In private life he would have been called an honest blockhead; and Fortune, that made him a king, added nothing to his happiness, only prejudiced his honesty and shortened his days.
- Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.

Additional Information on
George I (b.1660 r.1714-1727)

The death of Queen Anne heralded a complicated situation, namely the question of who would be the next British monarch. Anne had no children and therefore no direct heir. The rightful heir, James Edward Stuart, refused to renounce his Catholic faith, and by The Act of Settlement (1701) this meant he could never ascend the throne. The next Protestants in line were the ruling house of Germany - The Hanoverians, descendants of Charles I's sister Elizabeth. So on Anne's death the crown was passed to George, Elector of Hanover.

George arrived in England aged fifty-four and had a very limited knowledge of his new kingdom, but nonetheless was the closest possible Protestant heir to the throne after Queen Anne's death. His was a difficult inheritance, not helped by the facts that he could only speak German, did not like his new country and spent as little time there as possible. He much preferred his autocratic rule in Hanover.

Surpassingly, he suffered little opposition once a feeble Stuart revolt was put down in 1715. This peace was largely due to the successful governing of a new constitutional development - the Prime Minister. George was lazy and dull-witted and had no interest in the politics and governing of his country, so he left it in the hands of his Hanoverian associates and a chosen minister. In 1721 the minister Robert Walpole was given the role of speaking for the king in all meetings. He became the king's representative in Parliament, and came to be known as the 'prime' or chief minister, and thus, in effect, the role of the Prime Minister was created.

As a result of George's lack of interest in governing, by the end of his reign the power of the monarchy had drastically reduced. In turn, the change in balance saw the dramatic rise in Parliamentary power - something which has grown ever since.

QUOTATIONS

George I knew nothing, and desired to know nothing and desired to do nothing, and the only good thing that is told of him is that he wished to restore the crown to its hereditary successor.
- Samuel Johnson, Quoted Boswell, The Life of Johnson, 1775.

No woman came amiss to him, if they were very willing and very fat. The standard of His Majesty's taste made all those ladies who aspired to his favour, and who were near the statutable size, strain and swell themselves like the frogs in the fable, to rival the bulk and dignity of the ox. Some succeeded, and others burst.
- Lord Chesterfield.