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Elective monarchy

An elective monarchy is a monarchy ruled by a monarch who is elected, in contrast to a hereditary monarchy in which the office is automatically passed down as a family inheritance. The manner of election, the nature of candidate qualifications, and the electors vary from case to case. Historically, it was common for elective monarchies to transform into hereditary ones over time or for hereditary ones to acquire at least occasional elective aspects.

Evolution
Many kingdoms were officially elective historically, though the candidates were typically only from the family of the deceased monarch. Eventually, however, most elected monarchies introduced hereditary succession, guaranteeing that the title and office stayed within the royal family and specifying, more or less precisely, the order of succession. Today, almost all monarchies are hereditary monarchies in which the monarchs come from one royal family with the office of sovereign being passed from one family member to another upon the death or abdication of the incumbent.

Ancient Greece
The kings of Macedon and of Epirus were elected by the army, which was similar in composition to the Ecclesia of the Demos, the assembly of all free Athenian citizens. Military service often was linked with citizenship among the male members of the royal house.

Ancient Rome and Byzantium
In the ancient Roman Kingdom the kings were elected by the Roman assemblies. Once the Roman kings were overthrown, there remained an absolute prohibition for royal establishment in the Roman constitution, a prohibition which formally remained in place during imperial times, both classical Roman and Byzantine. In practice, however, Imperial Rome was a monarchy. During the Principate (27 BC to 284 AD), which was the foundational stage of Roman imperialism, Roman monarchs would often take care to disguise their de facto position with the de jure apparatus of republicanism. This was particularly the case for Augustus, the first Emperor, who established the Principate. Whilst given many titles (including "Augustus", i.e. "majestic") he described himself as princeps senatus, or merely "first among senators". The illusion of being elected from the Senate continued when Tiberius succeeded to the purple. Over time the principle weakened as republican government passed into distant history, and the Empire became functionally an absolute monarchy. The office of Roman and Byzantine emperor remained vaguely elective (albeit with the election procedure never strictly defined, but generally understood to be a matter for the Senate). For instance, whilst the first five Emperors were all descended from Julius Caesar, in each case their position was proclaimed, not inherited as of right. Claudius, the fourth Emperor, in particular stands out, being "elected" to office once the Praetorian Guard had made it clear he was their candidate.

Accordingly, heredity never was, and could never be, formally established in law. And whilst the later, more overtly authoritarian Dominate period further stripped the republican veneer from the constitution, Emperors succeeded by a mixture of proclamation by the Legions or Senate as much as by blood (though sons did succeed fathers).

In order to bypass the prohibition on heredity and ensure dynastic continuity, many reigning Byzantine emperors had their heirs crowned co-emperor so that the throne could not be considered vacant at their own death and thus the need for succession by election would not arise.

United Kingdom
A system of elective monarchy existed in Anglo-Saxon England (see Witenagemot).

John of England was chosen as King of England by a council of nobles and royal advisors at the death of his brother, Richard I, in 1199 because the heir by strict primogeniture, Arthur of Brittany, was a child at that time. This affirmed the principle of elective monarchy.

In 14th, 15th, late 17th and early 18th century England, the evolving relations between the Crown and Parliament resulted in a monarchy with both hereditary and quasi-elective elements – at least as between various contenders with some dynastic claim for the throne. Henry IV of England was chosen by Parliament in 1399 to replace Richard II. Richard was childless, and the Earl of March, the next in line to the throne, was a young child at the time, so Parliament bypassed him in favour of Henry, who had led a revolt against Richard. Parliament also confirmed depositions during the Wars of the Roses, as well as Henry VIII's settlements of the crown. During the Exclusion Crisis, King Charles II strongly opposed any such idea.

Following the Glorious Revolution, Parliament enacted the Act of Succession, whose effect was to disinherit the Stuarts and replace them by the Hanoverians, whose dynastic claim was far more remote. William III and Mary II were chosen by Parliament to replace James II. (Mary was James' daughter, William was James' nephew, and William and Mary were succeeded by Mary's younger sister Anne.) Parliament passed laws in the late 17th and early 18th centuries which explicitly excluded Catholics (and thus the male descendants of James II) from the order of succession. The Succession to the Crown Act 2013, replaced male-preference primogeniture with absolute primogeniture and ended disqualification of a person who married a Roman Catholic from succession.

In Scotland, the Declaration of Arbroath of 1320 asserted the rights of the nobles to choose a king if required, which implied elective monarchy. Tanistry was also the system of royal succession until King Malcolm II in the early 11th century introduced direct inheritance. The Isle of Man also used tanistry.

Ireland
In Ireland, from the beginning of recorded history until the mid-16th/early 17th century, succession was determined by an elective system based on patrilineal relationship known as tanistry.

Dutch Republic
In the Dutch Republic of the 17th and 18th centuries there was the office of the Stadtholder, whose powers fell short of those of a monarch, and which was elective. Each of the seven Dutch provinces could separately elect its own Stadtholder, and it did not have to be the same person in all of them. In theory anyone could be elected Stadtholder, though in practice it was restricted to members of the House of Orange. There was no obligation to elect a Stadtholder at all, and the leaders of the Dutch Republican faction, such as Oldenbarnevelt and De Witt, repeatedly tried to abolish the office of Stadtholder or leave it vacant – which it was for several decades of Dutch history. Conversely, the House of Orange and its adherents tried to increase the powers of the Stadtholder to approximate those of a monarch, to make it officially hereditary (which it became in the later part of the 18th century) and finally to transform it into a full-fledged monarchy – as it was in 1815.

Gaul/France
The Gallic tribes were each ruled by a rix, which can be translated as king, who were elected for terms of one year or longer. Candidates were drawn from relatives of past kings.

The Frankish kingdom was at least partly elective. Merovingian kings were elected, while Carolingian kings were elected at times. In the 10th century Western Frankish royal elections switched between different lineages before settling on the Capetians. Medieval France was an elective monarchy at the time of the first Capetian kings; the kings however took the habit of, during their reign, having their son elected as co-king and successor during their reigns. The election soon became a mere formality and vanished after the reign of Philip II.

After declaring the throne vacant, the French Chamber of Deputies voted 229–33 to declare Louis-Philippe of France as King of the French during the July Revolution of 1830, creating an elective monarchy. France briefly had again a kind of elective monarchy when Napoleon III was first elected President of France and then transformed himself into an Emperor.

Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire, beginning with its predecessor Eastern Francia, is perhaps the best-known example of an elective monarchy. However, from 1440 to 1740, a Habsburg was always elected emperor, the throne becoming unofficially hereditary. During that period, the emperor was elected from within the House of Habsburg by a small council of nobles called prince-electors. The secular electoral seats were hereditary. However, spiritual electors (and other prince-(arch)bishops) were usually elected by the cathedral chapters as religious leaders, but simultaneously ruled as monarch (prince) of a territory of imperial immediacy (which usually comprised a part of their diocesan territory). Thus the prince-bishoprics were elective monarchies too. The same holds true for prince-abbacies, whose princess-abbesses or prince-abbots were elected by a college of clerics and imperially appointed as princely rulers in a pertaining territory.

Bohemia
Since medieval times, the King of Bohemia was elected by the Estates of Lands of the Bohemian Crown. Since 1526, when Ferdinand I assumed the Bohemian Crown, it was always held by the Habsburg branch who later became Holy Roman Emperor and who expected this situation to go on indefinitely. In 1618 the Bohemians chose to exercise in practice their legal right to choose a King at their discretion, despite having already elected Ferdinand II as king, and bestowed the Bohemian Crown on Frederick V, Elector Palatine – "The Winter King". However, the Habsburgs regarded this as an act of rebellion, re-imposed their rule over Bohemia in the Battle of the White Mountain and in the aftermath abolished the Bohemian Elective Monarchy and made exclusive Habsburg rule the de jure as well as de facto situation. The attempt to make Frederick V King of Bohemia is regarded as a catalyst for the Thirty Years War.

Hungary
Hungary was an elective monarchy until 1687. This elective right carried on for another two more decades in the Principality of Transylvania which de jure continued to belong to the Lands of the Hungarian Crown but had split from Hungary when the childless King Louis II died after the Battle of Mohács.

Iberia
Visigothic Hispania elected the king from the relatives of past kings, in accordance with the Germanic traditions.

The Kingship of Aragon was initially elected by the "rich men" barons. Later this right was limited to the Cortes confirming the succession of the heir.

During the 19th century, more precisely between 1870 and 1873, an attempt of such a system took place in Spain. After the Glorious Revolution and Isabella II's subsequent deposition in 1868 a new parliament was constituted through direct male suffrage. It was then decided that a democratically elected monarch was needed in Spain. The debates regarding Isabella's succession took place until October 1869, when Amadeo I was finally chosen. Nevertheless, his reign lasted until 11 October 1873, when he abdicated citing his inability to solve the problems Spain was going through, after which the parliament proclaimed a republic.

Portugal's monarchy contained the remnants of the elective principle in requiring reciprocal oaths, the assent of the Cortes and acclamation before acceding to the throne. The Cortes affirmed the crown as elective when it elevated King John in 1385. In Portugal, on 6 April 1385 in the aftermath of 1383–1385 Crisis, the Council of the Kingdom elected John I, then Master of the Order of Aviz, as King of Portugal. His half-brother Ferdinand I had died without a male heir in October 1383, and different factions made strenuous efforts to secure the throne for Princess Beatrice, Ferdinand's only daughter and Queen consort of Castile and León, or for either of her uncles Infante John, Duke of Valencia de Campos and Infante Denis, Lord of Cifuentes. The Council elected instead the younger (and illegitimate) son of Peter I, thus avoiding a jure uxoris Castilian king.

Kingdom of Jerusalem
In the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, the kingship was partially elected and partially hereditary. During the height of the kingdom in the mid-12th century there was a royal family and a relatively clear line of succession. Nevertheless, the king was elected, or at least recognized, by the Haute Cour. Here the king was considered a primus inter pares (first among equals), and in his absence his duties were performed by his seneschal.

Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
The tradition of electing the country's ruler, which occurred when there was no clear heir to the throne, dates to the very beginning of Polish statehood. The election privilege, exercised during the gatherings known as wiec, was usually limited to the most powerful nobles (magnates) or officials, and was heavily influenced by local traditions and strength of the ruler.

In Poland, after the death of the last Piast in 1370, Polish kings were initially elected by a small council; gradually, this privilege was granted to all members of the szlachta (Polish nobility). Kings of Poland and Grand Dukes of Lithuania during the times of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569–1795) were elected by gatherings of crowds of nobles at a field in Wola, today a district in Warsaw. Since in Poland, all sons of a noble were nobles, and not only the eldest, every one of an estimated 500,000 nobles could potentially have participated in such elections in person – by far the most extensive franchise of any European country at the time. During the election period, the function of the king was performed by an interrex (usually in the person of the primate of Poland). This unique Polish election was termed the free election (wolna elekcja). Although the elective principle was already established in Polish political culture in the late Middle Ages, the rules changed significantly in the 1570s, and the principles developed in that period lasted until the Partitions of Poland. There have been thirteen royal elections in Poland–Lithuania from 1573 to 1764. Roșu (2017) marked the 1575/1576 Polish–Lithuanian royal election as the most significant for several reasons. First, 'the citizens of the commonwealth were forced to de facto depose their first elected king – thus applying the right of disobedience they had inscribed in their public records only two years before.' Second, it resulted in two candidates being proclaimed the winner, and in subsequent events the nobility was able to confirm their majority choice for Stephen Báthory and have it recognised, while avoiding war with Maximilian II of Habsburg.

Scandinavia
Scandinavian kingship, according to the Germanic tradition, was elected upon the death of the previous king. The selection was not always limited to the heirs of the previous king (e.g. in Sweden when the royal house was changing between the houses of Eric and Sverker between generations). Originally, kings were supposed to be elected from among the descendants of a previous king, which was connected to descent from gods. There could also be joint rule between multiple kings. Disputed succession was common because of a large number of sons sired by kings. However, when single rule appeared in the 9th century, civil wars grew in frequency throughout the region. Later, Christianisation led to the promulgation of primogeniture in Norway in 1163 and Denmark in 1170, but the elective idea still persisted in the requirement to be certified by a local assembly and subsequently the magnates would still elect the new king, albeit while the incumbent king was still alive. This demonstrated the enduring power of the nobles.

Originally, the Kings of Sweden were elected by all free men at the Mora Thing. Elective monarchy continued until 1544, when the Riksdag of the Estates designated the heirs of King Gustav Vasa as the heirs to the throne. The Danish monarchy was also officially elective, although the eldest son of the reigning monarch was usually elected. This continued until 1660, when a hereditary and absolute monarchy was instituted by Frederick III. Though the monarchy of Norway was originally hereditary, it too became elective in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Candidates had to be of royal blood, but the kingship was elected by a council of noblemen, rather than automatically passing to the eldest son. In 1905 Prince Carl was elected King of the newly independent Norway by the Storting after a referendum resolved in favor of monarchy.

The Scandinavian kingdoms were united under the Danish crown by Margaret I of Denmark in 1389, but many of her successors had the united kingdoms split up as Sweden elected a different king than Denmark and Norway upon succession. The election was usually contested through a Danish invasion of Sweden until Christian II of Denmark after his reconquest of Sweden had many of those voting against him executed in the Stockholm Bloodbath (1520), which ended much of the support for the Danish king on the Swedish throne.

In 1810, the Swedish Riksdag elected the French Marshall and Prince of Pontecorvo Jean Bernadotte to be the new Crown Prince, since it was apparent that the Swedish branch of the House of Holstein-Gottorp would die with the childless King Charles XIII. Bernadotte eventually ascended the throne as Charles XIV John of Sweden and founded the still current House of Bernadotte. In this case the elective aspect in the choice of Monarch was especially prominent, since Bernadotte had been a French commoner with no previous connection to Sweden and not the most remote of dynastic claims to the Swedish throne – his being chosen derived solely from urgent political and military considerations of the crisis time of the Napoleonic Wars.

Sovereign Military Order of Malta
The Sovereign Military Order of Malta, formerly known as the Knights Hospitaller or the Knights of Malta, remains a sovereign subject of international law since it was exiled to Rome from Malta during the French occupation of Malta under the First French Republic. The Order is ruled by the Prince and Grand Master, who is elected for life by the Council Complete of State. The Prince and Grand Master holds the rank of Prince, bestowed by the Holy Roman Emperor in 1607 and holds the precedence of a cardinal of the Church since 1630. The Council that elects the prince includes members of the Sovereign Council and other high-ranking office-holders and representatives of the Order's worldwide entities. The Sovereign Council, including the Grand Commander, the Grand Chancellor, the Grand Hospitaller, and the Receiver of the Common Treasure, aid the prince in governing the order.

Venice
The Republic of Venice was ruled from 697 to 1797 by a doge, who normally ruled for life, though a few were forced from office. His powers were never those of an absolute monarch, but he was the Republic's highest official and powerful within restrictions and levels of oversight that varied in different periods. The election process began with the Great Council of more than 2000 Venetian aristocrats and employed an elaborate system designed to prevent one family or alliance from dominating the process. It used smaller nominating groups that were reduced in number by the drawing of lots and required a supermajority for election.

Africa
The Kingdom of Algiers (from the seventeenth century to the nineteenth century) was an elective monarchy, whose dey was elected, depending on the period, by the Divan of Algiers or by the Taïfa of the raïs (Assembly of the corsairs). The elected deys also bore the title of governor-sultan of Algiers or sultan of Algiers.

Mali Empire
In Africa, the Mali Empire functioned as both a constitutional and elective monarchy. The mansa, or emperor, had to be approved by the Great Assembly known as the Gbara, despite hereditary claims.

Kongo
The Kingdom of Kongo was a purer example of an elective monarchy, where blood claims had even less influence. Nobles elected a king's successor, and it was common for the successor to be of a different family than his predecessor.

This form of elective monarchy existed in the kingdom from its inception around 1400 until its complete disintegration in the early 20th century.

West Africa
In the pre-colonial period, a number of West African rulers, such as the kings and chieftains of the Ashanti Empire and those of Ife and the Oyo Empire, were elected from amongst the various royal families of their polities by colleges of noblemen known as kingmakers. This practice has continued to the present day.

Afghanistan
In Afghanistan, loya jirgas have been reportedly organized since at least the early 18th century when the Hotaki and Durrani dynasties rose to power. The ancient Aryan tribes, who are hypothesized to have spoken Proto-Indo-Iranian, came down in intermittent waves from Central Asia and Afghanistan which is a common myth. They practiced a sort of jirga system with two types of councils – ' and '. The  (summit) comprised elders and tribal chiefs. The king also joined sessions of the . was a sort of rural council. In India they are referred to as Samiti and Sabha.

Persia/Iran
The Parthian Empire (248 BC–224 AD), also known as the Arsacid Empire, is considered to be the oldest elective monarchy in Asia. The King of Kings has been required to undergo an assembly of the nobles called Mahestān, as a vote of approval before being allowed to ascend to the imperial throne or to be removed from the power.

Other monarchs, such as the former Shahs of Iran, have been required to undergo a parliamentary vote of approval before being allowed to ascend to the throne.

Mongol Empire
In the Mongol Empire, the Great Khan was chosen by the Kurultai. This was often convened in the capital. Other critical leadership positions were also assigned.

Korea
The ancient Korean kingdom of Silla elected its first king by a conference of tribal and village elders in 57 BC. Unified Silla's kings were elected by the aristocracy whose powers were on par with the king. In the kingdom of Goguryeo, the ruler was originally chosen from among the heads of the five tribes, most often the Sono tribe.

Siam/Thailand
There were several occasions that the Kingdom of Siam and Thailand turned to a semi-elective monarchy system to settle the succession of the crown among disputed heirs:

 * In 1824, Phutthaloetla Naphalai died suddenly without having named a successor to viceroy Maha Senanurak, who had died 16 July 1817. According to the traditions of royal succession, the viceroy or uparaja was heir presumptive. If there were none, then an ad hoc senabodi consisting of senior officials present at the death of a king, would elect a successor. As a result of enormous support from senior and influential noble, Chetsadabodin was elected as the successor.

 * In 1867, as Mongkut had not designated who would succeed him, the choice fell to a council to decide. The council led by Prince Deves, Mongkut's eldest half-brother, then chose Chulalongkorn as Mongkut's successor. However, Chulalongkorn was only 15 and so the council choose Si Suriyawongse to become the regent until Chulalongkorn came of age.

 * On 2 March 1935, Prince Ananda Mahidol was elected by the National Assembly and the Thai government to succeed his uncle, King Prajadhipok, as the eighth king of the Chakri dynasty, because Prajadhipok, the previous king, had not named an heir before his abdication.

Oceania
In 1858, several central Māori tribes of the North Island of New Zealand elected Pōtatau Te Wherowhero as their monarch. The Tainui tribal elders have continued this tradition and the Kiingitanga movement alive to the present. The present Māori King (i.e. monarch of the Kiingitanga movement, not of all Māori) is Tūheitia Potatau Te Wherowhero VII, eldest son of the previous Māori monarch Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu. He was sworn in on 21 August 2006 on the day of his mother's funeral. While in principle the position is not hereditary, in practice every Māori monarch thus far has been the heir of the previous monarch.

The Hawaiian Kingdom could be considered a de facto example. From 1864 until the monarchy was overthrown in 1893, it was constitutionally a hereditary monarchy utilizing male-preference primogeniture. However, the Constitutions of 1864 and 1887, and the draft constitution of 1893, all provided that, in the event of the extinction of the royal line, the Legislature would elect a "native aliʻi" as the new monarch and stirps of a new dynasty. In practice, however, during the entire time from 1864 until the abolition of the monarchy, the throne was never passed from parent to child, as every Hawaiian monarch who reigned during that period died without leaving issue. Following the 1872 death of King Kamehameha V, a non-binding referendum was held, in which William Charles Lunalilo won; he was subsequently elected king by the legislature in 1873. King Kalākaua was elected by the legislature in 1874, after Lunalilo's death. However, when Kalākaua died in 1891, the crown demised to the collateral line of his sister, Queen Liliʻuokalani. Prior to 1864, the Hawaiian King-in-Council appointed the heir to the Hawaiian throne.

Mexico
The Tlatoanimeh of the Aztec Empire were chosen by a council of elders, nobles, and priests. He would be selected from a pool of four candidates.

Costa Rica
The mánkeme (king) of the Kingdom of Nicoya was elected by a council of elders known as the monéxico.

Chile and Argentina
French explorer Orélie-Antoine de Tounens claimed to be elected by the Mapuche to be the Great Toqui, Supreme Chieftain of the Mapuches, possibly in the belief that their cause might be better served with a European acting on their behalf. He later proclaimed himself as the King of Araucanía and Patagonia.

United States
An attempt to create an elective monarchy in the United States failed. Alexander Hamilton argued in a long speech before the Constitutional Convention of 1787 that the President of the United States should be an elective monarch, ruling for "good behavior" (i.e., for life, unless impeached) and with extensive powers. Hamilton believed that elective monarchs had sufficient power domestically to resist foreign corruption, yet there was enough domestic control over their behavior to prevent tyranny at home. His proposal was resoundingly voted down in favor of a four-year term with the possibility of reelection.

Haiti
The crown of the Empire of Haiti, established in 1804, was also elective according to its 1805 constitution.

Extraordinary election
A hereditary monarchy may occasionally use election to fill a vacant throne. For example, the royal family may become extinct; depending on how precisely the succession to the throne is defined in law, several candidates with equally, or almost equally, strong claims could emerge, with an election being held to choose from among them. This differs from a formally elective monarchy in that it is an extraordinary measure, and with the new monarch the succession again becomes hereditary.

Alternatively, the monarch may be deposed, as in a revolution. While sometimes a monarch may be forced to abdicate in favour of his or her heir, on other occasions the royal family as a whole has been rejected, the throne going to an elected candidate. Examples of extraordinary election are:
 * Michael of Russia, chosen by a Zemsky Sobor (national assembly) in 1613 after the extinction of the Rurikid dynasty and the end of the Time of Troubles. The resulting Romanov dynasty was an old boyar house with close ties to the former royal family, and Michael's father, Feodor Romanov, was at the time a Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia under the monastic name of Filaret, in effect holding a position of interrex. Later, Patriarch Filaret, a skilled politician in his own right, became effectively a co-ruler and sometimes a regent for his weak and not very healthy son.
 * In 1971 seven individual Emirates in the Arabian Peninsula united to form the United Arab Emirates and became a federation. Upon its formation, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan of Abu Dhabi was elected as the head of the state and Ra'is (President) of the union by the ruling monarchs of the other six Emirates, while Zayed himself voted for Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, then ruler of Dubai.
 * Gopala, the first emperor of the Pala Empire, was chosen by independent regional warchiefs in the 8th century. This arrangement was common in many contemporary tribal societies in the region.

Invitation
In the past; new polities or countries in internal turmoil sometimes selected and invited some person to become their monarch. The selected person might have had little or nothing to do with his prospective kingdom; he might have had associations with a current great power or with a current regional power, or might appear as a true outsider, (hopefully) unbiased in matters of internal politics. (The concept of "invitation" may discreetly gloss over intense lobbying or diplomatic maneuvering in some cases.) By selecting a foreign prince or aristocrat, nations could expect to gain diplomatic links and a figurehead accustomed to the trappings of courts and ceremonial duties. Newly established states in the 19th and early 20th centuries established trends in the selection and appointment of newly minted monarchs.

At the start of the 20th century, the first monarchs of several newly independent nations were elected by parliaments: Norway is the prime example. Previously, following precedent set in newly independent Greece, new nations without a well-established hereditary royal family often chose their own monarchs from among the established royal families of Europe, rather than elevate a member of the local power establishment, in the hope that a stable hereditary monarchy would eventually emerge from the process. The first king of Belgium, as well as the now-deposed royal families of Greece, Bulgaria, Albania (unsuccessfully) and Romania, were originally appointed in this manner. On 9 October 1918 the Parliament of newly independent Finland elected Prince Frederick Charles of Hesse, brother-in-law of the German Emperor Wilhelm II, as King of Finland – but soon afterwards, this move was foiled by the German defeat in WWI and the demise of Monarchy in Germany itself, and Finland opted to become a Republic instead.

Examples include:

 * 862: According to tradition, various tribes of northern Rus' invited Rurik, a chief of their former Varangian foes, to re-establish order: his descendants ruled in Kiev, Muscovy and Russia until 1917. The legend of an invitation echoes the habit of later invitations to Rurikids and others to rule in Pskov and in Novgorod.
 * 1573: The Polish szlachta broke with tradition by looking beyond Central Europe for a candidate and electing the French Prince Henry, Duke of Anjou as King of Poland.
 * 1810: Sweden elected the French Napoleonic Marshal Jean Bernadotte as Crown Prince: he became King Charles XIV John of Sweden in 1818.
 * 1831: Belgium selected a German Prince of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha as King Leopold I, the first King of the Belgians.
 * 1832: European Great Power diplomats selected the German Prince Otto of Bavaria to become King Otto of Greece.
 * 1863: The Greek National Assembly elected the Danish Prince William of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg as King George I of the Hellenes.
 * 1863: The Conservative Party of Mexico offered the crown of the Second Mexican Empire to Maximilian, younger brother of Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria.
 * 1866: Romania elected the German Prince Karl of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen as its Ruling Prince (he later became King Carol I of Romania).
 * 1870: In the wake of political turmoil in Spain, the Spanish Cortes re-established the Spanish monarchy under a new royal house, electing the Italian Prince Amedeo of Savoy as King Amadeo I of Spain.
 * 1879: The Bulgarian Grand National Assembly elected the Russian-sponsored German Prince Alexander of Battenberg as its reigning knyaz (prince).
 * 1887: The Bulgarian Grand National Assembly elected the Austro-Hungarian Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha-Koháry as Prince (later Tsar) of Bulgaria.
 * 1905: Norway, newly independent of Sweden, elected Prince Carl of Denmark as its first modern independent monarch: Haakon VII of Norway
 * 1914: The European powers selected the German Prince William of Wied as the ruler of the Principality of Albania.
 * 1918: The German-occupied Kingdom of Lithuania voted to offer the throne to the German Prince Wilhelm of Urach, Count of Württemberg, 2nd Duke of Urach, who would have become King Mindaugas II.
 * 1918: Frederick Charles Louis Constantine, Prince and Landgrave of Hesse, was elected to be King of Finland by the Finnish Parliament, but never reigned and abdicated on December 14 the same year.
 * 1918: During the end of the First World War, there was an attempt by the German Empire to recognize Adolf Friedrich of Mecklenburg as the Duke of the United Baltic Duchy. However, the Regency Council only lasted less than a month in November, and was recognized by no other nation than Germany.

Current elective monarchies
Currently, the world's only true elective monarchies are:

Cambodia
Article 13 of the Cambodian Constitution stipulates that the monarch is chosen for a life term by the 9-member Royal Council of the Throne, the composition of which includes the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the National Assembly, the Prime Minister, the two Patriarchs of the country’s two main Buddhist Sangha Nikayas, the 1st and 2nd Deputy Presidents of the Senate and the 1st and 2nd Deputy Speakers of the National Assembly. Article 14 of the Constitution further states that the royal candidate for the throne must be at least 30 years old and a descendant of the late King Ang Duong, King Norodom or King Sisowath.

Holy See
In The Holy See and the associated Vatican City State, the Pope is elected in a conclave by the College of Cardinals, generally from among their number.

Malaysia
The Yang di-Pertuan Agong (Supreme Head of State) is elected to a five-year term. Nine hereditary rulers from the Malay States form a Council of Rulers who will determine the next Agong via a secret ballot. The position has to date been de facto rotated amongst the State rulers, originally based on seniority. The Yang di-Pertuan Agong shall not be re-elected unless the rotation succession was complete.

 * Additionally, the Malaysian state of Negeri Sembilan is itself an elective monarchy, where the Yang di-Pertuan Besar of Negeri Sembilan is selected by a council of ruling chiefs. The ruling chiefs themselves are elected by the chieftain. Male candidates are determined based on matrilineal clan due to the influence of Minangkabau culture. The system was partially the basis for the federal monarchy.
 * The Sultan of Perak is selected from amongst the most senior male princes descending from the 18th Sultan of Perak, Sultan Ahmadin. The Sultan, Raja Muda (Crown Prince), and Raja Di-Hilir (Deputy Crown Prince) are selected by the Dewan Negara of Perak. A son of the reigning Sultan cannot become Raja Muda if there is a more senior prince descended from the previous Sultan; this is possible should the senior prince relinquish his right to become Raja Muda.

United Arab Emirates
The president is elected by the Federal Supreme Council with a term of five years. Since its formation, the position has been a de facto hereditary position to the Al Nahyan sheikhs of Abu Dhabi by consensus of the Federal Supreme Council. Likewise, the Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE is a position held by the Al Maktoum sheikhs of Dubai. Elections are held every 5 years. The position of the ruler of each emirate of the United Arab Emirates is determined by consensus of the respective ruling royal family of that emirate.

Similar forms

 * Andorra can be considered a semi-elective principality. Andorra's two heads of state are Spain's Bishop of La Seu d'Urgell and the Count of Foix. The title of Count was merged with the French crown in 1609, meaning that all French kings from then on became Co-Prince. France relinquished control upon the formation of the First Republic, briefly leaving Andorra under a clerical monarchy, but Napoleon reclaimed the seat. Since Napoleon III's deposition and the formation of the French Third Republic, the French co-prince of Andorra has been the (now democratically elected) President of France, as they are considered the unofficial successor of the Counts of Foix. The Andorran authorities and people have no say in the election of the President of France, leaving Andorra in the unique position of having a monarch who is democratically elected by the citizenry of another state.
 * Eswatini has a form of quasi-elective monarchy. No king can appoint his successor. Instead, the royal family decides which of his wives shall be "Great Wife" and "Indlovukazi" (She-Elephant / Queen Mother). The son of this "Great Wife" will automatically become the next king. The eldest son is never appointed successor, as he has other ceremonial roles.
 * Nigeria has a system in which Nigerian traditional rulers (or "royal fathers", e.g. the Obas, Ezes and Emirs) are usually elected by councils of kingmakers from almost endless pools of contending cousins who are eligible for the elections because they all claim descent from founding monarchs or other royals. Each title is therefore held for life by one of these dynastic cousins in turn, often through rotation.
 * The cacique of the Ngöbe people of Costa Rica and Panama is appointed for life by a council of 13 elders. The latest election was in 2013 after the death of the previous cacique at around 100 years old. The current cacique is Costa Rican-born Pedro Palacios, son of the previous cacique Pedro Bejarano.
 * While Samoa has been a parliamentary republic since independence in 1962, it was commonly mistaken for an elective monarchy for most of its existence. The Constitution of Samoa provides that the Head of State be elected for a five-year term by the Fono, the Samoan parliament. Articles 18 and 45 of the Constitution provide, respectively, that any Member of Parliament may be elected head of state, and that any Samoan citizen may be elected to Parliament, although 47 out of the 49 seats in the Fono are reserved for matai, or chiefs (the other two are reserved for non-Samoans). However, most of the confusion stemmed from a special clause which named Malietoa Tanumafili II and Tupua Tamasese Meaole, who were two of the four paramount chiefs (Tama-a-Aiga), as joint presidents for life, only reverting to the normal rule of electing the head of state for five years upon Malietoa's death in 2007. In addition, the Samoan head of state is referred to as "His Highness", and an unwritten constitutional convention dictates that the President be elected from among the four paramount chiefs.
 * Saudi Arabia's throne, while hereditary, is not determined by a succession law but rather by consensus of the House of Saud as to who will be Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia; consensus may change depending on the Crown Prince's actions or influence, creating strong incentive for the Crown Prince to assert his power. Since 2007, the process of establishing the consensus of the House has been institutionalized in the form of the Allegiance Council, comprising the most powerful senior princes, which has the power to disapprove the King's nominee for Crown Prince and substitute its own by simple majority vote. In effect, this makes the Saudi monarchy elective within the House of Saud, as the king's eldest son has not become Crown Prince since the death of King Abdulaziz in 1953. However, it was only in 2015, through the accession of Muhammad bin Nayef, that a member of the house who was not a son of Abdulaziz attained the position (all prior Crown Princes had been chosen from among Abdulaziz's sons). Upon Prince Muhammad's removal, Prince Muhammad bin Salman became the first Crown Prince since Saud to hold the position during the reign of his father.
 * The Māori King Movement in New Zealand chooses a Maori monarch, elected by the Kaumātua of various New Zealand iwi (tribes). However, every Maori monarch to date has been succeeded by their child, making the position hereditary in effect.
 * Wallis and Futuna (territories of the French Republic) have traditional heads of the three regions who are elected.

title: Elective monarchy


text:
Ergodic theory

Ergodic theory is a branch of mathematics that studies statistical properties of deterministic dynamical systems; it is the study of ergodicity. In this context, "statistical properties" refers to properties which are expressed through the behavior of time averages of various functions along trajectories of dynamical systems. The notion of deterministic dynamical systems assumes that the equations determining the dynamics do not contain any random perturbations, noise, etc. Thus, the statistics with which we are concerned are properties of the dynamics.

Ergodic theory, like probability theory, is based on general notions of measure theory. Its initial development was motivated by problems of statistical physics.

A central concern of ergodic theory is the behavior of a dynamical system when it is allowed to run for a long time. The first result in this direction is the Poincaré recurrence theorem, which claims that almost all points in any subset of the phase space eventually revisit the set. Systems for which the Poincaré recurrence theorem holds are conservative systems; thus all ergodic systems are conservative.

More precise information is provided by various ergodic theorems which assert that, under certain conditions, the time average of a function along the trajectories exists almost everywhere and is related to the space average. Two of the most important theorems are those of Birkhoff (1931) and von Neumann which assert the existence of a time average along each trajectory. For the special class of ergodic systems, this time average is the same for almost all initial points: statistically speaking, the system that evolves for a long time "forgets" its initial state. Stronger properties, such as mixing and equidistribution, have also been extensively studied.

The problem of metric classification of systems is another important part of the abstract ergodic theory. An outstanding role in ergodic theory and its applications to stochastic processes is played by the various notions of entropy for dynamical systems.

The concepts of ergodicity and the ergodic hypothesis are central to applications of ergodic theory. The underlying idea is that for certain systems the time average of their properties is equal to the average over the entire space. Applications of ergodic theory to other parts of mathematics usually involve establishing ergodicity properties for systems of special kind. In geometry, methods of ergodic theory have been used to study the geodesic flow on Riemannian manifolds, starting with the results of Eberhard Hopf for Riemann surfaces of negative curvature. Markov chains form a common context for applications in probability theory. Ergodic theory has fruitful connections with harmonic analysis, Lie theory (representation theory, lattices in algebraic groups), and number theory (the theory of diophantine approximations, L-functions).

Ergodic transformations
Ergodic theory is often concerned with ergodic transformations. The intuition behind such transformations, which act on a given set, is that they do a thorough job "stirring" the elements of that set. E.g. if the set is a quantity of hot oatmeal in a bowl, and if a spoonful of syrup is dropped into the bowl, then iterations of the inverse of an ergodic transformation of the oatmeal will not allow the syrup to remain in a local subregion of the oatmeal, but will distribute the syrup evenly throughout. At the same time, these iterations will not compress or dilate any portion of the oatmeal: they preserve the measure that is density.

The formal definition is as follows:

Let $T : X → X$ be a measure-preserving transformation on a measure space $(X, Σ, μ)$, with $μ(X) = 1$. Then $T$ is ergodic if for every $E$ in $Σ$ with $μ(T^{−1}(E) Δ E) = 0$ (that is, $E$ is invariant), either $μ(E) = 0$ or $μ(E) = 1$.

The operator Δ here is the symmetric difference of sets, equivalent to the exclusive-or operation with respect to set membership. The condition that the symmetric difference be measure zero is called being essentially invariant.

Examples

 * An irrational rotation of the circle R/Z, T: x → x + θ, where θ is irrational, is ergodic. This transformation has even stronger properties of unique ergodicity, minimality, and equidistribution. By contrast, if θ = p/q is rational (in lowest terms) then T is periodic, with period q, and thus cannot be ergodic: for any interval I of length a, 0 < a < 1/q, its orbit under T (that is, the union of I, T(I), ..., Tq−1(I), which contains the image of I under any number of applications of T) is a T-invariant mod 0 set that is a union of q intervals of length a, hence it has measure qa strictly between 0 and 1.
 * Let G be a compact abelian group, μ the normalized Haar measure, and T a group automorphism of G. Let G* be the Pontryagin dual group, consisting of the continuous characters of G, and T* be the corresponding adjoint automorphism of G*. The automorphism T is ergodic if and only if the equality (T*)n(χ) = χ is possible only when n = 0 or χ is the trivial character of G. In particular, if G is the n-dimensional torus and the automorphism T is represented by a unimodular matrix A then T is ergodic if and only if no eigenvalue of A is a root of unity.
 * A Bernoulli shift is ergodic. More generally, ergodicity of the shift transformation associated with a sequence of i.i.d. random variables and some more general stationary processes follows from Kolmogorov's zero–one law.
 * Ergodicity of a continuous dynamical system means that its trajectories "spread around" the phase space. A system with a compact phase space which has a non-constant first integral cannot be ergodic. This applies, in particular, to Hamiltonian systems with a first integral I functionally independent from the Hamilton function H and a compact level set X = {(p,q): H(p,q) = E} of constant energy. Liouville's theorem implies the existence of a finite invariant measure on X, but the dynamics of the system is constrained to the level sets of I on X, hence the system possesses invariant sets of positive but less than full measure. A property of continuous dynamical systems that is the opposite of ergodicity is complete integrability.

Ergodic theorems
Let T: X → X be a measure-preserving transformation on a measure space (X, Σ, μ) and suppose ƒ is a μ-integrable function, i.e. ƒ ∈ L1(μ). Then we define the following averages:

Time average: This is defined as the average (if it exists) over iterations of T starting from some initial point x:

 * $$ \hat f(x) = \lim_{n\rightarrow\infty}\;  \frac{1}{n} \sum_{k=0}^{n-1} f(T^k x).$$

Space average: If μ(X) is finite and nonzero, we can consider the space or phase average of ƒ:

 * $$ \bar f =\frac 1{\mu(X)} \int f\,d\mu.\quad\text{ (For a probability space, } \mu(X)=1.) $$

In general the time average and space average may be different. But if the transformation is ergodic, and the measure is invariant, then the time average is equal to the space average almost everywhere. This is the celebrated ergodic theorem, in an abstract form due to George David Birkhoff. (Actually, Birkhoff's paper considers not the abstract general case but only the case of dynamical systems arising from differential equations on a smooth manifold.) The equidistribution theorem is a special case of the ergodic theorem, dealing specifically with the distribution of probabilities on the unit interval.

More precisely, the pointwise or strong ergodic theorem states that the limit in the definition of the time average of ƒ exists for almost every x and that the (almost everywhere defined) limit function $$\hat f $$ is integrable:

 * $$\hat f \in L^1(\mu). \, $$

Furthermore, $$\hat f$$ is T-invariant, that is to say

 * $$\hat f \circ T= \hat f \, $$

holds almost everywhere, and if μ(X) is finite, then the normalization is the same:

 * $$\int \hat f\, d\mu = \int f\, d\mu.$$

In particular, if T is ergodic, then $$\hat f $$ must be a constant (almost everywhere), and so one has that

 * $$\bar f = \hat f \, $$

almost everywhere. Joining the first to the last claim and assuming that μ(X) is finite and nonzero, one has that

 * $$\lim_{n\rightarrow\infty}\; \frac{1}{n} \sum_{k=0}^{n-1} f(T^k x) = \frac 1 {\mu(X)} \int f\,d\mu $$

for almost all x, i.e., for all x except for a set of measure zero.

For an ergodic transformation, the time average equals the space average almost surely.

As an example, assume that the measure space (X, Σ, μ) models the particles of a gas as above, and let ƒ(x) denote the velocity of the particle at position x. Then the pointwise ergodic theorems says that the average velocity of all particles at some given time is equal to the average velocity of one particle over time.

A generalization of Birkhoff's theorem is Kingman's subadditive ergodic theorem.

Probabilistic formulation: Birkhoff–Khinchin theorem
Birkhoff–Khinchin theorem. Let ƒ be measurable, E(|ƒ|) < ∞, and T be a measure-preserving map. Then with probability 1:

 * $$\lim_{n\rightarrow\infty}\; \frac{1}{n} \sum_{k=0}^{n-1} f(T^k x)=E(f \mid \mathcal{C})(x),$$

where $$E(f|\mathcal{C})$$ is the conditional expectation given the σ-algebra $$\mathcal{C}$$ of invariant sets of T.

Corollary (Pointwise Ergodic Theorem): In particular, if T is also ergodic, then $$\mathcal{C}$$ is the trivial σ-algebra, and thus with probability 1:

 * $$\lim_{n\rightarrow\infty}\; \frac{1}{n} \sum_{k=0}^{n-1} f(T^k x)=E(f).$$

Mean ergodic theorem
Von Neumann's mean ergodic theorem, holds in Hilbert spaces.

Let U be a unitary operator on a Hilbert space H; more generally, an isometric linear operator (that is, a not necessarily surjective linear operator satisfying ‖Ux‖ = ‖x‖ for all x in H, or equivalently, satisfying U*U = I, but not necessarily UU* = I). Let P be the orthogonal projection onto {ψ ∈ H | Uψ = ψ} = ker(I − U).

Then, for any x in H, we have:

 * $$ \lim_{N \to \infty} {1 \over N} \sum_{n=0}^{N-1} U^{n} x = P x,$$

where the limit is with respect to the norm on H. In other words, the sequence of averages

 * $$\frac{1}{N} \sum_{n=0}^{N-1} U^n$$

converges to P in the strong operator topology.

Indeed, it is not difficult to see that in this case any $$x\in H$$ admits an orthogonal decomposition into parts from $$\ker(I-U)$$ and $$\overline{\operatorname{ran}(I-U)}$$ respectively. The former part is invariant in all the partial sums as $$N$$ grows, while for the latter part, from the telescoping series one would have:

 * $$\lim_{N \to \infty} {1 \over N} \sum_{n=0}^{N-1} U^n (I-U)=\lim_{N \to \infty} {1 \over N} (I-U^N)=0$$

This theorem specializes to the case in which the Hilbert space H consists of L2 functions on a measure space and U is an operator of the form

 * $$Uf(x) = f(Tx) \, $$

where T is a measure-preserving endomorphism of X, thought of in applications as representing a time-step of a discrete dynamical system. The ergodic theorem then asserts that the average behavior of a function ƒ over sufficiently large time-scales is approximated by the orthogonal component of ƒ which is time-invariant.

In another form of the mean ergodic theorem, let Ut be a strongly continuous one-parameter group of unitary operators on H. Then the operator

 * $$\frac{1}{T}\int_0^T U_t\,dt$$

converges in the strong operator topology as T → ∞. In fact, this result also extends to the case of strongly continuous one-parameter semigroup of contractive operators on a reflexive space.

Remark: Some intuition for the mean ergodic theorem can be developed by considering the case where complex numbers of unit length are regarded as unitary transformations on the complex plane (by left multiplication). If we pick a single complex number of unit length (which we think of as U), it is intuitive that its powers will fill up the circle. Since the circle is symmetric around 0, it makes sense that the averages of the powers of U will converge to 0. Also, 0 is the only fixed point of U, and so the projection onto the space of fixed points must be the zero operator (which agrees with the limit just described).

Convergence of the ergodic means in the Lp norms
Let (X, Σ, μ) be as above a probability space with a measure preserving transformation T, and let 1 ≤ p ≤ ∞. The conditional expectation with respect to the sub-σ-algebra ΣT of the T-invariant sets is a linear projector ET of norm 1 of the Banach space Lp(X, Σ, μ) onto its closed subspace Lp(X, ΣT, μ). The latter may also be characterized as the space of all T-invariant Lp-functions on X. The ergodic means, as linear operators on Lp(X, Σ, μ) also have unit operator norm; and, as a simple consequence of the Birkhoff–Khinchin theorem, converge to the projector ET in the strong operator topology of Lp if 1 ≤ p ≤ ∞, and in the weak operator topology if p = ∞. More is true if 1 < p ≤ ∞ then the Wiener–Yoshida–Kakutani ergodic dominated convergence theorem states that the ergodic means of ƒ ∈ Lp are dominated in Lp; however, if ƒ ∈ L1, the ergodic means may fail to be equidominated in Lp. Finally, if ƒ is assumed to be in the Zygmund class, that is |ƒ| log+(|ƒ|) is integrable, then the ergodic means are even dominated in L1.

Sojourn time
Let (X, Σ, μ) be a measure space such that μ(X) is finite and nonzero. The time spent in a measurable set A is called the sojourn time. An immediate consequence of the ergodic theorem is that, in an ergodic system, the relative measure of A is equal to the mean sojourn time:

 * $$ \frac{\mu(A)}{\mu(X)} = \frac 1{\mu(X)}\int \chi_A\, d\mu = \lim_{n\rightarrow\infty}\; \frac{1}{n} \sum_{k=0}^{n-1} \chi_A(T^k x) $$

for all x except for a set of measure zero, where χA is the indicator function of A.

The occurrence times of a measurable set A is defined as the set k1, k2, k3, ..., of times k such that Tk(x) is in A, sorted in increasing order. The differences between consecutive occurrence times Ri = ki − ki−1 are called the recurrence times of A. Another consequence of the ergodic theorem is that the average recurrence time of A is inversely proportional to the measure of A, assuming that the initial point x is in A, so that k0 = 0.

 * $$ \frac{R_1 + \cdots + R_n}{n} \rightarrow \frac{\mu(X)}{\mu(A)} \quad\text{(almost surely)}$$

(See almost surely.) That is, the smaller A is, the longer it takes to return to it.

Ergodic flows on manifolds
The ergodicity of the geodesic flow on compact Riemann surfaces of variable negative curvature and on compact manifolds of constant negative curvature of any dimension was proved by Eberhard Hopf in 1939, although special cases had been studied earlier: see for example, Hadamard's billiards (1898) and Artin billiard (1924). The relation between geodesic flows on Riemann surfaces and one-parameter subgroups on SL(2, R) was described in 1952 by S. V. Fomin and I. M. Gelfand. The article on Anosov flows provides an example of ergodic flows on SL(2, R) and on Riemann surfaces of negative curvature. Much of the development described there generalizes to hyperbolic manifolds, since they can be viewed as quotients of the hyperbolic space by the action of a lattice in the semisimple Lie group SO(n,1). Ergodicity of the geodesic flow on Riemannian symmetric spaces was demonstrated by F. I. Mautner in 1957. In 1967 D. V. Anosov and Ya. G. Sinai proved ergodicity of the geodesic flow on compact manifolds of variable negative sectional curvature. A simple criterion for the ergodicity of a homogeneous flow on a homogeneous space of a semisimple Lie group was given by Calvin C. Moore in 1966. Many of the theorems and results from this area of study are typical of rigidity theory.

In the 1930s G. A. Hedlund proved that the horocycle flow on a compact hyperbolic surface is minimal and ergodic. Unique ergodicity of the flow was established by Hillel Furstenberg in 1972. Ratner's theorems provide a major generalization of ergodicity for unipotent flows on the homogeneous spaces of the form Γ \ G, where G is a Lie group and Γ is a lattice in G.

In the last 20 years, there have been many works trying to find a measure-classification theorem similar to Ratner's theorems but for diagonalizable actions, motivated by conjectures of Furstenberg and Margulis. An important partial result (solving those conjectures with an extra assumption of positive entropy) was proved by Elon Lindenstrauss, and he was awarded the Fields medal in 2010 for this result.

Modern references

 * Vladimir Igorevich Arnol'd and André Avez, Ergodic Problems of Classical Mechanics. New York: W.A. Benjamin. 1968.
 * Leo Breiman, Probability. Original edition published by Addison–Wesley, 1968; reprinted by Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, 1992. ISBN 0-89871-296-3. (See Chapter 6.)
 * (A survey of topics in ergodic theory; with exercises.)
 * Karl Petersen. Ergodic Theory (Cambridge Studies in Advanced Mathematics). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1990.
 * Françoise Pène, Stochastic properties of dynamical systems, Cours spécialisés de la SMF, Volume 30, 2022
 * Joseph M. Rosenblatt and Máté Weirdl, Pointwise ergodic theorems via harmonic analysis, (1993) appearing in Ergodic Theory and its Connections with Harmonic Analysis, Proceedings of the 1993 Alexandria Conference, (1995) Karl E. Petersen and Ibrahim A. Salama, eds., Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, ISBN 0-521-45999-0. (An extensive survey of the ergodic properties of generalizations of the equidistribution theorem of shift maps on the unit interval. Focuses on methods developed by Bourgain.)
 * A. N. Shiryaev, Probability, 2nd ed., Springer 1996, Sec. V.3. ISBN 0-387-94549-0.
 * (A detailed discussion about the priority of the discovery and publication of the ergodic theorems by Birkhoff and von Neumann, based on a letter of the latter to his friend Howard Percy Robertson.)
 * Andrzej Lasota, Michael C. Mackey, Chaos, Fractals, and Noise: Stochastic Aspects of Dynamics. Second Edition, Springer, 1994.
 * Manfred Einsiedler and Thomas Ward, Ergodic Theory with a view towards Number Theory. Springer, 2011.
 * Jane Hawkins, Ergodic Dynamics: From Basic Theory to Applications, Springer, 2021. ISBN 978-3-030-59242-4
 * Andrzej Lasota, Michael C. Mackey, Chaos, Fractals, and Noise: Stochastic Aspects of Dynamics. Second Edition, Springer, 1994.
 * Manfred Einsiedler and Thomas Ward, Ergodic Theory with a view towards Number Theory. Springer, 2011.
 * Jane Hawkins, Ergodic Dynamics: From Basic Theory to Applications, Springer, 2021. ISBN 978-3-030-59242-4

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Ergodic theory


text:
Caruaru

Caruaru is a Brazilian municipality in the state of Pernambuco. The most populous city in the interior of the state, Caruaru is located in the microzone of Agreste and because of its cultural importance, it is nicknamed Capital do Agreste (Portuguese for the "capital city of the Agreste region"), Princesinha do Agreste ("Little Princess of Agreste"), and Capital do Forró ("the capital city of forró").

The city is located 140 km from the state capital of Recife, which has an international airport. However, Caruaru has its own airport. Caruaru is renowned for its extensive Festival de São João ("Saint John's Festival"), which takes up the whole month of June, sometimes extending into July. Caruaru had a 2024 resident population of 401,109 inhabitants, living in a land area of 920.61 km2.

Caruaru is the hometown, among others, of Álvaro Lins, Brazilian journalist, and Lieutenant Brigadier Reginaldo dos Santos, former dean of the Brazilian Technological Institute for Aeronautics.

History
The lands that today comprise the city of Caruaru were originally a cattle ranch owned by family Nunes dos Bezerros. This name was given because of the proximity of the farm to the Bezerros chapel. Some orphans used to live with the Nunes family. One of them, José Rodrigues de Jesus, inherited part of the estate, staying at the location that would later be named Caruaru. There he built a chapel dedicated to the Immaculate Conception. A village started to grow around this chapel. In 1846, Friar Euzébio de Sales started to build the parish named Igreja Matriz, nowadays a cathedral. In later years, the church was rebuilt twice, the last one in 1883. The geographical position benefited the city, because it was a necessary stopover in the transportation of cattle to the interior of the state.

Geography

 * State: Pernambuco
 * Region: Agreste of Pernambuco
 * Bordering municipalities: Toritama, Vertentes, Frei Miguelinho and Taquaritinga do Norte (N); Altinho and Agrestina (S); Brejo da Madre de Deus and São Caetano (W); Bezerros and Riacho das Almas (E)
 * Area: 920.61 km2
 * Elevation: 554 m
 * Hydrography: Capibaribe, Ipojuca and Una rivers
 * Vegetation: Hypoxerophilous Caatinga
 * Climate: Semi-arid
 * Mean annual temperature: 23.5 °C
 * Main road: BR-232
 * Distance to Recife - 140 km
 * Distance to Gravatá - 48 km

Economy
The main economic activities in Caruaru are industry (especially textiles), tourism, commerce, and handicraft, and the primary sector, especially the raising of goats, chickens, and cattle, and the production of milk. Agricultural activity in the Caruaru area also includes beans, cassava, and maize. Caruaru also hosts one of the biggest open-air traditional handicrafts markets of Brazil, the Feira de Caruaru.

Transports
Caruaru has one regional airport, the Oscar Laranjeira Airport, it is located in the west parte of the city, the nearest major international airport is the Recife/Guararapes–Gilberto Freyre International Airport in Recife which is 138 km far from the city. The city is served by two expressways, the BR-232 and the BR-104.

Festa Junina
Every June, as part of the nativity of St John the Baptist, Caruaru hosts one of the principal Brazilian Festa Junina. Since 1994, the festival has been held in Pátio de Eventos Luiz Gonzaga.

Sports

There are two association football (soccer) teams in the city: Clube Atlético do Porto, which plays at Antônio Inácio de Souza Stadium (capacity: 6,000), and Central Sport Club, which plays at Estádio Luiz José de Lacerda (capacity: 20,000). Both teams compete in the main series of Pernambuco's state tournament. Caruaru also hosts an annual race of the Brazilian Formula Truck competition, at the Ayrton Senna International Circuit, the state's main motor race track.

Tourism

 * Video: Saint John's Festival in Caruaru
 * Video: Caruaru's traditional handicraft market
 * Video: Caruaru's Formula Truck race

title: Caruaru


text:
Helen Gardner (critic)

Dame Helen Louise Gardner, (13 February 1908 – 4 June 1986) was an English literary critic and academic. Gardner began her teaching career at the University of Birmingham, and from 1966 to 1975 was a Merton Professor of English Literature, the first woman to have that position. She was best known for her work on the poets John Donne and T. S. Eliot, but also published on John Milton and William Shakespeare. She published over a dozen books, and received multiple honours.

Her critical stance was traditional and focused on history and biography; it involved the work's historical context, the personal habits of the author, and the relationship of the text to the time period. One of her beliefs was that a literary critic's job is to assist other people in reading for themselves.

Personal life
Gardner was the daughter of Charles Henry and Helen Mary Roadnight Cockman Gardner. She went to North London Collegiate School. She did her B.A. at St Hilda's College, Oxford, in 1929, later receiving a M.A. at the same college in 1935.

Academic career
Gardner's teaching career began at the University of Birmingham, where she held a temporary post as an assistant lecturer from 1930 to 1931. After three years as an assistant lecturer at Royal Holloway College in London, she returned to Birmingham, as a member of the English department (1934–41). She became a tutor at Oxford in 1941 and was a fellow of St Hilda's College, Oxford, from 1942 to 1966, where she was also a university reader in Renaissance English literature. From 1966 to 1975, Gardner was the Merton Professor of English Literature, the first woman to have that position, and a fellow of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford.

The University of Cambridge offered Gardner the new chair in Medieval and Renaissance Literature, but she declined, in part because she had heard that the university's first choice, C.S. Lewis, had changed his mind about refusing the position.

Critical approach and subject matter
Gardner published on T. S. Eliot from early on in her career; F. O. Matthiessen cited her 1942 essay "The Recent Poetry of T.S. Eliot" with approbation.

Her critical methodology included the work's historical context, the personal habits of the author, and the relationship of the text to the time period. She prepared several editions of poetry by John Donne, including The Divine Poems (1952), Selected Prose (1967) and The Elegies and the Songs of Sonnets (1965), all of which attracted commendation for her careful work. As a scholar of poetry by T. S. Eliot, she wrote three studies on Eliot and said that the poet is a major influence on her own criticism. Gardner also wrote criticism on John Milton and William Shakespeare. Gardner influenced the perceptions of British poetry of many readers, especially poetry from the late sixteenth to the early seventeenth centuries. Gardner was an Anglican Christian and her faith was a subtle part of her writing.

Gardner, it is said, "belonged to no 'school'" of literary criticism. She was critical of the New Criticism and its insistence on multiple interpretations; Gardner disavowed "the rejection of determinate meanings in texts", insisting that despite texts being open to multiple interpretations, there is still "intentional communication" for readers to try to understand. In 1979, when she delivered the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures (published as In Defence of the Imagination) Gardner said that she opposed the then-current trend of literary criticism to over-interpreting texts and using technical jargon. Of the function of a critic, she stated that it is to "shine a torch" and not "wield a sceptre", meaning that the function of a critic is "to illuminate rather than attack".

Honours
Gardner she was appointed as a CBE in 1962 and as a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1967. In 1971, she was elected as a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an international member of the American Philosophical Society in 1982. She received honorary degrees from Cambridge, London, Harvard, and Yale universities. She died in Bicester in 1986.

Legacy
Gardner's will bequeathed the royalties from the New Oxford Book of English Verse to the National Portrait Gallery, for the purchase of portraits relating to English literature and portraits from the late 16th and early 17th centuries. The character E. M. Ashford in Margaret Edson Wit is based on Gardner. Wit was later adapted into a 2001 film. She was listed in International Who's Who in Poetry 2004 under the subheading "Literary Figures of the Past".

Works by Helen Gardner
Gardner wrote more than a dozen books: monographs, critical editions, and anthologies. She edited The New Oxford Book of English Verse 1250–1950 (published 1972), which replaced Arthur Quiller-Couch's The Oxford Book of English Verse. The New Oxford Book of English Verse 1250–1950 was also published in braille.

Gardner's 1971 book Religion and Literature collects two lecture series, the 1966 Ewing Lectures on religious poetry and the 1968 T. S. Eliot Memorial Lectures on tragedy. Diana Fortuna, reviewing the book for the Modern Language Review, praised the lectures on tragedy as "an essential introduction to the subject", but was less impressed with the lectures on religious poetry, judging that it covered too much material and consequently did not treat some selections "fully enough".

She also published an anthology of religious poetry, A Book of Religious Verse, which according to her 1972 reviewer in the New York Times "should be read in conjunction with her provocative lectures on religious poetry printed in her Religion and Literature". The reviewer noted Gardner's attempt to find "viable" religious poetry from the 20th century, but found that religious poems by Edwin Muir and W.H. Auden could not compare "with Herbert, Donne or Milton", and thought the volume "end[ed] with a whimper". Other criticism of her work includes her focus on judgments in analyzing literary works.

title: Helen Gardner (critic)


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Georgi Lozanov

Georgi Lozanov (Георги Лозанов; 22 July 1926 – 6 May 2012), known as 'the father of accelerated learning', was a Bulgarian scientist, neurologist, psychiatrist, psychologist and educator, creator of suggestology, suggestopedia (or 'suggestopaedia', an experimental branch of suggestology for use in pedagogy), and integrated psychotherapy.

He developed suggestopedia, a learning/teaching theory based on his early-1960s study of suggestion which is known as "suggestology".

Lozanov's theory and practice triggered an accelerated learning movement in the West, where various techniques not originally included in Lozanov's theory were introduced. Such techniques included elements such as breathing, visualization, and biofeedback. There is a school in Sliven dedicated to preparing teachers for using suggestopaedia during lessons in order to improve the learning speed of pupils.

During the 1970s his theories and method were carefully analyzed and evaluated worldwide by a committee on languages learning and eventually certified by Unesco as "the most cultural integral and effective learning method" in Second Language Acquisition, better known today as its corporate adaptation called the Accelerated Learning Method.

Among his research, Lozanov had conducted during his earlier career stages advanced long-term research in the field of parapsychology, especially on clairvoyance at the University of Sofia.

He eventually left Bulgaria, and settled in Western Europe creating and opening the International Centre for Desuggestology and Suggestopedia, Vienna, Austria, also referred to as the Lozanov Institute in Vienna, while conducting his extensive work in North America, particularly in Washington, D.C., USA, and Ottawa-Gatineau, Canada, working at its corresponding Diplomatic Institutes on the development and implementation of Accelerated Second Language Learning, training programs tailored to enhance the learning of diplomats, defense officers, and global federal government employees.

Legacy
In 1966 he created the State Suggestology Research Institute in Sofia, Bulgaria, and the Centre for Suggestology and Development of Personality at the University of Sofia " St Climent Ohridski", which he directed until 1984.

During the 1970s he created the Lozanov learning method for super-learning of foreign languages, after the methodology audit of 1978 the method was certified by the Unesco in 1980. Upon certification of his method, he created the International Centre for Desuggestology and Suggestopedia in Vienna, Austria.

Then in 2005 with the contribution of his colleague, the linguist, pedagogue, and artist Dr. Evelyna Gateva, they created the Lozanov International Centre for Teacher Training in Vorarlberg, Austria that developed and provided teacher-training programs and certified new instructor and facilitators. During March 2006 at the Trainers' Conference in Sofia, it was created the International Association of Suggestology (Suggestopedia) founded with headquarters in Oslo, Norway; Dr. Lozanov was elected honorary chairman of the Association, and Professor Lisa Hartmark from Norway was elected chairwoman.

Also in 2006, on 26 March, he created the Lozanov International Trainers Association and they founded LITTA the Lozanov Institute. There are hundreds of trained teachers at Litta website in many different countries, from 1991 to 2008. One, in particular, named Paulo Sergio Negrete, from Brazil, and trained in 2000, developed the Neuropedia / Deblocking Method, based on Suggestopedia, which claims to be a development of the method. The scientific paper was published in 2011.

title: Georgi Lozanov


text:
Walmer Castle

Walmer Castle is an artillery fort originally constructed by Henry VIII in Walmer, Kent, between 1539 and 1540. It formed part of the King's Device programme to protect against invasion from France and the Holy Roman Empire, and defended the strategically important Downs anchorage off the English coast. Comprising a keep and four circular bastions, the moated stone castle covered 0.61 acre and had 39 firing positions on the upper levels for artillery. It cost the Crown a total of £27,092 to build the three castles of Walmer, Sandown, and Deal, which lay adjacent to one another along the coast and were connected by earthwork defences. The original invasion threat passed, but during the Second English Civil War of 1648–49, Walmer was seized by pro-Royalist insurgents and was only retaken by Parliamentary forces after several months' fighting.

In the 18th century, Walmer became the official residence of the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports and was gradually modified from a military fortification into a private residence. Various Prime Ministers and prominent politicians were appointed as Lord Warden, including William Pitt, the Duke of Wellington and Lord Granville, who adapted parts of the Tudor castle as living spaces and constructed extensive gardens around the property. By 1904, the War Office agreed that Walmer had no remaining military utility and it passed to the Ministry of Works. Successive Lord Wardens continued to use the property but it was also opened to the public. Walmer was no longer considered a particularly comfortable or modern residence, however, and Lord Curzon blamed the poor condition of the castle for his wife's death in 1906.

Lord Wardens since the Second World War have included Winston Churchill, Robert Menzies and Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, but they have made only intermittent use of Walmer Castle. In the 21st century, Walmer Castle is run as a tourist attraction by English Heritage. The interior of the castle displays a range of historical objects and pictures associated with the property and its Lord Wardens, protected since the 19th century by special legislation. The grounds include the Queen Mother's Garden, designed by Penelope Hobhouse as a 95th birthday gift for Elizabeth in 1997.

16th century
Walmer Castle was built to defend the English coast from attack by France and the Holy Roman Empire in the final years of the reign of King Henry VIII. Traditionally the Crown had left coastal defences to the local lords and communities, only taking a modest role in building and maintaining fortifications, and while France and the Empire remained in conflict with one another, maritime raids were common but an actual invasion of England seemed unlikely. Modest defences, based around simple blockhouses and towers, existed in the south-west and along the Sussex coast, with a few more impressive works in the north of England, but in general the fortifications were very limited in scale.

In 1533, Henry broke with Pope Paul III in order to annul the long-standing marriage to his wife, Catherine of Aragon and remarry. Catherine was the aunt of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, and he took the annulment as a personal insult. This resulted in France and the Empire declaring an alliance against Henry in 1538, and the Pope encouraging the two countries to attack England. An invasion of England appeared certain. In response, Henry issued an order, called a "device", in 1539, giving instructions for the "defence of the realm in time of invasion" and the construction of forts along the English coastline.

Walmer and the adjacent castles of Deal and Sandown were constructed to protect the Downs in east Kent, an important anchorage formed by the Goodwin Sands which gave access to Deal Beach, on which enemy soldiers could easily be landed. The stone castles were supported by a line of four earthwork forts, known as the Great Turf, the Little Turf Bulwark, the Great White Bulwark of Clay and the Walmer Bulwark, and a 2.5 mi defensive ditch and bank. Collectively the castles became known as the "castles of the Downs" and cost the Crown a total of £27,092 to build.

Walmer was built between April 1539 and autumn 1540, by a team including Richard Benese as the surveyor, William Clement as the master carpenter, and Christopher Dickenson as the master mason. It was initially garrisoned by a captain, two lieutenants, two porters, ten gunners and three soldiers, at an annual cost of £174. It was probably equipped with a range of brass and cast-iron guns, along with arquebuses and bows for close defence. In 1597, a report listed the castle's artillery as comprising a cannon, a culverin, five demi-culverins, a saker, a minion and a falcon.

17th century
Walmer Castle was left to decline in the early 17th century, with little money being made available for repairs and the garrison receiving low pay, leading some members to reside in nearby Deal rather the fort itself, and to take on additional employment to supplement their wages. Walmer Castle was seized by Parliamentary forces at the start of the first English Civil War between the supporters of King Charles I and Parliament, but did not play a significant role in the remainder of the initial conflict. After the few years of unsteady peace after 1645, the Second Civil War broke out in 1648, this time with Charles' Royalist supporters joined by Scottish allies. The Parliamentary navy was based in the Downs, protected by Walmer and the other Henrician castles, but by May a Royalist insurrection was under way across Kent.

Vice-Admiral William Batten had been forced to resign from his post as Commander of the Fleet the previous year by Parliamentary officials, and he now encouraged the fleet to join the Royalist faction. Sir Henry Palmer, a former sailor, accompanied by other members of the Kentish gentry, also called on the fleet to revolt, taking advantage of the many fellow Kentish men in the crews. Walmer and Deal Castle declared for the King, shortly after the garrisons at Sandown. With both the coastal fortresses and the navy now under Royalist control, Parliament feared that foreign forces might be landed along the coast or aid sent to the Scots.

Parliament defeated the wider insurgency at the Battle of Maidstone at the start of June, and then sent a force under the command of Colonel Nathaniel Rich to deal with Walmer and the other castles along the Downs. Walmer Castle was the first to be besieged, and surrendered on 12 July. Deal was attacked in late July, and in August artillery assaults began on Sandown as well, leading to the surrender of both remaining fortifications. Walmer was badly damaged during the conflict and it was estimated by Rich, responsible for carrying out the repairs, that the work would cost at least £500.

In 1649, Parliament ordered new supplies of ammunition and powder be sent to Walmer and the other castles of the Downs, which were brought back into good order. The garrison at Walmer remained substantial during the period, with a governor, a corporal and 20 soldiers, but when Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660 he reduced the numbers again to a captain, lieutenant, porter and 16 men. In the Glorious Revolution of 1688 against Charles' brother, King James II, the townsfolk of Deal seized Walmer Castle on behalf of William III, the Prince of Orange. By the end of the century, however, the castle was increasingly regarded as out of date from a military perspective.

1700–1828
In the 18th century, Walmer Castle became the official residence of the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports. The Lord Warden was originally a medieval title linked to five key ports along the coast of England; the position's prominence had faded, but it still retained important judicial and military functions. When Lionel Sackville, the Duke of Dorset, was appointed to the post in 1708 he decided that the existing residence in Dover Castle was unsatisfactory, probably because of the semi-ruinous state of the castle, and moved into Walmer Castle instead.

The Duke occupied the post of Lord Warden until 1765, save for two periods when it was filled by James Butler, the Duke of Ormonde and John Sidney, the Earl of Leicester. He carried out extensive work to make the castle more habitable, building extensions towards the north bastion and constructing a small house in the south bastion for the soldiers. Under the subsequent Lord Wardens, the politicians Robert Darcy, the Earl of Holderness, and Francis North, the Earl of Guildford, the castle continued to house artillery but it became increasingly less military in character.

The Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger was then made the Lord Warden in 1792. Pitt was badly in debt and King George III believed that the post, which came with a salary of £3,000 a year, would usefully supplement Pitt's income. Pitt made extensive use of the castle and by 1803 he used it as his main residence in an effort to reduce his living costs. Pitt's niece, Lady Hester Stanhope, joined him at Walmer between 1803 and 1806; together with Pitt, she carried out extensive work on the castle gardens, transforming them from a simple kitchen garden into a set of landscaped ornamental enclosures; Stanhope enlisted the Dover militia to help with the landscaping and planting.

With the outbreak of the French Revolutionary Wars, Pitt became energetically involved in the protection of the ports along the coast, entertaining the local garrison commanders, naval captains and the local gentry at Walmer on a regular basis. After Pitt resigned as Prime Minister in 1801, fears remained of a French invasion and he formed a volunteer cavalry unit at Walmer Castle, where he lived with his new officers. He also formed a unit of bombardier infantry and a fleet of 35 fishing boats called luggers, which he armed with 12 lb or 18 lb guns, reviewing them from the castle. Stanhope remarked on the constant drilling of army units around the castle during her time there.

Robert Jenkinson, the Earl of Liverpool, took possession of Walmer Castle following the death of Pitt in 1806. Liverpool was a favourite of King George's, and his appointment as Lord Warden was again intended to provide a valuable income and a country retreat. As Prime Minister, Liverpool used Walmer as a personal retreat and as a location for private political discussions with selected guests.

1829–99
On Lord Liverpool's death, Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington and the current Prime Minister, asked King George IV for the post of Lord Warden, primarily because he was seeking the use of Walmer Castle. Wellington took up post in 1829 and considered Walmer to be "the most charming marine residence". He made use of the castle each autumn, entertaining extensively there but living and sleeping in a single room. He was visited there twice by Victoria, once when she was still a princess and later as queen. Wellington let the gardens fall into a poor condition. Wellington died in his room at Walmer on 14 September 1852. His embalmed body was kept in his room to lie in state until 10 November, and when the room was opened for public visitors during the final two days, around 9,000 attended. The Duke's body was finally removed to London via Deal, complete with a military escort.

James Broun-Ramsay, the Marquess of Dalhousie became Lord Warden; on his death, the Prime Minister Henry Temple, the Viscount Palmerston, took over the castle in 1861. Palmerston initially declined to buy the contents of the castle from his predecessor's estate on taking up the post, a practice which had become traditional for the Lords Warden, complaining about the high price being proposed. This raised the risk that the historical contents of the castle might be sold off at open auction; and some of Wellington's former belongings were therefore removed by his family for safekeeping.

The politician Granville Leveson-Gower, 2nd Earl Granville was offered the post of Lord Warden by the new Prime Minister, John Russell in 1865. Russell noted that the role would be expensive for Granville to perform — the salary had been abolished in 1828 — but that it would provide him with a property by the sea, which Granville had been seeking to acquire for a while. Granville took over Walmer in 1865. He expanded the gardens, built new kennels for a hunting pack and spent many years reassembling the furniture and other objects that Pitt and Wellington had used at the castle. He received large numbers of visitors, many of whom stopped off while travelling to or from France. The diplomat Baron de Malortie visited Granville and his family at Walmer, and later praised the homely atmosphere in the castle. He described how, after breakfast, the family and guests would all gather in the drawing room, which was the only large room in the house, and Granville would answer government correspondence amid the daily life of the rest of the household.

The businessman and politician William Smith was appointed Lord Warden in 1891, but died in Walmer Castle during his first visit here in October of that year. Smith had proposed that the historical artefacts in the castle should be protected from being removed by later Lord Wardens and suggested that government pass an Indenture of Heirlooms Bill. The government carried out the plan after Smith's death, protecting almost 70 pieces of furniture and 50 artworks at the castle and forbidding them being moved from the castle without the Secretary of State for War's approval. Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, the Marquess of Salisbury, became the next Lord Warden; with adequate legal protection now in place, the 3rd Duke of Wellington suggested returning his grandfather's possessions to the castle, but Lady Salisbury declined the offer.

20th–21st centuries
By 1904 the War Office had concluded that Walmer had no remaining military value and agreed to transfer the castle to the Office of Works, who accepted it on the condition that they were paid £2,400 in order to carry out repairs. The Office's survey noted that "the lower floor ... is very inconvenient, dark and not conducive to health while the women servants have to sleep in a sort of dormitory in the slopes of the roof... The principal floor is, generally speaking, badly arranged and badly lighted and the Dining Room is very small"; the report suggested that it would be best to demolish the building and rebuild it.

Proposals were made to find the next Lord Warden, George Curzon, the Marquess Curzon, alternative accommodation and the Royal Marines were approached as replacement tenants for the castle, but declined the offer. The Ministry acquired agreement for most of the castle to be opened to the public, with various historical objects related to the property being put on display, including some donated by King Edward VII. Lord Curzon moved into the castle when returned from India in 1905. His wife, Mary, fell ill, which Curzon believed to be a result of their poor accommodation, and despite being moved to a new residence, she died shortly afterwards. As a result, Curzon decided to resign the post of Lord Warden, leaving the castle, and subsequently the Prince of Wales, the future George V, took up the post.

William Lygon, the Earl Beauchamp, became the Lord Warden in 1913, building a Roman Catholic chapel at the castle and holding large parties there each summer. His children later commented that they found the castle was chilly and cramped. The Prime Minister, Asquith, was invited by Beauchamp to use the castle during the First World War as a weekend retreat, as it had good communication links with the front line in France. Asquith's wife, Margot, was not initially impressed by Walmer, noting in her diary that while it was "very distinguished" and had "great charm", it was "terribly exposed" with "cold... noisy corridors and small rooms"; she later came to like the castle and noted that she was sad to finally leave it.

Lygon had sexual relations with men, which was illegal in England during this period. Rumours spread about the parties that he had held at Walmer Castle after the war, where, according to the historian Richard Davenport-Hines, he had "behaved indiscreetly with young men". The King was informed about his lifestyle and Lygon fled the country in 1931, resigning the appointment of Lord Warden the following year.

Lygon's successor, the politician Rufus Isaacs, the Marquess of Reading, became the Lord Warden in 1934, holding jovial family gatherings there. His wife, Stella, attempted to restore Wellington's old bedroom to its earlier appearance during the Duke's tenure and, as part of this project, the 4th Duke of Wellington agreed to send the original contents of the room back to the castle, where they still remain. The politician Freeman Freeman-Thomas, the Marquess of Willingdon, became Lord Warden in 1936, followed by Sir Winston Churchill who followed him in 1941 during the Second World War. Churchill noted to the Minister of Works and Buildings that he had told King George V on taking up the position that he doubted that he would be able to live at Walmer Castle during the war, as it was within range of the German artillery along the French coast, or indeed that he would able to afford to live there afterwards, and for that reason he hoped that the state would maintain the castle and gardens, and decide what use it should be put to after the war.

Sir Robert Menzies, the Australian politician, became the Lord Warden in 1965 and visited the castle on an annual basis, staying in the flat there. Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother followed Menzies in 1978, initially visiting the castle from the Royal Yacht, but from 1986 onwards taking over the entire castle for three days each July. This required moving furniture, silverware and other furnishings from London and caused difficulties for English Heritage, who managed the property. Admiral of the Fleet the Lord Boyce, took up the post of Lord Warden in 2004. Since his death on 6 November 2022 the post is currently vacant.

In the 21st century, the property is managed by English Heritage, attracting 152,391 visitors in 2019. English Heritage carried out a £674,000 programme of improvements to the castle in 2015 intended to improve the visitor experience. The castle is protected under UK law as a scheduled monument, while the surrounding gardens are protected with a grade II listing.

Castle
Walmer Castle retains most of its original 16th-century structure, with a tall keep, 83 ft across, at the centre, flanked by four rounded bastions, one of which served as a gatehouse, and a moat, surrounded in turn by a curtain wall. Its curved walls are 15 feet thick. It was nearly identical to its sister castle at Sandown and was approximately 167 by across, covering 0.61 acre. The historian John Hale considered the original castle to form a transitional design between older medieval English designs and newer Italian styles of defence.

The castle had three tiers of artillery – the heaviest and longest range weapons occupying the upper levels, including the keep – with a total of 39 firing positions, and 31 gunloops in the basement for handguns should close defence be required. The embrasures in the walls were all widely splayed to provide the maximum possible space for the guns to operate and traverse, and the interior of the castle was designed with vents to allow the smoke from its guns to escape.

From the 18th century onwards, the interior of the castle was converted to provide accommodation for the Lord Wardens, almost all of which is now open to visitors. The castle is still entered through the ground floor of the gatehouse in the western bastion, which contains the original porter's lodge. In the middle of the castle is the keep, which originally housed the Servants' Hall and now a set of tea rooms. In the southern bastion is a set of rooms which are reached through the Hall Room, originally built as gunners' lodgings in the 18th century and converted into the entrance hall to the castle in the 1930s. On the far side of the bastion are the Sackville and Willingdon Rooms, built in the 18th century; the Willingdon Room is now used as a museum for objects relating to William Pitt. The Lucas Room has been redecorated in a mid-19th century style and is used to present various items of Wellington memorabilia. The north and east bastions are filled in, providing solid foundations for the gun platforms above.

The second floor contains the Lord Warden's private apartments in the west bastion and the western half of the keep. In the southern bastion is the Duke of Wellington's Room and the Lucas Room, originally part of an apartment of rooms selected by William Pitt for his use, as they formed the warmest part of the castle. The corridor running across the castle through the keep was built by Pitt to link the north and south halves of the castle.

The Prince Consort's and Queen Victoria's rooms in the keep are named after their use during the royal visit of 1842, although their decoration today dates from the interwar period. The Dining Room, Drawing Room and Ante Room, which overlook the northern bastion, date from the 1730s, when the Duke of Dorset constructed them to form a private set of chambers. These rooms feature a range of pink and purple window glass, which tradition says was installed by the Earl of Liverpool to protect his wife's eyesight; recent analysis shows that some of the pink-tinted glass dates from the 1730s, and discoloured naturally over time, while other panes were intentionally purchased around 1800 in these hues, but probably as status symbols and not for any medical purpose.

Gardens
The gardens of Walmer Castle date mainly from the 1790s and 1860s and comprise around 13 ha of land, split evenly between formal ornamental gardens and parkland. The main body of the gardens stretches away from the castle towards the north-west, and is made up of protected, well-drained, chalk-based soil, forming a maritime microclimate.

The castle is approached through the castle meadow, an area of open parkland, lined with Holm oaks planted in the 1860s, and is surrounded by the dry moat, now a garden dating from at least the 1850s and planted with trees and shrubs. Adjacent to the castle are the Queen Mother's Garden and the kitchen garden and glasshouses. The Queen Mother's Garden was built by English Heritage as a 95th birthday gift for the then Lord Warden in 1997, the site having been originally part of the wider kitchen gardens, before being turned into a tennis court in the 1920s. Designed by Penelope Hobhouse, the garden incorporates a 92 ft pool, a viewing mound and a classical pavilion. The two glasshouses have been restored, functioning as cold greenhouses, while the remainder of the kitchen garden is planted with a mixture of vegetables, fruit trees and flowers.

The 262 ft Broadwalk is the main axis of the gardens and separates the glasshouses from the 328 ft Oval Lawn, planted with lime trees and yews. The Broadwalk is lined by the "Cloud Hedge", a formal 19th-century yew hedge that grew out of control in the Second World War and was left in its current, undulating style. Two terraces in the middle of the garden, designed by William Masters in an Italianate style, separate the further half of the garden. On the other side are the paddock, planted with Holm oaks, and a curved belt of woodland of beech, ash and chestnut trees, badly damaged in the storms of 1987 and 1990. At the far end is the Glen, a woodland hollow formed from an old chalk quarry in the 19th century.

title: Walmer Castle