Instruct: Given a question, retrieve documents that answer the question.
Query: Who will be the next queen or king of England?
Mary, Queen of Scots (lived 1542–87) was a devout Catholic and next in line for the throne of England after Elizabeth. Her status became a major domestic and international issue for England. After the death of King James IV at the Battle of Flodden in 1513. The upshot was years of struggle for control of the throne, nominally held by the infant king James V (lived 1512–42, reigned 1513–42), until he came of age in 1528.
When Elizabeth died, her closest male Protestant relative was the King of Scots, James VI, of the House of Stuart, who became King James I of England in a Union of the Crowns, called James I & VI. He was the first monarch to rule the entire island of Britain, but the countries remained separate politically. Upon taking power, James made peace with Spain, and for the first half of the 17th century, England remained largely inactive in European politics. Several assassination attempts were made on James, notably the Main Plot and Bye Plots of 1603, and most famously, on 5 November 1605, the Gunpowder Plot, by a group of Catholic conspirators, led by Robert Catesby, which caused more antipathy in England towards Catholicism.
Today the Queen delegates much royal authority to Ministers in government, allowing the Queen to engage in the ceremonial role outlined by the Danish constitution. The Prime Minister and Cabinet attend the regular meetings of the Council of State, at which the Monarch presides and gives royal assent to laws. The Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs report regularly to the Queen to advise her of the latest political developments. The Queen hosts official visits by foreign Heads of State, pays state visits abroad, receives letters of credence from foreign ambassadors and signs those of Danish ambassadors. The convention for appointment of a new prime minister after a general election is that after consultation with representatives of the political parties, the Queen invites the party leader who has the support of the largest number of seats in the Folketing to form a government. Once it has been formed, the Queen formally appoints it.
The longest reign of a British monarch is that of the current monarch, Elizabeth II ( since 6 February 1952). The second longest reign is the 63 years 216 days of Victoria between 1837 and 1901. Queen Elizabeth II's reign became longer than Queen Victoria's on 9 September 2015. The third longest reign (and longest of a King) was that of George III, who reigned for 59 years 96 days between 1760 and 1820.
Jane Seymour (c. 150824 October 1537) was Queen of England from 1536 to 1537 as the third wife of King Henry VIII. She succeeded Anne Boleyn as queen consort following the latter's execution in May 1536. She died of postnatal complications less than two weeks after the birth of her only child, a son who became King Edward VI. She was the only one of Henry's wives to receive a queen's funeral, and his only consort to be buried beside him in St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle.
In April 2010, Brown asked the Queen to dissolve Parliament. The General Election campaign included the first televised leadership debates in Britain. The result of the election on 6 May was a hung parliament. Brown was re-elected as MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath with 29,559 votes.
On April 30, 2013 Queen Beatrix, abdicated in favour of Crown Prince Willem-Alexander.
The prime minister may advise the Queen to recall the governor-general, and (so long as the prime minister has the confidence of the House of Representatives) the Queen is bound by convention to implement the advice of her prime minister. As no New Zealand governor-general has ever been dismissed on the advice of the prime minister, it is unclear how quickly the Queen would act on such advice. Some constitutional lawyers dispute whether the Queen would implement such advice at all, while others argue that the Queen would delay its implementation. Others argue that the Queen would be obliged to follow the prime minister's advice, and further that the Queen would be bound to implement the prime minister's advice immediately if so advised.
The Kingdom of Scotland was united under the House of Alpin, whose members fought among each other during frequent disputed successions. The last Alpin king, Malcolm II, died without issue in the early 11th century and the kingdom passed through his daughter's son to the House of Dunkeld or Canmore. The last Dunkeld king, Alexander III, died in 1286. He left only his infant granddaughter Margaret, Maid of Norway as heir, who died herself four years later. England, under Edward I, would take advantage of this questioned succession to launch a series of conquests, resulting in the Wars of Scottish Independence, as Scotland passed back and forth between the House of Balliol and the House of Bruce. Scotland's ultimate victory confirmed Scotland as a fully independent and sovereign kingdom.
The Dutch royal family today is much larger than it has ever been. Former Queen Beatrix and her husband, Prince Claus, had three sons, Willem-Alexander (married to Queen Máxima), Friso (whose widow is Princess Mabel) and Constantijn (married to Princess Laurentien). Her sister Margriet and her spouse Pieter van Vollenhoven have four sons: Maurits, Bernhard, Pieter-Christiaan and Floris. Four of these seven princes as well as princess Margriet, are all (potentially) legal heirs to the throne, although the first right goes to the crown prince, and after him his daughters Catharina-Amalia, Alexia, Ariane, and then his brother Constantijn. Prince Friso lost his right to the throne because no approval was asked for his marriage to Mabel Wisse Smit to the States-General. The two other sisters of Beatrix, Irene and Christina, have lost their rights to the throne because their marriages were not approved by the States-General. They both married Roman Catholics and Irene herself converted to Roman Catholicism, which at that time (the 1960s) was still politically problematic for an heir to the throne. An additional complication which the government wanted to avoid, was that Irene's husband, Prince Carlos-Hugo of Bourbon-Parma (whom she later divorced), was a member of a deposed Italian dynasty who claimed rights to the Spanish throne. Traditionally, Dutch monarchs have always been members of the Dutch Reformed Church although this was never constitutionally required. This tradition is embedded in the history of the Netherlands.
Despite attempts by Edward I to conquer Scotland in the late 13th and early 14th centuries, the two countries were entirely separate. However, when Elizabeth I became Queen of England in 1558, a union became increasingly likely as she neither married or had children. From 1558 onwards, her heir was her Catholic cousin Mary, Queen of Scots who pledged herself to a peaceful union between the two kingdoms. In 1567, Mary was forced to abdicate as Queen of Scots and replaced by her infant son James VI and I, who was brought up as a Protestant and became heir to the English throne. After Elizabeth died in 1603, the two Crowns were held in personal union by James and his Stuart successors but England and Scotland remained separate entities.
In 1999, he opened "BBC 2000 Today", the BBC's coverage of the millennium celebrations, from Greenwich, England. He commentated on the funerals of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother in 2002, and former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 2013, as well as the state visit of US President George W. Bush to the UK in 2003. In 2002, Dimbleby hosted the Golden Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II coverage. A profile by Ben Summerskill for "The Observer" in 2001 quoted an unnamed former Cabinet Minister who had observed Dimbleby's career for many decades: "I suspect he has an almost medieval view, that the Queen governs through Parliament... There are a few quarrels among the subjects – over which he presides very capably – but they have very little to do with what Britain is really about." Dimbleby, though, has himself criticised what he sees as archaic elements of the State Opening of Parliament.
In the United Kingdom, Parliament consists of the House of Commons, the House of Lords, and the Monarch. The House of Commons is composed of 650 (soon to be 600) members who are directly elected by British citizens to represent single-member constituencies. The leader of a Party that wins more than half the seats, or less than half but is able to gain the support of smaller parties to achieve a majority in the house is invited by the Monarch to form a government. The House of Lords is a body of long-serving, unelected members: Lords Temporal – 92 of whom inherit their titles (and of whom 90 are elected internally by members of the House to lifetime seats), 588 of whom have been appointed to lifetime seats, and Lords Spiritual – 26 bishops, who are part of the house while they remain in office.
The question of whether the Queen or the governor-general is Australia's head of state became a political one in the years prior to the Australian republic referendum in 1999. Among arguments advanced in that campaign some were for retaining the office of governor-general as the monarch's (nominal) representative, and others were for a popularly elected head of state. Republicans included in their campaign the idea that the Queen is head of state and not Australian and, as such, should be replaced with an Australian citizen; this was summed up in their slogan "a mate for head of state". Opponents of the move to make Australia a republic claim in response that Australia already has an Australian as head of state in the governor-general, who, since 1965, has invariably been an Australian citizen. The governor-general in 2004, Major General Michael Jeffery, said at the time: "Her Majesty is Australia's head of state but I am her representative and to all intents and purposes I carry out the full role." However, the following year, he declined to name the Queen as head of state, instead saying in response to a direct question, "the Queen is the monarch and I represent her and I carry out all the functions of head of state." The governor-general normally represents Australia internationally, making and receiving state visits, but the Queen also carries out some official duties representing Australia outside Australia, such as in the United Kingdom.
Coronations in Europe were previously held in the monarchies of Europe. The United Kingdom is the only monarchy in Europe that still practices coronation. Current European monarchies have either replaced coronations with simpler ceremonies to mark an accession (e.g. Denmark) or have never practiced coronations (e.g. The Netherlands and Belgium). Most monarchies today only require a simple oath to be taken in the presence of the country's legislature.
The Kingdom of the Picts just became known as Kingdom of Alba in Gaelic, which later became known in Scots and English as "Scotland"; the terms are retained in both languages to this day. By the late 11th century at the very latest, Scottish kings were using the term "rex Scottorum", or King of Scots, to refer to themselves in Latin. The Kingdom of Scotland was merged with the Kingdom of England to form a single Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. Thus Queen Anne became the last monarch of the ancient kingdoms of Scotland and England and the first of Great Britain, although the kingdoms had shared a monarch since 1603 (see Union of the Crowns). Her uncle Charles II was the last monarch to be crowned in Scotland, at Scone in 1651. He had a second coronation in England ten years later.
With Henry VII's accession to the throne in 1485, the Wars of the Roses came to an end, and Tudors would continue to rule England for 118 years. Traditionally, the Battle of Bosworth Field is considered to mark the end of the Middle Ages in England, although Henry did not introduce any new concept of monarchy, and for most of his reign his hold on power was tenuous. He claimed the throne by conquest and God's judgement in battle. Parliament quickly recognized him as king, but the Yorkists were far from defeated. Nonetheless, he married Edward IV's eldest daughter Elizabeth in January 1486, thereby uniting the houses of York and Lancaster.
A decision was reached by Elizabeth's prime ministers at the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference of 1952, whereby the Queen would accord herself different styles and titles in each of her realms, reflecting that in each state she acted as monarch of that particular country, regardless of her other roles. Canada's preferred format was: "Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God, Queen of Canada and of Her other realms and territories, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith". However, as Australia wished to have the United Kingdom mentioned in all the Queen's titles, the resolution reached was a designation that included the United Kingdom as well as, for the first time, separate reference to the other Commonwealth realms. Thereafter, separate but parallel royal styles and titles acts were passed in each of the Commonwealth realms, granting Elizabeth a distinct but similarly constituted title in each state, meaning that when Elizabeth was crowned in the same year, she held seven separate titles.
The title of Marquess of Dublin, which is perhaps best described as Anglo-Irish, was the first to be created, in 1385, but like the next few creations, the title was soon forfeit. The title of Marquess of Pembroke, created in 1532 by Henry VIII for Anne Boleyn, has the distinction of being the first English hereditary peerage granted to a woman in her own right (styled "Marchioness" in the patent). The English title Marquess of Winchester, created in 1551, is the earliest still extant, so is Premier Marquess of England. The title long remained less common, and on the evening of the Coronation of Queen Victoria in 1838, the Prime Minister Lord Melbourne explained to her (from her journals): 
"I spoke to Ld M. about the numbers of Peers present at the Coronation, & he said it was quite unprecedented. I observed that there were very few Viscounts, to which he replied "There are very few Viscounts," that they were an old sort of title & not really English; that they came from Vice-Comites; that Dukes & Barons were the only real English titles; — that Marquises were likewise not English, & that people were mere made Marquises, when it was not wished that they should be made Dukes".
Not much is known about the queen and the dates of her birth and death are unknown. She is the possible mother of an alleged son of Blot-Sweyn, Erik Årsäll. She was married to Sweyn before he became king and was alive to be queen during his reign. She is the last known Pagan queen in Sweden and in Scandinavia. She became queen of Sweden when her spouse ascended to the throne. About 1087 her husband was deposed and killed; according to tradition, by being surrounded in his home, which was set on fire. No murder of a female is recorded, and it was also the custom to allow the women of the household to depart from the building in such a situation. The queen is therefore expected to have survived the death of her spouse. The above is related from legend. Nothing factual about her life is known.
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known internationally as the UK Parliament, British Parliament, or Westminster Parliament, and domestically simply as Parliament, is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, and the British Overseas Territories. It alone possesses legislative supremacy and thereby ultimate power over all other political bodies in the UK and the overseas territories. Parliament is bicameral but has three parts, consisting of the Sovereign (the Queen-in-Parliament), the House of Lords, and the House of Commons (the primary chamber). The two houses meet in the Palace of Westminster in the City of Westminster, one of the inner boroughs of the capital city, London.
Anne of Cleves (; 22 September 1515 – 16 July 1557) was Queen of England from 6 January to 9 July 1540 as the fourth wife of King Henry VIII. The marriage was declared unconsummated and, as a result, she was not crowned queen consort. Following the annulment, she was given a generous settlement by the King, and thereafter referred to as "the King's Beloved Sister". She lived to see the coronation of Queen Mary I, outliving the rest of Henry's wives.
Ælfthryth ( – 1000 or 1001, also Alfrida, Elfrida or Elfthryth) was an English queen, the second or third wife of King Edgar of England. Ælfthryth was the first king's wife known to have been crowned and anointed as Queen of the Kingdom of England. Mother of King Æthelred the Unready, she was a powerful political figure. She was possibly linked to the murder of her stepson King Edward the Martyr and appeared as a stereotypical bad queen and evil stepmother in many medieval histories.
Judith, a friend of Esther, relates the news to her. Esther replies that if she were summoned to dance, she wouldn't come either. Haman, seeing an opportunity to become closer with the king, devises a plot in which his eunuch, Gasparif will speak up at the kings meeting, and suggest his daughter, Zara, to be the next queen. In a conversation with Mordecai, Esther expresses that she would have acted the same way that Vashti did, reminding him that even if the king commanded them to break the sabbath, they would disobey him. At the meeting, Gasparif suggests Haman's daughter to be the future queen. Mordecai then speaks up, and says that he has a worthy candidate as well. The king then decrees that there will be a contest to see who will be the next queen. Haman, in a private meeting with Gasparif declares outrage over the kings decision, and tells him that he will pay dearly for causing this situation.
The Duke of Norfolk visits his elderly mother to see if one of his nieces would be a likely enticement for the king. His ambition is clear: he wants a Howard on the throne of England. We meet Catherine Howard, a pretty and foolhardy teenager, who confides in her cousin Anne Carey that she had sexual relations with a young man named Francis Dereham the previous summer. She is taken by her governess, Lady Rochford (the former sister-in-law of the late queen Anne Boleyn), to her uncle, who informs her that she is to be the next Queen of England. She states her concerns because of what happened to Anne but Norfolk assures her if she listens to him all will be well, and stresses that she must not show fear or timidity when addressing the king. Norfolk is unaware of his niece's sexually active past, and Catherine lies about it, telling him that she is untouched. She is taken to meet the king. Henry, long ill with an ulcer on his leg, is immediately taken with the pretty young girl. She nurses and flirts with him and Norfolk's dream seems closer. The king decides to take her as his wife but on their wedding night Henry's impotence is an obstacle. Another obstacle comes when the young Dereham comes to visit the queen and blackmails her regarding their prior romance. She gives him the job of Private Secretary to her, to keep him quiet. To secure her future, Norfolk insists she produce a male heir, in any way possible. Catherine (with the help of Lady Rochford as a go-between) begins a desperate affair with Thomas Culpeper, Henry's young and dashing personal aide, who is already overwhelmingly smitten with her. But months pass with no sign of a child, and the court begins to know about the affair; as well the rampant rumours concerning Catherine's past indiscretions with both Dereham and a music teacher named Henry Mannox. With disclosure threatened, Norfolk betrays his niece to the king before his enemies can. Culpeper and Dereham are taken to the Tower, tortured, and later executed. There is then a dramatic scene where Norfolk and the king's guards come to arrest Catherine and the Lady Rochford. Catherine demands to see the king, but is denied. She is taken to the Tower where she rehearses the speech she will give at her execution. The episode ends with the king preparing for an operation on his ulcerated leg and banishing Norfolk, who is now very violently out of favour. Henry tells him that if he ever looks on him again, it will be only on his head.