All the Dukes of Edinburgh in Order: A Complete History of the Royal Title & Why it Will Go Extinct

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]It's one of the most famous titles in the British monarchy and named after Scotland's capital city. But why does it keep going extinct after no more than two generations? And why is it already doomed to oblivion again? This is the story of all the Dukes of Edinburgh and of 300 years of royal history.

[00:00:30]The first man on our list today is Prince Frederick of Wales, the eldest son of the future George II and his wife Caroline of Ansbach. They only became king and queen in 1727.

[00:00:43]Born in Hanover in 1707, Frederick was left behind there after his grandfather George I became king of Great Britain and Ireland in 1714. and most of the rest of his family moved to England.

[00:00:56]Whilst still in Hanover, he was made the Duke of Edinburgh in 1726. At the same time, his 5-year-old brother, who he'd never met, was being made Duke of Cumberland. He was only brought to the kingdom he was meant to inherit in December 1728 and was quickly made Prince of Wales in January 1729, rendering his jugal title one of his subsidiary titles and not something he was commonly known by.

[00:01:23]In keeping with most of the Hannavarian heirs to the throne, he had a terrible relationship with his parents, who he barely knew by this point, and his mother confirmed her hatred of him on her deathbed in 1737.

[00:01:36]See my video about her demise for more details. Frederick loved the wife his father had chosen for him, though, who was Princess Augusta of Sax God, and who he wed in 1736. Together, they had nine children, including the future George III.

[00:01:52]Frederick is one of those princes of Wales who never became king. I have a video about this group which I'll leave linked for you. And in his case, it was because he died in March 1751.

[00:02:04]The legend is that his demise at the age of 44 was the result of being hit by a cricket or tennis ball. All we know for sure is that he suffered from a violent pain in his side for two weeks before his death along with a fever and fainting spells. He was buried in Henry VIIth's Chapel in Westminster Abbey where so many of the Hannavarians lie.

[00:02:26]The title Duke of Edinburgh was inherited by his eldest son, Prince George, born in 1738.

[00:02:34]Just a few weeks later, the boy's grandfather, George I, created this new era parent, the Prince of Wales. And so, once again, the Duke of Edinburgh title became a subsidiary title, which George was not typically known by. On the 25th of October 1760, he exceeded to the throne as George III and at that point all his previous titles merged with the crown, including the Dukeom of Edinburgh.

[00:03:01]This is standard practice for a monarch.

[00:03:03]You can hold any number of titles while you're a more junior member of the family, but once you're the boss, you're only the king or queen. There's no such thing as a subsidiary title for you in the British parage, though you can hold titles in other countries. For instance, Queen Victoria was also Empress of India and the first four Georgees were also electors of Hanover.

[00:03:25]Now, I haven't the time to give you a full biography of George III's long life, but here are the highlights and low lightss. He married Charlotte of Methlinburgg Strelets in 1761, had 15 children by her, of whom 13 survived childhood, and his reign saw Britain lose control of the American colonies during the American Revolution and abolished slavery in 1807.

[00:03:50]The king suffered serious mental breakdowns starting in the 1780s, the last of which rendered him permanently incapable of ruling and led to the establishment of the Regency under his son, the future George IV in 1811.

[00:04:04]We aren't quite sure what his ailment was, but bipolar disorder and perferia are popular diagnosis, and he is known to history as the Mad King or Mad King George. He died in 1820 and is to this day the longest reigning king in British history. He is buried in St. George's Chapel at Windsor Castle. What had happened to his Duke of Edinburgh title, though?

[00:04:30]Due to the fact that George's lower titles had merged with the crown upon his accession, they were available to be redistributed however he saw fit, and this meant that he could give out the Duke of Edinburgh title to someone new if he chose to. and he did. The juke was recreated in November 1764 to mark the 21st birthday of his little brother, Prince William Henry, born in 1743, but this time it was merged with the title the juke of Gloucester 2, the only time this has been done to date. As English titles are invariably preferred to Scottish, Irish or Welsh ones if they are of the same rank, the prince was known as the Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh rather than the other way around or sometimes just as the Duke of Gloucester.

[00:05:16]Before we hear how this Duke of Edinburgh's life panned out, please like, hype, and comment on the video as this really helps it to do better. And subscribe to the channel with a notification bell on to stay up to date with my uploads. It's all totally free, but if you're already subscribed, maybe check your notification status as I get people telling me sometimes that YouTube isn't notifying them, even though it should be. You might also like to join as a channel member for badges next to your name in the comments and membersonly posts. And you can also find me on patreon.com/historyalling where I release bonus material like patronon podcasts every week. For free bonus material, sign up to my newsletter on my website, historyallingofficial.com, and you'll also receive two complimentary downloads right away. Make sure to check though that the newsletter isn't going to your junk email.

[00:06:04]On the 6th of September 1766, Prince William Henry secretly married the illegitimate Maria Walpole, who was already the widow of the second Earl Waldgrave and who was 7 years older than her royal husband and had three children. The marriage wasn't terribly popular with George III, but he did give Maria a pension of £5,000 out of Irish revenues and thought it was better his brother had a wife rather than a mistress. Still, Maria only admitted to the marriage to her father in 1772, and George III had an inquiry held into its validity that same year as the chaplain and only witness to it had died. This found in the Gloucester/Edinburgh's favor just before the birth of their first child, a daughter called Sophia Matilda at the end of May 1773.

[00:06:54]Two more children followed, a short-lived daughter called Caroline in 1774, and a son called Prince William Frederick, who was born in Rome in January 1776, as the family were by then traveling for the sake of Prince William Henry's health. George III had refused to ask Parliament for more money for his brother and his family and had barred the couple and their children from his presence. However, after the Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh had a medical crisis in 1777, the king softened, allowing the family to come back to England and providing a financial settlement for them.

[00:07:29]The Duke spent the rest of his life working in the military, carrying out philanthropic duties and traveling on the continent to save money and also for health reasons. His marriage to Maria gradually disintegrated though. He cheated on her with her lady in waiting, Lydia Maria Carpenter, by whom he had a daughter, and the royal couple were essentially separated by the early 1790s, with the Duke sometimes preventing the duchess seeing their children. He died on the 25th of August 1805 and was buried in St. George's Chapel, Windsor. The double juke of Gloucester and Edinburgh now descended to William Henry's only legitimate son, Prince William Frederick, the man born in Rome in 1776.

[00:08:12]The second juke of the second creation, because every time a title is reissued, you start the numbering process again, was known as Silly Billy due to his lack of academic acumen. though he attended Trinity College Cambridge and was awarded degrees in 1790 and 1796 but I doubt he really earned those accolades.

[00:08:31]He went into the army at the age of 13 as many royals do though they are a good bit older nowadays and was promoted through the ranks. This was no doubt due to his connections though rather than his merit as AW Perurdue writing in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography has described him as an enthusiastic and brave if not terribly professional soldier.

[00:08:53]After failing to convince the much younger Princess Charlotte of Wales, he ayes to the throne no less to marry him, he instead married his cousin, Princess Mary in 1816, by whom he had no children, which is hardly surprising as Mary turned 40 that year. William Frederick was known for being pompous and full of himself due to his status, but he was against slavery and he was pro- Catholic emancipation. He died in 1834 and was buried in St. George's Chapel. With no son to succeed him, the dukes of Gloucester and Edinburgh now became extinct once more. We now jump ahead to the Victorian era. In 1844, Queen Victoria gave birth to her second son by her husband, Prince Albert of Sax Kubraa, who was named Prince Alfred. An intelligent child, he joined the Navy at the age of 14 and was immediately sent to sea, becoming very welltraveled in the course of his career. In 1862, when he was just 18 years old, the Greeks voted for him to become their new king after they deposed the old one. But his election was not allowed as it contravened the terms of the London Protocol of 1830 and instead the crown went to the second son of the future king of Denmark. The following year, Alfred's older brother, the future Edward IIIth, renounced his claim on the duche of Sax Kubar, so that Alfred eventually became its duke in 1893 when their uncle died. But that is still far in the future.

[00:10:26]On his mother's birthday in 1866, he was made juke of Edinburgh and he continued with his naval career for many years, traveling the world and almost being murdered in Sydney in 1868 by Athenian sympathizer. In 1874, he married the Russian Grand Duchess Marie Alexandruma, daughter of Zar Alexander II in St. Petersburg. They had one son named Alfred after his father and born in 1874 plus four daughters. Marie born in 1875, Victoria born in 1876, Alexandra born in 1878 and Beatrice born in 1884.

[00:11:08]After that, Alfred and his wife's marriage fell apart. When Alfred senior became the Duke of Sax Kberg, he resided between his duche and his London residence. But tragedy struck the family in 1899.

[00:11:21]Apparently distressed that his marriage to a commoner was not accepted within the royal family and that his mother insisted the union be enulled, young Alfred supposedly unalived himself.

[00:11:32]Though there are various stories about his cause of death and the whole thing is a bit murky with family members claiming things like a breakdown in his health. The following year, Alfred Senior died too of throat and tongue cancer near Coberg. He was buried in his duche. Having outlived his only son, the title of Duke of Edinburgh now went extinct once more.

[00:11:55]It was created yet again in 1947 by George V 6th, who granted it to perhaps the most famous holder of it so far, the man born as Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark in 1921, and who was then about to marry George's daughter, Princess Elizabeth, better known as Elizabeth II.

[00:12:14]As his family had been booted out of Greece when he was a baby and Philip had surrendered any nominal claim on his birth titles before the marriage, taking the surname Mountbatton, the only titles he had by the time of his wedding, were those granted to him in the British parage. And so unlike previous holders, he was widely known by his Scottish title, particularly as he was not made a prince again until 1957, though he did have an HR from the moment he became Duke of Edinburgh. He showed his attachment to this title by naming an award scheme for young people after it, the Duke of Edinburgh award, which you can do at bronze, silver, or gold level.

[00:12:51]Some of my friends did some of these awards at school, but as I didn't fancy wild camping in the Mourn Mountains here in Northern Ireland and having to pee in a river, I did not. I probably don't need to tell you much about Philip's life given how recent an historical figure he is and how famous. Suffice it to say that prior to Elizabeth's succession in 1952, he worked in the Navy and he had fought for Britain in World War II despite having numerous Nazis in his family. After his wife's succession, he left his job and dedicated himself to life as her consort, which was quite a wrench for him as he really loved that naval job.

[00:13:29]Known for being quite blunt in conversation, he told my friend who was receiving her gold juke of Ed award from him to watch out for the bombs when she came back to Northern Ireland. He and Queen Elizabeth had four children, Charles, Anne, Andrew, and Edward.

[00:13:45]Philip died in 2021 at the age of 99 and was buried in St. George's Chapel at Windsor.

[00:13:52]You may not even realize that the next holder of the title, Chuke of Edinburgh, held it, but he did. I'm speaking about the current king, Charles III, who was born in 1948.

[00:14:05]Again, I doubt you need much of a biography of such a well-known figure, but in short, Charles joined the Royal Air Force, then the Navy between 1969 and 1977, and married Lady Diana Spencer in 1981. They had two sons together, Princess William and Harry. But after a difficult marriage marred by infidelity on both sides and excessive press intrusion, the pair separated in 1992.

[00:14:29]Their divorce was finalized in 1996, and Diana, Princess of Wales, then died in a car crash in Paris the following year, aged only 36.

[00:14:39]known for his environmental work and interests, which he was championing long before they were fashionable, and for establishing the Prince's Trust, now the King's Trust, to help young people get qualifications and jobs. Charles remarried to his long-term partner Camila Parker BS in 2005 and he inherited the title of Duke of Edinburgh along with his father's other subsidiary titles upon Philip's death in 2021 as he was then the Prince of Wales which is a superior title not to mention Duke of Cornwall and Rothsay two more superior titles including the Scottish juke Charles was never known as the Duke of Edinburgh and when he became king in September 2022 upon the death of Elizabeth II The title once again merged with the crown and became extinct. His reign has been quite bumpy so far thanks to a severe breakdown in relations with Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex, the king and his other daughter-in-law, Princess Catherine's cancer diagnosis, and the ongoing scandal of his brother Andrew's involvement with Jeffrey Epstein, which led Charles to take the incredibly unusual step of stripping Andrew of all of his titles in late 2025. It remains to be seen how the Sussex and Andrew situations are going to play out and how Charles will deal with them and attempt to protect the monarchy from further harm. I'll leave my videos looking at whether the Sussex's could lose their titles and also reviewing a biography of Andrew and his ex-wife linked below for you. We now come to the current holder of the title, Prince Edward, youngest brother of King Charles. Born in 1964, he had a short career in the Royal Marines before a job working in media.

[00:16:18]Very unusually, he was not made a juke upon his marriage to Sophie Reese Jones in 1999, instead being created the Earl of Wessix. The understanding though was that he would be given his father's Duke of Edinburgh title in due course. He and Sophie have two children, Lady Louise Mountbatton Windsor and James, who was born Vik 7, but who is now the Earl of Wessex himself. After a series of embarrassing scandals, including Edward's production company filming Prince William at University in St. Andrews in 2001, despite a media agreement to leave him alone, a sting operation against the then Countess of Wessix in 2002, in which she was caught making indiscreet remarks to an undercover journalist, and general accusations that the couple were coasting on their royal connections. The pair gave up their careers in media and dedicated themselves to being full-time royals. As we've heard, Edward's father died in 2021, and the Duke of Edinburgh title went to Prince Charles, then merged with the crown again in 2022.

[00:17:19]The king granted it to his brother as a birthday present in 2023.

[00:17:24]Unlike previous grants, though, the title was given as a life periage, not a hereditary title. And this means that James Earl of Wessix cannot inherit it.

[00:17:34]It is therefore doomed to become extinct again upon Edward's death.

[00:17:39]So, there you have it. Those are the stories of all the men who have been juke of Edinburgh over the past 300 years. I hope you enjoyed it. Let me know below which of them is your favorite and why. And for more videos looking at the history of specific titles, try one of these options next.

[00:17:55]Whatever you choose, please enjoy. And until next time, keep learning.