I'm not quite sure what all the papers had been going on about, probably having one of their regular goes at Prince Charles. I'm not sure that many muslim leaders would have been too happy to be compared to Yazid or Abul Abbas, but I named no names.

One of the names of God, mentioned in the Qur'an is Al-Malik, the King of All Creation, so I have to admit that the Qur'an recognises the nature of kingship. But it says very little about it, unlike the News of the World, the Daily Mail and the Sun.

Kingship is the ultimate earthly allegiance of the tribe. At the death of a leader, some tribes let claimants battle like stags or lions fighting for supremacy. Some tribes vote in their figurehead, like the USA and Ronald Reagan, and at a popular level we like to bestow kingship on our local heroes, footballers or singers (everyone knows who was the King - though not all of them think he was Elvis).

In a real monarchy, passed on by genetic inheritance, the rules are just like parenthood - you take what comes out. But what we parent isn't always what we expected, and royal families inevitably have their fair share of amoral wastrels, dullards and tyrants, just as we have in our own. We know families suffer from intrigues and feuds, and with succession at stake these can get bloody. Look to our history.

To put recent powerplays into perspective, however, Caliph Abul Abbas referred to himself as "The Blood Shedder", and is famous for throwing a party for all eighty Umayyad princes of Damascus. During the banquet he had them clubbed to death. You thought twice about marrying into royalty in those days.

A few decades after the death of Muhammad, the power of the army was sufficient to transform the Caliphate into a monarchy, when Mu'awiyya handed power to his son, Yazid. But Muhammad's grandson, Hussein, with his family and friends at Kerbala, refused to pledge allegiance.

The grandson who had sat on the Prophet's back while he was praying, was butchered by the army of a monarch who claimed to speak as Caliph, or representative of the Prophet, who was sent as a mercy to all beings. But the Islam of Muhammad survived in the hearts of the people, where, with luck, you can still find it, still ignoring the example of their leaders, from Yazid and Abul Abbas, through history to today.