3. George I passed a law making it illegal for a commoner’s pet to fornicate with a royal animal
During George I’s reign (1714-27), power shifted from monarch to parliament, with Britain’s first de facto Prime Minister, Robert Walpole. This didn’t stop George passing some silly laws, however. Most famously, he didn’t want common animals getting too familiar with his own. ‘The severest penalties will be suffered by any commoner who doth permit his animal to have carnal knowledge of a pet of the Royal house’, roared the legislation. The ‘severest penaltys’, by the way, potentially meant execution. It’s still illegal to let your pets copulate with royal animals, though the UK scrapped the death penalty long ago.
