Lampooned as the lunatic king who lost America…but who was also hugely popular with his subjects, who presided over a British intellectual Renaissance, and who defeated Napoleon…we take another look at the reign of the man who may just be the most misunderstood monarch in history.

For many, Elizabeth I was England’s greatest monarch – rising through the deadly intrigue and plots of court to ascend to the throne, and then defeating the Spanish Armada and saving the kingdom. All, supposedly, while spurning the advances of her many suitors. But how much of it is true, and how much glorious myth making?

Prince Andrew’s association with Jeffrey Epstein has gone beyond a royal embarrassment, and has threatened to become a genuine constitutional crisis. How did The Firm ever let it happen? And after his 2022 settlement with accuser Virginia Giuffre, what next for the Queen’s favorite son?

Behind the opulence and regal tradition lies an underbelly compromising generations of hundreds of  men and women who make up the royal household—from servants, consultants, advisers and protectors of the House of Windsor. Together, these disciples of the monarch have kept the institution humming, all under a reign of duty and destiny dating back to the ninth century.