Five People Who Were Kings When They Were Babies
Let’s put this diaper-baby in charge of the kingdom, what’s the worst that could happen? The end of a centuries-long family reign?
Michael I of Romania: Five Years Old
Few people have benefited more from their dad’s infidelity than ol’ Mikey. When he was four years old, his father, Crown Prince Carol, was embroiled in an affair and forced to step out of the line of succession and move to Paris. So when his grandfather died less than two years later, five-year-old Michael found himself in charge of the proud country of Romania. The kid couldn’t hack it, and his dad was invited back from Paris to take over three years later.
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But Carol got into trouble again, and Michael was back in business within a decade. Most 19-year-old kings are kind of assholes, in our experience, but Michael’s second three-year reign was about as noble as they come. Romania had become allied with the Nazis, and Michael used his limited power and political capital to both join the Allies and oppose Soviet Russian pressure. He was exiled, but spent the rest of his life keeping the Romanian government in check from time to time. Once, when he was allowed into the country to celebrate Easter, he delivered a speech from his hotel window that drew a million people and almost caused a popular uprising.
Mwambutsa IV of Burundi: Three Years Old
A lot of the baby kings on this list totally blew it before they were even out of diapers. Not so with Mwambutsa. This guy was three years old when he had to step into his daddy’s shoes in 1915, and he remained king of Burundi for over 50 years. While he was still a little kid, Burundi got tossed around between colonial Germany and colonial Belgium like two bros having a catch. As he grew older, the state built schools to educate and convert him to Catholicism (although, hilariously, he was never a very good student and he never converted).
He navigated monarchy under colonial rule for a few decades, and managed to kick off the colonial shackles in 1962. That’s when the trouble started. He immediately had trouble getting the Hutu and Tutsi populations to play nice, and ultimately his Hutu officers attempted a coup. They failed, but he’d had enough, and self-exiled to Switzerland for the rest of his life. He gave his son the keys to the kingdom, but two coups later, the royal family was ousted by an independent president/dictator.
Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev: Three Years Old
Gyanendra of Nepal had a pretty rough start to life. A court astrologer told his dad, Prince Mahendra, it would be bad luck to even glance at his baby boy, so he was immediately sent to live with his grandmother. Mahendra must have snuck a peak, or seen him in the background of a picture or something, because three years later, Mahendra and his father were forced to flee to India, making Gyanendra the only member of the royal family still in the country.
The three-year-old sat on the throne for exactly two months before his grandfather was invited back into the country so as not to entrench an icky hereditary rule, and the world agreed to pretend it never happened. But five decades later, Gyanendra made it back to the throne, and got to work dismantling any checks on his power and trying to strong-arm the country out of civil war. He ultimately failed, ending his reign and the entire Nepalese monarchy in 2008 when the country transitioned into a republic.
Puyi: Two Years Old
When the 10th monarch of the Qing dynasty died without an heir, they just kind of eeny-meeny-miny-moe’d his miscellaneous nephews. Puyi won this unfortunate lottery, chosen to rule China at two years old. Being a pants-peeing toddler, he ended up blowing the whole thing and ending 2,000 years of monarchy by the time he was six.
But he didn’t let a little thing like deposition and the institution of a republic end his career. A loyalist general briefly restored Puyi to the throne for 12 days when he was 11 years old, and he was later defected to Japan and installed as the puppet leader of the made-up state of Manchukuo. After being captured, repatriated and reeducated, he miraculously became loyal to the Chinese Communist Party at the age of 53.
Ahmed Fuad bin Farouk bin Ahmed Fuad bin Ismail bin Ibrahim bin Muhammad Ali: Six Months Old
Fuad II has a family history of getting to be King of Egypt way too young. His father, Farouk I, took the throne at the age of 17 in 1937. By 1952, Fuad II was born into turbulent political waters. Through a series of power grabs I won’t pretend to fully understand, Farouk was forced to flee the country, and the Egyptian army declared that this little bean with next-to-no neck control was the new King.
Less than a year later, the monarchy would be abolished and Egypt would enter its republic era. Enemies of the erstwhile royal family didn’t want them hanging out together, so Farouk stayed in Italy, Fuad went to Switzerland with his half sisters and their mother was able to move back to Egypt after getting a divorce. Fuad’s citizenship was restored in 1973, and his passport now reads “Previous King of Egypt.”
