In the olden days, did kings rule the kingdom all by himself?

Question

in the days of the older centuries, where the kings the only ones that ruled the kingdom or was there a "queen regent"?

Answer 1

the King of course was the lord of the land, but he had magistrates and barons to rule his individual provinces

Answer 2

Kings very rarely ruled kingdoms by themselves. Too much to know and do. They had advisors. Sometimes these advisors were their wives. Most often, though, they were men of religion.

The king was the last resort, though. He signed the acts of war, proclamations, officers' commissions, death sentences, etc.  Even minor things like tax notices wre signed in his name.

Occasionally, the queen might also sign things. But that was when she ruled as a monarch regnant, like Isabella with Ferdinand in Spain, or William and Mary in England. They were co-rulers. Kind of a nice idea.

Answer 3

Nope. No Queen Regent - kings ruled all by themselves. That was one of the things that led to the Magna Carta - it was a step towards ruling in kings and making them pay attention to something other than their own whims and desires, and acknowledging that people had rights that even a king could not trample.

Answer 4

Just to add a point to Lordreith's bit about co-rulers: the thing about Ferdinand and Isabella was that she was the rightful queen of Castile, and he was the king of Aragon - these were actually separate and independent kingdoms. It wasn't as though he had married some girl and said "Here, honey, now you're my Queen you can sign things too". She was top dog in Castile.

Similar thing with William and Mary - she was the one with the title to the English throne, he was just her foreign husband. She could have just made him Prince Consort (as her sister Anne was later to do with her husband), but she decided to let him have joint status with her.

Answer 5

The king did rule by himself generally but he would have people under him. Dukes, Marquess's, Earls or Counts and Barons were all under the king and owed allegiance to the king. They typically were the administrators of areas of the kingdom. Their roles changed over time to more of a ceremonial role. The king would also have advisors and other aides and assistants. By comparison there were relatively few Queen Regnants.  The inheritance laws basically forbid it in many countries. Most countries either followed Salic Law in which the eldest male relative would inherit the throne. Or they followed male line primogeniture. In which inheritance would go to the eldest male child of the king and then to the younger male children. If there were no male children then a female could inherit the throne. Many women were also cheated out of the throne for a male cousin or something because nobody wanted to have a queen. If a women were to inherit the throne they would be the ruler by themselves. A few queen regnants were Elizabeth I of England, Catherine the Great of Russia and Queen Victoria of England and the current English monarch Queen Elizabeth II.

Answer 6

The king did rule the land, but there also were Marquis, Earls, Barons, Dukes, Counts, and Lords. Of course they were married, but women had little say in the matter. If the man of the house was away though, the wives took control.