- How’d you like to be a king for a day? Or maybe 20 minutes?
Long-reigning kings, queens, emperors, and other rulers always go down in history. Everybody knows names such as Louis XIV the Sun King, Elizabeth II, and Queen Victoria.
But what about the other end of the scale? You know, the monarchs who were king for a day?
Well, nobody tends to remember them precisely because they didn’t stick around.
Let’s fix this mistake in historical recognition. Here are seven of the shortest-reigning monarchs and rulers from human history.
As a small disclaimer, we know there are plenty of others that slide between the ones we mentioned. These just had good stories behind them.
7. Louis II of Holland — 13 Days
Louis I of Holland left a really sucky situation for his son when he abdicated in favor of his son in 1810. Napoleon Bonaparte’s forces had marched across the border and there was nothing the small Kingdom of Holland could do to stop them.
The six-year-old Louis II was crowned king on July 1. On July 13, Napoleon annexed Holland to the French Empire.
On paper, that all sounds pretty bad. But the twist here is that all the involved monarchs were close relatives.
You see, Louis I was Napoleon’s younger brother. And ruthless as he was, Napoleon wasn’t about to hurt his little nephew.
Louis II ended up living a relatively comfortable life. Sadly, he died of measles when he was only 26.
6. Irina Godunova, Tsaritsa of Russia — 9 Days
Feodor I, the Tsar of Russia, kicked the bucket in 1598. As he died childless, his death put Russia in an unprecedented situation since — by the book — the person to become the next ruler would be Feodor’s wife, Irina Godunova.
Now, Feodor had made Irina promise that she would become a nun after his death. She, however, decided to take the reins of Russia to protect the country from descending into chaos.
At least that’s what she claimed.
Unfortunately, she failed to earn the nobility’s support. Irina granted to amnesty to prisoners to try and make the peasants like her, but that only released dangerous criminals into the world.
After nine days, Irina decided she’d had enough. She abdicated to prevent total breakdown of the Tsardom and retired to a monastery as she’d promised.
5. Henry V of France — 7 Days
Henry V of France (or at least that’s what he was supposed to be) got the real short end of the stick. His grandfather and uncle — kings Charles X and Louis XIX — abdicated during the 1830 July Revolution, leaving Henry next in line to become the king.
But the ruling regent, Louis Philippe of Orleans, who was supposed to declare Henry V the king decided to simply… Not to.
For seven days, Henry’s kingly status existed in theory, but without the official announcement, it didn’t give him real power. After waiting around for a week, Louis proclaimed that he was now King Louis Philippe I.
For the rest of his life, Henry mounted various attempts to regain the throne that was by law his. He never succeeded, though, and died in 1883 at the age of 62.
4. John II of Portugal — 4 Days
In 1477, things weren’t going well for King Afonso V of Portugal. After losing major battles in an ongoing war and getting betrayed by the King of France, Afonso decided he’d had enough and retired to a monastery.
Afonso left his kingdom to his son. On November 11, John II was crowned the King of Portugal.
Four days later, John’s father decided the monastery was actually a very boring place and put himself back on the throne.
John got to be the king for good in the end, though. Once his father died in 1481, John II returned to power and reinvigorated his kingdom before dying in 1495.
3. Napoleon II, Emperor of France — 2 Days
Louis II of Holland wasn’t the shortest-reigning monarch in the Bonaparte bloodline. That dubious honor belongs to Napoleon II — the son of the Big Napoleon — who ruled only for two days.
On April 4, 1814, the French Senate declared that Napoleon was no longer the Emperor of the French. The then-current laws of France dictated that power would be transferred to his son, who was at the time three years old.
He was never officially recognized as the French ruler, though. Furthermore, two days later, Napoleon renounced his and his descendants’ rights to the throne, ending Napoleon II’s theoretical two-day reign.
After Napoleon (the first one) became Emperor again and then lost at Waterloo, Napoleon II had another brief stint as the titular French Emperor, this time lasting for 15 days. He didn’t actually get to rule that time, either.
2. Lady Yuan, Empress of China — A Few Hours
Emperor Xiaoming of the Northern Wei Dynasty was assassinated on March 31, 528. After his death, his mother Empress Dowager Hu (who had orchestrated the assassination and was the real power player behind the throne) wanted Xiaoming’s only child to become the next ruler.
There was just one problem. Only men could become ruling emperors — and Xiaoming’s child was a girl.
Well, Empress Dowager Hu had the solution. On April 1, she declared that Lady Yuan, as the child later became known, was a boy and the rightful emperor.
She fooled nobody, though, and Hu was quickly arrested. Later the same day, Lady Yuan was replaced as the reigning emperor.
But hey — for a few hours, she was the Empress of China.
1. Luis II of Portugal — 20 minutes
France may have had monarchs with quick turnarounds with the Bonapartes, but Portugal beats them all. King of Portugal Luis II is one of, if not the shortest-reigning king ever.
On February 1, 1908, King Carlos I was assassinated in Lisbon. During the assassination attempt, his son Luis was also seriously wounded.
Carlos died on the spot, but Luis hung on to life — but only briefly. He died from his wounds some 20 minutes after his father.
Because they died so quickly after each other, Luis was never officially proclaimed king. That said, according to all the laws of Portugal, he should have become King Luis II.
For those 20 minutes that he managed to survive, he was basically the king. Sadly, his reign ended before it could even begin.