The phrase "the empire on which the sun never sets" has been used with variations to describe
certain global empires that were so extensive that there was always at least one part of
their territory in daylight. It was originally used for the Spanish Empire,
mainly in the 16th and 17th centuries, and for the British Empire, mainly in the 19th
and early 20th centuries. Especially in the 20th century, the phrase has been transferred
to refer to American power. Georg Büchmann traces the idea to a speech
in Herodotus' Histories, made by Xerxes I of Persia before invading Greece.
Spain
In the early 16th century, the phrase, "el imperio en el que nunca se pone el sol" originated
with a remark made by Fray Francisco de Ugalde to Charles I of Spain, who as king of Spain
and as emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, had an empire, which included many territories
in Europe, islands in the Mediterranean and Atlantic, cities in North Africa and vast
territories in the Americas. The phrase gained added resonance during the
reign of Charles's son, Philip II of Spain, when the Philippines and several other island
chains in the Pacific were obtained by Spain. When King Henry of Portugal died, Philip II
pressed his claim to the Portuguese throne and was recognised as Philip I of Portugal
in 1581. He then reigned over all his father's possessions in Europe, Africa and the Americas
and Asia and the Portuguese Empire, which itself included territories in the Americas,
in the North and the Subsaharian Africa, in all the Asian Subcontinents, and islands in
the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific oceans. In 1585, Giovanni Battista Guarini wrote Il
pastor fido to mark the marriage of Catherine Michelle, daughter of Philip II, to Charles
Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy. Guarini's dedication read, "Altera figlia / Di qel Monarca, a cui
/ Nö anco, quando annotta, il Sol tramonta.". In the early 17th century, the phrase was
familiar to John Smith of Jamestown, and to Francis Bacon, who writes: "both the East
and the West Indies being met in the crown of Spain, it is come to pass, that, as one
saith in a brave kind of expression, the sun never sets in the Spanish dominions, but ever
shines upon one part or other of them : which, to say truly, is a beam of glory [...]". Thomas
Urquhart wrote of "that great Don Philippe, Tetrarch of the world, upon whose subjects
the sun never sets." In the German dramatist Friedrich Schiller's
1787 play, Don Carlos, Don Carlos's father, Philip II, says, "German: Ich heiße / der
reichste Mann in der getauften Welt; / Die Sonne geht in meinem Staat nicht unter.".
Joseph Fouché recalled Napoleon saying before the Peninsular War, "Reflect that the sun
never sets in the immense inheritance of Charles V, and that I shall have the empire of both
worlds." This was cited in Walter Scott's Life of Napoleon
It has been claimed that Louis XIV of France's emblem of the "Sun King" and associated motto,
"Nec pluribus impar" were based on the solar emblem and motto of Philip II.
United Kingdom
In the 19th century, it became popular to apply the phrase to the British Empire. It
was a time when British world maps showed the Empire in red and pink to highlight British
imperial power spanning the globe. Scottish author, John Wilson, writing as "Christopher
North" in Blackwood's Magazine in 1829, is sometimes credited as originating the usage.
However, George Macartney wrote in 1773, in the wake of the territorial expansion that
followed Britain's victory in the Seven Years' War, of "this vast empire on which the sun
never sets, and whose bounds nature has not yet ascertained." In a speech on 31 July 1827,
Rev. R. P. Buddicom said, "It had been said that the sun never set on the British flag;
it was certainly an old saying, about the time of Richard the Second, and was not so
applicable then as at the present time." In 1821, the Caledonian Mercury wrote of the
British Empire, "On her dominions the sun never sets; before his evening rays leave
the spires of Quebec, his morning beams have shone three hours on Port Jackson, and while
sinking from the waters of Lake Superior, his eye opens upon the Mouth of the Ganges."
Daniel Webster famously expressed a similar idea in 1834: "A power which has dotted over
the surface of the whole globe with her possessions and military posts, whose morning drumbeat,
following the sun and keeping company with the hours, circles the earth with one continuous
and unbroken strain of the martial airs of England." In 1839, Sir Henry Ward said in
the House of Commons, "Look at the British Colonial empire — the most magnificent empire
that the world ever saw. The old Spanish boast that the sun never set in their dominions,
has been more truly realised amongst ourselves." By 1861, Lord Salisbury complained that the
£1.5 million spent on colonial defence by Britain merely enabled the nation "to furnish
an agreeable variety of stations to our soldiers, and to indulge in the sentiment that the sun
never sets on our Empire". In James Joyce's Ulysses, when Mr. Deasy asks
Stephen what an Englishman's proudest boast is, Stephen offers "That on his empire [...] the
sun never sets." Mr. Deasy retorts "That's not English. A French Celt said that." Critics
suggest Mr Deasy was mistaken. Satirical references
In an 1865 speech in Oakland, California, Rev. W. B. Brown of New Jersey quipped that
the reason the sun never set upon the Empire was that God did not trust the British in
the dark. The quip has been attributed to Abraham Lincoln, among others.
According to Richard Lederer's mock history of the world assembled from errors found in
student-written papers, "[t]he sun never set on the British Empire because the British
Empire was in the east and the sun sets in the west."
United States
From the mid-nineteenth century, the image of the sun never setting can be found applied
to Anglophone culture, explicitly including the United States as well as Britain, for
example in a speech by Alexander Campbell in 1852.
It was subsequently applied specifically to the American sphere of influence. An 1897
magazine article titled "The Greatest Nation on Earth" boasted, "[T]he sun never sets on
Uncle Sam". In 1906, William Jennings Bryan wrote, "If we can not boast that the sun never
sets on American territory, we can find satisfaction in the fact that the sun never sets on American
philanthropy"; after which, The New York Times received letters attempting to disprove his
presupposition. A 1991 history book discussion of U.S. expansion
states, "Today ... the sun never sets on American territory, properties owned by the U.S. government
and its citizens, American armed forces abroad, or countries that conduct their affairs within
limits largely defined by American power." Although the United States no longer has any
possessions further west than Guam or further east than the Virgin Islands, it currently
has military presence in Afghanistan, Bahrain, Brazil, the British Indian Ocean Territory,
Bulgaria, Cuba, Djibouti, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Guam, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kosovo,
Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Kyrgyzstan, Netherlands, Portugal,
Spain, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and others. The phrase is sometimes
used critically with the implication of American imperialism, as in the title of Joseph Gerson's
book, The Sun Never Sets: Confronting the Network of Foreign U.S. Military Bases.
Punning variations San Francisco librarian Dick Dillon is credited
with the story of a baseball umpire who spanks his little boy and then, by way of apology,
invites him to sit on his lap. The boy refuses, proving that "the son never sits on the brutish
umpire". In a 1997 article, Edward Johnson referred
to Dag Hammarskjöld as "The umpire on whom the sun never sets".
The monologue "Tried by the Centre Court" by Flanders and Swann ends with the line:
"The umpire on whom the sun never sets." See also
King of Kings Nec pluribus impar
Notes