Edward was the eldest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. He married Princess Alexandra of Denmark in 1863. The German Emperor Wilhelm II and the Russian Tsar Nicholas II were nephews of his. He was a notorious socialiser and womaniser, and was considered a worldwide trend-setter of men's clothing fashions.

At Victoria's death, his official title on acceding to the throne was King of the United Kingdom, Emperor of India, and King of the British Dominions. He supported the modernization of the British army, and also the reform of the British navy in the face of the German naval build-up. In 1903, he visited France and was instrumental in creating the Anglo-French Entente Cordiale as a counterbalancing force to Austria-Germany. He also made overtures to the Russian Foreign Minister Alexander Izvolsky which resulted in the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907 and a visit to Russia in 1908.

Schenker and Edward VII

Germany saw Edward VII as the prime architect of the "encirclement" of Germany, and Schenker referred to this in "The Mission of German Genius": "[...] long premeditated maneuverings of the enemy nations, such as King Edward VII's encirclement of Germany [...]" (Der Tonwille Heft I (1921), 9). In an article entitled "German Genius in Battle and Victory," submitted to the Frankfurter Zeitung in September 1914 but rejected, Schenker alluded to Edward's life-style in the remark: "King Edward VII, who, in his lifetime as he still 'traveled' in fraternities, toasts, and waistcoats, was prematurely prized as a genius but is nowadays, with the bankruptcy of his work, finally unmasked as devoid of talent."

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