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What does queen consort even mean ?

33 replies

Crouchendtigermum · 09/02/2023 15:40

just curious

OP posts:
Lonecatwithkitten · 09/02/2023 15:43

Consort - spouse of the monarch.

Some Queen who is the spouse of the monarch.

TeenDivided · 09/02/2023 15:43

Doesn't it just distinguish from Queen Regnal(sp?) or something?

So Consort os married to the King, Regnal is Queen in her own right?

TightFistedWozerk · 09/02/2023 15:47

Not-Queen, to appease the Diana woz murderded hordes. #meow

ahem.

In all honesty, I really don't know. This was first mooted around the time of the wedding of Charlie-Boy and Camilla-the-Hussy iirc. They have both been rehabbed very nicely. one of my kids has had dealings with Cammy over the years and says she is terribly funny and very charismatic

PurBal · 09/02/2023 15:47

As above: spouse of the monarch. Phillip was Queen Elizabeth’s consort. But he couldn’t be “King consort” because king is a higher rank and queen.

UnashamedLabelHo · 09/02/2023 15:49

Not Queen Regnant (the actual monarch like Queen Elizabeth or Queen Victoria).

She’s Queen because she’s married to the King, not because she inherited the throne. It’s like being Lady when you’re married to a Knight. A title you just get through marriage, not your own.

She is the King’s Consort. Like Prince Albert was Victoria’s Consort.

MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 09/02/2023 15:49

Consort just means wife of the king as opposed to queen regnant ruling in her own right. It's nothing to do with Diana, the wife of the king is and always has been the queen consort.

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 15:51

MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 09/02/2023 15:49

Consort just means wife of the king as opposed to queen regnant ruling in her own right. It's nothing to do with Diana, the wife of the king is and always has been the queen consort.

Yeah but usually she'd just be Queen Camilla, not the Queen Consort.

It's a sop to the Diana crazies that will presumably be dropped in time.

MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 09/02/2023 16:03

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 15:51

Yeah but usually she'd just be Queen Camilla, not the Queen Consort.

It's a sop to the Diana crazies that will presumably be dropped in time.

Consort is the official title. If she decides she prefers Queen Camilla, she doesn't stop being the QC.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_consort

Frankly the Diana crazies aren't going to like anything the RF does regarding Camilla.

Crouchendtigermum · 09/02/2023 16:03

Oh so Kate will be queen consort one day then too ?

kinda like queen in law I guess

OP posts:
MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 09/02/2023 16:04

Crouchendtigermum · 09/02/2023 16:03

Oh so Kate will be queen consort one day then too ?

kinda like queen in law I guess

Yep. And Philip was Elizabeth's consort. It just means spouse.

SenecaFallsRedux · 09/02/2023 16:07

I think adding 'consort" to Camilla's official title has more to do with distinguishing her from the late Queen than it has anything to do with Diana. Camilla is the Queen, but for 70 years Elizabeth was the Queen. I think in time consort will be dropped from Camilla's title.

Iwantmyoldnameback · 09/02/2023 16:11

It means Mrs King really.

CaptainMyCaptain · 09/02/2023 16:13

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 15:51

Yeah but usually she'd just be Queen Camilla, not the Queen Consort.

It's a sop to the Diana crazies that will presumably be dropped in time.

It really has nothing to do with Diana and applies equally to the husbands of Queen regnants like Prince Philip and Prince Albert, Victoria's consort. It's not a new idea. Diana wouldn't have been a reigning Queen she would have been a consort. Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother was Queen consort, Princess Catherine will be Queen consort.

GCAcademic · 09/02/2023 16:15

It distinguishes as the spouse rather than the ruling queen (Queen consort vs. Queen regnant)

WeWereInParis · 09/02/2023 16:17

It really has nothing to do with Diana and applies equally to the husbands of Queen regnants like Prince Philip and Prince Albert, Victoria's consort. It's not a new idea. Diana wouldn't have been a reigning Queen she would have been a consort. Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother was Queen consort, Princess Catherine will be Queen consort.

I think the point the poster was making was that it wouldn't normally be referred to. The queen mother wasn't called the Queen consort (although that's what she was), she was just called Queen Elizabeth, wasn't she? Articles wouldn't say the king and queen consort, they'd just say the king and queen.

SprungIsSpringing · 09/02/2023 16:17

SenecaFallsRedux · 09/02/2023 16:07

I think adding 'consort" to Camilla's official title has more to do with distinguishing her from the late Queen than it has anything to do with Diana. Camilla is the Queen, but for 70 years Elizabeth was the Queen. I think in time consort will be dropped from Camilla's title.

I think this too.

Elizabeth was The Queen for so long, I think this is just a way of leaving her with that for a while longer.

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 16:21

No other consort has used Consort as part of their title though - when her husband was a living king, the Queen Mother was Queen Elizabeth (and would have remained so if her daughter hadn't also been called Elizabeth). Or if any did (Victoria's husband?), it was the exception rather than the norm.

At the time of their wedding, it was announced that Camilla would need Princess Consort rather than Queen. I think the current use of Queen Consort is a sort of halfway house.

When Elizabeth II died, MN was full of "Not My Queen" threads about Camilla, many of them citing the adultery and treatment of Diana.

Of course, proclaiming that someone isn't fit to hold the title of Queen (or King, Prince, Princess etc) would indicate you're not a proponent of the monarchy. The whole bloody point is that we don't get to choose. She's married to the King, therefore she's Queen.

SenecaFallsRedux · 09/02/2023 16:57

No other consort has used Consort as part of their title though

Prince Albert's official title was Prince Consort. The husband of Mary Queen of Scots was King Consort of Scotland.

ladycarlotta · 09/02/2023 17:10

No other consort has used Consort as part of their title though

consorts are often referred to as such, historically. Often a King's wife will be described as his consort. Albert was actually styled 'Prince Consort', never King of any type. Same with Prince Philip.

It's trickier when women are the regnant because traditionally men got their wives' titles, for example Richard Neville married Anne Beauchamp and inherited her father's title, Earl of Warwick, through her ('jure uxoris' - 'by right of his wife'). But if a women is queen 'suo jure' (in her own right), it would technically mean her husband became king regnant via her (eg Mary II chose this for her husband William of Orange because she thought it wasn't right for him to occupy a lesser status than her - she was invited to rule alone but refused). Incoming kings were historically a lot more concerning than incoming queen consorts because women are meant to defer to men, so when Victoria became queen they wanted to make it extra clear that she alone had the right to rule the country, not any husband she might have. In fact she even had to propose to Albert, because of her higher status.

So... yes Camilla would always have been queen consort. I agree that her being explicitly styled as such is probably to differentiate her from our previous queen regnant. It might also be an attempt to be a bit more egalitarian, in that a monarch's spouse of either sex ought to be clearly identified as a consort rather than holding power in their own right - this isn't a measure that should only be applied to the husbands of female monarchs.

RustyBear · 09/02/2023 17:10

PurBal · 09/02/2023 15:47

As above: spouse of the monarch. Phillip was Queen Elizabeth’s consort. But he couldn’t be “King consort” because king is a higher rank and queen.

This isn’t necessarily true - when Mary I married Philip of Spain, Parliament passed an Act for the Marriage of Queen Mary to Philip of Spain in 1554, which allowed Phillip to be called King but set out his rights and limitations. For example, he wasn’t allowed to appoint foreigners to any officers, or to claim the throne if he outlived Mary. When Queen Victoria married Albert, she was advised that Parliament would refuse to make Albert King, and as far as I know, it wasn’t suggested for Prince Phillip, but that doesn’t mean it couldn’t happen in a similar situation in the future.

SenecaFallsRedux · 09/02/2023 17:33

As noted, Henry, Lord Darnley, the husband of Mary Queen of Scots, was made King Consort of Scotland.

Philip of Spain and William of Orange were co-rulers, as mentioned above, but William's title survived his wife's death, unlike Philip's case. Mary II had a superior claim to the throne as the daughter of James II and VII (William was the son of James’s sister), and William's secondary position in the succession was recognized in the settlement which provided that if Mary died first and William remarried, any potential children with a second wife would be after Queen Mary’s sister, Anne, in the succession, thus making her, after Mary's death, the only female Heir Apparent in British history.

One of the reasons for husbands of queens regnant generally not being called King is the historical notion that King is a higher title than Queen. In many European countries where the Salic law prevailed, only men could inherit the throne and so queens in their own right were very rare. And even in countries that allowed women to reign, men took precedence in the succession until very recently and still do in some (Spain and Monaco, for example).

It's certainly possible with more egalitarian rules about succession, the notion that King is a higher title can change and male consorts can be called King. With more queens regnant on the horizon all over Europe (Sweden, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Spain) and a move to have more equality between the sexes in these matters, we might see the King Consort title revived for the husbands of Queens.

x2boys · 09/02/2023 18:07

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 15:51

Yeah but usually she'd just be Queen Camilla, not the Queen Consort.

It's a sop to the Diana crazies that will presumably be dropped in time.

I thought it was more to.to.With the fact Queen Elizabeth The second was mainly known as just the Queen and she was the Reigning Monarch for such a long time ?
eventually Charles and Camilla will just be known as King,and Queen imo,but he's not even been crowned yet.

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 18:08

Aye there have been umpteen queens consort, but have any of them been known as Queen Consort and not Queen Firstname? Do we really think that however many years hence Kate will be Queen Consort and not Queen Catherine?

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 18:10

Or indeed that if Charles and Diana had somehow stayed married she'd be ok with being anything other than Queen Diana?

CaptainMyCaptain · 09/02/2023 18:10

JenniferBarkley · 09/02/2023 18:08

Aye there have been umpteen queens consort, but have any of them been known as Queen Consort and not Queen Firstname? Do we really think that however many years hence Kate will be Queen Consort and not Queen Catherine?

I expect she will be called Queen Catherine but she will actually be Queen Consort for all the reasons already given above.