England's Greatest Monarch


If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Victoria was not an English monarch, she was a British monarch. The Tudors have way more publicity than any of the earlier Plantagenets Kings. So more people are going to know about them compared to Edward III


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I can't decided between queen Elizabeth I or queen Victoria. As another poster said, it is very interesting that monarchs who left a strong legacy and a mark in history are women.
 
I don't see that Queen Victoria was that great. Early on she is Melbourne's puppet, then Albert comes and probably does more stuff than Victoria. He dies and then she basically abandoned the job to mourn for decades. Her relationships with her children were messed up. Britain was successful despite of her. Her meddling in Europe sets up WWI.


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No idea about 'greatest' but I think King George V did a lot of the right things. He may not have been an educated man but he was certainly streetsmart.

He brought in at what the time were many modernisations and he cut off militant socialism before it had a chance to do to him what it did to the Romanovs.

I think he was one of the better modern monarchs.
 
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I voted for Queen Elizabeth I .
 
I don't think Victoria's meddling in Europe set up the conditions for World War One. I think that war was a result of all sorts of political pressures within Germany and other imperial powers like Austro-Hungary.

Victoria is probably there because of the length of her reign and because, towards the end of it, she symbolised Britain's imperial greatness. Her 1897 jubilee with hundreds of troops from all over the Empire was one of the great set-pieces of her later reign.

Nevertheless, Victoria reigned, especially after 1861, not ruled, so I would give the title to Elizabeth I, though I do think Edward III should have also been considered.
 
Victoria is far from the greatest she pretty much did nothing but live a long time just like the current Elizabeth; putting her with Elizabeth I is rather insulting. Don't hold me to this but her son Edward VII was probably a better monarch than her.
Greatest
Elizabeth I, Henry VII, Edward III, William I, Henry II, and I can't say George V because of the Romanov debacle... Yes I know it's ridiculous.
 
It's outrageous that anybody could consider Henry VIII 'great' by any stretch. He was a despot! Greatest king was probably Edward III, or else George VI for getting us through the war.

Incidentally, who won? Please tell me it wasn't Henry VIII!
 
It's outrageous that anybody could consider Henry VIII 'great' by any stretch. He was a despot! Greatest king was probably Edward III, or else George VI for getting us through the war.



Incidentally, who won? Please tell me it wasn't Henry VIII!



I can’t believe Henry VIII made the list either. I certainly hope he didn’t win.

I think the thing with comparing some of these monarchs is it’s apples and oranges. Elizabeth I and II really are not comparable. Maybe they should have separated the modern ones.
 
No idea about 'greatest' but I think King George V did a lot of the right things. He may not have been an educated man but he was certainly streetsmart.

He brought in at what the time were many modernisations and he cut off militant socialism before it had a chance to do to him what it did to the Romanovs.

I think he was one of the better modern monarchs.

I have to agree - George V made a lot of difficult decisions, which whether right or wrong when viewed through the retrospectoscope, were good and proper for the future of the British Monarchy at that time. He showed great foresight.
 
If it's "England's Greatest Monarch", it should end with Elizabeth I as after that we are talking Great Britain/The UK.

I agree that in any case, it's impossible to compare absolute Monarchs with constituional ones and there's a grey area in between as monarchs gradually lost power but retained real influence.
 
Queen Mary I deserves a mention here. As the first true Queen regnant with a very divided Kingdom on her hands and foreign threats from every side, she did a remarkably good job of keeping the ship on course. It ended up in a very different port to where she intended it to go but had she had a son and heir? Mary I would get the same praise, if not more, than Elizabeth I. Which is of course why Elizabeth I took great lengths to erase and bastardise the memory of her predecessor.

So for me, England's greatest monarch? George V definitely ranks highly but Queen Mary I would be high on my list too.
 
The 'England's Greatest Monarch' contest should end in 1707, when Great Britain's Greatest Monarch commences...

'For my money' England's is Elizabeth 1st, and Great Britain's is George V.

HOWEVER , without any 'frame of reference' it is a pretty bogus 'contest'.
For example, can an individual be considered great because great things [which they had little or no influence on] occurred during their reign? Such as the Industrial Revolution in Victoria's reign, or victory in WWll during George Vl's ?
 
The 'England's Greatest Monarch' contest should end in 1707, when Great Britain's Greatest Monarch commences...

'For my money' England's is Elizabeth 1st, and Great Britain's is George V.

HOWEVER , without any 'frame of reference' it is a pretty bogus 'contest'.
For example, can an individual be considered great because great things [which they had little or no influence on] occurred during their reign? Such as the Industrial Revolution in Victoria's reign, or victory in WWll during George Vl's ?

A very good point! I didn't even consider the 1707 distinction. In which case it makes it easy for me to say Queen Mary I.

Your point about Victoria is spot on too. I think she's considered to have been a great monarch because her reign is defined by the works of other great Victorians. In reality, Victoria was probably one of the worst sovereigns we had. A selfish old woman who refused to accept the damage she was doing to the monarchy because of her own grief.
 
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