17 August 2011

Sweden: Crown Princess Victoria and Prince Daniel to become parents in March 2012

The Royal Court in Stockholm published earlier today, 17 August 2011, the following announcement:
Their Royal Highnesses The Crown Princess Victoria and Prince Daniel are happy to announce that The Crown Princess is expecting their first child.

The birth is expected to take place in March of 2012. No changes in the schedule of The Crown Princess's public engagements are planned during the fall of 2011.
In the Swedish version of the announcement we are also told that the Crown Princess is doing well.

Prince Daniel said to Aftonbladet today: - Vi är jättelyckliga och glada förstås, men vi tar en dag i taget. ("- We are very happy and pleased of course, but we take one day at a time.")

For some reason also the King of Norway, who is busy these days with the regatta H.M. Kongens Serieseilaser, was asked to comment the pregnancy news today (VG Nett): - Dette er kjempehyggelige nyheter! This is wonderful news! He declined to offer the Swedish couple some advice on the way, though.

The speculations about a name for the future heir has of course already started, and according to the betting company Unibet Gustav and Oscar are - as of now - in the lead among the male names, while Desireé seems to be the safest bet if the royal couple gets a girl. Betsson has Gustav on first place, while Oscar comes close behind. Personally I would love a future King Oscar! I haven't really thought so much about a girl's name yet, but can surely give some thoughts on it later on.

Crown Princess Victoria will, by the way, visit Norway on Sunday 21 August to attend the National Memorial Ceremony for 22 July 2011, which will take place in Oslo Spektrum. Together with her husband Prince Daniel she will return to Norway already on Thursday 25 August to attend the church service in Oslo Domkirke (Cathedral) on the occasion of the Norwegian Crown Prince couple's 10th anniversary.

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7 comments:

  1. I wonder why Oscar and Desiree are at the top? There has not been a King Oscar for over a century, so it is not the name of a close relative known to the Crown Princess. Also, why Desiree and not one of her other aunts' names? The connection with the first Bernadotte queen, I suppose?

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  2. I think your guesses are as good as mine. According to Statistiska centralbyrån (Statistics Sweden) Oscar topped the list for 2010. See http://www.scb.se/Pages/PressRelease____307093.aspx for more details. As of 31 December 2010 Desireé was not included among the 100 most popular names, cf. http://www.scb.se/Pages/TableAndChart____31057.aspx. It is a good and historical Bernadotte name, though - as you mention King Carl XIV Johan's wife was named Desireé.

    DTH

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  3. The Swedish media has a history of misspelling the name of the first Bernadotte queen, but her name - and that of the King's sister - is actually spelt Désirée, not Desireé (how would that be pronounced??).

    But officially her name from 1810 onwards was of course Desideria (like Joséphine became Josephina, Louise Lovisa etc), but it seems her official name was "eclipsed" in public usage by her original name during the 20th century - the decision of Prince Gustaf Adolf and Princess Sibylla to name their daughter Désirée and the success of the novel and film by that name were probably the main reasons for why people now tend to refer to Queen Desideria as "Queen Désirée".

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  4. Well, maybe I should write Desideria from now on, as I never remember where to place all the accents... A bit lazy not to check it out before posting, I guess. Yes, I know that Désirée (!) was called Desideria in Sweden, but generally I prefer the original spelling.

    DTH

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  5. She was not only called Desideria in Sweden, but also in Norway. Desideria was her royal name (after 1810), Désirée her name as a commoner, but it seems the latter replaced the former in the public consciousness in the course of the twentieth century, as I said probably because of Princess Désirée, the novel and the film. (There is by the way a guide at her dower house Rosersberg Palace who is named Désirée - I wonder if she got the job because of the name!)

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  6. Yes, I am sure King Carl Johan's consort was called Desideria in Norway as well, but that was not really relevant to the comment I made. The topic for this blog article was about Sweden after all.

    Another reason why "Désirée" has replaced Desideria in the public consciousness is perpaps because it has gradully become more common to use the actual name/birth name for a royal instead of a "translation" (although there are still exceptions to this "rule").

    That Desideria was used at the time the queen lived is of course a good reason to use that name, but I still prefer Désirée. If I can only get the accents right!

    DTH

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  7. Well, to me the words you chose ("Yes, I know that Désirée (!) was called Desideria in Sweden") gave the impression that you were under the impression that it was only in Sweden that the name Desideria was used, but obviously I misinterpreted that.

    Although it is correctly observed that it has "become more common to use the actual name/birth name for a royal instead of a 'translation'" (so that we write Charles II rather than Karl II in Norwegian) I would say that this is generally not the case when it comes to foreign-born queen consorts. The British still refer to Henrietta Maria rather than Henriette-Marie, the Swedes to Sophia (or Sofia) Magdalena rather than Sophie Magdalene etc.

    But what obviously complicates it in the case of the Bernadottes is that the royal-born queens - Joséphine of Leuchtenberg, Louise of the Netherlands and Sophie of Nassau - had their names translated into Josephina, Lovisa and Sophia in Swedish, but that we in Norway tended to use the more Norwegian versions Josephine, Louise and Sophie.

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