Queen Elizabeth goes platinum, but who are the other longest-reigning monarchs?

Sunday February 6th 2022 marks Queen Elizabeth II's Platinum Jubilee.

A 70-year reign is unprecedented in British constitutional history, and only surpassed by three other monarchs.

Acceding to the throne upon the death of her father King George VI, the then 25 year old Princess Elizabeth inherited a realm still reeling from the effects of World War II.

Bomb-sites and trashed dwellings littered the towns of England while military posts, largely abandoned, could be found across rural areas, and some of these would be staffed once again in the coming years as infrastructure built up towards cold war readiness.

The year was 1952.

The Korean War had another 18 months to run, Winston Churchill was the incumbent PM (who would announce that Britain had an atomic bomb three weeks after the accession), Alan Turing had to undergo oestrogen treatment to avoid a prison sentence for admitting to a homosexual relationship, 'The Mousetrap' began it's record run, and Chilean-born striker George Robledo, became the first foreign player to score in an FA Cup final as Newcastle beat Arsenal 1-0.

During the course of her extraordinary reign, Queen Elizabeth has been served by 14 British Prime Ministers (you can see many of these relationships dramatised in The Crown) and over a hundred other Commonwealth leaders.

Politically, she has overseen the transformation from the British Empire to the Commonwealth as well as the process of decolonisation across the globe.

Professionally, she is patron of over 600 charities and organisations and has raised hundreds of millions for them.

Personally, she doesn't give her opinion on events but has had to weather a series of familial trials including her annus horribilis of 1992 (characterised by affairs