collection of territories ruled by chiefs and warlords and gradually evolved into a constitutional monarchy. Most of Europe evolved up until a certain point as we did, but then diverged. Collections of territories that tended to speak similar languages first united under an absolute monarch and then with various degrees of success moved away from absolutism. Britain was almost uniquely successful and fortunate. We began our journey to democracy earlier than anywhere else and transitioned from the divine right of kings to constitutional monarchy earlier and more peacefully than anyone else. We have been invaded once or perhaps twice in the past thousand years, our boundaries with one major exception have remained unchanged, when Europe has revolted, we have largely watched. All this we owe to royalty.
Constitutional monarchy remains arbitrary. Our present Queen is as closely related to Alfred the Great or Kenneth MacAlpin as I am. This is partly a matter of simple arithmetic. There are thirty to forty generations between these kings and today. Two to the power of forty is a very large number indeed. If you go back far enough, we are all related to everyone else.
In the history of succession there are also breaks. At times the relation of one king to his predecessor has been distant sometimes non-existent. There is not an unbroken chain going back. It is due to a series of accidents of history that we have the good fortune to have our present Queen ruling us. But this doesn’t matter.
We are what we are because of that history. The history of Britain is the history of our monarchy. Without it we would not know ourselves.
[…]
See Also:
