Regnal number
Regnal numbers are ordinal numbers used to distinguish among persons with the same name who held the same office. Most importantly, they are used to distinguish monarchs. An ordinal is the number placed after a monarch's regnal name to differentiate between a number of kings, queens or princes reigning the same territory with the same regnal name.
It is common to start counting either since the beginning of the monarchy, or since the beginning of a particular line of state succession. For example, Boris III of Bulgaria and his son Simeon II were given their regnal numbers because the medieval rulers of the First and Second Bulgarian Empire were counted as well, although the recent dynasty dates only back to 1878 and is only distantly related to the monarchs of previous Bulgarian states.[1] On the other hand, the kings of England and kings of Great Britain and the United Kingdom are counted starting with the Norman Conquest. That is why the son of Henry III of England is called Edward I, even though there were three English monarchs named Edward before the Conquest (they were distinguished by epithets instead).
Sometimes legendary or fictional persons are included. For example, the Swedish kings Eric XIV (reigned 1560–68) and Charles IX (1604–11) took ordinals based on a fanciful 1544 history by Johannes Magnus, which invented six kings of each name before those accepted by later historians.[2] A list of Swedish monarchs, represented on the map of the Estates of the Swedish Crown,[3] produced by French engraver Jacques Chiquet (1673–1721) and published in Paris in 1719, starts with Canute I and shows Eric XIV and Charles IX as Eric IV and Charles II respectively; the only Charles holding his traditional ordinal in the list is Charles XII. Also, in the case of Emperor Menelik II of Ethiopia, he chose his regnal number with reference to a mythical ancestor and first sovereign of his country (a supposed son of biblical King Solomon) to underline his legitimacy into the so-called Solomonic dynasty.[4]
History[edit]
Almost all West European monarchs and popes after medieval times have used ordinals. Ordinals are also retrospectively applied to earlier monarchs in most works of reference, at least as far as they are not easy to distinguish from each other by any other systematical means. In several cases, various sorts of "semi-regnal" members of dynasties are also numeraled, to facilitate their individuality in works of reference – in cases such as co-regents, crown princes, succession-conveying consorts, prime ministers and deputy monarchs. In the first centuries after the Middle Ages, the use was sometimes sporadic, but became established by the 18th century. In the past couple of centuries, European monarchs without an official ordinal have been rarities.
As a rule of thumb, medieval European monarchs did not use ordinals at their own time, and those who used were rarities and even their use was sporadic. Ordinals for monarchs before the 13th century are anachronisms, as are also ordinals for almost all later medieval monarchs. Still, they are often used, because they are a practical way of distinguishing between different historical monarchs who had the same name.
Popes were apparently the first to assume official ordinals for their reigns, although this occurred only in the last centuries of the Middle Ages. It is clear, from renumberings of Popes John XV–XIX and Popes Stephen II–IX, that as of the 11th century the popes did not yet use established ordinals. The official, self-confirmed numbering of John XXI means that at latest from the 13th century the popes did take official ordinals in their accession.
Emperor Frederick II, King Charles II of Naples and King Premislas II of Poland evidently used ordinals sometimes during their reign, whereas most of their contemporary monarchs did not. In the 14th century, Emperor Charles IV sometimes used that ordinal. Presumably, use of the ordinal of king Frederick III of Sicily also is contemporaneous. The royal chroniclers of the Abbey of Saint-Denis were using ordinals to refer to the French kings as early as the thirteenth century with the practise entering common usage among royalty and the nobility by the late fourteenth century. The British tradition of consistently and prevalently numbering monarchs dates back to Henry VIII and Mary I; however, sporadic use occurred at least as early as the reign of Edward III.
The long history of the papacy has led to difficulties in some cases. For example, Stephen was only pope for three days before dying of apoplexy, and was never consecrated. Because not all list-makers count him as having been pope (as Stephen II), there has been some confusion in regard to later popes who chose the name Stephen. Later Stephens are sometimes numbered with parentheses, e.g., his immediate successor (in name) is denoted either Stephen (II) III or Stephen III (II). The church did consider Stephen II a pope until 1960, when he was removed from the list of popes in 1961. The history of the numbering of popes taking the regnal name "John" is even more convoluted, owing to the long history of popes taking the name (a common name, chosen frequently to honour the Apostle), bad record-keeping, and political confusion; among other results, the regnal name "John XX" is completely skipped under all reckonings.
Queens consort[edit]
While reigning monarchs use ordinals, ordinals are not used for royal female consorts. Thus, while King George V used an ordinal to distinguish him from other kings in the United Kingdoms called George, his wife, Queen Mary, had no ordinal.
The lack of an ordinal in the case of royal consorts complicates the recording of history, as there may be a number of consorts over time with the same name with no way to distinguish between them. For that reason, royal consorts are sometimes after their deaths recorded in history books and encyclopaedias by the use of their premarital name or, if they were from royalty or sovereign nobility, the name of the dynasty or the country. For example, Henry VIII of England's fifth wife, Catherine Howard (of noble but not sovereign ancestry), is known by her maiden surname, and George V's wife (a descendant of the sovereign ducal house of Württemburg) is commonly known as Mary of Teck (after her father's title) and Edward VII's wife (a daughter of the King of Denmark) is known as Alexandra of Denmark.