Abdicate

To abdicate means to resign, but it’s something only a king or a queen can do. When any king, queen, or other monarch decides to resign, it’s said that they abdicate. It has its own word because usually monarchs rule for life. The end of their reign is their own death. But when someone doesn’t want to be king or queen, they can abdicate, and let another family member accede to the throne—or become king or queen. King Juan Carlos I of Spain abdicated in 2014. Famously, King Edward VIII of England abdicated in 1936, just at the beginning of World War II.