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// Workers AI · dad joke modeWhat did the universal monarchy say to its king? You rule everything.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A universal monarchy is a concept in which one monarchy is deemed to have sole rule over the entire world. Though a theoretical concept, many monarchs aspired to obtain large empires over vast territories.[1]

Concept

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Some philosophers in the Middle Ages, such as Nicole Oresme[2] and Erasmus,[3] were critical of the concept, whereas the orientalist Guillaume Postel was more favourable of the concept.[4] Universal monarchy is frequently associated with Dante's De Monarchia; although he used the term "universal monarchy" one time, what he actually argued for was a universal empire.[2] Protestants generally rejected the concept, identifying it with Catholicism.[5] Immanuel Kant anticipated that a universal monarchy would suffer from either a "soulless despotism"[6] or "frequent civil strife" occasioned by partisan attempts to break away.[7] Kant did, however, acknowledge that some form of "federative union" might be viable.[6] John Rawls mentions Hume, Montesquieu, Voltaire, Rousseau, and Gibbon as other authors opposed to the idea of a universal monarchy.[7]

History of the concept

[edit]

Egypt and Mesopotamia

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For the ancient Egyptians, the four directions of the world were regarded as "united in one head" of the pharaoh. Ramesses III was presented as the "commander of the whole land united in one."[8] Except for the Amarna period, Egypt's official ideology did not recognize coexistence of two or more kings.[9] The Hymn of Victory of Thutmose III and the Stelae of Amenophis II proclaimed: "There is no one who makes a boundary with him ... There is no boundary for him towards all lands united, towards all lands together."[10][11] Thutmose III was acknowledged: "None presents himself before thy majesty. The circuit of the Great Circle [Ocean] is included in thy grasp."[12] Asiatic kings recognized Tutankhamen: "There is none living in ignorance of thee."[13]

The genre of king lists was introduced into the Egyptian tradition during the reign of Unas of the Fifth Dynasty (2385–2355 BC). The ideological purpose of the genre was to stress the pharaoh's royal universality as the only legitimate king stretching back in an unbroken succession to the time of gods.[14] The contemporary Mesopotamian civilization had a much weaker tradition of universal monarchy, but it also developed a king list to legitimize their royalty as universal monarchs. Mesopotamian kings did not claim to rule all that the sun encircles, but they did claim to be "King of the Four Corners" of the world and "King of the Inhabited World".[15]

Europe

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In Europe, the expression of a universal monarchy as total imperium can be seen in the Roman Empire during its Byzantine period. The emperor, by virtue of being the Europe's predominant sovereign state and thus the de facto head of Christendom, claimed sovereignty over all other kings -- even though in practice this could not be enforced. The Byzantine conception of universal monarchy went through two phases. Initially, as Eusebius expounded, the Byzantines believed that just as there was one God so too there could only be one Emperor.[16] During the 10th century, this developed into the image of the emperor as the pater familias of a family of kings, placing him in a position of authority over the other rulers in the world.[17] The successor state to the Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, adopted this understanding of universal monarchy, particularly when military rule was augmented by the Caliphate.

The idea of a sole sovereign emperor would re-emerge in the West with Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Empire.[18] The idea of the Holy Roman Empire possessing special sovereignty as a universal monarchy was respected by its surrounding powers and subject states, even while the empire was weakened by severe fragmentation.[19] Frederick III's iconic phrase "All the world is subject to Austria" is an expression of the idea that all states are subject to one monarchy.[20] The medieval hierocrats argued that the Pope was a universal monarch, rather than the emperor.[21]

Charles V's empire encompassing much of western Europe and the Americas "was the nearest the post-classical world would come to seeing a truly worldwide monarchy, and hence the closest approximation to universal imperium."[22] It was envisaged by its supporters as a world empire that could be religiously inclusive.[23]

The idea of a universal monarchy based on predominance rather than actual total rule would later become synonymous with France attempting to establish hegemony over western Europe.[24] Louis XIV, stylized as the "Sun King" around which all the other monarchs were subordinate satellites, exemplified the universal monarch. In 1755, during the reign of his successor Louis XV, Duke Adrien Maurice de Noailles, a member of the Council of State and formerly a key foreign policy advisor to the king, warned of a British challenge for "the first rank in Europe" through the domination of Atlantic commerce. Noailles wrote, "However chimerical the project of universal monarchy might be, that of a universal influence by means of wealth would cease to be a chimera if a nation succeeded in making itself sole mistress of the trade of America."[25]

Monarchy was strong in Russia. The Russian monarchy was Orthodox, autocratic, and possessed a vast contiguous empire throughout Europe and Asia, making it similar in some ways to Byzantine rule.[26]

The British monarchy was "Protestant, commercial, maritime and free"[27] and was not composed of contiguous territory, drawing comparisons to the Spanish Empire. Both were "empires on which the sun never sets." But where Catholicism provided ideological unity for the Spanish Empire, British Protestant diversity would lead to "disunity rather than unity".[28] An Imperial Federation was later promoted by Joseph Chamberlain to provide unity through economic control.

Napoleon also had a sizeable empire spanning most of Europe. Following the Battle of Jena when Napoleon overwhelmed Prussia, it seemed to Fichte that the universal monarchy was inevitable and close at hand. He found a "necessary tendency in every civilized state" to expand and traced this tendency to antiquity. An "invisible" historical spirit, he posed, runs through all epochs and urges states onward toward that goal. "As the States become stronger in themselves... the tendency towards a Universal Monarchy over the whole Christian World necessarily comes to light."[29]

The last attempt to create a European universal monarchy was that attempted by Imperial Germany in World War I. "If Germany is victorious", thought Woodrow Wilson in 1917, "the German Kaiser would have been suzerain over most of Europe".[30][31]

Published after World War I, The Decline of the West by Oswald Spengler proposes a theory of global "Caesarism" (an authoritarian, populist, and autocratic form of government inspired by Julius Caesar's reign). Spengler writes that the formation of the "battling society of nations" marks the beginning of every civilization. This society ends by contest "for the heritage of the whole world." The strongest race wins and seizes the management of the world. At the same time, an "accelerating demolition of ancient [political] forms leaves the path clear to Caesarism." Spengler argues that Caesarism is an inevitable product of such an age. Democracy struggles against the rise of Caesarism, but inevitably, the latter will prevail. The transition from "Napoleonism to Caesarism" is an evolutionary stage universal to every culture that takes about two centuries. Spengler applied his theory to three "ages": he argues that the cycle began in China circa 600 BC, in the Mediterranean circa 450 BC, and in the modern world circa 1700. The culmination of Caesarism occurred in China with the First Emperor, and in the Mediterranean with Sulla and Pompey. In the modern world - Spengler predicted - it was still forthcoming, but global Caesarism was likely to appear in "one century"; the Spenglerian century ended in 2022.[32]

East Asia

[edit]

The title "Son of Heaven" emerged in China during the Zhou dynasty. The title denotes universality, ruling all under Heaven. The title also implies a higher celestial rule, in contrast to kings who rule between heaven and earth and modern presidents who are merely earthly rulers.

The inscription of the First Emperor of China said: "Wherever life is found, all acknowledge his suzerainty."[33] This Sinocentric paradigm survived until the 19th century. When George III of Great Britain proposed establishing trading contacts, the Chinese declined, because "the Celestial Empire, ruling all within the four seas ... does not have the slightest need of your country's manufactures." They added that George III must act in conformity with their wishes, strengthen his loyalty and swear perpetual obedience.[34]

The Chinese concept of universal monarchy was taken up by the Mongol Empire,[35][36] who under Genghis Khan were able to enforce the concept more widely than China. The Chinese Son of Heaven also contributed to a counterpart in Japan, and in some aspects, the Japanese made their monarchy more universal. The Chinese emperor was bound to the Mandate of Heaven, but no such mandate existed for the Tenno. Descended from the Sun Goddess Amaterasu in the immemorial past, one Dynasty is supposed to rule Japan forever. The Chinese ended their dynastic cycle in 1911; the Japanese Dynasty continues until the present day and is the oldest active dynasty in the world, albeit Douglas MacArthur un-deified it in 1945.

The Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain concept of the Chakravartin exemplifies the ideal of a universal monarch.[37][38]

Inca

[edit]

In the Americas, the Inca monarchy was universal in the sense of a sole rule over the whole contemporary geopolitical area, around which were only unsettled societies.[39] The Inca people called their state the "realm of the four quarters of the world",[40][41] a concept of universality in space analogous to the "four corners" of other universal monarchies. Similar to how the Chinese called their state "middle country", the Incas called their capital, Cusco, "the navel of the world".[42] Inca Garcilaso de la Vega calls the Inca monarchy one of the most absolute and divine in history.[43][44] The Incan monarchs "were respected as gods" and considered universal monarch.[45] The royal title, Sapa Inca (lit. 'the only emperor'),[46] implied that no other emperor could exist anywhere in the world. The Inca believed their king to be divine: the Inca founder, Manco Capac, was the son of the Sun God Inti, and subsequent monarchs were titled Sons of the Sun. They were mummified after death and worshipped as gods by subsequent generations.[47]

Features

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Universal peace

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Universal peace is a term given by Dante to Pax Romana. Not until the time of Divus Augustus, he says, was there a complete and single universal monarch who pacified the world. Then, "mankind enjoyed the blessings of universal peace," the greatest “of all things that have been ordained for our happiness."[48] ake the mausoleum the largest burial complex of a single ruler ever to have been constructed anywhere in the world.[49] With the rise of universal monarchs in Japan, impressive megalithic tombs covered their land and gave name to the Kofun period, meaning the era of burial mounds.

See also

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References

[edit]
  1. ↑ Schröder, Peter (2017). "The Concepts of Universal Monarchy and Balance of Power in the First Half of the Seventeenth Century—A Case Study". International Law and Empire. pp. 83–100. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198795575.003.0005. ISBN 978-0-19-879557-5.
  2. 1 2 Mastnak, Tomaž. Crusading peace: Christendom, the Muslim world, and Western political order University of California Press, (2002), p 329.
  3. ↑ Persson, Hans-Åke and Stråth, Bo. Reflections on Europe: defining a political order in time and space. Peter Lang. (2007), pp. 51–52
  4. ↑ Kuntz, Marion Leathers, Guillaume Postel, prophet of the restitution of all things: his life and thought, Springer, (1981), p. 171
  5. ↑ Simms, Brendan & Riotte, Torsten (Editors), The Hanoverian dimension in British History, 1714–1837, Cambridge University Press, (2007), pp. 168–169.
  6. 1 2 Kant, I., Perpetual Peace, translated by Lewis White Beck (1795; Indianapolis, 1957), p. 31
  7. 1 2 Rawls, J., (1993), The Law of Peoples, in Critical Inquiry, no. 20, p. 46, accessed on 12 April 2025
  8. ↑ Ancient Records of Egypt. Historical Documents from the Earliest Times to the Persian Conquest, ed. James Henry Breasted, London: Forgotten Books, 1988, vol. 2/1015, p. 418; vol. 4/398–400, pp. 198–200.
  9. ↑ Donald Redford, "The concept of kingship during the Eighteenth Dynasty," Ancient Egyptian Kingship, eds. D. E. O'Connor, & D. P. Sullivan, Leiden& New York: Brill Academic, 1995, p 168.
  10. ↑ Ancient Records of Egypt, vol 2/792, p 311;
  11. ↑ Mario Liverani, Prestige and Interest: International Relations in the Near East c. 1600 – 1100 BC, Padova: Palgrave, 1990, p. 58.
  12. ↑ Ancient Records of Egypt, vol 2/657–661, pp. 264–265.
  13. ↑ Ancient Records of Egypt, vol 2/1032, p. 424.
  14. ↑ Amelie Kuhrt, The Ancient Near East c. 3000 – 330 BC, London & New York: Routledge, 1995, vol I, p 31.
  15. ↑ P. Michalowski, "Memory and deed: The historiography of the political expansion of the Akkad state", Akkad: The First World Empire: Structure, Ideology, Traditions, ed. Mario Liverani, Padua: Palgrave, 1993, pp. 88–89.
  16. ↑ Nicol, D.M. Byzantine political thought in Burns, J. H. The Cambridge history of medieval political thought c. 350-c. 1450 Cambridge University Press 1988 pp. 52–53
  17. ↑ Nicol, D.M. Byzantine political thought in Burns, J. H. The Cambridge history of medieval political thought c. 350-c. 1450 Cambridge University Press 1988 p. 57
  18. ↑ Bryce, James The Holy Roman Empire p. 209
  19. ↑ Brissaud, Jean A History of French Public Law John Murray (1915) p. 77
  20. ↑ "AEIOU". Die Welt der Habsburger. Retrieved 2 August 2018.
  21. ↑ Sisson, Keith (2016). "Popes over Princes: Hierocratic Theory". In Sisson, Keith; Larson, Atria A. (eds.). A Companion to the Medieval Papacy: Growth of an Ideology and Institution. Leiden: Brill. pp. 122–23. ISBN 978-9004299856.
  22. ↑ Armitage, David The Ideological Origins of the British Empire Cambridge University Press (2000) p. 32
  23. ↑ Ocker, Christopher; Printy, Michael; Starenko, Peter (Editors) Politics and Reformations: Communities, Politics, Nations, and Empires Brill Academic Publishers (2007), 495.
  24. ↑ Simms, Brendan & Riotte, Torsten (Editors) The Hanoverian dimension in British History, 1714–1837 Cambridge University Press (2007) p. 168
  25. ↑ Shovlin, John (2010). "Selling American Empire on the Eve of the Seven Years War: The French Propaganda Campaign of 1755-1756". Past and Present (206): 121–149. doi:10.1093/pastj/gtp046.
  26. ↑ Gavrov, Sergey Modernization of the Empire. Social and Cultural Aspects of Modernization Processes in Russia URSS (2004) p. 50
  27. ↑ see Armitage, David The Ideological Origins of the British Empire Cambridge University Press (2000)
  28. ↑ Armitage, David The Ideological Origins of the British Empire Cambridge University Press (2000) p. 66
  29. ↑ Fichte, "Characteristics of the Present Age," 1806, Theory and Practice of the Balance of Power, 1486-1914: Selected European Writings, (ed. Moorhead Wright, London: Rowman & Littlefield, 1975), pp. 87–89.
  30. ↑ Fischer, Fritz. Germany's Aims in the First World War. (1967)
  31. ↑ Niall, Ferguson, Virtual History: Alternatives and Counterfactuals (1999).
  32. ↑ Spengler, Oswald (1922). The Decline of the West: Perspectives on World-History, (tr. Atkinson, Charles Francis, (London: George Allen & Unwin LTD), vol II, p 416, 419, 422, 428-432, 464-465, https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.264078/mode/2up?view=theater
  33. ↑ Chris Peers, Warlords of China, 700 BC to AD 1662, London: Oxford, 1998, p 95.
  34. ↑ Cited in Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives, New York: Perseus Books, 1997, pp. 14–15.
  35. ↑ Marshall, Robert Storm from the East: from Genghis Khan to Khubilai Khan University of California Press (1993) p. 156
  36. ↑ Sicker, Martin The Islamic world in ascendancy: from the Arab conquests to the siege of Vienna Greenwood Press (2000) p. 107
  37. ↑ Bhandarkar, D. R. Lectures on the Ancient History of India from 650–325 B.C. University of Calcutta (1919) pp. 85–86
  38. ↑ Beér, Robert The encyclopedia of Tibetan symbols and motifs Serindia Publications 2nd Revised edition(2004) pp. 160–161
  39. ↑ Arnold J. Toynbee, "Preface", Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru by Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, (Indianapolis: Hackett, 2006).
  40. ↑ Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, 2:11. Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru, (tr. Harold Livermore, Indianapolis: Hackett, 2006), p 11.
  41. ↑ Alan Colata, Ancient Inca, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013, p 1.
  42. ↑ Garcilaso de la Vega, 2:11; p 11.
  43. ↑ Alan Colata, Ancient Inca, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013, p. 8–9.
  44. ↑ Rafael Karsten, A Totalitarian State of The Past: The Civilization of the Inca Empire in Ancient Peru, Helsinki: Societas Scientarum Fennica, 1949.
  45. ↑ Garcilaso de la Vega, 3:6, 20; p. 13–14.
  46. ↑ Sutherland, A. (2016-01-27). "Who Was The Sapa Inca?". AncientPages.com. Retrieved 11 April 2025.
  47. ↑ "Mummification: The lost art of embalming the dead". livescience.com. 2020-07-15. Retrieved 2023-01-19.
  48. ↑ Dante, De Monarchia, 1:4-5, 16.
  49. ↑ Shelah, Gideon (2014). "Collapse or transformation? Anthropological and archeological perspectives on the fall of Qin," Birth of an Empire: The State of Qin Revisited, (eds. Pines, Yuri et al, Berkeley: University of California Press), p 129.
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