#dei gratia rex anglorum

[dreamconsumer]

William Rufus, King of England (1057-1100).

[blackenedmagic]

Royal naming conventions.

These are the styles and regnal names of historic and current monarchs of sovereign countries in Latin. Hereunder, I will explain the meaning and significance of each.

Caesar Augustus.

A citizen of ancient Rome was often known by many names throughout their lifetime. The Romans had a system of personal nomenclature known as tria nomina (literally, "three names") comprising a given name (praenomen), a hereditary name (nomen gentilicium), and a cognomen, which originally served as a nickname but later became a hereditary name as an augmentation of the nomen. Perhaps history's most famous Roman, the consul Julius Caesar, was known as Gaius Iulius Caesar:

Gaius was his personal name;

Iulius indicated his belonging to the gens Julia, a ruling-class patrician family; and

Caesar indicated he belonged in specific to the most prestigious branch of the gens Julia, the Julii Caesares.

Caesar's ally and later enemy Pompey the Great was known as Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus. Again,

Gnaeus was his personal name;

Pompeius indicated his belonging to the gens Pompeia, conversely a lower-class plebeian family; but

Magnus was a cognomen Pompey earned for his military and political prowess in tribute to Alexander of Macedon, who was known and beloved in the Latin world as Magnus Alexander ("Alexander the Great").

Like his peers, Octavian was known by many names. At birth, he was Gaius Octavius, his nomen by virtue of his birth into the gens Octavia. Later, he took on the name of his granduncle and adoptive father, becoming Gaius Iulius Caesar Octavianus. Octavianus is the adjectival form of his nomen.

In 27 BC, following his victory against Mark Antony in the Battle of Actium, Octavian was acclaimed by the Senate as Princeps Civitatis ("first citizen"). Befitting his elevated status, he adopted a new name: Imperator Caesar divi Iulii filius Augustus.

In place of a praenomen, he adopted the military honorific imperator, meaning "commander." Roman militants who won the respect of their legionaries were acclaimed by the latter as imperator after a major victory. Julius Caesar was himself acclaimed imperator twice in his lifetime, once by his troops after a victory in Spain and once more by the Senate. In choosing to always be known as imperator, Octavian desired to associate the Senate and People of Rome with perennial victory. If you're very clever, you'll have noticed imperator is the root from which we derive the word "emperor," and princeps the root wherefrom "prince" comes.

Caesar, of course, reflects Octavian's status as an adopted member of the Julii Caesares.

Divi Iulii filius means "son of the divine Julius." After becoming ruler of the Roman state, Octavian took great measures to lionize and canonize the man unto whom he owed his legacy. The Roman imperial cult, the theory of divine right in its infancy, began with the canonization of Julius Caesar as himself a god. This move allowed Octavian to proclaim divinely sanctioned authority to govern as sole ruler of Rome.

Augustus, the name by which Octavian is most commonly known, was originally an obscure religious title in the republican era before being elevated as the honorific that signaled control of the Roman Empire. Thereon, a Roman became emperor when the Senate granted them the title augustus.

William the Conqueror.

William, Duke of Normandy, conquered the Kingdom of England in 1066, changing the British cultural and political landscape from predominantly Anglo-Saxon to predominantly Norman French. Everything from the kingdom's legal system to its language evolved dramatically. We have largely the Normans to thank for a heavily Greco-Latinate lexicon to supplement the Teutonic base from which Old English arose.

The Duke of Normandy acceded to the throne simply as Rex Anglorum ("King of the English"), a title first used by the Anglo-Saxon king Æthelstan in 927.

Elizabeth II.

Elizabeth Secunda, Dei Gratia Britanniarum Regnorumque Suorum Ceterorum Regina, Consortionis Populorum Princeps, Fidei Defensor.

The above is one of two official variations of the style of the British sovereign, the English and the Latin. As a matter of both personal style and convenience, however, this title is abbreviated by the Queen herself when signing her name simply as "Elizabeth R." Citations for court cases are customarily truncated to "R. v. Doe." During the era of direct rule over India by the British Empire, the sovereign would style themselves by their regnal name and "R. I.," meaning rex imperator (if male) or regina imperatrix (if female), respectively translating to "king-emperor" and "queen-empress." This titulature reflects the status of the king or queen regnant of the United Kingdom simultaneously serving as the emperor or empress regnant of India. Since after cession of India from the United Kingdom, of course, this title is no longer in use.

When offered the title "Emperor of the British Isles," George III refused. In addition to being king of Great Britain and Ireland, George was also, by virtue of heredity, prince-elector of Hanover, a state of the Holy Roman Empire. Should he have assumed the reign of British emperor, George III would have been an emperor who, in his capacity as an elector, swore fealty to an emperor.

Elizabeth Secunda means "Elizabeth, the second of her name," as Elizabeth Windsor is the second English queen of the same name since Elizabeth Tudor, known as Elizabeth I or the "Virgin Queen." But wait—wasn't Elizabeth Windsor's mother also a queen? Yes, she was. And wasn't she called Queen Elizabeth? She was, indeed. But that Elizabeth was queen in virtue of marriage to the king, George VI, the father of Elizabeth II. The difference is Elizabeth's mother, Elizabeth, was queen consort and thus accorded the title because she was the spouse of a reigning king. Elizabeth II, however, is a queen regnant, meaning she rules by her own right. Therefore, unless there were two Elizabeths previous to her, she could not have been styled "Elizabeth III."

Dei Gratia means "by the Grace of God." This title reflects the theory of divine right, a political and religious idea that legitimates the unfettered authority of a monarch by claiming the sovereignty of the same comes not from any earthly power but from God. In her capacity as queen, Elizabeth II answers to God in her duties, not the public. Needless to say, this doctrine has been wielded with impunity by absolute rulers to legitimize tyranny.

Britanniarum Regnum is the Latin name of the United Kingdom of Great Britain. Suorum Ceterorum means "his or her other realms," denoting the queen's status as not only sovereign of the United Kingdom but of 14 other Commonwealth realms and various dependencies of the U.K. Consortionis Populorum Princeps means "Head of the Commonwealth [of Nations]".

The title Fidei Defensor ("Defender of the Faith") was first conferred upon a British monarch, specifically King James IV of Scotland, by Pope Julius II in 1507, well before England broke communion with Rome in 1530 during the reign of Henry VIII. That the style of the British sovereign retains this title today means it survived the conversion of the liturgy of an entire realm from Latin to Anglican and the personal and later real union of the English, Scottish, and Irish crowns. Its presence also means the United Kingdom ranks among the only sovereign countries remaining that practice full-on caesaropapism, where the head of state (Caesar) is also the high priest (summus pontifex).

Francis.

Franciscus, Episcopus Romanus, Vicarius Christi, Successor principis apostolorum, Caput Universalis Ecclesiae, Pontifex Maximus Ecclesiae Universalis, Patriarcha Occidentis, Primas Italiae, Archiepiscopus et metropolitanus provinciae ecclesiasticae Romanae, Princeps sui iuris Civitatis Vaticanae, Servus servorum Dei.

The first thing to notice about Pope Francis' official list of titles is the absence of "pope." That's because, since at least the third century, "pope" referred to any kind of bishop.

Now, of course, "the pope" almost always denotes the bishop of Rome (Episcopus Romanus), the head of the Catholic Church (Caput Universalis Ecclesiae) and its high priest (Pontifex Maximus). Vicarius Christi is "Vicar of Christ," referring to the pope's primary mission as the earthly representative of God begotten of flesh.

As of 2006, Patriarcha Occidentis is obsolete. It means "patriarch of the West," in contradistinction to the ecumenical patriarch of the Eastern Orthodox Church, the archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome. Any inclusion of this title has been meant to explicitly acknowledge the break of communion between the Greek East and the Latin West since 1054.

Primas Italiae ("primate of Italy") and Archiepiscopus et metropolitanus provinciae ecclesiasticae Romanae ("archbishop and metropolitan of the Roman Province") reflect the Roman pontiff's status as an archbishop.

Princeps sui iuris Civitatis Vaticanae indicates the pope's role as ruler of the Vatican City State. Because of its use to identify the Roman emperor, princeps or primus ("first, foremost") is the standard Latin translation for "head of state." Perhaps the most interesting part of papal titulature is sui iuris, meaning "of one's own right." This term is used almost exclusively by the Catholic Church to denote churches with varying degrees of autonomy from Rome. In the context of the papal style, therefore, sui iuris probably refers to the pope's own autonomy in jurisdiction over the Vatican, its boundaries, its laws, and its politics.

The final item in the papal style is Servus servorum Dei ("servant of the servants of God"). This title was first used by Pope Gregory I as a sort of humble-brag in contrast to his eastern counterpart, John the Faster, assuming the more overtly preeminent "ecumenical patriarch" title.