Will King Charles the III be loved by you as much as the Queen?

Charles III (Charles Philip Arthur George; born 14 November 1948) is King of the United Kingdom and 14 other Commonwealth realms. He acceded to the throne on 8 September 2022 upon The death of his mother, Elizabeth II. He was the longest-serving heir apparent in British history and is the oldest person to assume the throne, at the age of 73.

Charles was born in Buckingham Palace as the first child of then-Princess Elizabeth, Duchess of Edinburgh, and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and the first grandchild of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. He was educated at Cheam and Gordonstoun schools, both of which his father attended as a child. He later spent a year at the Timbertop campus of Geelong Grammar School in Victoria, Australia. After earning a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Cambridge Charles served in the Air Force and Navy from 1971 to 1976. In 1981, he married Diana Spencer, with whom he had two sons, William and Harry. In 1996, the couple divorced after they had each engaged in well-publicised extramarital affairs. Diana died the following year. In 2005, Charles married his long time-partner, Camilla Parker Bowles.

Following the death of his mother, Elizabeth II, Charles ascended to the British throne after more than 70 years as the heir apparent.

In a statement released shortly after the official announcement of her passing, Charles described the death of his “beloved” mother as “a moment of the greatest sadness for me and all members of my family.” The days since the Queen’s death have been a time during which Charles has both assumed his new duties and mourned a great personal loss.

After a lifetime in the public eye, he is a familiar figure to many in Britain and around the globe. But no one yet knows what kind of monarch King Charles III – the title he has taken, ending years of speculation – will become.