Medieval Kings with Mental Illness

M E D I E V A L R U L E R S W I T H

MENTAL ILLNESS

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Have you ever wondered if some medieval rulers had a mental illness? Here I share a list of medieval rulers with mental illness and the conditions that scholars believed they had.

Known as Charles le Fou ("Charles the Mad"), he suffered from bouts of psychosis, including glass delusion. Glass delusion is an external manifestation of people who feared they were made of glass and therefore likely to shatter into pieces. He refused to allow people to touch him and wore reinforced clothing to protect himself from accidental "shattering".

HENRY VI OF ENGLAND Lived: 1421–1471 Ruled: 1422–1461 and 1470–1471

A breakdown in 1453 caused him to neglect state affairs for more than a year. A Lord Protector was appointed on that and two subsequent occasions to govern the kingdom. The ensuing succession struggles gave rise to the Wars of the Roses.

www.kimvermaak.com JOANNA OF CASTILE Lived: 1479–1555Ruled 1504–1555

Known as Juana la Loca ("Joanna the Mad"), is believed by historians to have suffered from melancholia, psychosis or schizophrenia.

Melancholia is the predecessor of the mental health diagnosis of clinical depression.

Psychosis is an abnormal condition of the mind that results in difficulties determining what is real and what is not real.Schizophrenia is a psychiatric disorder characterised by continuous or relapsing episodes of psychosis. Major symptoms include hallucinations (often hearing voices), delusions, and disorganized thinking. ERIC XIV OF SWEDEN Lived:1533–1577 Ruled: 1560–1568

He developed paranoia and irrational, violent streaks later in his life leading to an erratic rule and the brutal murders of several real or perceived political rivals in the Sture Murders. Eric himself stabbed Nils Svantesson Sture to death. www.kimvermaak.com KING PHILIP V OF SPAIN Lived: 1683–1746 Ruled: 1700–24, 1724–4

He suffered from intense melancholia, a predecessor of the mental health diagnosis of clinical depression.

QUEEN MARIA I OF PORTUGAL Lived 1734–1816 Ruled 1777–1816

Known as Maria, a Louca ("Mary the Mad"). Around 1790 Maria's long-expressed anxieties developed into religiously themed delusions. Her ministers determined that she was insane and appointed her son João to govern the kingdom.

www.kimvermaak.com GEORGE III OF THE UNITED KINGDOM Lived 1738–1820 Ruled 1760–1820

He exhibited signs of mental disorder, in the form of logorrhea, as early as 1788. He fell into a profound depression after the death of his beloved Princess Amelia, and Parliament delegated his state duties to George, Prince of Wales.

In psychology, logorrhea, also known as press speech, is a communication disorder that causes excessive wordiness and repetitiveness, which can cause incoherency.

They often report this ailment as a symptom of Wernicke's aphasia, where damage to the language processing center of the brain creates difficulty in self-centered speech.and disorganized thinking.

www.kimvermaak.com LUDWIG II OF BAVARIA Lived 1845–1886 Ruled 1864–1886

This ruler irritated his ministers with his uncontrolled spending on magnificent castles. With no end in sight, they arranged for a panel of psychiatrists to declare him insane and installed his uncle as regent. Although by political concerns, motivated ministers, scholars have offered medical explanations that include frontotemporal dementia, schizotypal personality disorder and Pick's disease.

The frontotemporal dementias (FTD) encompass six types of dementia involving the frontal or temporal lobes. Schizotypal personality disorder (STPD), or schizotypal disorder, is a mental disorder characterized by severe social anxiety, thought disorder, paranoid ideation, derealization, transient psychosis and often unconventional beliefs.

People with this disorder feel extreme discomfort with maintaining close relationships with people and avoid forming them, mainly because the subject thinks their peers harbor negative thoughts towards them www.kimvermaak.com CHRISTIAN VII OF DENMARK Lived: 1749–1808 Ruled 1767–1808

Although never completely incapacitated, Christian displayed severe emotional and moral instability, and members of his court and personal staff struggled to build a functioning government around him.

OTTO OF BAVARIA Lived: 1848–1916 Ruled 1886–1913

Otto suffered from depression, anxiety and insomnia throughout his life. In 1886, the senior royal medical officer wrote a statement declaring that Otto was severely mentally ill. Scholars believe Otto to have suffered from schizophrenia.

www.kimvermaak.com NEBUCHADNEZZAR II Lived 634 BC–c. 562 BCR uled c. 605 BC–c. 562 BC

The Christian Bible describes him as displaying symptoms consistent with boanthropy Boanthropy 'still occurs today when a person, in a delusional state, believes themselves to be an ox or cow... and attempts to live and behave accordingly

Alhtough this ruler is not from the medieval period, I have included him as he suffered from an erliest known form of a real condition that affected the next ruler on the list.

MAJD AL-DAWLA Lived: 993–1029, Ruled 997–1029

He was suffering from boanthropy until Avicenna cured him, according to Persian traditions.

Disclaimer: This information is to provide information for fellow authors and history fans only and not to provide any diagnosis.