As summer approaches, Queen Victoria is
the royal everyone is talking about. Even the descendant who
supplanted her as longest reigning monarch in British history has
been following in her famous footsteps in the past few days as the
woman who changed our concept of royalty forever takes centre stage
in one of the biggest royal exhibitions of the year. Even Victoria
herself might be amused.
King Henry VIII certainly took enough
mistresses in his day, but only one of the resulting children was
acknowledged: his beloved son, Henry FitzRoy, Duke of Richmond and
Somerset. He was born in June 1519, the son of Elizabeth “Bessie”
Blount and Henry VIII. Bessie…
This summer, Royal Central is taking a
look at who is who in the lines of succession around the world.
Today we are looking at the line of succession to the Norwegian
throne. Compared to many monarchies, the Norwegian order of
succession is relatively short and counts only…
The Queen has been named as one of the
most admired people in the world in a new poll. The YouGov research
also shows that Elizabeth II makes the top twenty most respected
women in every country where the survey took place. The overall
poll lists the top twenty most admired men and top twenty most
admired women and contains just one royal among all forty
candidates. The Queen is the fourth most…
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…
Throughout history, many royals have died
in brutal and bizarre ways. Royals have been killed in attacks, by
illnesses and by accidents. In 1889, a tragic incident happened
that ended up with not one, but two dead royals. Still to this day,
the event has not been clarified…
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. Before then, women were
excluded from the line of succession, which we’ll see impacts the
line with the addition of two…
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…
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 Frederick’s lifetime at least.
Metaphorically, she remains in his shadow. Unlike the husband she
revered, Elisabeth Christine…
