10 Whacked-Out Despots
By Robert on April 28th, 2009
The sheer amount of insane or mentally unstable heads of state is evidence that the one job that requires the least in the way of mental stability is absolute rule. In honor of every mad monarchs and deranged dictators who tried to live up to Zarkon, this is a list of the 10 most whacked-out despots in history.
1. Murad IV
Sultan Murad IV put the “homicide” in “homicidal maniac”. A large man with a fetishistic attraction to violence, Murad took capital punishment to levels very few have been able to match. A powerful warrior in his own right, Murad’s favorite weapon on the battlefield was a 130 pound mace which he used with one hand. But his most memorable act was attempting to root out corruption by instituting a universal death penalty for even the most minor of offenses. He would patrol the streets of Istanbul, disguised in civilian clothes, and would kill people on the spot with his mace if they broke the law. He had 18 people killed for the use of tobacco, coffee, opium, and wine in one particular day. This was Murad at his most sane. He beheaded anyone who got on his nerves, and he was fond of taking potshots at people unlucky enough to be standing nearby when he got the urge. On one occasion, he had a group of dancing women drowned because they were making too much noise. Murad eventually succumbed to cirrhosis of the liver as a result of excessive drinking. One could say that he executed himself for breaking his own laws.
2. George III of the United Kingdom
Most remember King George III for losing the American colonies but seem to forget that he was a popular king when he first took the throne. He united political rivals, funded the Royal Academy out of his own pocket, and created a new national library. But he suffered his first setback five years into his reign and things were never the same. Stricken with a nasty hereditary disease called porphyria, George’s symptoms included partial paralysis, full blown psychosis, and blue urine. If peeing Smurfs weren’t bad enough, the king endured Francis Willis’ “treatment regimen”. Simply put, Willis quite literally began beating the crazy out of King George III. The frequent cycle of lucidity, insanity, and torture wreaked havoc on George’s abilities to rule, and he started making increasingly bad decisions. He allowed Prime Minister William Pitt to increase taxes, raise armies to fight France, and suspend the right of habeas corpus. Then, to add insult to injury, Pitt blamed it all on George after the shit hit the fan. George became increasingly unpopular even among his supporters and compounded it through bizarre behavior. This included babbling for hours without ceasing, foaming at the mouth, and reputedly shaking hands with a tree after mistaking it for the King of Prussia. He spent the last years of his life in isolation, blind, deaf, mostly straight-jacketed, and some historians argue he wasn’t even aware he had lost the American colonies.
3. François “Papa Doc” Duvalier
Featured in our 10 Plundering Politicians list, François Duvalier was the product of an affair between a Haitian official and an insane woman – an event that foreshadowed his later life. He lived innocuously in his early years and even received acclaim for his work as a doctor. But as Haiti grew poorer, Duvalier witnessed gross human rights violations and started studying voodoo intensely for answers. In 1956, he won the election by positioning himself as a populist and challenging the power of the mulatto elite. He lost all semblance of sanity after this point. Duvalier began acting and dressing as Baron Samedi, the voodoo spirit of death, and even started speaking in the nasal tone associated with the spirit. To make things worse, he created the Tonton Macoutes, a private army named after a voodoo bogeyman that disappears people. Duvalier even had all black dogs in Haiti killed after hearing that a political rival had transformed into one. Duvalier eventually declared himself “President for Life”, and presided over Haiti’s decline into poverty, famine, and despair until the day he died.
4. Idi Amin
Also featured in our 10 Plundering Politicians list, Idi Amin’s life is the classic story of boy meets girl, boy becomes dictator, and dictator abuses power. He seized power by promising democratic elections and the release of political prisoners. Instead, a week after the coup, he declared himself president, put military tribunals above civilian courts, and started suspending rights. Amin suffered from syphilis and as time went on his behavior became increasingly erratic. When a diplomat asked him why he ate hundreds of oranges a day, Amin mused they tasted better than human flesh. After the British severed relations, Amin claimed to have defeated them and declared himself “His Excellency President for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Idi Amin, VC, DSO, MC, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea, and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular.” He never paid for his sins, as he escaped to Saudi Arabia after Uganda had enough of his shit and deposed him. He spent the last years of his life enjoying a lavish lifestyle and hundreds of oranges a day.
5. Caligula
Historical records overflow with rumors and speculation concerning Caligula’s level of kiddie crazy. Some sources speculate that he engaged in his uncle Tiberius’ perverse proclivities involving women, children, and even infants. Others believe that his obsession with his sisters started very young (and, he did bed all three of them during the course of his short lifetime). Regardless of which rumors you choose to believe, it’s safe to say that Caligula was balls-out crazy by the time he became emperor. He was a short, gangly man with too little hair on his head and too much on his body. As emperor, he would execute – at whim – anyone who he believed to be staring at his bald head or anyone who mentioned a goat in his presence. Early in his reign, he became deathly ill and began seeing conspiracies everywhere. In his mind, the illness itself was a conspiracy and when he got better he killed, banished, or imprisoned loyal friends, relatives, and compatriots. Caligula’s extravagant lifestyle emptied the state treasury and created a financial crisis that almost broke the Roman Empire. Later on, he marched an unprecedented number of legions all over Europe to annex more territory. It failed, so he ordered his troops to gather seashells as “spoils from the Ocean“. Soon after, he decided he was a god and killed everyone who disagreed. The stories of his eccentricities are too numerous to mention. One highlight, however: he tried to make his favorite horse, Incitatus, a consul. Eventually the Roman elites had enough of him and he was killed by a cadre of conspirators. I guess he was right to suspect everyone.
6. Nero
Like Caligula, rumors have circulated concerning Nero and Tiberius. On his island home in Capri, Tiberius kept a sicko version of the Playboy Mansion stocked with a bevy of “little fishes” – young 5-7 year old boys trained to swim around the naked Tiberius. Some historians claim that Tiberius kept Nero for a time, and if that is, indeed true, it’s at least part of the reason why Nero was so whacked-out. He rose to power through a series of backroom maneuvers and murders perpetrated by Agrippina the Younger, Nero’s mother and Caligula’s sister. Nero thanked her by having her killed. Early in his reign, Nero was obsessed with becoming a popular ruler so he passed a series of laws that favored the poor. But he quickly lost interest and became more interested in writing poems and playing music. In fact, it is said that he was singing the poem “Sack of Ilium” in stage costume during the infamous fire of 64 AD. The rumors that he was playing a fiddle, however, are false. It was more likely a lyre. After a series of other exciting missteps which led to several large rebellions, Nero absconded to avoid being killed by a large portion of his guard and an uppity governor. He found shelter in a villa, where he decided that the most noble option was suicide. He forced one of his servants to commit suicide first in order to research the process and to steel his nerves. Nero was unable to kill himself until the horsemen were right upon him, and even then he required assistance from his secretary.
7. Frederick William I of Prussia
Frederick William I probably didn’t suffer from any mental condition… he was just a good, old-fashioned psychopath. He was the type of monarch who carried a large rattan stick with him to test the fighting abilities of random strangers. He also threw plates at servants for no apparent reason and starved his children to test their mettle. Most of his valets were missing an eye because Frederick always carried two pistols, loaded with rock salt, and shot anyone who startled him. But his love for military display bordered on the obsessive. After inheriting a regiment from his father, Frederick became attached to the idea of a regiment composed entirely of the tallest men in Europe. The Potsdam Giants, as they became known, eventually included kidnapped priests, monks, and an Austrian diplomat. But, the bulk of his giants were mentally retarded, as William made disastrously bad agreements with the French, the Ottomans, and other nations to fill out his regiment. On his deathbed, a priest read from the Book of Job: “Naked I came out of my mother’s womb and naked I shall return thither.” “Not quite naked,” Frederick responded. “I shall have my uniform on.”
8. Charles VI of France
There is a good reason why Charles VI’s most common sobriquet is “The Mad.” Perfectly normal in his early life, he became unhinged after a mystery illness forced doctors to shave off his hair. He was prone to random bouts of violence where he would assault anyone within arms reach. When he was 24, Charles set off to capture a would-be assassin hiding in Brittany. While traveling, he was approached by a barefoot leper in rags who warned, “Ride no further, noble King! Turn back! You are betrayed!” A little later, Charles was startled when a page made a loud noise by dropping a lance. Convinced he was under attack, Charles drew his sword, spurred his horse, and bellowed: “Forward against the traitors! They wish to deliver me to the enemy!” He then promptly started laying waste to his own men and killed several of them before he was restrained. His psychotic episodes only got worse after that. He was prone to running like a madman through the palace halls, refused to wash, and even forgot that he was king at one point. Physicians attempted to cure him by shocking him. No, not with electroshock, instead they hired seventeen men in blackface to jump out of the darkness to startle him. Charles simply responded by assaulting the men. His madness left the throne up for grabs, and the resulting power struggle greatly weakened France.
9. Nader Shah
As a young boy, Nader Shah was captured by the Uzbeks but managed to escape and joined a tribe of bandits who eventually made him their leader. His rise to military power from that point onward was meteoric, and eventually he had himself made their leader, by virtue of being the baddest motherfucker around. While he was relatively respected and mostly supported by his subjects, the fact that he considered somebody like Timur his personal hero should have indicated what was to follow. As time passed, his campaigns grew more violent – during his invasion of India, Nader Shah’s troops killed as many 30,000 Indians in one day. Then his health started to decline rapidly, making him amazingly paranoid and ruthless. He saw enemies everywhere after a failed assassination attempt. Convinced that his son was behind the attack, he had him blinded, and then, just to make sure, he killed everyone who had witnessed the blinding. Pretty soon he stopped thinking up excuses and started executing everyone he suspected of treachery. He started exorbitantly raising taxes, and when his subjects rose up in revolt, he crushed them without mercy and built towers out of their skulls just like Timur. The captain of his guard and several other assassins surprised him in the night, stabbing him with a sword, but he managed to kill two of them before finally succumbing to his wounds.
10. Prince Sado of Korea
Prince Sado of Korea was so incredibly insane that he wasn’t allowed to become emperor until he was dead. A series of childhood illnesses laid the ground work for his insanity, and by the age of ten he was showing serious signs of mental issues. Sado became increasingly delusional, had frequent nightmares about a thunder god, and developed intense phobias about the sky, thunderstorms, and even the Korean characters for “thunder” and “thunderclap”. He frequently beat the crap out of his eunuchs, and would either rape, murder, or murder-rape servants and court women to pass the time. Murder was his Xanax, as on one occasion he remarked: “It relieves my pent-up anger to kill people or animals when I’m feeling depressed or on edge.” Not surprisingly, everyone was scared shitless of him. His father, King Yeongjo of Joseon, eventually got wind of his son’s insane behavior and ordered Sado locked in a rice cask for ten days. In a moment of lucidity, the prince complied and died in the cask. A few days later the dead prince was removed from the chest and posthumously declared emperor.
| © 2010