Mary I's husband Philip was also legally King of England.

He also had a screwdriver named after him.

my understanding was that the King could be divored but he coulen't, for reasons that remain unclear to me, marry a divorced woman. Or a commoner, maybe. Or a divorced commoner?

He could be divorced but couldn't remarry. Diana died, solving that problem.

If he marries a divorced woman, it's technically adultery because "Christian marriage is indissoluble." So he's sleeping with another man's wife.

Commoners aren't a problem. Legally, Diana was a commoner; although the daughter of a Duke, she wasn't noble herself.

Yes, I obsess about these things.

No, the point of the Anglican church is that Henry VIII can do whatever he damned well wants to. Divorce just happened to be the inciting incident.

Pretty much. Plus Charles isn't as likely to be able to chuck the Archbishop in the Tower with a view of the scaffold as Henry was. Not that I don't imagine the Royals think fondly of those times.

The divorce/remarriage thing is one of those "observed in the breech" things. In the modern world, divorce and remarriage are so common that the church has to let to go in order to survive. But the British Monarch is the Head of the Church, so s/he is held to the letter of the rules. The Princess Consort thing is a face-saver for all sides, because, technically, the last woman standing at Charles' side by the time of the Coronation would be Queen Consort. Much of England, I understand, gets very twitchy at the idea of Queen Camilla, whereas Her Royal Highness, the Princess Consort keeps the brick-throwing down.

Ah, I guess that does make a difference. But still.

Here's the deal. Henry VIII married his brother's widow, Katherine. The Pope had to give him a dispensation because that's within the legal bounds of consanguinity.

Henry VIII wanted out of the marriage. The Pope wouldn't annul his dispensation. Therefore if Henry assumed the power of the Pope, he could say the Pope never had the right to give him a dispensation in the first place, and thus he was never married.

There's a whole separate issue of whether Arthur slept with Katherine; if he didn't, Arthur and Katherine were never legally married, thus no consanguinity problem. Katherine said they didn't consummate the marraige.

technically, the last woman standing at Charles' side by the time of the Coronation

Hee! Mistress cage-match!

The straightforward remarriage is forbidden I understand. British royalty seems to operate under a muddier set of rules.

Yeah --- I thought it was as straightforward as, "if he marries a divorced woman, he can't become king." Apparently not.

Henry VIII's divorce wasn't actually a divorce in modern terms.

Was there a precedent for a modern divorce then? Not just permanent separation, which I'm sure has been going on since the dawn of time, but the legal dissolution of a marriage? (I feel like I should know this, but I don't.)

This discussion reminds me (I really don't care one whit about Charlie boy) -- did anyone else hear the NPR story about the monarch of Japan? Currently the only heir to the throne is a 3-year-old girl, Princess Aiko, the Crown Prince's daughter. A male heir has not been born since 1965. The Crown Prince's wife is 41, and had a hard time conceiving Aiko, so it seems unlikely that she'll have any more children.

The Crown Prince has one younger brother, who also only has daughters.

So a Japanese government panel has started debating whether women could take the throne. And apparently time is of the essence, because traditionally at age 3 the heir begins the regime of training and education required to be the monarch.

There's a very conservative faction who is violently opposed* to changing Japanese law to allow a woman to take the throne as Empress, but most Japanese people favor it. *(Violently opposed to the point that they're advocating the Crown Prince adopt a male from some far-removed branch of the royal family, rather than allow a woman to be monarch.)

I'm inexplicably fascinated by all this.

Nope. George IV couldn't STAND his wife Caroline, and went to a trial in the House of Lords on the grounds of her adultery (no question, she was a big ol' cheat), and they still wouldn't give him a divorce. Which is why Queen Victoria wound up succeeding him; George IV couldn't have any more heirs while his wife was alive.

That's the closest I can think of in modern times.

I'm inexplicably fascinated by all this.

Oh, me, too. (As if you couldn't guess.)

Princess AIko in her car seat.. So cute. Even royalty are not immune to the laws of physics. Diana, I'm a-lookin' at you.