Although they may seem like a different breed, the truth is that royals are just as prone
to drama as the rest of us.
As such, there's no shortage of disastrous royal marriages to be found in the annals
of history.
Here are some of the very worst.
Armed with a top-notch education and a humongous inheritance, Eleanor of Aquitaine was one
of the most powerful women of the Middle Ages — and by quite some margin, too.
She was first crowned Queen of France after marrying Louis VII, and enjoyed considerable
influence over the king.
Things weren't exactly rosy between these two lovebirds, though.
Simmering resentment, rumors of her infidelity, and the birth of two daughters rather than
a male heir led the couple to annul their marriage in 1152.
They cited "consanguinity" as the reason — that is, the fact that they were third cousins,
once removed.
But consanguinity didn't stop Eleanor from marrying another, more closely related third
cousin just two months later.
Her second husband, Henry of Anjou, later became King Henry II of England.
Over nearly two decades, Eleanor played an active role in ruling Henry's empire… while
birthing five sons and three daughters along the way.
But they weren't exactly a happy family, either.
In 1173, two of Eleanor's sons involved her in a plot against Henry, and she willingly
offered them no small amount of military support.
Some historians even wonder if Eleanor instigated the revolt herself as vengeance against her
husband's infidelities.
Either way, Henry II soon found out about the plot and imprisoned Eleanor for 16 years.
She was freed after Henry's death in 1189, but ultimately couldn't escape her husband:
Upon her death in 1204, she was buried next to him in France's Fontevraud Abbey.
Better known as the "She-Wolf of France," Isabella of France's rise to power began in
1308, with her marriage to Edward II and their coronation as king and queen.
By that point, however, Edward had been infatuated with a southern French nobleman named Piers
Gaveston for years.
Even at the time, many speculated that Gaveston was the king's lover as well as his confidante.
Their relationship didn't exactly end well, though — Gaveston was assassinated in June
1312 by a group of English barons who had grown tired of his considerable influence
over the king.
After that, a nobleman named Hugh Despenser the Younger became Edward's new favourite.
— and it's pretty hard to understate just how much Isabella despised him.
When King Edward went to war with Isabella's brother, Charles IV, in 1324, he began to
treat Isabella as his enemy rather than his wife.
She quickly found a new lover in Roger Mortimer, and together they led a rebellion against
the reign of Edward and Despenser.
The rebel group invaded England on September 24th, 1326, capturing and violently executing
Despenser.
The king's support crumbled immediately, and Edward was ordered to hand over the throne
to his and Isabella's son, who was crowned Edward III of England at just 14 years old.
A few years later, however, the 18-year-old Edward decided to take his rule into his own
hands, executing Mortimer and putting Isabella under arrest for two years.
She retired from politics and died in 1358.
Henry VIII became involved with an impressive six wives and countless mistresses over the
course of his 36-year rule.
But his soap opera-slash-horror show of a love life also led to devastating global consequences,
including an unstable succession, a number of wars, and, ultimately, England's break
with the Catholic Church.
When Henry married Catherine of Aragon in 1509, his top priority was to continue his
bloodline by producing a male heir to the throne, but their only surviving child was
a daughter.
Frustrated, the king annulled their marriage — pretty much destroying England's relationship
with the Vatican in the process — and moved on with Anne Boleyn.
But she, too, bore a daughter.
Henry subsequently accused Anne of adultery and treason and had their marriage annulled,
too, before ordering her execution.
A few days after Anne's beheading, Henry married her lady-in-waiting, Jane Seymour, who finally
gave Henry his desired male heir… but abruptly died due to complications of childbirth.
Some time later, Henry saw a portrait of Anne of Cleves and decided to marry her, only to
discover the painting bore no real-life resemblance to the woman herself.
As one recent documentary so deftly pointed out:
"This was the Tudor equivalent of a first date with someone you've met online, only
to find out they don't exactly look like their photo."
Another divorce ensued.
Henry famously referred to his next wife, Catherine Howard, as his "rose without a thorn"—until
she was beheaded due to rumors of adultery.
Henry's sixth and final marriage to Catherine Parr was his smoothest, and she even managed
to outlive him by a whole year.
The trope of the disapproving mother-in-law is almost as old as time—or at least as
old as 1682, the year Sophia Dorothea married George Louis.
George was Sophia's cousin and an elector of Hanover, and he later became King George
I of England.
Sophia's mother-in-law and aunt, an electress also named Sophia, addressed Sophia Dorothea
with such disdain that it soon poisoned George's own perception of his wife.
Feeling the weight of her husband's hatred, Sophia Dorothea joined forces with Count Philip
Christoph von Konigsmark in a failed attempt to escape from Hanover.
When George learned of this conspiracy in 1694, he had the count killed, divorced Sophia
Dorothea, and imprisoned her in a stately home in Ahlden, Germany.
Sometimes known as the "princess of Ahlden," Sophia remained imprisoned for 32 years, until
her death in 1726.
She died without ever having set foot in England.
In 1744, the aristocrat Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst headed to Russia to meet her second cousin,
the Russian heir Peter III.
Although many people were fans of the vivacious Sophie, she and Peter quickly developed a
mutual distaste for each other.
Even so, the two teenagers held an arranged, elaborate wedding the following year, and
Sophie changed her name to Ekaterina, the Russian equivalent of Catherine.
Their union didn't exactly start on a blissful foot, though, as Peter decided he'd rather
spend their wedding night partying with his friends than stay with her.
But then again, his wedding night did look like this.
Still, things only got worse from there.
While Catherine distracted herself from her husband by reading books by Enlightenment
authors, Peter had been a poor student, and spent most of his time playing soldiers with
his own guards' units.
Before long, the ill-suited spouses were each engaging in extramarital affairs.
After Peter's aunt, Empress Elizabeth, died in 1762, Peter became ruler of Russia and
severed Catherine's social alliances.
Convinced that Peter planned to divorce her, Catherine gathered her social resources to
lead a coup against him, and the Russian church crowned her the nation's ruler.
Meanwhile, Peter was arrested, deposed, and exiled.
He died just over a week later, while Catherine the Great went on to rule for 34 years — the
longest reign of any woman in Russian history.
When Caroline of Brunswick and George IV first laid eyes on each other in 1795, she told
him that he wasn't half as handsome as his portrait had been.
He, on the other hand, staggered backwards and immediately asked for a brandy.
Not a great start, all things considered.
George, who was then the prince of Wales, preferred more mature women, while Caroline
was known for being inappropriate and was often mocked for her foul body odor.
On their wedding night, George got thoroughly drunk and passed out in a grate, and Caroline
left him there.
The prince soon deserted Caroline for his five-plus mistresses.
After the couple's inevitable separation, Caroline was given permission to see their
daughter for just two hours a week.
When she adopted another son and a daughter, she was accused of bearing another man's children,
but was found not guilty in 1805.
Caroline then moved to Italy once her royal duties were kaput.
There, she found romance with a messenger named Bartolomeo Pergami.
When George became King in 1820, he tried to pay Caroline to stay in mainland Europe,
but she returned to assume her role as Queen.
In the end, George had her barred from his coronation at Westminster Abbey, and when
she tried to get in, the Deputy Lord Chamberlain slammed the door in her face.
Caroline pounded on the door, but to no avail.
She fell ill that night and died just 19 days later.
Known to her friends as "Ducky," Princess Victoria Melita had a lot to live up to as
Queen Victoria's granddaughter.
And although the princess fell in love with her Russian cousin Cyril Vladimirovich Romanov,
her royal grandmother had other plans.
The queen deemed Cyril too foreign for Ducky, and arranged for her to marry her other cousin,
Grand Duke Ernest of Hesse.
Although Ernest was gay, he reluctantly agreed to marry the princess.
Drowning in the loneliness of a loveless marriage, Princess Victoria begged her grandmother to
allow a divorce.
Alas, such a thing wouldn't happen on Queen Victoria's watch.
When the Queen died in 1901, the princess demanded a divorce again, which prompted Ernest's
sister, Empress Alix of Russia, to become her sworn enemy.
Following her only daughter's death from typhoid, a grieving Princess Victoria quietly wed her
first love, Cyril.
In an act of vengeance, Alix took Cyril's title from him.
Alix also demanded he hit the road, so Cyril and the princess gladly relocated to Paris,
soon welcoming two daughters.
Before long, though, Alix's husband, Tsar Nicholas, asked Cyril to come back to Russia
— and almost overnight Ducky became the Grand Duchess Victoria Feodorovna.
In 1973, Princess Anne's wedding to Captain Mark Phillips was televised from Westminster
Abbey and watched by more than 500 million viewers around the world.
Princess Anne had met the captain in 1968 at a "party for horse lovers," and they got
engaged five years later.
Upon their engagement, a reporter asked Princess Anne whether she believed the marriage could
withstand the pressure of public duty.
She answered:
"It's got to, hasn't it?"
But no marriage can survive on horses alone.
Trouble brewed as the couple's respective work duties began to take precedence, and
their public appearances together became fewer and fewer.
Even when travelling together, the princess and the captain would check into separate
hotels — and that was just the tip of the iceberg.
"Should we leave through different doors?"
"We came in the same car."
In 1989, the press reported that Phillips had engaged in semi-public affairs with a
British television anchorwoman, a Canadian public relations executive, and an Indian
call girl.
The couple separated that year when intimate letters were unearthed between Princess Anne
and one Commander Timothy Laurence.
Then, in 1991, an art teacher from New Zealand told the Express that she had a child by Phillips
five years prior, before his separation from the princess.
Though the captain denied these claims, a DNA test promptly proved his paternity.
Despite the princess' initial vow to stay legally married to the captain, their divorce
was finalized in 1992.
"Well, there were three of us in this marriage.
So it was a bit crowded."
That's what Princess Diana had to say about her relationship with Prince Charles in her
infamous 1995 Panorama interview.
Her and Prince Charles' romantic turmoil began long before they were married, however.
According to the biography Diana: Her True Story, Charles told Diana she was, quote,
"a bit chubby" a week after their engagement.
The comment was a catalyst for Diana's bulimia, which, as she revealed in the book, he also
criticized for being a, quote, "waste" of food.
As their marriage went on, Diana's mental health struggles escalated, and in her biography
she even said Charles brushed her off after she threw herself down a flight of stairs.
Of course, Prince Charles' ongoing, and at times overt, love affair with Camilla Parker
Bowles was at the heart of the royal couple's undoing.
The affair, combined with Diana's feelings of inadequacy and displacement within the
royal establishment, led the couple to part ways in 1992.
Their divorce was finalized in 1996, the year after Diana's explosive Panorama interview.
Worst of all, though, the couple's marital difficulties drew major attention from the
tabloid media, which contributed to the circumstances of the princess' tragic death in 1997.
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