To be fair, I want to get all my emotional and intellectual cards on the table. I have issues with royalty. It is a stretch to claim that a tiny group of people are better than the commoners based upon their birth. To make matters even more ludicrous is the notion of the royal we, which can be traced back to Henry II in 1169. He came up with the idea of the divine right of kings nearly a millennium ago. He was the first to claim that he and God were running the show jointly.

Queen Elizabeth I ruled England from 1558-1603. She was 25 when she became queen. She was into all things royal, even looking royal.

Elizabeth I looking quiet royal

However, she managed to contract smallpox when she was 29. Interestingly, she was lucky that she didn’t die from smallpox. Approximately a third of the commoners died from that disease.

While Elizabeth was queen, she denied that she had smallpox even as her condition worsened. It got so bad that it was difficult for her to talk. The royal physician, Dr. Burcot, told Elizabeth that she had smallpox, which she denied even as her medical issues deteriorated. Finally, she accepted Burcot’s diagnosis, to which she yelled, “God’s pestilence! Which is better? To have the pox in the hand or in the face or in the heart and kill the whole body?”

I wonder what King Donald said when his White House doctor told him that he contracted COVID-19?

As for Queen Elizabeth I, she managed to avoid death for another four decades. During her reign, she had two issues related to her looks. Since she was the queen, she wanted to look royal. Looking like commoner was to be avoided, many of whom worked in the fields and acquired a tanner skin color.

Olay, Clinique, or L’Oréal weren’t available even to royalty four centuries ago. Nevertheless, to get her royal white skin, Elizabeth used Venetian ceruse, which is a concoction of vinegar, water, and white lead. It did make her white. It also covered up her smallpox scars. While it made her completion a ghostly white, she died of sepsis. There have been several attempts to exhume her remains to determine whether she had lead poisoning.

Many in Elizabeth’s court had other names for her. Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, was her closest confidant. He happened to notice her without makeup and coined the term, crooked carcass. He also attempted a coup in 1601 was executed regardless of using that term for Elizabeth I.

An ailing Elizabeth I

Let’s jump to the present-day. We have King Donald, aka Donald the Dumb, who also is into facial makeup. Our former king doesn’t use Venetian ceruse, but he uses something to make him look orange. My guess that he is using a tanning bed. If you look at the area around his eyes, it looks like King Donald uses tanning bed goggles. It is also possible that he uses tanning spray. Goggles would be used in that situation also.

Orange Man #1

However, what haunts me is why. Elizabeth I used Venetian ceruse to look white and to cover her smallpox scars. What is King Donald covering up by tanning himself?

Before and after

The photo on the left was before getting COVID-19, and the picture on the right was King Trump at Walter Reed Hospital during treatment for the coronavirus. Royalty, whether in England or America, is filled with indignity.