Royalty Digest Quarterly no 2, 2020

The latest issue of Royalty Digest Quarterly – no. 2, 2020 – has arrived, and as usual it provides plenty of quality reading. The cover is in green colour this time (what about yellow next, Mr. Editor!), and the photo is of King Alfonso XIII of Spain (1886–1941) together with his 6 surviving childen; Jaime, Maria Christina, Gonzalo, Alfonso, Beatriz and Juan. The latter was of course the father of King Juan Carlos and grandfather of the current king, Felipe VI.

Royal jewels is the topic of the first article of the present issue. The Leuchtenberg Jewels in Sweden is written by the Brazilian-born Claudia Thomé Witte, who appeared on Norwegian TV 12 days ago in a documentary on the royal jewels of Sweden. While royal jewels (tiaras etc.) are not exactly «my thing», there is no doubt that they represent important royal family history, and I admire experts like Ms. Witte who posess such a detailed knowledge. My daughter, who will turn 10 years old next month, took a great interest in the documentary, and even hushed me down when I dared to start talking. Who would have guessed that she would be interested in royal history ... It was a good article as well, although I miss a list of sources at the end.

Empress Elizabeth of Austria, Duchess in Bavaria (1837–1898), nicknamed «Sisi», still draws great interest, and there are no limits to how many different aspects of her life one can write about. In the article Imperial Bride in Vienna Elizabeth Jane Timm studies the wedding between Sisi and Emperor Franz Joseph in great deatail, including the whereabouts of her wedding dress.

The photo cover revals that the main article of this issue is the second part of The Royal House of Spain – A Family Album. A House Divided - the descendants of Carlos IV by Charlotte Zeepvat. The introduction takes the readers from King Fernando VII to King Felipe VI, and we are as usual treated by a large number of illustrations – 99 in all – the last is of King Felipe VI and his eldest daughter Leonor, Princess of Asturias. In addition there are four pages with genealogical tables.

The historian Datiu Salvia Ocaña, who resides in Barcelona, Spain, then completes the third and last part of his series The Six Stunning Infantas. The unexpexted fortune of the daughters of exiled King Miguel I of Portugal. The third part also includes notes, which also cover part I and II.

Who is the next one out in the series Little-Known Royals? Coryne Hall has this time written about Princess Maria of Italy (1914-2001), the youngest daughter of King Vittorio Emanuele III of Italy and his wife Queen Elena, née Princess of Montenegro. Princess Maria married in 1939 Prince Luigi (Louis) of Bourbon-Parma (1899–1967), the 22nd (!) child of Duke Roberto I and his 2nd wife Duchess Maria Antonia, née Princess of Portugal. They had four children. None of them made «dynastic marriages» and their children don't appear to have any titles according to An Online Gotha, but here I could be wrong. I am not talking about legal titles, of course, only titles by «a genealogical-historical definition».

And finally the column The World Wide Web of Royalty, bringing genealogical news from the European Imperial, Royal and Princely families. This time we get news from Bourbon-Parme, Greece (Brandram), Hesse, Luxembourg, Russia (Kulikovskaya), Stolberg-Roßla, Sweden (Nilert), Bourbon-Two Sicilies and Waldeck and Pyrmont.

Information about Royalty Digest Quarterly can be found at its editor's website Royalbooks.se. See earlier presentations of RDQ here. See also its Facebook page.

Royalty Digest Quarterly no. 3, 2018

I really enjoyed the latest issue of Royalty Digest Quarterly (no. 3, 2018). There were several articles about royals and royal families that I knew little about, so I felt I got full value this time, and I trust that other readers feel the same.

The five daughters of Heinrich XXII, Prince (Fürst) Reuss zu Greiz, adorn the front page this time, meaning that Charlotte Zeepvat has devoted her traditional Family Album to the House of Reuss zu Greiz. The daughters were Emma, Marie Agnes, Karoline, Hermine and Ida. The latter is surely the one in the middle, while I will not make a guess on the others. Hermine (1887–1947) is the most famous of the sisters, as she in 1922 married the exiled Emperor Wilhelm II. She was previously married to Prince Johann Georg of Schoenaich-Carolath (1873–1920) and had 5 children by him. Interestingly enough, a second cousin of Prince Johann Georg, Princess Karin-Elisabeth (1900–1966) married in 1933 the Norwegian banker Christoffer Blom Heimbeck (1885–1967). They were both members of the Norwegian nazi party Nasjonal Samling during WW2, but that is a story I will get into another time. Karin-Elisabeth and Christoffer's eldest daughter Ingrid (1934–2016) was in 2000 married to her second cousin Count Wolfgang von Schimmelmann (1921–2004). Of course none of this was mentioned in Zeepvat's article, I just get carried away here because of the Norwegian connections. There might be other family connections between Hermine Reuss zu Greiz and the Schoenaich-Carolaths which make the connection between her and Karin-Elisabeth closer than through her husband, but I haven't got the time to look into it right now. Two of Hermine's children were present at the Heimbeck wedding, I should add. But I cannot forget to mention that the said Reuss sisters had a brother, Prince Heinrich XXIV (1878–1927), who was the last (at least in name) reigning Prince (Fürst) of the small Reuss zu Greiz principality. According to Zeepvat, «the mental and physical disabilities he suffered as the result of a childhood accident made him incapable of reigning», and his regent was originally Heinrich XIV, Prince (Fürst) Reuss zu Schleiz (1832–1913). I gather that his son Heinrich XXVII (1858–1928) was the second regent.

Anyway, Zeepvat tells the story of the Reuss elder line and all the Heinrich princes (all the princes are named Heinrich followed by numerals which were supposed to go up to 100 before it would start all over with no. I again, it never did as the house died out with Heinrich XXIV mentioned above. In addition to the introduction to the Reuss zu Greiz family, the readers are treated with 43 illustrations of various family members and palaces, as well as two pages with genealogical tables. The first shows one (of surely many more) connection between Reuss zu Greiz and the Norwegian Royal Family.

But before we come as far as to the Family Album, Charlotte Zeepvat has also made another contribution, 'My Dear Miss Howard. Serving the Kaiser's family', which tells the story of Ethel Howard (1865–1931), who served as the governess of Emperor Wilhelm II and Empress Auguste Victoria's elder sons from 1895 to 1897, while from 1900 to 1908 she was in charge of the upbringing and education of five orphaned Japanese princes! She later published her memoirs (Potsdam Princes, 1916, and Japanese Memories, 1918, but the article is mainly based on a collection of her papers which have recently emerged on the collector's market.

Before the Reuss article starts, the readers have arrived at column The World Wide Web of Royalty, which usually is placed at the end of each issue, but this time appears quite early on. Anyway, the column this time gives us genealogical news from the imperial, royal or princely houses of Austria, Denmark, Bourbon-Parma, Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Saxony, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Solms-Laubach, Waldeck and Pyrmont and Thurn and Taxis.

Following the Reuss article, Michael L. Nash takes over with the article The Belle of the Coronation Ball. Emperor Alexander II had succeeded the year before, but because of the ending of the Crimean war, the coronation was delayed. The belle of the ball was Princess Ekaterina Dadiani (1816–1882), née Chavchavadze, who served as Regent of Mingrelia (Western Georgia) for some time. Not often we can read about the various monarchies and reigning families in Georgia, so this was an interesting encounter.

Queen Marie of Bavaria, née Princess of Prussia (1825–1889) had a life-long love of the mountains, of climbing and hiking, and Elizabeth Jane Timms takes us to Marie's retreat in Elbigenalp in the Austrian state of Tyrol.

It is not the first time that Royalty Digest Quarterly provides an article about the royal family of Montenegro, but I am confident that it is the first time that Jutta, née Duchess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (1880–1946) is portraited. The author is Marlene A. EIlers Koenig. Jutta was married to Prince Danilo of Montenegro in 1899 and took the name Militza following her conversion to Orthodoxy. WW1 and later Montenegro's incorporation into the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later Kingdom of Yugoslavia) forced Danilo and Militza into exile. They lived rather separate lives. Danilo died in Vienna in 1939. Militza lived in France and later in Italy, where her sister Elena was Queen, and died in Rome in 1946. Koenig mentions that Militza was buried at the Non-Catholic Cemetery for Foreigners in Testaccio, Rome, i.e. Il Cimitero Acattolico di Roma. I might not have paid enough attention to Militza's life in exile, as the information on her place of burial was new to me. I visited the cemtery around a year ago and thought I had prepared well for the visit! I can't find Jutta or Militza's name listed at the website at all. I photographed numerous graves of people of Norwegian or Scandinavian origin, including the last resting places of the historian Peter Andreas Munch (1810–1863), in addition to the grave of Prince Felix Youssoupoff (1856–1928), the grave of the poet John Keats (1795–1821) and many others. When you visit the cemetery, you are able to search for the names of all the people buried there, but as I didn't know of Militzia's grave, I never looked for it. Surely I must have passed the grave, but when looking at a photo of it tonight, I must say it was certainly not a headstone that would scream out for my attention. Well, well, it only means that I have to visit the cemetery again another time.

Speaking of royal graves, the Danish Ove Mogensen has for many years taken a great interest in this topic, and there is hardly a royal grave he hasn't been to. Well, not to the grave of Karin-Elisabeth Heimbeck, Princess of Schoenaich-Carolath, I am sure! But anyway, I just love his articles on royal graves, and his contribution Tombs, Graves and Monuments. Burial Places of the Bonaparte Dynasty [Part] I certainly didn't disappoint me. I look forward to reading the second part!

Coryne Hall then gets the honor of providing the last article of the present issue, Prince Ataulfo of Bourbon-Orleans (1913–1974) in the series Little-Known Royals. He certainly deserved the description little-known, and Hall gives a good survey of his miserable life. Ataulfo, his brothers and parents, Infante Alfonso, Duke of Galliera (1886–1975) and Beatrice of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1884–1866) are buried in the Capuchin convent in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Spain, yet another place I hope to visit one day.

Information on Royalty Digest Quarterly can be found at its editor's website Royalbooks.se. See earlier presentation of RDQ here. See also its Facebook page.  

Royal December Summary

This December month has been rather busy due to Christmas preparations and work load, and I have not been able to write about the various events as I had wanted to. Here is a summary of the events I wish to write about.

• 1 December 2017: The christening of Prince Gabriel, second son of Prince Carl Philip and Princess Sofia, took place in the Royal Chapel at Drottningholm Palace outside Stockholm. The christening was officiated by Archbishop emeritus Anders Wejryd, assisted by Bishop and Chief Court Chaplain Johan Dalman and Court Chaplain and Rector of the Royal Court Parish Michael Bjerkhagen. Normally the christening would have been officiated by Archbishop Antje Jackelén, but she had obligations abroad. Prince Gabriel's sponsors were Princess Madeleine, Sara Hellqvist (one of Princess Sofia's sisters), Oscar Kylberg (friend and business partner of Prince Carl Philip), Carolina Pihl (friend and business partner of Princess Sofia) and Thomas de Toledo Sommerlath (cousin of Prince Carl Philip). Guests attending the christening ceremony and the reception can be viewed here.
• 5 December 2017: In the case between Prince Louis of Luxembourg, Princess Tessy of Luxembourg and The Telegraph Media Group Ltd., the England and Wales High Court ruled that details of the former royal couple's financial matters as well as details of their divorce settlement were not allowed to be published. The explanatory note to the court decision said:  «1. The Applicant Husband and the Respondent wife are engaged in financial remedy proceedings before the High Court of England and Wales. Those proceedings are ongoing. 2. The purpose of this order is to seek to protect the confidentiality of the parties' financial arrangements and their negotiations within the context of their financial remedy proceedings, pending resolution of the same by agreement or determination of the court. 3. In the circumstances, the court has ordered that the matters set out at Paragraph 6 of this order shall not be published pending the conclusion of the financial remedy proceedings between the parties.» Prince Louis and Princess Tessy, who were married in 2006 and have two sons together, broke up in the summer of 2016 and a decree nisi was granted om 17 February 2017.
• 5 December 2017: King Michael died in his residence in Arbonne, Switzerland, 96 years old. King Michael was King of Romania twice, from 1927 to 1930 and again from 1940 until his abdication was forced upon him by the communist regime in late 1947 and he was forced into exile. He earned his people's respect and popularity especially for, when he felt his position was strong enough, launched a coup d'etat against the fascist dictator Ion Antonescu and brought Romania over to the allied countries. Then king was awarded the Legion of Merit in 1946. The citation can be read here. After the communist regime fell in 1989, the was on several occasions refused entry to his homeland, but in 1997 his citizenship was restored and he was allowed to visit Romania again. King Michael was married to Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parme (1923–2016) in Athens, Greece and had 5 daughters. I had the pleasure of meeting both King Michael and Queen Anne as well as their daughter Princess Margarita and her husband Radu Duda during their visit to Oslo in 1997. A man of principles, King Michael for a long time felt loyal to the last monarchist constitition of 1923, which stipulated agnatic succession and in case of the lack of a male heir, the succession would revert to the House of Hohenzollern. However, in 2007 King Michael changed his mind and signed a document named the Fundamental Rules of the Royal Family of Romania, by which he designated his eldest daughter Princess Margareta as his heir. No-one would doubt that Princess Margarita would be his heir if Romania had restored the monarchical form of government. The question many monarchists and royal watchers ask is if the king should personally decide on the order of succession and include and exclude members as he saw fit. Normally succession questions are a state affair, not the king's personal toy. The last ten years of his life was partly shadowed by scandals within his family, and his own handling of the succession question and treatment of his grandson Nicholas de Roumanie-Medforth-Mills has received critical comments. Concerning the fundamental rules, The Telegraph in its obituary wrote that «As Romania is now a republic with a president, the document has no legal standing.» That is of course correct as of now. However, the Parliament of Romania is currently considering to pass a law giving the royal family a special status and by which the fundamental rules would be acknowledged. In her declaration to the Romanian people Princess Margarita referred to herself as «Custodian of the Crown of Romania».
• 15 December 2017: The remains of Queen Elena of Italy (1873–1952) were brought from Montpellier, France to the family mausoleum at the Sanctuary of Vicoforte in northern Italy. Two days later the remains of her husband King Vittorio Emanuele III (b1869–r1900–1946–d1947) were transferred from Egypt. Parts of the royal family had wanted the former king to be buried in the Pantheon in Rome, but this was refused by the authorities.
• 16 December 2017: The funeral service for King Michael took place in Romania. The program can be read at the official website of the royal family. The list of representatives of reigning and former reigning royal families can be read here. The courts of Norway, the Netherlands, Denmark and Monaco did not send any representatives. Concerning Norway, the main reason for the absence of representation, other than that there has – as far as I understand it  – been little contact between the two families over the years, was that the king was to attend the consecration of Kari Veiteberg, the new Bishop of the bishopric of Oslo at 11 a.m. on Sunday 17 December, and he would not have made it back in time for that event if he had gone to Romania. The Crown Prince could of course have attended.
• 18 December 2017: According to the newspaper Romania Insider, «Romania’s governing parties ponder referendum on constitutional monarchy».
• 24 December 2017: The King and Queen of Norway celebrated Christmas at Kongsseteren («the Royal Lodge») in Oslo together with Princess Märtha Louise, Ari Behn and their daughters, while the Crown Prince family spent Christmas at Skaugum in Asker. Ari Behn, who is on good terms with his former in-laws after his marriage to Princess Märtha Louise broke down in 2016, commented in an interview earlier this month: «I am still part of the family». In an interview with TV2, Behn said: «This will be Christmas no. 2 in my new situation. Last year the children were with me, so this will be the first Christmas with the royal family after the divorce». On 5 August 2016 the Norwegian Royal Court announced that Princess Märtha Louise and Ari Behn were going to divorce. The court did not reveal when the formal separation took place. According to the Norwegian marriage act section 21, «Each of the spouses may demand a divorce when they have been separated for at least one year.» This would mean that the divorce was granted some time in 2017, but the royal court has not stated exactly when the royal marriage was finally dissolved.
• 25 December 2017: King Harald, Queen Sonja, Princess Märtha Louise and her two youngest daughters attended church service at Holmenkollen Chapel. The Crown Prince family attended the Christmas service in Asker Church the day before.

Updated on Thursday 28 December 2017 at 07.50 (I had for some reason forgotten to write King Vittorio Emanuele's numeral!).

Genealogen no. 1, 2013

Genealogen ("The Genealogist") is one of two genealogical journals published by Norsk Slektshistorisk Forening (The Norwegian Genealogical Societ, NSF) - the other being Norsk Slektshistorisk Tidsskrift (Journal of Norwegian Genealogy).

Genealogen is published twice a year, and the first issue of 2013 reached my mailbox last week. As I am a member of the editiorial committee, where I am first of all responsible for proofreading, the contents are not news to me. I might be a bit subjective, as I am also a board member of the NSF, but I would say the issue has many interesting articles to offer.

The front cover shows a wedding photo taken in 1890 by Heinrich Tønnies. The photo also appears in the article Bruden var i sort. Brudebilleder gennem 100 år - en lille guide ("The bride wore black. Bride photos through 100 years - a little guide") by Bente V. Larsen and Tommy P. Christensen. The article was earlier published by the Danish genealogical journal Slægten no. 46 (July 2012), and reappears here as part of an exchange deal with NSF's Danish sister organisation Sammenslutningen af Slægtshistoriske Foreninger - SSF.

Ronny Rismyhr Haugen and Trond Bækkevold have authored the article Er mitokondrielle DNA-tester nyttige i slektsgransking ("Are mitochondrial DNA tests useful in genealogical research?", which is based on an article published in Tjukke Slekta no. 2-3/2013, which I presented in March this year.

Torun Sørli has contributed with an article about the missionary Peder Hole (1875-1965) from Brandbu (today in Gran municipality, Oppland), who spent many years in China and was a prisoner of war in Japan, while Ronny Rismyhr Haugen reappears, this time with former chairman of the NSF, Lars Løberg, as author of the article Metodeproblem i norske bondeslekter. Med utgangspunkt i eidsvollmannen Ole Olsen Evenstads nærmeste forfedre ("Methodical problems in Norwegian farming families. With basis in the Eidsvoll man Ole Olsen Evenstad's closest ancestors"). Evenstad was one of 112 men assembled at Eidsvoll in 1814 to draft and sign the Constitution of Norway.

The Norwegian Genealogical Society plans to publish the ancestry of all the Eidsvoll men in connection with the Constitution's 200th anniversary in 2014, and the book project is presented in the issue, not for the first time, naturally.

I have also made a contribution to the journal, this time a presentation of the book Papal Genealogy. The Families and Descendants of the Popes (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2004. On 11 February 2013 Pope Benedict XVI announced that he was going to step down later the same month. The announcement coincided with a board meeting, where I suggested that the society should buy the said book for its library. The chairman, who also happens to be the editor of Genealogen, agreed on the condition that I wrote a presentation for the newsletter. I stress the word presentation and not book review, as medieval history certainly is not my speciality. The book's main source is the work Famiglie celibri italiane (or Famiglie celibri di Italia), which the Princeton University Library has presented here. The work by Pompeo Litta Biumi (1781-1852) deals with the history of the most prominent (and mainly noble) Italian families. Litta managed to cover 113 of the families before he died, and his work was continued by Federico Oderici, Count Luigi Passerini, Federico Stefani, Francesco de Mauro di Polvica and Costantino Coda. 150 families in all were covered, published in 19 volumes (Princeton University Library says 16) from 1819 to 1883.

December news summary

I have had another break from blogging, due to family events, Christmas preparations and genealogy work (read: The Norwegian Genealogical Society work). I will be very busy at work this and the next 2-3 weeks, but I still hope to post 2-3 more articles before the new year. There have been several news lately that I normally would have (or might have) covered, so I have decided to keep up the tradition by making a short summary:

1. Prince Sverre Magnus of Norway celebrated his 7th birthday on 3 December. He was born at Rikshospitalet (the National Hospital) at Gaustad, Oslo in 2005, and is third in line in succession to the Norwegian throne.
2. Princess Christina Mrs. Magnuson has become a grandmother for the first time after her youngest son Victor, b. 10 September 1980, and his partner  Frida Bergström, b. 18 February 1980, became parents to a boy on 11 December. The name is still not made known to the public.
3. 12 December 2012 marked the 100th anniversary of the birth of the Norwegian author and artist (and much, much more!) Thorbjørn Egner. The anniversary was celebrated all over the country with theatre performances and other arrangements. Norsk Slektshistorisk Forening - The Norwegian Genealogical Society - marked the occasion by publishing Egner's ancestry table at Slektshistoriewiki, the Norwegian genealogy wiki initiated by the said society. Hopefully the table will be expanded on later. The genealogy wiki is still in the starting phase (it was launched in the latter half of September 2012), but it is great fun to be involved. You can read more about the Egner anniversary at the website of the National Library (in Norwegian).
4. The Grand-Ducal Court of Luxembourg announced on 13 December the engagement between Prince Félix, the second son of Grand Duke Henri and Grand Duchess Maria Teresa, and Claire Lademacher, daughter of  Hartmut and Gabriele Lademacher. Claire was born at Filderstadt, Germany on 21 March 1985 and grew up in Usingen where her parents still reside. She is currently living in Rome, Italy where she is working on her PhD on the ethical aspects of organ donation consent. Claire's CV can be read here, while an article on the engagement by Wort.lu can be read here. Does anyone know the maiden name of Gabriele Lademacher, by the way? Any more details on Claire's ancestry at all?
5. Over in the United Kingdom on the same day, the bill to change the British succession law, the Succession to the Crown Bill, was finally introduced and had its first reading in the House of Commons. The explanatory notes can be read here. The bill aims among others to "make the succession  to the Crown not depend on gender" and the disqualification arising from marriage to a Roman Catholic will be removed. This means among others that several people who so far have ben excluded from the line of succession due to being married to a Roman Catholic will have their rights returned, including the late Princess Ragnhild Mrs. Lorentzen's daughter Ragnhild, b. 1968, who in 2003 married Aaron Long, an Irish-American Catholic. And this again means that the line of succession will be expanded rather than limited, which many have favoured. I can't really see the point of such a long line of succession, even if it is only of academic interest, and wonder if wouldn't have been better if the succession was limited to the descendants of King George V (or even King George VI or Queen Elizabeth II).
6. Prince Aimone of Savoy and Princess Olga of Savoy, née Princess of Greece, became parents to a daughter, Isabella, on 15 December (cf. Monarchia.it and Nobiliana.de). Prince Aimone, Duke of Apulia is the son of the Duke of Aosta, one of two pretenders to the extinct Italian throne. The Duke and Duchess of Apulia also have the sons Umberto, Prince of Piedmont, b. 2009, and Amadeo, Duke of the Abruzzi, born in 2011.
7. On the evening of 15 December, HRH Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway received the Golden Heart award in Berlin in recognition of her work on behalf of children and young people. Her speech (in German) can be read here.
8. The Norwegian daily Aftenposten published on 17 December an interview with Harald Hallberg, whose book Norske dekorasjoner ("Norwegian decorations") was recently released by Dreyer Bok. The book is said to be the first of its kind to give a complete survey of all the Norwegian decorations (orders and medals), and names among others all the recipients - 19.339 so far - of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav. The price is set at NOK 399, the book has 463 pages with illustrations, while the ISBN is 978-82-93193-17-3.

Updated on Wednesday 19 December 2012 at 08:55 (minor language correction).

Prince Carlos Hugo, Duke of Parma: Obituary in The Daily Telegraph

Prince Carlos Hugo, Duke of Parma, died in Barcelona on 18 August 2010. The Daily Telegraph published his obituary today, 25 August 2010.

The funeral service and interment will take place in the Sanctuary of Santa Maria della Steccata in Parma on Saturday 28 August 2010.