The king is the monarch of a kingdom.
The king is the monarch or sovereign of a kingdom . The form of government where the supreme office of the State is in the hands of the king is known as monarchy . In these cases, power is hereditary (when the king dies, his son is crowned and so on).
In the various cultures of ancient times, the king held an impeccable position. At first he was believed as if he were a God . At that time, this deity was justifiable because they were polytheists, however with the imposition of Christianity in societies, new reasons had to be sought to believe in the absolute power of the monarch , given that there was only one God.
There it was considered that the best way to understand this power was to consider that it was given to him by divine design. Then they stopped being theocratic monarchies and became absolute . It is important to keep in mind that their power was so great that everything they decreed was taken into account as if it were a prophecy and their decisions were never questioned.
The power of the king
For centuries the power of the kings manipulated the populations throughout the entire land to the utmost, until with the arrival of the English Revolution of the 17th century , this power began to suffer limitations because the people opposed continuing to be governed with such a system; Parliamentary monarchies then emerged that, although they maintained the figure of the king, he had to respond to a group of people who looked after the rights of the residents and prevented the monarch from making decisions that could endanger social stability .
In this way, over time, monarchies modified their essence (except in some countries in Africa and Asia ) and lost power, although in some countries they continue to remain important public figures, as is the case of the kings of Spain. .
The monarchy today
Today, in some countries the institutionality of the Monarchy is maintained because it is considered to be the best guarantee of harmony, stability and democracy; In these the function of the king is to advise and guide the steps of the Republic towards a space where all citizens enjoy freedom and well-being .
Thus, the kings of European nations are currently at the head of constitutional or parliamentary monarchies , with democratic regimes and popular sovereignty. The king, therefore, plays a symbolic and representative role, but does not exercise political power.
In recent years, with the increase in people's distrust in leaders, the following question has begun to arise: What is better, the monarchy or the Republic?
Without a doubt the second is, however it is necessary that there be reforms that prevent democratically chosen rulers from taking advantage of their power and ruining a country.
It is worth mentioning that a monarchical regime is a government system that is flatly opposed to the Republic , where there are several leaders who have been democratically chosen by the people.
Finally, it is worth mentioning that according to Aristotle, monarchy is the pure form of government as long as it is exercised legally and not for the personal benefit of the king. It is worth mentioning that the name given to the monarch can be king, tsar, emperor , sultan , etc.; That is to say, in all these types of States there is the similarity that there is a person in command who exercises power over the people.
The lion is known as the king of the jungle.
Symbolic use of the notion of king
Symbolically and making an analogy for the power or superiority that a king has over the rest, the lion is called the king of the jungle and Elvis Presley is called the king of rock , for example.
The footballer Edson Arantes do Nascimento ( Pelé ) is also known as O Rei . In these cases, kingship refers to the influence or control that the "monarch" has over other colleagues or members of his species.
a chess piece
In chess , the king is the main piece of the game . It can walk in all directions, although only one square at a time.
The objective of chess is to trap the enemy king in the checkmate position ( "defeated king" ), which is the last position of the game.