"For it is said in old lore: "The hands of the king are the hands of a healer." And so the rightful king could ever be known."
— Ioreth, The Lord of the Rings, Book V Chapter 8 "The Houses of Healing"
In many works featuring royalty, the king (or queen) has the power to heal the sick, whether as part of their duties to their people or as confirmation of their divine right to rule, based on the supposed ability of French kings to do this in Real Life.
A common form of this is Healing Hands. May overlap with Priest King.
This can also overlap with Combat Medic when you have a Warrior Prince, Pretty Princess Powerhouse, etc.
A Sub-Trope of Royals Who Actually Do Something and Royalty Superpower.
Compare Benevolent Mage Ruler and Fisher King, which have something of the effect on a grand scale.
Examples:
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Anime and Manga
- In Kyo Kara Maoh!, Wolfram is able to heal an entire hospital full of sick and injured patients with his Bishie Sparkle.
- In The Vision of Escaflowne, Princess Millerna was also an accomplished surgeon.
- In a more realistic version, one Black Jack story features the king of a small country visiting Japan to observe its medical system who winds up assisting Blackjack in a difficult surgery because he had studied medicine before inheriting the throne.
- In Sailor Moon, Mamoru Chiba is the reincarnation of the Prince of Earth from a lost golden age. As he comes into his power, he develops magical healing abilities (and it helps that he's studying to be a doctor). This element is present in the manga and Crystal adaptation, not so much in the '90s anime.
Fan Works
- Dungeon Keeper Ami: Ami starts with Healing Hands, then becomes this trope when she's given rulership over the Avatar Islands.
- Queens of Mewni: Soupina the Strange's specialty, when it turns out the soups she was obsessed with making had healing properties. And when she unlocked her butterfly form, the resulting rain of soup eradicated the Red Plague.
Literature
- The Bible: Jesus and some of his disciples have the ability to heal people, taken by others as a sign of either divine authority or demonic influence.
- Discworld
- Parodied in Guards! Guards!: when a group of royalists start claiming the King will right all wrongs, Vimes demands to know what wrongs the people of Ankh-Morpork are suffering. Someone comes up with "premature baldness", and another instantly replies "Ah, kings can cure that, you know."
- In Lords and Ladies, Nanny Ogg says kings are a bit magical because they can cure dandruff.
- Old Kingdom: In the time period of the short story "To Hold the Bridge", it was traditional for petitions to be fielded for the opportunity to be healed by the King on feast days. Morghan considered it for his bad arm but found out that whose petitions might be heard depended on personal connections and bribe money, neither of which he possessed.
- A Study in Emerald. Queen Victoria is able to ease the narrator's constant pain from a wound he received from an Eldritch Abomination in Afghanistan. Of course, in this verse, "Victoria" is herself an Eldritch Abomination, one of those who emerged from the sea, triumphed over mankind, and ruled over it for thousands of years.
- J. R. R. Tolkien:
- The Lord of the Rings. Aragorn is accepted as king of Gondor when he uses his medical knowledge (presumably from both being a Ranger and spending his early years in Rivendell, a literal Hidden Elf Village) after the battle of Minas Tirith. Compounded by his healing also being a supernatural power, in addition to whatever knowledge he collected; the Gondorian royalty have the ability to cure the crushing despair that the more powerful minions of Sauron can inflict. As this isn't a disease in the normal sense, the cure is also quite different from any normal medical technique. The Ringwraiths and other minions of Sauron can make people suicidal out of sheer terror. Aragorn (and Lord Elrond) have the ability to speak so attractively that the person decides not to die. They have this ability because they are descended from the Maia Melian, the Maiar being basically lesser angels. To augment their abilities they use the plant called kingsfoil, or athelas, whose crushed leaves have a calming scent apparently.
- In The Silmarillion, Brandir, lord of the Haladin, is disabled and can't fight, so he becomes a healer, and rehabilitates several main characters when they come to his land for refuge. The Haladin aren't hugely appreciative of Brandir's role, because they expect their leader to be a bold warrior like his predecessors were.
- In Warrior Cats, the leader of the Tribe of Rushing Water is called the Tribe-Healer (or just Healer). They serve as leader, spiritual leader, and medic for the Tribe.
- Played for laughs in Mikhail Uspensky's novel White Horseradish on a Field of Hemp. In this world, all kings choose what disease they will be able to heal: diarrhea or scrofula (derived from the Russian proverb "If it's not diarrhea, it's scrofula", meaning "Something bad just has to happen"). Every king chooses scrofula because it's less widespread, less messy and stinky.
- In The Wheel of Time, Elayne helps heal Rand with a first aid kit in the first book, and her brother Gawyn comments that she is always bringing home injured animals to heal. This isn't mentioned much in later novels and can be considered Early-Installment Weirdness, although Elayne does still have the ability to Heal people with the One Power. Played much more straight with Nynaeve when she becomes Queen consort of Malkier as the most powerful Healer in history who rediscovered the method of Healing those severed from the One Power, and discovered how to Heal madness, which was barely thought to be possible in the Age of Legends.
Live-Action TV
- Ohsama Sentai King-Ohger: Hymeno Ran, aka. Kamakiri Ohger, is queen regnant of Ishibana, a kingdom at the forefront of medical science, and is herself one of its top physicians.
Tabletop Games
- Warhammer 40,000. The God-Emperor of Mankind's throne is a holy place, and as such pilgrims hoping for healing come to Terra by the millions, most of them dying of what ailed them or just plain old age while still waiting in line.
Theatre
- In William Shakespeare's Macbeth, King Edward does not appear on stage, but Malcolm, having taken refuge in England, comments on how he's touching for the King's Evil.
Video Games
- The protagonists of Dragon Quest V and Dragon Quest VI learn several healing spells before they learn of their royal status.
- Chrono Trigger. Marle, the Rebellious Princess, is the party's first and most dedicated healer. She's the only one who can learn Arise, the most powerful revival spell.
- Warcraft III. Arthas Menethil, crown prince of Lordaeron, starts the game as a paladin with a strong healing spell at his disposal. Even after his Face–Heel Turn to Death Knight, he still has a healing spell (though it now heals undead and hurts the living).
- Worldof Warcraft: King Anduin may be barely 20, but he's a ridiculously powerful priest. The Battle for Lordaeron cinematic has him casting a FLIPPING HUGE spell that lets his wounded soldiers get up safely and seems to provide at least some healing. In this universe, the bigger a spell is the more powerful the caster: and this spell is at least twice the size of what a player character priest could pull off (from the limited area of the battlefield we can see in the cinematic). This is also true in-game if you go try to kill him with Horde characters. His ability to self-heal and self-shield is absolutely maddening. While this is true for the priest class in general (making them the bane of every pvp players' existence) it's even more true of Anduin.
- In most of the Ultima games, Lord British will heal the Avatar.
- The Princes and Princesses in Etrian Odyssey III: The Drowned City have skills that can heal as well as increase stats. You can also subclass a Monk (and vice-versa) for them to have more direct healing skills.
- Estelle, the resident White Magician Girl of Tales of Vesperia, is also a princess and one of two main candidates for the imperial throne. And unlike other medics in this setting, she doesn't need Blastia to heal people. Her powers are due to her status as a Child of the Full Moon, which runs faintly in the royal line. Estelle is the only member in recent history with powers strong enough to actually use, and it brings a LOT of trouble her way.
- Cecil of Final Fantasy IV is a Paladin and has a role as a secondary healer. Rosa is a White Mage with extensive healing abilities. They become the king and queen of Baron at the end. Averted with the other characters who become royals or are royals.
- Fire Emblem:
- Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones: L'Arachel is a mounted White Mage and the Princess of the Thocracy of Rausten by her own birthright, plus a potential Queen Consort of either Renais (if she marries Ephraim) or Frelia (if she marries Innes).
- Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn: Micaiah is a young woman with Healing Hands who in the end becomes the Queen of Daein. She also has claim to the throne of Begnion, but her younger sister Sanaki is already doing good enough work as Empress so she stays in power.
- Fire Emblem: Awakening:
- Chrom's older sister Emmeryn is the Exalt of Ylisse and her class is Sage, which uses magic tomes and staves.
- Out of Chrom's potential wives, Maribelle is a mounted White Mage while Sumia and the Female Avatar can be reclassed into classes that include use of staves.
- Fire Emblem Fates: Mikoto is the Queen of Hoshido until her murder helps kick off the plot, and she's a Combat Medic able to use bows and staves.
- In the Golden Path, the Avatar will become this at the end of the game if he/she promotes into Hoshido Noble or switches to a class with healing skills - and stays into such classes when he or she is crowned as King or Queen of Valla at the end of the game.
- Out of the Royal Families, Sakura and Elise are White magician girls. They can fully become this if, in the Golden Path, either Sakura marries Elise's brother Xander aka the new King of Nohr, Elise marries Sakura's brother Ryoma aka the new King of Hoshido, or either girl marries a Male Avatar and reigns over Valla with him. The same can apply to any other female that can a)marry any of the above males, and b)can class/reclass into a staff user.
- In The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Mipha is a Zora princess who has magical healing abilities. In a more downplayed and mundane sense, Princess Zelda is also shown tending to Link's wounds in an After-Action Patch-Up.
- The Princess Remedy games, Princess Remedy In a World of Hurt and Princess Remedy In A Heap Of Trouble feature the aptly-named, Princess Protagonist, Remedy.
- In Super Mario RPG, Princess Peach and Mallow, the princess of the Mushroom Kingdom and the prince of Nimbus Land respectively, are the only two party members to have a healing spell.
- Catie from BoxxyQuest: The Gathering Storm. She’s a queen, as well as the party’s main healer.
- Castle Crashers' King is the only character with access to the Heal spell.
- Chloe for the Kiseki/Trails of series, has a water-aligned Orbment, that has the best healing spells in the series and she is the princess of the kingdom of Liberl, and the next in line to the throne
Western Animation
- Queen Janna in The Lion Guard probably counts. There is a potion involved that goes on Ono’s eyes, but Janna is the Tree of Life’s healer until her death when Nirmala becomes lead healer. Janna also healed Azaad in the past. Kion’s was just more complex and better left to Nirmala since Janna was too weak to leave the tree cave.
- She-Ra: Princess of Power has healing abilities.
- Double Subverted in the animated adaptation of The Little Drummer Boy. The titular boy's lamb has died, and he brings it to the Three Wise Kings visiting Bethlehem, begging for them to heal it. The kings respond that they're only human and can't do anything to help, but luckily they're visiting THE king who's just been born and has the divine power to resurrect his lamb.
Real Life
- Ur-Example: The kings of France were said to be able to heal the sick (originally sufferers of scrofula, but sometimes other diseases as well) via Healing Hands followed by the sign of the cross. The practice ceased in the 18th century.
- Kings of England also claimed this. Samuel Johnson was touched for the King's Evil, or scrofula, by Queen Anne. It didn't work.
- Technically, the powers claimed by the King of England are those of the King of France. Kings of England claimed the title of the King of France until The French Revolution, shortly before the French did away with their king. As for the French kings, they were believed to have inherited this ability from their royal ancestor Louis IX, who was canonized by the Roman Catholic Church.note
- Queen Elizabeth I gained a lot of brownie points with her people for doing this. She was particularly praised for "pressing the sores of the sick, boldly and without disgust". Elizabeth wasn't just going through the motions as a public relations stunt either. She would pray for hours before a session to prepare herself spiritually and if she didn't feel inspired she would cancel the session.
- Considering that she was a survivor of smallpox and had the scars to prove it, it's not that surprising.
- King William III also did this, although he was massively skeptical. The procedure in his time involved the King saying "God grant you good health." William amended this to "God grant you good health—and better sense." (William was of course Dutch and a Presbyterian Reformed Protestant, skeptical of this sort of ceremony; a few decades later, George I, a German Lutheran Protestant, banned the practice outright for being "too Catholic.")
