Definition of the Queen Archetype
The Queen Archetype reflects the role and responsibilities related to the power, leadership, and authority. Queen Archetype is portrayed as a queen who is at the same time protective and powerful, both qualities of a good leader. The Queen is depicted as a powerful woman, a wise ruler, and a personality that must carry the responsibility for the state and for herself. This type is not confined to any gender and can be depicted in numerous ways and in different cultures and works of literature to depict authority and the leadership.
Types of Queen Archetype Characters
The Queen Archetype can manifest in various forms, each with distinct characteristics and roles:
- The Benevolent Queen: A kind and fair queen who rules with the peoples’ best interest at heart. She is a patronizing character who is interested in the well being of her dominion and in the creation of balance.
- The Warrior Queen: The rule who can lead a battle for her kingdom and for her people. She is a warrior, and the fighter archetype is strongly represented in her character; she frequently wields a sword to protect her territory.
- The Shadow Queen: A ruler who represents the negative aspects of the Queen Archetype. She is cunning, ambitious and quite unscrupulous, using her position to get what she wants and to control others.
- The Wise Queen: She is a figure of great insight and vision. She rules her kingdom wisely and sometimes she is shown as a wise woman giving advice to people.
- The Consort Queen: A queen who stands behind her husband, the king and assist in the management of the kingdom. She can also be seen as having a rather significant though not always visible part in policy-making.
Characteristics of Queen Archetype Characters
Characters embodying the Queen Archetype share several key traits:
- Authority and Leadership: The Queen has authority and she is expected to look after the welfare of the people within her kingdom. She is a strict and powerful leader.
- Wisdom and Insight: She is also a very wise woman and frequently has a vision of what could happen in the future and how it could affect her decisions.
- Strength and Courage: In physical might or determination and courage in the face of foes and obstacles, the Queen is never powerless or weak.
- Responsibility and Duty: The Queen is very much a professional in her position and responsibilities; she is willing to sacrifice herself for the sake of her kingdom.
- Compassion and Nurturing: A positive Queen Archetype in a balanced manner also shows compassion, as a mother, she takes care of her people and tries to rule her kingdom fairly and with prosperity.
Weaknesses of Queen Archetype Characters
While the Queen Archetype embodies many positive qualities, it also has inherent weaknesses and potential flaws:
- Overburdened by Responsibility: This is the reason why the leaders end up stressed, burnt out, and emotionally drained due to the overwhelming duties of leadership.
- Isolation: The Queen has authority and this makes her have limited contact with other people thus limiting her chances of forging good relations.
- Power Struggles: The representation of the Queen also has the power and can bring power struggle and conflict, be it from inside or outside.
- Rigidity: A Queen that is too much into control and order can be very uncompromising, being unable to accept change and adapt to it.
- Shadow Aspects: The shadow Queen characteristics entail being a tyrant, controlling, and power hungry to an extent of being cruel.
Examples of Queen Archetype in Literature
1- Lady Macbeth in “Macbeth” by William Shakespeare
“Come, you spirits That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood, Stop up the access and passage to remorse, That no compunctious visitings of nature Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between The effect and it!”
Lady Macbeth is considered as the Shadow Queen Archetype. She is ambitious and gets what she wants by using her wits; she is also very ruthless. Her greed to see Macbeth on the throne makes her perform evil deeds, thus exposing the evil side of the Queen character.
Lady Macbeth calls on the spirits to ‘unsex” her and fills her with harshness, which indicates her wish to throw her feminine compassion in order to attain her manly goal. This is seen with the fact that she gradually becomes mad, showing that power and ambition are dangerous when they are allowed to run rampant.
2- Galadriel in “The Lord of the Rings” by J.R.R. Tolkien
“In place of a Dark Lord you would have a queen! Not dark, but beautiful and terrible as the Morning and the Night! Fair as the Sea and the Sun and the Snow upon the Mountain! Dreadful as the Storm and the Lightning! Stronger than the foundations of the earth. All shall love me and despair!”
Galadriel is the Wise Queen Archetype. She was a strong, very beautiful and wise leader of Elves. Her heroine temptation by the One Ring, shows her inner character and intelligence when she decided not to take the power of the ring.
The Queen Archetype is shown to be as equally capable of great benevolence as she is of great malevolence in her vision of herself as a beautiful but also powerful ruler. This decision of her to stick to her values is quite akin to a balanced queen who knows how to rule.
See also: 4 Types of Archetypes in Examples
3- Cersei Lannister in “A Song of Ice and Fire” by George R.R. Martin
“When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die. There is no middle ground.”
Cersei Lannister is a significant example of shadow queen archetype. She is greedy for power, cunning, and ready to go to any extend to ensure she stays in power and to protect her family. Cersei’s statement on the game of thrones, which is one of the popular quotes of the show accentuates her approach to power and administration.
The observed actions of Nightmare in the course of the series depict the negative aspect of the Queen Archetype as the character is characterized by power hunger that leads to anarchy.
Nevertheless, Cersei Lannister is an interesting, and to some extent quite realistic and rather dark and complex character whose actions can be analyzed from different perspectives and her fall and transformation into a tyrant are worthy of a separate study of the consequences of the power.
4- Daenerys Targaryen in “A Song of Ice and Fire” by George R.R. Martin
“I am the blood of the dragon. If they are monsters, so am I.”
Daenerys Targaryen is the example of the Queen Archetype. Originally she is a Benevolent Queen and wants to liberate suffering masses and govern fairly. It is possible to observe her evolution from a young maiden in exile to a strong and effective ruler.
But, as her story progresses, she expresses elements of the Warrior Queen and the Shadow Queen when she leads her troops to fight in battles and orders the massacre of the ‘enemies’. She announces about herself as “the blood of the dragon” and admits to being a potential figure of the story and a monster, too. The Queen Archetype is not as simple as it may seem as evidenced by Daenerys Targaryen’s character.
5- Guinevere in Arthurian Legend
“And therefore, like a lusty winter, Frosty, but kindly, let me go: With him shall I not live again, And with his love shall I not know Such bliss as when our love began.”
An example of the Consort Queen is Guinevere, who is the wife of the famous King Arthur. Elena’s position in Arthurian legend is commonly perceived in light of her connections with Arthur and Lancelot.
The essence of Guinevere is most defined by her beauty, grace and wisdom in decisions but she also represents weakness of love and the betrayal by having an affair with the best knight of the kingdom, Lancelot. She learns that her relationships and actions directly affect the outcomes of the story. This reflects the power and the role of the Queen Archetype.
See also: Jester Archetypes Examples
