As we have all been reminded these past few weeks, the royal family is no stranger to controversy. With so much money, power, and influence, this is hardly surprising. But when you have so much money, power, and influence, everything you do tends to be pretty well-documented, so no matter how well you think you hide something, who knows what historians in the future could uncover. In the case of the Royal family, it seems there are a few connections they tried to hide, but ones that historians today felt were too good to leave buried.

See Also: 10 Plans Hitler Would Have Put In Motion If The Nazis Had Won

10 Edward VIII

If you’ve seen the movie The King’s Speech, then you’ve already got an understanding of why King Edward VIII is so famous. That’s right, the man who worked so hard at overcoming his fears and inspiring the nation was none other than his brother George VI, who became the unexpected King when Edward abdicated in 1936. Now pretty much known as the man who gave us Queen Elizabeth, there is a lot more to Edward’s story than the first few minutes of that film would suggest.

You may think that working as an officer in World War 1 would have instilled some anti-German sentiment in young Edward, but it seems the opposite is true. Having witnessed the horrors of war, he grew up with a desire to ensure that the UK and Germany had better relations moving forward, and his sympathies for the Nazis are well-documented.^[1] In the early 1930s, this wouldn’t have been particularly uncommon, but the fact that he was heir to the throne made his support a little more controversial.

In 1934, the Prince began an affair with his future-wife, a twice-divorced American named Wallis Simpson. Although the public were unaware of the relationship, both British & US intelligence suspected Wallis Simpson of being a Nazi spy. She was accused of having a second affair with Germany’s ambassador to the UK, Joachim Von Ribbentrop,^[2] and of passing on sensitive information to the Nazis. However, neither of these allegations have ever been proven, and it is possible that they were simply character attacks aimed at a woman who had the gall to marry three times.

During World War 2, Edward gave speeches advocating reconciliation both before and after his abdication, much to the chagrin of the British people. In 1937, he even took his controversial new-wife on an official visit to Germany, where they were met with cheering crowds, Nazi salutes (which they reciprocated), and even joined the Fuhrer himself for some afternoon tea. Although Edward told an interviewer in 1966 that he had been “foolish and naive”^[3] about Hitler, it is hard not to look back and wonder if there was more to this story that hasn’t come to light.

9 Churchill’s Weeders

We often hear that history is written by the victors, but most of us probably underestimate just how much work goes into the editing process before that history is published. That saying is often (albeit, unreliably) attributed to Churchill himself, and while he may not have been the first to say it, he certainly took the advice to heart.

As soon as the war was over, one of Churchill’s first acts was establishing an elite team known as “the Weeders”. Their job was to sift through any records in Berlin that they could get their hands on, looking for any useful information, particularly any information that could have been damaging to the British. But while they did succeed in uncovering some potentially unflattering files, they unfortunately weren’t the first.

The files in question were a number of German telegrams sent in 1940, most notably one that describes a conversation Edward & Wallis had with Nazi officials. According to the telegram,^[4] the couple were intrigued when the officials said that the war could result in them returning to the throne if the Nazis were victorious.

As the telegrams had been intercepted by both US & French intelligence, Churchill got to work on ensuring they were not released. President Eisenhower agreed that they were likely Nazi fabrications aimed at sowing distrust amongst the Allies, and that no good would come from their release. Their publication was delayed until 1957.

The Weeders may not have retrieved enough solid information to enable us to make an informed decision on whether the telegrams were fact or fiction, but the fact that they are in the public domain does leave us with another big question: if these files were released after roughly a decade, what did the Weeders discover in the files that the Royals requested be locked up for 100 years?^[5] Come back in 30 years to find out.

8Operation Willi

With such strong ties between Edward VIII and the Nazis, it should come as no surprise that there was one final, last-ditch attempt to win him over to the Nazi cause. Or, more accurately, take him over by force.

Once France had fallen to the Nazis in 1940, Edward & Wallis fled to Spain in order to evade capture. Although Spain was technically neutral at that point, it quickly declared a state of “non-belligerency”, which essentially meant supporting the Nazis when provoked. That explains why, when the Spanish Foreign Minister asked how to deal with the royals, Joachim Von Ribbentrop requested that they be detained for 2 weeks, but without letting them know it was at the request of the Nazis.

During this delay, the couple continued on to Portugal and Edward allegedly spoke about his dislike for the royal family, their policies, and their treatment of his wife. While the Nazis gleefully listened and agreed that he’d be much better without the Royals, Churchill heard about the conversations and sent 2 telegrams to Edward. The first ordered him to return to Britain, with a reminder that Edward was technically a military man and could face a court-martial; the second announced his new role as Governor of the Bahamas, and instructed him to go there immediately.

Although Edward was reluctant, he seemed to be giving serious consideration to the Governorship, and it was at this point that Hitler began Operation Willi,^[6] a plan to kidnap the couple and either use them as peacebrokers or reinstall them on the throne of a German Britain. The first step of the plan was to intimidate the couple, which included throwing rocks through their windows, sending a bouquet of flowers with a threatening note, and spreading rumours amongst the staff that British intelligence was planning to assassinate the couple.

The operation came to a head on August 1st, when Hitler learned that the couple were making their way out of Portugal to the Bahamas. While the Spanish ambassador to Portugal tried to convince the couple not to go, the car carrying their luggage to the port was sabotaged, and a phoney bomb-threat was made against the ship they were supposed to be travelling on. Despite these efforts, the couple made their escape, bringing a decisive end to Edward’s relationship with the Nazis.

7 Charles Edward

When Charles Edward was 16 years old, he was asked to move to Germany by his grandmother, Queen Victoria. Even though he had no knowledge of or desire to learn about German culture, the Queen had chosen him personally to become Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, where her husband was born and their family got its name, so he was shipped off without a second thought. In the ensuing years, he threw himself fully into his new life, ultimately marrying the niece of Wilhelm II, the last German Kaiser and King of Prussia.^[7]

When World War One broke out and the house of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha became the house of Windsor, Charlie decided to side with his new family instead of the old. When George V was replaced by Edward VIII, Charlie wore a full Nazi military uniform to the funeral, and immediately set to work on leveraging Edward’s pro-German feelings to his advantage. After Edward’s abdication, Hitler appointed Charlie as President of the German Red Cross,^[8] which sounds nice, but the position was really used to euthanize up to 100,000 disabled people. Despite his royal blood, Charlie was held in a brutal internment camp while he awaited trial after the war. Due to his deteriorating health, he was spared a prison sentence, but had essentially all of his wealth confiscated in fines.

6 Home Video

Because we now know so much about what the Nazis were doing during World War Two, it can be easy to look back with hindsight and wonder how people could have supported them or seen them as anything other than monsters. You can argue about how much people should have known and by when, especially when you see the information that was available at the time. But we could easily make the same arguments about all sorts of current political issues, so it should not come as a surprise to see well-known figures aligning themselves with the bad guys.

This was the essence of the statement put out by the Palace in 2015, when The Sun published a 17-second video of the royal family that was shot 82 years earlier.^[9] The 1933 footage, believed to have been filmed in Balmoral, features the Queen Mother alongside Prince Edward and Princess Elizabeth, both of whom would go on to rule the nation. In it, all 3 are seen giving the Nazi salute, with Elizabeth giving the sign first and most frequently. Understandably, the Palace said that taking out-of-context footage of a child making a gesture before it had taken on any significance as a symbol of oppression was unfair criticism, but the video still made waves in the tabloids, and made people question what else the royal family may be sitting on.

5 Princess Alice

Although the Royal family does have some very questionable links to the Nazi regime, there are also some examples of Royal-Nazi relations that they can actually take some pride in. Probably the best example of this comes from Princess Alice of Battenberg (mother-in-law of Queen Elizabeth), also known as Princess Andrew of Greece and Denmark, after her husband. While most royals have some sort of charity-work to their names, Alice is one of the ones who truly devoted a lot of her time to helping those in need,^[10] which many attribute to the fact that she was born partially deaf.

When the Nazis invaded Greece in 1943, Alice was contacted by Rachel Cohen, a Jewish widow of Haimaki Cohen, a longtime family-friend. Years earlier, Haimaki had helped King George, who promised to repay the favor one day. Although both men had since died,^[11] Rachel reached out to to Alice seeking refuge from the occupying forces. While four of her sons planned to join the exiled Greek government in Egypt, Rachel and her daughter needed shelter in Athens, and were later joined by one of Rachel’s sons who failed to make the journey across the mediterranean sea. The Cohen family stayed with Alice until Greece was liberated from the Nazis the following year, during which time the Gestapo became suspicious of Alice and interviewed her at her home. Using her deafness to her advantage, Alice pretended she had trouble understanding the questions (she was a fluent lip-reader in three languages) and frustrated the process enough to keep the family safe until the war was over.

4 Nazi Costume

Even though most of the royal family’s Nazi-related anecdotes understandably take place around the 1940s, possibly their most well-known Nazi scandal was a lot more recent, having taken place in 2005. As many of you may remember, that was the year a 20 year-old Prince Harry dressed up as a Nazi while attending a private party.^[12] As you can imagine, many members of the public were upset, and he quickly issued a public apology.

Since Harry was still living with his father at the time, the statement was issued by the office of their residence, Clarence House, and Charles ended up taking a lot of the heat. A book released in 2011 claims that even the Queen blamed Charles for the incident, calling into question his skills as a father. While the scandal did not ultimately do too much damage to the royals as a whole, it is undoubtedly something that will follow Harry around for the rest of his life.

3 Prince Ernst

Prince Ernst August of Hanover may not be the most famous prince, but he is pretty emblematic of royalty in the modern era: a descendant of Queen Victoria, whose father is brother-in-law to Queen Elizabeth, and who himself is married to Princess Caroline of Monaco, Prince Ernst is not really a prince of anywhere since Germany became a republic, although the family still uses the styling “of Britain and Ireland”, despite the fact that his relatives are the royals of Britain, and Ireland has none. In general, Ernst is most well-known for his controversies, such as public urination and aggravated assault.

Despite the fact that he was only born in 1954, Prince Ernst found himself tangled in a web of Nazi legal troubles as a result of his grandfather, who was also called Prince Ernst (Duke of Brunswick). In the 1990s, the youngest Ernst brought legal action against Bild-Zeitung,^[13] Germany’s leading tabloid, which had claimed that his wealth was a result of Nazi operations against the Jewish community before, during, and after World War 2. The allegations were that the grandfather Ernst had taken huge, even majority, shares in Jewish-owned businesses, such as Munich Bank, and the largest construction firm in Germany at the time. Although they were never charged, both Prince Ernst’s grandfather and father (who was also called Prince Ernst) were Nazi supporters, with the middle Ernst even signing up to the SS. While that lawsuit went nowhere, the questions surrounding the Prince’s money persist to this day, with others claiming the family smuggled artefacts out of Germany to sell back to the German government after the war.

2 Princess Ileana

Despite being the great-granddaughter of both Queen Victoria and Tsar Alexander II (not together), Princess Ileana isn’t a very well-known historical figure. While she did lead a relatively exciting life, living through two world wars, the forced abdication of her father, and was exiled from her country, Ileana is probably most well-known (among those who know her at all) for her anti-communist speeches and books. But not everyone is convinced that her public proclamations were an accurate reflection of her private beliefs.

In 1953, Ileana’s cousin Archduke Franz Josef wrote to a Senator in New York (where Ileana was living at the time) to alert him that the Archduke would be bringing legal action against the Princess. In it, he claimed that Ileana was not the anti-communist heroine she would lead people to believe, and that she had in fact leveraged her position as a royal to benefit from the Nazi regime.^[14] He claimed that when Hitler first invaded Austria, the Princess and her husband greeted him by telegraph. Because of this, Hitler allowed them to continue using their Royal titles, and the couple stayed in Nazi Austria for the next 7 years, schmoozing with the elites.

The Archduke also claimed that during this time, Ileana stole a number of his Austrian properties by travelling to Berlin and using her royal status to lay claim to the buildings. After Austria had been liberated from the Nazis, Ileana spent several years in Romania before moving to Argentina, where many Nazis fled after the war, before ultimately settling in America.

1 King George VI

Even though his brother may have been working with Nazis behind the scenes, there seems to be no doubt that the loyalties of King George VI lay with the British. While the British were planning Operation Overlord, which would culminate in the Normandy landings, they enlisted the help of the King for Operation Fortitude, part of a larger plan to deceive the Nazis about the Normandy invasion.

Throughout 1944, King George, Queen Elizabeth (the Queen mother), and Princess Elizabeth made visits to the troops around Britain. That is pretty standard stuff, so the public wouldn’t have had any suspicions. But the hope was that the Nazis would.^[15] The locations that the royals visited had been carefully selected to make the Nazis believe they were really there for planning, and the photo ops were just a cover. In reality, the sites they were visiting were intended to lead the Nazis away from Normandy, and suggested that Norway and Calais were the real targets. At the same time, newspapers published articles that “attempted” to conceal the location of the royals, while giving away just enough information for the Nazis to figure it out. In the end, the plan worked, with the Nazis taking the bait, and the Battle of Normandy is now seen as one of the main factors in their defeat.

About The Author: Simon can be found on Twitter @simongireland

The nicknames that royals are given by their subjects tend to become part of the historical record. For some that turns out to be a very good thing indeed – as a heroic sounding nickname can turn a pretty average reign into the stuff of legend – but others are not so fortunate.

For every leader of men who has been dubbed Richard the Lionheart, Catherine the Great or William the Conqueror, there are some unfortunate souls like the ones we will look at in this list.

10 Failed Assassination Attempts On British Royals

10 Halfdan the Bad Entertainer

is said to have been the King of Norway, having taken over this role from his father King Eystein – who had an even more embarrassing nickname. The real full name of Halfdan was Halfdan Eysteinsson King Uppsala and he was said to have been a brave and brilliant warrior in battle who was something of a champion when it came to pillaging and bringing back the spoils of war to his kingdom.

So it seems a bit strange that he did not end up being known as Halfdan the Mighty Pillager or Halfdan the Battle Brave, but instead ended up with a nickname that makes him sound like he was most notable for being crap at charades. In fact the real reason why he went down in history as The Bad Entertainer is apparently because, although he gifted land and money to the men who served under him in battle, he was a bit mean with the drinks and snacks when they visited him at his home. There is a lesson for kings and queens here: always break out the booze and biscuits for your subjects, because if you forget, they never will.^[1]

9 Bernard the Hairy Footed

Bernard Plantapilosa was a French nobleman who served as the Count of Auvergne between 1872 and his death in 1886. This was not the only position of nobility he held during his fairly brief 45 years of life though, as he had earlier spent five years as the Count of Autun before losing that title to Bernard of Gothia. The reason why he was deposed has been lost to history, but it is possible that the people of Autun demanded he be replaced by someone who did not have to shave his toes every morning.

There is still a lot of historical speculation as to why he got saddled with his embarrassing nickname, with the most commonly accepted theory being that ‘plantapilosa’ roughly translates as ‘hairy feet’. According to this version of the story, ‘planta’ in Latin means the sole of the foot and his family name of Plantapilosa was derived from that. That certainly sounds like a sensible explanation for what is a really bizarre nickname to give anyone, but we should not completely rule out the possibility that Bernard was part werewolf. Or that he just had spectacularly hairy feet.^[2]

8 Ivalyo the Cabbage

King Ivalyo may have been the ruler of Bulgaria for only a very short time after his crowning in 1278, but he rose all the way from a peasant background to become its king by leading an uprising. He initially came to fame while King Constantine Tich was on the throne and Bulgaria was struggling both with the Tatar invaders and an economic crisis. Ivalyo put together a peasant army that would defend Northern Bulgaria against the Tatars and defeated them in numerous battles. However, instead of being grateful for this, King Constantine chose to wage war against the peasants, only for his army to be routed by them and Constantine killed by Ivalyo.

With Bulgaria still under threat from both the Tatars and the Byzantines, the widowed Queen Mary chose to marry Ivalyo and make him the new King. He went on to win battles against the Tatars and the Byzantines with his army of peasants, but eventually met his match in King Georgi Terter of Tarnovo. The peasants found themselves unable to overcome their opponents and Ivalyo went to a rival – Nogai, the leader of the Tatars – for help and was killed by him. So why did someone with this sort of record of bravery and success in battle get nicknamed The Cabbage? Apparently, it was a reference to his humble working class origins.^[3]

7 Alfonso the Slobberer

Alfonso IX was the son of King Ferdinand II of Galicia and Leon and took over as the ruler of those regions when his father died in 1188. He stayed on the throne until his own death in 1230 and during his reign he oversaw the modernization of his kingdom, creating the very first parliament to represent ordinary citizens in the history of Western Europe – known as the Cortes de Leon. Alfonso also chose to set up the University of Salamanca during 1212, to improve educational standards among his subjects.

Furthermore, he was no slouch in terms of military conquest, overseeing a victorious campaign against Extremadura and the invasion of Castile in an attempt to rescue the defeated Alfonso VIII. He then went on to marry one of his own cousins to ensure peace between Castile and Leon, which led Pope Celestine III to put both Alfonso and Leon under interdict – which means they are not allowed to receive the sacraments. Despite all of this, Alfonso IX was destined to be remembered as The Slobberer because he had a habit of getting very angry and tended to foam at the mouth a bit when he did. Still, if it did not put his cousin off, who are we to judge?^[4]

6 Justinian the Slit-Nosed

It is bad enough having your nose cut with a knife in public, but it would definitely add insult to injury if people went around called you ‘slit-nose’ for the rest of time. That was the fate of Justinian, the ruler of the Byzantine Empire between 685 and 695 and a second time between 705 and 711 AD. Justinian was pretty much a tyrant who taxed his subjects way more than they could possibly afford and ordered the murder of thousands of Slavs – including women and children – that he felt had not been loyal enough to him.

He was also a religious fanatic who persecuted anyone whose beliefs were different from his own Orthodox Christian ones, with the Paulicians being the sect that received particularly brutal treatment. Justinian was such a paranoid, bloodthirsty and generally crazy ruler that he was overthrown by a general called Leontius in 695, a move that was backed by his subjects who hated his guts. It was Leontius who ordered the nose cutting to prevent Justinian returning as Emperor on the grounds that no-one with a physical deformity was allowed to rule the Empire. It did not work though, as Justinian returned after a period of disastrous rule by Leontius and had the nose of his rival chopped off completely as a punishment. In all honesty, Justinian the Slit-Nosed is probably a nicer name than he deserved.^[5]

10 Wild Adventures Of Former Royals

5 Fruela the Leprous

Fruela II ruled as the third King of Leon, but was on the throne for only a year – from 924 until 925 when he died. Given his nickname, it is a bit surprising to discover that his death apparently came from natural causes rather than the more expected leprosy. He was sick with that particularly disgusting disease at the time though, so the ‘natural causes’ might just have been several vital body parts falling off at the same time. Actual information about what Fruela did while was on the throne is pretty scarce, but given that it was only fourteen months it seems likely that the answer is: not a lot.

Researchers into the period have suggested that the main thing of interest during his reign, other than the fact that he managed to become king despite having leprosy, was a conflict with some noblemen who were not very happy about him being ruler. However, he apparently did very little to change Leon itself, partly because his actual authority was not that great despite having the title of ‘king’. Fruela II has probably gone down in history as The Leprous mainly because that was the most notable thing that anyone remembers about him.^[6]

4 Archibald the Loser

If we want proof that insults do not change very much over time, there is the story of Archibald Douglas. He was the 4th Earl of Douglas and he found himself lumbered with Donald Trump’s favorite term of abuse despite being born all the way back in 1372. To be exact he was known as ‘the Tyneman’, which is an old Scottish word that basically means ‘loser’. He was the son of the equally unfortunately nicknamed Archibald the Grim and inherited the role of Earl from him. This was actually a position of serious power and influence, so it seems weird that he should have gone down in history as ‘The Loser’ until we look at his record in battle.

Archibald was not short of bravery, as he took part in numerous major battles during his lifetime, including the Homildon Hill Battle, the Battle of Shrewsbury and the Battle of Verneuil, but unfortunately he ended up on the losing side every time. This cost him more than just his historical reputation, as he lost one of his eyes in the defeat at the hands of the English at Homildon and one of his testicles (!) at the Battle of Shrewsbury. It is possible that he got his nickname because of his habit of losing bits of himself on the battlefield rather than because of his military record, but it was at the Battle of Verneuil between England and France in 1424 that he truly earned it. Again he was on the defeated side and this time it was his life that he lost.^[7]

3 Eystein the Fart

We told you that the father of Halfdan the Bad Entertainer had a much more embarrassing nickname and here it is. He was the King of Romerike in Norway from his birth in 0736 to his death in 0810 and the people of Romerike must have really sniffed the wind when he came to the throne. Eystein was a Viking and spent much of his life doing all the things Vikings usually did, mostly warmongering and pillaging – and he was pretty good at it by most accounts (maybe because his enemies were too busy holding their noses to hold their weapons).

His embarrassing nickname is said to have been an Old Norse one that actually translates as ‘The Swift’. That makes sense, as we all know that the most significant thing about a fart is how quickly it moves. Whether he got his name because he moved like the wind or because he had the wind, it was his enthusiasm for pillaging that led to the death of Eystein. He took his ships and men to Varna to plunder it of gold and drowned at sea, with the colorful mythological account of his death suggesting that the King of Varna – Skjold – was actually a warlock and used his magical powers to tip Eystein over the side of his ship into the ocean.^[8]

2 Joan the Lame

It is not only male rulers who can end up with unflattering nicknames, as this former Queen of France proves. She was the consort of King Philip VI but acted as the monarch in his place during periods when he was away fighting for his country in the Hundred Years War. Joan was a very well educated woman and throughout her period on the throne she dedicated much of her time to improving standards of education. Modern historical scholars see her as a patron of learning, but at the time her powerful personality and the favoritism she showed towards nobles from the Burgundy region of France – which she was the Countess of – made her unpopular with rival factions in the royal court.

She was unfortunate enough to have been born with a physical deformity and some at that time believed this to be an outward sign of her evil character. She was given the nickname ‘la male royne boiteuse’, which translates as ‘the lame male queen’ and was a dig at both her appearance and the amount of control she was said to have over her husband. Joan died of the plague in September 1348, but 14th century France can consider itself cancelled in 2020 on the grounds of sexism, ableism and body shaming.^[9]

1 Constantine the Dung-Named

Constantine V ruled the Byzantine Empire between 741 and 775 AD and seems to have been every bit as mad as all of the other Byzantine Emperors. He spent most of the time that he wasn’t waging war in persecuting monasteries, churches and Christians that dared to worship religious relics and icons. Constantine was fanatical in his belief that the only genuine sacred rite or symbol was the Eucharist and he devoted a lot of time to purging all others and punishing those who worshipped them.

This meant burning down churches and monasteries and destroying religious artifacts, while those who defied Constantine were stoned, burned to death or had their bodies mutilated as punishments. Constantine is believed to have carried out some of these violent purges himself, including putting oil on the beards of those monks that refused to repent, before burning them alive. Given all this, we should not be surprised that a lot of Christians hated Constantine and that is how he got his nasty nickname. They spread the story that he had crapped in the baptismal font when he was baptized as a baby, which led to him being called Constantine ‘Kopronymos’ – which means ‘named in dung’. Whether the story was true or not is uncertain, but we do know that he was a crappy human being, so it is oddly appropriate anyway.^[10]

Top 10 Nazi Links To The British Royals

About The Author: I am a freelance writer from Dundee, who also makes short films under the name Wardlaw Films.

More than six months after the event, the Royal Family last week revealed Prince William tested positive to coronavirus in April. It was kept private to avoid alarming the nation.

It’s not the first time the palace has opted to keep things within the royal family hush hush, although the reasons differ all the time.

Top 10 Nazi Links To The British Royals

10 Diana threw herself down stairs while pregnant with Prince William

English journalist Andrew Morton interviewed Diana for her 1992 biography ‘Diana: Her True Story’ on the condition of confidentiality on specific topics. Many years later after her death, the revelation that she threw herself down stairs while pregnant with Prince William was published in transcripts of the interview tapes.

The incident occurred while Diana was four months’ pregnant with William in 1982. She told Morton that she was so desperate for her husband Charles’ attention that she resorted to this attention-seeking tactic. She was aware at the time that Charles was having an illicit affair with Camilla Parker-Bowles and subsequently was struggling with depression.

“I had told Charles I felt so desperate and I was crying my eyes out,” Diana said in the recordings. “He said I was crying wolf. ‘I’m not going to listen,’ he said. ‘You’re always doing this to me. I’m going riding now,’ so I threw myself down the stairs.” Diana was bruised from the incident but she said she knew she wasn’t going to lose the baby.^[1]

9 King Edward VIII was a Nazi symphathiser

Edward VIII, who was Queen Elizabeth II’s uncle, had one of the shortest-reigning monarchs in British history, totaling just 326 days in 1936 as King, due to his want to marry a divorced woman, which at the time was strict taboo for a royal. However after his abdication in 1937 he toured Germany. If you know your history, at the time Germany was a Nazi state under Adolf Hitler’s rule, so such a trip was pretty unusual!

He made the trip against the advice of the British government and met with Hitler, which made news in Germany. It’s worth noting he made the visit in the context of the rise of Communism in Eastern Europe, so he saw Germany as a lesser evil at the time, which history will condemn.

Plenty of detail about Edward’s relationship with Hitler came out in 2015 in the aforementioned Morton’s book ‘17 Carnations: The Royals, the Nazis and the Biggest Cover-Up in History’. The book detailed the numerous coercions and dinner dates among the secret friendship and how Britain tried to cover it all up.

It is also claimed that Hitler had planned, if Germany won the war, to reinstate Edward as King of a fascist Britain.^[2]

8 Prince Charles dated Diana’s sister first

This story may be explored in the next series of The Crown but it is understood Princes Charles dated Diana’s older sister Lady Sarah McCorquodale briefly in 1977. It’s alleged Charles dated approximately 20 women in this period as he sought an appropriate wife to take on royal duties, before settling on Diana. As a result, not all dating partners were made public.

Charles and older sister Sarah’s relationship occurred before Charles and Diana were romantically linked, despite the fact they had naturally already met. There’s mixed reports about how long they dated, some say as long as nine months, but either way it didn’t go well. In a stunning interview, Sarah told The Mirror at the time, she said their relationship was only “platonic” and that she wouldn’t marry Charles “if he were the dustman or the King of England”. It’s now come out, once Charles found out, he contacted her and told her she’d done something stupid and that was the end of that.

Sarah has also later labeled herself as “cupid” for introducing Diana and Charles to each other.^[3]

7 They’re not royals?

Richard III was King of England for two years from 1483 to 1485. That’s a long, long time ago but in 2012 he remains were discovered in a parking lot (the location of the former Greyfriars Church) in Leicester after a concerted search. DNA tests confirmed they indeed were Richard’s remains.

However, the DNA tests opened up a range of new learnings, namely it was what scientists called “a false paternity event”. In layman’s terms that meant Richard wasn’t linked with any of his paternal relatives, breaking the royal chain. It may be inferred at some point in time an affair may have occurred, meaning the monarchial birth right may have been misplaced along the way.

To be fair, this has never been proved conclusively either way and whether the royal family actually knew about it is totally unclear. But if someone did, it’s a significant secret.^[4]

6 ‘Camillagate’

Barely a month after Princess Diana and Prince Charles announced their official split in 1993, the transcript from a 1989 bedtime conversation between Charles and Camilla was made public. The intimate six-minute conversation exposed the intimacy of their relationship, and ultimately their affair, at a time when Charles and Camilla were both married.

Charles and Camilla had actually been together in the early 1970s but their relationship ended abruptly in 1973, shortly after he joined the Royal Navy. They’d remained friends and that friendship eventually evolved in a romantic relationship, while Charles was married to Princess Diana. There were plenty of rumours about the rekindling of the relationship but it was evidently public shortly upon Charles and Diana’s split, thus the title ‘Camillagate’, or ‘tampon-gate’ as the Prince said he wanted to become one to ‘live inside her trousers’.

Charles later admitted his marriage with Diana had “irretrievably broken down” in 1986, thus sparking his re-connection with Camilla. His relationship with Camilla was already known by then but this conversation revealed their deep and intimate connection and they’d later marry in 2005.^[5]

10 Truly Disgusting Habits Of Royalty

5 Princess Margaret fell in love with a married man

Princess Margaret was Queen Elizabeth II’s younger sister and as a teenager she became infatuated with Peter Townsend who was her chaperone and the King’s equerry or officer of honour. Townsend wasn’t just anybody, he was a respected war hero who’d been selected for royal service in 1944 having impressively risen through the ranks. The problem was Townsend was non-titled and non-wealthy, but also married.

The interest turned real when Margaret entered her 20s after Townsend had been appointed Comptroller of her mother’s household following the death of her father King George VI in 1952. It’s not clear exactly when the romance started, although Margaret later claimed she fell in love with him during a tour of South Africa in 1947 as they shared time together riding horses. Given Townsend’s close role within the royals, the tabloids weren’t aware of any love connection at the time.

Rumours began after Townsend divorced his first wife in 1952 and the next year he proposed to Margaret. Given his status, their 16-year age gap and the fact he was father to two children, Margaret required her sister’s (by then Queen) consent to accept. A range of circumstances, including her own recent coronation, meant Elizabeth asked Margaret to wait and keep it a secret in the meantime. It eventually came out explosively and they never married.^[6]

4 Princess Anne’s husband’s lovechild

Prince Charles’ sister Princess Anne married English Olympic equestrian gold medal winner ‘Captain’ Mark Phillips in 1973. The couple were married for almost 20 years and have two children together, however it wasn’t revealed initially that during their marriage Phillips had a fling with a New Zealand art teacher New Zealander Heather Tonkin. Tonkin actually gave birth to a girl, Felicity, in 1985.

Eventually the affair and potential fatherhood got out publicly as Anne sought a divorce. Phillips was always in denial about his lovechild too. During a paternity suit in 1991, the court ordered Phillips undergo a DNA test which confirmed he was in fact the father. It’s believed that the pair met while riding in New Zealand and had a one-night stand. Phillips wanted her to have an abortion but she refused. He secretly paid child support, believed to be around $12,000 a year but had no involvement in Felicity’s life.

Tonkin, who made the situation public, said: “I am doing what I am doing for my child. I hope and pray Mark will do the right thing and make a proper and legally binding settlement on her.”^[7]

3 ‘Squidgygate’

In 1992, The Sun publicly revealed tapes of a conversation between Princess Diana and her long-term friend and Lotus salesman James Gilbey. The nature of their relationship wasn’t public at all. In fact the conversation happened at a time when Diana and Prince Charles were headed towards divorce as their relationship fractured, with the latter having an affair with his future wife Camilla Parker-Bowles.

The tapes revealed a risqué level of fondness between Diana and Gilbey which hinted at something romantic. The name ‘Squidgygate’ came from Gilbey affectionately referring to Diana as ‘Squidgy’ 14 times. Diana actually called Gilbey ‘darling’ 53 times. It was explosive stuff and came out a few years after the conversations had taken place, so Diana and Charles by now were engaged in bitter pre-divorce proceedings and a public relations battle too.

‘Squidgygate’ fueled the tabloid media’s coverage of the drawn-out feud and divorce for a long time after The Sun initially revealed them. The exact nature of Diana and Gilbey’s relationship was never quite clarified publicly; Morton labelled it a ‘dalliance’ while others called it an affair.^[8]

2 King George & Queen Mary’s son had epilepsy

King George and Queen Mary reigned from 1910 to 1936 but during that period they kept a very big secret. Their youngest son Prince John developed epilepsy at a young age and as his condition deteriorated he was hidden at the family estate. It’s said he was excluded from family photos and whenever he traveled to London to see his doctors the blinds were drawn. He was kept away from major events, like his parents’ coronation but that was for health reasons.

There was also some concern that John had signs of autism and he was deemed to not be “presentable to the outside world”. However it wasn’t until he was about 11-years-old that the royals opted to keep him out of the public eye. Claims he was hidden at an early age are inaccurate.

John suffered seizures and they only worsened with time. Sadly he passed away aged only 13 in 1919. Only after his death did the royal family reveal to the public that John had been battling epilepsy.^[9]

1 Prince Andrew’s friendship with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein

Prince Andrew’s links with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein are well and truly public nowadays but that only came to light years after the financier’s crimes. The scandal led to Andrew, who is the third child of Queen Elizabeth II, resigning from all public roles as part of the royal family in late 2019.

Epstein was first investigated in 2005 and convicted in 2008, serving 13 months in custody, but it escalated in mid-2019 when he was arrested again on federal charges for sex trafficking of minors, before he died in his cell a month later.

It’s understood Epstein and Andrew met no later than 1999, introduced by the former’s ex-girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell. Despite being jailed in 2008, Andrew maintained his friendship with Epstein and the pair were photographed together in 2010. There was a photo leaked in the press with Andrew and Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who was a victim of Epstein’s, leading to him being identified in a Florida court on the case. Andrew was never charged for any crimes but his connections to Epstein were a PR nightmare for the palace.^[10]

Prince William’s Dancing Is The Latest Of 10 Shocking Scandals To Rock The Royal Family

It wasn’t very long ago that anyone with a noticeable mental condition was locked away in a cold, bare cell inside a so-called lunatic asylum. Yet in that same era, and for a couple of millennia before, if that same mentally ill person was of the royal family, you just kind of rolled with it. 

Noble birth often meant a dramatic increase in the odds of mental illness, thanks to their special brand of elitist inbreeding. It also often meant that whatever decrees came from the mouths of those inbred rulers was law. Despite all the exaggerated tales of babbling, syphilitic kings and malicious rumors meant to weaken the influence of rivals, many stories of insane monarchs were quite true. In many cases, there are enough congruent eyewitness reports to essentially confirm the deeds and misdeeds of these eccentric sovereigns, including some of the most bizarre, depraved, and horrific vices in history. 

Here are ten royals whose actions earned them a spot on the list of history’s craziest.

10 King George III of England

George III is remembered mostly for being the king who lost to America in their War of Independence. But he left behind another legacy: numerous tales of erraticism and madness. So much so that he was eventually deemed unfit to rule and his son George IV ruled as Prince regent in his stead.

George (thought now to perhaps be bipolar) reportedly oscillated between manic periods in which he would speak too quickly to comprehend and foam at the mouth, and periods of such depression that he would cry and wail for hours or days at a time. He reportedly suffered from increasing paranoia and hallucinations, at one point even trying to shake hands with an oak tree. His urine was also described as either blue, red, or purple, leading some experts to think he suffered from acute porphyria.

9 Charles VI of France

Charles the VI had a lot in common with George III. His reign is also remembered for a crushing victory with far-reaching political ramifications, in this case, the Battle of Agincourt. And also like George, Charles gradually built up more and more of a reputation for being a bit off.

There are two most notable displays of Chuck’s mental illness, and they are weirdly at odds with each other. The first is his famous ‘glass delusion.’ He held the ardent belief that his body was made of glass and therefore fragile as glass. He refused to let people touch him, even sitting still for hours on end to avoid breaking himself. The second is his violent, murderous outbursts, which he directed at anyone close to him. Charles even went so far as to kill his own knights.

8 Nero

Roman emperor Nero’s legacy as a ruler is complicated. Many reports claim he was beloved by the common folk, with some even refusing to believe his death and elevating him to the level of folk hero. On the other hand, many historians and nobles (the ones who tend to do the writing) saw Nero as a cruel, hedonistic tyrant who cared only for his own interests, not the Empire’s.

Though surely both are at least partially true, it is clear that he was a bit crazy, and many accounts support the hedonistic tyrant view pretty heavily. For example, when Nero’s second wife Poppaea died—which multiple sources say was Nero’s doing—he had a young commoner man who looked like Poppaea castrated and put in a dress. Nero married the young man and referred to him only as Poppaea.

7 Elagabalus aka Antoninus

Elagabalus was a Roman emperor, but unlike the (in)famous Nero, Elagabalus’s reign was short and has mostly faded into obscurity. What details have survived, however, paint the young royal as wildly depraved. Depraved enough to be assassinated and replaced by age 18.

Reportedly, Elagabalus had little to no interest in actually governing. Instead, he preferred having sex with anything and everything that moved. He had innumerable lovers, some of every age and gender, appointed whomever he was porking at the time to high-ranking government positions, and according to some, even spent his free time prostituting himself. 

Even worse to his fellow Roman nobles, he was an utter heretic, and replaced traditional Roman religion with fringe cult worship in his court, and so: off with his head.

6 Mustafa I

Mustafa I was a sultan of the Ottoman Empire just after its 16th-century peak. He earned the title ‘Mustafa the Mad,’ and with the way he was raised, it’s easy to see how.

It was customary in the Empire at that time for a new sultan to execute his brothers. Easy transitions, you get it. But when Mustafa’s older brother Ahmed I took the throne, the new sultan took pity on young Mustafa and instead locked him away in a windowless room. For 14 years. He then took the throne for just a year and was sent back to his room for another four years. Then another one year of rule. This imprisonment and extreme yo-yoing of fortunes took their toll on Mustafa. His social skills were nonexistent and he often would yank any beard within reach or throw his wealth away to nearby animals.

5 Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg

As consort to the King of Sweden, Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg had a lot of pressures placed on her. None more so than producing for the king a male heir, which she never quite accomplished. She had a miscarriage, a daughter who died within a year, and a stillborn son. Though her fourth (at least) pregnancy finally yielded a healthy baby, it was another daughter, whom she named Christina. Maria could not take it.

She called Christina a monster and repeatedly tried to injure and even kill her as a baby, though luckily, she was unsuccessful. By the time her husband the king died, Maria had completely lost it. She had the king’s heart placed in a golden casket and hung above her bed. She then forced Christina to sleep with her in the bed, night after night, the two of them below the dead king’s heart.

If Maria lived in today’s world, we might have recognized her suffering and gotten her the help she needed. However, she was victim to an era’s cruel beliefs and left alone to deal with the tragic outcomes of her previous pregnancies.

4 Princess Alexandra of Bavaria

Princess Alexandra of Bavaria was extremely intelligent. Refusing to ever marry, she instead devoted herself to her studies. She became a novelist, essayist, and translator. But underneath her brilliance and accomplishments, she struggled.

She was a notorious germaphobe and for some reason refused to wear any color clothing but white. Oddest of all, she became convinced she had swallowed an entire grand piano made of glass as a child. It’s hard to make that up. This caused her to avoid touching people and objects and even walking sideways through doors to avoid the frames, lest they touch her and break her (oddly similar to Charles VI of France).

3 Vlad the Impaler

Vlad the Impaler is one of the most notorious figures in history. Though considered a Romanian national hero by some, his cruelty was almost inhuman, and his reign was marked by many large-scale acts of torture and genocide.

The mythos surrounding him even caused him to become conflated with vampire mythology (for one, Bram Stoker borrowed his name Dracul for his title character). His insanity is less eccentric than others, more driven by pure bloodlust. Vlad would invite foreign envoys to his palace in the guise of peace talks, and then impale them, still alive, on stakes to die slowly and painfully. He is also famous for nailing turbans to the heads of Ottomans who removed to remove them in his presence.

2 Nebuchadnezzar II

King Nebuchadnezzar II of the Babylonian Empire is the O.G. crazy royal. His insanity is attested to all the way back in the Book of Daniel from the Old Testament. According to the book, he went mad for seven years, choosing to live in the forest as a cow, even eating grass. The psychological term for this is boanthropy, the belief that one is actually a cow.

Though this is generally considered a work of historical fiction, some believe that said events might have actually occurred, but perhaps should be ascribed to a different Babylonian King, Nabonidus.

1 Gaius Caligula

I mean, come on. How could the number one spot not go to Caligula? The Roman emperor (another one?!) has become the very embodiment of hedonism, decadence, perversion, masochism, and sadism (although the Marquis de Sade kind of has dibs on the latter).

Caligula took Nero’s cruelty and cranked it to 11. He took Elagabalus’s perversion and cranked it up to 12. Though an accurate account of his misdeeds is impossible, just a few of his greatest hits are: sleeping with his sisters and even prostituting them out, appointing his horse as a priest, converting his palace into a working brothel, and even having his guards throw innocent audience-members into arenas during intermissions so he wouldn’t get bored.

Nowadays, matters of alchemy and the occult are largely regarded as pseudoscience, but in the past, supernatural practices were taken more seriously. For example, the idea of a philosopher’s stone that could turn base metals into gold and grant immortality goes back to at least ancient Greece. Throughout the centuries, many people sought (and failed) to prove its existence. The occult was also a hot topic during the Renaissance; astrology was sometimes studied as a science, while the fear of dark magic led to feverish witch hunts. Here are 10 royals, historical and modern, who have dabbled in the occult.

10 Queen Elizabeth I

In 1555, John Dee was arrested for witchcraft after casting the horoscopes of Queen Mary I of England and Princess Elizabeth. However, he was exonerated and, a few years later, found favor with Elizabeth once she became queen. She even trusted him to select an auspicious coronation date for her, which was January 15, 1559, based on his astrological calculations. In 1564, he was “appointed Royal Advisor in mystic secrets,” and as her court astrologer, he also advised her on matters of state and science.

Elizabeth’s interest in mysticism seemed to stretch no further than astrology, while Dee delved deeper into the supernatural, believing he could communicate with angels through a medium. Dee fell out of favor when James I took the throne. He was once again accused of conjuring, and the new king refused to clear his name. James hated the occult and witchcraft so much that he published an entire book, Daemonologie (1599), devoted to the subject.^[1]

9 Queen Victoria

It has been speculated that Queen Victoria of England took part in séances, but nothing has ever been officially verified. This may be because the queen never actually had any interest in the occult. Or it could be because, after her death, her journals and letters were censored by her daughter, Princess Beatrice.

There is speculation that in 1846, Georgiana Elizabeth Eagle, a child clairvoyant, performed before Victoria and her husband, Albert, at Osborne House. Then in 1861, after Albert’s death that year, it is rumored that a teenage medium named Robert James Lees fell into a trance during a séance and channeled the departed spirit of Albert. Lees may then have conducted séances for Victoria to speak to her dead husband.

It has also been claimed that John Brown, Victoria’s favorite and long-rumored lover, acted as a medium to channel Albert. Still, there is no historical record of these conversations taking place.^[2]

8 Empress Alexandra Feodorovna

Alexandra Feodorovna was Queen Victoria’s favorite granddaughter and became a part of the Russian Romanov family when she married Emperor Nicholas II in 1894. Their son Alexei was born in 1904 and suffered from hemophilia, a condition where the blood does not clot properly. Alexandra believed in the occult, participating in séances and speaking with clairvoyants, and she sought the aid of Grigori Rasputin, now known as one of the world’s most famous mystics.

Alexandra and Nicholas brought Rasputin into their inner circle to heal their son, although some were riled by this, regarding him as a charlatan. But the couple were convinced of his magical powers, believing he could stop Alexei’s excessive bleeding. Some modern historians now think that it was actually Rasputin’s insistence that the boy not be treated with aspirin (which thins the blood) that caused his seemingly miraculous healing.^[3]

7 Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II

As well as juggling his many political responsibilities as Holy Roman Emperor, King of Hungary and Croatia, King of Bohemia, and Archduke of Austria, Rudolf II was also deeply involved in researching the occult. While matters of dark magic and witchcraft were criminalized during the Renaissance, astrology and alchemy were often regarded as legitimate scientific fields. When Rudolf moved the royal court to Prague Castle, the city became a center for the practice of alchemy.

Notable alchemists who visited his court include John Dee, Elizabeth I’s astrologer, and his companion-cum-medium, Edward Kelley. Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel also gained an audience with Rudolf, where the two discussed Kabbala, the Jewish mystic interpretation of the Bible. Rudolf is also the earliest known owner of the Voynich manuscript, one of the most famous texts written in a code or unknown language that remains undeciphered to this day. It is thought that he may have purchased the cryptic manuscript from Dee, but its history is unclear.^[4]

6 Queen Catherine de’ Medici

Catherine de’ Medici was born in Italy and became Queen of France in 1547 through her marriage to King Henry II. She was also the mother of the French kings Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III, and thus occupied a position of power for many years. Soon after the untimely death of Charles in 1574, a pamphlet circulated accusing her of witchcraft, which led to her becoming known as the Black Queen. It claimed that “through the wave of her wand and bewitching potions, she had changed us into wild beasts and torn out our humanity.”

More fuel was thrown on this fire when Jean Bodin’s book De la démonomanie des sorciers or On the Demon-Mania of Witches (1580) alleged that she had participated in a Black Mass during which a child was sacrificed. While there is no actual evidence of Catherine practicing (or, rather, attempting to practice) dark magic, she was certainly interested in astrology.

Cosimo Ruggeri served as her advisor and astrologer, and in 1555, she invited the seer Nostradamus to court after reading his predictions in Les Prophéties (1555). She had him draw up horoscopes for her children and, in the following years, made him Counselor and Physician-in-Ordinary to the young King Charles.^[5]

5 Emperor Yongzheng

Many historical Chinese emperors took alchemical elixirs in an effort to achieve immortality. Although the danger of these potions and pills was not unknown, numerous emperors succumbed to mercury poisoning in their quest for eternal life. The first Chinese emperor to die in this way was actually China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, who died in 210 BC. The last to die via a so-called elixir of life was Emperor Yongzheng, and it was surprisingly recent, occurring in 1735.

At the time, officials said that Yongzheng died from exhaustion caused by overwork. A rumor then spread that he had been assassinated by Lü Siniang, who was seeking revenge for the execution of Lü Liuliang, her father or grandfather (accounts vary). Based on court records, it is now generally accepted that he died from mercury poisoning. The true cause of his death may have been concealed at the time because few people still believed in immortality-granting elixirs, and officials did not want to bring shame to Yongzheng’s name.^[6]

4 King Philip II

As well as greatly expanding Spain’s influence across the globe, Philip II of Spain was also a dedicated patron of the arts and sciences, including alchemy. In 1584, the magnificent royal palace of El Escorial was completed, containing within its walls a church, college, library, and even alchemical distillation laboratories. It became a center of knowledge, with Philip furnishing the library with great works of history, science, and literature and inviting alchemists to work in the labs.

In 1591, for instance, Philip brought Irish alchemist Richard Stanihurst to his court after hearing that he had concocted a panacea (a cure-all potion). However, Stanihurst’s experiments with the medicine failed to come to anything. Philip was also interested in transmutation and had people attempting to turn base metals into gold. These experiments likewise failed to produce results. Although panaceas and transmutation are now known to belong to mythology, Philip II’s interest in alchemy stemmed from scientific exploration rather than a preoccupation with the supernatural.^[7]

3 Crown Princess Hwi

In the early 1400s, during King Sejong’s rule of Joseon, now modern-day Korea, Crown Prince Munjong married Lady Kim, making her Crown Princess Hwi. Their marriage lasted just a couple of years because Hwi was deposed for practicing witchcraft, or in the words of King Sejong, using “the sorcery of yin and yang manipulation to obtain the favor” of her husband.

The princess had appealed to her lady-in-waiting, Hocho, for help in gaining the prince’s love. Hocho told the princess to do two things: first, to burn the shoes of her romantic rivals and mix the ashes into Munjong’s wine to make him reject them; second, to rub snake sperm onto a piece of cloth and wear it on her body to win his affection. Sundeok, another lady-in-waiting, found leftover pieces of shoe leather from the ritual and raised her suspicions with King Sejong. He questioned the crown princess, and she confessed to everything. Hocho was subsequently executed, and Hwi was stripped of her title and banished from the palace.^[8]

2 King Frederick William II

Rosicrucianism, a spiritual movement that began in the early 17th century and sought out esoteric knowledge, counted Frederick William II, King of Prussia, within its ranks. When he was still prince, Frederick William was a member of the Masons, but he yearned for more mysticism than the Masons could offer. He believed that he could hear the voices of ghosts and occasionally held séances to communicate with them. He met a man named Johann Rudolf von Bischoffswerder during the War of the Bavarian Succession (1778–79), and when he fell ill, Bischoffswerder cured him with an esoteric Rosicrucian elixir.

The experience left its mark, and in 1781, Frederick William was officially initiated into the Rosicrucian brotherhood by Johann Christoph von Wöllner. When he became king in 1786, both Wöllner and Bischoffswerder were placed in positions of power. Bischoffswerder had a machine that could supposedly summon spirits, and during one séance held at Charlottenburg Palace, the ghost of Frederick William’s namesake, Frederick William, “The Great Elector,” apparently appeared and told the king to stop seeing his mistress.^[9]

1 Princess Märtha Louise

Not all royals who were interested in the occult are long dead and buried. Princess Märtha Louise is currently fourth in line to the Norwegian throne and makes her living working as a clairvoyant. In 2002, she withdrew from the royal household, giving up her official “Her Royal Highness” title and her annual $1 million allowance. She has since made a career from her supposed clairvoyant abilities. She is a motivational speaker and, for a number of years, ran an “angel school,” where she taught clients how to speak to angels and the dead.

In 2019, she faced controversy for using her royal title for financial gain after titling a seminar series, “The Princess and the Shaman,” which she ran with her self-proclaimed shaman fiancé, Durek Verrett. She agreed to stop using the title and, as of November 2022, has officially withdrawn from all royal duties. Still, the couple continues to be criticized by the press for spreading pseudoscience. Verrett has claimed that he can cure illnesses (including cancer) and rotate the atoms in a person’s body to make them younger and that he’s not a regular human but rather a hybrid of “a reptile and Andromeda.”^[10]

Being royalty or nobility comes with a lot of obvious perks, such as money and power, but there is no escaping death. In the past, being a monarch or leader sometimes meant meeting a violent end, whether that was on the battlefield or through assassination. However, there are also a number of more unusual and bizarre ways that have taken out high-ranking historical figures.

Historical records from the past cannot always be taken as absolute fact, so a few of these deaths may have been exaggerated, but they are interesting nonetheless. So, here are 10 of the weirdest ways that royals and nobles have reportedly left this mortal world.

10 King Pyrrhus Was Hit by a Roof Tile Thrown by an Old Woman

To die on the battlefield was often seen as an honor, but not all kings were blessed by being struck down by an enemy blade during an epic fight. King Pyrrhus, who ruled the ancient Greek kingdom of Epirus, was known as a brave and skilled commander, but his death at the hands of an old woman during the Battle of Argos in 272 BC was far from a glorious end.

The battle took place in the narrow city streets of Argos, and while Pyrrhus was fighting an Argive soldier, he was hit on the head and fell from his horse. The Greek philosopher and historian Plutarch writes that the soldier’s mother was looking down from her house, and “when she saw that her son was engaged in conflict with Pyrrhus, she was filled with distress in view of the danger to him, and lifting up a tile with both her hands threw it at Pyrrhus.” It is not known whether he was killed outright or merely dazed by this blow; either way, the enemy seized the opportunity to decapitate him.^[1]

9 King Henry I Ate Too Many Lampreys

While in France in 1135 to visit family and enjoy some hunting, King Henry I of England decided to indulge in a hearty meal of lampreys, a type of fish that looks like an eel and has a circular mouth filled with rows of teeth. Although Henry was fond of the fish, his doctor advised him to avoid them because, according to historian Henry of Huntingdon, “they always disagreed with him.”

Henry ignored his physician and chowed down on the forbidden fish. Soon afterward, they “caused a sudden and extreme disturbance, under which his aged frame sunk into a deathly torpor.” Henry I is not the only king to have eaten himself to death: Adolf Frederick of Sweden managed it in 1771 after eating copious amounts of seafood, then tucking into a semla bun, then another, and another. In total, he ate 14 of the sweet buns before experiencing stomach problems and dying.^[2]

8 The Duke of Clarence Drowned in Wine

The nobility was usually granted the honor of being privately executed rather than publicly humiliated, which means that their cause of death is sometimes uncertain. This is the case with George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence, who was executed for treason by his brother, King Edward IV, in 1478 during the Wars of the Roses. A rumor soon spread that rather than being beheaded or hanged, he was drowned in a barrel of wine.

Although it may have just been false gossip, his unusual death is recorded in multiple histories. Fabyan’s Chronicle (1516), for instance, mentions that Clarence “drowned in a butt of Malmesey wine.” His supposed death by wine gained even more traction when William Shakespeare included it in his history play Richard III (1597). In the play, Clarence is stabbed, and then one of his murderers declares, “I’ll drown you in the malmsey-butt within.” (I.iv.243)^[3]

7 Al-Musta’sim Billah Was Either Trampled or Starved

In 1258 Baghdad was attacked by the Mongols, and Al-Musta’sim Billah, the last Abbasid Caliph to rule from Baghdad, was killed by Hulagu Khan, Genghis Khan’s grandson. There are different stories about how exactly he was executed, but it is generally accepted that no blood was shed. The most popular accounts are that he was rolled up in a rug and trampled to death by horses or locked in his treasure room to starve to death.

In The Travels of Marco Polo (1300), it is written that Hulagu told the Caliph to “eat of thy treasure as much as thou wilt, since thou art so fond of it; for never shalt thou have aught else to eat!” Historian Nassima Neggaz states that trampling is now regarded as the more likely cause of death. She comments that while this is technically a noble death, as no blood was spilled, it probably “had less to do with honoring him because of his royal blood, and more to do with Mongol religious beliefs and superstitions.” Mongols believed that the soul resided in a person’s blood, so a bloody death meant their soul was free to seek revenge. Plus, breaking a person’s bones was believed to ensure that their lineage would be ended.^[4]

6 King Edward II Had a Hot Poker Inserted Into His Anus

Edward II’s rule of England was fraught with controversy, much of which stemmed from his relationship with Piers Gaveston. The nature of their relationship remains unknown, although many speculate that they were lovers. Regardless, the English king’s close bond with his favorite and poor leadership led to Queen Isabella and the nobility murdering him.

Many modern historians believe he was simply left without food and water to die of natural causes. However, medieval historians claim that a hot poker was inserted into his anus to burn his bowels. Holinshed’s Chronicles (1577) explains that this was done “so as no appearance of any wound or hurt outwardlie might be once perceiued.” This account was then further popularized in Christopher Marlowe’s history play Edward II (1594), where Lightborn murders the king with “a spit, and let it be red-hot.” (V.v.32).^[5]

5 Emperor Valerian Was Forced to Drink Molten Gold or Flayed Alive

The Roman Emperor Valerian ruled from AD 253 to 260 when he was captured in battle by the Persian Emperor Shapur I. As a prisoner of war, Valerian was subject to humiliations which included being used as a stepping stool from which Shapur would mount his horse. Sources vary in their descriptions of his eventual execution, with the most gruesome tale being that he was forced to drink molten gold.

An alternative story is offered up by Lactantius, advisor to Emperor Constantine I, who alleges that Valerian was flayed alive and his skin was then dyed with vermilion and displayed as a warning to the Romans that “they should not place too great confidence in their own strength.” Although neither account is verified, drinking gold and being flayed alive are both horribly painful ways to go.^[6]

4 Sigurd Eysteinsson Was Killed by a Dead Man’s Tooth

Sigurd Eysteinsson, the first Earl of Orkney, was the leader of a Viking attack on Scotland, and while few details of his life made the history books, his unusual death certainly did. During his attempted invasion of northern Scotland in 892, he agreed to an even fight against a royal steward called Máelbrigte. Each leader was supposed to fight alongside 40 men, but Sigurd cheated by mounting 80 men across 40 horses.

Sigurd won the battle, of course, and tied Máelbrigte’s chopped-off head to his saddle as a trophy. The Norse history text “The Orkneyinga Saga” reports that this was his fatal mistake. As Máelbrigte was known for being buck-toothed, a particularly prominent pearly white caused a wound on Sigurd’s leg as he rode. The wound quickly became infected, and Sigurd died. Máelbrigte may have been decapitated, but he got revenge in death.^[7]

3 Emperor Valentinian I Screamed So Much He Had A Stroke

The next time you let your anger get the better of you, just remember Valentinian I, who died of a stroke after screaming in rage. Valentinian was Roman Emperor from AD 364 to 375 and spent much of his reign defending the borders of the Roman Empire in Europe. Valentinian met with a group of Quadi messengers, the Germanic people the Romans had been fighting, to negotiate a ceasefire.

The envoy maintained that the Romans had been wrong to build forts in their land and could not guarantee that all chiefs would cease their attacks. Ammianus Marcellinus, a Roman soldier and historian, wrote that Valentinian then “burst into a mighty fit of wrath” and that once he had calmed down, he was suddenly “speechless and suffocating, and his face was tinged with a fiery flush.” Valentinian had worked himself into such a rage that it caused him to have a fatal stroke.^[8]

2 Emperor Qin Shi Huang Drank Mercury

In 221 BC, Qin Shi Huang unified China for the first time, after which he took the title of Emperor and then began the process of building the Great Wall of China. Alongside these huge achievements, he was also obsessed with trying to live forever. In his attempt to achieve immortality, he had alchemists prepare elixirs for him to drink, but his habit of consuming wine mixed with honey and mercury led to his death at the age of 49.

Mercury may also have followed him into the afterlife: He was buried in a city-sized mausoleum guarded by a life-sized Terracotta Army, which supposedly features rivers of mercury. Until his resting place was discovered in 1974, it was thought that the writings of the Han dynasty historian Sima Qian greatly exaggerated the magnificence of his tomb. But he was proven correct about the huge number of clay figures and may also be right about the rivers of mercury. However, this will remain a mystery until the technology is developed to enter the tomb without damaging the contents. It is doubtful that Qin Shi Huang was able to source enough of the liquid metal to create literal rivers, but high levels of mercury have been found in the surrounding soil.^[9]

1 Duke Jing Drowned in Feces

Duke Jing ruled the State of Jin in ancient China between 599 and 581 BC and died shortly after he abdicated due to illness. According to the ancient Chinese text the Zuo Zhuan, Jing consulted a shaman after being visited by a demonic entity in a nightmare. The shaman told him he would not live to “taste the new wheat.” Jing struggled on, and when the wheat was ready to be eaten, he had the shaman killed for making an incorrect prediction.

Either just before he tucked into his tasty wheat or just after, he suddenly felt the need to go to the toilet. It is unknown why, but Jing fell in and ended up drowning in the pit of urine and feces. Drowning in anything is a bad way to go, but drowning in excrement is particularly grim. The servant who fished his body out of the latrine also suffered a horrible death, as they were buried alive with Jing.^[10]