Queen Mathilde of Belgium
Queen Mathilde of Belgium has arrived in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia for a four-day visit with representatives from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). She began her visit on Monday, 9 November. Queen Mathilde has been the Honorary President of Unicef Belgium since 2009, but she has been active for UNICEF for over 10 years, even before she became Queen.
During…
Spencer House
Tomorrow, on 11 November The Duke of Gloucester will attend a dinner as patron of the Heritage of London Trust in quite a special building, Spencer House.
Spencer House was built between 1756 and 1766 by John Spencer, 1st Earl Spencer. He initially employed…
Queen Elizabeth’s portrait removed from Canadian Foreign Affairs building
10th November 2015
Among fears that newly elected Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government may be trying to excise her images from Canada’s national life, a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II has been removed from a prime location at the Foreign Affairs building and replaced by twin…
Charlotte of Bourbon
The third Princess of Orange was Charlotte of Bourbon. She was born in 1546 or 1547 as the daughter of Louis, Duke of Montpensier and Jacqueline de Longwy, Countess of Bar-Sur-Seine. She was their fourth daughter and fifth child. Supposedly her father intended her for the church as well as some of her sisters, as he did not want to pay a dowry for all of them. She was taken…
The second Princess of Orange, and also William the Silent’s second wife, is probably the most scandalous of them all. She was born on 23 December 1544 in Dresden as the daughter of Maurice, Elector of Saxony and Agnes of Hesse. She would be their only surviving child…
Anna of Egmont was born around March 1533 as the daughter of Maximilian van Egmont and Françoise de Lannoy. She would turn out to be their only child and thus heiress to her father’s estates. Her father was an ally of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, and he was often…
Catherine Howard was born around 1520 as the daughter of Lord Edmund Howard and Joyce Culpeper, and through her father’s side of the family she was a first cousin of Henry VIII’s second wife Anne Boleyn. Though she was of aristocratic birth, her father was relatively impoverished, being the younger son of a Duke. Her mother died in 1528 and Catherine was sent to live in the household…
The Castle of Mey is perhaps best known as the holiday home of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, who purchased it in 1952 after the death of her husband King George VI. She restored it to its former glory, even giving it back its original name. She made regular visits to the…
From Ireland to Australia: How Queen Victoria’s statue travelled the world
21st October 2015
Not many statues have travelled such lengths as this statue of Queen Victoria. Queen Victoria herself visited Ireland in the year before her death. Ireland was still 16 years away from their independence and Victoria’s visit received mixed reactions. However, 52,000…
Archaeologists at Tower of London find ‘ritual protection’ to ward off evil
18th October 2015
The Tower of London is perhaps England’s best known and premier fortress and has been for almost a thousand years, but now evidence has been found that its inhabitants sometimes felt far from safe.
Recent research has been carried out by archaeologists from the Museum of London Archaeology in the residence of the Queen’s representative in The Queen’s House. Archaeologists have…
