Hair works like a symbolic thread
throughout a person’s life history. For Queen Victoria, this was no
exception. Indeed, for a royal personage, hair plays a massive part
in ceremonial display and formal dressing as well as private
ritual. The role of royal hairdresser is also one that enables
exceptional intimacy, thereby an indication of great privilege.
Today we can visit Queen Victoria’s…
Today we’re looking at the Luxembourgish
line of succession, which has seen some changes to its rules since
current Grand Duke Henri ascended to the throne. Luxembourg now
practices absolute primogeniture, which Grand Duke Henri
established in 2011 to apply to his heirs.
For Queen Victoria, the number fourteen
held a terrible power. This date, the ‘14th’, could seem to haunt
the Queen like the shadow of death. Much as she later tried to
reclaim it as a sacred date, she beheld it with an almost mystical
sense of dark fascination and…
We’ve just had another royal silver
wedding anniversary although the couple involved is so discreet,
it’s perhaps not a surprise that it’s passed pretty much under the
radar. Lady Sarah Chatto, niece of the Queen, celebrated twenty
five years of marriage with husband, Daniel, on July 14th 2019. And
that gives us a great excuse to take another look at her wedding
dress. For this…
In Berlin, there is a missing queen. Her
burial place in the historic Hohenzollerngruft [Hohenzollern vault]
in Berlin Cathedral is disputed and may be lost. Elisabeth
Christine, Frederick II’s (‘the Great’) unloved queen was a victim
of historical banishment, in…
This summer, Royal Central is taking a
look at the lines of succession across Europe and this latest
installment looks at the first twenty with a claim on the British
throne. Elizabeth II has achieved much in her long reign and from a
dynastic point of view she has…
Today we’re looking at the history of the
Palace of Zarzuela, which is the home of King Felipe, his wife,
Queen Letizia, and their two daughters, Princess Leonor and Infanta
Sofía; as well as King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofía. Construction
began on Zarzuela Palace back in the 1600s, though the then-King
Felipe IV meant for it to function as a hunting lodge or country
palace instead of an…
It’s set to be a right royal turnout at
Wimbledon this weekend as the famous tennis tournament comes to a
close. Leading the way will be the Duke of Kent who is President of
the All England Club and whose presence at the finals is a long
standing royal commitment. But…
In 1888, a year whose numbering Queen
Victoria thought odd (‘Never can it be written again!’), her
daughter, the Princess Royal and Crown Princess of Prussia, had
become German Empress, prompting the proud words from her mother:
‘My OWN dear Empress Victoria… may God…
Frederick II, accorded the epithet ‘the
Great’ already during his own lifetime, had in fact, a whole other
life after death, aside from his legacy. The great King’s legend
stalks the eighteenth century like a gigantic historic shadow, much
as the oversize silhouette of him prowls the terrace at his beloved
refuge of Sanssouci, the palace he built for himself at Potsdam, as
portrayed by the…
