Top 5 Strangest Monarchs

Sunday, December 4, 2011

5. Emperor Norton I
Reign: 1859-1880 (unofficially)



In the 19th century, the United States was unofficially “ruled” by Emperor Norton I, a San Francisco native who declared himself “Emperor of the United States” and “Protector of Mexico.” Emperor Norton’s real name was Joshua Abraham Norton. A British national, he came to the U.S. in 1849 as a wealthy man, but a string of poor investments soon left him nearly broke. His financial troubles supposedly lead to him developing a number of eccentricities and delusions of grandeur, and in 1859 he officially declared himself the ruler of America. Local newspapers originally published Norton’s claim as a joke, but he became beloved by San Francisco’s locals, who gave him a regal uniform and addressed him in public as “your highness.” Norton spent much of his early reign issuing edicts to dissolve the “corrupt” U.S. congress and officially declare himself Emperor. But when his efforts were ignored, he turned to local matters. He was known to stroll through the city streets inspecting roads and buildings, and he even issued his own money, which was widely accepted by local merchants. Norton was a poor man, but he was allowed to eat in San Francisco’s finest restaurants and was given seats to any new play that opened. In exchange, he would place an imperial seal of approval by the establishment’s front door. Norton I died in 1880 after collapsing in the street. Grand obituaries were written in all the local papers, and his funeral was supposedly attended by as many as 30,000 people.
Despite his obvious mental problems, Norton I often demonstrated remarkable foresight. He proposed that a “League of Nations” be formed years before the U.S. government considered it, and he decreed that a bridge be built linking Oakland and San Francisco, which also eventually became a reality. But this doesn’t mean that all of his edicts were completely rational. In 1872, he declared that anyone who referred to his fair city by “the abominable word ‘Frisco’” would be fined the sum of $25.
4. Ibrahim I of the Ottoman Empire
Reign: 1640-1648


Also known as “Ibrahim the Mad,” Ibrahim I was the most mentally unstable of a series of insane and cruel Turkish sultans that ruled the Ottoman Empire during the 16th and 17th century. Ibrahim is believed to have suffered from a host of mental illnesses, all of which were no doubt encouraged by “the Cage,” a windowless building where he was kept for most of his youth. When his brother died in 1640, 23-year old Ibrahim was released and declared sultan. Ecstatic and more than a bit unhinged, he immediately made up for lost time by building up a harem of virgins to satisfy his voracious sexual appetite. Ibrahim supposedly enjoyed having his concubine gather in a palace courtyard so that he could gallop around them while “neighing like a stallion.” He also had a fetish for fat women, and at one point sent his servants on a quest to find the heftiest lady in all the land. They returned with a 350-pound woman nicknamed “sugar cube,” who became a favorite member of his harem. Ibrahim’s excesses didn’t end with sex. The Sultan was also greedy, and his agents frequently looted houses to provide him with perfumes, clothes, and anything else he desired. He was also notoriously violent. In addition to ordering executions and torture at will, Ibrahim once threw his baby son in a pool of water, and later stabbed the boy in the face out of anger. This kind of debauchery and wanton cruelty won Ibrahim his fair share of enemies, and in 1648 a coup was staged. After being captured, the Sultan was briefly put back into “the Cage” before being strangled to death by a gang of assassins.
Ibrahim was known for his impulsive, terrifically violent behavior. For example, when the Sultan received information that a member of his harem had been “compromised,” he proceeded to have a number of the women tortured. When he couldn’t get any of them to give a name, Ibrahim had 280 members of the harem thrown into a lake and drowned.|
3. Juana I of Spain
Reign: 1504-1555

Also known as “Juana the Mad,” Juana de Castile became the first Queen of the Hapsburg dynasty when she married Philip of Burgundy in 1496. The couple started out madly in love—unusual for an arranged royal marriage—but things soon became complicated. Juana was as jealous as Philip was promiscuous, and his infidelities soon drove her into a state of extreme paranoia. Because her husband would chase after any attractive lady of the court, Juana took to only including old and ugly women in her retinue, and in one case she even have attacked a woman she believed to be her husband’s mistress. Desperate to for Philip to be true to her, Juana started consulting sorcerers and using love potions, and when her husband ignored her she even briefly went on a hunger strike. Whether or not Juana was actually “crazy,” is debatable, but this kind of erratic behavior—along with the desire of the men around her to usurp her power—eventually led to her being locked away in a castle for the latter part of her life.
Queen Juana’s eccentricities ramped up considerably in 1506, when Philip died after a brief illness. Utterly distraught, Juana constantly wore black and wept uncontrollably, and she even had the coffin opened on several different occasions so that she could kiss the feet of her husband’s corpse. Worried that her husband would cheat even in death, Juana forbid any women from coming near his coffin, even nuns.
2. George III of England
Reign: 1760-1820

Perhaps the most famous case of royal madness involved England’s George III, who suffered from recurring bouts of mental illness throughout the latter part of his life. Modern historians have theorized that the King probably suffered from porphyria, a blood disease, but George’s doctors were forever at a loss to diagnose his condition. The King would rant, rave and insult and curse at his servants to the point that his caretakers were often forced to gag him and confine him with a straight jacket. A team of doctors was enlisted to help King George, but their primitive treatments, which included everything from purging and blistering to bloodletting, only seemed to make his condition worse. Soon, the King began to become delusional. He developed the belief that London was flooding, gave orders to imaginary or long-dead court officials, and once even tried to sexually assault one of his servants. In a bizarre episode on Christmas Day, the King named his pillow “Prince Octavius” and celebrated that it “was to be new born this day.” The King did have moments of clarity, and for a time his illness abated. But with age the delusions returned, and after losing a good deal of his sight and hearing, George III was kept in seclusion until his death.
Strangest Behavior
One of King George’s more bizarre delusions occurred during his first outbreak of illness, when he met and developed an obsession with a woman named Elizabeth Spencer. In the heat of his infatuation, George began to believe that he and Elizabeth were married, and he even claimed that his own wife, Queen Charlotte, was an impostor intent on killing him.
1. Caligula
Reign: AD 37-AD 41

Caligula only served as Rome’s emperor for four years, but in that short span he managed to establish himself as one of the cruelest and weirdest rulers in history. He was only 25 when he rose to power, and while for the first two years of his reign he was well liked and seemed a capable leader, those in the know rarely doubted that the emperor was stark raving mad. These psychotic tendencies would eventually come out in some of Caligula’s laws. For one, he made it illegal for anyone to look him in the face, an offence that was punishable by being thrown into a lions’ den. He also delighted in torture and executions, and took great pains to think up new ways to dispatch his enemies (one of his personal favorites was said to involve covering the condemned in honey and setting loose an army of wasps). Of course, today Caligula is best known for his deviant sexual behavior. This involved everything from bisexuality and bestiality to even incest (he was rumored to have slept with all three of his sisters). He was fond of great excesses, and along with declaring himself a demigod and frequently holding gluttonous feasts and parties, Caligula turned the Imperial palace into a veritable whorehouse, complete with days-long orgies. Not surprisingly, Caligula’s insanity and cruelty eventually drew the ire of his political rivals, who successfully murdered the emperor and his family in AD 41.
Some of Caligula’s weirdest exploits involved his favorite horse, Incitatus. The emperor dressed the animal in lavish blankets, and had it housed in a marble stable and tended to by a small army of handlers. Caligula even let the horse eat from the table during dinner parties, and guests were frequently invited to the palace at Incitatus’s behest. Still, the most ridiculous extravagance came when Caligula announced his intention to make Incitatus an official citizen of Rome, and later a Consul and even a priest.
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