Elizabeth II did not found the British empire. Nor did she preside over its extension to Southern Africa. It was her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria , who did so.

Elizabeth II grew up in a royal family whose significance in the British Empire had swollen even as its political authority shrank at home. The monarchy ruled an ever-lengthening list of Crown ...

For centuries, British monarchs — including Queen Elizabeth II — ruled over vast swathes of the globe with the most powerful empire in history. Even as it has crumbled, its legacy of ...