Spain’s future queen comes of age today,
meaning she can carry out official duties and represent her father,
King Felipe, at official functions. This also means she would no
longer need a regent if her father were to die or abdicate the
throne. Let’s look at Leonor, Princess of Asturias, on her special
day. She was born on 31 October 2005 to the Prince and Princess of
Asturias…
Princess Leonor of Spain, heir to her
country’s throne, is about to come of age. The future queen turns
18 on October 31st 2023. On that day, Princess Leonor will swear
the Spanish Constitution before the Cortes Generales in Madrid.
After the swearing-in ceremony…
Hampton Court Palace is infamous as the
setting for the tragic stories of Henry VIII’s six wives, so it’s
no surprise that people have been reporting ghostly sightings there
for hundreds of years. Postcards with double-exposed photographs
supposedly depicting…
On May 7 1697, a fire broke out and
destroyed much of the old royal palace in Stockholm. The castle Tre
Kronor, or Three Crowns in English, is now only a footnote in
history with the present royal palace of Stockholm built above the
ruins of the old middle-aged castle that burned down over 320 years
ago. But why exactly did the castle burn to ashes so mysteriously
and suddenly? Tre Kronor…
Her Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress
of The Tower of London is steeped in history and has occupied a
major part in royal life since it was constructed by William the
Conqueror almost 1,000 years ago. The Tower has been the backdrop
to royal life, beheadings, scandals…
In the ancient world, many cultures
invoked different forms of magic to protect their dead from those
still in the physical world. In ancient Egypt, this included
placing a curse on the mummy. One of the most famous instances of
this was the curse placed on King…
You may think that all the Kings and
Queens of Great Britain are buried somewhere in our sceptre isle,
even if in the case of some efforts are still going on to work out
exactly where. In fact, two of our Kings and one of their wives at
buried at the Royal Abbey of Our Lady of Fontevraud, in Anjou,
France. They are Henry II, his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine and their
son Richard I. For this was in…
History has her down as the ultimate
survivor but the sad end to the story of Katherine Parr, sixth wife
of Henry VIII, is behind the tales of sightings of her ghost at the
last castle she called home. For the queen consort who avoided the
axeman is said to roam the…
She was a hugely popular queen who became
beloved in the country she made her own. But Elisabeth of Belgium
was also intrigued by the past of another nation and she ventured
to King Tut’s tomb and was fascinated with Egyptology. Queen
Elisabeth of Belgium was born…
The site of Christchurch Greyfriars, is a
strange, haunting place, redolent of history. It is now a ruined,
public garden and a popular place for Londoners to take their
sandwiches for lunch. Long gone is the atmosphere of bells and
prayer from the Middle Ages; although in an odd parallel to its
previous use as a church, it manages to be a place of peace in the
noise of the City and nearby Stock…
