HistoryPalaces & Buildings

Caernarfon Castle - A History of Investitures

On Tuesday, 5 March, a special reception will be held at Buckingham Palace in honour of Prince Charles, who is this year celebrating 50 years as the Prince of Wales. Hosted by Her Majesty The Queen, the reception is expected to be attended by all of the senior members of the Royal Family and will be a celebration of Welsh organisations, businesses, charities and music. The investiture of Prince…
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Poetry and the Tsarina?

Included amongst the works read as a young woman by Princess Alix of Hesse, later Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna (1872-1918), were – according to letters that she wrote to her eldest sister, Victoria, Princess Louis of Battenberg – Guizot’s Reformation de la Litterature, the Life of Cromwell and Raumer’s nine-volume set, Geschichte der Hohenstaufen(Baroness Sophie Buxhoeveden…
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'My darling Auntie': Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna and Princess Louise

Amongst the extensive collection of letters left by Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll, the sixth daughter of Queen Victoria, are at least two from her niece, Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna (1872-1918). Two of Alexandra’s letters to her aunt were reproduced in the admirable book Darling Loosy, Letters to Princess Louise 1856-1939, ed. Elizabeth Longford (1991). I want to explore these letters and…
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The hunt is on for the powerbase of a Tudor legend

She wasn’t just the power behind the throne, she was the force that helped create the throne and now one of the grand houses she called home is in the sight of modern historians. Archaeologists have begun a hunt for the Northamptonshire residence of Margaret Beaufort, mother of King Henry VII and the woman who helped establish the Tudor dynasty. Lady Margaret, whose determination to put her…
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